PRC 2014 01 28
CHANHASSEN PARK AND
RECREATION COMMISSION
REGULAR MEETING
JANUARY 28, 2014
Chairman Kelly called the meeting to order at 7:30 p.m.
MEMBERS PRESENT:
Cole Kelly, Steve Scharfenberg, Elise Ryan, Brent Carron, Jim Boettcher,
Rick Echternacht, Luke Thunberg, and Ryan Lynch
MEMBERS ABSENT:
Jacob Stolar
STAFF PRESENT:
Todd Hoffman, Park and Rec Director; Jerry Ruegemer, Recreation Superintendent;
and Mitch Johnson, Recreation Supervisor
APPROVAL OF AGENDA:
Kelly: Anybody have any additions to the agenda?
Scharfenberg: I would like to add under Commission Member Reports an update from staff on the
ballfield lighting and the City Center bandshell please.
Kelly: Ballfield lighting and City Center bandshell. Any other additions? I’m going to add under new
business, the City Council has charged the Park and Rec to come up with additional ideas on how to keep
our city a number one city so we’ll be discussing that as item number 2 under new business. Any other
changes? Do we have approval of the agenda?
Scharfenberg moved, Carron seconded that the Agenda be amended to include an update from
staff on ballfield lighting and City Center Park bandshell under Commission Member Reports and
Ideas on How to Keep Chanhassen a Number One City under New Business. All voted in favor and
the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 8 to 0.
PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENTS.
Kelly: Do we have any public announcements tonight Todd?
Hoffman: Mitch you want to do that…
st
Johnson: Thank you Chair Kelly. The City’s excited about our 21 Annual February Festival this
Saturday out at Lake Ann. The event is from 12:00 to 3:00 p.m. with a ice fishing contest from 1:00 to
3:00 p.m. so it sounds like the temperature’s going to be warming up so we’re looking forward to a good
turnout and we’ll talk more about it too later in the meeting as well.
Kelly: Okay, thank you Mitch.
Hoffman: Guaranteed to have warmer temperatures.
Kelly: So you’ve got a new job now Mr. Weatherman.
VISITOR PRESENTATIONS:
None.
Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
APPROVAL OF MINUTES:Carron moved, Thunberg seconded to approve the verbatim and
summary Minutes of the Park and Recreation Commission meeting dated December 10, 2013 as
presented. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 8 to 0.
NEIGHBORHOOD MEETING – PIONEER PASS PARK.
Kelly: Tonight we’re going to discuss Pioneer Pass Park, which I believe we have a lot of people here
that are near and dear to it. Before Todd discusses Pioneer Pass Park, I want you to know that we are a,
we are a recommending authority, the Park and Rec Commission to the City Council so what we come up
with here and we decide here has to go to the City Council for approval. And then whatever the City
Council approves or doesn’t approve then we move forward from there. Anything to add to that Todd?
Hoffman: The next item they would see would be the approval of the playground purchase so that’s what
we’re going to talk about here tonight and so once the commission works with the neighborhood to decide
on what kind of playground equipment we’d like to see there, we’ll put out a request for proposal and
then the City Council will approve that and we’ll purchase the playground.
Kelly: Okay. And I guess now it’s your turn to talk about the playground Todd.
Hoffman: Great. Thanks Chair Kelly, members of the commission and welcome everybody who’s here
in the audience this evening. We’ve got a quick presentation but most importantly tonight we’d really
like to engage your conversation and hearing about what you enjoy about your new or existing
neighborhood if you’re on the other side. The Liberty side, and then what you really are looking forward
to in the park, both in the existing facilities. The facilities that were built last year and then the
playground which is coming up this June. We’re also like to solicit feedback about whether or not you
think the neighborhoods are up to a neighborhood installation process where you actually install this
playground probably over a couple of weekends or one long week through the month of June so that’s a
neighborhood installation process and what that entails is you just get more bang for your buck. You get
to put more dollars into the equipment. You don’t pay for that installation. You do it yourself as a
neighborhood coming together and what that takes is just a couple of meetings between now and then.
Either back at this building or at somebody’s home or at the Rec Center to gather up some organizational
skills around that. I just went through the file and I’d like to start with that image that’s up on the screen
right now. So that is typical of what we see when a new neighborhood comes to the Park and Recreation
Commission or the Planning Commission or the City Council. The folks who are developing that, they
knew we wanted a park in that general area but developers don’t generally put a park into their plan
unless they’re requested to or they work with the City so the park is in this vicinity and so under the
original plan they really wanted to put some additional lots in there. It’s always difficult to extract
property for a neighborhood park. The downtown in the economy and the downturn in land price really
helped that situation in this particular case and really what it turned around is that Ryland saw it as an
advantage to sell those new homes in that neighborhood if that park was put in place. So that was one of
the original concept plans and then that land was carved out for the 8.7 acre park that we see there today.
Now I’ll go to the power point. So thanks again for coming to the Pioneer Pass Park neighborhood
meeting. So the City has a Comprehensive Plan and it includes a variety of sections. One of those is
parks and Chanhassen’s park and recreation system is a source of community identity and pride and
greatly contributes to the quality of life for our residents. Historically the City has placed a strong
emphasis on parks and recreation in the community and we expect that trend to continue. Neighborhood
parks are the most visited of any family, they’re just close to home so they’re the most visited park that
you get to see throughout the year. Chanhassen’s standard is that most residents should live within
walking distance of a neighborhood park and walking distance is measured by half a mile radius, free of
barriers such as major roads and large water bodies. So we want a park to be within a half mile of
everyone’s front door in our community. That’s our goal. So here’s a location map on where we’re at.
