EDA 1994 01 20CHANHASSEN HOUSING AND
REDEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY
REGULAR MEETING
JANUARY 20, 1994
Chairman Bohn called the meeting to order at 7:30 p.m.
MEMBERS PRESENT; Jim Bohn; Don ~ lvrfl~ Mason, Charlie Robbins and Gary
Boyle
MEMBERS ABSENT: None.
STAFF PRESENT: Todd Gerhardt, Asst. Executive Director
APPROVAL OF MINIYrF~: Chmiel moved, Mason seconded to approve the Minutes of
the Housing and Redevelopment Authority meeting dated December 16, 1993 as presen~
All voted in favor and the motion carriexL
VISITOR PRESENTATION: None.
STATUS OF HIGHWAY 5 PEDESTRIAN DESIGN SELECTION.
Gerhardt Mr. Chairman, HRA members. Tonight Fred Hoisington is here to go through the
two concepts for the pedestrian bridge design. In there you have what is Scheme A and
Scheme B. Scheme A would include those costs and those elemen~ with the trellis and also
with the larger center pier. Scheme B will include a smaller center pier and no trellis work
and I've outlined those costs for you. This item has gone to the Planning Commission and
the Planning Commission's recommendation was to go with Scheme A. They felt that the
aesthetics of this were much more enhanced with the trellis work and the larger center pier.
It allowed for landscaping to grow faster and quicker and...than without those two elements.
At this time I'd like to have Fred Hoisington go through those two schemes and show you
some photo imaging of how those are outlined.
Bohn: Now this picture looks like Stillwater.
Chrniel: It really does.
Gerhardt: I apologize for that. From what I was told, they had prin~ up the colored ones
SO...
Chmiel: If I could just interject something. When we looked at this the last time, were we
not asking for some other aesthetic appearance to that bridge7 I flfink we, the comment that
came out was it looked like Stillwater or something to that effect Was there not some
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - 1anuary 13, 1994
discussion regarding that to come back with something a little bit different? Or was my.
Boyle: ...looked at the aesthetic value looking at the exterior more than the interior Don?
Chrniel: Yeah, strictly the exterior.
Nred Hoisington: This, based on my recollection, this is the bridge that was essentially given
approval, or recommended, suggested by the liRA without the pop-ups on the ends and the
center and with the smaller piers. About $80,000.00 difference in cost. The Planning
Commission on the other hand felt, and I don't know how we resolve these kinds of
dilemmas but the Planning Commission felt the bigger pier, which is a planter in itself and
that the plants grow up from the top as this one they must grow from the ground. So this
actually extends out from the bridge on both sides. It is in fact a planter as well as a SUPlX~
and the trellis pop-ups were appropriate for this particular gateway to Clumtuia~m and
recommended thaL The difference is that the pop-ups really cost almost nothing. They're
about $3,000.00 difference. The pier is about $31,000.00 difference. There's quite a
difference however. You can't even see it and that's one of the reasons the Planning
Commission didn't feel the space between the beam and the de~ was irn?ormnt. But in this
scheme, wanting to float this, the architect has a space between the beam and the deck that if
you could look strai~t through it, you'd see air. You'd actually see this bridge almost
floating there in air. The fact is that where you are on the road, we don't see this space. It
really doesn't come into play and that, if you take it out, reduces the magnitude of size of the
structure which ~ that you can drop about $45,000.00 total dollars out of the cost of the
bridge. The Planning Commission recommended that as sort of a co .rr.mromise. Maybe one
that you could consider to get the cost down but still keeping the general character of the
bridge intact. One other thing that you could do if the trellises don't really make that much
difference, if you really felt strongly about it, you could reduce the size of the center ~
about another $35,000.00.
Boyle: But you could still cover that center pier from, I mean even though it's a planter on
top, you could still use the same concept to get vines growing up the center.
Fred Hoisington: You could. You could except Gary in this case the idea, and this was
really the first one which was created and then this one was a cost cutting meas~
Robbins: We're assuming that the code and safetyness on both are identical?
Fred Hoisington: Yes. No difference in that respect Charlie.
Robbins: And as far as the trelli,,es, the pop-ups. Call them what you will At the ends. In
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 199~
other words, we can, no matter what combination of piers, you could put those with either
one7 That does not matter7
Nred Hoisington: Oh, exactly. Really all we're, exactly. You could put those pop-ups right
on this bridge.
Robbins: Yeah, and you've not stated this but it's in the writ~-up. In the write-up that was
done in terms of there was a question regarding the fence...I drove around. I've been, after
than the last few, after our meeting while driving on business I saw some, several bridges
that are mesh and the ones I saw were enclosed all the way around, i.e. they went all the way
around. To me, if you've got a, I don't care whether it be 6 or 16, if you've got a point
where it stops and shows open space and encourage kids to climb up on top of that. Throw
something off or dive off or bowling balls or rocks. Either go all the way around or just...
Mason: Yeah, you know that's true but I think of all the freeway bridges downtown on
35-W. I mean none of those bridges are enclosed.
Robbins: Yeah they are. They all are.
Mason: No sir. No sir. The bridge by Walker Art Center isn't.
Chmiel: Not there but on 35.
Robbin.~: I'm saying the freeway bridges. Where the roads are, they're all enclosed.
Chmiei: Enclosed. Encased. Yes. I've been up on them.
Robbins: I drive it cvcry day.
Mason: Which ones are we talking about now?
Robbins: Lake Street. Or I should say on 31st is enclosed. 36th's enclosed. 42nd's enclosecL
46th is enclosed.
Mason: The road?
Robbins: No, the walkways~ The overpasses. Where the walkways are~
Bohn: Thc bridge itself is not. Thc pedestrian part is enclosed.
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
~t: ...and they're not. I mean I drove by yesterday, lohn and I and it's the one...
Bohn: The road is not but the walkway is.
Chmlel: The one that goes over 31st is completely enclosed.
Robbins: And there's been problems on that bridge by the way.
Mason: Well, we're also talking a little different area than Lake Street than Chanhassen too.
I mean.
Chmiel: I agree but kids are kids unfo~m,mly. Give them a chance and.
Mason: Weli yeah but, boy I don't know. The thought of enclosing that changes the whole
picture for me at any rate. I just, I wouldn't want to go on it.
Chmiel.' I only look at it from a safety aspect
Fred Hoisington: MnDot does not require enclosure. They said this design is acceptable to
them.
Boyle: Docs Scheme A include an enclosure?
Fred Hoisington: Gary, this comes up 8 feet. The mesh goes up 8 feet and then there's
another 2 feet essentially on top of that that's open and the top is open.
Robbins: So the way, with the 8 foot that's stated in the letter, hypothetically a person could
crawl the 8 feet, and then you're in open space and dump a ball out or something.
Fred Hoisington: It's not inconceivable. You could Charlie. You could do that...unless it's
completely enclosed, even with the...I believe you could probably, a kid could figure out a
way to get up there and jump out of that as well.
Chmiel: Well it's the same thing that I looked at with vehicles going undern~ that. Is
kids can take rocks, flip them up and over. Where they land, if it hits a car or not. They're
gone off that bridge and there's no way to eliminate it.
Robbins: And you see a lot of, I see a lot of youths using that bridge because you're going
from two neighborhoods. Going from where the Legion is across to where Hanus is.
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
Mason: Yeah. I'm certainly not going to deny a thing that's been said here but at what point
do we go to the ends of the world to protect people from evea'ybody else? I mean.
Chmiel: As much as you possibly can without causing any harm to anyone and I'm not
saying, if that's where the...go, that's fine with me but to me I still see us, we'll save the...
