CC 2006 02 27
CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL
REGULAR MEETING
FEBRUARY 27, 2006
Mayor Furlong called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. The meeting was opened with the
Pledge to the Flag.
COUNCIL MEMBERS PRESENT:
Mayor Furlong, Councilman Lundquist, Councilwoman
Tjornhom and Councilman Peterson
COUNCIL MEMBERS ABSENT:
Councilman Labatt
STAFF PRESENT:
Todd Gerhardt, Elliott Knetsch, Justin Miller, Paul Oehme and Kate
Aanenson
PUBLIC PRESENT FOR ALL ITEMS:
Janet D. Paulsen 7305 Laredo Drive
Debbie Lloyd 7302 Laredo Drive
Jon Agrimson 12397 Jack Pine Trail
Kari Nettesheim 9151 Great Plains Boulevard
Jerry McDonald Planning Commission
David Jansen Chanhassen Villager
PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Mayor Furlong: Thank you and good evening to everyone here with us in the council chambers,
as well as those watching at home. We’re glad you joined us. At this time I’d like to make an
announcement regarding our agenda as well as add an item to it, then open it up to the council to
add additional items or modify it. First of all, just for point of clarification, if there are people
here this evening for the Halla Greens matter, that has been pulled off tonight. We will not be
discussing that this evening. We expect that to return at our next meeting, our first meeting in
March. So if there are people here for that, we will not be discussing that this evening. Also
based upon our work session, the item under work session C, which is the discussion related to
the motor vehicles sales tax constitutional amendment. We will be adding that as item 1(m) this
evening on our consent agenda. So at this point I would ask if there’s any other modifications or
changes related to the agenda. If not, with that addition we will proceed. At this point I would
like to consider the consent agenda.
CONSENT AGENDA: Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Lundquist 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 February 13, 2006
-City Council Verbatim & Summary Minutes dated February 13, 2006
City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Receive Commission Minutes:
-Planning Commission Verbatim & Summary Minutes
Resolution #2006-14:
b. 2005 MUSA Expansion, Bid Package #2, Project 06-05: Receive
Feasibility Study, Call for Public Hearing.
Resolution #2006-15:
c. TH 101 Corridor Scoping and Environmental Screening from
Lyman Boulevard South to Scott County Line, PW067F4: Approval of Consultant
Contract.
Resolution #2006-16:
e. Lift Station No. 27, PW055AA: Approve Quotes for Upgrade
Improvements.
f. Minnetonka Middle School West: Approval of Request for an Interim Use Permit to Allow
Over 1,000 Cubic Yards of Grading, 6421 Hazeltine Boulevard, (Highway 41).
g. Approval of Appointments to Slow-No Wake Task Force for Lake Susan.
h. Approval of Agreement with Plowshares for Regional Storm Water Ponding.
i. Public Surplus Auction Web Services: Approval of Joint Powers Agreement with the City
of St. Paul.
j. Sand Companies: Approval of Loan Agreement for Local Housing Incentive Account
Grant Award.
k. Surface Water Management Plan Update: Approval of Contract Change Order.
l. Approval of Ordinance Renaming Hemlock Lane.
Resolution #2006-17:
m. Resolution of Support for Dedication of 100% of Motor Vehicle
Sales Tax (MVST) to Transportation and Transit Purposes.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 4 to 0.
VISITOR PRESENTATIONS:
PRESENTATION OF LOCAL HOUSING INCENTIVE GRANT; JULIUS SMITH,
METROPOLITAN COUNCIL.
Mayor Furlong: This evening I would like to welcome our representative to Metropolitan
Council, Jules Smith who’s here this evening and would like to make a presentation to the
council.
Jules Smith: Mr. Mayor and council members, it’s my pleasure tonight to advance to the City of
Chanhassen the $300,000 to help facilitate development of a 3 story, 48 unit building to provide
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
for lower cost housing in the community. Very pleased to do that. I realize that this money is
primarily, this is part of the Livable Communities Act of the Metropolitan Council and this
project was selected upon many, many that were offered. I realize that this actually is a pass
through but it’s, it does help the City achieve some of their modest cost housing units, so I’m
very pleased to present this to the City. Good to see you.
Todd Gerhardt: You too. I’ll come down any time.
Mayor Furlong: Why don’t we step up here if we can.
Jules Smith: I’d just like to take one second and introduce the sector representative of Met
Council for Carver County, Jim Hutley who’s out here tonight and knows Kate. Well I’m not
sure…You didn’t chop off my head did you?
Mayor Furlong: One of the items, just to be clear, with regard I think in the staff’s
recommendation, I think at this point I would entertain a motion officially on behalf of the City
to officially accept the grant. Is there such a motion?
Councilman Peterson: So moved.
Councilman Lundquist: Second.
Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Lundquist seconded to accept the donation from
Metropolitan Council for Local Housing Incentive Grant. All voted in favor and the
motion carried unanimously with a vote of 4 to 0.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Appreciate the work that everybody did so that that grant could
occur and we could increase some affordable units here in our city. We are still within visitor
presentations of our agenda so at this point I would welcome any resident or guest at this point
that would like to come forward and address the council on a matter to please do so. Come to
the podium. State your name and address. Okay. Very good. Seeing none, we’ll move on now
to the next items on our agenda.
LAW ENFORCEMENT/FIRE DEPARTMENT UPDATE.
Sgt. Jim Olson: Thank you and good evening. Before you for this month I have the sheriff’s
office area report for the month of January. I have the citation list for the month of January.
Crime alerts that were issued by Chanhassen Crime Prevention Specialist Beth Hoiseth and also
Community Service Officer reports. As you probably noticed the format of our monthly reports
have changed. There were some discrepancies however in comparisons to last year and they
pulled that out of this report. I hope they have that back in for the next report that we present
you with. What you see on the first page is number of crimes. What we’ve had in the past is
calls for service, and I think it’s very important for the City Council to have a handle on the
number of crimes that are occurring in the city as well as the calls for service that are code. The
difference between those two, we might get a call, a call for service to a burglary that’s occurring
at a residence and once we get to that, and we respond to that like it’s a burglary. Once we get
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there we realize it’s actually not a burglary. Maybe it’s a son that’s coming home late at night.
The neighbor calls it in and doesn’t realize that it’s the son calling it in. That comes across as a
call for service. However, that’s not an actual crime that occurred. I think it’s important again
for the City Council to have both of those numbers as far as number of crimes and the calls for
service, so what is before you on the first page of the report are the actual crimes. And those are
the part one crimes and part two crimes that occur, and these are the numbers that we send in to
the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension that gets logged into the uniform crime reports that the
BCA puts out. The second page is more the non-criminal calls that come in, and sometimes
what used to be on the criminal calls for service are now going onto this page, so that is the
difference that we’re doing. Any questions at all in the change in the format? Again next month
I hope to have the comparisons to last year that will be on there. I apologize that it’s not on
there. The one that I did want to point out was the burglaries. They’re a little bit high for the
month of January. There was some stores and strip malls that were broken into in the middle of
the month and I talked about that actually in the January council meeting, and we have not had
any break-in’s to strip malls or stores in strip malls since then. Crime Prevention Officer Beth
Hoiseth did put out a crime alert at that time that went out to the businesses with information on
how to minimize their chances of being broken into, and also how to minimize their loss if they
do get broken into. So there was a crime alert and that is included in your packet. That was put
out. The theft and the property damage were both pretty comparable to what we had last year
and there weren’t anything else. There wasn’t anything else that really stood out to me
compared to last year in that. I also wanted to point out that warmer is coming and with the
warmer weather sometimes speeds kind of increase with people, and I would encourage parents
to talk to the new drivers about driving through neighborhoods. The deputies will be in the
neighborhoods monitoring traffic. It’s important for people to slow down going through
neighborhoods. We’re going to have a lot more people that will be on the streets and kids
walking home from school sometimes instead of taking the buses so a lot more traffic on the
streets, so just keep that in mind when you’re driving through these neighborhoods. I also, I read
a report today that I think residents need to hear about and need to know. And the report did not
come from the City of Chanhassen but it did come from the metro area. A woman in the metro
was renting a house, or she was renting a house out I should say. She had an ad in the paper
about renting her house out, and somebody from out of the country exchanged e-mails with her
about interest in renting this house out and they ended up sending her a money order to rent the
house and said that they’d be in I think a couple of months to come in to move into the house,
and it was a rather substantial amount of money that the money order was for. A couple days
later the renter contacted the homeowner and said that he had had a tragedy in his family and
needed the money back in order to pay for funeral expenses. The homeowner checked with her
bank and they said the money order was good, so she had a money order made out and sent it
overseas to the perspective renter. She found out a few days later however that the money order
was not good, and she was out the substantial amount of money. I have seen some reports of this
coming through, not only just metro area but also nationwide with some money order scams
going on with some countries overseas. People need to be very cautious with that as far as if
somebody gives them a money order and wants money back from that, I would not do that for a
while anyway, until you’re sure that that money order has cleared. We’re also continuing to see
a large number of thefts by, you know check forgery, credit card thefts, identity thefts, so on and
so forth. I would encourage residents to buy a paper shredder and any paperwork that has any
kind of account numbers on it, you know whether it be from credit cards. Whether it be from,
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
you know it’s got your check routing number and account number on it, anything that’s got
account numbers on it, to shred that. This time of year is also tax time, and sometimes people
will do a few different tax forms and make a mistake and go on and they throw those in the
garbage and start over again. Remember that those tax forms have your social security number
on it and some other information that you probably do not want anybody to get a hold of, so
make sure you shred those. There are people that are actually going through garbage looking for
account numbers. And garbage is, they can do that. There isn’t anything illegal about that so
make sure you shred your account numbers. I also wanted to compliment two of our deputies.
