PRC 1999 06 22CHANHASSEN PARK AND
RECREATION COMMISSION
REGULAR MEETING
JUNE 22, 1999
Chairwoman Lash called the meeting to order at 7:30 p.m.
MEMBERS PRESENT: Jan Lash, Mike Howe, Fred Berg, Jim Manders, Jay Karlovich, Rod
Franks, and Dave Moes
MEMBERS ABSENT: None.
STAFF PRESENT: Todd Hoffman, Park and Rec Director; Jerry Ruegemer, Recreation
Superintendent; and Tracy Peterson, Recreation Supervisor
VISITOR PRESENTATIONS:
Lash: Linda, do you have something for us or are you just? Okay.
APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Berg moved, Franks seconded to approve the Minutes of the May
25, 1999 Park and Recreation Commission meeting as presented. All voted in favor and the
motion carried.
YEAR 2000 WEST HENNEPIN COMMUNITY SERVICES CONTRACT; ADAPTIVE
RECREATION SERVICES FOR PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES.
Todd Hoffman presented the staff report on this item.
Lash: Okay, questions or comments about this?
Manders: Can I ask if you have, can run through a couple examples of how it worked over the
last what, year?
Hoffman: Well it's been actually less than that. Since this spring. The contacts, they had a dance
out here. A single dance out here and then people will also register and go down to programs at
their sites so it's based on a Chanhassen residency. If they're engaging in a program offered by
the services. What's happening is people see the newspaper. They call and they say we're
interested. We have a child who to be able to participate or benefit from this. Can you put us on
your mailing list. They get on their mailing list. They get the brochure. They sign them up for a
program. It might happen in Hopkins, St. Louis Park, Minnetonka or Chanhassen. They're still a
Chanhassen participant and get booked as a participant of the program.
Lash: So in the column thing where it says winter, spring, summer. For Chanhassen has one.
What does that mean? One event or one participant?
Hoffman: Participant.
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Lash: One Chanhassen participant?
Hoffman: That's what they're saying. Again when we had our dance out here, we probably had
just a couple of Chanhassen people and the rest were coming from. It will grow. I've had many
people contact me.
Karlovich: Does that include the transportation as well when they go out to, I'm trying to
remember. When they go to the different locations like Hopkins, does that include transportation
for Chanhassen? No.
Lash: Some things I think if it's like a field trip kind of thing where they're going to go
somewhere.
Hoffman: They have a variety of transportation methods but what they're using up there does not
come all the way out this far.
Berg: I thought you said they would if we got them to a central point.
Hoffman: Tracy, anything?
Peterson: I don't believe so. I mean I know for the dance that we had out here, the participants
that came had to provide their own transportation. I know they work with Southwest Metro and
Metro Mobility to try to arrange transportation for kids getting home after you know an 8:00 or
9:00 hour.
Lash: I think they had buses for that but where they came from I don't.
Peterson: Yeah, there were a couple of vans that were at that dance so I believe there is.
Karlovich: Yeah, I thought I had remembered something about transportation but maybe it was
the field trip type because that's more cost...
Hoffman: Well I think if we get a half dozen participants and they want to carpool or vanpool
from the Rec Center, they'll attempt to coordinate something.
Lash: Okay, anybody else? Okay so.
Berg: Do we need a motion?
Lash: Yeah somebody.
Karlovich: I guess the only comment, you know anything having to do with disabilities seems
like a very good program. One of the, am I reading this right that they have a budget of $48,000
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
and I guess it was $40,000 last year and there were 380 total participants. That it's more like
between $100 and $150 per event per person?
Hoffman: I think your calculations are correct. These numbers are new to me.
Karlovich: It was a budget of $45,000 and there were 300 participants, then participation was
$150. I don't much about the program.
Lash: Do you know how many?
Hoffman: 308 total on the right.
Franks: That's per participant, not per event.
Lash: How many events were there?
Manders: Well this is 308 events so if the same person went to three things, it'd be three things.
Moes: If it's 308 activities.
Lash: No, that was 308 people.
Manders: No I don't think so. I think it's.
Lash: Yeah. Yeah, it's people. That's how many people attended during.
Manders: You could have the same persons going to multiple events.
Lash: Yes I know but that doesn't tell us how many events there were.
Karlovich: 308 appearances.
Lash: But you don't, well.
Franks: Unless the programming, I mean we don't know exactly, I can't remember exactly the
programming. If there are classes, you might have one participant in the class that they might
meet on a number of different occasions, but I see what you're saying. I mean it's there. There's
a cost per event it seems, or per participant.
Hoffman: I'll pose that question to Mary Perkins, see what her response is.
Lash: Okay. Anyone else? Is there a motion?
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Berg: I move we recommend to the City Council that they approve the Year 2000 budget request
of $3,001.00 for payment to West Hennepin Community Services for Adaptive Recreation
Services for People with Disabilities.
Lash: Is there a second to that?
Howe: Second.
Berg moved, Howe seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission recommend
approval of the Year 2000 budget request of $3,001.00 for payment to West Hennepin
Community Services for Adaptive Recreation Services for People with Disabilities. All
voted in favor and the motion carried.
1999 SKATE PARK.
Todd Hoffman presented the staff report on this item.
Lash: Okay, let's open it up for discussion. Jim, do you want to start?
Manders: Well I guess reading through it the first time, the first thing that caught my eye without
question was the insurance. If that's not as big an issue, I'm inclined to be supportive of this. It
sounds like documentation is maybe worth while. Is it going overboard? I guess maybe it is
considering how much effort we've put into playgrounds. I'd be inclined to do it because we're
making use of a hockey, dual use type for starting a separate.
Lash: Jay.
Karlovich: I'd like to start out with a question for Todd. It appears that were you thinking about
taking $15,000 and buying as much equipment as that would supply and taking a look at... see
where it can expand further? Was that kind of the game plan?
Hoffman: Correct. You buy the $15,000 you get a start on it and then it's really a decision to be
made. Do we want to include additional dollars in the 2000 budget for a skate park? We don't
have them in your budget this evening. It's not in there as a part of your recommendation for the
2000 budget that either you worked on in the past couple of months or that I prepared for you this
evening. And if any of these skate parks are going in that neighborhood citizen groups are
participating in raising dollars. The other article that you have on your desk... I think the people
that want to use these are very comfortable with it.
Karlovich: This has been in the works since 19977
Hoffman: It's been talked about.
Karlovich: What would $15,000 get us, do we have an idea?
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: Yeah, it would get about four pieces of equipment. The individual who was in today
Tim Hughes, his opinion is about $19,000 would be the optimum starting configuration for 2000.
Berg: How much space would the five pieces or the pieces for $19,000 fit? Out of 20,000 out of
40,000.
Hoffman: You wouldn't only need about a quarter of the space.
Berg: A quarter of the?
Hoffman: The entire space.
Berg: The entire 40,000.
Hoffman: So about 10,000 square feet would be more than sufficient.
Lash: Jay, did you have?
Karlovich: No.
Lash: Fred.
Berg: I just sort of support the idea of doing like we do with playground equipment in terms of
phasing it in. My question was going to be the same as Jay's in terms of percentage of what we
can fill with $15,000 so we have some idea what the budget is in here. They are getting a lot of
use other places, correct? Communities where these exist. I know not a week goes by that I
don't have at least 5 or 6 kids at the high school asking when they're going to, I made the mistake
of telling them we'd be getting on in summer. I thought we would. You know what can I do to
get up there and what can I do to build it? I'll bring the wood. My element seems like, the
element I hang around with seems like they're really anxious to have it but I don't know if they
represent a large enough population.
Hoffman: Well I would characterize it as you have nothing now so the $15,000 in my view has
the largest return on your investment of just about anything you can invest your dollars in today.
There's nothing out there. There is a tremendous need. Tremendous desire.
Manders: Going in that lane is this whole youth thing that we've talked about how many years
trying to find something.
Berg: Yeah, we've looked at community centers to basements of churches for crying out loud.
Looking for something to do with this element of kids. Now we finally have an opportunity to do
it, and we're quibbling over $15,000 that has been approved already anyway. It doesn't make any
sense to me to wait. And then look at a phase in process as we go along.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Lash: That was just exactly what I had in mind too. I was thinking if we went with the Phase I
with our $15,000 and figure out what we can get max with the $15,000. Use the most and if we
can get the kids who are trying to get this ball rolling and getting organized with petitions, again I
just continue to go back to the businesses that I'm hoping this is going to create a solution to some
of the problems that the business owners have and if we were to, that the kids may be even
organized to go and ask, are they willing to provide a small donation. Say they give out $50.00,
$100.00. Whatever. Pool some of that money. That could maybe be Phase II for next year and
see what we can get. And I know he mentioned in here about maintenance, yearly maintenance
dollars and how would we deal with that. I'd be interested I guess in then approaching the
businesses and saying, would you be willing if we put, we talked about putting up side boards. If
there's a Subway sign. To get advertising space, are they willing to provide $50.00 a year for
maintenance or something to keep that, keep it looking nice. Their sign looking nice in the park.
