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PRC 2005 06 28 CHANHASSEN PARK AND RECREATION COMMISSION REGULAR MEETING JUNE 28, 2005 Chairman Stolar called the meeting to order at 7:30 p.m.. MEMBERS PRESENT: Glenn Stolar, Jack Spizale, Paula Atkins, Steve Scharfenberg, Ann Murphy, and Kevin Dillon MEMBERS ABSENT: Tom Kelly STAFF PRESENT: Todd Hoffman, Park and Rec Director; Jerry Ruegemer, Recreation Superintendent; Corey Hoen, Recreation Supervisor; Susan Marek, Recreation Center Manager; Susan Bill, Senior Center Coordinator; and Dale Gregory, Park Superintendent APPROVAL OF AGENDA: Stolar: Todd I will start with you. I know there are several items you wanted to add to the agenda, so if you’ll start with your’s and then commission members will add others. Hoffman: Great, thanks. Item number 7, I’d like to add a brief discussion about Highway 41 pedestrian underpass grant application. That will be between the County and the City for a potential 2009-2010 funding cycle. Number 8, I would like to distribute the results of the 2005 Citizen Survey. It was presented to the City Council last night. Number 9, a report on the status of the CAA scoreboard and advertising banner proposals. And then I’d like to show the commission some concept plans on two different park locations or proposed park locations. Those are for the west water treatment plant and the 2005 MUSA area. And these are very conceptual. Just received by the city staff on Monday. Stolar: On the surface water? Can we put that under new business? Hoffman: Sounds great. Appointment to the Surface Water Management Task Force. 2.5. Stolar: Okay. Other items? Want to put the off leash dog area? Murphy: Sure. Stolar: Just an update. Murphy: Just an update. Stolar: Okay. We’ll make that number 11. I guess it could be under Commission Member Committee Reports. Either one. It’s all in the same place. Okay, anything else? Scharfenberg: How about an update on the skate park? Since our last meeting. Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Stolar: Sounds good. That’s number 12. Anything else? Seeing nothing else, do I have a motion to approve the agenda? Scharfenberg: So moved. Stolar: Moved by Commissioner Scharfenberg. Murphy: Second. Stolar: Seconded by Commissioner Murphy. Scharfenberg moved, Murphy seconded to approve the agenda amended to add the following items: 2.5 Appointment to the Surface Water Management Task Force. 7. Highway 41 pedestrian underpass grant application. 8. Results of the 2005 Citizen Survey. 9. Status report of the CAA scoreboard and advertising banner proposals. 10. Concept plans on two proposed park locations for the west water treatment plant and the 2005 MUSA area. 11. Update on the Off Leash Dog Park. 12. Update on the Skate Park. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 6 to 0. PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENTS: th Stolar: I think we’re going to get to some of them in a little bit but certainly the 4 of July celebration coming up is going to be a great event and Corey will be giving us a report on that I think. Corey or Jerry. One of the two. Ruegemer: Corey will be. Stolar: Any other public announcements? Hoffman: I would like to make note of the installations. I’ll pass this around. Glenn brought that this evening. Those are a couple of digital shots of the North Lotus Lake installation. These projects started a week and a half ago, or 2 weeks ago on the Curry Farms playground installation. Crew prepared that site and the neighborhood showed up on Friday following the 2 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 initiation of the project by Midwest Playscapes and their staff and some of our full time folks. They finished up at Curry Farms about 2:00 on Saturday, so they finished it in rapid fashion and that’s thanks to I think the larger than anticipated crew that Midwest Playscapes brought out and the assistance by staff and then the volunteers. The concrete has been put in place at Curry Farms. That’s done this Monday. 2 days ago. And then we moved out to North Lotus. Glenn worked both days there and I’ll let Glenn talk about North Lotus. Stolar: Well I think to preface anything, I was out at Curry Farms a couple of days, for a couple hours on Friday too, and two groups, the three groups need to be commended. First of all Dale, your team. Just outstanding. Jerry and Rob and a couple of the interns. I think one other person was out there. Who was that? Hoffman: Some of the seasonal employees. Stolar: Some of the seasonals, yeah and they just did fantastic job and appreciate all the work they did. Midwest Playscapes came out with a crew and they weren’t contracted to do that, and they came out with a crew that really helped and what was especially helpful was their supervisor and all their staff really worked and so did Jerry and so did Dale and his staff, Jerry and Rob, worked very hard to get the neighbors involved. So they were patient. You know they knew they could do it quicker themselves but they were patient and they allowed the neighbors to get involved, and then of course I want to thank the neighbors because both neighborhoods showed up with pretty good crews. Quite a bit of people so it couldn’t have been any better. North Lotus Lake. A lot of fun. I know Dale you had to do some gerry rigging on the site before we started and it seemed to work out well. Got it straighten out and then we had a very, very nice picnic thanks to both Midwest Playscapes and Park and Rec Department provided stuff and we had what, about 30. No, more than that. We probably had 40 people out there and it was all neighbors out there, so it was great. Looking forward to Rice Marsh Lake. th Hoffman: And the commissioners can stop down. Rice Marsh is Friday the 8 and Saturday the th 9. …for some of the neighbors and let them know that, giving them thanks for participating in thth the project. And then we skip a few weeks and go to the 29-30 of July for Chanhassen Hills. The last group. I’ll keep sending e-mails as I remember. Stolar: It’s been great so far and the neighbors really, really feel like they own it. They just one by one, both places kept coming up and saying, wow this is great that we were able to help. Thank you. Other public announcements? VISITOR PRESENTATIONS: None. APPROVAL OF MINUTES:Murphy moved, Spizale seconded to approve the verbatim and summary minutes of the Park and Recreation Commission meeting dated May 24, 2005 as presented. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 6 to 0. 2006 PARK AND TRAIL ACQUISITION AND DEVELOPMENT CAPITAL IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM (CIP). 3 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: Thank you Chair Stolar, members of the commission. The time of the year that comes very quickly. We typically start both the general city budget and CIP process sometime in June. The city’s general operating budget needs to get completed in a little bit more rapid time line but we like to start the CIP at the same time. And then generally the full CIP does not get approved until sometime in December in generally. Capital improvements exceed $5,000. They provide significant long term value to our park system and trail system. Examples that we included completed this year are the playgrounds which we talked about. The Lake Susan playground. We’re going to finish off the summer with some improvements down at the old Village Hall courtyard. If you’re familiar with that at all, we have some tripping hazards there between some paved surfaces and some limestone, or some concrete surfaces and so on, stone pavers and so that’s going to be coming out and we’re waiting for the Goddard School to be completed so we can integrate our improvements back into what they’ve completed. Last year CIP projects examples included the Holiday Inn Express trail which was completed just to the south of the new Holiday Inn Express and then the Highway 41 connection trail connected… They’re typically funded from one or two sources. Park dedication funds or general capital replacement funds. Park dedication is collected on the basis that new people coming to the city generate increased needs for park and recreation facilities and that money should be banked and then put back into the community in a variety of new projects. Generally we feel, or we hold the position that general capital replacement dollars are used when things