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1990 12 12CHANHASSEN PLANNING COMMISSION REGULAR MEETING DECEM8ER i2, 1990 The Planning Commission held interviews for Planning Commission candidates prior to the regular Planning Commission meeting. Chairman Conrad called the meeting to order at 8:45 p.m.. COMMISSION MEMBERS PRESENT: Ladd Conrad, Tim Erhart, Steve Emmings, Annette Ellson, Brian Batzli and 3oan Ahrens COMMISSION MEMBERS ABSENT: Jim Wildermuth STAFF PRESENT: Paul Krauss, Planning Director and Jo Ann Olsen, Senior Planner PUBLIC HEARING: ZONING ORDINANCE AMENDMENT TO AMEND SECTION 20-29(d), CONCERNING APPEALS FROM DECISIONS OF THE BOARD OF ADJUSTMENTS ON VARIANCES. Paul Krauss presented the staff report on this item. Conrad: /ell us about the down side of the 10 down to 4? What's the negative for somebody who would want to make? Ellson: For the applicant probably? Conrad: Yeah, for the applicant. In 10 days what could they do that they can't do in 4 days? Krauss: There is no down side for the applicant. It's an upside for the applicant. ,The applicant does not, currently when we have a variance, it's approved by the Board of Adjustment. We write them a letter saying that your variance was approved on Monday night, it's not good until 2 weeks have passed and if anybody at any time gives us a letter of concern requesting that it be heard, then we have to schedule it for the next Council meeting. Conrad: That anybody would be, people that disagreed so we're going to give them 4 days to make an appeal? Krauss: Right. And most of the time you get it the next morning because they were there the evening the variance was approved. Batzli: Is it published or something within the 10 day period? Krauss: No. No, no. But variances are published before they're heard by the Board and we do send out mail notice. Batzli: Okay, but after the Board of Adjustments and Appeals makes their decision, nothing happens like publication or something to give people an additional time period to see that and come in and be able. Ellson: What percent do get appealed? Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 2 Krauss: Not very many actually. There was a problem where Councilman Boyt appealed virtually every one of them to the City Council so it got very clunky. I mean it sort of circumvented frankly the Board of Adjustment. The Board of Adjustments is the final court if you will on these things. If they approve it or deny it and the only way it goes to the City Council is if there's an appeal. Ellson: Doesn't that have to be done by the applicant? Krauss: No. It's anybody aggrieved by the decision. Ahrens: Why did he do that? Ellson: He didn't agree with it. Krauss: He often disagreed. Olsen: When they approved he would disagree. Krauss: Now keep in mind that the Board of Adjustments can only approve things unanimously so it made it tough. We had people who had to sit in the audience from 6:00 p.m. to 11:30 just to hear Bill's issue and usually there was nobody aggrieved by the decision. Now if there are people that are legitimately concerned and sure, Bill was legitimately concerned it just circumvented the procedure. Conrad: What does it take to register an appeal? Krauss: All you have to do is tell us. We prefer to get a note in writing saying I wish to appeal a decision. Conrad: So the process is relatively simple? So we're going from 10 days down to 4. The person still has a simple process to go by? Krauss: Yes. Conrad: Okay. Emmings: Can I ask, number one. If I'm the applicant and I'm turned down by the Board of Adjustments and I want to appeal to the City Council. Krauss: Right. In that case the applicant states I wish to appeal the decision. Emmings: Alright. Now if I don't appeal. If I'm turned down and I don't appeal, I could always come back and ask for it again. Alright, whatever but I get another shot. Now if I'm a neighbor and I don't like the granting of a variance and I want to appeal that to the City Council and I blow the 4 day time limit, that's it forever. I can never come back right? Krauss: That's true Emmings: 4 days is real fast. If I'm a neighbor and' I wonder what my rights are, I might want to go talk to my attorney. Maybe I'm not around. Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 3 Four days is real fast to lose what could be a very, something, a very valuable right. I guess my thought when I read this, and maybe this is just too cumbersome, would be to have, well it probably wouldn't work because you've got 2 classes of people. I was wondering if there could be an expedited procedure where if you get your appeal in within 4 days, you get rewarded by getting heard early by the City Council and if you don't, then it just takes longer because 4 days scared me. It sounds real fast. Maybe that's, I don't know. The other thing I wanted to ask about the ordinance as I read it is, it says appeals to the board and I didn't understand what gets appealed to the board. Krauss: It all gets appealed to the City Council. Emmings: Yeah. So if you look at (d), the last sentence in (d). It says the procedure governing appeals to the board shall also govern appeals to the City Council. What the hell does that mean? Batzli: It's not in the new one is it? Emmings: Oh, am I reading the old one? Batzli: Yeah. Emmings= Oh, I'm sorry. Where is the new one? I missed it then. Batzli: Last page. Emmings: Oh, okay. Well that takes care of that concern but the same problem. Batzli: They have changed it to go from any person who is aggrieved by the decision of the Board and they eliminated that. They've limited it now to you have to be a City Council member, the applicant, or own property within 500 feet. So they've limited who can appeal. Emmings: I don't have any problem with the 4 days for the applicant, or even for the City Council member. I guess I worry a little about the 4 days for the people who are neighbors and I guess I'd also, there's more language in here talking about appeals to the Board. Let's see. It says upon the filing of an appeal or an application for the variance. This is in (b). The zoning administrator sets a time and place for a hearing before the Board of Adjustments on the appeal. It just should be on the application. That idea kind of runs through here. I saw it a few places and that probably ought to be cleaned up. Olsen: ...I think what was done with that is that there's an application for a variance to the zoning ordinance and an appeal to the interpretation of the ordinance. Emmings: To the City Council? Olsen: No. An appeal to the interpretation of the ordinance. Batzli: To the Board of... Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 4. 