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The green in the center is the park and then off to the right is the Pioneer Pass neighborhood and then off
to the left is the Liberty at Bluff Creek neighborhood and you can see even in this photo, aerial photo the
Liberty at Bluff Creek neighborhood was just getting going with their street plan, and so in general we’re
servicing approximately 500 homes in this vicinity and even beyond that as you’ll see in one of the
coming slides. So there’s the service area. The half a mile service area. It includes Liberty at Bluff
Creek, Pioneer Pass and then also stretching to the north up into the homes that are on the other side of
the creek on Bluff Creek Boulevard. But again those are generally going to be the communities. Camden
Ridge, the new neighborhood will also be making their way up here. We envision somewhat of a little
pocket park or a feature on the large wooded area that’s across to the north and so we think much of that
wooded land will be preserved as that area is developed to the north and we’ll try to incorporate some
kind of a pocket park into that particular area for that side of the neighborhood as well. It’ll be more of a
natural type feel so it certainly won’t be something like Pioneer Pass Park. But that large woods is in the
primary zone of the Bluff Creek corridor. It still is eligible for development. We just would not like to
see all the trees cut down so we would transfer, try to transfer some of that density out of there. That
housing density and then increase the density out in the field and save the woods, or at least a portion of
the woods. Trails are another big deal in Chanhassen and the City has put a significant effort into
establishing trails and sidewalks. It’s resulted in over a 90 mile and growing citywide system that
connections neighborhoods to parks, schools, to commercial and civic destinations and trail systems in
adjacent communities. Most recently we connected with a brand new trail on Rice Marsh Lake to the city
of Eden Prairie. Very nice trail just north of 212. I know that’s hard to see. We can look at a map when
we sit down but that’s the comprehensive trail plan and the red lines are the ones that are finished. The
blue lines are the ones that are yet to come and there are a few lines in your area that are yet not built so
we’ll talk about those when we get into our smaller groups. Just in general the system is 90% built out so
we, we have about 10 or 15 miles yet to go in the community so it’s just about fully established. The
acquisition of your park, so we started with the plan where there was no park and then on September,
2010 the final plat for Pioneer Pass Park was approved and that included this 8.7 acre park that you see
out there today and it was acquired using a technique called park dedication where we can acquire certain
acreage so it depends on the number of houses that generate people in your neighborhood and our
standard is 1 acre of parkland for every 75 people so we do the math in that calculation and we can take or
request as part of the development contract the 5.2 acres of land through park dedication. But it wasn’t
enough so we had to purchase the 3.5 additional acres at a cost of $290,000 from the developer at the
time. So cash out of pocket to date has been $290,000 for land acquisition and then the park plan that you
see here is about a $350,000 project. Maybe slightly more. The parkland features basketball play court
with two hoops. Traditionally we do a one hoop 50 by 50 but we added a 50 by 85 surface with two
basketball hoops at this location. We have some natural woods down at the bottom of the hill. A
ballfield with a backstop. Neighborhood trail connections. Playground with swings. Swings are
important. People really like swings. Picnic shelter. A large open play field or a soccer/lacrosse field
and then that trail loop, the outer trail loop is one-third mile so if you walk that three times you’re going
to get your first mile in and then a 24 stall parking lot. And it is a neighborhood park. We’re likely not to
schedule a lot of activities at this location as far as ballfield practices and games and those type of things
but I think it’s a sufficient enough, significant enough facility that coaches, if you’re coaching your team
you’re going to want to practice there and so you’re going to say hey, we’re going to practice at this
location. Pioneer Pass Park and that’s why the parking is sufficient to allow that so we don’t have that
spilling over on the streets. Here’s the park plan that you were all mailed and that’s sticking pretty close
to what you see. The playground plan. You can look once we break out into our smaller groups, that’s,
was just a draft and it’s been refined. The playground area will have, well I can show it. There you go.
So on the left side, the larger box is the 5 through 12 age playground and then the smaller box to the right
with the round corner is the 2 through 5 so we know there’s a lot of toddlers in this area and you really
want to separate those play areas so the 2 through 5 kids go to the right. 5 through 12 on the left in the
larger playground and the swings. There’s a nice walkway down the center with benches for viewing and
resting and then the picnic shelter down at the end. So some of the events you’re doing in your back yard
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and your side yard and your driveways through your neighborhood now can take place at the park and
that’ll be a nice gathering point for the community. We’ll try to make that neighborhood shelter as large
as we can for the budget that we have. To finish out the park plan yet this year, that’s the budget so we
have about $20,000 in equipment for the 2 through 5. $55,000 for the 5 through 12 for a total of $75,000
in playground equipment. The shelter itself would be about $25,000 and then the concrete walks and
borders an additional $20,000. Including the work that was completed last year, there were some soil
corrections in the parking lot and the basketball court area so this budget will run us into about $377,000
and so we’ll ask the park board next month for a budget amendment recommendation and that will go to
the City Council and so we’ll be asking them for that additional $27,000 as part of budget. So what’s
next? We can talk a little bit about tonight and when I’m done people are welcome to come up and talk
about what their views are and what kind of playground equipment you’d like to see. We just want to get
a feel for what kind of amenities do you want to see there. There’s not a lot of variability so we’ll talk
about that and we would like to get an RFP for the playground. We’ll send it to about 4 companies.
Really the 4 that give us some of the best plans and that’s a highly competitive process. It’s a really
visible playground. They like doing business in Chanhassen so they’re going to give you a really good
run at this product. You’ll get a lot of playground equipment for your money, and then they’ll assign, if
you choose to do that neighborhood install, they’ll assign some leaders to lead that process as a part of
that installation. And then we’ll distribute the RFP for the picnic shelter and the playground. We’ll get
those back and then we’ll meet as a neighborhood and you’ll choose it. So you’ll select out of those 4 or
5 plans, as a neighborhood you’ll get to select and sit around and talk about which one you think is the
best value for your neighborhood and then you’ll make that recommendation to the City Council and
we’ll select that, purchase that playground. We’re hoping for June and so if we can grow some green
grass, the site was dormant seeded and with the snow cover out there it should be in great shape come
spring, and if we get some decent growing. We really want the turf to be somewhat established before we
get out there and start building playgrounds and let the neighborhoods loose on the park because if you
just don’t have it established then there’s going to be too much foot traffic and it’ll damage the site. So
we’re hoping for June. That could push into July if we don’t get good growing conditions. So city crews
will install the picnic shelter and the tables and benches. The neighborhood hopefully will install the
playground, if you want to go that route, and then once you’re done we have a grand opening and a ribbon
cutting event. Typically on the last night so the last day will probably be a Saturday that you’re doing the
installation and then again your neighborhoods plan a ribbon cutting celebration event and we open up the
playground directly that night. So thanks for attending tonight’s meeting and then.
Kelly: Before we take a recess, does anybody have any questions for Todd at this point? And again on
behalf of the park and recreation. Oh there was, I’m sorry.
Hoffman: Come on up.
Audience: I just wanted to ask. As part of the playground equipment does it include the surface of, will
we do it like wood chips or rubber mat underneath the playground?
Hoffman: Yep. There’s a number of surfacing options that can go into a playground and you really need
to have that resilient surface for a specified fall heights and in this case it will be, what they call an
engineered wood fiber and it’s a Tamarac. It’s a really nice, clean. If you go visit Riley, the new Riley
Ridge Park you’ll see it there. It’s much better than just a traditional woodchip. It’s rot resistant. It’s a
lighter yellow. It’s soft and it’s really a nice product that we’ve been using recently. In past history it
was mostly pea gravel and pea gravel was used and it’s not nearly as nice a surface. The other one you’ll
see around town, at least in our community at Lake Ann, Bandimere and Lake Susan is a poured in plan
resilient rubber material but that would cost probably in this configuration about twice as much as the
playground equipment itself to put that product down and so it’s really expensive so our model in our
community is engineered wood fiber in all of the neighborhood parks. The outlying parks and then in our
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high volume, traffic areas in our community parks we really try to go to a smaller footprint playground.
Bring it up in the air and then put poured in place resilient surfacing there just for long term maintenance.
So this will be wood fiber.
Kelly: Any other questions? On behalf of the Park and Recreation Commission and the City of
Chanhassen I want to thank all of you for being here and for your interest in your playground. What
we’re going to do now is we’re going to suspend the meeting and have an informal discussion on how
you want to move forward on your park which will include having neighborhood meetings to decide what
kind of playground equipment you’re going to have. You know is somebody going to volunteer to have it
at their house or do you need a room here at City Hall? You can reserve this room or you can reserve the
Senior Center. Just depends upon how you guys want to move forward as a group and maybe you want to
have a group leader or a few group leaders so we’re going to suspend the meeting at this point and have
informal discussion with you and we can all kind of gather together and discuss how you want to move
forward on your playground.
Hoffman: And make sure to sign in for us please when you have a chance to do that. Thanks.
(The Park and Recreation Commission meeting was recessed at this point for informal discussion
on the Pioneer Pass Park playground design and construction process.)
Kelly: Meeting is restarted. Okay Todd, please continue.
