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1991 05 01MAY PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING lg91 thai an Emmings called the meeting to order at 7:35 p.m.. :S PRESENT: Tim Erhart, Ladd Conrad, Annette Ellson, Steve Emmings, Joan hrens, and Jeff Farmakes : Brian Batzli ST PRESENT: Paul Krauss, Planning Director and Jo Ann Olsen, Senior Planner PUBLI HEARING: PRELI PLAT TO SUBDIVIDE A 39 '0 TWO SINGLE FAMIL LOTS WHICH WILL REQU)RE A LOT ABrA AND ~OT WIDTH VARIANCE (LAKESHORE WIDTH ON PROPERTY ZO iD AT 6541 MI SHTA PARKWAY LUND AND D~NA JOHNSON, WASHTA ~Y COURT ~E)DITION. PubIi Present: Nae ~ddrews Ken LI.nd Dana 'ohnson Charl s Anding Tom K ueger Joan impson 395 Hwy 7 6301Greenbriar 6601Minnewashta Parkway 3860 Linden Circle · 6560 Minnewashta Parkway Jo Anl Olsen presented the staff report on this item. Chairman Emmings call the public hearing to order. Dana 55331 : I 'm Dana Johnson. I live at 6301 Greenbriar in Excelsior, Ken : I'm Ken Lurid. I live just down the street at 395 Highway 7. Dana today forth has 1 have en We fr foot here the here son: Well first of all I want to thank you for the opportunity be able to come in here and talk about the variances here and so Ken Lund and I have lived in the area for quite a few years. Ken here for 25 years. I've lived here for 15 years. We do both ke access on the Lake Minnewashta at this present time so we have the lake quite a bit and know the surrounding area quite well also. that we are a little short. 12 inches on both lots on the lake and the size of a walk in closet on the existing 20,000 square lot. It isn't a lot obviously but we still don't meet it. We're basically just to kind of plead our case to see if you will okay lances. One of the things about it is, first of all we're not s. We're not in here to make any big money on this. We're just try and build two existing single family homes. Build it with pride nd take pride in the lot. The lots that are around there right now. One the things too is that we are squeezed in between the lake and the road a id that's one of the hardships we've got here also in trying to make Plann May I the al bench' to se, of th~ all. the 1 I try t devel can b in th4 live exist But I Emmin: down. Dana aroun( I 'm vacani would lot n creek i n th4) care ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 2 ount of the frontage and the square footage also. Can I approach the I do have some pictures. I don't know if anybody's been out there the home. The surrounding homes. I went out and took some pictures house that's existing there and you know, it's not in great shape at It's got holes in the roof on one of the out buildings that are on t. It was built way back in the 40's so it's a pretty old home. aken pictures of the surrounding homes around there. What we want to do is kind of make the area a little bit better looking by ping two lots there. Now you can also say that it could be just, you ild one home there. Well, if somebody came in there, they could come re. Keep the existing home that is there right at this point and n it the way it is because you can live in that home. So that ng structure could still be there if you deny us our permit or not. did take some pictures of it. Why don't you just give them to Tim and then he can pass them ohnson: The first three are the existing home and then the rest are the area. The houses next door and behind it. Every which way. t a professional photographer so. Right now the house has been for a couple years. It is in poor condition in this point and we demolish the house and put it up. And you know you talked about the xt door to it too. I take pride in the things that I do and even the the creek is full of bottles. Full of cans that people have thrown re. That could be cleaned up also. I definitely would be taking f even though it isn't on my property, I would improve the look of that peopl there Emmi n~. Dana be di~ lot, I don one also. There's a snowmobile trail right along side that that a lot of e toss stuff along as they're going along the lake. At one time too, ~re two sewer and water hook ups on that piece of property. It's stubbed in from the street? ~hnson: Right. So at one time the city engineers thought that could [dable. In fact when I took, I went and when I did my survey on that ~ey do an aerial view of the city water. I saw an aerial view of it. know what it's called. There were actually three on there so at [nt I'm sure way down the line they had this divided up into three actual lots. We could only state that there's two because. Farmak~s: Who purchased the association access next to the property? Dana 3>hnson: I'm sorry. Farmak~s: From whom did they purchase the association access next to this prope Dana Farma about whom? that r y? It's about 30 feet. J ,hnson: You mean in the, there's two lake associations. k)s: There's a fenced access Just to the south of the property. It's )0 feet wide and it goes down to the lake. Do you know who, from It looks like the lot was purchased from the property owner where h>me is. Plann May i Ken LI the sl think He that acces' Dana on bo obv i o: the c' Due t, $chmi, in th~ singl~ them 19, W Farmal Ken LL tiny ; Farmal Ken Lt house Dana Ken L~ Dana Ken LL one f¢ to the paper real went claim Dana Ken L~ that ¢ Da na J you ta to aff really of om ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 3 nd: I don't think so. I think the person who had the land across .feet, because I know years ago, I remember when that was for sale. I that person had land across the street actually had a 30 foot access. .ually owned his land right across the street and when he developed ,roperty, the people that lived across the street had their own little to the lake. ohnson: We've even pursued it on one side of the, there's accesses h sides of our lot. One's about 50 feet on the creek side and then sly the larger access. We even went as far as to pull the deed on eek side to see who actually owns that to try to even purchase that. the fact that there's about 50 names on it and it says in the t Tract which is B which is across TH 7 and there's a number of homes re. The deed really wasn't very clear because