wear out in parks, and so they’ve been here for a while. Up to 15, 20, 25 years and many of these improvements and they need replacement. Those projects should not be using new park dedication dollars. We maintain a 5 year CIP for organizational reasons. Our current one, 2005 through 2009 is utilized as a planning tool, and then we really focus in on next year’s improvements and so as you look through the document you’ve noticed that there’s some gaps in 2006, and again that’s due to the accelerated, acceleration of the playground improvements. It stretched those out and originally were 5 years. Then over 3 years and then we completed them in 2 years. So we have some work to do on our CIP to lay out the future 5, next 5 years of improvements. Capital improvements in our park system. Your charge is to update a 5 year CIP for 2006 through 2010 and make a recommendation to the City Council. As commissioners you bring your ideas forward to staff and we do the same. Ideas generated from past public testimony. From residents and user groups. Input from friends and neighbors and from personal experiences. We want to know what the community has as a desire. A budgeting tool that our budget is a very good way to look at any organization, what they value. What they spend their dollars on. What they value. We want to have that reflected in our CIP as well. And these things change over time as to what’s needed in a community as we mature and we fill out some of our park needs. The current 5 year CIP is attached for a starting point. We look forward to working with you. Jerry and I have notes that we’ve jotted down throughout the year and we’re here to assist the commission in a discussion about what your desires are for the future and that will probably take 2 more meetings to refine this document prior to sending it off to the City Council. Stolar: Okay. So we’ll do questions. Kevin, why don’t we start with you. Dillon: You know I don’t have any specific questions. I mean you put…but I know all the reasons why. I mean the out years I mean looks, I mean to be properly prioritized as best as I can tell. And so I have no specific questions on the, what’s in this plan right here in front of us. 4 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Stolar: Jack. Spizale: The $20,000 for the dog park contribution. That’s just like money that’s in the bank? Hoffman: Money in the bank. It’s a holding pattern. It’s a pledge. If the County moves forward, which they’re, we met with them yesterday on a different issue but we talked about the off leash dog area. They think, Marty Walsh, the Parks Director for Carver County, he thinks he needs about $40,000, again that same number to move forward. Until he reaches that commitment he will not make a recommendation to the County Board to move forward so he’s waiting on some other potential interest groups. And there is one foundation of sorts in Shorewood that is considering very seriously for a contribution. And they have heard from Chaska now. They’re starting to show some interest but Victoria will have a dog park. Dog area as a part of the Three Rivers Park District, so that negates Waconia because they’re shortcut is obviously the Victoria one so. Spizale: That’s all I got. Stolar: Okay. Steve. Scharfenberg: In terms of proposals going forward for 2010, in light of our discussions with the Chanhassen Athletic Association and the ballfield issue, I’d maybe like to see you know lights potentially in 5 years from now. I mean we’re only going to continue to grow in terms of need and demand for ballfields. That’s one of my thoughts. Stolar: Okay. Atkins: I’m really glad to see that Old Village Hall courtyard improvement on there. It’s a disaster area up there right now. I was, what’s out at the Chanhassen Community Gardens? I’m not familiar. Hoffman: The one that is slated for how much? Ruegemer: $12,000 this year. Hoffman: Oh, that’s the expansion of the now renamed Olson Community Gardens, so the community garden right up here. On Kerber. Atkins: Oh okay. Yep. Hoffman: So working with the Environmental Commission and Jill Sinclair, they were looking to an expansion this year. Atkins: Good. Popular? Hoffman: Very popular. 5 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Atkins: Oh great. Hoffman: And last night it was officially renamed to the Olson Community Gardens in honor of Al or Albin Olson. Atkins: Okay. Also we had talked 2 years ago about the parking lot out at Lake Ann. Whatever, did anything ever happen with that? We were trying to figure out whether it should be part of city maintenance or whether it was park dedication or whatever. I know it might, I heard from someone in my area about the condition of the parking lot again. Hoffman: Yeah, the parking lot is in need of, in some cases reconstruction. In some cases maintenance. The parks and engineering/public works have teamed up in a pavement management program and so on an annual basis the city street department, engineering department they undertake various street improvements. For coordination, the largest, getting the best value out of our dollars invested we’ve teamed up on that so our trail overlays, parking lot improvements are all going to be coordinated through that one improvement program. But now we have to wait our turn. This year the city parks department received about $50,000 in an allocation as a part of that program, and that is repaving the trail from Minnewashta Parkway so if you go out to Minnewashta Parkway, take a look at it now. They haven’t started yet Dale? Gregory: No, they haven’t. Hoffman: So if you get a chance, take a look at it now and then take a look at it in a money or two, once that project is completed and so that’s our section of our pavement management program. We’re going to have to wait and build up enough allocation, which will take just about the entire allocation so one year we’re going to have negotiate a project where practically no streets are improved, so they have to play some catch up in that area, which we have a lot to do. Then allocate one year’s complete allocation of pavement management dollars to Lake Ann to rebuild that park road. So it’s going to take a few more years still and so we patch the pot holes th this deep going around the back side of Lake Ann but we’ll get that before the 4 of July and then we’ll continue to wait and put that into the pavement program. But it’s the best way to handle those improvements. We don’t want to use park dedication dollars for the asphalt road so we need to work on it. Stolar: In light of that, I know Minnetonka’s having a discussion about even, they’re talking about raising their taxes to just redo all their streets because they’re so far behind in all of their repairs. I forgot what the number was. It was phenomenal. It’s not a lot per house but it’s still something that they’re going to then take like a 5-6 year project and just go after everything. Hoffman: Get it done. Stolar: Get it done. By combining it with our streets, I’m not saying we’re going to consider it but at least it puts it in the right place. For those type of things. 6 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: Absolutely. The City Hall parking lot, you’ll see some work done there this year as a part of that program. And then the streets that are currently underway on that program include the reconstruction or the overlay of Lake Lucy Road. Plus the addition of the trail on the north side, so that’s going to go this summer. And they’ve also completed some streets down off of Pioneer Trail, so if you go down there, that road surface will be completed this year as a part of that program. And there’s various other locations in the city. Atkins: Okay, that’s all. Murphy: Just to clarify on the dog park money. That is earmarked for Carver County? Hoffman: This particular $20,000 contribution. Murphy: Okay. And if they didn’t get the other contribution and it didn’t go forward next year, would we be able to use any of that money or some of that money for our dog park that we? Hoffman: You can make any designation that you’d like and ask the City Council to approve it. Stolar: We can even switch this one around if we want to do something local this year and target that money for next year, depending on what their timing is. Well I had sent Todd a series of questions to be included in the July discussion so I’m going to go into detail on