01sen: Yeah, they're appealing staff's interpretation of the ordinance. Emmings: Oh, so there are things then that are appealed to the Board? Alright, that's what I was asking. I didn't know what it would be. Batzli: Are we losing anything by eliminating that sentence Paul? The procedure governing appeals to the Board shall also govern appeals to the City Council? Krauss: I honestly don't know. Batzli: And why did we change it from any person aggrieved by the decision of the Board to limit it to only those people owning property within 500 feet? Olsen: Was that changed? It still says any person aggrieved including. Krauss: No, the new one doesn't. Erhart: That changes it substantially. Conrad: Yeah, substantially. Unless there's a reason to do that. Erhart: The original writing was very confusing because it made you believe that the...as you have it now certainly would not be... Krauss: Yeah, I guess you know frankly I don't know why Roger deleted the person aggrieved by the decision. I don't see any reason why we should preclude anybody who's got an interest in an action from mentioning that and appealing it regardless of whether they're living within 500 feet or not. You might want to consider putting back in that aggrieved language. Erhart: If you're going to do that, then you might as well eliminate the City Council or anybody within 500 feet to say any aggrieved person period. Batzli: Well I think you wanted to clarify that a City Council member can do it. I don't mind that part in there. I liked the old language better then I liked the new. Krauss: You know I think too you need something to clarify. I mean I don't know how this would happen but it's not inconceiveable that if we just say anybody could do it at any time, then we'll just have somebody who's trying to be disruptive or delay a decision. There should be some kind of a standard. I mean I like the aggrieved language because it says that you have to have some credibility. You have to have an issue. Emmings: Some kind of interest that's being stepped on. Erhart: Yeah, but I don't see how 500 feet has to do with anything. Emmings: Is that who you give notice to on a variance? Krauss: That's who gets the notices, yes. Emmings: So it kind of makes sense in that regard I guess. Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 5 Ellson: Yeah, but maybe if you guys denied and now you're seeing someone with a similar situation... Batzli: So somebody within 502 feet can't do it then. Conrad: I'm not comfortable with the 500 feet. Ellson: He either. It could be someone who has a similar situation who wants to go through this exact same thing after this person so they want to make sure. Erhart: A typical case would be we give a variance to something downtown on a sign or something like that...as a Planning Commission member we developed the sign ordinance and I'd be real upset about it and I live 5 miles away. Emmings: Me talked about posting property. Do we post property? Me talked about doing it and I can't remember. Krauss: Me approved it and I'm just on the verge of ordering the signs. I've got an order...now. Conrad: Okay, what are we going to do? Do we know the words we want or do we want to send it back to Roger for better wording? 8atzli: I'd like to table it so that staff can look at why the language was changed and to come back with a recommendation. I think so far the consensus has been that we need broader language in there on the aggrieved persons and I guess we don't know why the last sentence was or wasn't taken out. Conrad: Makes sense to me. Erhart: I'll move we table. Ellson: I'll second. Erhart moved, Ellson seconded to table on the Zoning Ordinance Amendment to amend Section 20-29(d) for further staff clarification. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. Emmings: I think 4 days is too fast. I'm probably going to vote against it. Ahrens: I would think that if somebody was that concerned about a particular issue, since the result of the decision isn't going to be published anyway, that they would be right on top of it and ready to appeal if the decision didn't go their way. Emmings: Unless they went skiing. That's real fast. Ahrens: Yeah, but they'd realize that if that issue was of such a concern to them they would find out what the decision was. Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 6 Krauss: People have about a week and a hall's notice before it's ever heard by the board. Batzli: That assumes they get notice. Sometimes you hear about things after the fact. If you're not within 500 feet, you may not know about it in advance. Ahrens: There wouldn't be a natural inquiry anyway. Krauss: But a lot of times you're asked to act on things where somebody said I live 3/4 a mile away and nobody ever told me and does that say you can't act? Emmings: No. Olsen: It's never happened. I guess that's why we went with the 4 days. It's never happened. I mean anyone who is aggrieved or whatever, is always at the meeting. Emmings: I think posting the property will help assure that that doesn't happen. I think that's a better way of getting the people then anything else. Krauss: Well I think the ordinance that was approved though didn't require posting for variances. It was for site plans, subdivisions, rezonings, CUP's. Olsen: We could... Krauss: We could but it adds to the, you know variances are kind of a mom and pop thing. I mean we're talking about residents that ask for these things that go before the Board. You deal with much more involved variances than the Board of Adjustments. There's going to be a fee for use of our signs and a damage deposit and they're going to have to install them themselves. Developers are quick to do that. I'm not so certain that an individual homeowner necessarily is. Emmings: I had to do that on my lot when I lived in Minneapolis. I had to apply for a variance and had to post my lot and they had all kinds of fussy requirements and stuff and the signs blew down on a couple of days, and I don't know. It doesn't always work real well I don't thinki APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Krauss: Do we have to do this anymore? Emmings: No. Krauss: Should I delete this from the agenda? Batzli: I think it should be raised in case somebody wants to make changes. We just don't have to vote on it. Conrad: Any changes? I forgot to see when the meeting closed. 8:557 Planning Commission Meeting December 12, ~_990 - Page 7 Batzli: Well, we interviewed people after. Conrad: Oh, okay. Emmings: Talk about feeling threatened. Conrad: Protective? Anything? Okay, Minutes (November 28, 1990 Minutes of the Planning Commission) stand as accepted. CITY COUNCIL UPDATE: Krauss: We have a budget for next year. You'll have a tax cut. Really we did not have a lot on that last agenda and it was Monday night. In fact, did we have any planning? Olsen: Well McGlynn got expansion. Krauss: The extension for their grading permit. Emmings: We'll have a tax cut? Krauss: Well no. The City is cutting taxes for the City. Whether or not your taxes go up is a completely other matter. Erhart: This is spending per individuals... Krauss: Well what happened is the rate of growth exceeded the rate of inflation in the City budget but a significant margin. Erhart: What things... Krauss: Well, I had put together a budget memo. Originally all the departments heads did and asked for some kind of projects that had been brewing in the background. One was to retain some expertise to work with us on a sign ordinance. Another was forestry intern to finish up. Emmings: Mapping? Krauss: Yeah. I forget what the other one was but the budget was a very lean budget and like a lot of optional things, those fell by the board. Now one of the things that's not strictly speaking a budget item but is really going to be kicking into high gear this coming year is the surface water utility. The water bills going out in January hopefully should have that fee on there. I think that amounts to $3,00 and 20 some odd cents per house for 3 months. And with the revenues that's generating, I'm in the process of