there wasn't any name on that that we could go actually right to that person and ask hat. It just says the Schmidt Tract and the deed is dated back in at was it 13 or something like that? 1914. It was a real old deed. es: This is the abandoned home to the north? nd: No, no. The abandoned home to the north, there's the little arcel between that and the house that we're dealing with right now. es: Oh, the wetland area there? nd: Right there. It's a little 50 foot tract that, it's like a gate Lake access for people from the Schmidt Acre. ohnson: Which is across the street from TH 7. nd: By Minnewashta Church. ohnson: By Cathcart. Up that way. nd: In fact somebody had mentioned to us that if we could purchase ot of that from them, then we'd meet the requirement. We went down County. They said that it would take a long time and a lot of ork and a lot of legal to try to do that because they didn't have a Lear deed owner on that property. It belonged to too many people and ~ck too long. Nobody really claimed it. They said actually we could it or go after it but it. ohnson: It would be a year and probably too much money for us. nd: It would take about a year to do it and a lot of money to get ne foot to make the lots legal. 3hnson: But basically you know, it is a small variance and I hope ke a look at it. This is Ken and I's kind of first dream to be able 3rd to get on the lake. We see it as a great opportunity and we believe that we can better the area with two homes on that instead because always remember, somebody can just move in there and just Plann May 1 redo Thank Emmin,, here Charl assoc are corre( Dana Charl~ ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 4 he inside and keep the outside.the way it looks, as you just saw. you. s: Okay, thanks. This is a public hearing. Is there anyone else ho wants to speak on this? Please come up. s Anding: My name is Charles Anding. I live next door to the ation lot. 6601Minnewashta Parkway. I understand what you folks ying. I do have some concerns however and I would like to make one tion. You stated the home had been vacant for over 2 years. ohnson: Year and a half. s Anding: I think it's closer to about a year but it has been vacant for al~eriod of time but the property has generally been fairly well taken careI . There is again one out building that does sit next to the assoc ation lot that has for a number of years that I've looked at it, a hole n the roof. I think it was from a collapsing chimney. I can't speak about the actual house itself. A couple things that I wanted to make sure the Planning Commission was aware of. On the south side of their lot runniTg along the, what do you folks call youselves? Linden Circle Assoc] tion? Tom K~ueger: Minnewashta Creek 2nd Addition Association. CharlE Anding: Okay, whatever it is. The folks up there off of Linden Circ , Linden Drive. There's a drainage area that runs from along the line there about 5 or 10 feet into their lot that of course would be of ncern. That's a natural drainage area to the lake and I would be co ned about development affecting that drainage area. Number two point that13 would just like to point out. That this property sits on a very smal . If you were out there today you probably would have seen the amount of curve along that shoreline and I live inside of that curve along with neighbor on the south of me and we've found that the traffic that would on the lake would be difficult with the docks coming out from two ties in that small bay and that we all have to have this shared area the end of our docks. I'm fearful that if we put two lots in there extend docks off of that area, which is a very shallow area, those ks are going to extend quite a ways and it's going to cause more of a lestion problem on the lake than what we'd probably like to see out there I've talked to my wife. I've talked to a few of the other nei s and generally we're concerned about this particular split occur ng. Of course we can't make a recommendation. Only express our views t we are concerned about it. Co Your last comment. It's hard for me to track what you just said. Char Anding: About the bay? Co Right. Explain that a different way for me. Charl Anding: I don't know if you folks have these things but that shows the ye of the bay better than of course what this does up here. But Plann May 1 what force towar~ very Recog put i at th into Conra Charl, al 1 ti think if we follo~ Emmi n~ Tom K~ up th~ house basis Pau 1 was al aesth( up in you c garag.: would on the anythi the s.: assoc i o kay of pre ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 5 e're saying is that the way this bay, the small curve in the lake us to essentially, the way the docks would have to point to get out s the deeper water· If you extended them another 50 feet would be lose to each other at the end. I guess is what I'm trying to state. izing that the association lot in here doesn't have the ability to a dock, it would still cause a congestion of boat traffic out here s specific point. My only point being that if we have to split that .wo lots, I assume that there would be two docks coming out there. : From a motor standpoint? s Anding: There is one other point I'd like to make. If you look at ,e homes along in this area, we're all running minimum, minimum of I of 120 foot lots out there so the other consideration would be that go to something that's 75 or 85 feet wide, it's not going to be lng the context of the rest of the homes along the shoreline. s: Is there anybody else that wants to address this? ueger: I'm Tom Krueger. I live at 3860 Linden Circle which is just street going to the west or on the top of the chart. I'm the third back. I did look at the property. I did put a bid in on it on the of a single family dwelling. That was based on the fact of seeing rauss who basically said that the lot was really not splitable. It so based on the aesthetic point of view of the lot. From the tics, no matter how you split the lot, one person's front yard ends another person's front yard. You end up with very little privacy and n put a nice little house on each lot. You can put up a 2 car · With the road improvement going up, you're left with a house that not be of the same size and the same aesthetics as the other houses lake which is why I gave up looking at splitting the property or ng like that and going in on a single family dwelling. The beach to uth, we've applied a number of times for a dock through the ation. We've probably done it wrong both times. 