Hoffman: For those of you who were around you saw that some of the excess dirt from the Phase II came
onto the park and it was well above the amount that we had agreed to with Ryland and so that was a
challenge for everybody involved in that particular part of the project and so there was a greater elevation
on the entire site and then they also pushed out the sledding hill and so the top of the slope is here and this
top of the slope was planned to be quite a ways farther back so then you could have a sledding hill with a
run out at the bottom before you hit the trees. Now the top of the hill is pushed too far out and so there is
going to be some accommodation or some availability for sledding over here but it’s not going to be in
the really large hill. And in fact we’re going to come back and reforest this just really to prevent that
activity because we don’t want people sliding and then hitting the edge of the woods but I think there is
going to be some neighborhood sliding ability on this edge over here of the park. Other things that people
asked about? Oh, the number of volunteers. So a typical crew will work a Thursday evening or a Friday
noon to 5:00 or noon to 6:00 and about 10 to 15 volunteers for each crew. And so if you worked one time
you could work the next day if you wanted but 10 to 15 people is a good amount of people so you have a
couple of work crews that are working with 1 or 2 leaders on the project so when we go through those
sign up’s we’ll break those out with some of the neighborhood captains and get some names. I’m not
sure if you’re doing some email stuff in your neighborhood as of yet but we can utilize it that way or you
can do some team captain.
Kelly: Todd I think Luke, aren’t you hooked up with email about this project in your neighborhood?
Thunberg: We do have an email and distribution list for the Pioneer Pass so either send emails to that part
of the neighborhood. We don’t have anything for the Liberty on the other side of Bluff Creek.
Hoffman: Dogs was asked about and the city ordinance on dogs is that dogs are not permitted in parks
and so if you’re taking your neighbors or your kids to the playground and you’re going to spend an hour
at the playground, the family pet’s not invited on that trip to linger around the playground but if you’re
walking the animal, your pet through the park on a leash on the trails that is permitted so that is city
ordinance throughout our community. If you’re walking your pet on a lease on a trail and the trail
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happens to go through a park, you’re invited to do that but you can’t take your dog to the ballgames or to
the playground. There’s a couple others that we were talking about.
Audience: …playground equipment. Do you have 4 companies that…bid on the playground equipment?
Hoffman: Do I have the names of them?
Audience: Yeah. I mean just out of curiosity who you normally use.
Hoffman: So it will be like Little Tykes, Midwest Playscapes. Let’s see who else do we have? Yeah but
they rep a company. So Game Time might be in there. So there’s a variety. We went through, I think we
had 6 or 7 that did their RFP on the Riley Ridge and we really had 4 and that was the last one we did last
year and we really had 4 that came to the table and gave us some tremendous plans so those are the ones
that we’ll be taking a look at. Oh, color came up. So again the playground manufacturers they kind of
know the colors that are you know popular at this time and they’ll propose some colors but that’s
completely up to the neighborhood once you see those colors what you’d like to see in the plastics and the
metal for the slides and the equipment. Tonight we can talk about, you know is there anything special
that neighborhood just does not want to see in this playground and we can kind of refine that this evening
or if you want to have a separate meeting we can do that as well to talk about number of slides. Type of
slides. There’s not a lot of variability in that plan. You’re going to have a 2 through 5 playground, a 5
through 12 and then a swing set and you’re going to see a lot of variance in the plans that come through
so I don’t think if we met for another hour we could really get a lot more information out of that particular
thing but if there’s something that you’d like to voice tonight, it will be handicap accessible so it’s,
there’ll be a transfer station so it will be ADA accessible and that woodchip material is handicap
accessible as well. The trees. For those who saw the trees come in and then the trees leave and then the
trees come back again. The general contractor came, we had a tree contractor that brought some really
just not good nursery trees to the project so Jill Sinclair, our City Forester and I, we reviewed those trees
and we rejected just about 50% of them in the first go around. That provider was very upset with that
process and they really weren’t in a position to bring back good trees for those 50% so they just chose to
leave and they came back and they took the rest of their trees. K.A. Witt was forced to go with the
second lowest bidder and they were, they had to cough up another 6 and a half thousand dollars out of
their pocket to buy those trees but we got a much better product in the long run so that’s why you saw that
go on on the park.
Ryan: A couple other things that were brought to my attention were speed bumps in proximity to the
parking lot along Bluff Creek. They said that a lot of people are using it as a cut through right now and
when the park is finished to have, to get people to slow down even though the round about at the end does
slow people down by the main area across from the parking lot is…with the high speed. Another thing
was the signage in the crosswalk. Only one right now is apparently…and I don’t know if that just has to
do with timing but they would like to see it very clear on the road as well as some signage.
Hoffman: Okay, great. So on the speed bumps, the City really doesn’t have speed bumps but we’ll refer
to that safety question to our engineering division and it’s a collector road. Bluff Creek Boulevard so
we’ll have them respond and I’ll get some information back to the neighborhood on that. And then the
signage, so we talked a little about crosswalks in our smaller groups. There are 3 shown on this plan.
One down in this, by the round about. That’s in place. This crosswalk is in place and this third
crosswalk will not be installed. It’s a through street so you really want to concentrate your crossings at
one location with the best sight lines. The one down here has the hill and poor sight lines and you just
don’t want to put that many crosswalks on a through street. You know it confuses the drivers and puts the
pedestrians at even a greater risk so as people start to utilize this crosswalk the drivers and the pedestrian
will realize that that’s the location where you want to concentrate and so when you come down this
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sidewalk you want to travel north to this crossing, and this crosswalk is in place and again I’ll ask our
engineering division to evaluate whether additional signage at that location is warranted. The other thing
we can do is put out the tubes with the flags and so we can start to get some more visibility. Those have
been very effective in the community. Started by a boy scout and they’ve really taken off in our
community where not only when people hold the flags do they see them but drivers see those flags in the
carriers as they travel down the road as well.
Ryan: I think the concern is because on the, the third one you were talking about it looks like there’s a
lead into the road and so it’d be a natural crossing.
Hoffman: Yep, and that lead in is not in there.
Ryan: Is not in there.
Hoffman: No.
Ryan: Okay.
Hoffman: This trail T’s here and this is not, this crosswalk is not there.
Ryan: Okay. Okay. Thank you.
Joel Schultz: I have a question. I’ve walked that area quite a few times…I see why you’re doing it now.
It makes sense but it’s…it just to me when I walk that, it’s a natural progression for me to walk the whole
park down to that…and I understand why you’re saying it because it does lead to that but my only
concern is, and it’s very minor, is that kids…and so if kids use it with their bike. They ride off, one side
does have access point up to the street. The one that’s on the Riley side…so that’s going to be a little bit
longer for the kids to ride a bike to make it from the Ryland area to the park. I mean my only thing is, I
understand why you know it makes perfect sense to me why you’re making those choices. I just
wonder…justice to the system, to what’s going on there with the way this trail’s been laid out.
Hoffman: I understand.
Joel Schultz: …relook at that because I’m thinking, here you take out a cross where…kids ride their
bikes. They’ve got to stop, you know… And strollers too. Sorry, I didn’t say strollers…
Hoffman: Yep. Those are all good points and no doubt, pedestrians make all sorts of decisions and
adults make all sorts of pedestrian crossing decisions and then, so we’ll have them take a look at that. I
don’t think we’re going to see another, well you won’t see a curb cut go in there without an additional
crossing and I just don’t think they’re going to approve that second crossing at that location but we’ll
have them take a look at it and see if they can evaluate it. It was something I was talking about them
today because I knew it would be a topic of conversation tonight.