putting together a request for proposals for consultants to work with us on a combined proposal probably but a wetlands ordinance and mapping update program. Water quality plan and a surface storm water management plan. I think certainly there's going to be a very high level of interest and we're going to set up a process where you'll be involved in that in the wetland aspects. The rest of it relates to it so you'll be filled in on all that. Conrad: That triggers a thought that we should be doing in January Paul is just sort of, one of our meetings early in the year. Planning Commission Heeting December 12, 1990 - Page 8 Krauss: Goal seting? Conrad: Yeah. And the process should be, I guess I'd like to set them, submit them to City Council. Get their feedback on what gets added to or deleted from and their priorities so we give them something to react to. Last year, well I'm not sure how we did it last year. Krauss: I guess fortunately we have the list of ongoing priorities here and that gives me some guidance because I have to do my goals to the Council now, before I get a raise I think. Emmings: Like a lot of optional things. Conrad: Okay. Ongoing items. What does that mean? Is that our status report? Krauss: Oh yeah there was something I wanted to mention on there. I mean you asked us to get working on some of those items and I think clearly we've given a shot at it. You know we didn't have too much time since the Comp Plan to really get into it. Do you have it in your packet? Emmings: Yeah, it's the last item. Krauss: The last one? There was an item and I don't know if you want to add it to your list or not. I really don't. I got a call from Dave Peterson over in the newspaper and he was reading about in Ramsey and a couple of the cities up to the north where there was an adult material shop that opened up next to a daycare center and everybody was picketing and there's attempts to model ordinances that will regulate that and Dave's question to me was does Chanhassen regulate this sort of thing? And my answer was, no we don't and I called Roger to find out if you know, this all goes back to the First Amendment issues. Has there been any change or substantial change in Supreme Court rulings that basically say this is something that you might not like but you can't do very much about. He told me that there really isn't. However, a lot of communities are passing ordinances that you can't ban these things. What you can do is focus them and you can prohibit them from locating within 500 feet of a school or from a daycare center or whatever else but there has to be a place that they are allowed in the city. So it raises the question, do you want to get involved with this at all or do you want, if we're going to deal with it, you're going to have to basically say it is allowed someplace else and not just it's not allowed here. Emmings: Where would it be allowed now? Krauss: In any commercial district. Conrad: Do we want to be involved? Emmings: My opinion is no. Ellson: I don't think it's worth it either. Emmings: I'm fundamentally opposed to that kind of regulation. People ~oing to shop there or those shops wouldn't be open and you know, that's Planning Commission Meeting December _12, 1990 - Page 9 the way you exercise your vote on this kind of a thing, as far as I'm concerned. Conrad: I don't think we're a prime community for that so I'm not too nervous. Ellson: We've got a lot of bigger issues that we should be working on. Krauss: I just thought I'd bring it up. Conrad: You should. That's valid. Obviously somebody could critique and say hey, if somebody comes in and-we haven't reviewed it. Erhart: If somebody does come in with an application would we still have time to react at that time? Krauss: Well no you don't and that's what they're doing up there or trying to do. They're trying to do an after the fact ordinance that prohibits them in that specific spot. These things are difficult. I mean if you develop an ordinance I can guarantee you, you can't close all the loopholes. You're going to have to have a place where these things are going to locate. Then if you develop an ordinance and this thing locates in a permitted spot, then you have egg on your face for having looked at it or you weren't able to prevent it. I think it's kind of a no win situation but unless there are some fundamental changes in law where you have an ability to define these things and define the situations they can locate in a little better, it doesn't appear and Roger confirmed that there's a whole lot that you can do. Conrad: I can't imagine us coming up with a location for. Krauss: Well you sort of come up with a location the back way. You say it can't be here, it can't be there and it can't be here so it can be every place else. Batzli: So basically you could limit it to your central business district or something? Krauss: Well you can, you know Minneapolis has a 500 foot I think it is restriction from residential. You can prohibit, you know set a distance from a church. You do that on your liquor licenses. You can do that with this. But what happens if you do that and say somebody locates an adult material shop in the Frontier Center. You've got a church upstairs there. I don't know. It's not something that I relish having to work with. Emmings: They should be allowed anywhere underground and not be given a sign. Then I'm comfortable. Krauss: There was also a question, when the video shop moved in down the street here. They contacted me and I believe 3im Chaffee at the time to ask what the City, does the City regulate adult videos and what is the regulations for that? Emmings: They've got it out on TH 7 and TH 41 at Video Update. Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 10 Krauss: Do they? Well, what we had told this fellow. Emmings: Now, how do I know that? I heard a rumor. Krauss: Well this guy called. This guy contacted us and what I told him and what 3im told him is no we don't have regulations to do it but I would counsel strongly against you doing it. That this is not the kind of community that takes kindly to it and will probably have repercussions and I think he took it to heart. I don't know if that persuaded him but I don't believe this one has adult video. Batzli: This is the one by MGM? Krauss: No, this one right over here by... Conrad: Any interest in persuing this? Is there any interest? Okay, we're not going to persue it. Anything else you want to talk about in the ongoing issue? Krauss: You can put this in ongoing possibly. I handed out tonight a calendar for next year. There was a couple of issues that you needed to decide. I think Vicky wrote notes on here. There's only one meeting scheduled in 3uly and one in November because of how the holidays fall out. Now last year we skipped a 3uly meeting. Of course we had a number of other special meetings for the Comp Plan that kind of bracketed that but we skipped the 3ulw 4th meeting. We also skipped the Thanksgiving meeting but Vicky points out that the Council only meets once in December on the 9th and if you have your regular meeting on December 4th, whatever's heard then doesn't get heard until the following year. Is that a big deal? If it is, what you can do is you can move up your meeting time to November 27th. Emmings: That gives us 3 meetings in November? Krauss: Yeah. It's very hard to know what kind of a work load we're going to face this coming year. Maybe you want to play it by ear. Conrad: That's also not necessarily fair to staff either in putting 3 meetings in November. I guess I'm not too concerned about the out of sync. To tell you the truth I'd prefer, if we have issues, I'd prefer to have staff have enough time to deal with them versus our ability to process them to City Council. Ahrens: There'd be 2 November meetings wouldn't there? Krauss: Well that's the thing. We skipped the first. Ahrens: November 6th. Emmings: Oh no, you're right Krauss: We skipped the Thanksgiving meeting. Emmings: I was looking at City Council. You're right. That's my first mistake this year. Planning Commission Neeting December 12, 1990 - Page Batzli: We haven't started 1991 yet. Emmings: How'd you know? Conrad: I'm still not too concerned. Krauss: If we leave it with December 4th, if we've really got a slug of work to do, we can move it. Ellson: Right. We can discuss it in October. 