Keith Walgrave and Ryan Steele. Last Friday we had a fire that occurred in the city of
Chanhassen that was a rather large fire. Keith and Ryan went running into a burning house
where a frantic homeowner was trying to rescue some property. They went above and beyond
the call the duty to help this homeowner. They actually went in not only once but twice run in to
this burning house to help this gentleman, and we have, both Ryan and Keith have been
nominated for an award for their, for what they did with that and they did a wonderful job so.
Any questions for the sheriff’s office at all?
Mayor Furlong: Thank you, questions for the Sergeant? At this time. No? Very good, thank
you.
Sgt. Jim Olson: Thank you. Have a nice evening.
Mayor Furlong: Appreciate the report. With us this evening from the fire department I see we
have two assistant chiefs here. Assistant Chief Wahl and Walsh, good evening.
Assistant Chief Walsh: Our fearless leader is out of town so we’re here to represent Chief Geske
tonight.
Mayor Furlong: Great, thank you.
Assistant Chief Walsh: It’s been a very busy month for the fire department. I know that Greg
submitted his monthly update. He put in there, as of the date of the update there were no
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structure fires, and I’d like to take that back. Wednesday, February 8 was a mutual aid call to
Excelsior fire department for a new construction home that was a total loss, approximately 4
hour, 5 hour call for our members. We had a piece of property located on Audubon Road that
we were able to do a very good training with, and we burned in those two Saturdays as well as
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one Monday night, and so to give you a little chronological event here. Saturday, February 11
in the morning we spent about 6 hours training in one of the homes and then ended up burning
that down. We were home by about 1:00 in the afternoon after clean-up, and that evening, about
8:00 Excelsior had another structure fire which was at Highway 7 and 41, behind Cub Foods.
Fully involved structure fire that turned out to be a 9 hour call for our members. Monday then,
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the 13, two days later we conducted another hot live training down at the Audubon site, and
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then that following Wednesday evening, the 15 we helped Eden Prairie with a structure fire. It
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was approximately a 5 hour call. And then on Saturday the 18 we conducted our last practice
burn down at the Audubon site, and burned that last home down. That was also the coldest
weekend of the year. We all had several layers on, and we also responded to 4 water alarms.
One of them being at the AmericInn that sustained extensive damage to their lobby area, and
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
another in an insurance company located off of Century Boulevard that also had extensive
damage. The other two were residential. And then Jim took our thunder but we had our own
rd
structure fire then on Thursday, the 23 of February and that was located on Lotus Trail. It was
about 1:00. I was working but Randy responded to that. As far as our membership, we have lost
a total of 3 members over the last 4 weeks. One of them less than 5 years of membership and
one with 6 years. And then we have also lost one probationary member. And then one note to
the changes in our officer structure. We have, are beginning to transition Greg Hayes into our
training position and Ed Coppersmith will be transitioning out of that as part of his
responsibilities. Any questions for the fire department?
Mayor Furlong: Are you done with your practice burns?
Assistant Chief Walsh: We are.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Alright. So things should calm down a little bit.
Assistant Chief Walsh: I hope so, yeah.
Mayor Furlong: Not to make light of that but obviously there’s been a lot of time spent and we
appreciate everybody’s effort. I know that’s, it’s dedication on the fire fighter’s part but it’s also
an interruption to family time and work time as well so we appreciate that.
Assistant Chief Walsh: Thank you.
Mayor Furlong: And I, from every report I heard, the structure fire last Thursday was a major
one that everybody responded well and professionally and did the best they could so we thank
you for that. Anything more on that that you want to share with us tonight?
Randy Wahl: No, actually everything went pretty well. I want to also thank the sheriff’s office
for getting everything prepped and ready to go for us by the time we had come up in there.
Pretty much everything went like clock work other than the fact that we were working on some
narrow streets and it gets a little tight in those areas so can’t always do what you want to do so,
but everything worked out pretty good over there.
Mayor Furlong: Good, but we never want to hear those events occurring but we’re glad you’re
there to deal with them when they do, so thank you.
Todd Gerhardt: Sherry or Randy, could you tell, what was our response time to the Lotus Lake
fire and how long were we at the scene? Do you know those numbers?
Randy Wahl: Response time, not exactly sure on that other than Dale, I would have to say, the
Battalion Chief was initially on the scene within 4 minutes. First in engine probably comes in
around 6 to 7 minutes after that. Once we had established a right-of-way into the area,
everything went pretty good there. As far as on scene, we were probably 1:00 til 8:00 by the
time we had actually left there. There was some extensive overhaul in making sure that we had
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no rekindle and going through and making sure everything was okay. I think the initial knock
down probably a couple hours.
Todd Gerhardt: I know that the insurance company was out there today and recommended that
the house be taken down to it’s original foundation. That it not be reconstructed or rafters
replaced. That it come down to the original foundation and rebuilt from there. That’s the intent
of the homeowner.
Randy Wahl: Yeah, there was also some accolades I guess from the insurance company in that
the fire ground preservation was well intact so they were able to make cause determination from
that.
Todd Gerhardt: And cause again was wood burning stove is what I was told.
Mayor Furlong: Very good. Any other questions for the fire department? Thank you for
everything.
Assistant Chief Walsh: Thank you.
ND
PINEHURST 2 ADDITION, LOCATED AT PINEHURST & GALPIN BOULEVARD,
APPLICANT: LENNAR CORPORATION (LUNDGREN BROS. CONSTRUCTION),
PLANNING CASE 06-03:
A. PUBLIC HEARING ON VACATION OF DRAINAGE & UTILITY EASEMENTS
LOCATED AT PINEHURST DRIVE AND GALPIN BOULEVARD.
B. REQUEST FOR PRELIMINARY & FINAL PLAT APPROVAL TO SUBDIVIDE 28
ACRES WITH VARIANCES.
C. APPROVE FIRST AMENDMENT TO PINEHURST DEVELOPMENT
CONTRACT.
Kate Aanenson: Thank you Mayor, as I was going to state, there is 3 action items for you
tonight. The one action item requires the public hearing. Otherwise this item would actually be
on consent. This project was actually recently approved a little over a year ago. The Pinehurst
development. It included 2 lots. As you know when subdivisions come in we request that they
demonstrate the home size. At that time it looked like the homes, the biggest one would be 72
feet in width, at our 10 foot side yard requirements use little bit bigger lots because our normal is
90. The home site actually went up and with that the staff was reluctant to grant variances, so it
resulted in a replat. Not all the lots got replatted but if you can just follow me I’ll point to one lot
was lost up in the northern area, and then one lot was also lost, there was 2 lots that were
removed from the project. So it went from what was originally approved at 43 down to 41 lots.
With that, utility lines have to follow property lines so that’s the public hearing tonight is to
vacate the old utility lines and to have those put in their place. So with that, unless there’s
specific questions, it’s all the grading, utility work, that stuff is pretty much, there is some clean-
up with the site, with the plat except for the 2 lots being removed. It’s pretty similar looking to
what was originally approved. So with that I’d be happy to answer any questions. Otherwise I
would just have you follow as on your agenda, the 3 items for a motion.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Mayor Furlong: Alright, thank you. Do you want questions on any of the 3 items at this point?
Kate Aanenson: Sure.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Are there any questions for staff? The one I have is with regard to
impervious surface coverage, as we’re looking at.
Kate Aanenson: Yes, actually we did ask the applicant to look at that because that was one of
our issues. We did, they submitted for us a summary. We do have one model that’s up on the
project already, on the site and so if you look at their standard home size, which is about 74 by
45, add in a 900 square feet for the driveway, we’re just around 4,000. So we should be well
within that impervious for that homeowner an opportunity to put decks or some other features
that they want. So the impervious surface would be, meet the requirement of the 25% so there is
room within that.
Mayor Furlong: And that’s the question, that they’re not maxing it out with the actual
construction?