8ut we're learning o we'll probably get there one of these days. It is a 60 foot piece petty already. Not 30 feet· So there in that case you'll end up with three 60 foot separations or less between docks maybe eventually which is a concern to us. Also a concern is with that many docks and in that area, it is a swimming beach. We have 40 children up in that area. In the Addition up there. For matter of reference, the Addition and the outlot for tls beachlot and the separation of the other properties to the south were Fart of the Burkee estate which is the older house up on the hill with the p~llars. Kind of kitty corner off and away. $o considering all and I placsd my bid in and everything, not having won of course but still it would meem to me that common sense would prevail and a single family dwelling would be allowed there considering the property, the association, the crgek drainage. I don't think buying a foot on the other side of the proper the it there of bo~ ty does anything because the creek is still there and that confuses sue. The association supports 36 families. There are 40 children in ~nd the number of docks would definitely concern us with the number bs in there and the traffic that that would bring. Thank you. Emming~: Thank you. Plann May 1 Joan the p under. for t} the al area will as I ~ aren '1 splitl the dj the he or no1 to st~ attem It's reoom Speak Emmin want ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 6 impson: Hi. I'm Joan Simpson. I'm at 6560 Minnewashta Parkway. I'm nk house on the hill. We've only lived there 2 years and I tand what you say that you want to bring the old home up to standards e area because it is an old home. I think one nice home would bring ea up to standards because I think there is a lot of homes that have n the land and I think trying to put two homes on that piece of land ake it very crowded. Speaking from the association that just talked, m a member and just talking with the people that I have who a lot in attendance, there's a large dissatisfaction with the idea of ing the land. We don't have the say in whether it's split or not but ssatisfaction is very prominent from the members. Rs far as leaving use as it is, you know how can we say that that's what would happen ? It would depend on who moved in. Hopefully it would be brought up ndards and I would imagine at some point it would be. I have ed an estate sale there and I have gone in and it is very liveable. ery small but it is very liveable and I think just as a endation, I would say I would just hope to see one home go in. ng for the association. Thank you. s: Thank you. Are there any other comments from the public? Do you o respond or say something else? Go ahead. Dana 'ohnson: I'd like to address a couple of those issues. Speaking of the deck situation. Number one, we've already talked about just putting one deck out there in the first place. You know I've lived on the lake long enough, for 15 years and that's what all of my neighbors have done. Just ~ut one dock out and that's exactly what I would do too. You know when )ou talk about, if you put one dock out is it going to crowd, is it going to hinder boat traffic or whatever? Well, there isn't any docks to the r ght of it because it's all open land up there. If you look at the plot, there's no homes for probably 700-800 feet of lakeshore. And the assoc ation doesn't have a dock either at this point either. So basically I jus' wanted to address those two issues on that. Again, you say one home or twc homes. You say it's going to be crowded. Well, we can put on one lot, ~e can put a 60 foot home across on Lot 2 there to the left and on Lot 1, we ye already been to our builders and we can put a 50 to 52 foot home on th, other one so there's plenty of space to put a house that's up to the sizes 3f other homes in that area. We're both talking about doing walkouts. Two story homes so that will go right along with the other homes on the lake also. I just wanted to address those issues that they brought up. Thank you. Emmin! there Conra~ favor Erhart the I~ Okay. Any other public comment on this application? If not, is motion to close the public hearing? moved, Ahrens seconded to close the public hearing. Ail voted in and the motion carried. The public hearing was closed. For my piece of mind here, Jo Ann or Paul, the surrounding lots on :e are what size in general? Olsen Well they all meet or exceed the 20,000 square feet. Plann ng Commission Meeting May 1 1991 - Page 7 Erbar : 30,0007 Olsen Well the ones near it are closer to 20,000 to 30,000. They're not real ig but they meet the. Erhar And the general frontage on the lake would be, on the surrounding lots ould be what? Olsen Area right there? Erharl : Well yeah. Down the lakeshore there. Olsen of th, just Erhar Olsen Minne of, i Erhar the 1 Olsen not Well they really vary. But the ones that have homes on them, some m have like 100. Around that. More than 75. A lot of the lots are hose narrow little strips that will never be buildable sites. : You say that there's a lot of lots there that are unbuildable? There's some, if you're saying what's really going on around Lake ashta. Like where Stratford Ridge was. Do you remember how a lot 's just a narrow strip on Minnewashta Parkway. : Oh you mean narrow this way? Okay. Not narrow perpendicular to ke? Right· There's no depth so those have a lot of width but they're ildable. Er : Okay· I'll tell you a couple of things concern me about this. One is the fact that it's next to a recreational beachlot I think has an impact in th~ beach actua beach width at th~ width becau~ absor lot I think we really want to try to keep houses as far away from the as possible to avoid conflict. Here we have a situation where ly we're really encouraging someone to build a house closer to the · The beachlot to the south. The second thing is, the effective Lot 1 really is about, it looks to be about 60 feet. If you look piece that comes down. The flag so to speak. Real perpendicular is only about 60 feet there even though when you get down the lot of the angle it may be 75 feet. Plus part of that is being by the setback from the creek. I just don't think this is a two cel. I guess I would be opposed to the split. Conra The creek. Does that creek, what's the value of the creek? Olsen has ml space Emm i CoKlYa( It's an outlet to the lake and it's important enough that the DNR ked it as a protected creek. So that setback is to maintain open nd that. : Lake Minnewashta outflows to Lake Virginia by that creek. Outflows? Emmin~ : Yeah. Plann May 1 Erhar' Olsen acces: anyth Conra, Olsen Conra~ creek' Dana varia get feet No pr tonig Conra are t asked Olsen: the 2( water acros.