Boyle: I do too and I thought we discussed this quite thoroughly last time.
Bohn: Nancy, did you have something to add?
Nancy Mancino: Is this thc pedestrian l~-idgc?
Chmiek Yep.
Nancy Mancino: Fred what has happened to our downtown. You know the beautiful great
Loring Park and the Sculpture Garden. They don't have me~ there and there are people and
there are children and there are actually they take classes down there and everything...I-Iave
you heard?
Fred Hoisington: That bridge is art. A piece of art in itself. It was very delibemtrly
designed accordingly. And so rne~ that would have been totally contrary to the design. It
simply would not have workeat. Nancy, I haven't heard anything but I wouldn't be surprised
and there could be, could have been perhaps some problems. I think you run that risk no
matter where you are and I don't think it msice, s any difference if you arched. I think the
only way you can totally preclude kids from going...is to close it in entirely. That will have
detrimental affects on the way this bridge looks.
Nancy Mancino: ...I was just wondering because I was concerned about what level we're
going to be going...because usually when something like this, there's been a problem like that,
journalist pick up on it right away and we all hear about it and I haven't heard anything.
Fred Hoisington: I haven't either. If it is, I think it's relatively minor...but I haven't heard
anything on that.
Robbins: Fred7 Just on a comment that you had made regarding the covering of the bridge.
I guess not being a real art person but if you're driving here, I can't see how you can tell if
the top is covered or not. I mean it would be.
Fred Hoisington: Well, if you're driving generally from where you were here.. .that' s one
thing. When you get up to the bridge you will see it. When you get up close to the bridge
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
you will see it but from here you won't see it.
Bohn: You have to have a roof in your car. A glass roof.
Fred Hoisington: No. I think you'll de~nitely see it from your windshield at a certain point.
Bohn: You will be able to see the roof?
Fred Hoisington: Sure. What k will do is make the grades look boxier and it's purposely
designed to have an open space up there and it will enclose it and it will make it look heavier
than it does currently and it will make it look a lot...
Crerhardc This is the best one if you can go in there, maybe we could do a video image of
showing this thing with the mesh all the way around it.
Fred Hoisington: We could.
Chmieh Well that's what I thought we were going to see.
Bohn: Yeah, I did too.
Chmiel: That was my understanding when we left last time.
Bohn: When we left after the last meeting that's what we thought we were going to see.
Fred Hoisington: I didn't understand that. That's my fault, if that's the case. What we can
do is we can have them do some video imaging to see what it would look like in that respect
and then...so that would be just fine.
Boyle: Rather than have it boxy, what if it was rou~nded maybe at the Wp or maybe the Wp
could be open but it's still round rather than the square? Is that a major?
Fred Hoisington: You know what we could do is ask that que~on Gary because if you
rounded it at...you still have the open space in the top. So yeah.
Boyle: It would round and then you had a 3 foot opening at the top, I don't know.
Fred Hoisington: Well, let me ask the questio~ We can see what the possibilities are, sure.
Gerhardt: This is what I think 35-W, at least one of them looks like. You know you've got
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
the, what I'll call is the bird cage. When it goes like this. The mesh goes and stops like that.
It looks like the things are completely enclosed. They come up and they do this little loop.
This is open inbetween. This is 35-W. One of them I noticed had that. I don't know how
many there are along there but this is open through this section and so I would think if kids
are going to throw the rocks, is going to have to really loop that thing and it's going to hit
this side or that side so, but I'll take some pictures of that and show you what that really
looks like.
Boyle: You know it sounds like you're being k--ina of picky but for the safety factor of it, if
somebody did want to throw something over and hit one car. A rock went through one
windshicld and we'd all feel a little.
Mason: Well, if somebody wants to throw something, they're going to do it anyway. You
know I mean rocks from the sides of the road. I mean how big are these mesh links7
Fred Hoisington: They're about the same size, except they're not diamond shaped. They're
about the same size as a normal chain link fence.
Mancino: Teenage...cut across.
Mason: Well yeah, I mean you could take that to an extreme. If somebody wants to do it,
they're going to come up there with a bolt cutter and throw something through there anyway.
Boyle: Most people that do it, do not do it for that., maybe it's im?romptu.
Mason: I guess maybe I'd like to see some statistics on numbers of, how many times a rock
damages a car thrown from a bridge in the State of Minnesota you know because I personally
don't see that. I understand what's being said about the safety issue and I'm not discounting
it. From the safety standpoint I'm just thinking that the chances are so ~ of that
happening that I don't know that we need to be worried about it. I guess that's what I'm
saying.
Bohn: You don't have to be worried about it if it's enclosed.
Mason: Well yeah, and that's kind of the, to take that analogy. On NPR tonight they were
talking about all the heat and elecu'ic problems they're having out on the East Coast and
they've had to have some tempora~ black-outs for 30 minutes at a time and some people are
up in arms saying, we need to spend m~lions of more dollars to get electricity up to da~e but
then the comeback is look_ This happens once every 20 years. We don't have to spend that
kind of money and mske that effort because it's such, it's essentially a non-existent problem.
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
Bohn: How much more money are we spending for the roof of this thing?
Mason: I think this is overlcill and I want to see some more information on this before we
put, I mean it is. It's going to look like a prison in there.
Chmiel: And I don't disagree with that. But the pros and cons to that issue and the question
you rose as to how many vehicles have been hit by rocks from those, I don't know if they
even have any stats on it. But I just look at that and I think about kids in themselves and
they can stand on the side of the road and throw apples at cars too, which I know some kids
have. And I remember somebody saying that at one time but you know, it could be a
problem. I would like to see us you know take a look at that to see. Maybe find out what
those stats are and see what that appearance might be as well.
Mason: I think Mr. Meyer, in his last sentence here about the Chan pedestrian bridge in a
letter to Fred. It is my opinion that fully enclosing the bridge will give it a clauslrophobic
and fearful character which is at odds with the city's intentions. I mean we, yeah. I guess I
think that does fly in the face of what we're trying to do but Todd, any suggestions on how
we could find out7
Gerhardt: Well I've got sort of a...idea and I'll come back with some estimate~..on how
much it would cost to enclose the brkl§e itself and...I mean looldn§ at the pictures...
Mason: Well how would you find out about rocks being, I mean dam~e from cars via over,
you know things bein§ dropped on and things like that. Any idea where you'd go?
Gerhardt: I'd have to §o to Scott and see if he couldn't call the State and see if they keep
records on incidents like that.
Boyle: I guess that's important. I don't know how important that statistic is going to be.
It's a one time deal If you did it once, it's a possibility. We could get all sorts of statistics
on it.
Chmiel: If you remember, many years ago it could be done from cars as well. Where
someone threw a cement block off the end of a lzuck, a bunch of kids and it did kill the
passenger in the vehicle that was behind and that ~ed over on the Mendota Bridge so.
And I'm not saying that's going to happen but just on a precautionary aspect.
Gexhardt: Yeah, bridges are difficult. I mean you can sit there and look tight over the edge.
It almost begs you to spit on cars or throw something over ff you've got it. You know this
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
thing, you've got to really heft up a big rock to get to the Wp of that thing. At 8 feet, or
have a buddy toss it up to you.
Boyle: I think that's a very good point. It's going to discotuage somebody...of any weight at
all.
~t: And I would hope that if some kid, you know...and I just can't imagine some kid
doing thaL I ~ he really had to plan this thing out and he's got to have some other
problems if something like this is going to happem I mean you can't...