Kate Aanenson: No, and we looked at that too, which is one of the reasons why we didn’t want
to go to a variance because we just felt like that the homeowner is being…that they can’t make
changes too, and we find that comes back to the City as a rub and that was the developer. So
yes, there is enough room for them at a future date to do additions or make modifications.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, and work out across the entire subdivision?
Kate Aanenson: Correct. What I gave you for those dimensions would actually be at the 4,000
and 500’s actually some of the smaller lots so, it should work alright.
Mayor Furlong: Alright, very good thank you. Any other questions for staff at this time? If not,
the public hearing as I understand it relates to the issue of vacating utility easements that were
with the original plat and since some of the lot lines have been redrawn, they need to be vacated
that were there and then new ones would be established…
Kate Aanenson: Correct, and that was when you approved the new plat, those are, with the new
plat which would be item (c).
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. So at this point I would open the public hearing with regard
to the discussion and invite interested parties to come forward and discuss, represent their
opinions with regard to the vacation of the drainage and utility easements. Seeing nobody, we’ll
close that public hearing and move on. Is there any discussion on any of the other items, (b) or
(c) here as well? Any discussion on the first item? If not, is there any reason that we can’t deal
with all 3 of these in a single motion?
Kate Aanenson: Right, you can make one motion.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Mayor Furlong: Okay. We can make one motion based upon staff’s recommendation in the
reports. Do I hear such a motion?
Councilman Peterson: Mr. Mayor, I would make that motion that the City Council approve all
the recommendations supported by staff this evening.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Is there a second?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Second.
Mayor Furlong: Made and seconded. Any discussion on that motion? Hearing none, we’ll
proceed with the vote.
Councilman Peterson moved, Councilwoman Tjornhom seconded to approve the following:
a. Resolution #2006-18: Vacation of Drainage and Utility Easements for Pinehurst,
Vacation #06-07.
nd
b. Preliminary and Final Plat for Pinehurst 2 Addition, Planning Case 06-07.
c. First Amendment to Pinehurst Development Contract, Project No. 05-03.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 4 to 0.
DAVE BANGASSER, 3633 SOUTH CEDAR DRIVE: REQUEST FOR A HARD
SURFACE COVERAGE AND TWO FRONT YARD SETBACK VARIANCES TO
CONSTRUCT A 3 STALL GARAGE.
Kate Aanenson: Thank you. The subject site is located out at Red Cedar Point. It is actually
two lots. This is where the actual variance is on, where the existing garage is and I’ll show you
that in a second. There is existing home on the site and existing single car garage on the north
property. The applicant is requesting to receive a variance to add a 3 car garage. The variance
involves a front and rear yard setback for the garage, as well as the impervious surface, hard
cover. Can you zoom in on that just a little bit Nann? Thank you. So the existing lot with the
house on it, I’ve got the hard surface shown in yellow on this. The gravel driveway in the front,
which provides access to the existing dwelling and the garage. The Planning Commission held a
th
public hearing on this on February 7 and recommended, or voted for a 3-3 tie, which is why it’s
before you tonight. It didn’t have a super majority vote. One of the things that the Planning
Commission did ask for was some of the surrounding impervious surface coverage in the area,
and that was at 29%. This would be at 31%. In looking at the 3 car garage, staff looked at the
existing situation regarding the driveway. Could some more hard surface coverage be removed?
We also recommended that the lot be combined. I know there was that question regarding
whether or not you could combine two lots when the street goes through. You can under the
City’s code. Under lot, definition of zoning lot you can combine lots and we have no
requirements of how that would happen. We have other circumstances in the city of why we
would do that. Have it under one ownership so you can sell them off and try to allow somebody,
if this was in a separate, it’s a lot of record and there is some legal standing for someone should
ever get a permit on there. So one of the conditions that you can apply when someone asks for
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
variances, things to mitigate that impact and certainly having them under one ownership would
be more of the idea would be one thing that we feel would be better than someone else trying to
come in and maximizing that lot. So in discussing and looking at this itself and looking at some
of the surrounding properties, there is a wide range of lot sizes. If you were to go back, and I
know the applicant’s concerned. This is a narrower lot with the existing home. There’s a wide
range of some homes have garages on the lot. Some have homes, garages across the street, so
some have 3. Some have 4. And again in this circumstance, going back to what we have for,
there is parking convenient. While it’s not covered, to the property in itself, and looking at the
hard surface coverage, as outlined in your staff report at the tying the two together. The 31%,
they felt that that’s exceeding, or it’s on the higher end so we recommended against the second
stall, or the third stall and just recommended the two. And the Planning Commission struggled
with that too, so with that we did put the findings in there. There are, there is a motion for the
alternative in your staff report. If you were to approve it. But we believe again that’s reasonable
use with the 2 car garage. So with that I’d be happy to answer any questions.
Mayor Furlong: Questions for staff? Ms. Aanenson, a question for you. The issue of combining
the two lots is something that I think you said we’ve done before and in fact I think in this
particular area that occurs too where there are individual parcels that public roads cross.
Kate Aanenson: That’s correct. It is defined in the code. You could have, and we have in the
city 3 or 4 different lots under separate, that are under one ownership, so it’s the lots that are
under one ownership combining them. And the purpose of that is if someone doesn’t, if it’s a lot
of record, it has certain legal rights to it and if someone wants to sell it, they may try to come in
and try to maximize the building and the circumstance. Building…accessory structure. As it sits
today it’s an accessory structure on a separate lot which would be in violation of the city code, so
again doing as many things as we can to bring it into compliance as part of that mitigation for the
variance.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, and that’s what, condition number 10 does by making it in the same
parcel…
Kate Aanenson: That’s correct.
Mayor Furlong: …parcel identification number, then it becomes a single lot of record.
Kate Aanenson: Correct. And to say that it helps impervious may or may not. Someone might
try to put even more on there. Do a single car garage and put a loft above it and then try to make
it a dwelling unit. It may end up being something else.
Mayor Furlong: Okay.
Kate Aanenson: So again if you look at number 11, it’s the affidavit of the lot combination and
that’s, it’s a combination lot. It’s a zoning lot is different than just a regular lot is defined.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. And that, would then that create a single parcel?
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Kate Aanenson: Yes, that’s the right word. Parcel is the right word as opposed to lot. If you
look at other definitions of.
Mayor Furlong: It would be called a single parcel.
Kate Aanenson: Correct.
Mayor Furlong: And so if there is any desire to do, to separate them, then they would have to
come through the subdivision process.
Kate Aanenson: That’s correct.
Mayor Furlong: Okay.
Kate Aanenson: And that’s the hook that you want.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. And then you mentioned something this evening that I didn’t see in the
Planning Commission minutes. Maybe it was in there and I missed it, with regard to their drive
gravel…
Kate Aanenson: Well I think that was a discussion in fairness to Mr. Bangasser that really
wasn’t talked about at the Planning Commission and that’s the fact that there is a lot of hard
surface, so if there’s a way to try to get a 3 car garage, if the council felt strongly about that, what
could you do to improve the amount of hard surface and that would be to remove some of the
driveway. I know it provides access to the house for parking, to getting things in and out, but we
saw that as an opportunity to again mitigate the amount of hard surface. I don’t believe Mr.
Bangasser would like to do that.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. And I guess in looking at that, right now if they went with the.
Kate Aanenson: Actually if you took the driveway out, which…of the front and I know this is
shared portion over here. It will actually get you right about to 25% so it meets code.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. So it looks like there’s a way to do it.
Kate Aanenson: Right. Yeah, it’s whether or not that that’s acceptable.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Alright. Okay, any other questions for staff at this time?
Councilman Peterson: Just one last one Kate. Just so I understand, if we do this as one parcel,
then we don’t have to go after some kind of easement for the road?
Kate Aanenson: No. We have this circumstance if you go up and down Minnewashta Parkway,
we have lots on the other side of Minnewashta Parkway. We have other lots in actually the
Carver Beach area that also have structures so, no. It is allowed. A zoning lot is allowed by city
code.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Councilman Peterson: Okay.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. If there’s no other questions for staff at this time, is the applicant here
this evening? Like to address the council. Good evening sir.