Equipment going. So I'd look at going again back to the community. Selling advertising space.
Phasing in and you know monitoring the usage and this article that we got from the Lakeshore
Weekly News, looks like there's this South Lake Youth Coalition getting going. Maybe none of
those town that are involved in this yet have a place to put it. This would be a nice, a close
enough location for them, if they'd be willing to join in on this effort too. If their kids, that it's for
Excelsior and Shorewood and the other towns.
Howe: Tonka Bay.
Lash: It may be something that they're doing some fund raising and this could be the way for
them to at least get a short term need until they can get one in their community. But it's got a web
site and people to contact. That might be an avenue for funding or help with some of the
discussions. But I think if we had, I guess I'd be more inclined to want to see a pretty concrete
plan too before we send it on so that we're all at least on the same page that we know how we're
going to accomplish these goals. I think we can set the goals tonight and then how are we going
to get there? And again, because I agree with the City Manager, I guess it's not our job to
necessarily have to...
(There was a tape change at this point in the discussion.)
Franks: ... something that's just going to delay this longer and you know you're going to have
skaters and skateboarders and BMX people who are all going to want to get in and they're all
going to have a different idea about what they want and with just the amount of equipment that
we'd be able to purchase, you know nobody is really going to have their needs satisfied. So part
of me thinks that the staff could probably use some good judgment in just putting together a
package.
Hoffman: It's a pretty simple plan at $15,000.
Lash: I agree with the focus group. I think it will slow down the whole process. The other thing
is, these kids use this for short time periods. It's between when they're like 13 or 14 and when
they can drive. So the longer we drag this out, the more kids who come to us and ask, we've
been screwing around with this for like three years. Yeah, they're driving. They're done.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
They're probably in college. The longer we drag it out, the more kids are just getting passed by
and.
Moes: To that point, what is the age range?
Berg: Well when I asked that question of the kids that originally came here and they said
anywhere between 13 and 24. I think they were a little bit.
Moes: They start bringing their motorcycles then or BMX.
Berg: Kids that I talk to at school are juniors.
Lash: I would say somewhere from 14 to tops 18. Once they get their drivers license they're.
Hoffman: Oh it goes younger than that. 7-8 years old.
Berg: Kids are really into it through high school.
Lash: See I don't even know what we're planning on putting in there.
Karlovich: Some of the fear I see coming off of Scott's memo is that once you put something out
there and spend our $15,000, the grass roots movement will die because they will have been
successful. They will have something out there and there will no other funding. But then I do
agree with the rest of the commission that we need to get something out and see how popular it is.
Franks: Me feeling is if the $15,000 satisfies the need and the interest in further expansion dies,
then we've fulfilled the goal. If the need continues and people say this needs to be expanded,
expand it. Then we need to look at it but that's a relatively...
Moes: How is the skate park managed? Is it managed any differently then the rest of the park
facilities that are out there as far as monitoring it or oversight or?
Lash: I think we talked about that way, way, a long time ago and came, at one time we kicked
around the idea of having a gate attendant and charging and all that but generally I think what
happens is you end up paying more to have a gate attendant sitting there than revenues that you
generate so it just.
Moes: So is management kind of a free skateboarding scenario like free skate is versus six kids
coming and saying we've got this for the next half hour because we're going to do something. I
mean how is that managed or has that been addressed?
Berg: Much like you would a tennis court I would imagine.
Moes: That's what, I was trying to think of the different scenarios that could come into play or
like ballfields. Those are reserved or shelters are reserved.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Lash: We can deal with that when it happens. Linda, did you have something that you wanted to
say. Can you come up to the podium though so the mic picks you up.
Linda Jansen: You bet. I guess one of the things that I want to help with is maybe a little of the
clarification as to where the direction is coming from from the council and it's not a fear of what
this complex represents. It's not a hesitation to support a need. It's looking to policy and
procedure and policy and procedure is that as we are addressing a new facility, as we are with
this, and keep in mind you have lwo new council people. And a new city manager. We all turn
to needs analysis and feasibility studies. There's none of that that's been pulled together on the
skate park. There's a lot of good concepts. You're throwing them around here tonight and what
we're looking for is let's pull them all together in a report in a recommendation saying this is what
we ultimately see as the size of the skate park. This is what we're trying to achieve. Help us and
the city see what it is so that as residents come to us and say, and they have, what's this skate
park. How big is this going to be? You know what's going to be in it? Who's going to be using
it? All of those things typically would come down to one of these reports. So as this is coming
back to you, and one of the things we're trying to avoid is don't look at that $15,000 as this is
what for immediate we're going to apply to the park. It was presented to us as this would be the
seed money, if you would, that we would play a part of the skate park with the contributions that
would be coming from the community. So it's not that we're saying to you go out and spend the
$15,000. That option was presented to council as an option to consider. We didn't approve that
option. What we approved was forming the committee. Getting us the design. Showing us the
concept of what we're creating. What are the pros? What are the cons? There are communities
that are out there who have built these. What have been their successes? What have been their
failures? I understand isn't there one that's going out of business now and we might reap some of
the benefit of being able to get the equipment cheap. You know if someone's going out, you
know is there a problem with them? What are the pros and cons? We don't want to throw a few
pieces of equipment out there and then have the kids coming in and saying, this isn't a skate park.
You know what is this? Where's the rest of the equipment? We're not saying, and it wasn't
presented to us that the city was going to be 100% building a skate park. It was presented that
there were enough people wanting the skate park that there would be the ability to do this grass
root effort to fund it. And reading the articles, it's from $40,000 to $80,000 that Mr. Hoffman has
quoted the potential cost could be and in the articles, if you read, it's from $120,000 to $170,000
that they've managed to fund raise to construct these. So what is the actual number? You know
what ultimately would you like to see there? What's it going to cost and so what are we going to
the community for as far as a money match to the $15,000? That's just the start. You know let's
build it right or at least know what the plan is that we're trying to achieve. I don't know if that
helps, you know maybe shed a little bit of light. It's not that we've never said no, that we don't
want to do this, but we don't have any documentation to say what this is. It's some great ideas.
I'm hearing them here tonight. You know I want to take them all down and put them into a report
form. That's what we're asking for.
Lash: And I think that's, Todd that's what you're planning on doing.
Hoffman: Correct.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Franks: That would be our...
Hoffman: Excuse me.
Franks: That would be what we typically do anyway. We'd see a plan. We would look at a plan
and either pass that on or not.
Hoffman: Correct. If you would ask the City Council to go ahead and buy the equipment and the
City Council approved that, you would solicit a plan and present that for a purchasing decision.
At that time we'd plan...
Linda Jansen: So we're off there. We're not looking for a plan to spend the $15,000. We're
looking for the total plan for the skate park.
Karlovich: That makes a lot of sense. I mean.
Lash: Normally when we do a park plan, we'll have the master plan and then we've got phases.
We're going to accomplish this in this year. We're going to try and accomplish this in this year
and down the road. This particular thing I can see us doing that. Of course it's not as grandiose
of a plan because it's just equipment. We don't have to get into a lot of other things, so I can still
see us doing a Phase I, Phase II kind of a thing. However, I want to have flexibility, if we do
Phase I and that seems to fill the needs and the kids are happy with that, why would we then want
to go back and do a Phase II and spend more money if that's filling the need. Or if all of a sudden
the whole thing falls apart and nobody uses it any more, I wouldn't want to put more money into
it if nobody's using it. So if we have a report that's got, Phase I would cost X amount. Phase II
would cost X amount. Doesn't mean necessarily that we'd go through with Phase II.
Hoffman: It's all a fluid process. Putting a plan together for a skate park, I really don't, I mean I
didn't do that and there are plenty of people out there but if you're going to buy $15,000 and then
look to the community to come up with the rest, they don't necessarily want to fund raise for what
you see as your plan. People like some ownership in what they're going to fund raise for so that's
my reasoning for being hesitant to go out and say, here's the plan for the skate park for the City of
Chanhassen. We're going to buy the first $15,000 and then hopefully come forward and
purchases the rest. Or there will be some modifications. I see a lot of value in just getting the
whole plan out there and then that's not a problem. We can put that together. I've been busy this
spring with construction projects and a lot of other things and it's taken a back seat and it's, we'll
just put together a report which will be very simple to do. The ad hoc group is just a single
meeting. So we will take what we have for a plan. Present that to them. And just make sure that
we do have some connection out to the community and they have some buy in and they say yeah,
we met with the park department and they've got a good plan. It's got nice jumps and ramps and
it's got a good flow to it and all those types of things. Because what you hear from these groups
is that communities that do just go out and make a plan, put it together and then it doesn't have the
right equipment or it doesn't flow correctly, and they say well that was a mistake. You should
have talked to us. And so we want to do that. We want to make that connection out to the
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
neighbors or the community that does this and then we'll put that report together. Present it to the
commission. You know we can do that in a special meeting if you want us to...
