Loading...
PC Minutes 10-6-09Chanhassen Planning Commission – October 6, 2009 All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. PUBLIC HEARING: LOTUS LAKE ESTATES BEACHLOT CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT: REQUEST FOR RENEWAL OF CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT FOR LOTUS LAKE ESTATE BEACHLOT ON PROPERTY ZONED SINGLE FAMILY RESIDENTIAL (RSF) AND LOCATED ON OUTLOT B, LOTUS LAKE ESTATES. APPLICANT: LOTUS LAKE ESTATES HOMEOWNERS ASSOCIATION, PLANNING CASE 09-16. Angie Kairies presented the staff report on this item. Larson: Okay. Let’s start with Kevin. Dillon: You know I don’t have any questions. I guess I would, it was kind of hard for me to see why anyone would be against this. I mean… Aanenson: It’s a formality. Dillon: Okay. Larson: Okay. How about you Denny? Laufenburger: So really the, you’re amending the location of the fire pit to where it is right now? Kairies: Correct. Laufenburger: Thank you. Larson: That’s it? Anyone else? Thomas: I’m good. Larson: I don’t see any problem. Okay, have we got an applicant? State your name and address for the record please. Lois Anderson: Good evening Madam Chairwoman and members of the commission. My name is Lois Anderson. I’m the current President of the Lotus Lake Estates Homeowners Association. I live at 145 Choctaw Circle and just wanted to tell you a little bit about our neighborhood so you could understand why this is important to us. We are requesting that it become permanent so we don’t have the anxiety of whether we’ll be removed or not and also to get the amendment for the fire pit. Our neighborhood consists of 44 homes. Many of the neighbors have been there since the inception of the neighborhood and we have a number of families moving in with young children. We range from empty nesters to virtual newlyweds. We have a lot of interest in the lakeshore area. It’s kind of the center of our neighborhood. That’s where we have neighborhood 9 Chanhassen Planning Commission – October 6, 2009 picnics. Where we have a fishing derby in the spring. Where we do winter and summer time activities. And it’s been something that people have been remarkably willing to get very involved in. I have been delighted as the president this year to see how many people have been willing to come down and get their hands muddy. Planting new plants to take the place of the buckthorn that we’ve pulled out. People work to put the docks in. Take them out. It’s a very engaged, active neighborhood. We use the beach individually and family groups. As a whole neighborhood. People swim, waterski. Somebody plows the lake and, in the wintertime, and makes a skating rink down there. We have become involved with other organizations such as the Lotus Lake Clean Water Organization. Paul Dryke is here tonight has been very persuasive. We have 95% membership in the Lotus Lake Clean Water Organization in our neighborhood. We have attended meetings of the watershed district to see what we can do to help improve our lake and make it a better place. We have talked to Terry Jeffrey and Jill Sinclair about not only the kind of plantings we need but what we can do to reduce erosion and runoff, and we have been delighted with the support and recommendations we’ve gotten from them. We are looking at putting in some rain gardens on the outlot so that we can reduce any kind of runoff that we might be producing from the hard cover above the lake so that we can clean up the lake as much as we can. As I said this is, this is important to us. We have been involved in cutting and pulling buckthorn. Replacing that with native grasses, ferns, sedges, things like that to try and improve the quality of the growth on the outlot as much as possible, and we’ve had a lot of donations of both time and materials in doing that. The involvement of the City in this effort has been also wonderful. I’ve been delighted with the kind of help and advice we’ve gotten from Terry Jeffrey and Jill Sinclair and then the help we’ve had from Angie Kairies in going through this renewal process so we thank you very much for your assistance with this and we look forward to continuing to work with the City to make things better yet. Thank you very much for your time. Larson: Thank you. Okay, at this time I will open the public hearing. Is there anybody that would like to step up and make a comment? I guess not. We will close the public hearing and talk about it. What do you think Tom? Doll: I’m fine with it. No questions. Larson: Okay. Kathleen. Thomas: I’m good with it too. I think it’s a good idea to make it easier and less having to come back year after year after year. Larson: Okay. Denny? Laufenburger: Same. Dillon: I, it looks pretty straight forward to me. I’m in favor of this. Larson: Okay. As am I. I would say I agree with you. I don’t know why this was even an issue so at that I will entertain a motion. Dillon: I’ll make a motion. 10 Chanhassen Planning Commission – October 6, 2009 Larson: Okay. Dillon: That the Chanhassen Planning Commission recommends that the City Council approve the amended and restated Conditional Use Permit 79-6 for the Lotus Lake Estates beachlot property located on Outlot B, Lotus Lake Estates, Planning Case 09-16, subject to the conditions and adoption of the Findings of Fact and Recommendation as specified on page 5 of the staff report. Larson: Have we got a second? Thomas: Second. Dillon moved, Thomas seconded that the Chanhassen Planning Commission recommends that the City Council approve the amended and restated Conditional Use Permit 79-6 for the Lotus Lake Estates beachlot property located on Outlot B, Lotus Lake Estates, Planning Case 09-16, subject to adoption of the Findings of Fact and Recommendation and the following conditions: 1. Outlot B must comply with conditions of the Amended and Restated CUP 79-6. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. PUBLIC HEARING: ORDINANCE AMENDMENTS TO CHAPTER 20, ZONING: BLUFF PROTECTION. Kate Aanenson presented the staff report on this item. Larson: Do you have any questions? We’ll start with Tom. Doll: Does this, did people in these areas, are they aware of this change? Aanenson: We have a lot of non-conforming setbacks and they’re in place right now. There are people that are built to the edge or close to the edge right now so they are non-conforming. If they go to alter it then often we have, we’re working with some right now that are, have retaining walls into that bluff impact zone, or into the bluff already. Those are non-conforming situations so, in those circumstances they have to be over time they may deteriorate and we require that they come back and engineer them and it’d be difficult to try to pull those out. You know say you can’t replace them because there’s integrity issues there so we would continue to work with those people and try to minimize those impacts. But this would be different than somebody that’s coming in new. Especially along, if you go down the southern part of the city where there’s some pretty steep bluffs so. Doll: Okay, that’s all. Larson: Kathleen? 11