Kelly: We, just a second. We welcome all questions. We would like you to identify yourself by name
and street address please.
Joel Schultz: Sure, Joel Schultz, 1661 Mayapple Pass. And this is just a question on just the plan and it
relates to the crosswalk. The second street in there, the street on the left. You can see the crosswalk is on
the left but the sidewalk on, that’s Mayapple Pass right there. Actually on the other side of the road.
Hoffman: Yep.
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Joel Schultz: And I don’t know if that was intentional or you know if you’re walking down Mayapple
you’d be walking on the sidewalk and then cross to get to the crosswalk. I don’t know if that was
intentional because on here the sidewalk is on the I guess the north side of the road but it’s actually on the
south side of the road.
Hoffman: Yeah it was not intentional and the crossing was put on the north side because of the entrance
into the park and so if we would have put it here then we would have, you know we’d have another
crossing at this location so I know there was lots of discussion about pedestrians and the crossings and the
locations. The fact remains you know all people using the park at some age, at some point a parent’s
going to have to decide well how old is my child going to be before I let them go down there alone and
then there’s just going to be some education that’s required. I live near Lake Ann in the Greenwood
Shores neighborhood and all my children had to cross Powers Boulevard at an uncontrolled intersection
with no crosswalk and so you know that was about you know 12 to 14 years of age and they had friends
on the other side and they had to cross and so we just, you know we had a lot of conversation about that
and then you just trust that they’re doing you know what you’ve been, what they’ve been instructed to do
so great concerns. We’ll have them take a look at that in our engineering division to talk about those
crossing questions and what additional signage can go out there. The fact remains it is you know a fairly
high speed road because of it’s nature that it does not have homes in it and so there’s going to be some
need for caution as a pedestrian.
Carron: So Todd if we’re looking at that right crosswalk there that’s not going to go in, there’s currently
right now there’s a ped ramp that goes.
Hoffman: On the concrete side.
Carron: On the concrete side?
Hoffman: Yep, on the neighborhood side, yep.
Carron: So is that, if.
Hoffman: I don’t know, does this come straight out this way or does it just go this way at this point?
Audience: Both.
Hoffman: Both ways, yeah.
Carron: Is that going to get removed then? I don’t think per code you can have a ped ramp without a
crosswalk.
Hoffman: Yeah. I’ll take a look at that. Okay, thank you.
Kelly: I think the idea maybe tonight is to try and get some input on what you want in the playground
equipment, or some ideas and as Todd said earlier that will save you an hour meeting trying to decide on
playground equipment. The choices are not going to be great but we’re going to put it out to four
different contractors and you’ll see some different plans available and then schedule a meeting and I
guess I understand Glen is your leader over here. Glen, stand up and wave to everybody? And we’ve
kind of, at least enough people told me he was the leader so I’m going with that and we’ve kind of
decided that next door we’re going to try and reserve the Senior Center because it’s got nice tables and
nice seating because we don’t know how big your group will be and it’ll probably be too big to be at
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someone’s house and so the idea would be maybe in mid-March to have a meeting to go through the
contractor’s plans for playground equipment and select it. And you know if there’s something specific
you’re looking for in the playground tonight would be the night to come up and introduce yourself and
tell us what you’re looking for so we can see if we can incorporate that at a reasonable cost or not and
then give you feedback in March. Does anybody want to come up and talk about the playground?
Joe Brothers: My name is Joe Brothers. I live at 9515 Declaration Drive at Liberty at Bluff Creek and
one thing I’d like to see, it’s not so much playground equipment but I’d like to see a tree to the south side.
South, southwest, southeast side of the playground area. I have kids who are 5, 7, and 9. I’ve gone to a
number of parks and it always seems when you have a playground in the summertime, in July, you try
and take your kid to a park when it’s 90 degrees and you know it’s already hot enough when you have
slides that are facing south, which may be another detail we look into, they always seem to, and there’s no
shade for them. It’s always, they become too hot. Especially the plastic slides, well even metal slides too
but they become too hot so just be aware that when most parks are used is usually in the summertime and
you want to protect that south side of the park. Thank you.
Kelly: Thank you. Any other comments? Questions? Any input on what you’re looking for in your
park? Please come on up.
Jeremy Burkauskas: Jeremy Burkauskas at 1445 Hemlock Lane. Just a question on the open field. Are
you guys planning on doing anything with regards to the field like a soccer net or is it literally just grass
and that’s it or is it like a football set up?
Hoffman: Currently there’s going to be just a conversation between you know what does the community
want to see so you can have soccer, lacrosse. You can have lines. We talked about you know should we
line it? Should we not line it? So that’s going to be an ongoing conversation and you know we’d like to
hear if you want soccer goals and lines, then that’s something we’ll take a look at and put out. It’s not
going to be like a Lake Ann where it’s going to be groomed on a, you know twice a week basis but it’s
more of a neighborhood setting but if they’re available and it’s line at some point then we can certainly do
that. Otherwise as it is it’s an open grass field.
Jeremy Burkauskas: Okay. And along the lines of maintenance, so coming from Minneapolis. Having
a park close by you always had a basketball court that had no net. Is that going to be an issue here?
Hoffman: You can have nets.
Ruegemer: We’ll guarantee you’ll have nets.
Hoffman: And hopefully not even chain link so. Hopefully they’ll be regular nets.
Kelly: By the way for those of you who haven’t met him, Jerry Ruegemer is in charge of all our fields.
Jerry, why don’t you stand up so everybody can see who you are. Jerry and his crew do a great job and
they’re very busy but once you decide what you want in that open area, Jerry’s the one who’s responsible
for making sure that something happens out there. Anybody else, comments? Questions? Please come
up.
Betsy Hopman: We’re getting into specifics. My name’s Betsy Hopman, 1475 Hemlock. In regards to
swings, kids love swings. We do like to teach them to share and take turns but if it’s going to be for so
many kids, we might want to consider more. Especially baby swings. There’s a lot of itty bitty kids in
our neighborhood. You’re going to need at least two and I don’t know what the rules are for the special
needs swing.
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
Hoffman: Yeah it’s always a challenge to have as many because of the new safety laws from Consumer
Product Safety Commission. We’ll take a look. We might be able to expand the site to add another bay.
That’s really what it would take to get additional swings. I don’t think there’s a tire swing shown now
which would be nice to accommodate a group of kids so we’ll take a look and see if we can add
additional swings on one side or the other of this park.
Kelly: Thank you.
Ryan: And one of the things that were brought up, I think the family that I spoke to earlier left. Zip lines
is one that people were, they were interested in and then some sort of climbing mechanism, whether it’s
rock wall climbing or one of those kind of rope pyramids that the kids have at some of the middle schools
and elementary schools. Those are a couple things that were mentioned as well.
Kelly: Any more input? Questions, thoughts on what you want in your park?
Echternacht: The only comment that was made was they were asking about grills, if there were going to
be grills.
Hoffman: They’re not included in neighborhood parks as a policy so if this is a neighborhood that really
wants to do a lot of grilling on outdoor grills without, most people bring their own. They bring a portable
gas grill or portable grill to the site so it’s not a part of our plan right now.
Kelly: Last chance to speak your peace. Tell us what you want.
Hoffman: Our leader. Glen, your last name?