Moes: Will that report have like a Cadillac design with the Chevrolet somewhere in the middle?
I mean do we need to see it back? We're going to have $100,000 park? A $50,000 park?
Lash: Well we could do Phase I, Phase II, Phase III, Phase IV. The first phase is only going to
fill in a quarter of the space. You know we could certainly do a four phase plan. Who knows if
we'd ever go past Phase I.
Hoffman: yeah, I think they'd be perfectly happy with just the 20,000 square feet. And leaving
one rink up all summer for inline hockey. You'd have an inline hockey rink up here and then a
skate park.
Lash: Maybe say Phase I and then a possible Phase II, possible Phasing whatever possibility we
thought on how well it's received.
Berg: I'd favor that much more than getting the business owners involved in fund raising. That
smacks of my old parochial school days. The city should be in that business.
Hoffman: Yeah, we don't have.
Moes: And I think the businesses in the community probably figure they give quite a bit already.
Lash: Well that's my point.
Berg: But I don't know that we have to charge them for it. We can ask for a donation for it. I've
got kids drag racing up and down my street and I'm not going to contribute to an oval that they
built someplace because they won't be on my street anymore. So I think if the city council will
go along with the idea of phasing something in based on need and not getting set, we have to
spend $60,000 or whatever, I think that's the way it's worked with playground equipment and I
see no reason why it can't work the same way with this. I don't know if that's what council has in
mind. You don't know or no it doesn't, that's not what they have in mind?
Linda Jansen: It's not the way that it's been discussed. And that's what I'm trying to
communicate because now if we're going to completely change the way that we're approaching
the skate park, it's coming back to us in a new format. Because the way that we understand it as
a council is that we're simply making a small contribution to what will be this total skate park.
That it's a community grass roots effort that's wanting to contribute to creating this and suddenly
the focus has become this $15,000 instead of where did the original plan for what we were going
to be doing as a skate park go. We weren't trying to fund the entire skate park. It was an
understanding, and the way that it was presented and correct me if I'm wrong Todd, but the way
that it was presented to council was that this was going to be a larger project than the city would
be funding. You know what you're saying is that you don't want to go to the businesses. You
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
don't want to do the fund raising. It's been presented ever since last year's budget meetings as a
fund raising effort. So now I'm hearing differently.
Berg: I thought, correct me because I'm getting really confused here. I thought at the work
session that we had last month that any number of people, two that I can think of specifically said
we're surprised you haven't spent the $15,000 already. Go for it. That's an incorrect assumption
on my part?
Linda Jansen: We weren't saying, the money has been allocated to be applied to this project
along with to fund the grass roots efforts, it's seed money is the way that it's been worded to us
all along. Is that this is just strictly a start for the total. What's the city's contribution compared
to what the user contribution is going to be, because there's a big fund raising effort that's about to
happen to create the skate park. So yes, we have protect, the $15,000 is there but now I'm
hearing it's a different effort than council is thinking it's going to be. And so I can't tell you that
council will approve because we didn't approve already the option that was presented to us back
on February 16th, Option #2 was construct what we can using the $15,000. We didn't approve
that. What we spoke to was form a grass roots committee to raise additional capital and manage
the design and construction process is the way the staff presented the skate park to us. And that's
where we said do #1. The grass roots effort. Form a committee. Get us the plan. Get us the
design. Show us the specifics like we would receive for any project. On any project we would
be receiving for the similar to know exactly what it was we were creating instead of chasing down
different minutes and different reports to try to put all the parts together.
Lash: It will be difficult for us to have a real clear plan if we don't have a clear amount of money.
And right now the only clear amount of money that we know that we have, or that we thought that
we had was the $15,000. There's fund raising that goes on. We can do that but that's going to
take a lot of time which then, you know are we going to say okay, we talked to the kids who are
involved. You guys go out and try and do some fund raising or we talked to this other group or
whatever, come up with some funds that could take us June, July, August, September. I mean it
could go until next summer. Fund raise until next summer and do it summer. I mean is that the
direction you want to go? And you guys are saying you want us to do fund raising. We got the
memo from Botcher that says, I do not believe it is the city's job or stafl~s job to be in the fund
raising business.
Linda Jansen: It's our understanding that a separate committee, this grass roots committee would
be formed.
Lash: That would do that.
Linda Jansen: To do that. And would probably come up with the whole design and construction
aspect so that they have the buy in to it and are willing to make that effort to go create something
that they've been a part of. And one of the articles in the packet actually speaks specifically to the
other communities having done that where it was the, just the big committee that pulled together.
Figured out how much space. What the design would be. They work with skate park designers
to come up with it. Be sure that they were doing it appropriately and that park money and then
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
they went out and they did the fund raiser and that was one of the ones that was up in the
hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Karlovich: It appears to me like we should be directing staff to come up with number one, a
design. And then different options, whether it's phasing and at what point is it a build. There
should be funding options. Whether we just go with you know, if there's $15,000 and then it's
more additional funding that's raised. Then at that threshold that something gets built. Do we
direct Todd to come up with different options and we review that and then send that onto the
council?
Lash: No, I think we need to just totally back off and say, get a hold of Tim Hughes and tell him
to get a hold of people on his petition and tell him to get those people together and figure out how
they want to do some fund raising. They've already provided us with some suggestions of what
they'd like it to look like so I think they've already got some ownership. If we take their ideas in
the plan, that's fine but you know if you can take some of their plans and say, okay this is how
much we need. The city's willing to contribute $15,000. You guys need to go out and raise
$50,000, or whatever else it will take to do an adequate job and see if they do it. If they don't do
it, then it doesn't sound like the city council is willing to see the project through.
Manders: I have a comment. I'm not wanting to be negative so I'll phrase this being realistic.
What I see happening here, we're going to have $15,000 that the city's planning to put forward as
seed money and we're going to pursue needing some kind of an organization to fund raise the rest
and the group of people that we're talking about in terms of doing this fund raising is a shifting
group. It's not going to happen with this year's group and the people that are involved in it are
going to move on. They're going to get new people in. They're going to start over again and
you're never, it's not like a park or a playground where you've got adults. Adults are going to be
there for 10 years, you've got those same adults working with it. Here you've got probably 3-4
years and that group keeps turning over in the interim, wanting to fall apart. And so this idea of
financing it isn't going to work. I just don't see it happening. It's going to have to be funded by
the city in my opinion.
Franks: I like what Jay what you're kind of going for is to really see some plans, some options
from staff2 Talking to the people who are going to be using it. What their ideas on what they'd
like to see and then with the vendor to see what the cost would be and what a plan would be so
we could take a look at that. But I still am thinking you know when someone wants to play
basketball or ice skate, they don't go around thinking I'm going to have to raise money in this city
to do it. And I am all in favor of partnership because I think it's like the wave of the future. I'm
also a believer in equity and I just don't see this group, as far as their recreational interest is
receiving equity necessarily. I mean if it's to the point where you know something extra is being
asked for and their participation and fund raising, whatever makes that happen, that is a
partnership. But trying to say that to get this you have to do this does not strike me as a
partnership.
Hoffman: The group is, when we say that group, the people who have talked to me are certainly
willing to participate in the effort and participate in fund raising. And it's just what message do
12
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
we want to send back to them. I mean I really think we're beating this thing to death but I mean
Chaska, they've got a committee. They said alright, form a committee and they're working with
the city and with funding and design and those type of things and if that's what you want to do,
fine. There's just, you know there's so much budgeted. Let's just review quickly the series of
events. You talked about this as an improvement for City Center Park. Allocated or
recommended $30,000 allocation. $15,000 was funded. So in February I talked to the council
about it and provided the options that Linda spoke about and they wanted to see some additional
information and I don't know, do you have the exact motion? I have that upstairs. And so then I
went away and left the project on the back burner and I deal with Bandimere and trail construction
and those type of things. And then Timothy Hughes started calling really on his own. The
information in last week's article was really a lot off there's a lot of inaccurate information in that
article written by the reporter from the, Timothy Hughes did not mention the $15,000 up here in
the budget, etc, etc. He's simply an interested person. He was scheduled to come onto the, talk
to the council just about his interest. As a staff member, until I have some pretty clear direction.
I've got a new city manager that's coming in and saying, you know I really don't think we should
be out working with a group. Just get a focus group. Get us a plan. Those type of things and so
I'm trying to sort those messages out and Scott's given me clear direction and I work for the city
manager and I'll be preparing this report and I'll present it to the park commission and I'll present
that then after that point to the city council and we'll get something happening. I'm not going to
go out and form a subcommittee to generate dollars. If that happens out of this, fine. It will
happen but what we're focusing on this evening is Mr. Botcher's report as city manager and I'm
telling the commission that I will complete this work as he's directed me to do and by August or
September we'll probably have a skate park out there. At least hopefully some form of a skate
park out there on the site, and I think it's going to be very successful. I think we're going to have
a lot of use and you talked about teens and how they drop off the face of the earth. They hit that
age group.., get a positive response to some of their desires so. I don't think I have anything
further to add or I don't think I need any further direction either.