8atzli: I don't think we're going to have a slug of work next year, at least as far as applications. We'll get a lot of stuff done though. I say we royally kind of. Assuming I'm here. Conrad: It's a real humbling experience. UPDATE ON FLOOD PLAIN ORDINANCE. Jo Ann Olsen gave the staff presentation on this item. Krauss: It's one of those curious anomalies where we need to adopt the Federal regs for those people who need it so they can get flood insurance. We have very little in the way of a flood problem in Chanhassen and we don't allow people to build in flood plains anyway so a lot of these regs are kind of moot reallY. We've never used them but we're still obligated to do it nonetheless. Emmings: Have we mapped our flood plain? Krauss: The Feds have. In fact we'd like to see if there's a way we can get them to update it but Jo Ann's looked into it. Olsen: We have to do the work. We're given a list, a long list of the people... Emmings: Where is it other than the river valley? Olsen: It's around the lakes. Krauss: All the creeks. Bluff Creek has a flood plain. It goes through the industrial park. Emmings: And how, I didn't read this. There was too much detail for when I got to this part of the packet. When you're talking about a lake or a creek, how do you define the flood plain then? Olsen: There's a map and I should have brought one down but there's a ring all the way around it. Emmings: And does it go to a certain elevation? Krauss: Yeah. In a 100 year event how high is it going to bounce off and where does it go? Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 12 Olsen: So like your shoreline would be...and if you were going to be building a house...you'd probably call City Hall and say'is this in the flood plain? And we would have said well a portion of it is but we have a 75 foot setback...That's as much as we enforce it. Batzli: 30 Ann, are all these changes then required? These are required under the Fedearl regulations or what have you? Did you just go through and do it then? Olsen: The whole ordinance, we regulate a lot more than is here. What I did was I went through what our ordinance says now and tried to add what we didn't have that they now require you to have. Also the DNR has one of their staff persons to go through our ordinance and list what is needed for us to add to our ordinance so that's a combination of those two is where we came up with what we have. Batzli: But the federal people won't review it until after you've made the changes? Is this something that Roger should look at? Krauss: It might not hurt before we bring.it back to you and we publish the ordinance. We can certainly do that. Batzli: I mean I don't know if that would add anything or not. It sounds like you've looked at it pretty thoroughly but. Olsen: Yeah, I've discussed it with him before. Again we've gone as bare bones as we can. I don't think we can cut anything else out. I don't know that we want to add anything. Conrad: So you're just bringing this to us for our input and there will be a public hearing. Olsen: Just to let you know. It looked kind of big but really... Conrad: It gets real tough to read. Any other comments on that? Ellson: I thought it was interesting. Krauss: We'll try to have somebody from the DNR here when this comes up too so they can answer specific questions. Conrad: Okay. EDEN PRAIRIE PLAN AMENDMENT. Conrad: Paul, if you could highlight your key concerns. Again I think you're just bringing it to us for information. Krauss: Well if you have anything specifically that you'd like to raise or if you have a question with the tenor or the content of what's in there. I did send it but I told them that I was acting kind of unilaterally in this and I was going to bring it before you and the City Council if there were further comments or changes, I would tell them about it. This is the third Comp Plan or guide plan amendment that Eden Prairie has gone through since I've been with the city in the last year and a half. There's a Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 13 number of concerns I have and !'11 be honest with you and say that this is the third draft of this letter and was the one that went out. There was a lot that I had to cut because I was really somewhat upset with the way in which that request came across my desk. Eden Prairie, I'll be diplomatic about this but has a somewhat pre-emptive maternalistic attitude towards Chanhassen and Chaska and I think it's reflected in their comp plan. They basically, and this has been related to me by their Planning Director~ believe that we would never~have occurred but by the grace of God and Eden Prairie. That if Eden Prairie had constrained themselves with the MUSA line, that we would not have sufficient development that wanted to be out this far. I've always disputed that point of view and we've tried to deal with Eden Prairie in a fair manner. We've always said we don't oppose your MUSA line amendment but we want a level playing field and we want you to know that we have some concerns. In this case our concerns focus on some of the rationale that Eden Prairie's using to justify this Comp Plan amendment. Eden Prairie's basically saying that the Metro Council regional model has allocated them a number of units and jobs that they're comfortable with, unlike us and to accommodate that they need 370 acres. Well, this letter is in part addressed to the Metro Council which now says wait a second. This regional model is so far off that you're telling us -and we're across the street from Eden Prairie that we're supposed to decrease in size over the next 10 years. Some of the rationale. The amount of work that we've done to justify the Comprehensive Plan amendments we're proposing and the amount of work that Eden Prairie's doing, it's just not a fair comparison. Also, Eden Prairie appears to have gone through a comprehensive planning process without publicizing it. Eden Prairie has one comprehensive plan that the Metro Council uses and then they have another one that they apparently use and we've never been given an opportunity to review it. That was what I was raising some issues with. There were some very large storm drainage outflows going directly into Lake Riley. Well we're coming up with a multi-million dollar plan to clean up our water. We don't need Eden Prairie's water sloshing down in there unless it's of the same quality. I think those are