Glen Schoenberg: Glen Schoenberg, 1665 Hemlock Way. I guess talking about the open field. I guess
I’d like to see a goal there, at least one on one side. Just something for the kids to kick a ball into and I
definitely agree with the climbing, something climbing. Monkey bars, something. I’ve got two boys that
love to climb on anything so we love to see them wear out their energy.
Kelly: Thank you Glen.
Joe Shamla: 1691 Mayapple. I guess I could have done this in the small group but what are the chances
of getting a ice rink? Just a small one. Not, just for skating purposes.
Scharfenberg: Well typically what happens with ice rinks is that we look at them usually in about
October. At our October meeting and to kind of talk about where we put our neighborhood parks.
Typically what we have in the last several years is just flooded that up here at City Center, at Bluff Creek.
Hoffman: Roundhouse and North Lotus.
Scharfenberg: And then North Lotus. We have in the past, and the City has in the past flooded
neighborhood parks but we’ve kind of not adopted that recently just because there hasn’t been a lot of
people haven’t seen a need for it. They go and use the other ones but if it’s something that you really
want, certainly that open field could be flooded. I would say come in October when we have our meeting
and that’s how you get your neighborhood flooded if you want one.
Joe Shamla: Okay, thank you.
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
Scharfenberg: Yeah.
Joe Shamla: It just seems like our neighborhood’s a little further away from City Center and that’s.
Hoffman: Bandimere Park is going to be really in this service area so in the future, as the future
expansion of Bandimere Park, hockey, ice skating and a warming house will be included in that master
plan and you know that’s, you know not just down the road but closer to your neighborhood and so if you
invest some resources here to put just a sheet of ice down, there’s no hockey boards. There’s no warming
house and then it kills the grass on the soccer field and then we have to replant it with seasonal grass on
an annual basis and so it’s really, it would be better at that time to go down to Bandimere where there’s
all those other facilities. Ice skating, we used to do 17 rinks and we’re down to 9 and those were all out in
neighborhood parks. Some of them had hockey boards. Most did not and ice skating in general is just on
the decline so we don’t put rinks in neighborhood parks like we used to.
Joe Shamla: Thank you.
Kelly: Thank you Joe. Anyone else? Want to throw some ideas. Questions? I thank you all for your
input. I appreciate it.
Hoffman: Got a couple more responses to some of the questions. So the trees around the playgrounds
were intentionally left out until the playground is installed. Then there are additional trees so we’ll
accommodate the gentleman’s request about the trees around the playground in the second phase of the
playground construction or the second phase of the park’s construction. And then, the playground, the
container size can only accommodate so much. A zip line will not fit in this particular container and
probably not a separate climbing structure but there will be climbing apparatus as a part of the playground
structure itself and so we’re limited by a couple of things, both by the size of the containers and then the
budget as well so that budget of $55,000 is going to be used up sooner than later. If we add, if we take a
look at the additional swing I think a swing bay, that might be able to be accommodated but it would have
to change. Enlarge the structure size. It’s additional concrete then and additional playground surfacing so
the dollars are going to be consumed so we’ll take a look at that. If there can be a second phase I’ll have
Amy who does our drawings draw in a potential second phase and so if we do have, we run out of money
but there is potential to go to the primarily it would be to the north for a second phase then we would have
her draw that in there and then we would eliminate tree plantings from that area and then we would just
utilize that space for a future addition to the playground at a future time.
Kelly: Thank you Todd. Moving on to new business number 2. Todd you told me that the City Council
has now put a charge to us to come up with some new ideas at one of their last meetings. Would you
elaborate on that please.
Hoffman: Yep I will. I think we should let these folks, thank you very much for coming in.
IDEAS ON HOW TO KEEP CHANHASSEN A NUMBER ONE CITY.
Hoffman: Thank you Chair Kelly, members of the commission. As a part of the work session for the
City Council, council was going over the key financial strategies and then they were also, this was at their
work session at the first Saturday in January and some of the things that were mentioned were okay, so
the off leash dog area is a recent improvement that really added quality of life to our citizens in our
community. The disc golf course. In the past the skate park and so they really asked the commission to
take a look over this year or a series of years of what is the next thing that you think would improve the
quality of life in our community in the park and recreation amenity arena that you could propose to the
City Council. Come up with an idea and propose that to the City Council so that was a challenge that
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
they added on to your to do list and how you accommodate that request is really up to you as a
commission so I’ll leave it at that.
Scharfenberg: Do they have a timeline in terms of when they are looking for that?
Hoffman: Probably the next CIP. You know next year’s CIP discussion.
Kelly: Okay, so when’s our next group session with the City?
Hoffman: Likely in April or May.
Kelly: Okay, so I would think we would want to have something to offer by then.
Scharfenberg: I would say that we need to put it on as an agenda item either for February or March.
Kelly: Well I think we should have it on as an agenda item in February and be talking about it. Yes I
agree with you.
Scharfenberg: Okay.
Hoffman: Sounds great. Get your thinking caps on.
Carron: And that could be an event, structure.
Hoffman: Program.
Carron: Program. Okay.
Kelly: Think out of the box. They want ideas. Obviously the costlier the idea, the more likely it is to be
rejected but.
Hoffman: Unless you have a funding source.
Kelly: Unless we have a funding source.
Scharfenberg: Well one of the things that brought up, one of the ladies that was here tonight had
suggested, had talked about a splash pad, if it would ever be put in at Pioneer Pass and I said no.
Probably not at Pioneer Pass but you know potentially it would be something that would be put in at one
of the bigger parks and I said the way that you get those built is to talk to your commission and bring
those ideas forward so that was just one idea that was thrown out tonight.
Kelly: Good. Thank you. Okay. If no other thoughts on that we’re going to move on to reports.
2014 FEBRUARY FESTIVAL PREVIEW PRESENTATION.
Johnson: Thank you Chair Kelly and good evening commissioners. As I said earlier, staff’s been busy
stst
preparing for the 21 Annual Feb Fest which is this Saturday, February 1. Excited for the double digit
temperatures that are hopefully in the forecast but the ice is in great shape obviously with the weather. At
least check about a week or two ago I think there was over 18 inches of ice out there so in the past couple
of years been nervous there wasn’t enough. Now there’s a lot of ice so crews have been busy working the
lake. You know kind of moving some snow around and taking care of the slush issue. Opening up the
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
walkways to the lake you know for a successful event. The event is pretty similar to the past. You’ll see
the fliers in the packet. We have an attractive two sided color flier that went out in the Chan Villager and
the Chaska Herald. We did two inserts. One previously and one will be in this Thursday’s edition, right
before the event. We also did an advertisement in the Villager and then after the event we have a nice
thank you ad to thank all our sponsors. Sponsors have been great this year. You’ll see they’re all listed
there. You know as the sponsors grow it seems like the event flier gets small but we want to make sure
that we put the sponsors that are prevalent on there. Through their contributions we’ve been
accumulating lots and lots of prizes for both the fishing contest and for the door prizes. Added up today I
think for the fishing contest we’re over $6,400 dollars which will be awarded to the top 50 fish in prizes
and then for the door prizes you know we advertise $3,000. Just today I received another like $700 in
door prizes so they just keep coming in you know so we’re organizing them. I think we’ll have 96 door
prizes to give away so basically every 15 minutes we’ll be drawing just as many tickets as we can to get
those out so we’re excited about that. Obviously the whole event is kind of centered around the big ice
fishing contest which is from 1:00 to 3:00 out there. We are selling tickets at City Hall, Cabin Fever in
Victoria and at Ivan’s Food and Tackle. Sales are a little bit slower this year I think just because of the
weather but we will be selling tickets on the ice. If we have a good weather day I think we’ll have a lot of
walk up’s to fill that so hoping to sell about 500 fishing tickets out there and expect probably about 1,500
people probably for the whole event. We’re doing the sleigh rides again. We’ve got the sledding hill.