~ Conrac lots t Olsen exoee~ Emmi n! propel are. then i Rememk there. tract~ really there where feet. that a Conrac Olsen ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 8 : Excuse me but what's on the north side of the creek then? The north side of the creek is that little strip that provides for Schmidt Acre across the street. It's not a trout stream or ng like that but it's protected. : so the 50 feet is from where on the creek? See where it's right on the top. : Are you able to build, would you build 50 feet away from the ohnson: Sure. I've already done, I'm just going without the ces at this point and that's the way I'm assuming that I'm not going e variance on the 50 foot and made my plans accordingly to build 50 rom the creek. I can build a home 50 feet from the creek no problem. blem at all. If it would have been a problem, I wouldn't be here t. Believe me. : I have to go back to the context that these lots are in. Jo Ann, ese smaller than what we would see in the neighborhood? And Tim you the same question. Yeah. All the other lots do meet the requirements. They all meet ,000 square feet. They all have the 75 foot at the ordinary high mark. That's where we measure at least within the 500 feet. Not the street. No. But along the lake, yes. : And to the south we have the beachlot and then we have a lot of ~at reaiIy don't have houses on it. Well no. Just to the south you do have homes and those do all the 20,000. It's as you go down. s: Ladd? Maybe I can fill you in. As you go south from this ty there's the beachlot. And then I'm not sure how many homes there There's 5 or 6 homes and you get down to a couple more beachlots and t gets narrower and narrower until you get down to Cedar Cove. er when we did Leach's thing and then you've got Red Cedar Point And to the north of this property there are large undeveloped for probably, there could be 800 feet of shoreline or more. I don't know how much but it's a big piece. There's 3 or 4, 3 tracts in that I think are totally undeveloped. And then you get around to I live and in there it's, on the north shore they're, I have 100 My neighbor has 150 and there's a lot of 100 foot size. Lots in rea. Okay, thanks. I have a location map if you want to look. Conra( Yeah. I looked at that Jo Ann. Plann May 1 Olsen setti Erhar the n build~ Olsen Erhar Olsen 5rhar buida signi lot? Olsen Erhar' Olsen Erhar' builde Olsen Erhar Olsen signi Erhar~ ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 9 It kind of gets confusing. But they all, this would definitely be a precedent. If I could interrupt. What is, on a 15,000 square foot lot with rmal setbacks, how many square feet do you normally have there that's ble? With the regular setbacks? Yeah. Quite a bit of it because you only have typically 30 foot. Let me ask you this. Is the area that you've got on there that's le, you've got the lines drawn. That area, is that bigger than, icantly bigger than a normal buildable area in a 15,000 square foot On Lot 17 : No, when you combine the two. The whole two? : Yeah. That would be what? Significantly bigger than the Die area on a, well. Well that 50 foot setback cuts in. : Well yeah. That's what I'm saying. And the 75 foot setback too so I don't know that you would have icantly larger than typical. Because of the setbacks, there just isn't that much buildable area left e id then to take that and divide it in two. Is what you're really dividing in half. Conrac I guess in context, and Steve I'm going to ask you a question. In contex will this be out of place? Emmin~s: On that stretch? Well, Lake Minnewashta has old development on it li~ don't but I Ken Lu Emmin~,i Ken L~ ~ Red Cedar Point where there are a bunch of narrow lots. And I know how wide the lots are there. I expect they're somewhat narrower don't really know that. nd: ...40 foot lots over on Red Cedar Point. s: Yeah but a lot of them have. ~d: 40 to 60. Most of them are 60. Plann May 1 Emmi n.. so th, it's say t Tom K~ Emm i n~ very typic say , Olsen Emmin! Olsen Conra when make not t, requi be pe' apolo~ ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 10 s: It appears to me some of those have been combined over the years y're double wide so I'm not clear on exactly how wide they are and lso a situation where it's narrow beachlots. You know we have, they elf's is 60. Is that right? ueger: That's correct. s: You know and we know that the Minnewashta Heights is 25 or, it's mall. So there's kind of a mixture. 