Lash: But it looks pretty clear there are some different points that I think everyone's in agreement
on. There are some things that I'm confused about between the message we're getting from city
council and Botcher and the history and what we all thought was happening. So I need some
clarity. I don't know about the rest of you guys. I mean I see you need to make a basic design
and I think Jay had a good idea, one like a possibly a $20,000 one. A $30,000 one. A $40,000
one. That way we know the $15,000 is seed money. That's what the council wants. They don't
to be feeling like they're doing the entire project with $15,000 and if that's the way it goes,
they're not going to approve it so we know that already so we might as well start with $20,000.
We can tell the grass roots movement, if you guys can fund raise $5,000 this is the park you're
going to get. If you can fund raise $10,000, this is what you'll get. If you get $15,000, this is
what you get. Like that so we've got a pretty clear basic design, some different options to
present. Then that's also your cost analysis. He wants that. They want that. We need that.
We've got the storage thing covered. About the fund raising and stufl] we've taken care of that
using the kids, right? As far as saying to them, if he says we don't want staff doing that. City
Council says we want grass roots movement doing that. So the kids will be doing that with you
giving them some indication of what they would get for certain increments of money.
13
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: Or the plan would do that.
Lash: Right. So then they've got a little direction as to what they can shoot for. I think we
already, I think he wants to know about the usage and city council wants to know, and you've had
people coming in for 2 or 3 years you now consistently. It's always different people but they're
coming in. They're doing petitions. I think we're covering that. I think we can show that there's
need.
Hoffman: Oh yeah we can present.
Lash: You've done the insurance thing so you've got that covered. So does that sound Linda to
you like we're trying to cover what direction you guys want to go? Meeting Scott's requirements.
So everybody's going to come out with what they want.
Linda Jansen: I think as far as making the blanket statement that if you came to the full council
with a $15,000 proposal that they wouldn't approve it, that I'm not going to say for them. Only
that it was presented as one of three options and it wasn't the one that we selected. So I mean if
you came back to the council with a new proposal as to how we're going to do this, it would
reopen it again for a whole other discussion. Scott's point cover all of the points, pulling them all
together from each of the conversations that we've had at the council as to what everybody's been
asking for. And some of those questions go back to '97 so it's just pulling them all together.
Lash: Okay. So if we get all of that put together, you'll be fine. Okay.
Berg: Jay had something to say.
Karlovich: No I just, it's obvious that you have some different options to spend the $15,000.
...the $15,000 eats of a quarter of the space, and maybe $60,000 the whole piece and then
$15,000 here you spend when we have seed money. That's not really, then it's not seed money if
you just spent it. Just funding. Option 2 is, you know other type of combinations. And then we
also have the grand plan of what we want it to look like. It's a huge fit and.., point that Linda
made is that we want to be assured that we don't put something out there that's so small that it's
an embarrassment. One little, that's not a skate park.
Hoffman: I guess I can provide some clarity on the numbers that Councilwoman Jansen talked
about. $40,000-$80,000 will buy more ramps than this community would ever need. I mean
$80,000, we could put the nicest skate park in the metro dang near out there. The other numbers
talk about..put asphalt under these rinks and either inline skate on them during the summer or have
the skate park on top of them in the summer. So we have about a base investment of $75,000 and
if you invest $40,000 to $80,000 out there you're going to be in that $150,000 range and you're
going to have... $15,000 is the base money. $19,000 I think was Tim's base number. And it gets
us about four pieces of.
Lash: Okay. Everybody okay?
14
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: I'd go ahead and table it until July.
PROPOSED 5 YEAR PARK AND TRAIL ACQUISITION AND DEVELOPMENT
CAPITAL IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM (CIP).
Todd Hoffman presented the staff report on this item.
Berg: Can I ask you one thing?
Lash: You bet.
Berg: Maybe we want to as a commission talk very seriously about a significant shift in our
philosophy. Thinking of, I'm looking at Lake Ann for example. In 2001 we've got a budget of
$150,000 for the road and the parking lot and that. Maybe we have to start realistically looking
and saying we can't afford to do that from our budget. From a park and rec point of view.
Maybe we have to, obviously we're not falling short of other needs. If we can have an initial
budget this year of $873, almost $74,000, maybe we have to start looking at the fact that we can't
afford either this year or budgeting money aside each year to try to pay for things like the road or
fallout shelters. I dated myself there just a little bit. Maybe that's just not our prerogative
anymore. Maybe we just have to look at it and look it at square in the eye and say we don't have
and we won't have the money for these big ticketed items. And maybe we have to be more
concerned about maintaining our parks and making them as useable as possible and if other people
decide that the road is an important thing to have happen, I'm using that just as an example. Any
big ticket item you want to look at, whether it be maybe if at City Center the $275,000 wanning
house and park shelter. I guess I'm saying the same thing five different times.
Hoffman: Yeah, there's a lot of big items in there.
Berg: Maybe we just can't afford to do them.
Karlovich: Maybe I can ask a question was that, for the next few years we're going to cut down
all the budgets because we spent so much. So all these other commission members have spent a
lot of money and now I've got to be sure.., cutting it. Sounds like.
Franks: Timing.
Karlovich: Sounds like the discussion my wife and I had last night.., want to spend money.
Lash: I just did a quick, to transfer information here because I'm visual and I need to be able to
look at it. So if take out the blue one, which was the one that was 3 times our budget, right?
Hoffman: Four.
Lash: Yeah. And I think I transferred the information correctly but I'm not positive. If you look
at Bandimere, Todd left that the way it was. Bandimere Heights is left the same. Bluff Creek
15
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Preserve was left the same. Carver Beach Park was left the same. Carver Beach Playground was
left the same. Chan Estates Park, parking improvements was taken out. They're going to have a
real.., that that really has to be done. Chan Hills was the same. Kerber Pond Park was the same.
The Rec Center was the same. City Center Park, the wanning house was taken out and moved
out to the next year. I think we all said we thought that was a priority thing. But it is a huge
outlay of money and we just don't have it. We'll have to just rent a wanning house, right? Next
year. Are we okay with that? Curry Farms was left the same. Sugarbush. Greenwood Shores.
Herman Field was left the same. Lake Ann Park. The entrance road, parking lot, trail
construction we had put in $150,000. That's taken out and a dock, the roll in dock which he said
is in need of replacement right, is $4,500. So that's a big coin but, a bunch of coin but we need to
come back and discuss that. That road when we're done anyway. Lake Susan Park was left the
same. Meadow Green, both trail connector pieces came out. Landscaping was reduced from 20
to $5,000 and the grill was left in. That saved $120,000. Minnewashta Heights Park stayed the
same. North Lotus was landscaping at $5,000. That's around the picnic shelter, right? We said
we wanted to do that everywhere, and a grill so that would be 59 in there. Pheasant Hills stayed
the same. Power Hill stayed the same. Prairie Knoll stayed the same. Rice Marsh stayed the
same. Round House the renovation went from 80 to 40. We talked about we're going to get a
bid on that and talked about possibly doing that in phases, right?
Hoffman: This $40,000 allocation would be matched with the $40,000 that is sitting in the
referendum fund right now. So you still have a total of 80 to complete the project.
Lash: And I don't know, for some reason I just don't see that happening and, oh this is for 2000.
Never mind. South Lotus stays the same. Sunset Ridge stays the same. Stone Creek stays the
same. Other improvements stayed the same. Does that sound about right to you Todd? Okay.
Brings us down to the 244.
Karlovich: My only input was I know we wanted these concrete waste receptacles but I guess my
only observation is that I'd rather have cheap garbage cans than.., permanent facility. I mean if
we're going to cut this 244 down more. I'd rather put up with whatever type of plastic garbage
cans we're using than cut some landscaping or some type of permanent improvement so.
Hoffman: Yeah, page 29. You can do a variety of cuts there. You can wipe out miscellaneous
$10,000. Miscellaneous asphalt $10,000. You can reduce contingency to $10,000. You can
reduce picnic tables to $10,000. You can eliminate or reduce the waste receptacles. What kind
of waste receptacles you have in your park system, that's simply policy. If the commission would
like, these plastic ones are essentially free. Then we just have to manage them. You're out there
in the park systems. You see them. Probably use them. So that 93 could easily get cut in half, or
even farther.
Moes: For that item Todd, I'm thinking of the concrete waste receptacles versus the plastic ones.
We're talking, you know the capital dollars here. How does that impact then.., for the people to
maintain the plastic ones. Do we need to balance that at all in these discussions or is that another
topic of discussion in your overall?
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: Maintenance costs, operation and maintenance cost?
Moes: Yes, exactly. I mean I'm seeing the concrete waste receptacles being something that saves
a lot of time, effort and energy on recourses within the department to focus on other things.