Dave Bangasser: Hello. I’m Dave Bangasser and this is my wife Mary Jo. Our lakeshore
property’s been in Mary Jo’s family for 60 years and as you may be aware, the property was
originally platted in 1913, nearly a century ago and as a result of that nearly all of the properties
in this area either have variances or some kind of non-conforming use. This past year a hail
storm caused severe, came through and caused severe damage to our vehicles, and we’re here
tonight to try to avoid future damage, as well as minimize outside storage. There’s a well known
shortage of storage space in this area, and a high amount of exterior storage. City staff has cited
multiple property owners for excess storage of boats and trailers and as a result there are many
cars parked outside. We would like to store 2 cars and a boat. The key issue here is the
definition of a reasonable sized garage and a reasonable amount of impervious surface. We
believe the council has already established definitions for both of these issues by recently
granting variances for neighbors on either side of us, and that we are well within these
definitions. Three years ago the council granted a variance to the Gunthers, our neighbors to the
north to build a garage that increased their total to 4 stalls. In reviewing the staff report and the
minutes from the council meeting for the Gunther variance, the staff, nor the council questioned
whether 4 stalls was reasonable. Further down the point, the council also approved a variance
for the addition of a third and fourth stall at 3605 Red Cedar. That’s this picture here. At least 7
variances that were listed on the staff report, at least the executive summary that just came out, at
least 7 of those variances involved 3 stalls or, 3 or 4 stalls and 3 of those 7 were for properties
that were immediately adjacent to our parcel. The staff has stated that the majority of the
property owners in the area have 2 stalls and that is the basis for the recommendation for 2 stalls
tonight. We disagree with that assessment. This drawing here, the pink areas show properties
that have in excess of 2 stalls. 22 of 38 lakeshore property owners have in excess of 2 stalls,
which I believe is a majority have more than 2 stalls. The staff in coming up with their numbers
is only counting the number of garage doors, not the total storage capacity of the garages. If we
look at the properties that are immediately adjacent to our property, two of these properties have
the capacity of 5 stalls with 4 doors. And 3 of the properties have capacity of 3 stalls with
what’s in excess of 30 feet with 2 doors. We own significantly more land than all 3 of the
neighbors with 30 foot wide garages. Why restrict us to a smaller garage than they have? Based
upon the council’s past variances and the existing conditions in the area, we feel that our
proposal for a 3 stall garage is well within the definition of reasonable. Concerning the second
issue, impervious coverage, 2 years ago the council granted a variance to the Johnson’s, our
neighbors to the west, for an identical front yard setback and 40% impervious coverage. Three
lots further west the council granted a variance for 50% coverage. We have proposed 31.
Looking again at the adjacent properties, our proposed 31% coverage is well below the
surrounding properties of 40%, 52%, 54%, 35% and 46%. You can see from the drawings,
pictures from the road, how much hard cover they have. These figures are somewhat different
then what the staff figured in their 29% calculation. The staff had limited information to work
with and we believe they’re miscalculation of 29% average hard cover is a gross
misrepresentation of reality. I could show you many pictures to illustrate my point. However
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allow me two quick examples. This survey was one of those used by a staff in calculating the
29% average hard cover. They figured the impervious surface for this property at 20.7%, which
was the lowest of all that they looked at. If that were true, that would mean that there would be 4
times as much white as pink inside the blue lot area. Clearly this is not the case. The pink area
divided by the lot size is 41.4%, exactly twice what the staff figured. Also the staff does not
count sidewalks, rock, or the roof over the main entrance off to the side of the house. They have
to walk around the garage to get to their entry. In fact I listed all of the staff’s surveys, in many
cases they excluded sidewalks, patios, and rock. Our second example involves the Johnson
variance granted at 40%. However the staff used 31% in determining their calculation of 29%
average cover. Tom and Jackie are doing the majority of the work themselves and simply have
not finished their project. Nobody called them to ask if they were done, and yet the 31% was
used. With the inaccuracies I just described, it’s easy to see how the 29% average becomes
skewed dramatically. If we use the staff’s method calculating only footprint and driveway, our
proposed 31% coverage would be reduced to 20%, which would be lower than any of those that
the property, that the staff looked at. We purchased this back lot 4 years ago in order to mitigate
these types of issues, which we believe the council encourages. Our goal was to transfer density
from the lake lot to the back lot, which we believe is also a desirable goal. The neighborhood
supports this plan and would rather see a well designed garage than outside storage. The 3
closest neighbors have taken the time to write letters of support which I believe Kate handed out
right at the start of the meeting. Kate mentioned the existing driveway which was brought up
about 3:00 this afternoon. The possibility of giving up the existing gravel driveway in order for
staff to support this. We did consider that possibility. However I need to make you aware of
some facts. The entrance to the house is 9 feet above the road, and I’ll take back the survey that
Kate… It may be difficult to show all the detail but there’s 9 feet of grade change between the
road and the front door, and you’ll notice there’s a retaining wall basically all along the road,
except right at the driveway, and that retaining wall curves as it approaches the driveway. With
9 feet of grade change, that’s a very steep driveway. In fact the curve is there because you can’t
go straight up that driveway without bottoming out in a normal vehicle. You have to take that
curve and get a little bit of run at it to get up that relatively steep portion in order to get up into a
flatter area in which to park and get out of the vehicle. With that steep grade it’s very difficult to
provide access. It’s difficult for people to walk up the elderly, the handicap. We had a handicap
daughter in a wheelchair that could not have made this. There’s been other times when we’ve
had people in wheelchairs that had a difficult time getting up that driveway. In fact, Mary Jo’s
uncle lived next door in the property to the east, basically on the other side of the house. Lived
there for many years and in his elderly years he used to park in this driveway because it was
easier for him to get across and into his house from there, then to park in that shared area where
there’s a stairs and get up. We have no stairs. The stairs belongs to our neighbors. In addition
the access issue, we also think we need to be able to drop things off that are closer to the house.
The new driveway that we’re proposing with the 3 stall garage is approximately 140 feet from
the front door. It’s a long ways to travel if you’re trying to carry groceries or whatever. At some
point we hope to be able to improve the access to try to deal with that 9 feet. I don’t know
exactly how we’ll deal with that but at some point we hope to be able to deal with the access and
when we do deal with that, we are willing to give up the gravel driveway and put sod there, but
it’s not something we can do at this time. We did, as Kate mentioned, that they were trying to
find ways to mitigate and, mitigate the situation. We are open to that. We have proposed to staff
providing a permeable pavement design. It’s a design, there’s a number of alternatives.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Ecostone is one of them. The Minnesota DNR endorses the use of permeable design. The
Landscape Arboretum has a demonstration installation of this, and both the cities of Mound and
Minnetonka accept permeable pavement as an acceptable solution. With that, before I close, do
you have any questions for me.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Any questions for the applicant at this time? No? Alright, very
good. Thank you.
Dave Bangasser: Thank you for your consideration.
Mayor Furlong: You bet. Ms. Aanenson, any I guess quick response in terms of some of the
information that he provided.
Kate Aanenson: Sure. Again the nexus that we’re looking at is between, it’s hard when you
segment it, the variances and on every variance that we do, we always try to find mitigation, so
that was a component that was left out in each of these. Sometimes we achieved a greater
setback from the lake, so we would have to go back through and find out, and that’s a key
component that was missing because each one we try to put, is there something else that we can
achieve by giving here. Is there something else that we’re gaining? Maybe it was lakescape or
maybe it was a reduction of a non-conforming setback so that component was left out by this
part. We just did follow through what the Planning Commission had asked us to do. Again, I’m
not going to argue the percentages. There might have been a few that were off, but I don’t think
in generalities, if you want to talk about the Johnson’s. That lot’s a lot bigger. They also took
down the existing structure and made sight lines better, so again we look at each case
individually as you’re supposed to on a variance request. As we did on this one, we said is there
other things that we can do to try to get, making the situation better. So in this circumstance
they’re saying well, we added more pervious but what did we do to make the situation better?
And that’s what we’re trying to find. That area.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Any follow up questions for staff?
Councilman Peterson: The only other one Kate was the question of 3 stalls versus 2. It’s not a
stall issue…
Kate Aanenson: Exactly, thank you. It’s not a stall issue. If you could get 4 on there, great.
That’s not the issue. We didn’t look at it to say it was a hard surface coverage issue. That was
really the nexus to say, that third stall is what pushed over the impervious. This is already over
so we said okay, well two is reasonable. And if we weren’t so far over on the impervious, or we
could get some better setbacks or something else that we could compromise or find some
mitigation to say well we got something back to improve the lake, maybe we would have gone
that way but it wasn’t because we always felt 2 was what we should get. It’s the hard surface
coverage. And that number we cast the difference between the 2 and the 3 and…
Mayor Furlong: And I guess a clarifying question there, the alternative motion includes a 2.28%
hard surface coverage variance, which was some estimate with regard to what the.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Kate Aanenson: The third stall I believe.
Mayor Furlong: Or the difference between what was being requested and that number was the
third stall. Or in the area.
Councilman Peterson: …31 and we’re recommending 27.
Mayor Furlong: As the alternative.
Kate Aanenson: Right, so that would give you the additional, yeah.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: In the Planning Commission minutes of their meeting, and I read the
notes and watched the meeting actually, some of the commissioners you know were having, were
struggling because they’re were saying water runoff would be going different directions. What
do you say about that? The fact that you know, some, the house, the runoff from the house
would be going down to the lake, but with the garage it’d be going an entirely different direction.
Kate Aanenson: Well I don’t know if that’s actually going to make a difference because the
house itself which is adjacent to the lake isn’t changing. It’s just what’s behind. I mean we
could put gutters on the garage and mitigate that so I’m not sure that that was really. The
Chairman of the Planning Commission’s here if you wanted to ask him to kind of summarize, if
you had any questions for him, I’d be happy to.