Bohn: How wide is that bridge?
Fred Hoisington: Thi~ one, 12 feet.
Bohn: And the opening would be 3 feet7
Fred Hoi~ington: The opening on the Wp7
Bohn: Yeah.
Fred Hoisington: The opening is about 2.
Nancy Mancino: My only other suggestion would be that if you are really, really concerned
about that, that you may want to start _this design over again. Maybe that was not a design
parameter when the designers designed the bridge that it needed to be so enclosed because I
don't think they would have come up with this particular airy design..Jf that would have been
a high priority in starting the design. I don't know.
Gerhardt: Well we started to look, I mean the next step you're talking about doing is either
kind of a pitched roof and the State won't allow you to pitch the wof because of the snowfall
off the Wp of the pitch onto cars as they drive underneath. So that's when we had to
abandon what was the covered bridge idea. And that's, now with that mesh up there, that
could get covered with snow...so I'd like to do the video imaging and I think we can come up
with some nice things that, there's a lot of limitations on this. The State again is controlling
us on what we teary can do on this. I mean they've got this thing, the reason the price of
this thing has skyrocketed is because you can't go in there with a pre-fab pedes~ crossway
and we felt we had a really nice, pm-fab pedestrian walkway. And MnDot's regulations
won't allow us to use that type of design. And they're dictating. This thing is going to last a
long time. This thing is one s~rong ~ that we're putting in and Fred can attest to this.
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
They've monitored this whole review process. And if they're not concerned with kids
throwing rocks over the edge of this thing you know, that has s~g to say too. They're
going to be more concerned. That's their liability is that road down below.
Mason: That's a good point.
Boyle: That's a very good point. Has handicapped access on or off of the bridge been an
issue at any time? Can I quote your...
Nred Hoisington: ...ADA standards.
Gerhardt: And that's one of the other things. We have to bring in some substantial fill over
by the Red-E-Mix site to get that sidewalk and grades for the downwwn access too. Maybe
if Charlie James has some extra fill on his sim...
Bohn: We don't need a motion or anything on this do we?
Gerhardt: I would like, it's up to you. I mean if you want to approve the motion for one of
the schemes and add the altnmative that we look at enclosing the structure. I'll be back to
you, if you feel comfortable in doing that. That's your call. Right now the two schemes do
not take the structure to be enclosed.
Chmiel: That center support ~ Fred. And the s/ze comparison with the cost
differences being that $45,000.00, right?
Fred Hoisington: Which scheme Don?
Chmiel: The center support The mid pan of the highway. As you were mentioning, the
support here as opposed to some of these. Now is it a distance, shot difference or are they all
the same in size?
Fred Hoisington: No. You mean this one?
Chmiel: Yes.
Fred Hoisington: This one is the big one and much wider in this direction. There's about
$31,000.00 difference between them.
Chmicl: Okay. From a standpoint of a u'uck going at a high speed. If he were to have hit
one or the other, which of those two, this one would have a better chance of sustaining any
l0
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - lanuary 13, 1994
real problems?
Fred Hoisington: This doesn't show it. This image doean't show it but there will be.
Chmiel: There will be a guardrail around it.
Fred Hoisington: It has to be there.
Chmiel: Yes, I realize that.
Crerhardt: In either of thc two concept~
Chmiel: And I just stop and think about some of the structural problems that they've had in
Calffomi~ I don't expect any ~uakes but I'm thinldng of truc~ hitting them, is what
I'm looking at.
Fred Hoisington: Actually it's kind of interesting because this one actually has a door and
it's open so I suppose you could sustain more damage is s~g did hit it than this one
which is a little bit more solid.
Chmiel: Well that's one of the points.
Bolm: The door goes to where7
Fred Hoisington: Well for some reason there has to be. Either they have to fill it entirely Jun
or they have to keep it ope~ for some purpose, and if Lan~ were here he could explain that
to us but I'm not exactly sure what it is. This one is a solid structure. There is no opting
in here at all.
Boyle: You got a door on there so just in case that truck goes through, he can drive right
through there.
Mason: There you go.
Boyle: You know they've really batted this around for a long time. I guess, and we could
look at a lot of different concepts and we could carry this on for another 2 to 3 months. The
Planning Commission kind of liked the idea and they put height on this thing is not all bad.
That's going to take some major involvement to get anything heavy over that to throw off. I
personally don't know if we need to take this any further. I Idnd of like Scheme A and I
guess I'd go along with what the Planning Commission recommended and move this thing
11
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
Mason: Is that a motion?
Boyle: I'd make it a motion-
Mason: I'll second that.
·
Boyle: That we accept Scheme A.
·
Bo]m: It's been moved and seconded.
Chn-dcl: Discussion?
Bohn: Discussion.
Chmiel: Is that to move ahead and have them proceed without seeing the imaging as to what
we were looking for as well?
Boyle: That's my motion.
Chmiel: Okay.
Boyle nmved, Mason seconded that the Housing and Redevelopment Authority support
the Planning Commim/_'on recommendation and select Scheme A for a total project cost
of $512,S00.00. Ail voted in favor, except Don Chmiel and Charfie Robbina who
opposed, and the motion carried with a vote of 3 to 2.
Chmiel: And my reasoning is to just make sure that we're covering as we should.
CONSmER APPROVAL OF A PRIVATE REDEVELOPMENT AGREEMENT WITH
CHARLIE JAMES,
Gerhardu Mr. Chairman, HRA members. In your packet is a private redevelopment
agreement between the HRA and T.F. James Company. There are some minor changes to
that agreement that occurrext after a meeting I held with lohn Ekan and Mr. lames' legal
counsel yesm~y. Basically what Mr. lames is ffroposing here is 106,000 square feet of
retail and otYu~ space on Lot 4, Block 1, West Village Heights 2nd Addition- With that,
there's only one area that I'd really like to key in on in the changes and it's not asking the
liRA for any additional dollars but what we're doing is changing the dollar amount...revenue
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Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
amount which in mm will change the dollars for the plan breakdown. Now let me explain
how... Over the next 4 years the possibility of this retail development paying more in taxes is
pretty good and the way ~ohn Dean now puts these private redevelopment contracts together,
he sets that dollar amount. Right now that dollnr amount is set at $581,553.00. With that,
thnt is based on tnxes that that facility would pay today on a value of $5 million. If you look
at the proposed taxes on Attachn~nt #3, which shows that the proposed development will pay
$308,475.00. That's based on taxes today and does not take any increases over the years. So
under our policy, Mr. lames cnn collect 3 years worth of incxement nmi that 3 years worth of
increment would occur in 1996, '97, '98. What we need to do is to modify that dollar
amount to _tnke. into account...he will not get any of those additional tnxes up and nbove what
I've estinutt~ on the sheet. So when I put these together, I'm conservative nnd with the
money.., that is the cap so we nre not giving him anything mor~ What you're doing is he
pays mor~, he will get more back. Am I clear on that? So what I'm suggesting we do is to
change the $581,553.00 to $767,853.00 and that tnk~s into account roughly about $62,000.00
a year in possible increase in taxes. How we did that was, the County Assessor could view
thl.q building ns having a true mnrket value of $6 million so we cnlctthtted taxes on a $6
million facility and added those additional taxes on bnsecL..tax capacity. So it's nothing out
of your pocket. Basically the bottom line is, if Charlie pays more in taxes up and above the
308, we're saying he can have those during the years '96, '97 and '98.
Chrniel: ~y what you're saying is just if the assessments are, if the Assessor judges that
property to be more than it will raise to what it would be we're looking at.