Hoffman: At a certain level. I mean we're not going to save $30,000 worth of trash. You're
going to present a nicer image in the community. They're going to stay where they're put and
they're not going to blow over. They're not going to get tossed around, etc. You don't have blue
barrels in your park and trail system. You're going to save some money. You're not going to
save $30,000. We chase them around, you know 120 some garbage receptacles out there with the
$7.00 clips every one that we replace every other week. So it takes $7.00 clips every other week
and the time to go out there and do it and chase down the garbage barrel, which has fallen in the
ravine and put it back up there and pick up trash and put it back together. Pluses and minuses.
You can put up with a lot of headaches for $100,000 worth of trash barrels that you'd buy every 3
years. Then you'd have in your system, but then you'd have them there for 20 years.
Lash: When are we supposed to get that cost analysis on the Roundhouse?
Hoffman: I'm meeting with the contractor, Locus Architect next week.
Lash: We would have that before we need to have the budget submitted.
Hoffman: I suppose, yeah. About that same time period.
Moes: What happens if we do take the, push the Roundhouse one off the.
Lash: Do you think that could be done in phases where the outside could be fixed up so at least,
it can't be done that way? You can't just fix up the outside and then work on the inside later?
Hoffman: They're integral. One in the same. What has to happen to Roundhouse is you
completely gut it. So you take that, you take the roofofl~ You take the windows out. You take
the second floor out and what you have left standing is walls, a floor and a foundation. At that
time you can start renovating it. There is no inside, outside. It's all open to the air. It's all one
and the same. They still think $80,000 is going to be short. They're just going to have to design
around that.
Karlovich: But with this $40,000 in this budget it will happen in 2000 though? This $40,000.
Hoffman: Yep. There's $40,000 being held over from the referendum funds, yes. Our goal
would have been to have it completed last year. Now we're not completing it in '99. We hope to
complete it in 2000.
Franks: Jan, are we just going to consider dealing with year 2000 today?
17
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Lash: Yeah, I think so. Well we'll look and see if we get 2000 done. See where we're at that
time wise but I was kind of, one other question I had was on the, that one trail connection. The
Fox Chase. I want to make sure I'm remembering it as the right one. That one that's right next to
the people's house.
Hoffman: Correct.
Lash: That's that one, okay. Then are we committed to getting that done in 2000?
Hoffman: It may happen in 1999.
Lash: Oh it may already, okay.
Hoffman: The properly owners come in, he wants, the Kreislers, they want to expedite the
process and I met with him and his attorney last week. We're going to meet again this week with
the other neighbors and if they can come up with some type of a solution which seems to work for
everyone and the city, send that back to the council.
Lash: Because one of the things that we talked about last time, and that's not on here. I think we
all thought it's a priority. I just don't know where we're going to put it, is that 101 connector
down to Bandimere.
Hoffman: Didn't get it in there under trails at some point?
Franks: 2001.
Lash: Is it? Where is that?
Franks: Trail improved development.
Hoffman: Under the pink.
Franks: Pink on page 28.
Lash: Oh, okay.
Hoffman: This is why we passed a $4.9 million referendum if you remember.
Moes: Yeah, it's not going to happen. This sounds familiar.
Hoffman: We started to back lot a lot of projects. Got behind and said.
Lash: I thought we were having clear sailing for a few years.
Berg: Well we are if we lower our sights a little bit.
18
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Karlovich: It just seems like if you only have $200,000 a year, what can you do with that
$200,000. Playground equipment and landscaping.
Hoffman: Small projects or big projects.
Karlovich: The trails and parking lots and roadways, it doesn't seem like you're adding...
Lash: We almost have to leave the $20,000 in for contingency because with Roundhouse we
know that's probably going to run a little over. So we've got a little bit there to finish the project,
and we need $5,000... have that.
Manders: I don't want to push on the subject but the $15,000 here is for the skate park?
Hoffman: Correct. It's in the '99 budget.
Franks: And if the Fox Chase connector trail goes in in '99, does that come from the 2000 budget
then? Or would there be funds available from '99 trail construction?
Hoffman: Not from the referendum, no. We'd have to allocate some funds out 410 so what
you'd be doing is doing a budget amendment for 1999. And just making it happen in '99.
Lash: So we wouldn't just have contingent, a contingency money from this year's budget, enough
to cover the $15,000 for that?
Franks: I guess that's what I was asking.
Hoffman: It might be less than that because the $15,000 is that number which would account for
both trail segments going down and then making the big L. Right now we're focusing on just
going down, which would be considerably less.
Lash: So we don't have anything left in our contingency?
Hoffman: There is money left in the contingency. There were items spent earlier in the year so I
think there's about, there was $10,000 in there in the 1999 contingency. Some was spent.
There's about $4,000 left is my recollection.
Lash: For like scout projects, we didn't do any of those?
Hoffman: Not yet. If it comes up, right now they're looking at a concrete sidewalk. That'd be
their preference to go through there. You know $3,000-$4,000 if you're going to make that
happen.
Manders: For the Fox Chase thing?
19
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: Correct.
Franks: I'm sitting here listening to that and looking at the other improvements under
miscellaneous and thinking it may be a luxury and I'm sitting here thinking of that luxury, isn't
that interesting. Concrete waste receptacles are maybe out of here and then maybe dropping our
own contingency fund down a little bit from $20,000.
Berg: What about picnic tables and benches too? What?
Karlovich: And the $93,000.
Lash: Or do we have those in already?
Hoffman: We don't have them in already. We need additional tables for the shelters we built.
Bandimere.
Franks: I really yeah, wouldn't want to skimp too much on the tables with the expansion in part.
I mean people are going to need to eat.
Berg: Good point.
Lash: We almost have to have the monument sign for the...
Manders: But don't we still have to pick up that $40,000 that we chopped out though?
Roundhouse, because we're not going to get away with us doing.
Lash: No, he's got $40,000 left over.
Franks: From the referendum.
Manders: Oh, so that would get us up to the 80?
Hoffman: That's where we started with the, we started, let's do the Roundhouse for $40,000.
That's what we've got in the budget from the referendum and they said no, you're not going to get
it done. So we went back to the drawing board and said well let's add another amount into,
$80,000 is the minimum. We can do that or close to the minimum. It's like building a small
house.
Karlovich: Is there anything that we cut out that had a higher priority than the Roundhouse, like a
playground?
Lash: Not really.
Hoffman: You completed $200,000 worth of playgrounds in the referendum.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Franks: And Phase I needs to go in up here.
Hoffman: And Bandimere.
Lash: The Roundhouse is really an eyesore at that park right now.
Karlovich: Sounds like you get Bandimere Park and Roundhouse and the $93,000.
Lash: Yeah, we're getting the play equipment at Bandimere, Roundhouse, a couple little trail
connectors, some picnic tables and landscaping at the new shelters and garbage cans.., what we
did in '99, it sounds pretty lame.
Berg: I wish we could eliminate the waste receptacles and cut the contingency fund in half and
take at least part of that and move the silo restoration to this year. To the year 2000 at
Bandimere.
Lash: The silo is really an eyesore too, and it could be a safety issue.
Berg: That doesn't do what you want in terms of cutting down the total dollar amount but.
Lash: We're not trying to cut down the dollar amount.
Hoffman: Well it would be nice.
Lash: What are we trying to get that down to? We're trying to get that down to $200,000?
Hoffman: That would be better.
Franks: Personally I'm thinking along with what Fred's saying. I would also be in favor of
taking out the waste receptacles for the year 2000 and cutting the contingency fund by half and
thenjus stopping. And knocking that down by another $40,000 figure for 2000. Then you're at
$204,000.
Berg: And not do the silo.
Franks: Well not this year, right. My only concern too though, is somebody brought it up too and
I was thinking that was a safety issue on the silo.
Hoffman: We've removed all that. We've taken, took the ladder off up to about 14 feet and
boxed in the other side where the ladder and the silo.., interim measure.
Moes: What is the, I guess I evidently missed this one so the significance of the renovation of the
Roundhouse at Roundhouse Park versus demolition and sodding? Someone needs to update me
on that.
21
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Lash: Well, just accept it. It was the source of much, much, much, much, much discussion and
that it's sort of a landmark type thing. It's what the park was named after.
Berg: It will be used as a wanning house in the winter. Used as a beach house in the summer.
Activities that are going on at the park could be moved into there in the case of inclement weather.
Lash: For totlot, dynamites, those kind of things.
Berg: It provides a service for that beyond just aesthetically looking wonderful.
Moes: Yeah, we're rebuilding or building a new one.
Lash: Well it'd be cheaper than building a new one.
Moes: Is it?
Lash: Oh, the one that we were going to put out here that's a wanning house, concession stand, is
$275,000.
Karlovich: I went there during the tour. I looked at that and...
Lash: Well it hasn't gotten any better.
Karlovich: But I didn't know I guess that the general feeling of the commission is that it's like
a...
Berg: That was a big part of the discussion was, I don't know how long.
Moes: I was looking at the allocation of the dollars.
Karlovich: Was it also part of the referendum?
Howe: Yeah, 40 of it was.
Lash: Not specifically.
Franks: Oh not specifically.