those, but just highlight some of the things we’ve talked about previously. Bandimere ice rink was one of the things we had talked about previously. Putting a more permanent structure as a future thing to consider and now talking through 2010 is probably reasonable. One I did mention Todd, you also talked about Bandimere Heights of either a half court basketball or something where that old playground was. Something along those lines. And then some of those other questions I sent you Todd, if we could just include those for next meeting, that’d be good. One other question I had was about the City Center Park shelter warming house. It’s kind of a lump sum out there in 2009. If there’s any way again for next meeting to consider, I don’t think I sent you this. Are there ways to break that up to start that? I mean we started focusing on City Center Park being a real showcase for concerts Corey, apparently went great so, and Jerry, fantastic group news there. Since we’re in that momentum of trying to really build the City Center Park to be a true focal place, something like this we might want to at least start looking at earlier so that’s one thing to probably talk about but if there’s a way to divide that, and I certainly know we can’t bring the whole thing forward but if there’s like a design phase for example that we could start in 2006, to better understand the cost and do some of the planning. Something along those lines. Hoffman: Sure. Then talk about City Center Park a little bit. If you take City Hall and go forward to the main street, that’s basically, for the most part programmed improved very beautifully right now. If you note the bars in this area. And the concert series we would want to, we’re thinking about putting in a hard surface area down in that little courtyard to allow the bands to set up in that area so we would want to include something in 2006 for that. The 275 is talking about a building very similar to the one out at the Recreation Center where you have a warming house, covered picnic shelter and putting that back here. You’re right. I don’t think we want to get into that all at once, in fact it may never happen, depending on what occurs in this north side of City Hall. So master planning process, and it may not even be court’s money. It 7 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 would potentially be admin or City Council money. If you’re not aware there’s been a variety of, in the future the city, there may be additional need for parking, roads, other improvements on this property. And so there’s a road now that dead end’s, Market Boulevard kind of dead ends right there at the ice rink. There’s always been talk, it’s never been mapped, but again it’s a potential road. There’s really no official mapping. That that road could extend straight north and then curve and then go out the existing entrance over here. So you have more of a loop road around city hall. If that would happen, that would take out the location for any future warming house shelter, and it would take out a hockey rink as a part of the construction that may occur. May never happen. But I think it’s at least worth a conversation, especially when we start talking about should this designation stay in there or not. Stolar: And actually, I think the idea about definitely put in the concept of the permanent band location as something because I think that just seems like well received. Something we’d want to move forward. Hoffman: City Center Stage. Stolar: City Center Stage. And then on a separate note, and this might be a separate item for a later meeting. This whole idea of the park dedication fees, and you and I have had conversations in trying to establish it for new, but also running into the realization that the cost of land is increasing faster than the fees we get off the land that’s being developed. Which puts us behind. And so something I think this commission might want to look at, not necessarily directly related to the CIP but it certainly impacts the CIP is, is there something there we wanted to talk. Now the city raised it last year, correct? Did they raise it the year before? I don’t think so. Hoffman: …we’ve always been very aggressive in maintaining our park dedication fees at a level that we think is, right now we’re using $100,000 so that’s what we use. $100,000 per acre for land costs and that’s how we base our park dedication fees off, but we know that land in Chanhassen is going for upwards of $200,000 so we’ve chased that land sales figure from $18,000 an acre, 25, to 32 to 60 to 65 to 90 to 100 and now it’s going to have to go to that. But you get into there’s a, you have to create and not only create but validate an essential nexus between how much do you take in and what are you giving these people and so we’re at $4,000 per single family home right now, so every single family home that is built in our community, we collect $4,000 on a building permit. You take out a building permit for a single family home in this town, and it’s probably going to be about a $12,000 fee. If you’re a person that comes out of say Owatonna or Austin, Minnesota, you’re going to fall over stone cold dead from a $12,000 building permit fee. It’s just unfathomable. So you reach a threshold where people tend to say enough’s enough. This is too much and builders will start to challenge us on that. And there’s some court cases already so we maintain ourselves in the top 5% of the pack in the entire metropolitan area and so as land prices move up, and everybody else moves up, we all move up together. If we…today and I believe our city attorney would say, go ahead and do it. We could raise our fees from $4,000 to $8,000 per house. He would defend us and probably would be some challenge to that but we are kept cognizant of that but we want to again…because one thing I think Chair Stolar is getting to the point that if we go out there and ask the developers for their land in lieu of fees, they’re going to say hey, my land’s worth $2,000 but your fees are only based on $100,000. There’s no equity here. It’s not equitable and so there’s some issues there. 8 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Stolar: Yeah, because it can’t, right now it’s not an equal trade off either. They give us the land equivalent to what we would have had to purchase but we’re going to be short of their price, or they’re going to be short of their value. One of the two because of that gap, and that’s what my concern is that as that gap widens, becomes more difficult to work with them and everybody wants the same thing I feel, right? They want the amenity there so that when they develop these houses it’s another nice thing to add to the house, you know we would want to have it but if there’s a gap there between what the fees we can collect and what it would cost us to buy the land and put in the park, then no one wins. It’s a hard level to reach but just something that maybe we would want to look at in the fall. Hoffman: You bet. We’ll look at it. It’s been tougher to keep up with that gap. Stolar: Has anyone ever had pegged the fee amounts to the land valuation or the sale price? With what the person you sell the land, the developer sells it for. Hoffman: The City of Chanhassen did that in the late 80’s and we were challenged immediately because McDonald’s bought the lot next to them I think for at the time it was like a million two, and the park dedication fee was going to be 10% of whatever the number was, and so there was like $120,000 park dedication charge against one of the first properties that sold under the new ordinance and it was challenged and it was taken away. We’ve tried it at least once in our history, and I think other cities have as well. Stolar: Anything else? Scharfenberg: Just one. What is the old village hall court yard improvements? Hoffman: Down where the old village hall sits. So we have, the village hall used to be across the street. It was moved as a part of our historical downtown and now we have a courtyard there which has two different materials. I believe it’s exposed aggregate concrete and then limestone pavers. And the limestone pavers has settled so we have these tripping hazards throughout the courtyard and want to take that out and improve that entire area. Put in some signage. Interpretative signage. Talk about our history of downtown and just, the Chamber of Commerce has moved into that building