things that can be worked out you know if it's done in an above board manner and I'm asking the Metro Council and Eden Prairie to do that. We have what we believe to be better traffic information than Eden Prairie has and we're asking that that be considered. As in. the past I continue to make sure that the Metro Council knows that we are coming in with a guide plan amendment. That Chanhassen is not more... That we are growing and' that we have grown and that we need access to the sanitary sewer. That Eden Prairie should not be allowed to pre-empt us. They should be allowed to have their fair share but they should not be allowed to take ours. So basically there's an amalgam of issues that I wanted to articulate. Give to Eden Prairie. Give to the Metro Council and say let's talk about it. Conrad: In the memo, I think it makes some points. Well you're obviously trying to contrast Chanhassen's degree of involvement in planning with theirs and that fact clear. In terms of your first point. Southwestern Eden Prairie development phasing study. What is your, other than them not going through the right process, do you have a problem? What is the problem you're expressing other than the process? Is that it? Krauss: With the study? Conrad: Yeah. Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 14 Krauss: There are elements of the study that I don't think gave. Ellson: Like the traffic part. Krauss: Like the traffic. Like the storm sewer. Like the sanitary sewer that give Chanhassen possibly short shrift and possibly not the consideration we deserve. Conrad: But you don't have a, okay so what's your bottom line concern on that study? What is it letting them do? Krauss: We operate under the Metropolitan Land Planning Act. All of us do. Everyone in the 7 county area. The ? county area requires that you have a comprehensive plan. It requires that you keep it up to date. It requires that you give neighboring communities and other agencies an opportunity to review and comment. Eden Prairie did that in 1980 as did we when we exchanged plans. In 1988 Eden Prairie apparently went through a process that they believed they needed to go through which is fine but they kept it close to the vest and then they started regulating the city based on this document. I'm not necessarily opposed' to this document. I'm a little uncomfortable with the way in which it was handled and there are issued that it raises that had we been given a chance to comment in 1988, we would have raised then but we're raising now because this is the first shot we've had. Conrad: And those issues deal with sewer, water and traffic? Krauss: Yes. Conrad: So it's a process? There's nothing below the surface? You know I kept trying to figure out what you were getting at and in this addition to this MUSA line, if they can resolve some sewer issues, some drainage issues and traffic, you don't have a problem with what they're proposing? Krauss: No. And part of this goes to the Metro Council. If there is a level playing field, if the same consideration the Metro Council gives Eden Prairie is given us, I'm comfortable. Conrad: Okay, then I understand what you're trying to do. Batzli: But part of your letter talks about the Red Rock Interceptor no longer being a possibility. Krauss: Bluff Creek, yes. Batzli: Oh, Bluff Creek, yeah. Now if that's no longer a possibility, has the sanitary sewer system that they're proposing here just end at south of Chanhassen? Krauss: That's correct. As does the Chaska system on the other side which has been my concern all along through this is that everybody's taking care of their own and they're doing a good-job of it and southern Chanhassen is left with no answer and any answer that does come at that time would be extraordinarily expensive. Because basically the line is the deadhead from wherever it starts to here. Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 15 Batzli: If they had had to go through the process, you know the formal review process, would we have had an opportunity to comment on that? Krauss: Yes. Batzli: Is it clear that that interceptor is not going to occur? Krauss: It's still I think on the Metro Waste books but everybody tells you that it's dead. Metro Waste is going through a study or wants to initiate a study as to what to do with the Chaska sewage treatment plant. The alternatives include enlarging it, which is a problem since it's in the flood plain. It gets innundated. Or eliminate it and if they eliminate it they need to have a Metro Interceptor taking this stuff, the sewage to Blue Lake. We've been telling that if you do, whichever alternative you choose, we need to be considered. Our future needs to be taken into account. The Chaska plant is kind of unique. The Chaska plant is an old municipal plant and it was designed to serve Chaska and Metro Waste bought it with regional dollars, our dollars. They've improved it with our dollars. The regional dollars and we have no access to it because all the lines leading to the Chaska plant are municipal Chaska lines. Now on the other side of town, Eden Prairie's proposing to do the same situation. To do the same thing. Conrad: Anything else on that? Krauss: No. I'll keep you posted. I expect that this is not the end of it. Conrad: I agree with what you're saying. RURAL AREA DEVELOPMENT, 2 1/2 ACRE MINIMUM LOT SIZE. Krauss: In some of the meetings I've been at in the last few months, in talking to Metro Council staff, it became clear that the 2 1/2 acre rural lot size that we adhere to is no longer required by the Metro Council. They do require that we maintain the 1 per 10 acre density zoning that we've been enforcing since 1986 and I don't have a problem with that frankly. I mean we discussed rural area development long enough that that 1 per 10 zoning seems to make sense for future development for less impact on agricultural areas and everything else. I was a little bit taken back to find out that the Metro Council apparently changed their policy on this 2 1/2 acre zoning at the same time they were requiring us to adhere to it in the Lake Ann agreement. Be that as it may, it's kind of water over the darn and if in fact their policy is different today, I believe that we have the option of going with 1 acre lots in the rural area. I asked our city attorney about that. It's a little bit unusual because not only do you have to consider an amendment to zoning ordinance but we actually have to have a contract amended between the City and the Metro Council, which is the Lake Ann agreement. I asked Roger to prepare a contract amendment that would take care of that and he's done that. I think this is kind of a two step process. I think we have to first know that we have the ability or the flexibility to change the contract and either concurrently or after that you have to consider whether or not you want to and what kind of standards you might apply. I've discussed this with Commissioner Erhart and he rightfully points out that when you consider 1 acre lots relatively to 2 1/2 acre lots, that other standards may be different as well. You may Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 16 want to look at different front yard setbacks, different sideyard, you know those sorts of standards should be looked at comprehensively. If you'd like us to follow up on this, I think the way in which to do it is to direct us to ask the City