The bonfires. The boy scouts are coming out again. We have multiple groups that are volunteering.
Have the Chanhassen High School Key Club. Chaska High School Key Club and then the Interact Club
from the Chanhassen High School which is a new club. Kind of a subsidy of the Rotary. It’s a service
oriented group through the high school and they’ve had a great response from them as well so but yeah.
We’re looking forward to it. The medallion hunt started on Monday with the clues. We’ve got them
posted all over town including the City’s Facebook and website so nobody’s found it yet. We’re two
clues in so, which is a good sign. I think last year it was like clue 1 or 2 they found it so hopefully we’ll
make it til Friday but I’d be happy to answer any questions if anybody has any questions.
Kelly: Any questions for Mitch? Mitch what I want to know, are you going to back up Todd on his
prediction or 10 or above?
Johnson: I would love to.
Ruegemer: We’ll go 3 for 3. We’re all going to guarantee. It’s going to be 15.
Kelly: I’m looking forward to it and I’m hoping it’s above 10. Thank you Mitch very much.
Ruegemer: Chair Kelly I’d just like to go over real quick through the, just a power point we have here.
Mitch kind of touched on a lot of the information here but just to go through a couple things here. We’ve
got a few slides we can take a look at so I think everybody can see them on their screens here but like
st
Mitch said, it’s our 21 anniversary with that. Kind of went through. Here’s a schedule of events. You
guys have seen that. We’re getting that information out through our local areas. Did another Eblast last
night. It went over to 5,000-6,000 email addresses again so we’re really trying to get that information out
there. Like Mitch said we’ve got a lot of money in fish prizes and you know Earl Milbrath of Travel
Advisors International is back for quite a few years now with the travel voucher to use for a trip anywhere
you want to go in the continental domestic United States so it’s really a neat deal. We’ve touched on the
door prizes so just really a fun event. I think people are going to be having a little cabin fever to get out
by Saturday here so hopefully. So basically kind of when you walk down the path itself you kind of come
right down into the kind of the entrance of the event itself. We have fishing tickets right when you come
in. We’ll have 6 to 8 picnic tables kind of off to the right of the trail as you come down. That’s where
you get your free door prize ticket as you come in and it’s one ticket per person. You’ve got to be present
to win. Mitch said we’ll start kind of the drawings and start that allocation process with the door prizes
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
around 1:00 of the contest so you know we’ll start about 10:30 with the door prizes and ticket sales as
people start to come down and picking out holes and that sort of thing here so we’ll give people plenty of
time to get a free door prize ticket then we’ll allocate, then we’ll write that information up on the prize
board right on the other side of the fishing prize area.
Carron: Jerry, last year we shut down the door prize tickets right at 1:00. Are we going to keep it open or
are we going to do that same thing?
Ruegemer: No, we’re going to be shutting down right around that time again. Yep. We’re very fortunate
to have a really a great, really kind of a co-sponsor of the event with the Chanhassen Rotary. Chanhassen
Rotary’s been awesome passing out the sheet at the meetings as of late. They always supply, you know
you can see down on the left side of the picture really a large number of people drilling the contest holes.
That really saves us a lot of time as far as the City. As far as labor. That we can direct our labor and
efforts into other components of the celebration and that’s been a great partnership for us. I think they
have fun doing it with that as well so it’ll take a little bit more effort this year with you know 20 plus
inches of ice but it’s been a great, it’s been really a great partnership for us. We really appreciate their
efforts. You can see on the right hand side we try to lay out for them and try to lay out the augers and
everybody go in a straight line and it really does go good so we start about 8:00 on contest morning and
typically we’re done in about 2 1/2 hours roughly about with that so.
Hoffman: Those with good backs will drill.
Ruegemer: Again the Chanhassen Rotary has really stepped up and have continuously been kind of our
provider of concessions out at the Lake Ann itself for the contest. Had a partnership with Culver’s in
Chanhassen as well to kind of provide the food. The cheeseburgers, the French fries, that sort of thing.
Kind of the staples of ice fishing. And then the Rotary then will take care of you know hot chocolate and
other types of concession items for that so we’re very lucky that we had that component of the event and
it’s been a great thing for us again. The boy scouts are back. They’ve been there for multiple years
selling bait right as you walk in. Really trying to make it convenient for people that they don’t have to
bring bait down to the contest itself so they sell you know a variety of bait and that sort of thing for the
contest folks. They can certainly, people can bring their own if they liked to but another convenience.
It’s a fundraiser for them as well. They sell s’mores kits for the bonfires, for that as well so it’s great
exposure for us and another partnership that we have for the event so, and the boys are raring and ready to
go on the right picture there so please support them. It’s nice to have them down on the ice. So you
know on cold days the bonfire’s one of the most popular events down there as well. We did do a, kind of
a split it the last couple of years where we do have a bonfire down in the east side of the tent as well so
then if people on the west side and the east side can go down and kind of warm up and that sort of thing
here too so it’s convenient for the bonfire but for the s’mores kits. People can buy them at the bait stand
there and go and roast some marshmallows and the one bonfire that’s closer to the skating rink so people
can come over on their skates and kind of warm up as well so a popular component of the event and it’s
kind of fun for us as well. Sledding hill. So that continues to be just another kind of event for us. It’s
real easy for us to get that ready to go. We pile up snow in front of the trees so we make it safe for
everybody and that’s located right on the Klingelhutz shelter so on the top of the hill right there. It’s kind
of a natural place for people to come out to Lake Ann other than you know with Feb Fest going on so
they do come out and use that as well so we do take some measures to make it a little safer during those
types of areas and kids seem to have fun and gravitate towards that area so. You can see kind of with
Your Story on there, they’re one of our sponsors. They come out to all of our special events and provide
us with all of these fantastic pictures and they just hand over the CD and the information to us after the
event and we possess the rights to use them however we like to so it’s really been a great partnership for
that so if you see that logo on some of the pictures, that’s one of our sponsors. They have fantastic
camera equipment and we’re really fortunate to have them as a sponsor. Chanhassen company as well.
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
Mitch talked about the hayrides. Kenmare Farms has provided the hayrides for over 6 years. They’re the
same company that does the hayrides for the Halloween party with that. This is a picture from last year.
Kind of our back-up plan if the ice isn’t safe, then we go between on the trail between Lake Ann Park and
Greenwood Shores Park and just kind of do a loop that way. I think Ken, it sounds like Ken feels
comfortable this year taking the horses out on the lake itself and then he’ll have a sleigh. A non-wheeled
sleigh that we’ll kind of plow a path or road for him that will be, you know will have grip enough for the
horses so they don’t slip and fall but, so it looks like we’ll be going back on the lake again this year.
Kelly: That will be fun.