as a tenant and so it’s kind of a very nice connection. The old village, or the old St. Hubert’s church is currently leased by the city by St. Hubert’s. It’s been vacated now so if you know of any churches looking for a spot, the city has to maintain that building throughout…in 2 or 3 years so. Scharfenberg: Could that be a park then or is that just city land? Hoffman: It’s a city park, just like this part out in front but it would be a public court yard. Stolar: Okay. Corey, we had one thing we added to new business before you present and that’s the surface water management task force, so item 3. So new business, we’ll have an action on that under the July meeting or August meeting, correct? For the CIP. 9 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: For the CIP, correct. We’re bringing the things that we’re talking about. They include the recreation center hockey rinks need to be rebuilt. Highover has a trail that needs to be constructed and a trail outlot. We’re adding, looking at a fence at the Bandimere soccer fields, directed by the situation where the balls are constantly going into the wooded area. Familiar with that? And Jerry has some notes down as well, so we’ll bring staff’s comments forward at that time. Stolar: Okay. APPOINTMENT TO THE SURFACE WATER MANAGEMENT TASK FORCE. Hoffman: If you did not receive the e-mail, do you have a copy of what? Stolar: I didn’t print out a copy. Did everyone receive the e-mail? Hoffman: So we just need a member of our commission as an appointee to that body to go through and to take the original document and take a look at it and to come up with the necessary improvements or changes. Stolar: Is anyone interested in volunteering for that? Hoffman: Who likes wetlands? Scharfenberg: I’m a desert person. Stolar: Dry them out. Put cactus in right. And did Tom get back to you at all, if he was interested? Hoffman: No. You can always nominate him. Stolar: It is actually an area I’m interested in. If no one has any objections I would be happy to serve on it. Hoffman: Okay, thank you. Stolar: Everyone can stop sweating now. Hoffman: Appreciate it. TH 2005 4 OF JULY CELEBRATION REPORT. Hoen: Thank you Chair Stolar, members of the commission. Welcome to you all. Probably th remember we’ve got a little party coming up here this weekend. City’s 4 of July celebration rdthrd will be held on Sunday, July 3 and Monday, July 4. All activities on the 3 of July take place th at City Center Park and at City Center Park and Lake Ann on July 4. The events will get started rd on July 3 at 3:30 with the Chamber sponsored Business Fair. Some other events that day 10 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 include Kiddie Parade, some food and beer garden. We’ll have a total of 13 different food vendors this year. We’ll have 8 vendors, the carnival type of vendors that we’ve had in the past, and then in addition to that we have 5 local restaurants this year which the Rotary has lined up for us. We’ll have a total of 13 food and beverage vendors this year. We’ll also have some kids games and then the evening will conclude with the street dance by Casablanca Orchestra again th this year. Events get started again early on Monday, July 4 with an adult fishing contest out at Lake Ann, and then following that with a kids fishing contest, along with some beach games and different activities down at Lake Ann. Then at City Center Park we will have the Taste of Chanhassen and the Classic Antique Car Show put on by the Chanhassen Rotary Club. Then after that we will have the parade, which is also put on by the Chanhassen Rotary which starts at 2:30. Immediately following the parade we’re going to have a historical melodrama that will take place in the tent on the north side of City Hall. After that the event will kind of conclude with a fireworks display over at Lake Ann which begins at 10:00 p.m. and then new this year we’re going to have a musically choreographed fireworks so we’re kind of excited about that. As far as promotional material goes, I’ve done a schedule of events insert in the Chanhassen Villager and Chaska Herald and it’s displayed in each of the two magazines as well. And then there is…signs placed throughout the city. Stolar: Okay. Any questions for Corey? Atkins: You’ve got 13 vendors for Sunday. Is that more than usual? Hoen: 5 more than last year. Atkins: And what local businesses are selling? Hoen: Maggie Lu’s, Axel’s…Quiznos, and I’m not sure of the fifth one. Atkins: Good, that’s great. I’ve been wanting to try Them Bones. The Taste of Chanhassen, did you get a lot of people back? I thought that was fun last year. Hoen: There’s going to be 12 to 15. We did get 12 last year so all but one I think is coming back from last year and they added a few additional ones this year. Atkins: And remember we talked, if there’s shirts left we should maybe try and sell shirts at Taste of Chanhassen and if you would set it up, I’d do a shift because people were asking about shirts that day. If there’s any left from the night before. I remember that. And I just want you to know that this historical melodrama is a comedy. It’s not stuffy, historical melodrama. It’s very funny. It’s pretty short in length too so everybody should come. That’s all for me. Hoffman: And you’re going to be in the parade and… Atkins: There’s a unit in the parade. Hoffman: Come to the Melodrama. 11 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Stolar: Anybody else? We’re looking forward to it. Do you have your sign up’s for the booth? Hoen: For the trade fair? Stolar: Not for the trade fair. For the raffle. Hoen: I think I’ve pretty much got about everybody. Stolar: Okay. And t-shirt sales and such. Okay. Murphy: What about the business fair Corey? Stolar: That’s the next item on the agenda. Which actually these were kind of reversed in your packet. Corey’s report should be 3(a) and then Jerry’s on the business fair, 3(b). So let’s go to 3(b). Thank you Corey and we’re looking forward to it. Should be a great event. TH 2005 4 OF JULY CHAMBER OF COMMERCE BUSINESS FAIR REPORT. rd Ruegemer: The commission has participated in the business fair on July 3 for a number of years now, and last year we had comment cards that we asked people to fill out for that event. You know to kind of gauge the interest out there. What are the hot topics? That sort of thing. I th know John Sussman, our intern has ordered up 4 of July Tootsie Rolls and other types of decorations so we can decorate that booth and that. We had set aside kind of two shifts to staff the booth. It really depends on if you want to break it up into shifts like that or if people, a couple people want to take it the whole time, which is fine with me but the coverage we do need is, it does start at 3:30. Get done somewhere at 6:00 to 6:30 so if there’s anybody that would like to volunteer for that as well, we’ll certainly be taking volunteers. Atkins: I’ll do that because I’m not taking a shift that evening. Ruegemer: Do you want to go 3:30 to. Atkins: 6:00, yeah. That will be fine. Hoffman: They’ve turned away over 10 people since they closed this thing. Trade Fair. Stolar: I can do, I’ll get there as soon as I can, but for sure I’ll be there, 5:00 to 6:30. We’re going to be out of town that morning. Dillon: Need some help, I will follow up on that early shift. Murphy: I can probably do the early one. I think the late one… Ruegemer: Are there any specific questions you wanted to ask or are you just going to kind of light heartedly engage in conversation. 