Council to direct me to submit this contract amendment, to the Metro Council and first see if we can get the flexibility to take action. If you feel strongly enough about it. I guess we talked about the 1 acre lots for a moment. I think you know, we've all been through the process where we've seen first hand the difficulties we have with situations such as Timberwood and Sunridge Court and Lake Lucy Highlands. That's not necessarily to mean that these are bad places to live. I mean anything but. They're highly attractive environments but what happens when you mandate a 2 1/2 acre standard, you chew up inordinate amounts of ground for very small gain. I mean 1 household on 2 1/2 acres. Now if somebody truly wants a 2 1/2 acre lot, that's their right but we're mandating that that's the minimum lot size right now and once we institutionalize that, you've seen the problems that we have when we need to bring services around and through these areas because these people have their own roads, their own on-site sewer and water and basically you're faced with dead heading everything past them or assessing them for future benefit. It makes it difficult to develop comprehensive road systems. One of the things that we'd like to look into, and I know Commissioner Erhart raised this at a meeting, regional meeting with the Metro Council, is that when you come down to smaller lot sizes, the I acre lot sizes, you have the potential to develop a community based on site sewage system. We have one of those right now over by Minnewashta. Now I'm not aware if that one was built correctly or not or functions properly or not but if we designed this to a high standard, what you basically have is you have the system terminating in a drainfield and if one day we need to provide services, you just cut out the drainfield and tap it into the sewer main that's the City's so I think it gives you a lot of flexibility to bring utilities in in the future that we don't have in developments such as Timberwood. So I guess from my point of view I would advocate that we do follow up and look further at these one acre lots and if you wish, we'll submit that contract amendment to the Metro Council and see what they say. I have no idea they're going to receive this. I'm not even sure of the administrative procedure to go through at this point because Chanhassen was singled out for some very unusual treatment with that agreement. But it's a contract and like any other contract it can be changed. Conrad: Tim is the official rural expert. Do you feel comfortable looking at the 1 acre lots? Erhart: Oh yeah. I think this is a real important thing given the experience we've had here in the last year with the Comp Plan... I did bring a copy of the...Met Council. I've been following this a little bit and attended one of their meetings. The turn about is unbelieveable compared to what we were faced with back in I985 or I986 when we got first involved with that. You know statements like...agriculture preservation... I think Paul's correct. The first step is to...long term goal, first step is to see if we can get the contract changed and then proceed to get as much flexibility as we can and then go back and tailor this thing to what our needs and desires are here. Conrad: Anybody with a different opinion? Planning Commission Heeting December 22, 1990 - Page 17 Emmings: I agree completely. Ellson: I do too and I like the idea of the community sewer thing too. Emmings: This could be one of the most significant things we do for how the southern part of the city develops and give us an opportunity to look at whether or not we're interested in agricultural preservation...and also the idea of clustering in this. I don't know to what extent we can use any kind of cluster development. Maybe you can't. Krauss: They do encourage cluster development but the context that's referred to in that report that Tim's got, if you're out by a cornfield in Young America someplace and they talk about clustering, if you've got 360 acres or old section or whatever it is. We can explore that further. I can ask them. I think, you know i acre relative to 2/1 2 acres, I mean that's clustering in itself in that context. It may be preferable to do them even tighter than that but you can't do them tighter than that 9 times out of 10 if you go with individual... Erhart: I think it's important to understand that their policy on that is a zoning policy. Other than that one contract, it doesn't really state how we have to execute that policy. We really aren't required to follow their approach and the fact that our approach is more tailored to our situation with smaller parcels, I don't think anybody at Met Council objected to that. To our approach. Krauss: In terms of clustering? The 1 per 107 No, they don't. Erhart: Their approach is more tailored to out in western Carver County... Krauss: Well one of the most significant things in that policy statement though is they finally, for the first time, recognized situations that we have really typlified in Chanhassen in that for the first time they came up with this transition area designation which we clearly are. I mean we're surrounded on 4 sides by urban development. They recognize now that there's some difference in the way you manage land that you expect at some point to either go urban or be pressured to go urban than you do with prime farmland if your primary motivation is long term preservation. You may want to allow some residential development but that's the accessory use, and it's a real major change for them. It's a very major departure. Unfortunately they don't tell you very much about the transition area. What the standards are going to be or anything else but at least they came up with the idea. I did prepare written comments to the Metro Council on that and basically gave them a pat on the back for doing that and I asked them to try to develop some more definition for that area because we've had problems with Metre Council on construction of TH 212 and TH 5 simply because they went outside the MUSA line. They didn't recognize the fact that there was traffic on the roads anyway or the fact that Chanhassen was likely to bring these areas into the MUSA line. That's the reason why TH 5 is ending at CR 17 in the improvements. That's the reason why Metro Council staff was opposing the construction of 4 lane, 212 through Chanhassen. They actually at one point advocated that it go from 4 lanes i Eden Prairie to 2 lanes in Chanhassen at TH 101 and go back to 4 lanes again in Chaska. Now presumably with the transition area recognition we'll have a lot better time of it. Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 18 Batzli: Why does the proposed amendment that Roger's drafted not include a acre minimum? It just includes the 1 per 10 density. Krauss: Well I think maybe we can define that further. Maybe we should. You point out a good point. I think Roger just rewrote that paragraph deleting the offending sentence. Satzli: Would they accept it without any minimum lot size in there? Krauss: Probably not. Erhart: If you read this, they're advocating no restrictions on minimum lot size whatsoever and suggesting performance standard. If they do, it iis referenced however that in good soils, and independent septic systems, that 1 acre is probably the sensitive minimum site. Emmings: To get two septic sites. Satzli: So really on one acre they say'you can get 2 sites. Krauss: Well it depends on the soil. It really depends on the individual situations. They've also asked communities to develop and adopt high standards of design and inspection for on site sewers. Fortunately we did that several years ago so we can go to them and say look, we've performed and we'd like you to recognize that. Erhart: They say in this...minimum lot size should be determined by performance standards. Current Council indicate that the minimum should be determined by the standard... Conrad: Okay. How much time do you have to put, how much energy do you need to put into something like this Paul? Krauss: Beats me. I've never done it before. I don't know how they're going to deal with it. Conrad: We tell you to do stuff and then yet we never know how it affects other things you do. I think it's, I heard Steve say it was important to him and Tim says it's important but I never know. Are we saying spend a month of your life. Krauss: Well clearly if it became a major problem. I'm going to work with you on this anyway. What I need to do is get this on the City Council agenda because they're the ones that entered into the contract and get their authorization to proceed. I'll shift it over to Carl Loren I believe at the Metro Council and he and t can meet and discuss how we need to proceed on this. If it's simply a matter of their attorney changing the contract for them and changing it for the Council, that's great but I've found that nothing's ever that simple at the Metro Council. Emmings: A question. Let's say Timberwood, I'll use Timberwood as an example where you've got a rural subdivision with 2 1/2 acres. If we change the ordinance can those people come back in and subdivide? Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 19 Krauss: They probably could. As a matter of fact Timberwood, A1 Klingelhutz has told me several times that Timberwood was designed to do that. Emmin9s: Yeah, and there's a lot of empty lots over there still so it'd be very easy to do because nothing's built. That's something else we'll have to take into consideration. Krauss: But that is an implication. If you moved into a 2 1/2 acre lot neighborhood, would you be upset to find 1 acre lots next door? Emmings: So there are covenants for the preservation as a whole that will prevent further subdivision? Krauss: I doubt it. Emmings: Is there anything like that? Erhart: Timberwood has... Olsen: I know when we were working with a couple of people who specifically located their homes so it could be subdivided. Batzli: bJe probably need a blending ordinance. Conrad: Let's go, if we're all done on that issue, let's go back to the one we started with earlier tonight. Tim, before you came in we had a land owner present a map to shift our MUSA line. No, not necessarily our MUSA line but a boundary for a potential one of our zones a little bit south. I guess we should send some kind of signal. Paul, you weren't comfortable with moving it? I guess I, well I'll open it up. What's the commission's pleasure on this one? Ellson: I think if we had known this in the beginning. I think we arbitrarily have a line there and if we had known this in the beginning, that could have just as easily have been the line as this one and I think it sort of makes sense because I don't think people want to build right on top of a pipeline. It just seems funny that we're going to take, well this arbitrary one holds more weight than this one. I don't have a problem necessarily moving it. I can understand the fact that we've already presented it and that may be Steve's idea that if the proper thing comes in or whatever but I have a hard time saying absolutely no because we didn't have a real good reason for where it is. Emmings: Hell there was a little bit of a reason. It wasn't completely arbitrary. Ellson: No, but I'm saying if we knew this plus the fact that we thought there was a couple little elms there would we have made the decision different probably? That's my opinion. Satzli: I guess I would feel more comfortable recommending that it be moved south if our city people spoke with the William's Pipeline people directly and knew that they would allow berming and plantings and things like that. Because if in fact they don't and this is just going to be an Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 20 open space, then it doesn't serve the purpose of our buffer which we originally intended. So I guess I would .like to recommend it in a qualified way if Z had my druthers after staff has had a chance to talk to them to see what would be allowed. Emmings: Do you think it ought to be presented? t mean the people that live there in the blue were very involved in the comprehensive plan. We took their concerns into consideration when we moved it to the north in the first place. Doing this without telling them, they would be outraged I'm sure and rightfully so so I think that's the other. I agree with what you said and I think the other thing is it has to be presented to those folks and get their input. Conrad: Before we moved the line to the north, where was it? Krauss: It was on the property line. Conrad: Okay. So we had commercial abutting them? So moving it to the tree line. Ellson: Was arbitrary. Conrad: Was arbitrary but it was a distance away. Krauss: It was arbitrary but it also wasn't. Yes, we did not know that the Pipeline was there. We did know that it was a property line. We did know that. it had some vegetative cover on it that in the summertime anyway looks better than having nothing there. We also knew that the land mass was such that the top of the hill is fairly close to Sunridge but it doesn't fall of a whole heck of a lot until you're past Rod's property line and then it dips down substantially. When you're talking about 20 to 45 high tip up panel buildings, they're going to be pretty visible across the top of that plateau no matter where it is. Just below the hillcrest or wherever. There was also a concern as I recall that was voiced by Mrs. 8arinsky I believe who lives in a Chaska brick home and wanted to preserve Chaska brick homes and Rod house is a Chaska brick house. And there was a desire to maintain a residential feel for at least a significant amount portion of Audubon Road that we're not just creating an island. In previous meetings with Rod Grams I've told him that I'd be pretty relunctant to change this at this point but that if he came into me at some point in the future and had, was able to present a done deal you know. Here's our development package. We're going to develop 30 homes on this property here. Here's the buffer we're going to build and then we've got these industrial sites down there and packaged it up so basically it was served on a platter and meet with the neighborhood and give them firm facts because we could do this as a PUD and it will be a firm commital. I can't go before a neighborhood, if we put that line on the pipeline now, I can't guarantee them that they're going to have the level of separation or buffering that they would if everything were pushed beyond the hill because then I know it's going to work. Even if V~illiam's Pipeline is cooperative, which in our experience they're not, you just can't guarantee them. Conrad: You know sometimes you took at the Chaska brick houses and say, there's not much value