Lash: No. No, I think it was development of that park but not specifically renovation. I could be
wrong. Todd was renovation part of the referendum? Or was it just development of the park.
Hoffman: Phase II development. No, it did not specifically.
Franks: Did not specify renovation.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Berg: But it would be wrong to say there wasn't an element of history that entered the discussion
when we made the decision.
Lash: And it would be wrong to day it was a unanimous decision.
Karlovich: I know we have this, we've got the pink budget here. It looks like we're going to
$244,000. Said you'd like to get it down to 200 or 175. What drives those numbers or kind of
how much.., flexibility is there? I mean there's a big difference beiween 175 and 250.
Hoffman: Annually we budget, or we estimate revenues. And estimated revenues for about the
past halfa dozen years in park and trail acquisition and development funds is somewhere around
$250 to $300,000. The high years you go $300,000 or slightly over. The lower years you're at
$250 or slightly under. So if you want to keep yourself in check, you certainly don't want to
spend more than the $250,000 or $300,000 or you're going to start spending down your 410
budget. If you want to save money, well you're going to have spend less than the $250 or $300
that you hope to make. So the council, the commission said alright, let's. I mean we got this
money for the referendum but it's not doing it all but now's the time to invest the money so
$300,000 was invested. Additional dollars was invested in trails. $200,000 additional money
was invested in neighborhood or community parks. That spend down the budget by $500,000.
So if we make $300,000 in a good year and we only spend $200, it's going to take, 2 or 3 or 4 or
5 years to build that back up to where you were before. It doesn't matter, right now you're at
about halfa million dollars where you were at about $800 or $900,000 and there's a balance in
there depending on when the dollars come out and when it's been receipted. So the park fund is
down to about bare bones now as far as what's identified for reserves and what's identified for an
annual budget and cash level. You don't want to be aggressive. We want to be a little
conservative.
Franks: This sounds like a... but could there be any, would there be any value to a discussion of
looking at $40,000 as for Roundhouse for demolition and construction of one of the park shelters
like we built at some of these?
Hoffman Surely.
Lash: Go ahead, open it up for discussion Rod.
Franks: Well in fact you know, when we started, when I looked through this, when I got the
packet and I looked through that and after going to the roundhouse yesterday and peaking at the
foundation. You know the construction of the building really up close, the thought occurred to
me that maybe we could just knock it done and put one of the park shelters up like we had in the
other parks.
Lash: How much were those little park shelters?
Hoffman: $25,000.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Lash: It was only $25,000?
Hoffman: They range from $18 to $25,000.
Franks: Depending on the size, but like Power Hill. That's $25.
Hoffman: 18.
Franks: Oh, that's 18. Where's the $25,000?
Hoffman: Meadow Green, North Lotus.
Karlovich: Do those have vending in it?
Hoffman: Steeper in the top. It's a larger diameter.
Berg: Larger.
Hoffman: Just the roof.
Lash: Redesign it so it would be round.
Hoffman: Well they're about as round as they get.
Moes: I have this thought of a picture in there of the round house. All painted up and looking
nice.
Howe: What's that going to cost to tear that down, does anybody know?
Hoffman: Staff time of, boy.
Lash: Fire fighters drill.
Hoffman: No, less than that.
Howe: Less than 5?
Franks: And to haul it away?
Hoffman: Well the staff time is just going to take a day to push it in and a day to haul it to the
dump and it's going to cost you what you pay at the dump to dump it. Demolition of that
structure would be... It's this big history thing. I mean it's the round house.
Karlovich: Fred is having a heart attack over here.
24
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Berg: I can't believe my own commission members are saying this.
Lash: Because we've got new blood here.
Berg: We'll go along with whatever obviously the commission wants to recommend, but once it's
down, it's down. There's another part of your community that will no longer be there and it never
will be again and you can build a dark, pretty little solid structure that will last.., of what makes
Chanhassen unique. With the round house. Now there's absolutely no logical reason to keep it
up. You can save money. You can build something more sturdy. It will withstand like I said,
anything and it will get plenty of use and nobody 10 years from now will even give a dam that it
was there. The round house was there and that I think.
Lash: Except for the old...
Berg: What I think is sad is that 10 years from now nobody will care that it was ever there.
Lash: Rename it your typical, average, everyday park.
Berg: And you've just taken one more step, in my mind, you've taken one more step to Eden
Prairie.
Karlovich: We were talking about knocking down the silo too.
Berg: Well why don't we do the silo too.
Lash: Let's rip down old City Hall and the Railroad Depot.
Berg: You're absolutely correct logically, and as I said. I'll go along with what you do. With
what you decide but I think it's unfortunate that we even have this discussion. That's nobody's
fault. It's just unfortunate that we have to be talking about.., this place so we can create an Eden
Prairie. That's nobody's fault. That's 1999 and I'm not assigning blame to anybody here. That's
why I'm not welcome in Eden Prairie.
Lash: Okay, is anyone unclear on how Fred feels now?
Berg: I have a problem with letting people know how I feel.
Howe: At a minimum should we wait for the engineer's report before we decide this?
Hoffman: Architect's report.
Franks: And you said to Jan's question, that we would receive that report prior to the necessity to
submit the budget for 2000? Or do we need to do that.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: I'm not exactly sure on the timing. The first, I heard verbally that I have to have
budgets ready by about July 15th. There's plenty of leeway, ifI get my report and I'd come back
to you. If you leave it in and I come back to you at your July meeting and say here's the analysis.
Here's what you've got and you want to make the decision, there's time to do that.
Karlovich: I think we can cut down a few thousand, I guess let's take out the waste receptacles
before we take out the round house. I even feel guilty about the discussion.
Lash: Way to go Fred.
Berg: That wasn't my intention. I should have been an English teacher. Then I wouldn't have
this sense of whatever.
Lash: But Fred, you know you've lived in town for.
Berg: 19 years.
Lash: 20 years. I've been here for 22 years. Everybody who's been here any length of time, if
you say the round house, people know where it is. And it is kind of a historical, unique thing and
it was part of the reason, it was the reason that this, got voted for the name. It was a very
philosophical debate back then as to what, what was the vote? It wasn't that close though. I think
it was like 5 to 2 or 6 to 1.
Hoffman: 5 to 2 1 think. If you have any history and you look at the historical society for the
State of Minnesota and any one of those buildings, you can tear it down and rebuild the same
thing for much cheaper than if you restore it. Same goes for the round house. You could tear the
round house down and rebuild a round structure for less money than it's going to take to restore
what you have out there because you're telling the contractor to work around a dilapidated, old
structure that they have to clean up and then retrofit and make it work.
Franks: So you're talking a similar structure could be built for.
Lash: Oh, I could go with that. Are you, do you still have real strong that it has to be exactly.
Berg: Well I don't know. Yes. Well I don't know what we're talking about. A round structure
like at Meadow Green except for round is not the same thing as the round house.
Lash: Well it would have to be a new round house. Like the old round house only not old.
Hoffman: I mean you can't replace it. It's a wooden water tower with stays and cross members.
You can't replace the round house. You're not going to pacify anybody if you tear down that and
build them a round structure. You're either going to tear it down and be done with it or.
Manders: Or go back to Mike's point of the architect's report coming in and justification.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: I'm at $204,200. Do I hear any more axes?
Lash: That's as deep as I'm willing to go.
Manders: That's it for me.
Moes: What did we cut out then Todd?
Lash: Half the contingency fund.
Hoffman: And give me some direction on the remainder of the five year CIP and I'll bring that
back in July as well.
Manders: $200,000.
Lash: I guess what I want to know is if our projected revenues are $250 to $300,000, and each
year we're going to try and keep our budget at $200,000. It should be generating or coming out
ahead of $50,000 to $100,000. That's going to go into our reserve fund for?
Hoffman: Future big projects. You're saying we can't do the $300,000 project. So you build up
your reserve and then one year you say you know what, we've been sitting on aluminum trailer at
City Center Park for five years. Let's take our reserves that we built up and build that one.
Karlovich: It would have been helpful, I had a hard time, we're still flipping back and forth but if
we had a list of everything and just go priority 1, 2, ,3, 4. Maybe that would give us a little bit
more direction. Say this is what's got to be done.
Berg: ... trails to parking lots to benches.
Karlovich: Right. Just prioritize things.
Howe: We've got to be earning what, $25,000 a year even on $500,000? I mean we have
interest that's going to this account we're in right?
Hoffman: Correct.
Lash: We have $500,000 now?
Hoffman: There abouts.
Howe: Well that's $25,000 right there every year we're picking up.
Lash: So why are we not putting the shelter in?
27
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: It's all, the $500,000 in your balance right now is you have a $200,000 reserve. You
have some other reserves in there. There's not a halfa million dollars in your account today. It's
there but it's allocated for other reserves and all of the items. If you want to look at the budget, I
can bring it on down here.
Lash: Are the reserves of things that aren't in our 4107
Hoffman: No.