Mayor Furlong: Yeah, given the topography I guess my question is even if it starts out on the
triangle piece where the garage is now to the west, it’s going to north or south.
Todd Gerhardt: It’s going to make it’s way to the lake.
Mayor Furlong: Other questions? Okay.
Kate Aanenson: And then just the one other comment. You know when we talked about the
driveway, I certainly recognize that that’s a good access to the house. Nobody can dispute that.
I guess our concern was that, you know if you went with a 3 car garage, what would be the…that
there still would be storage there for convenience sake to park next to the house and if the goal is
to get 3, then could you get a commitment that they’re going to be outdoor storage. Or some
parking out there, you know because that would be the goal, as I understood for the 3, the boat
and 2 cars, would there not be storage or parking that’s occurring now.
Councilman Peterson: If we got that though, how enforceable is it?
Kate Aanenson: Yeah, exactly. That’d be a good will or good faith.
Mayor Furlong: That’s the challenge. Okay. Alright, well let’s bring it to the council for
discussion then. Thoughts or comments.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: I still have one more question.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Mayor Furlong: Certainly.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: How does the applicant feel about the proposal of a 2 stall garage?
Kate Aanenson: They want the 3.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: They don’t want to compromise.
Kate Aanenson: They would like 3, certainly.
Dave Bangasser: Well what’s the definition? You’re talking…what’s the definition of a 2 stall.
I don’t know what that is. I mean one, if we go down to a 2 stall garage, you’re just encouraging
us to have, almost forcing us to store outside, and so are we flexible? Yes, to a point but we’ve
got to be realistic too. There are certain storage needs. We live on a lake. You’ve got boats.
You’ve got other you know water toys, what not. Why not put it inside? That’s what the
neighborhood wants. The neighborhood wants us to put it inside and not have all this storage
outside.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Alright, thank you. Thoughts. Council members, discussion.
Councilman Lundquist.
Councilman Lundquist: A tough one, as Mr. Bangasser was giving his presentation, which was
very well done. Obviously I always try to strive to be fair and reasonable to everyone. But the,
the thing that keeps striking me is that for exactly the same reason why the neighborhood may be
higher is precisely why you should try to limit it whenever possible because, just because
everybody else has a 50% hard cover variance, you know that’s essentially why you want to try
to minimize when possible. The thing that strikes me with the lateness of the, talk about the
driveway and other things is, is I would be okay to considering it a 2 week delay to allow staff to
work on that a little bit more rather than you know after 3:00 thing, unless the Bangasser’s have
a construction deadline they’re trying to meet or something like that, to at least give that some
due. If it comes back that it doesn’t work, then you know that’s fine. At least we tried. To
mitigate that, so I guess I’d like to explore that a little bit more. At the end of the day I think
there’s some give and take. I’d be interested to see what the other members, I think I’m still on
the fence here. If I had to make a decision tonight, I’m not sure so I’d like to explore that
driveway piece a little bit more potentially.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Other thoughts.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: I too would be willing to give them an extra 2 weeks to work things
out and figure out a more creative way to handle it. But it’s a hard thing to decide on. I guess
the whole issue is the hard surface coverage and, what I’m confused about is, obviously 2 stalls
are better than 1. 3 is even better than 2, I understand that but during the season, and maybe I’m
wrong about this but usually your boats and your jetskis are up on the dock or they’re not in the
garage, so that’s when you can park your cars in the garage when you’re using your lake home.
During the winter, when the season is over, that’s when you put your boats in the garage and you
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
don’t need to be too worried about protecting your cars as much. So that’s the argument I have
that they still would have reasonable use of a 2 stall garage and you wouldn’t necessarily have to
be storing things out in their lot, so I’d like to see the 2 week, 2 weeks to kind of hammer things
out. If they…otherwise I think I’m more inclined to vote in favor of staff’s recommendation.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Councilman Peterson.
Councilman Peterson: Yeah this is all about keeping the lake as clean as possible. I think we
kind of lose sight of that on occasion. And the variances that were cited this evening, as Kate
reinforced, you don’t want to, I hate to say we negotiated something for the betterment of the
lake but that’s essentially what we’ve done in those other cases. Where those variances and the
impervious surfaces might be higher, we did get, we did better the lake making those decisions.
And in this case I’m struggling with the thought that we’re bettering the lake by making that
decision. And that’s what I’m struggling with. I quite frankly don’t know what 2 weeks will do,
but I’m certainly willing to do that and I think if there’s something creative that we haven’t
found, I’m certainly amenable to affording the opportunity to search for that but you know I just
come back to what’s the lake getting here, and without being overly punitive to our residents but
you know I don’t like the feeling of horse trading here but I don’t know a different alternative to
maintaining the lake so, I’ll struggle with that so. I would look to staff to see if it would benefit
by a 2 week delay. If not, I’m ready to vote on it tonight.
Mayor Furlong: I guess my thoughts are similar in that each time we receive these requests you
look to see what else can be done to avoid providing a hard surface coverage variance. I never
enjoy approving these because it’s a storm water runoff issue, especially for properties this close
to any of our lakes. It’s important. I think here there’s an opportunity, because the property
owner owns property and the intensification here is further away from the lakeshore than it
would be near the lakeshore. That’s good when we can do that, but it is an intensification. It’s
whether they go from 1 to 2 or 1 to 3, they’re going and having driven by there, the one that’s
there now is not a very large one so whatever they do with is going to be an intensification.
…that there’s an opportunity for the property owner to achieve the inside storage that they’re
looking for, by talking about number of stalls, and with other mitigation across the combined
parcel or the two parcels becoming one, and not, and be in a situation where we don’t have to
provide a hard surface variance coverage at all, I think we should pursue that. If that’s 2 weeks,
th
if that’s longer, just looking at the staff report, the application was received January 4, so that
tells me if we’ve got 60 days plus another 60, if that counts here, we’ve got time. But I would
not be inclined tonight to approve either of these given that there may be an opportunity for the
property owner to achieve the inside storage that he’s talking about and avoid a hard surface
coverage variance at all. And so I would be hesitant going forward tonight. I’d like to, for
reasons that some of you stated, Councilman Peterson I think in particular, where’s the
advantage here? Of the examples that were mentioned that I was involved in, I know that there
was mitigation as well. That driveways were taken out or reduced or there were setbacks from
the lake that didn’t exist before that we increased. There were changes to it and here it is, it’s an
expansion and so, while I believe there’s an opportunity here to provide the inside storage that
the applicant’s looking for, I don’t know that we’re there yet and I’d like to spend some time to
find a way to work together with staff and the applicant to see what they can do to even eliminate
the need for hard surface coverage at all across the two parcels. That would be my
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
recommendation because knowing that that might be out there, I couldn’t see moving forward
with either of these two this evening. Other thoughts or are people consistent with that or is
there?
Councilman Peterson: Well I mean Kate, do you think that there’s value in getting you guys
some time to continue pursuing or do you think?
Kate Aanenson: Yes, be happy to meet with Mr. Bangasser. Come up with some other
solutions.
Mayor Furlong: With the extent that we’ve got some newer information, let’s dig into it and
let’s make sure that everybody understands what’s available and maybe there’s an opportunity
here.
Councilman Peterson: Motion to table.
Councilman Lundquist: Second.
Mayor Furlong: Made and seconded. Any further discussion?
Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Lundquist seconded to table the request for
hard surface coverage and two front yard setback variances to construct a 3 stall garage at
3633 South Cedar Drive. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a
vote of 4 to 0.
GATEWAY NORTH/GATEWAY PLACE, NORTHWEST INTERSECTION OF
HIGHWAY 101 AND FUTURE HIGHWAY 212, APPLICANT, CHANHASSEN
GATEWAY PLACE, LLC: REQUEST TO SUBDIVIDE 6.2 ACRES INTO 3 LOTS AND
1 OUTLOT AND SITE PLAN WITH VARIANCES FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF A
MULTIFAMILY BUILDING.
Kate Aanenson: Thank you. I have a few exhibits here. This is the subject site. We talked
about this most recently in your work session. The new 101/212, so this application includes a
couple of things. One, the subdivision. Creating a parcel, a lot for this to be built on. And then
also site plan approval with a variance. In your staff report we went through the history of this
property, this area in itself. We did a PUD for the entire piece. Again the property’s actually on
both sides of the new 212. The property that we’re talking about specifically is this piece right
here with the apartment building. When we did this PUD it was always anticipated that that
would be apartment building. On the property immediately to the west will come in at a future
date. This property right here is being built by the Sand Company. As I indicated, this will be
the one lot that will be built on. It’s, the building itself will be 47 units and will include
multifamily, excuse me. 48 apartments and will include 2 and 3 bedroom units. In the
architecture itself, where we looked at putting this again, while we looked at the apartment
building in this location, the fact that it’s close to the park and ride we felt had a lot of benefits.