left in them. You can look at it two ways. I don't know if they're historic or not. I know the one across the street from Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 21 this property is quite nice and I feel that there's a reason to, I think your comment Paul was that if you zone it commercial, the house's going to be torn down. Got to be. So I guess I have a problem with forcing it or encouraging it to be torn down at this point in time. I also have a problem with going back to the neighbors right now and telling them we've got a different line and I haven't been persuaded on this point and Rod hasn't really, you know he's come in at the tail end. I go back to the buffer. I'm not sure the buffer is there where the pipeline is where we've got it so I would have a hard time revisiting the issue right now~ After looking at all those things and after working with the neighborhood, guess I don't feel that there's any value to resurfacing it right now. Ahrens: Well I thought the comprehensive plan was kind of a done deal for Lis at our level and I think that for us to entertain new proposals from people in the community is a little unfair to everybody else in the community who would think that maybe they have a chance to come in with a new great proposal that they've just come up with in the last week and since it hasn't been approved yet by the City Council, they still have a chance. I mean this process makes me real uncomfortableM Conrad: Well I talked to, Rod called me and I said well bring it in. If it makes sense we can do it before the process. If I thought it was an easy deal and it just made all the sense in the world and the neighbors were going to agree, hey I think we'd make that recommendation so the City Council could see what it was. If we had that feeling but I don't have that feeling. Now that I see what he's talking about and where he's moving it, I don't have a feeling at all that this is the right move and I wouldn't entertain it. Well that's my perspective but I asked, he was trying to figure out how to look, get this in and we said we'll take a look at it so I brought them back or I brought them in. But I have no sense that this is a better move for anybody at this time. Krauss: Commissioner Ahrens, I think your point's well taken. You have acted to send them the plan to the City Council. This does not seem to be a change. Well it's unlike the Lundgren proposal which when that one was presented from an environmental standpoint and from the standpoint that it was high quality residential, kind of light went on and we were able to do that prior to the public hearing or during the public hearing and it made some sense. On the other hand, I think that there are going to be a number of people probably at that 3anuary 7th meeting where you're going to be presenting the plan to City Council and I like to think that we spend a lot of time in analyzing these issues and they're put to bed but you know, you will have people who, and I haven't really heard from anybody for a long time honestly but I expect there to be people who basically say to themselves I took my shot with the Planning Commission. I've still got one more shot with the City Council and try to have issues re-opened or re-visited. Whether or not the Council does that is going to be up to them but you're going to be at that meeting hopefully on the 7th and if somebody does come up with an issue, I can see all the heads on the City Council turning over to you and saying Hell what do you guys think about that. So to the extent that you've been able to think it through a little bit, I don't think it would hurt. Conrad: Okay, should we close it? Planning Commission Meeting December 12, 1990 - Page 22 Erhart: I think it's the wrong time to...it's actually more in line where I would prefer to have it but I think it's the wrong time... Conrad: Okay, last item. I asked' Mike here to give a 5 minute speech to close out. No, we're happy you're here Mike just to listen to how some of the process works or doesn't work. We really do enjoy it. It's a far better form of communication when City Council members are here and hear what we're talking about. It loses a whole lot in Minutes. Mike Mason: It's good to have but this is a far better thing. Conrad: Anything else? Olsen: The next meeting we're going to be bringing a public hearing for the, we talked about rezoning A-2, the Timberwood... Krauss: Well you may want to hold off on that in light of our discussion a few minutes ago now that I think about it. I mean that may be the way to protect Timberwood is to leave it agricultural. Erhart: You still have the requirement of the 1 in I0 density and that would preclude Timberwood from doing any subdividing... Krauss: That's right. Should we bring it together with this 1 acre stuff? Ellson: Yeah. Erhart: Yeah. I think it is... Conrad: Well this is our last meeting this year. Seriously though, as the last meeting, I think it's fun to sort of look back and we'll do that in January and look back and see what we got done and what we didn't and where we want to go but I'm really rather impressed with what we got done this year. The reaction of the community to the comprehensive plan. think that was really quite nice. I'm impressed with what everybody has done and added and the energy that you've put in this year so I thank you and I think it's really fun to be on the Commission with all you folks. think that gets reflected. I talk to Don occasionally too to find out what he's thinking about what we're doing and obviously he's gotten some very nice feedback on how we've operated so again, I think it was a nice year and we did some good things and I want to compliment you all on that. Erhart: Has anybody concluded what it means...Planning Commission? Were they positive or negative? Conrad: I think that's positive. Emmings: We've had none and we've had almost 20. One time we had none. Mike Mason: That isn't the same reason 8 people ran for City Council. A lot of people... Emmings: Out of jobs. Ahrens: More people out here. Planning Commission Meeting December 22, 1990 - Page 23 Ellson: I think it's good planning for the community. People are getting involved more and I like that. Whatever happened when we used to have the newspaper here? I remember when I started they were going to be here with us every week. Conrad: They got bored with us. Krauss: They're at every council meeting but I thought they were here. mean they were at every comprehensive plan meeting. By the way, I had hea. rd at the Council meeting that we're losing Ann Hanson who was our relatively new reporter for the Sailor. I heard she was laid off. We're not sure if we're going to get coverage frankly so I've got to find out. I mean we always have Dave and Dave's been excellent. Conrad: When I was handing out the job well done, I think again to the Planning staff. I think your help this year has been, you've really improved a lot of things. I could go down the list of some of the staff reports and the updates and I think in general we've made great strides so I thank the planning department for your help too. Is there a motion to adjourn? Batzli: Well we have to give credence to our grand poobah as well. Batzli moved, Ahrens seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 10:OO p.m.. Submitted by Paul Krauss Planning Director Prepared by Nann Opheim