Berg: I guess the heart of what my question was earlier about saving for big ticket items, do we
have to discuss as a commission whether or not we, we have $250,000 to $300,000 this year in
our budget. Should we be having a discussion as to whether or not we want to spend that
$250,000 now because the needs are very pressing now. Because there's no guarantee that if we
save for a big budget item, that we're going to be able to do it for that anyway. So are we, why
are we saving, trying to save an extra $50,000 at the expense of cutting off Paul's ann when Peter
might not get it anyway?
Hoffman: Well 410 allocations can only be invested in park and trail. Spend it now or spend it
later. It's wise to be conservative at this stage in the game then to put some money back in that
fund.
Moes: Or is there another way of looking at it that, looking at spending the $200,000 in
anticipation of a slow revenue year whereas second, third quarter of 2000 we see that the revenue
stream is significantly higher. What are their opportunities then, I'm not going to say reprioritize
but include additional things in at that time that have.
Hoffman: You can make budget amendment requests to the council at any time and it's happened
many times over the years.
Manders: We're talking about one quarter of another.., fully built there's X dollars that we bring
in. Whether we bring them in earlier or later, we're only working with so many dollars left. How
quickly do we want to spend that. Spend it now or do we want to push it out, maybe a couple
years past when we're full, we have no more revenues coming is about what's it's going to come
down to.
Moes: No, I understand.
Karlovich: I think Fred's point is we're kind of being cheap in putting money away when there's
so much out there that we're going to need another referendum so.
Berg: Yeah. That is exactly what I'm saying. If the need is there now, and there's no guarantee
that we're going to have the money later if we save it, why aren't we spending the money now on
the needs that we have right now?
28
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: No, there's a guarantee that you'll have the money. It will be in the fund. Another
way to look at it. If you did not have a $900,000 plus dollar reserve in 410, we would have had
to make some difficult cuts in these referendum projects. If you were at the level of financing
today, you know when you had to make those decisions, you would have cut off the north half of
Galpin, the north half of Powers, and City Center Park would have looked much different and
Bandimere would have looked much different. The fact that we had $900,000 in the bank
allowed you to make those decisions and make those things happen and you're happy because
you had that opportunity.
Lash: And what do we have now? Because I was thinking that we had pretty much tapped that
by finishing those projects. So what do you think we have now?
Hoffman: It's down around $400,000. I'm not sure, we have not received a statement in quite
some time but it's down around $400,000. IfI go upstairs and get the budget you'll see the
allocations which are in there. There's a reserve for this. A reserve for Lake Ann. There's a
reserve for other items. The $200,000 just basic fund reserve, and the fund reserve was started
back in the 70's when it say you know what, this fund should always have money in it because
when we get a LAWCON grant for $150 grand, we have to match it. And so that stayed in there.
It's a state assisted policy not to bottom out your bank account. And then the other reserves are
noted in here.
Berg: Help me out then with what Mr. Botcher said in our work session. I was under the
impression he said that you can set aside money for a large ticket item but there's absolutely no
guarantee that it will be there when you need it.
Hoffman: No guarantee that that's what will be allocated for. If you make the recommendation
to allocate it for that, the council can choose to do that or they don't have to do it.
Lash: But it has to be used for a park and rec issue.
Hoffman: Oh sure.
Lash: Well that was, okay. Mayor Mancino called me last week and that was exactly our
discussion and she wanted to make sure that we all came away from the meeting with the
understanding, and really what we discussed was I think what everybody came away with. What
Fred said. She said philosophically she thinks the council would still like us to go in that direction
but then again she said she can't guarantee that the money would be there. That if something
happened, yeah they could access it. And then I said, my follow-up question is, can we be
assured that if you did that, whatever that money was used for, it would be a park and rec issue.
You couldn't just go and take that money and use it to build a water tower say if you were in a
pinch. And she said that in the situation of an emergency, the city council would have the
authority to do whatever they wanted with the money but she thought that philosophically they
would not do that. But that they would have the authority, if an emergency came up, that they
could do that.
29
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: I think ifI were to make the decision to do that, but these fees are collected as an
impact fee for parks and recreation. And whether or not anybody would challenge that, the city
attorney would certainly recommend that they not spend it on a water tower. So Fund 410, park
and trail dedication funds are set aside to do parks and trails.
Karlovich: I think we're going around.., you're never going to answer but I don't.
Lash: If we have that money now, what's the problem with the Lake Ann road?
Karlovich: I don't think you can bind future commissions or for future city councils. I mean that
was kind of the bottom line.
Hoffman: Correct. Well the reality that even if you tried, they might not go along so.
Lash: If we do have these excess funds now in reserve, and I know that the Lake Ann roadway
reconstruction is a huge issue right now, why aren't some of these funds being looked at it do
that?
Hoffman: We've got a council that's considering that but again, I don't recommend that we spend
a halfa million dollars out of Fund 410 to construct the road at Lake Ann.
Lash: No, I don't either. But I would rather have it I guess come out of there than have our
budget for years wiped out. Well it's a $500,000 project and say ultimately it's got to come out
of our budget. So say for the next two years, if our revenues are 250, that would take care of two
years of our normal, what we just did. We'd wipe out everything we wanted to do in 2000, 2001.
Update the roadway system.
Hoffman: That's for you to recommend. I don't believe as a staff member, as Director of this
department, that we should be spending a halfa million dollars of park dedication funds to rebuild
the road at Lake Ann. If you believe that, make the recommendation.
Lash: I don't believe that either. The message that we've been getting is that the money's got to
come from somewhere and they're trying to figure out where it's going to come from.
Hoffman: Correct. City Manager Botcher has written the council a letter and said he doesn't see
doing this road in 2000. Or perhaps not in 2001. There needs to be a funding source identified.
There's a chance that working with MnDOT on the new frontage road, that we would have the
opportunity to do financing with that so we need some more time to go over financing.
Franks: Todd, I'm wondering in looking at years 2001 through 2004. You've already done like
a lot of work and kind of shifting things around. Would it be reasonable to ask that we maybe get
some other work from staff about like what would be some of the other cuts that could be made or
areas as far as staff is concerned. We need to work these yearly numbers down to kind of our
target goal. And maybe a couple of case scenarios here of how those might be reconfigured.
3O
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Hoffman: What I would do is bring you back that list of capital projects and make the cut line on
it and say these are the ones that I'm recommending that you complete in the 5 year CIP or look
to in the 5 year CIP and the others don't or if you want to make some modifications as well you
can do that. You can send that document down to the council and see if, this is just a guide
document. See if the council believes in some of the values that.., and get their opinion on it and
make the final changes and put it on the shelf. It sits on the shelf until 2001 and we pull it out,
base our budget on it...
Karlovich: I guess, I mean I think it would be helpful for all of us obviously if we had a little
more direction as to what, at what level should we be cutting down. You know if we're going to
be pulling in up to $300,000 this year in park dedication fees, is down to 250 enough? Is down to
200 enough? Is down to 175 enough? I think that's where we're all, we don't know where to go.
Obviously there is hard fought things that we feel strongly about and we don't know if we should
go, how far we can cut. I think we just need a little bit more direction there and then go with it.
Franks: I guess I was asking the same thing. What would the $175 package look like? What
would the $200,000.
Manders: I think even to carry it to the next step, to do that some prioritized list of what are, that
we want...
Hoffman: I'm not uncomfortable at all with the feelings because we're on new ground. We
talked about improvements, certain improvements for a lot of years and everybody was pretty
comfortable with them and then we got them done and they, most of them were completed with
the referendum. So now we're starting with a whole new package. In fact the referendum
projects created a lot more work for us. You've got Bandimere that's not done. The master plan
is not done. Doesn't have tennis courts. It doesn't have the park shelter. You've got City Center
that needs a park shelter. You have a trail connection you looked at tonight that you would never
look at if it wasn't for the referendum. Now you've got two pieces you've made and we need to
connect. So even though the referendum invested $4.9 million, now you've got another million
and a half of residual projects that we need to kind of sort of and we haven't had the opportunity
to talk about those for a great deal of time. Let's take that time.
Lash: So people want to keep going. Do you want to quit with 2000 or do you want to keep, do
you want to quit with 2000?
Karlovich: ...how we're going to cut it down to $200,000 or $204, is that what? Do we need to
do that?
Lash: Yeah. We'll need a motion to, I guess it would be to approve this budget with those two
changes.
Hoffman: Yeah what you should probably do is I would suggest you'd table that for, until July.
Open discussion on item 5 and establish a... and you've already established that you want to be at
204, 200 was your recommendation. I need a motion.
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Manders: I'll move that we establish the 2000 budget at $204, whatever, $200, by cutting the two
items, waste receptacles and cut contingency in half $10,000.
Moes: I'd also like to add that the other component to that was the valuation of the round house
facility as a part of that re-evaluation of the budget here. As far as the inclusion of it in the 2000
budget and what we were going to be doing with the round house.
Karlovich: The only question I have about this motion is, is it premature without additional input
made from the council or through staff as to what level we're going to be at for 2000? If you're
comfortable with 225 or 250, we could move something else into there.