Gerhardt $5 million is the minimum. And other things could be that the city one of these
years may raise taxes and Charlie will pay more in taxes. And more than lilmly the County
and the School District will continue to raise taxes and pay you more in taxes. And what
he's saying is he wants to have the option to collect those and with my conservative numba~
that limits...up and above the $308,000.00 that I estimamd.
Chmieh Is there anywhere within the contract we can make that clarification7
Gerhardt: If your motion would be to just modify my number of $581,553.00 to $767,853.00,
that would be more than adequate.
Boyle: And your question was, is it in the contract Todd. Was that question answered?
Chmicl: Would it be within thc contract so that reread could be made.
Boyle: And you're saying yes.
13
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
Chmiel: By saying this and by adopting that ir/nH of motion, you're saying that...
Crerhardt: If you look to Exhibit D, which is the IJmi~l Revenue Tax Increment Note. It
calls for $581,553.00.
Chmieh What page is that Todd?
Gerhardt: It's one of your attachments. D-1 on page, it's probably the first.
Mason: Schedule D, D-17 h's right after Exhibit A?
Gerhardt: Yes.
Mason: Which is right after the redevelopment conuacc
Gerhardt: It says United States of America. State of Minnesota. County of I-Immepin.
Mason: Too far. You're too far. Back up. Yeah.
Gerhardt: We're changing that dollar amount to $767,853.00. And then on page 10 of, in
front of there about 5 pages on page 10 of the Private Redevelopment Contract, Section
4.2(a). You have the $581,000.00 in there and that would also change to $767,853.00. Those
are the two areas of the contract that would change.
Boyle: Will that change 4.2(c)7
Gerhardt: Yes. And in.~ad of the total annual tax increment payable to the redeveloper as
land write down, the $193,851.00 would change to $255,951.00 and that's just basically the
$767 divided by 3.
Robbins: Todd, one more comment. Under the recommcndation...it has staff recommeods
approval of the style and the redevelopment agreement. I'm assuming the redevelopment is
our standard household approved, what we've used before. I thinlr this is the first timc we've
seen it in this context where we also are approving the architectu~ style at the same time.
Because I'm not sure we've gone through that process. That doesn't mean what I've seen
isn't good. That isn't the question. It's more of to follow suit with the rest of the plans in
Gerhardt: Just to touch on that one. I have asked Charlie James to be present tonight that he
may go through this site plan in detail for you to highlight some of the style that he has
14
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
incorporated into his building. Somc of the changes that the City Council and Planning
Commission have asked him to make and meeting some of those needs of the community and
matching up to some of the styles in the downtown area. If the Chairwon of the HRA at this
time would like to hear from Mr. lmnes, I think he is prepared to make that presentation.
Bohn: Mr. lames.
Charlie lames: Good evening. I guess before we get onto the project design, I just wanted to
perhaps offer a few more points of clarification on modification to the con~act that's being
proposed. Number one, I want to make it clear that we're not asking for anything different or
any changes or anything more than is what policy of the HRA. What the concern is is that
we haven't gotten our guaranteed maximum price from KlaUS Anderson yet and we're
concerned that to the extent that this project ~ns over or that the County Assessor comes up
with a different valuation than what we anticipa~ that by fixing these numbers we wouldn't
be able to, once this thing is agreed to, we wouldn't be able to adjust that. And since this is
a pay as you §o program, the City is not out of pocket on anything. I mean basically ff you
don't get the money, we don't pay the increased amount. What we tried to do here with Mr.
Dean is basically allow this W be a fixed conuact but to have them in as sort of a moving
formula and that formula is nothing different than Todd has explained to me is what is your
standard policy for everyone in the TIF district or your most recent policy for everyone in the
district. So I just want to make that clear. We're not here asking for anything more or
anything out of the ordinary and that's what that modification is about. Tonight I have with
me Tim McCoy. He's the project architect. Tim has his own firm. He's a graduate from the
University of Minnesota School of Architecture and also has a Masters Degree in Architecture
from Harvard University and if you'd like, I'm not sure what the format should be here
tonight but if you'd like, Tim can perhaps spend 5 or 10 minutel/, or how6'ver much time
you'd like, to §o through all the elements of the project and basically explain to you how he
got to where we're at and how we've laken into consideration the Vision 2002, the Highway
5. The proposed Highway 5 report and plan and other aspects of this project so.
Bohn: I'd appreciate that.
Charlie James: Okay, Tim.
Tim McCoy: Good evening. I know that the Mayor and Councilman Mason have already
been through this overview so if they'll indulge me, I'll go through it.one more time in tm'ms
of how we arrived at this particular design and site plan for thc project. When Bycrly's
initially became in~ in this location as a potential site for the new stm~ what we had
done was we had sat down with them with Charlie lames and looked at a number of
alternative locations on _this total 13 acre site parcel wiih them in terms of orientation of the
15
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 113, 1994
building and sighting and so forth. What the relationships were to the access and internal
circulation and parking potent/al and any type of relationship to the retail component of the
project that would be added. And I thinlc early on we decided that we would locate the
building up in this northeast comer of the site. Up in the broadest area of the site and arient
it down to West ?Sth Street. By doing that and locating it in this particular area we actually
aligned the entry of the store directly with the center line of the existing curb cut off of West
?Sth Street which would allow us to make some type of special feature out of the entry of the
swre. There aren't a lot of areas where there's a lot of glass in a supermazket that you can
really make something I think or give it some type of special architecunal treatment. At the
same time we developed an employee parking area over to the east side of the supermaflcet
and along the north side, adjacent to the relatively steep berm here that goes up to multiple
family housing to the north, we developed a service drive that goes all the way along the
northern edge of the property and talre~ care of all the new service and loading funcfion~ to
the project. And in this particular location we had studied a nnmber of different locations
relative to the store in terms of the drive thru grocery pick-up area. We looked at it on the
west side of the building. On the east side of the ba;ilding. Byerly's decided that this front
location on the south side of the building is one that best suited their needs and they felt
worked best for their uaffic patterns around their store. One thing that that's enabled us to
do is w attach the retail component of the project directly to the su~ and in planning
some of the major features of that, or we k-ina of pinched down the center of this so we could
extend our looding ar~ at the north side a little bit. Develop a little mini-pedestrian plaza on
the south side of the project and this entry, just step the bnilding back out since the Byerly's
is set back quite a ways because of the drive thru pick-up area. The third major component
of the project was the ¢~ building which we pulled down to the location closer to
West ?8th w try to establish a little bit of a relationship with the street and essen~y break
up this broad expanse of parking and the supermarket retail development rather than putting it
up as one more element on the west side of what's already a fairly long slructure. And we
worked with the staff quite closely throughout this process in tetras of trying to respond to a
lot of the concerns that they had in the staff report and just on a kind of an informal bash
and also the considerations of the Highway 5 corridor overlay study. The landscape
consultant report and so fort~ We're showing this/rom our landscape plan which is now in
it's sixth revision ~nce it's initial submisdon on November 1st. And some of the things that
will be done is we've tried to develop pretty much of a continuous buffer or screen up at the
northern boundary of the site. Those are predominantly Colorado and Black Hills spruce
trees and we've interspersed. I think we've got about a dozen white oak. We've got 16
white oaks up there also which will hopefully relate to the Oak Ponds development to the
north. We're developing some lower level screen_ lng up there too. A sumac and so forth in
that area. Trying to maln_tsin plWa~ much the rhythm of the city lree planting along Kerber
and West ?Sth Street. One of the major changes that we've made in the landscape plan since
we met with the Council is we had 3 large internal landsca~ pm'iring lot islands and we
16
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
were responding to about 3 different skeWhes that slaff had proposed in terms of mea~ of
dispersing those islands and developing some more overstory Irees within the parking lot area
so that at maturity we can get some pretty full shading and coverage of the parking lot area.