12 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Stolar: Well I think a couple things. One, this was for, and I’ll get you one for Curry Farms so if we can just put some sort of either a notebook with covers so people can see the new playground stuff. I’ll try and get to Lake Ann also to show the ones from last year at Meadow Green, but for sure I’ll have the Curry Farms and this one. Hoffman: And if you don’t get to them, just let us know. We’ll take them. Ruegemer: The master plans? Stolar: I think for the two that aren’t finished, if we want to throw those in and then the Lake Susan one. So even if we just showed the 2005 without the 2004 ones, that’d be good so I’ll have a picture of Curry and this one, and then probably the plans for the others. So if you can just put them on a poster, I think that’d be nice. As a suggestion commission members please. Or staff if you guys want to do something else. Atkins: With the suggestion box it’s always been really pretty general comments that we get and I was wondering if it wouldn’t be a good idea to make it something that’s a little more specific. Stolar: That’s what we were thinking about when we talked about it last year. Hoffman: When we go over the survey, this may bring some questions up because there are going to be things that either rate very high or very low in here and you may want to ask some follow up questions. Stolar: Sounds good. So we’ll postpone the discussion of what we survey, if anything until after that? Any other? Murphy: What if we listed out some of the options for the dog park and got some feedback on some of our locations? Stolar: That’s one of the things when we get to this, why don’t we talk in more detail, but I think that would definitely be one of the, one that all of us would mention would be good to have on the survey. Okay. Alright, thank you. Why don’t we move on then to rec center report. RECREATION CENTER REPORT. Marek: Commissioners. Well, this is the slow period at the recreation center out there so if not for Corey’s recreation programs and a few recurring rentals, we’d be pretty quiet out there. Certainly our fitness business, our fitness classes have really gone down for the summer months. But basketball camps, the soccer camps, volleyball camps, keep the traffic coming in and out… thth We are looking at being closed August 20 through September 5. This will be the second year that we’ve shut down for 2 weeks before the beginning of school, and that’s where the school district comes in and does some larger maintenance projects in the recreation center and gives all the hard working staff some time off as well. A couple of new things out at the recreation center. We have elliptical trainers in place. Those were placed in service in March, and it’s, I’m hard pressed even now to walk down there and see those things empty. People just go onto those 13 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 things and have taken ownership of them and if they’re not available then certainly I should go down there and help them become available. So it’s a popular addition and so we’re real happy that our customers have enjoyed that. Although business at the recreation center has been a little show over the summer, it’s important to keep in mind how really well used the center is in terms of the variety of activities that happen there during the year. And I’ve listed some of those here. So you know it can be art lessons, ballet practice, parties. I have a home based business expo coming in. I’ve got a recurring financial consultant who holds open houses there. Mary Kay has held a weekly meeting there for 10 years. Louise Lainer. Bringing it home for the rec center for 10 years now. She donates make-up to the front desk staff, male or female. I’ve got belly dancing classes…going on now. And Commissioner Atkins group coming in with their comedy melodrama for play rehearsal going on so it’s nice to really recognize the fact that we do host all of those things in our community and what an asset that is to have that local…available. Now we’ve got some changes at the recreation center and one of the biggest changes is losing a real key employee to us that’s Ann Ellwood. She’s just a fabulous, talented person. A real fitness professional. Some things changed in her life and she needs to make a move for a full time employment and we’re just absolutely thrilled for her that she has found that at Lifetime Fitness. Certainly we have a lot of clients, personal training clients that will miss her. Some will certainly follow her but she’s had a good 10 year run at the recreation center so we certainly wish her well and if you do see her, please do congratulate her on that change. That being said, we are searching for another lead personal trainer willing to sort of grow that business and kind of make it their own. Along with some front desk staff, and again it’s just very intermittent shifts that are available at the recreation center coming up in September. So after we re-open in September. So I’m looking at hiring those positions here in the next couple weeks and completing that schedule and moving forward. And once again if you’re interested in becoming a group fitness instructor, I’d be glad to help you with that. You can come and teach classes. Programs, you know the biggest program we run, even exceeding softball Jerry? Ruegemer: By a little bit. Marek: By a little bit, is our dance program out at the recreation center so that ends up being th somewhere between a $50,000 and $60,000 revenue program that did conclude on May 7 at the Eden Prairie Performing Arts Center with two performances of our recital this year and we just had a fabulous greeting by the Eden Prairie School District staff this year. Different from all the other years we’ve been there. They’ve kind of snubbed us when we walk in the door and we had to clean off the stage and haul our garbage out and put on our show and this year they met us at the door. Custodians in hand. Theater agent in hand. Tech’s available and treated us like we were the absolute best renters in the whole wide world so it was a very nice experience this year and a fabulous recital once again pulled off without a hitch. Every year I just sweat it out but we were able to have a great performance and about 1,200 people attended that. We were real happy with that and we had Tony Abernathy as one of the judges this year, a street worker here at the City of Chanhassen so we were able to at least get one city staff in there judging. Hoffman: All the way from the street department. Marek: He just happens to be engaged to one of our dance instructors. It’s not like we grabbed him off the street… Other than that we’re just really planning on getting our fall programs all set 14 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 and getting all the schedules ready for the recreation center and gearing up for another year. Our season runs through the school year so we’re just getting ready for that. Hoffman: Something called Lifetime Fitness opens soon so we’ll watch that. It’s like a little bee’s nest out there at that place. Atkins: Is that pool going to be really open? Hoffman: Yes. Indoor pool I believe. I’m not sure. Murphy: The outdoor one was pretty good when I stopped by there today. Stolar: Any other questions? Thank you Sue. SENIOR CENTER ACTIVITIES UPDATE. Bill: Good evening. …update everybody on this summer is the collaborations I’ve been working on with different groups in the community. The reason that I’m focusing on this is trying to engage younger seniors or the boomers to try to offer activities or to add additional activities to draw some younger people into the senior center. Kind of to get over that image that the senior center is bingo and cards. We have a whole lot more than that in the new space. It’s a lovely environment. Once people come in and we get them in the door, they come back so that’s what I’ve been focusing on the last number of months, the collaboration outlined on a number of those in my write up. The Lions sponsored our annual picnic this year. They had a great time. We had a great time. We had 80 plus people. By the end of the picnic they asked if they could come back and do it again next year. So that was, they had as much fun as we did, so that was really, really nice, and they donated all their time, food. They paid for everything and so it was really, really a great event. Park Nicollet, we hosted a couple meetings with them to get seniors to volunteer at the new clinic because they’re really wanting to get involved in the community. So the senior center held some educational meetings. Some workshops and stuff to learn about the new clinic. We’re also, we’ve got a group of 5 people working on a mosaic project that will hang in the clinic, and that’s pretty exciting. They’ve got an art coordinator who is trying to get local artists and people to do a lot of the artwork so our mosaic panel is going to be hung I think th on July 5. So there again that’s another partnership that I’ve been working on and probably will, I’ve kind of got ulterior motives when I do some of this but I know that things that the clinic can offer some educational opportunities at the senior center on some treatments, whatever so they can be a valuable resource