Lash: We projected, the low end projections is about 250. So we'd be talking about roughly
46... I'd say if we have that projections come in on target at 250, we could at that point if we
wanted to next year at this time, I think the waste receptacles would be a good thing to put back
in. If we wanted to try to make it a budget amendment. And then for the summer season we
could have some of the cement receptacles...
Hoffman: Those numbers, they are pretty accurate. That's what they have been. It's dependent
upon building activity. Building activity looks pretty good right now but if things slow down, it's
going to shut off2
Lash: Okay, so we had a motion. Is there a second?
Franks: I second.
Manders moved, Franks seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission establish the
2000 budget at $204,000 by cutting the items, the concrete waste receptacles and cutting the
contingency fund in half to $10,000. All voted in favor and the motion carried
unanimously.
Franks: Jan I was wondering, do we need a motion on item number 4?
Lash: Yeah, I think you had that, didn't you Jim? Motion to table 4.
Manders: I didn't.
Lash: Oh okay. Add that on.
Manders: Add that to table 4.
Moes: Second.
32
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Manders moved, Moes seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission table action on
the 5 year Park and Trail Acquisition and Development Capital Improvement Program
(CIP) to the next meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
NAMING OF PARK OPEN SPACES.
Lash: Oh, this is going to be another bad one I can tell. We have to go back to renaming of Kelm
Farm.
Hoffman: We had an interesting discussion last meeting on the naming of some open spaces and
as it turned out the Kelm that we were discussing never really even were related to this properly at
all. They were the Kelm family in town so I chided Ron Roeser. He left one meeting too early
because he was the almanac of information so he suggested we select an alternative name.
Manders: Did he have any suggestions?
Lash: What was our second choice?
Berg: We were divided.
Lash: Susan Hazeltine Park Reserve was one, and what was the other one?
Hoffman: Galpin.
Manders: My suggestion was just call it Chan...
Lash: I say we just order all the material... Did anybody have another suggestion? We had Lake
Susan and Chanhassen Park Preserve.
Berg: Susan Hazeltine.
Lash: Susan Hazeltine Park Preserve.
Hoffman: I want Linda to come up with a winner. She's familiar with this site.
Linda Jansen: I read your minutes. I was glad I missed that one.
Lash: Got anything over there Mike?
Howe: I've been running through there quite a bit and I don't have any ideas. Goose Droppings
Preserve. There's a lot of those.
Lash: Wildlife Crossing. Dave you have any?
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Moes: I thought last time Chanhassen Park Preserve had a lot of discussion on it versus the Susan
Hazeltine.
Lash: Well I thought we almost had, I believe it was Susan Hazeltine went through until, wasn't
that almost.
Berg: No, I don't know if that happened.
Howe: We've got a lot of stuff named after her I thought.
Moes: And I think the final was there's a lot of name sake heritage associated with Hazeltine or
Susan Hazeltine and that there is a strong leaning towards the Chanhassen Park Reserve or a
different.
Franks: At 90 acres, is this the largest parcel that the city is likely to own as park space?
We don't have any currently that are that large.
Hoffman: Well Lake Ann's lee. This is lee acres.
Franks: lee acres. And any of the acquisitions won't be that large.
Hoffman: lee Acre Preserve.
Howe: Winnie the Pooh.
Hoffman: That's lee Acre Woods. Highway 5 Preserve. Coulter. Galpin.
Lash: I was going more the Galpin way.
Moes: Well now knowing the specific boundaries, how close is it to the western edge of
Chanhassen then?
Hoffman: Quite a ways.
Lash: Because Arboretum is still in Chanhassen.
Hoffman: It's next to Arboretum Business Park. It's next to.
Ruegemer: 82nd.
Hoffman: Bluff Creek's in there but you already have so much stuff with.
Manders: I'm thinking Bluff Creek Water...
Hoffman: You can just leave it that it's part of the Bluff Creek Preserve.
34
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Lash: Too much.
Hoffman: Bluff Creek Preserve.
Howe: West Branch.
Lash: It sounds like a YMCA.
Hoffman: That's the way national parks do it or state.
Franks: What would the direction from city staff be? If you had a recommendation.
Hoffman: We had a contest. 100 Acre Woods was in there. O'Shaughnessy was in there.
Coulter was in there.
Ruegemer: The Blade.
Hoffman: The park cut in half by the blade of progress.
Lash: How about something nature center?
Hoffman: Boy, that'd be confusing.
Moes: In trying to stick with the word preserve. Have some consistency so people would have
some definition of what those spaces.
Lash: We talked about ultimately the goal being kind of an interpretative center where you could
have a self directed, go from station to station and make observations, right? With some signage
to say look here, you see blah, blah. Look there.
Karlovich: Chanhassen Nature Preserve.
Hoffman: May be the biggest one.
Franks: Well that's what I was wondering. If it's the biggest piece, then I would be comfortable
with attaching the name of the city to it.
Lash: I just think of Chanhassen Pond Park and I always thought that was a dumb name.
Moes: Pond Park has this... I think as well. We're talking about this thing is 100 plus acres gives
it a definite stronger image for the community.
Manders: The only reason I'm in favor of it is because I haven't heard one.
35
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Franks: Chanhassen Nature Preserve.
Lash: We're just a bunch of brain dead people tonight.
Manders: The roads or the Galpins or the Hazeltines are all over. You think more Chaska than
you think Chanhassen if you're in Hazeltine. You don't want the Arboretum so there isn't.
Lash: How about Chmiel? Of course no one would ever pronounce it right?
Berg: How about Chmiel. Chmiel park.
Moes: What's the requirement to nail this thing tonight or is there time to ponder it?
Hoffman: Plenty of time to ponder.
Howe: There's only so many, I think we should do it. You know we could look through a
dictionary but I think.
Hoffman: We could get the baby name book in here.
Howe: Maybe find one name that Jim likes better than Chanhassen.
Franks: I mean of all the preserve areas, this is the one that we would consider developing as
some kind of interpretative use and so, and it's also the largest...
(There was a tape change at this point in the discussion.)
Lash: ... Arboretum Boulevard, that's Highway 5. That's Arboretum though.
Berg: I don't think we want to be associated with that.
Lash: Arbor.
Hoffman: Chanhassen Nature Preserve. People are going to wonder where, well where is the
Chanhassen Nature Preserve.
Franks: So that's a good question, isn't it?
Manders: It's on the main route.
Franks: Are you saying that they'd have a problem with that question or that that's.
Hoffman: I say that's a good question. It's not in Chaska. The Chanhassen Nature Preserve.
Now if you would have had Chanhassen Pond Park and then Chanhassen Nature Preserve but.
36
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Howe: I'd go for Chanhassen Nature Preserve.
Hoffman: It's Bluff Creek that's in there so you have Bluff Creek Preserve. Then you could say
the West Bluff Creek preserve or the Wooded Bluff Creek and then that's going to start.
Howe: Right, that's confusing.
Manders: I'll move that we name this space Chanhassen Nature Preserve.
Franks: Second.
Manders moved, Franks seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission recommend
to name the O'Shaughnessy open space as Chanhassen Nature Preserve. All voted in
favor, except Lash and Berg who opposed, and the motion carried 5 to 2.
Lash: To be on the record, we didn't like it.
Berg: I don't think there was much doubt anyway.
Hoffman: How do you like Sugarbush Park?
Franks: Oooh, flame on that fire.
Lash: Like the park. Park is nice.
RECREATION PROGRAMS:
1999 LAKE ANN LIFEGUARD OLYMPICS.
Lash: Somebody just want to make a motion to approve this? We do it every year.
Ruegemer: Thank you Jan.
Berg: So moved.
Lash: Is there a second?
Franks: Second.
Berg moved, Franks seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission approve
Minnetonka Community Education and Services' request to host the annual Lifeguard
Olympics at Lake Ann Park on Sunday, August 8, 1999. All voted in favor and the motion
carried.
1999 4T}~ OF JULY CELEBRATION.
37
Park and Rec Commission Meeting - June 22, 1999
Peterson: Thanks Chair Lash and commissioners. We are finalizing details on getting ready to go
so hoping for some good weather. I do have the volunteer sheet and looking at the past I saw that
you guys helped out with the prize board so depending on what you plan for your availability
those two days, I will just, you can either talk to me afterwards or I'll start this list with Mike and
if you see something that you'd like to do, you can just jot your name in. But the prize board
would be helpful if we could get that covered. I've heard you guys have done a great job with
that so. And I actually saw pictures so.
Lash: We haven't screwed it up too bad. Too many times. One suggestion that I have though. I
think this happened last year but it could have been two years ago, I forget. But people start
coming, what times does it start? 6:00? 7:00? People are coming to buy tickets. They want to
start buying tickets like at 10 to or for sure right at 7:00 so whoever's got the first shift...
(Taping of the meeting ended at this point in the discussion.)
Submitted by Todd Hoffman
Park and Recreation Director
Prepared by Nann Ophehn
38