In terms of the design of the bni]tlings themselves. The design of the project was really
driven by Byerly's in terms of establishing the themes and images for the project and so
forth. I mean once we got a lot of these site elements fixed, what we did is we went through.
We were given essentially a fixture plan, a pe~meter plan for the Byerly's store and then
we're going to try to make a building or a piece of archi~ out of that and I think most
people generally tend to think of Byerly's as something that has some pretty anonymous types
of bniltlirtgs and so forth. You know it's pretty much background buildings although they're
all nice brick slructures and so forth. There's not anything that is really highly distinctive
about then~ And that's I think partially just due to the type of philosophy that they've got.
That if they've got a design philosophy, they want to have a building that wears well over
time. Something that will look good 20 years from now and so forth and would rather not be
on, maybe not being on the cutting edge of design or whatever but they would, are just as
interested in how their project lasts over time as what it looks like the day it opens up. So
we had gone through probably about I'd say 7 or 8 different types of schemes in terms of
what the vi~o! image and archil~mml Ireamt of the store would be and we finally settled
on something that had the arched openings that you see over on the board to the fight over on
the chairs as being probably the most distinctive visual feature of the bnilding. What we've
tried to do is develop something that would have some classical motifs in it and so forth
using arches and barrel walls and yet still remain somewhat conservative and this was the
scheme that they preferred the most. And _thi.~ is even one of the number of variations on the
arched opening and arched drive thru grocery pick-up areas. We ranged all the way fa-om
arches all the way across to a combination as we've got at the present time. It also in thi.~
scheme what we're doing is we're lrying to vary the plane and the pattern of the bricks
somewhat. That is some of these large blank wall areas we've actually recessed the brick
panels to give them a little bit of relief. We've got a number of different bands of different
types of...and different relief in the brick and so forth. And this will be the first Byerly's
swre in the area which intxalx~ates..~m~__tofial owtdde of the brick in any kind of significant
way and we're proposing some use of Kasoda stone in here as trim and little feature type of
elements within the project. It's the same stone that they used on the Norwest Bank Building
in downwwn Minneapolis. And the store will be brick all the way around. It also has, and
we've got some elevations that I'll get out of the east elevation facing Ker~ Drive. That's
where the restaurant's going to be located and we're going w have arched windows in there
which will be the first use of windows that they've used in any of the restamants in any of
their stores locally. And as I mentioned, the Byerly's design pretty much drove the theme of
the rest of the projects and we tried to carry through some of the same arcade trea~ts on
the south side of the retail project. The arched openings once again. One of the things I
forgot to mention is that we're stepping out the hdck at the wp of all of these bnildlngs or
17
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - lanuary 13, 1994
corbeling it out to get a little bit of a cornice line at the wp of all the s~ which is
probably a little bit difficult to see from your disumce at the present time. Since the site
steps down to the west, it enabled us to develop a two story retail portion on the ~
most side of the site which will maintsin the same height as the Byerly's store. So one of the
things we're trying to do is carry over these bsndings of detail and parapet heights
continuously through the project so that as the retail steps down, we end up still cazrying
some of these lines all the way through the project. The most notable feature on this retail
board is the clock tower down here which aligns once agsln directly with the center line of
thc western driveway corning off of West 78th Street. That's the main entry drive to the
Target store. And what we tried to do there was essentially take all the service functio~ the
toilets and the mechankal spaces and so forth and the elevator for this two story western
most building. The upper portion probably being office use or service types of business.
Dentist or lawyers or whatever the case is. And we put the elevator in that tower element.
That's actually the elevator lobby that you're looking at in _this area. This little square right
down here. And so at night hopefully it's going to be a very transparent type of element
that's lit up that you can see all the way from the front of the Target store and conversely in
the day when you §et off the elevator on the second floor, you'll be looking through this
glass wall out to the south and so forth. $o we tried once again to take a couple of items.
The large circular opening at the main entry of the Byerly's store and also the elevator tower
down in the western end of the site and...And although we do not have a specific user for the
free stab_ding co~ building at the present gme, we do plan on trying to caw] over the
same type of arched entry theme and the same type of brick detailing, coursing and so forth
in that particular project and we do have a preliminary drawing of that that wasn't as
enthusiastically received, and pan of the reason for that is we really don't have a client and it
was just kind of a one shot take on trying to get that impre~ion of what that might look lik~.
But I think that probably gives a fair overview and I'm sure you've got a number of
questions relatod to how we developed it and how we arrived at some additional decisions
that we made. I've got one particular question in mind I guess that I'm expecting.
Bohn: Have you thought about a gabled roof?
Tim McCoy: Yes, and that was the question as a mn._n)er_ of fact. It wasn't because we didn't
explore that or didn't offer that to Byerly's. When I mentioned that we had probably done ?
or 8 alternatives. As a matter of fact we did more than one rehted to that, and that was just
something that they preferred not to have for their store in term~ of that being, as a mn__tter_ of
fact they didn't like it at all. One thing that I should also mention is that, although it's still
within the same conservative vein as most of Byedy's stores, they did want ~o make some
type of departure in _this store from what thcir standard desi~ would be. And in travcis
around the country they did take photographs of other types of retail projects and say these
are the kinds of the elements that we like and so farth. They saw thi~ and thought this looks
18
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
nice and we tried to incorporate some of those type of ideas. But the short answer is, they
didn't like it and it didn't make a great deal of diff~ to us. One of the things that I
should mention in terms of trying to apply the gabled roofs to suuctu~s of this size, which
are 60,000 square feet plus. Almost, I think we're up in about the 99,000 square feet of
continuous developrmmt here between the Byerly's and the retail space. Is that it's often
diffi~t in these ldnd of large box users to essentially what you're doing is you're treating;
trca~g the exterior 10 or 15 feet in terms of utilizing that type of roof form just because of
the types of pitches that you need on the metal roofs and so forth. So in some respects some
of the things end up being more or less decorated boxes and I'm not, I ~ I've done those
myself and we have at least one of those under conslruction right now. There's nothing
inherently wrong with that and at the same time, I guess within some of the parameters that
we were working in, we tried to do the best job that would meet the interest of all the parties
involved and we're hoping that we've done that and we're hoping that we've created
something that will be a real asset to the community over _time and so forth. One of the
things I feel that's a little bit nn¢ormnate about that provision rclated to the use of the pitched
roofs, and I think that's a spedfic provision now of the Highway 5 corridor overlay district,
that it's nnfortuna~ that if that was the intent, that it wasn't able to be done 20 years from
now. There's so much with the character or whatever. There's so much of the other in the
area that it's, I guess a lot harder to make it a consistent theme as I'm sure is the intent
behind that.
Bohn: How high are the parapets7
Tim McCoy: The parapets arc, the top of the parapet is 26 feet 4 inches at the high portion
and we are going to be rai~ing these parapets up. These are shown at 20 feet right now and
we're going to move those up to about 24 feet just because we've done some additional
studies of thc building and some of the mechanical equipment and so forth and would like to
raise those and that was one of thc things that Byerly's had a little bit of a reservation about.