8ut these are smaller than the 1 lot on the north, that exists on the north and west side I would eah. On the north and west side? s: Yeah. Yeah. : Okay. I guess I've been trying to rationalize the split because hings are so close, I want to give the applicant every opportunity to t happen. If it's 20,000 square feet, you miss it by a few feet, I'm o concerned. I'm looking for the intent of the square footage ement. I'm looking for context of how things fit. And I still can suaded by the rest of the Planning Commission who actually I ize for not visiting this site. I should have. I think that would have n ade me feel a lot more comfortable with what I'm going to say but I'm looki g for the rationalization and it's looking like we're trying to squee', e too much out of the property right now with the setbacks. And based on what I'm hearing on the context of where it's found and my concern with t ~e creek. I guess we don't have the control over the creek and varia Des and I don't want to see a variance on the setback to the creek. I simpll don't. I think creeks are extremely valuable and if it's a protected creek, I don't want to see that. We dont' have control but my biggest concern right now is that plus the fact that it's looking like we're trying to squeeze a little bit too much out of the property and therefore unless somebody can persuade me another way, I would vote right now net to grant the variances. Emmin~ s: Annette? Ellsor I agree with these two gentlemen. I don't have anything new. I think t's just too much in a small space and there's not really a good enoug~ reason to give a variance. Emmin~, s: Jeff? Farina ss: I went out to the property today and had a look at it. It's a nice l~t but I do think it's a single home lot. I guess I'd disagree that the hc~se that's on there is to be described as an abandoned piece of proper [y. The house is relatively in good shape from what I could see. The skid does has a hole in it but it's an out building shed. It would seem t) me that if you took the park away which is now a very narrow road, and sa~ that in the future as being widened so it actually has a shoulder Plann May i on it these. in th~ wot k Board follo[ meeti A lot i f yo~ that surro~ large' an ad~ would lot. Ahren.~ Olseni Ahren.~ Olsen the s to pr, this ] Reside Olsen: somet~ Ahrene like t he va build alot somet~ think doc k there SO persor that think can kind know foot We ca~ Emm i ns ,no Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 11 those cars would be coming awfully close to your front door. And setbacks as it stands now may work but I think it'd be a real problem future if they do widened that road. I can't see anywhere on the hat the staff did here. It says a variance can be granted by the of Adjustments and Appeals and City Council only if all of the lng criteria are met and there are several criteria that you're not ,g. It's not just a walk in closet issue. There are several issues. of them have to do I think with the worth of the property and I think put two pieces of, two homes in there and make two lots out of that, t certainly would be beneficial because I think some of the nding homes that are there would not fit into that category. They're homes with more space around them and I could see where it could be antage to the person who's splitting that lot but again, I think it be a disadvantage to the surrounding homes. I think it should be one : Jo Ann, is there any, there was a drainage issue raised here. On the south side? : Right. Is that? The engineering department didn't point that out. We did go out to te. If there's actually a drainage area on this lot, we would want tect it with an easement. I can't say. Do you recall it being on ot or is it on the recreational beachlot? nt: No, it's on this lot. Right along the south border of that lot. We didn't notice it. We can go out and check it again. That's ing we didn't notice. : Is that something that was just maybe missed on the report? I'd o know that because I'd like to recommend approval of this. I think riances are very small. I think these people are going to go out and houses that are not going to fit in. I mean they're going to spend f money to build houses on these lots. They're not going to build ing that's going to be an eyesore for the rest of the co~nunity. I that the idea of the shared dock meets the concerns of, o~ just one ~s going to be shared, meets the concerns of the neighbors that s going to be too much traffic on that one area. Variances are just ll here. On the other hand I hate to set a precedent for the next coming in saying well our lot's only 200 feet smaller than the lot ~u just approved. But this is so close and I think that if they that they can build a nice house on these lots, I don't see how we ~ that no, they can't build a nice house on these lots. I mean what f standards are we using anyway? I would though like to see, I don't f we can do this. Can we set as a condition of approval that that 50 ~tback from the creek be maintained? That no variance be approved? t do anything like that? : It's a different body. PlannJ May 1 Conra( Emmin~ tell t Kraus.~ futur~ this ] Olsen: Ahren.~ condit ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 12 : That's the problem, we have no control. s: Well we do. It's the Board of Adjustments and I guess we could hem that that's the way we feel about it but what they do, they do. : I think you could put in a condition. It wouldn't firmly bind a action. However, it would clearly state that the intent in creating ot was not to create additional variances. Right, but they can still apply. : They could still apply but if we had clearly as one of our ions that they had to maintain that setback, how likely is it that they KYaus~ create Olsen hard Ahrens on thj Emmi n.~ else t his D~ about issue won't the i ~ill say well we think it's good, we'll allow a variance? : It shoots a hole in the argument that could be made that you d a lot that's unbuildable without further variances. It will definitely be a self-created hardship and they'll have a ase. : Well that's the way I would go with it and I'd recommend approval S. s: Okay. As for me, I think I have to say, before I say anything hat I know Ken and I know Dana and his family. My children play with na's children and I don't think that matters to me. I've thought it quite a bit and I don't think I have any problem acting on this We're not close friends or anything like that, and we especially 3e after this. No. I basically adopt Joan's comments. I think that sues that we have to look at, the variances we have to grant to allow this s Jbdivision I think are so small that I don't have any problem supporting the proposal. It does seem like the lots are a little narrower on the lake side than the lots immediately around it, although there's a lot of undeveloped land and we don't know what's coming in on those and 75 feet is what's required so we can't really hold up a standards of 100 or 125 feet because 75 feet is what the ordinance says. I think they're