Ruegemer: Yeah it’s really, it’s a whole different experience so it’s really cool. Talked about the ice
skating with that. Park maintenance crew has been out there and it’s plowed out right now. We did add
the loop back again this year for that. People were kind of asking you know where’d the loop go? So we
added the loop back so kids and participants can kind of go out and around a little bit so it just adds to the
experience of that and it’s close to the bonfire so they can warm up if they need to so it’s been a nice
event that we just clear out the rink and it’s just another component for family fun out there. Tip
Outdoors has been probably at Feb Fest for oh probably the last 3 to 4 years I’m guessing with that. Just
a non-profit organization kind of really trying to get the information out and give people tips on how to
fish so they set up, last year they had the kind of the blue bigger fish house that they had set up for that
and just really kind of show people that don’t have that opportunity to ice fish, give them tips. Show how
the electronics works. How to use the fishing poles and that sort of thing so they’re coming back again
this year so it’s been really a nice addition for us too that it’s not such a serious thing so people feel
intimidated going out and purchasing a ticket and going out to an ice fishing contest. They can just go
right over here and kind of pick up some tips and that’s, we’re hoping then that they’ll take their families
and kids out ice fishing at some point in time as well so it’s really a nice thing that they’re doing so we
appreciate them being involved as well. Last year’s medallion hunt, Mitch did touch on that. We do have,
as part of the prize pack there’s gift certificates from local businesses around Chanhassen. There’s also a
Nook in there as well. Barnes and Noble Nook. Part of the prize pack as well so, was that the Friends of
the Library that purchased that right?
Johnson: Yep, that’s correct.
Ruegemer: So our last year’s winner, Mike who lives up in I believe the North Lotus Lake area and his
family participates in many of our programs. They’re always around so it was really a thrill for him to
come in and win the medallion hunt last year so, and he won a jar of pickles last year at the ice fishing
contest.
Johnson: 6 jars of pickles.
Ruegemer: 6 jars of pickles so he’s pretty happy about that too so, it was a big winner for their Feb Fest
family last year so. Mitch said kind of the signature event for Feb Fest obviously is the ice fishing
contest. Mitch does a great job going out and getting fishing prizes for that. Really the more prizes we
get donated, it really helps our bottom line with the revenues that we do collect. Last year I think we even
made some money on it so, which is a good thing. It’s always our goal. Last year we sold over 500
tickets with revenue. Just about $5,100 for that so we’re hoping that people are going to be wanting to get
outside on Saturday and hopefully, and we do a large percentage of our ticket sales the day of the contest
anyway so this isn’t necessarily really that far out of the ordinary that our ticket sales are a little slow right
now. It’ll pick up the tail end of the weekend and on Saturday so just a friendly reminder if you see the
picture down on the lower left, we did add that last year with a lot of good signage to attach your fishing
ticket to your, either your tip up or your rod just to let people know that you did purchase a ticket so
contest marshals or staff are going around just verifying to make sure that people are fishing with the
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
proper number of poles to ticket ratio that they should be doing so. I think we’re fairly unique as well for
the contest. We do, we added the top 50 prizes. We used to do top 25. Now we do top 50 so I think
people really enjoy seeing their name up on there and the corresponding prize with that so obviously it
takes more effort on our part just to make sure that everything is sliding and everything is in the right
order but we have obviously a computer program now that we input. We can print out reports and kind of
get that going. It’s always a little stressful just trying to get everything lined up right at the end here just
to make sure that everything is flowing but it really is a nice system that we have and the door prizes then
are on the other side. Mitch did a nice job last year of getting, if you see on the top, the fishing contest
prizes. Kind of a sign package with that with the, you know fishing tickets. The door prizes. Fish weigh
in station. I think that was done with Sign Sources as part of our sponsorship program last year. We used
the monies that Randy normally donates for that to make some additional signage to help our customer
experience really to kind of communicate as to kind of you know what is that part of the function of the
event so it’s really helped out tremendously for that so. Just I think the fish from last year that went back
in was a little bit too big so I think the kids.
Hoffman: There’s designated slots. On northern pike 24 to 36 inches they’re ineligible and all bass are
ineligible by State law. They need to be released immediately upon catch so they can’t be brought up to
the weigh station.
Ruegemer: So they got the picture taken. They can live on in the power point so.
Hoffman: Still broke the law.
Ruegemer: Yeah. So just, we kind of touched on the door prizes here. We have usually volunteers from
the Key Clubs from the high schools or city staff or a number of different folks for that. Everybody
certainly can get a free door prize ticket if they’d like to with that. There’s one door prize ticket per
person so, and with the door prize total we’ll start drawing those around 1:00 and then we’ll have Cole,
our emcee read the number as well as their name and prize for that and people can come up to the main
fishing tent to pick up their prize. Just you know again Feb Fest is really about making memories and
kind of breaking the cabin fever blues and just getting out and enjoying and having fun with the family so
some of our favorite pictures from last year. You can see just families sitting down and just enjoying a
great day out on the ice so grab a hamburger. If you want a hot chocolate. Make a s’mores so there’s
just, it’s really just good family of fun out there. Mitch kind of went over our sponsors a little bit.
Currently we’re at 60 sponsors total for our sponsorship program. Obviously the sponsors then will be
carried over through all of our events throughout the course of the year. Mitch does a great job with
sending the letters out in the fall time and communicating with our local businesses and really making
that really a seamless process for that. Last year we starting adding the logos to all of our promotional
material so to get your logo on that information it’s a $1,000 contribution minimum so right now we have
19 sponsors and that’s continuing to grow as well with that so the value of our contributions for our
sponsorship program is currently at $28,000 and that will continue to grow throughout the course of the
year so I know Mitch talks to local businesses every day and trying to sell the businesses on our
sponsorship program and we really do give a pretty good bang for their buck through our advertising with
not only our event promotional sponsors and event brochures. That sort of thing. Website and all kinds
of different things so their name does get out quite a bit throughout the course of the year for events so.
Park and Rec Commission, couldn’t do it without you. They always help out tremendously with the
weigh station area, door prize area. I see Cole down there interviewing somebody from last year so
thanks again Cole for being our emcee and.
Kelly: That was the young lady who counted down the start of the tournament.
Hoffman: Nice. Nice.
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
Ruegemer: So are you going to pick out somebody again this year?
Kelly: Yeah we’ll find somebody.
Ruegemer: Potentially. So thanks again. We couldn’t do it without you. We appreciate it. I think it’s
fun for the commission to get out and kind of see all of our hard work and effort that goes into the
celebration itself and the community is so appreciative of just coming out. There’s long standing
traditions with people that have been at every event. Every Feb Fest that we’ve had. All 21 and just
family members that come in from out of state for the weekend to come and really that’s, it’s their annual
you know really tradition now where they come and we’ve got to look at that god awful Green Bay
Packers flag again I’m sure but that family will be there back I’m sure so. No, I say that. But it’s a lot of
fun so we appreciate everybody’s help. So we kind of go into that again. You know Mitch kind of
touched on you know certainly Rotary’s a big part of our event. The Interact program now. Both Chaska
and Chanhassen High School are involved with providing students to help out with ticket sales and door
prize areas and many components of the event. Rick Rice is there with our Chanhassen Fire Department
along with other Chanhassen fire members. They bring the fire rescue truck down to the event so they
really are staged during the event if there’s any type of medical emergency that we may have from A to Z.
From a cut to a broken bone or anything that may happen so we’re very lucky to have that partnership
with the fire department. I think they enjoy being out there as well with that. Carver County Sheriff
Department is there with not only deputies or sworn officers. They also have reserve officers out there as
well and certainly our park and rec staff is out there as well as the other public works employees too that
kind of do work leading up to the celebration itself so we’re very lucky to have a lot of partners and
cooperation throughout our community and we couldn’t do it without everybody so many thanks to
everybody. That’s it.