for updated health information for our seniors here at the center. District 112, I’ve had one meeting with them. I’ve got another one set up because they’re struggling with the same issue. How do we engage those younger seniors? All the demographic and information points to that. The newly retired people are still pretty independent. Want to do things on their own but want to give back to the community and I’m looking at ways with them to get them involved, whether it be…approach, travel shows, or offer some evening programming. Just to draw those younger older adults into our programming. So I’m going to meet with them again in July and maybe offer the senior center as a site to help host a couple of their programs because everything they do is in Chaska in the evening and if there would be something appropriate, we’ll try a one or two time event here that’s sponsored by them 15 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 to get new people in the door. The senior commission, our senior commission has been looking for some things to do in the community. They’ve really done an excellent job you know bringing the housing and the parking and everything else. They’ve done an excellent job in Chanhassen getting the senior, Chanhassen is known as a very senior friendly community. So now what we’re doing, they wanted to have some volunteer prizes, and about three senior commissioners that are going to volunteer to teach one on one computer classes. So starting th right after, and other volunteers possibly too. Right after the 4 of July we’re going to have one on one computer classes that seniors are going to teach to interested people in the community on a computer base. So that’s like how to access the internet. How to use e-mail. How to do a word document. Maybe do a spreadsheet. Everything I’ve heard is even the most beginners, beginning basic computer classes are sometimes too advanced. I’ve got 3 senior commissioners and a couple other people that are going to volunteer their time, so that’s pretty exciting. They’re real excited about that. MAAA, that’s Minnesota Area Agency on Aging. There’s some big changes coming up in Medicare as well as some other programs. They’re going to host a series of three different educational events. So we’ve just got a whole lot of things going on and I’m feeling the more we can work with people in the community and let them know and get them involved, that will sure help draw more people. Not that we need a whole lot more people because our programs and activities have been going great, but kind of looking down the road and thinking, you know we’ve got to, it will be exciting to get some different programs and some new people in the senior center. Day trips and extended trips continue to go well. We continue to partner with Chaska. Out of Chaska and Eden Prairie on our day trips, we do one to two a month. I think we have 34 people that went to Hinkley today. They boarded the bus to the casino. We do just a variety of different things and those continue to go real well. We had 18 people that went to North and South Carolina. When I do an extended trip I book in with other travel agencies because we don’t have enough, or the tours from travel agencies. We don’t have enough to sell a bus. So 18 people went there. I’ve got 14 people going on a mystery tour in July and they keep bugging me all the time. It’s actually a balloon festival in Iowa so I hope it won’t be like 110 or something… So just a lot of exciting things. With the addition of, well with the two spaces we now double, I’m able to double book and plan more than one activity at a time, and it’s been really wonderful. There are some days when both places are being used and it’s just wonderful for that, the additional space so all and all things are going well. Got a lot of ideas but there’s only a limited amount of time so we’re starting to introduce some of the things into the program. Stolar: Great, thank you. Questions for Susan. Very good stuff. Thank you. PARK AND TRAIL MAINTENANCE REPORT. Gregory: Good evening. Summer programs are in full swing. Park staff has been busy this spring getting our ballfields, soccer fields, the beaches all ready for the summer and that. Been doing a lot of concentration on striping soccer fields and that. We have our first application of fertilizer down for this year and we have also, in fact I just finished today doing our full mowing of all of our trails. So we’ve got that stuff all finished. We have had with the last couple storms, we’ve had a lot of trees go down in some of the parks and trails. We’re still working on those. We’ve got trees laying along side of trails. Trails all open but we’ve still got some we’ve got to get out of there. We’re sharing one chipper between the street department and park department 16 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 so it’s, when they’re not using it we’re using it and we’re trying to fit it in our schedule and also working with all the play equipment and that that’s going up and that so it’s, it may take a little bit longer to get the, that out of there but we will get to it eventually so. Like I say, the guys have been doing a lot of time working with the play equipment, that type of stuff. You did cover that earlier so I’m not really going to go into that. You’ve kind of heard the whole report on that. Talking with Jill Sinclair and that, we do have a lot of Dutch elm disease again this year. I don’t know why but it’s, we have a lot of it going around. In our parks and all over and so. I talked with Todd on that. We’re going to try to work out a schedule if we can get to it. If we can’t get to it, what we’re going to be doing with some of those, the trees and that that have to come out. So we are, our main concentration is strictly on the play equipment and how to stay on schedule with that. Hoffman: We’ll contract if we have to. To remove those trees. Gregory: I’ve got pretty much my full staff on right now. This year was really, I have a different one. I was pretty much full. Had all my people hired by the end of April and since then I’ve had 7 seasonals that have quit and that’s the most I’ve ever had and 5 out of those 7 have quit before they ever started simply because they found other jobs that paid more. So they just up and quit. 2 of them were due to other circumstances and that but, that they quit and that but I talked to Todd a little bit and we’re going to work on that a little bit. If we’re not paying quite enough or what the deal is and that but we’re losing a lot of kids and we get them right off the bat and then they apply, they get a job and it seems like they continue to keep looking for other jobs and so they get another job and they’ll quit our’s and go take a different one so. The people we do have now, I think I’ve got 6 out of the 14 that came back from last year and we’ve got 8 new ones and we do have a really good crew this year and that. The guys, I was talking to the full time guys this year and that and they said that they’re really working out real well and so the ones we brought in this year and really working. It’s a good crew so. That’s pretty much it other than like I say, pretty much our whole concentration is going to be play equipment this spring and that so, take care of ballfields. Stolar: Okay. Any questions, comments? No? Alright, thanks again and again the crew’s doing a great job on everything so appreciate it. Hoffman: I have a couple comments Glenn. We do this 2 or 3 times a year we get to introduce the staff, reintroduce the staff and have a conversation with the first line of management employees. I want you to know that I firmly believe that if this was a private organization sitting here in front of you, there’d probably be twice as many people here. As a department we operate very lean. We are a growing community. These people are focused. They’re self starters. They’re intelligent and they’re dedicated to this city. As a Director, I could, if we were a community that was completely built out, I could manage these people individually on a daily basis. I could set up their jobs for them. I could work with them on a daily basis. I don’t have that luxury many days of the week. We’re off managing new development. New growth and so what I talk to these folks about is that I need them to be self starters. I need them to help themselves get their job done on a daily