going to ha~s difficulty building a house on Lot 1 but if he says he can do it and i see w subdi notio there out. Erhart Prelin reaso Ellso~ satisfies them, then I don't have a problem permitting it. I don't ~ I should tell him he can't build a house there so I do support the ision. The creek is an important issue and I would support the that no further variances should be granted. $o with that, are any other comments? Does somebody want to make a motion? Okay, time I'll move that the Planning Commission recommend denial of nary Plat #91-3 as shown on the plans dated April 1, 1991 for the stated. The subdivision creates two non-conforming lots. I'll second it. Emmin~ : Any discussion? Plann ng Commission Meeting May I 19gl - Page 13 Erharl, moved, E11son seconded that the Planning Commission recommend denia! of Pr ,liminary Plat #91-3 as shown on the plans dated April 1, 1991 for the follo,~ing reason: 1. Tie subdivision creates two non-conforming lots. All v~ ted in favor except Emmings and Ahrens who opposed and the motion carri~d with a vote of 4 to 2. Emmims: Denial is recommended by the Planning Commission. This will go to th, City Council? Olsen: May 20th. Emmin(s= On May 20th and you should folio, it there. Alright. We don't have ~oo much else on the agenda. IAL OF MINUTES: Chairman Emmings noted the Minutes of the Planning Commission meeting of April 17, 1991 as presented. CITY IOUNCIL UPDATE: Kraus~: There were relatively few Council actions on the last agenda. The Counc 1 did vote to approve the chemical toilet ordinance on a split vote. They id add a modification however that the Satellite units that be used be igned to incorporate, I don't know what the technical word is but it's he sump in the vent line so that if it tips over that there's a rese' ir to catch the material. Satellite told us that they designed that into heir new ones anyway. We changed the ordinance accordingly. We brou a proposal to the City Council to fund a Comprehensive sewer and water lan. This is a follow up to the relatively cursory look we provided in thc comp plan thus far to how we're going to serve the new MUSA area. We've talking very seriously to several parties, one of which you're real iliar with, Lundgren who wants to proceed with actual design. There another office/industrial developer who's looking at three possibly devel . Two certainly but possibly a third. And people are asking us OhS like where do you want the sewer to run? Where do you want the main to come in from and we don't have a real good handle on that right and we want the City to be out in front of that issues instead of playi catch up and trying to figure out if the developer's proposal which is ously good for the developer is good for the city in the long run. We we~ out and got RFP's and brought them back to the City Council. The City 1 authorized us to retain the firm of Bonestroo, Anderlick and Rose to undertake these studies. What we said is we're going to hold off on si 'ng contracts until we get Metro Council.approval. Trying to prude with spending the money before we go. 8onestroo is working with us right on our comprehensive plan application with the Metro Council. In the nse of a city engineer, they've been helping us respond to quest ns the Metro Council's been raising regarding sewer. In fact, they rewor our entire sewer section and recalculated sewage flows which are the ical number and using what they think is methodology that MWCC will acce They work for MWCC on a lot of projects. They've actually come up with much lower flow rate than had been anticipated originally in the Plann May 1 plan. with been sort looki walk conta also now . envis feel i ntu i real from ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 14 So it looks better to Council at any rate. So we'll be going ahead hem as soon as we hopefully get approval on the plan. June 8th has stablished as, it's a Saturday, as the date to have a bus tour and f a design shirette for the corridor. The TH 5 corridor. What we're g to do is to get a bus, drive up and down the corridor. Get out and round sites. Use some design professionals. Dick Wing has been in t with an individual from the Urban Design Studio at the U and we've ct, we work with the firm of Barton-Aschmann on TH'5 improvements We'll arrange to have individuals from both aboard. What we oned doing is driving up and down. Walking around sites. Getting a or what the comprehensive plan says. Getting a feel for what. you ively think a property should be developed as and I think you get a ifferent perspective on it. It's different driving back and forth he highway every day to actually going out and hiking around a site and t~ing to vision forward what you think you might see. And then I'd antic~ate that we'd come back to City Hall for an hour or so and have these ndividuals do some sketches and that this would serve as kind of a kick ff for further work on the corridor which will probably lead to ordinances changes, etc., etc.. But this is really the initiation of the corridor study that the Council asked for concurrent with the comprehensive plan :proval. I don't know ~hat else I can say about that at this point. What ~ ~'re going to do is invite the Planning Commission, the City Council and t e HRA to tag along on this so you're all welcome and we'll be sending out s, me official information with the details as soon as we have them. Emmin: s: In your report you apologized for not having, and I'm glad you said omething about it. Some of the things we've been working on. Landscaping ordinance I suppose you had in mind and the bluff ordinance and lookilg at Bluff Creek. Looking at that valley in terms of it's preseYvation and also who was it? I think Tim mentioned making a greenway or corridor out of the whole Bluff Creek flowage there. That seemed like an awfully good idea but when can we expect to have those back on our agend~ Paul? Kraus~:. Well, actually there's another announcement on that too. The same two irldividuals who gave the presentation here went before the Park Board and t~ Wing i preset recall hike t much f Counci schedc is the We're again abbre~ phone i n thr flag ~ aga i n go ing s Park