Kelly: Thank you Jerry. Very nicely done. Any questions for Jerry or Mitch on this? Okay.
COMMISSION MEMBER COMMITTEE REPORTS.
None.
COMMISSION MEMBER PRESENTATIONS.
Kelly: Todd I think we’re looking for an update on the ballfield and City Center bandshell.
Hoffman: Both those items were included in the City Council’s key financial strategies list to be voted on
by the council so they talked about them that Saturday morning and then they ranked both of those items.
Asked to be continued for conversation and possible installation in 2014 so both items are in the CIP.
Ballfield lighting is in this year’s park and recreation CIP, as is the City Center Park bandshell so the City
Manager will schedule those items for a City Council work session. I’ll be preparing a report. Can
present that to the commission for your input prior to that going to the council and then it’s going to go
back to the council and they’ll have some sort of discussion and give direction to staff on that.
Kelly: And when do we have to have it to the council by?
Hoffman: That’s up to the City Manager to schedule those items.
Kelly: Okay.
Ryan: But it’ll come, you’ll present to us before? You’ll present here before it goes to City Council?
Hoffman: I certainly can, yeah. I think that can be great.
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
Ryan: Thank you.
Kelly: Any other questions for Todd?
ADMINISTRATIVE PRESENTATIONS.
Kelly: Todd, anything you want to point out specific?
Hoffman: Nothing that I recall. The blue bird house, Dale Rusch was recognized by the council and he’s
a great volunteer. Now he’s one of Denny’s, Councilmember Laufenburger’s neighbor so they’re getting
to know each other as well. Dale has a passion for blue birds and he does it every year so we thank him
and appreciate that.
Kelly: Great, thank you Todd.
Ryan: And then Todd I just have a general trail plowing question. In the last few week I’ve noticed some
of the trails are a little delayed in the plowing. Could you explain the schedule? How they make the
decisions on roads and trails please.
Hoffman: Absolutely. So the parks division and the street division are two separate divisions and as a
park and recreation department we’re fortunate to have that division because that allows us to get out onto
our duties right away while the streets crew are out clearing streets. I will start by saying Chanhassen
really prides itself both in our streets and our trails division on snow removal. You’ll be hard pressed to
find a city where you have better service in those areas. So the streets crew will start anywhere between
2:00 and 4:00 in the morning typically and we borrow one of our employees, Jim Theis to the streets
department as a full time street plower and so we start generally with 6 individuals, if they’re all in town
and our division needs to do public parking lots and so we do public parking lots at the fire hall, the City
Hall and the Recreation Center first. And then after that we start on streets and the downtown sidewalks
and so just like businesses have to have their sidewalks and their businesses open, it’s our responsibility
to have the public sidewalks in the downtown area cleared, ready for commerce on the day of business.
So that’s a lot to get done just in the start of the day. Have to have the fire hall cleared. City Hall, not
only the lots but then the sidewalk cleared. The library cleared. The Recreation Center cleared and we’re
doing that typically with about 6 employees. Then they’re out starting on rinks and trails at the same time
so they need to clear all of our rinks and that’s a, can be quite a, depending on the size of the snowfall, a
significant process. So you have to plow it all out and then snowblow it out. Hand shovel it and clear
those and then start flooding the rinks and so that takes an amount of time. If the trails are all plowable
with a plow, we can plow them with our, if we have our entire staff in one day so 90 miles of trails give or
take will take one full day. One 8 to 10 hour day. But we don’t have our whole crew on any given day
and also when you get a 4 1/2 inch snowfall or 4 inch snowfall that results in about maybe 8 inches of
snow on the trail after they plow the streets on it and then in a case like Sunday, we ended up where about
half of our trails had to be cleared with a snowblower. You could no longer do them with a plow or a V
plow. That’s when it really slows things down and that’s what you saw here on Monday and Tuesday and
so at the end of today we had all of our trails cleared but it took a, it was Sunday, Monday and Tuesday to
get that done. Sunday was the day that it all drifted in. Monday we got about half cleared. Tuesday we
got about the other half clear. A few years ago during those big snowfalls where we had 10 to 20 inches,
it took up to 2 weeks to clear all of our trails with a snowblower so we had significant delays and we had
really some sizeable and number of complaints, primarily for bus service. And so these trails also act as
bus loading areas and bus transportation areas to get kids from their home to the street corners so
Minnetonka stopped bus service in some of the areas in our community because the kids could not get to
a safe busing location. That forced parents to drive their children to school and so for the simple fact that
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Park and Recreation Commission – January 28, 2014
we weren’t able to get out there and clear that amount of trail area for up to 2 weeks, we caused, that had
some significant ripple effects in our community so it is a service that we know people want. When we
get heavy and extensive snows it’s going to take longer to clear them but we do do all of the trails. We
don’t designate, some communities say we’re just going to plow half. We’re not going to plow all of
them. In Chanhassen we think it’s a service that people really appreciate and so we do clear them all.
Ryan: Thank you for explaining that because it is noticeable when we go to other communities that our
trails are plowed and others have not touched their trails and they just, it came up in a couple
conversations with the neighbors and it was specifically to do with bus stops and kids having to climb
over or stand in the street and so I just was curious…change in approach of plowing trails.
Hoffman: So is it different you think this year right now?
Ryan: Just in, well just in the last couple, like week and a half because literally the snowplows come and
then you know by afternoon the trails are done, especially in the area that we live they get plowed really
quickly and it just, there seemed to be a couple day lag with the trail plows so.
Hoffman: Yep. There’s going to be delay and some of that is by schedule and some of that is planned.
We simply don’t want to duplicate our efforts when they’re clearing streets, they’ll come back and they’ll
re-clear again and they’ll widen and they’ll just keep putting more and more on the trail and so if they
plow the first time we don’t want to go and then plow our trail and they’re just going to come back and
put more on anyway so we do have some delays built into our, to our clearing so we just don’t want to,
we want our resources to be most efficient and so we’ll build that delay into, we might wait a day. The
other thing you’ll see is when it warms up and these streets can be scraped, they’re going to be out
scraping the streets and that’s going to put all that blow back onto the trails again and then we have to get
out and clear that off so we’re on the outside. We get all the snow and we hear it from residents. With
their sidewalks. We put a lot of snow on sidewalks if you happen to have a sidewalk in front of your
home, and once you get this kind of volume of snow there’s nowhere else to go with it. It has to go up
and out. You’ll see them start to widen or wing back and so they’ll now go and wing back and create
more storage space on the side of the roads. You’ll see that but when they do that wing back they don’t
hit the driveways because then you’re just putting a lot of snow in your driveways and so the streets start
to go like this on these long winters and they get a little bit narrower. It’s just a real challenge and, but
our crews work hard. We tire them out I can guarantee you that. It’s one of these things where at some
point in our winter season we really have to take into consideration the health and welfare of our
employees so at some point we really have to, depending on how the winter goes, you might see that
response might even go slower because we just don’t have the manpower to get it done.
Ryan: Thank you.
Kelly: Any other questions for Todd, Jerry or Mitch? Anyone? Any thoughts? Anybody want to go to
the question?
Carron moved, Boettcher seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor and the motion
carried unanimously with a vote of 8 to 0. The Park and Recreation Commission meeting was
adjourned.
Submitted by Todd Hoffman
Park and Rec Director
Prepared by Nann Opheim
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