basis. And I’m pleased to report to you that they do that in a wonderful fashion. We operate 34 parks, 42 miles of trails, a senior center, a recreation center, a complete recreation program, 4 or 5 beaches, and the list goes on and on. The 17 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 downtown that we take care and our park system with our downtown boulevards and our downtown City Center Park, an online registration and activity registration programs. The list of activities goes on and on for a staff this small so each of these people do a wonderful job every day and I want to let them know that I appreciate them and I know you guys do as well. Great group of people to work with. Stolar: Yep, thank you. Give them the accolades so appreciate it. In that note we are going to move on, which I think you’re done with your reports. If you feel like you want to go home and get some sleep and rest, please feel free to do so. Unfortunately Todd and Jerry can’t do that yet, so Todd why don’t we move to the next item. HIGHWAY 41 UNDERPASS GRANT APPLICATION. Hoffman: Receive a call a few weeks ago from Marty Walsh, Carver County Parks Director. The city, we manage a comprehensive park and trail plan. The trail system is starting to get pretty well gridded out. If you can think in your mind as we head west on Highway 5, that’s a major…Powers, Audubon. A couple of pieces that are, more recently 101 north and then a couple of pieces that are left are Highway 41 and that’s been left off intentionally because we do not want to complete that next section of Highway 41 until such time that we would have an underpass going under Highway 41 to the regional park. There are some other trail segments associated with Highway 212 that are coming on line, and then there’s the future Lake Ann trail that will go around Lake Ann, so there’s some big pieces left. Timing is important when we take a look at these individual segments. The County completed an assessment of 6 individual trail projects in the county. Two of them rose to the top. Highway 41 underpass and then a railroad grade project from Waconia to Mayer. Carver County has acquired a railroad, an abandoned railroad corridor where the ties are off and the rails are off and they think they have a good chance of receiving federal dollars. These are ISTEA dollars or T-21 grant dollars, if you want to use some of the lingo. So this application would be for 2009-2010 time period, up to a million dollars. We would apply for the full million dollars. The underpass would probably consume most of that allocation. Maybe 750. Maybe 500 but could be up to a million. Could be over a million, depending on what you get into once you start designing that. If you’re familiar with the Highway 41 corridor, as you drive north and you’re near the park, there’s some very steep drop off’s on either side. It’s near the Yoberry, where Yoberry is right there, and so that’s where the underpass would be going through. The grant requires a 20% dedication from the co-sponsors. We would be co-sponsors, the City and the County so we would be responsible for 10%. They would be responsible for 10% so it’d be $100,000 each. We would include the entire trail on the east side of Highway 41. The trail going into the park to connect people up to the park amenities, and then the underpass and the grant application. That is going to exceed a million dollars by quite a bit. The County is paying for the application consulting and so we remain as a partner and then Todd Gerhardt and I met with the county engineer and the county parks director yesterday. We discussed briefly I think Todd discussed it with the Mayor and will be talking th about it with the full council at July 11’s work session but I wanted to keep you up to date on that project. This application will be submitted probably by the end of July and then we’ll know probably within a 6 month period how the application process was viewed. Stolar: Questions for Todd. Okay. Thank you. We’ve had other trails with grants haven’t we? 18 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: Yes. Many in the past. Stolar: Great. 2005 CITIZENS SURVEY. Hoffman: I’ll distribute these and then we’ll go through the highlights and you can take this home and probably put yourself to sleep tonight. Hit some highlights. These are things that were talked about last night and apologize staff, they do not have comments or copies. This was presented to the City Council last night and then they wanted this distributed to the commission as well after they received it. You’ll probably see a newspaper article on it and then staff will be discussing, taking actually kind of a celebration pizza party I think in a week or two at a lunch time about the results of the survey because they were very positive. 94% of our residents rate the quality of life in Chanhassen as either excellent or good. 87% feel very or somewhat safe from violent crimes. 96% feel very or somewhat safe in their neighborhood during the day. It drops slightly to 89% after dark. 8% of our residents responded they are a victim of crime in the past 12 months. 93% responded that they visited a Chanhassen park in the last year. 82% read the Chanhassen Connection which is our newsletter. 39% watched a public meeting on TV while 30% attended a meeting, and those were viewed as very high in our community, but I think it reflects things like the neighborhood installation of playgrounds. People get involved in those. Probably upwards of 100 people have attended meetings as a part of that process or more. 50 of them or so or 25 of them received a survey and they respond accordingly. 82% have used the Chanhassen library. 79% responded the overall quality of service they receive from the city is either excellent or good. For 36%, location was the number one reason they chose Chanhassen. 50% of our residents, that’s the highest percentage prefer to receive information from the city by mail. Open ended question, the biggest issue facing the city in the next 2 to 3 years, the top answers are control growth 35%, traffic and road conditions 22%, taxes 15%. So many good things in the survey. When you have a chance you can look through it. Something of interest to note is that they some comparisons. This survey was completed differently than in the past. It’s not a phone survey. It was a mailed survey. I think it saved the city somewhere in the neighborhood of $15,000. So 50% of the people that received this responded, which is very high. And then you see a comparison to their responses, is it above the norm, similar to the norm, or below the norm. So we’re above the norm as a place to live. Overall quality of life. Overall appearance. Air quality. Safe in the downtown. Safe in downtown after dark. Safe in parks after dark. Snow removal. City parks. Sidewalk maintenance. Health services. The list goes on and on. And then similar to the norm in a variety but a smaller number of areas and a very small fraction below the norm. Below the norm, there were 6 things cited. A place to retire. Access to affordable quality housing. Opportunities to attend cultural activities. Drinking water. Shopping opportunities and cable television. So one of those in particular, drinking water, the council has been taking some recent action on. And the other, shopping I don’t think that’s going to change significantly. You’d have to include Eden Prairie in your shopping around or you’re not going to be satisfied there. And cable television, although it’s very low, it’s come up from past surveys. Scharfenberg: What about cable television? 19 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: What about it? That it’s bad? They have black out’s. Brown out’s. I don’t know, I don’t have cable. Anybody experience problems with cable? Stolar: It’s much better than a few years ago, or yeah even last year, yeah. Much better. Hoffman: So the citizen survey results are very good indeed. The council was pleased to see them. The newspaper was there last night and then council’s going to take a more in-depth look at their next meeting. Stolar: If you look at the page 25, for the quality of the services. You have the average rating and then you also have the percent that chose good or excellent and those are very high numbers. 92% for city parks. 