A nice transition as you come from the 101. Easy access. Some of the issues that we changed in
the staff report, which I know the applicants have some disdain with is the sidewalk being built
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
now along Lake Susan. We want the continuous sidewalk, even though they’re not coming in on
this phase. That will actually tie into the sidewalk along current 101, which will provide access
to those properties. I want to talk about the plat…architecture first. So there’s actually 3, 4 lots
being created. Sorry. So with the plat itself, while this does require storm water pond, this is a
project, can you zoom in on that a pinch. So this is the subject site so these are the lots that are
being created. This will be future townhouse sites. This is the sidewalk I’m talking about.
Taking it into the existing trail. This is going to be a storm water pond. Future residential on the
north side abutting the Klingelhutz property, and there’s also some additional right-of-way that’s
being dedicated with the new 101. One of the things we talked about with this ponding, on the
southern area too, working that out with the Lake Riley improvements, but this project itself and
it’s ponding that will be built now to accommodate, also accommodate this future development.
So that’s the plat in and of itself. Again the preliminary plat starts on page 12 of the staff report.
There’s findings with the subdivision located at that section of the project. Now about the site
plan in and of itself. Again we’re looking at the orientation. We wanted this to be a highly
articulated building so we worked hard on the orientation of the building. Access. We worked
that with Lake Susan Drive. Temporarily this, as we talked about earlier in the work session,
101 will not be constructed before this is done so it will have access coming off of old 101 until
that switch is made, so they will have to provide and work with MnDot on the improvements on
Lake Susan and giving access to that. Again the timing of this is related to the funding that we
received tonight and being able to use those dollars. There is required underground parking with
this project and that’s addressed in the staff report. Because it is 2 and 3 bedroom units and a
highly articulated building, there are 61 enclosed spaces. It does require 70 because of the
number of units, 2 and 3 bedrooms in the staff report on page 9, we go through the requirements
that we feel that the parking was adequate, and we are recommending approval of the variance.
The overall parking, including surface parking. Surface parking lot parking would exceed the
requirements so we’re comfortable with that. There is some fencing that will be required along
this side. We have the plans for that. The landscaping which we think again provides a nice
mitigation. Now I’d just like to talk a little bit about architecture available. And so there’s two
difference colors on there, the tan and the beige. Again we think it’s a highly articulated
building. With the height in itself with the traffic on 101, again we believe that should provide
mitigation for noise. They are also required, you know they’ll have air conditioning and the likes
of that as we looked at some other projects will provide the noise mitigation but the visual aspect
we think is, because it’s the material mix and the detail on the building, that it’s highly
articulated and will fit, be a nice compliment to the area. So we are recommending approval of
the site plan itself and the conditions for that as well as the variance for the parking requirements
are also found in the staff report. So with that, if there’s any questions I’d be happy to answer
them. Otherwise we are recommending approval of the preliminary plat and site plan with
variances as found in the staff report starting on page 14. And I’d be happy to answer any
questions you have.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Questions for staff.
Councilman Peterson: Kate would you, I hate to make you take things off the table but one of
the first drawings you had was kind of the whole area. Could you spend a little bit of time and
just kind of walking through what’s adjacent to all of this.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Kate Aanenson: As you recall the park and ride is located in this facility. 600 deck park and
ride and then there will be some residential, and then also be some commercial. So that’s on the
west side of the new 101, which is moving over. This is current 101. It’s moving over. So with
that, there was with the PUD some other commercial office shown in this area that’s being
developed by another developer, and again this is one of those areas that’s under study. They
may want to do some other things as part of…group looking at that area itself. Then the rest of
this.
Councilman Peterson: Before you go off of that, to the far west there, what’s the intent?
Kate Aanenson: Over here?
Councilman Peterson: Yeah.
Kate Aanenson: There’s a pond and that’s the pond I was talking about.
Councilman Peterson: No, the building. Is that, is that commercial too?
Kate Aanenson: This?
Councilman Peterson: Yeah.
Kate Aanenson: This is actually an apartment building and that’s something that the other…
that’s looking at that property may want to change that. This is the one area of the city, well
actually there’s two areas that we have this mixed use development. So it can have commercial
or residential. As proposed in the PUD when the Sand Company came through, they actually put
that in there. That doesn’t mean it can’t change to something else under that PUD but would
have to amend the PUD, and we felt we didn’t have enough information about additional
commercial until we finished this site so we’ve asked them to wait before we change it, to be
consistent with what we’ve told other people that want to change to more commercial. So there
is a storm water pond over here. That’s one that we will have the developer do as part of the
Lake Riley improvements. So we’ve got the park and ride. We also just rezoned this property
right here to do twin homes and we just recently approved that. And then you’ve got the
Springfield neighborhood here. So we worked hard with the, and you’ll be seeing the park and
ride development coming shortly, probably in the next couple months to come in with that, to
work with the neighbors in putting those PUD’s together. So the rest of this will be coming in in
the future. One of the other concerns that we had is, you know how do we make this piece work
with the rest of the property to the north, the Klingelhutz property because there will be access
via 101 going to the north. So whether you have additional access coming in here, these two
parcels tie together so that’s something that we’ll be working with the developer on and trying to
make sense of how that lays out instead of having a little narrow piece. So right now, this is the
project that we’re working on but all this area will be changing as 212 comes in and the
extension of Lake Susan. Again the lower density, what we looked at in the PUD to blend, make
that transition between existing Lake Susan and moving up towards the apartments. And then
with the 212 it creates a natural buffer where you’ve got the 212 kind of provides that break
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
between the residential there so it’s kind of a different feel with kind of that 3 quarter lot on 3
collectors. 101, Lyman and 212. So that’s kind of the super area.
Councilman Peterson: Okay, thanks.
Kate Aanenson: Yeah, and I was just going to say too, again you see the proximity to the park
and ride and then some convenience commercial which we thought, that’s why we wanted to
connect back up to that trail to get back under the 212, provide access for those folks to get to
convenience commercial.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: So this area doesn’t have to wait for the market study?
Kate Aanenson: This apartment?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Right, all the building’s we’re talking about.
Kate Aanenson: No, because that’s all residential. The only one that we ask to wait is anybody
that wanted to change to more commercial. That was, those were the ones who we’re asking to
wait til the study’s completed. Otherwise if they have their zoning in place, then if it’s consistent
if they’re asking for a change, then we would ask them to wait.
Mayor Furlong: Any other questions Councilwoman Tjornhom? Councilman Lundquist?
Councilman Lundquist: Kate, on the parking spaces. Where do we use, the guideline that we
used for the number of spaces per unit, and the number of bedrooms. What’s the basis for that?
Kate Aanenson: Well, you know when we updated the city code, that isn’t something that we
looked at and we probably should have. It may be antiquated. The way it works right now is
there’s 61, for example on this project there’d be 61. They’re not necessarily assigned to any
unit. They’re kind of separately leased so if you’ve got someone that only wants 1 and there’s
more available, so we believe within that there’s probably plenty to go around if somebody
wanted 2 or 3, it would work internally. That they would solve that through the management
itself. Most of these units are geared for the 3 bedrooms, for young families so we don’t believe
we should have a problem with more than 1 or 2 cars per unit.
Councilman Lundquist: So each unit gets at least 1 and the other ones are first go first serve?
Kate Aanenson: Correct, and that’s, right. If they don’t use them, they’d be offered to
somebody else that would, right.
Councilman Lundquist: And the engineering and cost required to get to that 70, as you said in
your staff report is a significant piece to be getting?
Kate Aanenson: Correct, and they have some concerns with that. The sidewalk along the
existing Lake Susan, is that what you’re talking about? Correct.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Councilman Lundquist: Well, to make the building big enough to get the 70…
Mayor Furlong: To avoid the variance.
Kate Aanenson: Right, I think that’s, it’s pretty onerous. We don’t really have that many 3
bedroom units in the city. And I think it would be onerous. I’m not sure, we really don’t have a
parking problem with underground parking. A lot of the units that we already have it’s never
been a problem and even when you have 2 bedrooms with 2 drivers, I don’t see that as a
problem.
Councilman Lundquist: Okay.
Mayor Furlong: I guess to follow up on that line of questioning with the parking, by your
comments here, should we be reviewing those requirements?
Kate Aanenson: Yes.
Mayor Furlong: Would we expect those same requirements of someone else elsewhere in the
city or would we also say that’s too onerous?
Kate Aanenson: I think we need to re-evaluate that and we’ve got that on our punch list of
things to re-evaluate in the city code because we didn’t when we updated it, look at that.
Mayor Furlong: Based on what you know now and maybe this has not been looked at yet, and so
that’s fine. Are our standards similar to surrounding communities?