Board is equally excited on preserving the bluff. Councilman s on Monday night I believe going to request that they give a similar ration to the City Council so that can be carried forward. You may that we asked them if we could work with them to set up a date to brough a portion of this to give people a hands on feel. They very eel that it's useful to do this in May instead of in June. The City 1 won't get to hear this officially until sometime in June with their le with the property assessments and all that. They think that May ideal month because it's not too buggy and it's not too overgrown. looking at May llth which doesn't give you a whole lot of time but it's a Saturday. We're looking at, they're going to do an iated hike. It's going to take about an hour. I've got to make some :alls to the golf course to get permission to park there and to walk Dugh their property but if you could, those of you who are familiar, put calendars for an hour's walk on a Saturday morning and hopefully ,e'll get this, this will be a part of the process in getting this Plann May 1 ConTa, Ellso Olsen agend~ Emmin~ Commi~ Kraus~ tonig} Emm i n! KYausl Emmin! Kraus,~ Emmi n,, Kraus~ try. Emmin,< done. to st~ since KTaUSE update Emmin! Prair ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 15 : What day? : Satuday, May llth. The ordinance itself is back on the next Planning Commission · It's a public hearing. s: Okay, so we'll see the bluff ordinance on the next Planning sion meeting· How about the landscaping ordinance? : Honestly I'm working on the PUD ordinance first. That I was doing t and we're shooting to get that on the next agenda too. s: Okay, so we have PUD. : And the bluff. s: Is there any chance that you can get the landscaping one in too? : I don't want to promise that. I'll try. s: Okay. I think we ought to get those out. : We haven't published it so it wouldn't be a formal one but I will s: Maybe if we could see another draft. Anything that will get it We should get those out of the way because we're soon going to want rt that 1995 study area and it'd be good to have those out of the way we've already addressed them, it seems to me anyway. Okay. : While we're in the business of marking calendars too, I want to you on where we're at on the comprehensive plan. s: Yeah, there's a lot of stuff in here. How's it going with Eden e? Kraus~: Up and down. I think we've reached some sort of a medium position with ~den Prairie. Without going into too many details, Steve saw a letter that w a litt Eden F Direct sent a concer going and we the E~ roads affect Minnet tryins County s got from Eden Prairie which raised a lot of issues that I felt were le bit unusual about our plan. We had an opportunity to speak to rairie. Met with their City Manager, the Community Development 3r and some Engineering staff. Don Ashworth and myself. They have letter to the Metro Council which is in your packet raising some ns but it's a much more abbreviated letter than their initial one was to be. One concern that they raise that I think is a legitimate one ye been trying to do some follow-up on is the fact that based upon ~tern Carver County Study, we are talking about traffic being on ~hat Eden Prairie had never anticipated. And that doesn't only Eden Prairie. It affects Hennepin County. It affects probably )nka. It affects Shorewood. It affects Excelsior. And I've been to work with the County Engineer who headed up the Eastern Carver Study to go to the next step. The next step is to start a series of Plann May 1 meeti under: Gusta' Trane and a Prair probl the M there great, and I~ the f~ look ~ Ward! right to be there Metro the ME about in the ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 16 gs with all these agencies and with MnDot so we can come to tandings about these things and get things in work programs. Roger son set up a meeting at the Metro Council last Friday with their ortation staff. I was in attendance and it was a productive meeting ain I think it's going to get the process rolling. I don't Eden e is raising any issues at this point that I find cause fundamental ms with the plan. At all. In fact, I've had a follow-up letter to tro Council. One of the concerns they raised was, you may have read was an HRA brochure that was put out that seemed to indicate a r amount of vacant land than we had indicated to the Metro Council ye sent a follow-up letter to the Metro Council basically outlining ct that HRA's tend to be boosters of a community and they tend to t things in a certain light. For example there was property like the state which was shown as available for industrial use. That's true now but as soon as the comprehensive plan is approved, it's not going industrial anyway. It's going to be residential and commercial. And were some other discussions of individual properties and I did give Council a letter of that that explained it. My initial meeting with tro Council was now about 3 weeks ago. I don't know if I told you that at the last meeting. There were 14 Metro Council staff people room and there was 3 of us. There was Mark Koegler, myself and an individual who we're working with from Bonestroo, Bob Schunicht. The comments we received on the plan are very favorable. I mean environmentally they'¥e telling us we're on the cutting edge. In fact they're telling us we're in front of the Watershed District and all this kind of stuff. It got dcNn to we spelled the name of a street wrong...but Mike. Munson contiTues to be difficult in the manner that he has been to communities for the last 15 years. Mike Munson refuses to amend his population or employment forecasts. He admits that they're wrong but he won't accept that us're right and he won't re-run his model for another year or two. He actually kicked off the meeting by suggesting that we only come in for a one year MUSA or two year MUSA amendment until he can re-run his model which I let him know in no uncertain terms that that was outrageous and unacceJtable and that everything we're doing is consistent with the Metro Council policies. Dealing with the Metro Council is kind of unique because they cJn't have consensus amongst themselves on how to deal with situations such as ours. Met again with their staff the following week and Mike Munso~ was more conciliatory. He is willing to go with the TH 212 forecasts which were above their original forecast but below what we had thought. You recall we used the three tier forecasting. 