This dropping down this much between _this element and kind of isolating these two end
portions from the larger center portion so we are rai~ing that up to something that will be
below this crown that will be in there but we're up at 26 feet 4 inches. So we're essentially
talking about a winirnum of about, our bearing elevation and we haven't, we don't have
enough mechanical right now to get it precisely but it's going to be either the wp of the roof
elevation is within 4 inches of 20 feet. So we're talking about a 6 foot parapet at the front of
the store.
Bohn: What k/nd of ~ing are you having around the mechanicals up there7
Tim McCoy: I guess we haven't delta-mined that at the present time because we haven't
picked the specific equipment and so forth. I know one of the things that we have discussed.
19
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - lanuary 13, 1994
I know just in terms of local, they haven't sized all of the loads and so forth. For in~ance
for some of their large units, they haven't decided whether they're going to use one. One
rooftop unit to service the particular area or use two smaller ones for that. I mean there's
some dcficiencics cithcr way. I mean it's more inexpcnslvc to go with onc m~it but then
you've got problems if there's ever a breakdown and thom you're without any kind of service
for that area at all But in the elevations that we've got, non-color we've got some of the
rear elevations of the sWre and I know in one area between what is the larger me~.7~nlne, at
the receiving area in the back. We've already decided to raise the parapet to the same height
between there and the second level office there. I know that's kind of hard for you to
imagine but just because we know that more of the mechanical is going to go over on ~is
western side of the store. We're going to try to place it as close as possible to where our
second floor office area will be. The office area, and maybe could you get the board that has
all of the rest of the elevations on it. It might be easier, like I say, since I've been looking at
this every day and to...that one will do. Here's once again the restaurant area facing Keflx~
Boulevard but what I was referring to was there is a second level office area on the western
portion of the building that goes up the full height and the roof over the sWre is lower than
that. So what we've been discussing with the en~neers is trying to get as much of the
mechanical up against the roof or up against the boundary of the second floor as possible so
that will be more or less of a natural screen to the west and northwest. In some of the
preliminary sections that we've cut through here, and this will be a little bit difficult to see
also. This is actually behind the Byerly's store ~ncl this is the relative elevation of the
wwnhouses that are up there right now. The first floor is at 996 of the wwnhouses and our
wp of roof fight now, not including the parapet, is at 998 up there and the top of the parapet
as we had planned it in here went up I think 6 1/'2 feet above the first floor here. We've got
a more severe situation behind the retail space farther to the west as the grade goes up. But
that's I guess to our benefit that we'll have that second level office area on the west side of
the Byerly's sWre because that will help to screen the roof from that ~icle. From I think that's
the Oak Ponds development. But I guess our intent is to try to do what needs to be done
because I know, just from the standpoint of we do predominsntly retail and I know just from
the standpoint of the budget that we've got to work with is a...greater budget than we've had
to work with on a retail project before of any size. And I know how much Charlie wants to
do a good job on the project and so forth and we don't want to have a project where we try
to devote all that invesunents and effom towards doing something as good as possible and
then having something where we're looking at our bnilding with people or other potential
clients or photographing it or whatever the case would be and saying, see the rooftop
equipment up there. We spent weeks and months w0ring to develop all the details for this and
we've got something that looks like it's got little units sticking out of the top of the building
and so forth. And in the same token, in terms of screening between this project and the
multiple family housing up to the north. We're interested in screening that not just from the
standpoint of saying, well let's see what we can get by with the city to screen that because
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
looking at this from an elevation out on West 78th Street, you've got some fine multiple
family housing but we don't want to drive by or look at this building out from West 78th
Street and have it look like there are townhouses growing out of our roof either. So we
would like to have a nice green background on the project also.
Robbins: A question, lust from the other centare or strip malls that are in the locality of
Town Square, Market Square, the new bank. As lira was saying about the roof. There's also
the architectural style has been a little bit angular involved and with a little...of the ~ green
shall we say. Of those colors. This to me, as being a lay person, looks different than that.
While it's a great drawing. It's a wonderful store by the way. It looks different. Is there
any way of kind of combining any of that or doing something to make it should we say
compatible to what's in town now?
Tim McCoy: ...your coming directly from east of this property starting down at the Fire
Station and so forth and in terms of some of the, I mean the~ are more or less rectilinear
types of buildings and we've added some of these little stone features up here to be...with the
fire house and so forth. I know what you mean because it is different than what most
commercial retail arc~ that you find in outlying areas these days. And I don't know
exactly what we do. I wean I know Byerly's is looking to use a little bit different brick than
the standard kind of chocolate brown. I mean they want something, it's probably not going
to be this red. That's just a matter of the pencils that we had but something that would be a
little bit livelier and that hopefully incorporated some of the stone materials and so forth but.
In terms of other types of colors and things, I think it's possible that we're probably limited
by doing that. I wean I guess I've developed, and af~ wor~ng on this over the last few
months pretty much intez~mlized an image of what this is going to end up being and I think it
will be pretty nice. One of the things, as I have pointed out, is we've got a number of
planter types of things adjacent to the building and so forth along the front of the wines and
spirits and raised planters...But I agree~ It is di~t and.
Charlie James: I'd say that we probably relate more to some of your rrmnicipal StZllCtur~ in
town. Some of the elements that you've incorporatrxi..anade reference to the fire hall and so
I guess I understand that we do fit in. I think that what mak~ this project maybe stand out is
thc fact that it has exceptional quality and exceptional deign so I think we stand hoads above
and maybe this is more of an urban concept, or the finishes that we're showing on this
building, they're not consistent with painted block ~ the Target but does that mean that we
should build a structure out of psinted block. I mean when we first came in, at that _time the
landscape ordinance was 5%. We came in with 8% and now God knows, I lost count after
the last time we were here with all these things in the parking lot. So I'm going to say
something maybe a little out of line here. I mean ff we have a hard time relating to some of
the other things in town, I guess it would be because, at least I'd like to think maybe we're,
21
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
the difference is that we're a little better quality or higher standard finish and that sort of
thing so. I don't know, I'd hate to see us...building down you know to, I'm sorry I shouldn't.
But I guess what I'm trying to say is, I thinir there are elemen~ in wwn here that we do
relate to and I think we relate to everything on our side of the street. The bank, City Hall,
the fire stafion~
Boyle: I think it'S got a lot of class. It's very excellent. N'we building.
Charlie lames: We could paint the brick.
Chmlel: I think what Charlie is saying, and Charlie is saying, is maybe wc should have
started with this project. Although I like what we have downtown. But this is going to be a
compliment to the balance of downwwn.
Mason: Definitely a compliment.
Boyle: It's be very difficult to try to put the pitch roofs and some of that to try and msire
this look like some of the things across the street.
Chmiel: Put your paintbrush in your back pocket Charlie.
Boyle: ...Charlie is that we like this better.
Mason: No, this looks _and I do appreciate the time and the effort and I quite honestly can't
wait to see it happen. I want to get going on this.
Chmlel: When are you going to start digging, do you know?
Charlic James: Well ori~nslly we can~ in here and thought we were going to be
conventional consmlction with block and what the schedule is now is we're going to go with
tilt up panels and then put the brick on in the spring when we can contwl the environment so
the biggest concern I had was having this bnilriing lilm'ally under wraps because under the
previous scenario, I was in here trying to get a grading permit They wo,~d have had to
scaffold up to the block. Cover that and then they had to put the brick on at the same time
because otherwise if they went onto the block and then they'd come back to these scaffolding
twice and...twice and so then you'd be putting the brick on under wraps and there's a lot of,
there is a word for it...Brick, under different, you want to make sure that the mason can get
back far enough so that he can see how the little tonalities or whatever in the brick are
working out fight and then also that you're mortar is going to be, that can turn different
colors ~ntling on the ~ and the heat that's supplied so I was very paranoid that
22
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
they'd literally pull the wraps off _this thing in the spring and it'd look like somebody in a
zoot suit you know. Oh my God, what have we done. So the schedule now is to go tilt up.