Kate Aanenson: Yeah, and I think you also you have to look at type of product. Amenities. If
you’re looking at a luxury condo, maybe it’d be different. If you’re looking at, again this is next
to transit so we’re anticipating that there might be more ridership, so I think that was some of our
rationale too for the variance but we will look at the surrounding communities standards and
what we have to date.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. And well, that’s a question for the applicant so I’ll wait for them. Good,
thank you. Any other questions for staff at this time? Okay, thank you. Is the applicant here
this evening? Would you like to address the council on any matter?
Jamie Thelen: My name is Jamie Thelen with Gateway Place, and we went through the staff
review and we’re okay with everything, all the conditions. We just do have one request on the
map that we have here. We’re putting in the sidewalk in orange. That has been added which
makes a lot of sense to connect to the 4 way at future 101 and Lake Susan Drive. And we’re also
making a connection to the north to cover people coming from the north side too, which is fine.
We would make one request, the highlighted area in yellow is not in front of our property at all
and we would request that that would be delayed as not part of our project. What we would be
willing to do if, we do understand that it’s tough to tell how far out townhomes are and it’s an
important sidewalk, we think it is. We just request that if the site, if there’s no site plan in
review by the time we’re getting ready to get a Certificate of Occupancy, that we put that
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
sidewalk in at that point. If something, if they come in right after us for the townhomes, that that
would be required for their site plan because we are putting a pretty extensive sidewalk system
already on our property so we, that’s one request we would like to make.
Mayor Furlong: Just so I understand your request, you’re saying don’t require that unless there
isn’t a site plan for that property at the time that you go for Certificate, and then you would put it
in at that point.
Jamie Thelen: Yeah.
Kate Aanenson: You have about a one year construction, is what you’re saying?
Jamie Thelen: Yeah, we’d be looking at opening up basically the same time as Lake Susan
Drive, which is probably in July. June-July of 2007 so, somewhere in that range. We’re about
12 months of construction. And we do understand that it’s important to have that sidewalk. It
makes sense. It does connect. We would just ask you know, we’re putting in quite a bit already
in front of our property just, this is quite a bit off our site and if we could have, then we could put
that in the development agreement if you’d be open to that. Otherwise we’re okay with all of the
conditions.
Paul Oehme: That’s fine. I guess if maybe just a letter of credit, just so we have the assurance
that it will go in.
Kate Aanenson: Yeah, I’ll work with the attorney’s office to figure something out to get that
security or understanding.
Jamie Thelen: Yep as part of our development agreement we have to put together a letter of
credit for the public improvements and we can just include that in there.
Mayor Furlong: And it would be your request that if that property develops or if there’s a site
plan for it, that that sidewalk be a condition of that.
Jamie Thelen: That is correct.
Mayor Furlong: And is that something staff that we would be reasonable?
Paul Oehme: I think we can work with them.
Mayor Furlong: Okay.
Jamie Thelen: Otherwise I have nothing else.
Mayor Furlong: So I don’t know that we need, so that would be a matter for the development
contract, but I think that’s on our agenda this evening. So we may want to hold on that, is that
correct? Or is it not?
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Kate Aanenson: So they’ll come back.
Todd Gerhardt: This is site plan.
Mayor Furlong: This is just site plan, okay.
Kate Aanenson: …and typically those are our concern. We’ll put that language in there.
Mayor Furlong: That was an earlier matter on the agenda, the development contract so this
wouldn’t affect any of the conditions at this point? Something that we could work out with the
development contract. Okay. I just had a quick question, if I could, and I don’t know if
anybody, does anybody else have a question for the applicant? With regard to the parking, and
as I looked at, based upon the shape of the building, the footprint of the building, you have
angles. You have a right, 90 degree curve. To me that’s got to affect the availability of
underground parking space, based upon the architecture of the shape of the building. Is that
correct?
Jamie Thelen: Yeah, I’ll let Richard, our architect talk a little bit about that because we, as soon
as we saw the requirement he actually did some other layouts, more efficient layout of a straight
building which we don’t want to do and you wouldn’t want to see and it’s pretty nearly
impossible to meet that requirement.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, there’s my answer.
Councilman Peterson: Just what Craig wanted to see.
Councilman Peterson: Yep.
Councilman Lundquist: And you didn’t come forward with this first.
Richard Hennings: maybe not the politically correct thing to do but when that comment came
up, and I was concerned that why can’t we get as much parking in this building as we should
here. So it struck me that an exercise of just drawing a box that couldn’t be more efficient then
that rectangle, and that box then consists of another 48 unit apartment building with a common
mix of apartments. 1 bedroom, 2 bedroom and 3 bedroom and you end up with a box, you can
see 64 by 330 feet long. And then allocating just kind of minimum space for the stairways and
the lobby and elevator space in that garage, you can see I end up with 62 parking spaces in that
one so slightly better than the stretched out building, but what I think that tells you is that
anybody that’s going to do a 3 story building with underground parking is going to have trouble
meeting your parking requirement. And I first thought, like you said Kate, that it was onerous to
put a lot of 3 bedrooms in, but I actually looked at the situation with 1 bedrooms, because they
get so much narrower, it doesn’t get better. It actually gets worst so the only way you’d meet
this requirement is if the basement space were considerably bigger than the upper floor space,
and that’s not an impossible design but it’s not the design we look for in this building so.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Kate Aanenson: I just want to clarify too from the findings of fact that was one of the basis
points that we put in there, because you were concerned about applying this to somewhere else.
Kind of we had the discussion earlier. One of the findings of the variance was that based on the
shape of the building.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Any other follow up questions at this point? If not, thoughts
and comments. Council discussion.
Councilman Peterson: You know I was the one that pushed hard to kind of set the tone to get
something that was distinctive and certainly articulated, and I think they’ve met that challenge
and I applaud both architect and staff for working together to make that happen so I’m pleased
with the way the building has come to fruition in it’s look and feel. I think the conditions that
staff has got in there to continue tweaking, you know are appropriate. I think the sidewalk issue
I think it sounds like a reasonable request personally. And I think we should move ahead.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Other thoughts?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: I think it’s a good building and a good location and yeah.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you.
Councilman Lundquist: I would agree with Councilman Peterson also. Think the building
works well in that spot with the transit and the access right there. Some mixed use on that so
getting a good application of using zoning to create an area that fits well together and then
planning that goes along with that so, looking forward to moving ahead.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. My comments would be similar. I think it is a well designed
building. It looks nice and I think it will look nice as, and provide a nice entryway as people
enter into the city off of Highway 212. Coming off the intersection there. I certainly like the
shape of this building versus the alternative A that we saw this evening. And some thought went
into it. Both in terms of the design and the color and what they’re doing in terms of providing a,
some different housing products as well to our city, so I think that’s a positive as well. And it’s,
there’s going to be a lot of development in this area but to Councilman Lundquist’s comments,
there’s a lot of thought and coordinated effort going on all around this area and I think that’s
great and I think it’s going to be something that everybody will be proud of as well, so I certainly
support this project. Any other comments? If not, we have a motion starting on page 14 of the
staff report. 432 of our electronic packet, if somebody would like to make a motion.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: I make a motion the City Council approve the preliminary plat for
Planning Case 06-05 for Gateway North as shown on the plans received January 6, 2006, subject
to the following conditions 1 through 16.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Do you want to keep going?
Councilman Peterson: Right below 16 is another motion.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Okay. I make a motion the City Council approve the Site Plan with a
variance for the reduction of 9 enclosed parking spaces for Planning Case 06-05 for Chanhassen
Gateway Place as shown on the plans received January 6, 2006, subject to the following
conditions 1 through 21.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Is there a second?
Councilman Lundquist: Including findings of fact.
Mayor Furlong: This is based upon the findings of facts contained in the report?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Yes.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. I knew that’s what you said.
Councilman Lundquist: Second.
Mayor Furlong: You’re listening to Councilman Peterson too much with his motion. Made and
seconded. Any discussion on the motion?
Councilwoman Tjornhom moved, Councilman Lundquist seconded that the City Council
approve preliminary plat for Planning Case 06-05 for Gateway North as shown on plans
received January 6, 2006, subject to the following conditions:
1.Submit storm sewer design calculations with full-size drainage map for a 10-year, 24-hour
storm event.
2.Work with staff to revise the pond design calculations for the 10- and 100-year storm event.
3.Realign Lot 1, Block 2 full access perpendicular at Highway 101 and Lake Susan Drive
intersection.
4.The applicant is required to coordinate with MnDOT on the full access at Lake Susan Drive
and the storm pond outlet control sewer construction.
5.The applicant is responsible for obtaining and complying with all regularity agency permits:
Watershed District, MPCA, NPDES, MnDOT, Health Department, etc.
6.On the grading plan:
a.Show an emergency over flow.
b.Show stormwater pond easement.
c.Show silt fence Type II around the proposed pond.
d.Extend Type I silt fence to the north along the west side.
e.Show minimum 75-feet construction rock entrance.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
f.Add a bench mark.