212 was the lower range. Well 212 never, did not include any projections at all for employnent and they don't have any understanding or any grasp of how to proje¢ foreca this Lundgr we're what forec never Chanha have t forward on employment. What they're doing though is using the 212 st for household growth. We're lucking out on this one it appears at ~int. We were so conservative. I think you may recall like when )n wanted us to add 90 acres I said I didn't see a problem because Doming in way under what we think we can justify anyway. We were so Jative in what we were bringing into the MUSA that we can Justify )'re bringing into the MUSA for residential land based upon those 212 sts. On the matter of employment growth, Munson did something I've seen him do before. He basically threw up his bands and said, if seen thinks they're going to have 12,000 jobs by the year 2005, I ~ reason not to believe them. If anybody could do it, they could. Plann May 1 And I uncom' appro' looks inste~ thing,, Erhar Kraus They have trans~ They secti( write then recom, commi the M, after Emm i n, Kraus,, proce. anyth,i the M~ mar k suppo¥ Councj to be and h~ point spend~ entir~ they them a new Bonni~ her or what I unde work Mayor Counci ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 17 think they're going to leave us alone on the industrial. I remain ortable with this thing and I will be until the day we get it ed and I haven't seen anything in writiog from their staff but it now as th6ugh they're trying to develop reasons to approve the plan d of the reverse which was oftentimes the Metro Council's position on Who approves? Is it a person? Is it a vote? : Well, they follow a process that's a little analogous to ours. ave all these different, except it's a bigger bureaucracy and they 11 these different divisions. They have sewer. They h~ve ortation. They have airports. They have parks. They have housing. ave Mike Munson in demographics. And then they have a land use n and all these departments go off in their own little world and their own reports and they oftentimes disagree with each other and hey're supposed to pull all this together in one recommendation. The endation is supposed to go to, I think it's their development tee which is sort of, I guess if you will the Planning Commission for tro Council. It's supposed to go to them on May 16th. Thursday oon. s: Do you get to be there and defend it? : Well I'm certainly going to be there. I'm not sure of their s yet. I'm assuming I get an opportunity to do that. If there's ng we need to defend against at that point. It's supposed to go to tro Council itself on May 23rd for final action. I'd like you to hose days down on the calendars. If it seems as though we need t, if there's a problem, we'd like to call on a few people from the 1, from the Planning Commission, major property owners and developers down there basically saying everything we've been telling you is true re's why. I'm not sure that that's going to be necessary at this but I'd like to have that in our back pocket. We've also been ng a lot of time. One of the problems is we're dealing with an ly new Metro Council. That's been in the press a lot lately for how nteract with communities and pressure that the Governor's placing on nd the Metro Council itself is comprised of all new individuals with Chair. The Mayor and the City Manager and myself had a meeting with Featherstone, who's our new Metro Council representative. We took a tour of the community and found her to be pretty supportive of e were doing and she seems to be a pretty straight'shooter. And as rstand it on some issues, the first issues that she's been given to n, she's been very defensive of her communities which is good. The ~lso has set up a luncheon meeting with Mary Anderson, the new Metro 1 Chair. Fortunately Don was her neighbor in Golden Valley and knows her f.~rly well. Mary Anderson, she was somewhat non-commital as you would expect. She's not going to say her staff is right or wrong or anything else at this point but she also was receptive to the point of view that we foster gal and I guess the premise that we're taking forward is. Here's a community that's done everything right. We've given you everything that you've asked for in a plan. We've taken self-initiative to resolve envircqmental issues, to resolve transportation issues. We're not asking Planni May 1 , the Mc here t grown neighb shoul¢ tryin~ at thi any c~ ng Commission Meeting 1991 - Page 18 fro Council for a darn thing. We're not saying spend one dollar more nan you thought you were going to spend in the first place and we've tremendously and been a job generator and have good residential ~rhoods. We're the perfect example of everything the Metro Council be advocating. If they take a position where they're actually to hinder it, we'd like that to be as public as possible. 8ut again ~ point I'm quite hopeful that we're going to move ahead with few, if mnges. We'll know more in the next few weeks. Emmin~: Okay. I'd just like to bring people's attention to, I spotted a t~a case it bas permit compre with t think resort brougP Other~ Co'nra~moved, Emmings seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor andt~s motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 8:40 p.m.. t came out of the Supreme Court and I brought a copy for Paul but ically said that a City Council can refuse to issue a conditional use on the grounds that the use would be in conflict with the hensive land use plan. Not with the ordinance writing but just even ne comprehensive plan. And maybe that's nothing earth shaking but I it's a good thing to know because we've talked about being able to to the intent of the comprehensive plan to support decisions. I t that for you. Alright. Does anybody have anything else? ise we're through with the agenda. Submit Planni ted by Paul Krauss ng Director Prepared by Nann Opheim