You get the basic structure enclosed so we can be working in there and building out the
interior and then we're going to come in the spring, when we don't have to...and have more
control and then hang all the masonry in the front of the building and so because of that,
we're not going to be ripping frost now until Felmmry because the best insulation on the
ground is the existing dirt and where this bnildlng is going to go, there's 12 to 22 ~
covered.
Mason: Pretty well insulated.
Charlie Sarrw~: So that's the worst condition...so we're looidng at February then. And then
all of a sudden, when it comes to the walls, they come at once because they'll be all fl~i~ pre-
fabrication that's going on in the background.
Bohn: When do you expect to have it completvat?
Charlie Same~: We have to have it completed by Octo~ 15th under the lease agreement that
I have with Byerly's. Typically retailers, if they can't be open for Nov~ or
Thanksgiving I should say and C~trism~as, then they don't want to be open until ~g
because they don't want to carry all that special merchandise and not be able to sell it and
then have to mark it down and move it out. They don't want to be c~g Thanksgiving
decorations and not open until Christmas and so forth so we're under a real time crunch.
There will be a lot of activity out there.
Bohu: Any questions? Thank you very much.
Mason: Are you looking for a motion here Mr. Chairman?
Gerhardt: If you guys feel comfortable with both the architectm~ style based on-..and would
like to see something more. I don't know what Charlie could come up with but if you want
to go with staff recommendation, it'd be my suggestion that you change the $925,425.00 in
special assessments and land write down assistance to $1,111,725.00. That will give us
enough leeway there if taxes did go up from what my estim~_~ on it is.
Robbins: I would move that we accept slaff's recommendation with the modifications that
we've talked about regarding the dollars.
Mason: Second.
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
Bohn: Discussion.
Boyle: Refresh my, on the modifications,
Robbins: Meaning we changed the dollars upward to reflect the increase of the tax dollars.
Bohn: Any discussion7
Robbins: Discussion. lust a matter of a little more technical. With the change or with the
approval of thc style of architectm~, if anything l~:chnically changes, does that mean it has to
come back to us again to approve it?
Gerhardt: There should not be any technical changes based on these drawings as they've
been presented. If they are, I believe he would have to go back through the Planning
Commission and the City Council and I would keep you updated on that also. So I don't
know what the reco~fion was for the out tmildlng. Is that a standard design7
Charlie lames: Yeah, and Tim isn't up to speed on that but we do have a party that we're
designing for there right now on that. Or I mean we do have a party identified and he was
just given the packet this week on that and so...I talked to Bob Generous about that and we
have to come back and let the Planning Commission revisit that.
Bohn: Will we be seeing that then7
~t: I'm usually included. The process we've been going through for the last 2 years is
that it goes to Planning Commission, City Council and then I bring it to the HRA. I think
Charlie would be more than happy to come back and visit with us at that time.
Boyle: Is the intent to build that building this year7
Charlie lames: Everything's got to be done by December 31.
Bohn: The builtting's then to the west aren't included7
Gerhardt: The one bnilding down from you Jun, the professi_'_onal office building, is the one
I'm talking about.
Charlie lame~: Everything that you see here will be built at once and compleied this year.
Everything on this area right here.
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
Gedmrdt: What Nancy's telling me is you have to come back to the Planning Commission
on some site plans with the office building?
Nancy Mancino: Yes, that's one of the conditions.
Charlie lames: Right. I mean I talked to Bob Generous about that today and he said that we
don't have to have like a month's delay or whatever. I can just hop back on and say ....
accommodate me but they're just waiting for us. We have preliminary design for this
building. There were some suggestions from the Planning Commission and the Council I
believe but in any event we're addressing those issues. We're waiting to kind of firm up and
we have three different competing uses here, all which were mu0~lly exclusive in terms of
design and we finally have had a meeting of the minds with which party we're going with
and our. Yeah, this was the design of the building as it was initially proposed and there was
some talk about, down in this project here for instance the building is kind of over here. It's
stepping out.and this element stands up and then the back end stepping out and stepping out
here again and then...and then this is in a different plane than this element here so there, we
had this as a preliminary design for that building and there was some talk about varying the
roof line a little bit more and I think that was a major concern was the roof line and trying to
do a little bit more in terms of the volumes on the front of the building here than what we
had here so that's what we're working on~
Gedmrdt: You don't have any problem coming back here when you finalize those with thc
Planning Cornmission and City Council and the HRA7 I mean they just to be updated on
how it's going to look and what impact..
Bolm: Any other questions?
Robbins moved, Mason seconded that the Housing and Redevelopment Authority
approve the architeetm~ style and the Private Redevelopment Agreement with the
Jmes Company and their request for $1,111,725.00 in special assessmem and land
write, down assistance. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
HANUS FACILITY ROOF REPAIRS UPDATE,
Gerhardt: ...about a month ago I guess. Fred and Don handled that and at that meeting there
were some discussion on some Hanus facility development and with that the HRA directed
staif...in making the necessary roof repa/rs to the I-Ianus facility. And I believe staff was to
go back and meet with Mr. Kirt and see if he was interested in making those roof repairs
because it...what I'H call is the stand up roof section on the roof until the roof was in repair.
Staff met with Mr. Kin here approxima~¥ 2 weeks ago and from that meeting staff was to
Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
look at the option of maybe placing that roof into a mansard roof. So using a mansard roof
design, would attach that parapet roof, mansard on the outside of the buil~ling. Included in
your packet is a memo from Fred Hoisington that expressed concern with that in the cost
area. That it would be substantially more than placing it on top of the roof. With that stuff
felt the HRA would not go along with the additional costs in trying to fix the situation. Since
our meeting Mr. Kin had thrown out one other idea that maybe we just re-use the interest
rate on the repurchase loan amount. In my mind I felt that it's just another way that the
HRA is going to pay for this. Fred has talked to Mr. Kin this week and Fred, I'd feel more
comfortable if you expressed what your conversations were with Mr. Kin and how we might
deal with this roof problem.
Fred Hoisington: It seems to me that the issue is pretty simple. That the roof is either
repaired now and paid for by Mr. Kirt or repaired later and paid for by Mr. Kirt. If he pays
for it later, he doesn't have the benefit of the new ~. So we kind of explained that to
him over the telephone and he said, well I'd still ~ the HR to consid~ this redu~on in
interest rate and I said, I don't think that there's any chance that will happen. He said, I
don't want this issue closed and one of the reasons we wanted you to act on it tonight
somehow or another is because when the parkin§ lot gets started, and if it §ets far enough
along before the roof is placed, there could be some additional costs associated with the roof
because of the potential damage to the parking lot during construction. Now it probably
wouldn't be big but you're running some risk if that happened. But Gary says he needs mare
time to decide what he's going to do. I guess what we'll recommend to you is maybe to take
another month and give him a chance to come up with a way to pay for this thing. But one
thing he did throw out. I guess I would just throw it out to you, is the possibility or the
proposal perhaps the HRA could finance that to repair the existing roof...at a lower interest
rate for just that element rather than having to write the whole thing down for that purpose.
If the answer is no to that, I thinl~ probably we simply won't do anything as far as that is
concerned. If the answer is yes, at least we can keep negotlafions...and come back to you
next month with something in the way of an answer.
Chmiel: What's the difference between our, what's our interest rate on this now7
Gerhardt: It's 10% on $700,000.00.