7.On the utility plan:
a.Show the watermain within the street Right-of-Way as a public utility.
b.Revise the existing sanitary sewer flow direction.
c.Add a note that any connection to any existing structure must be core drilled.
d.Show all utility sewer pipe type, class, and size.
e.Show all utility manholes rim and invert elevations.
f.Add a gate valve to Lot 1, Block 1.
8.Plan and profile views are required for the entire public utility.
9.To guarantee the installation of the public improvements, the applicant must supply the City
with a financial security in the form of a letter of credit or cash escrow and enter into a
development contract.
10.On the plans, show the pedestrian ramps and a sidewalk connection between the south and
north sides of proposed Lake Susan Drive and add a sidewalk along the north portion of Lot
1, Block 2.
11.Temporary easements are required for any off-site grading.
12.The applicant must provide a proposed haul route for review and approval.
13.If fill is coming from and/or going to another site in Chanhassen, a separate grading permit
will be required for the other property.
14.All disturbed areas as a result of construction are required to be reseeded and mulched
within two weeks of site grading.
15.Add City Detail Plates Nos. 1002, 1004, 1005, 1006, 2001, 2101, 2109, 2110, 2201, 2202,
3101, 3102, 3107, 3108, 3109, 5200, 5203, 5206, 5214, 5215, 5217, 5300, and 5301.
16.On the site plan, show the dimensions of the parking stalls and driveway widths.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 4 to 0.
Councilwoman Tjornhom moved, Councilman Lundquist seconded that the City Council
approves of site plan with a variance for the reduction of nine enclosed parking spaces for
Planning Case 06-05 for Chanhassen Gateway Place as shown on the plans received January 6,
2006, subject to the following conditions:
1.The applicant shall replace the Colorado blue spruce specified on the landscape plan with an
alternate evergreen species.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
2.One monument sign shall be permitted at the entrance to the development off of Lake Susan
Drive. These signs shall not exceed 24 square feet in sign display area nor be greater than
five feet in height. These signs shall be set back a minimum of 10 feet from the property
line.
3.Additional information must be submitted pertaining to the height and materials used for the
privacy fence located east of the tot-lot and picnic area.
4.Details on the storm sewer connection to proposed Lake Susan Drive and proposed TH 212
should be provided. An emergency overflow for the proposed pond should be illustrated.
The applicant should submit a routing plan for any pond overflows from the site to a public
water body.
5.Drainage and utility easements (minimum 20 feet in width) should be provided over all storm
water infrastructure, including any emergency overflow structures. The storm water pond
should be platted in an outlot.
6.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:
Type of Slope Time (Maximum time an area can remain open
Steeper than 3:1 7 days when the area is not actively being worked.)
10:1 to 3:1 14 days
Flatter than 10:1 21 days
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.
7.Rock construction entrance shall be installed as illustrated on Chanhassen Detail Plate 5301.
8.Wimco or similar inlet protection shall be installed at all inlets that may receive storm water
from site per Chanhassen Detail Plate 5302A. All inlet protection shall be inspected and
maintained to comply with NPDES requirements.
9.Street cleaning of soil tracked onto public streets shall include daily street scraping and street
sweeping as needed.
10.Temporary stabilization of the exposed area shall include a straw or hay cover at a rate of 2
tons per acre, disc anchored into the soil, including the area around the apartment building.
11.To minimize tracking and erosion around the apartment building during construction,
temporary cover of straw or wood chips shall be placed around the building in amounts
sufficient to control rutting.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
12.The plans shall be revised to show a concrete washout area, BMPs for containment and
potential stockpile locations.
13.Silt fence (Chanhassen Type 1) shall be installed around the north and east side of the pond
within 24 hours of permanent outlet installation.
14.The plans shall be revised to show inlet protection for sediment during construction for the
trench drain at the garage and shall include a detail.
15.Submit a detailed lighting and signage plan consistent with the Chanhassen Gateway PUD
Development Design Standards.
16.Building Official conditions:
a.The building must be protected with automatic fire sprinkler systems.
b.The building plans must be prepared and signed by design professionals licensed in the
State of Minnesota.
c.An accessible route must be provided to the building, parking facilities and public
transportation stops.
d.All parking areas, including parking garage, must be provided with accessible parking
spaces.
e.Accessible dwelling units must be provided in accordance with Minnesota State Building
Code Chapter 1341.
f.The building owner and or their representatives shall meet with the Inspections Division
to discuss plan review and permit procedures.
17.Fire Marshal Conditions:
a.A 10 foot clear space must be maintained around fire hydrants, i.e., street lamps, trees,
shrubs, bushes, Xcel Energy, Qwest, cable TV and transformer boxes. This is to ensure
that fire hydrants can be quickly located and safely operated by firefighters. Pursuant to
Chanhassen City Ordinance #9-1.
b.Yellow curbing and “no parking fire lane” signs will be required. Contact Chanhassen
Fire Marshal for exact locations of yellow curbing and locations of signs to be installed.
c.Builder must comply with the Chanhassen Fire Department/Fire Prevention division
policies. Copies enclosed.
c.1 1-1990 regarding fire alarm systems.
c.2 4-1991 regarding notes to be included on all site plans.
c.3 7-1991 regarding pre-fire drawings.
c.4 29-1992 regarding premise identification.
c.5 34-1993 regarding water service installation.
c.6 36-1994 regarding proper water line sizing.
c.7 40-1995 regarding fire protection systems.
c.8 06-1991 regarding fire lane signage.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
c.9. 52-2005 regarding commercial plan review submittal criteria.
d.Show on utility plan location of post indicator valve (PIV).
e.The hydrant on the south end of the loop shall be moved approximately 30 feet northeast.
Contact Chanhassen Fire Marshal for exact location and approval.
f.Fire apparatus access roads and water supply for fire protection is required to be installed.
Such protection shall be installed and made serviceable prior to and during the time of
construction except when approved alternate methods of protection are provided.
Temporary street signs shall be installed at each street intersection when construction of
new roadways allows passage by vehicles. Pursuant to 2000 Minnesota State Fire Code
Section 501.4
g.Fire apparatus access roads shall be designed and maintained to support the imposed
loads of fire apparatus and shall be serviced so as to provide all-weather driving
capabilities. Pursuant to Minnesota Fire Code Section 503.2.3.
18.Approval of this site plan is contingent upon approval of the final plat for Gateway North.
19.The applicant shall enter into a site plan agreement.
20.The building shall comply with the Planned Unit Development building setback
requirements.”
21. The applicant shall revise the plans to show a clock on the vertical element of the building.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 4 to 0.
COUNCIL PRESENTATIONS:
Mayor Furlong: Any discussion on council presentations this evening? Just a quick comment as
a follow up to a previous work session item where we talked about legislative initiatives and
priorities. We have arranged a meeting for Councilman Lundquist and myself and Mr. Gerhardt
to meet with Representative Hoppe this coming Thursday and we’re working with Senator
Ortman to meet with her as well, so we expect that meeting to take place soon.
Councilman Peterson: You couldn’t get them both together huh?
Mayor Furlong: We couldn’t. They were not, we’re unsure if the Senator can join us on
Thursday but we do have a meeting scheduled for Senator, or Representative Hoppe and we are
going to continue to do that. Are these related to that?
Todd Gerhardt: Yep.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Mr. Gerhardt, you want to.
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City Council Meeting – February 27, 2006
ADMINISTRATIVE PRESENTATIONS:
Todd Gerhardt: What you have in front of you are our 2006 legislative policies. This is a draft.
As Tom mentioned we have a meeting this coming Thursday with Representative Hoppe to
present our priorities. I will be attaching resolutions of support for the local road improvement
fund, some of the maps, similar to the documents I showed you at the last meeting. With that I’ll
send out an electronic copy to you tomorrow, if anybody wants to see an electronic form but if
you have any questions or concerns on how these documents or priorities are written, let me
know. But I did put in a background and then both Mayor Furlong and Councilman Brian
Lundquist’s address so if Senator Ortman or Representative Hoppe need to get a hold of us,
phone is there.
Mayor Furlong: So you’d be interested in any comments on this.
Todd Gerhardt: Yeah, prior to Thursday’s meeting would be nice.
Mayor Furlong: Very good.
Todd Gerhardt: Last item, we’ll be hosting the School District 112 Leaders meeting here in the
Senior Center on Friday. Tom and I typically attend those meetings so if there’s any issues that
you’d like us to address at that meeting, let us know. Both Carver County and every mayor in
School District 112 will be in attendance. And that’s all I have.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Any questions for Mr. Gerhardt? If there’s no other business to
come before the council this evening, is there a motion to adjourn?
Councilman Lundquist moved, Councilman Peterson seconded to adjourn the meeting. All
voted in favor and the motion carried. The City Council meeting was adjourned at 8:25
p.m.
Submitted by Todd Gerhardt
City Manager
Prepared by Nann Opheim
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