Chmiel: 10% of how much?
Chmiel: Okay.
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Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1~)4
Bohn: We're not going to put a mansard roof on it, correct?
Gerhardt: The mansard roof was substantially more than the roof design that you approved.
Fred Hoisington: And what Gary is concerned about, one of the reasons to consider the
mansard to begin with was, this roof does have a number of...but at least the structure's there
to do that. There is...outside of that smlcture so that's much more expensive. This is really
the cheapest alternative.
Bohn: And we don't want to put a mansard roof on if the roofi..
Fred Hoisington: Well you could put the mansard on if the building was...you can't do that.
The ~ expensive roof...
Gerhardt: And if you §o along and make the pwpo~ put on the roof that you're pwpo~g,
and Gary decides to fix the roof 5 years/rom now, h~ has to rip that tar roof off. And would
it §o back up or things like that. You know we don't have anything in agroe~e~ts to make
sure that that stays up. Because then he will incur the additional costs of putting that back up
again and he was also concerned about the number of penetrafions,..I'm not concerned about
the penetrations...I think that that is more than suffice to handle that.
Bohn: Staff's recommendation is?
Gerhardt: Right now I guess I'd like to open up the discusdon regarding _this potential loan
situation. I haven't discussed that with Don yet and I gue~ I wouldn't even want to have
you discuss that and I'd guess I'd ~ to take it to legal counsel and see if we can even do
something like that or how we could go about structuring something.
Bohn: If we would want to.
Gerhardt: Yeah, and what interest rate it is.
Mason: Maybe that's the first thing we should quickly talk about is whether we even want to
consider that or hOC
Chmiel: I agree.
Mason: I'm not convinced we do.
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Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
Bohn: I'm not convinced we do either.
Mason: I'm seeing five heads shaking their he~s no on that so.
Gerhardt: Well I guess I got my direction-
Mason: Fisher cut bait I guess huh? I mean is that being unreasonable to not even consider
that?
Chmiel: Well, I think I've got the same position as you are but the thing is, I don't know if
we want to put ourself in that position. If we establish a precedent as well by doing this.
Have we done it before?
Gerhardt: I guess the only other example of something like this would be Colonial Centar
where we physically went in and msde the facade i .mpmvements and basically assessed those
costs back against. But this is a little different. We own the building and it's substantially
more and I don't know. We've done it to Colonial Center and...I don't know if we should
get in the banking business.
Bohn: You hit the nail right on the head.
Chmiel: Government gets involved in too many things.
Bohn: Do we need a motion for this? Your recommendation?
Gerhardt: No. Fred, are you looking for any?
Fred Hoisington: No, I thini~ you could make it very clear to Gary by just simply saying,
Gary. You need to replace the roof. The existing roof won't hold...
Mason: That's real cut and dry. I like that.
Geflmrdt: I'll leave it open to, I tried calling him today. He's out of town until Monday but
I will express that to him and if he wishes to come back and make arguments.
1994 MEETING TIMES.
Bohn: 1994 meeting times. Does anybody got any problems with it?
Mason: I have a conflict. I'm pretty sure I have a conflict on October 20th but that's not
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Housing and Redevelopment Authority - Sanuary 13, 1994
worth. I'm pretty sure I'm out of town that night. But that's a long ways down the road too
so I wouldn't anticipate.
Bohn: We could always change it.
Mason: That's fine. Yeah.
Bohn: How about Gary for July...
Boyle: There could potentially be a conflict but it's a long way down the road. The 24th of
February right now is a conflict I believe. I might be back in time but I don't know. You
could probably find any month where some person is going to have a problem.
Gerhardt: We try to schedule these on off Council meeting work days.
Mason: Which has been nice.
Gerhardt: I don't know why we do fl~at. The Council's meeting every Monday anyway. But
it's understandable that you're not going to msire every meeting. If we can play around with
other things so you can make it, whatever we can do.
Bohn: We try to make it even.
Boyle: Thursdays seem to be the best night.
Mason: Yeah, I agree.
Bohn: And it's always been usually the third Thursday of the month and everybody knows
that months and years ahead.
Robbins: I would motion to accept the approval of meeting dates as indicated on the '94
meeting schedule.
Mason: Second.
Robbins moved, Mason seconded to approve the Housing and Redevelopment Authority
meeting schedule for 1~ as presente& All voted in favor and the motion carried.
APPROVAL OF BILLS:
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Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
Robbins: Question on the bills. I mean I asked this before and it was shown last week on,
or last month on the statement regarding Holmes and Graven. I understand we weren't using
them for counsel anymore.
Gerhardt: You're correct. We've tried to...away from Holmes and try to give them all over
to Knutson but Holn~ is, it's attachment number 6. An outline of some of the fees...Target
we brought Hohnes back in to bring those people back in line. It just got to be too much so
Holmes is so heavily involved with the State and tax increment. I know we made that
comment to you that we tried to use them less and we just can't. We're dependent on them
for their knowledge in the lax increment laws and the changes that occur there. And they're
the front runners. I mean Roger's excellent in getting things out timely and that and from the
planning aspect but when it comes to redevelopment..~elopment contracts and working
with Ryan's and the Target's and Byerly's people, Hoknes and C~aven have done it 3 or 4
times and they know how to deal with those. So we tried in the past Chaxlie and we just
can't. I mean they're just so helpful and it's money well spent by the HRA.
Robbins: Well we're not doubling up on any fees by paying, by having our counsel review
their findings or any of that?
Gerhardt~ No. No. We just, with their expertise we just need them on our staffi..
Bohn: Okay. Can I have a motion?
Robbins: $o moved.
Mason: Second.
Robbins moved, Mason seconded to approve the Housing and Redevelopment Authority
bills as presented. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
CJer~t: Did that include the pre-existing I-IRA bills? My whole purpose there to ex~lain
some of those?
Robbing: My motion included them, yes.
Ga'hardt: And Tom...he owns the Mail Source building. I think we used Mail Source...
lIRA PRESENTATIONS:
C. vcflmrdt: One other item I handed out to you tonight that needs action tonight is we need
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Housing and Redevelopment Authority - January 13, 1994
your authorization to acqu/re part of the Mortenson property off of Lake Drive East for the
pedestrian bridge. With that there's a resolution and if I could get a motion that would give
the City Attorney authorization to start that condemnation for the taking of that property.
Here's a map that shows the area of question- We do not own...south side of Highway 5
where they Wuch down with the pedestrian bridge and that's owned by the Mortenson
Company and we've already received an appraisal and completed for that taking over there
but we need to pass this resolution tonight authorizing the City Attorney to start negotiations
and use condemnation if necessary...I do not know. I haven't seen the apprais~ I don't
want to see the appraisal. We leave that up to the City Attorney. That's for condemnation
purposes so basically we would bring that back for you to approve that acquisition...
Robbins: So all you're asking us is for the direction to start.
C-edmrdt: Authorization.
Robbins: I would motion to start per the letter from Campbell-Knutson-
Bohn: It's been moved by Charlie aud seconded by Gary.
Robbins moved, Boyle seconded that the Housing and Redevelopment Authority approve
a resolution authorizing the City Attorney to begin nek~tiati~ to acquire the property
owned by Mortenson Company on Lake Drive East for the pedestrian bridge, and
authorization to start condemnation proceedings if necessary. All voted in favor and the
motion carried.
Boyle moved, Mason seconded to adjourn the meeting, All voted in favor and the
motion carrie& The meeting was adjourned.
Submitted by Todd Ger~t
Asst. Executive Director
31