93 but there’s some rounding here. Hoffman: In parks and trails and recreation, the only thing I think of note on the low side is recreation centers. And if you dig a little deeper, that’s not a reflection of the recreation center. It’s a reflection of the people perceive we don’t have a recreation center. The one that we do have, when they talk about that, they rank it very high. Stolar: Questions for Todd. No? Dillon: What is the N on this or average? People responded, number of responses. Hoffman: Oh the number? Dillon: Yeah. 583. Stolar: Completed surveys received from 583 residents. It’s on page 2 at the top there. So we had talked about once we were presenting this some thoughts about how we wanted to approach rd any survey or information collection at the booth. On July 3. I guess Todd I’d start with you. Any thoughts you’d have of what this has led you to think about or Jerry or any of the staff members? Hoffman: Yeah, we haven’t had a chance to review it. I just looked at it briefly today so. Can you put the section about parks and see if anything… Under parks and recreation and they talk about rec center, trails. Thank you…and that’s one thing, it’s funny terminology. I think we should change our terminology and just continue to use the dog parks. People have a very negative, some people have a very negative connotation of dog park. So off leash dog area, that’s the new term for dog parks. And off leash dog areas are not necessarily just for dogs obviously. The human race as well and our social needs as human beings and dog owners. So off leash dog areas I would think would be ranked high. Ballfield improvements. You may want to talk about specific improvements. Stolar: I guess that was one of my questions is do we want to, and we’ve got to be careful about this but use this kind of as a guide of prioritization or input to prioritization for major chunks of capital areas. 20 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: I wouldn’t think so because it’s such a random survey. Stolar: Yeah, it’s only those that show up and decide to fill it out. Hoffman: Well you need, one of the best ways to get the reading is just to have, you don’t even hand it out. Just say here’s a few questions we’re having. Could you respond and then fill them in as you stand there. And then just put them in the bin. So 2 or 3 questions. And we’ve got some, we’d like your feedback in these areas. What do you think about off leash dog areas? What do you think about whatever items you’d like to talk about, because I think people just aren’t taking the time to fill it out. At least the open ended ones they don’t like very much. Stolar: Well what would be our purpose then? What are we trying, what information are we trying to gather I guess is what I’d like to start with? What are we trying to understand from the people who walk by that booth? Their priority, is it their input on how we should do it? Is it? Murphy: I guess I would like to know what locations people are interested in. Lake Susan. Lake Ann. Kerber. All the ones that were, Jack and I are working on listing out. Stolar: So specific off leash dog area. Murphy: I’d just like to get feedback… Stolar: Which of these areas do you think, and again I’m not…but basically listing out some areas and say what do they think, you know. Is this a good area? Is it not? Would you be interested in seeing one there, that sort of thing. So that’s one category then and what we’re trying to get specific for that is some feedback on areas. Scharfenberg: So do you need to put up a map there so people can. I mean some people don’t even know what you’re talking about. Murphy: Well they’re going to say where in Lake Susan. Scharfenberg: Right. Murphy: And we can kind of describe it but a map would help a lot more. Hoffman: Those of you who have worked will recall it’s very busy and sometimes people are just really moving. Stolar: They want the candy. Hoffman: So perhaps just even you know just giving a survey. We talked about that. I think, in fact I think we came to that conclusion once or twice… 21 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Stolar: Which is still an option here too. I mean if we choose not to, and just informally ask people. Hoffman: Informal communication. Scharfenberg: How about a map with colored push pins? They could just put it where they thought. Hoffman: Or just a, yeah. A question about, you’re talking about your CIP as well. What would you like to see improved or, in your parks? Stolar: That’s what I was suggesting with the CIP question, it’s input. The question I would ask is, please rank these types of improvements for capital investments in priority. Off leash dog area. Lighted ball parks. Additional playgrounds. But that one we’ve already solved but maybe ice rinks I think was one of the other. I think like 4 or 5 things. I don’t want you know the whole laundry list of capital improvements but major buckets. Hoffman: I just don’t want 40 people to sway on the commission views an entire CIP. Dillon: I agree. Unless you’ve got like some decent methodology behind it, it’s I don’t know. It’s very random and you know, you’re right. I mean it’d be maybe some nice antidotal information to know, but I wouldn’t use it to make any decisions off of. Hoffman: Yeah, you might just want to just ask people and then make some mental notes or jot down some notes and then those people working, Paula, Glenn and Ann, just bring those comments back at your July meeting. Stolar: So should we, let me just, why don’t I just poll on how do you want to approach. What are your thoughts for it? I mean it could be anywhere from no survey, specifically just to the off leash dog area, which is an area we have on our agenda. Input on capital improvements or just informal discussion. Steve. Scharfenberg: I think you’re going to, I would say informal discussion if you can with people about what, and bring back the input. Stolar: Okay. Paula. Atkins: I’m interested in people’s response to a specific question about whether an off leash dog area is important to them. Just like if it’s, you know if you ask 5 people, how many people are going to say it’s very important and how many people are going to say not important at all. Because I really don’t know. Murphy: My thought was more in anticipating what City Council was looking for the last time we went in front of them, which was proof that there really was a need or a desire for a dog park and they wanted that proof and this might be a good opportunity to gather that. So I guess as far as the locations, probably an informal discussion is best because it’s just going to get too difficult 22 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 and too complicated to have maps there and try to tell people what we’re talking about as far as location. Dillon: I would say the informal discussion, just like we do normally around, when we’re just talking to people in the community. I mean without, with the short amount of time we’ve got to get something prepared for this, I just think we might be going off cocked with some kind of survey or something like that and I don’t think it’s worth the effort at this point. Spizale: I tend to agree. The informal discussion because people are in pretty much of a hurry to get candy or to get gifts from one booth to the next booth so I think if we can engage in some discussion and maybe have the information. I think it’d be nice to have a map with maybe highlighted of some areas that we’re thinking of as far as the dog parks so if somebody is interested and you kind of engage that person in that, kind of show him what we’re thinking about and get some reactions. I think informally. Stolar: Okay. So varied opinions. Trying to bring them to some, or are you comfortable Todd that you know what to do. I mean it sounds to me like we certainly want, so let me break this down into chunks. The only thing we would even consider formalizing in any way, shape or form is the off leash dog area. That’s what I’ve heard, with the exception of lights at parks, better lighted ball fields but just focus on off leash…have concurrence on that but if we do anything it would only be for that specific topic. So we’ve got that. So then the question, the second question is, should we have a map showing potential sites of off leash dog areas like a park map and just, we could put pins in there and just you know show where highlighted so that if you think about the display, we’ll have a board that shows the playground stuff and then maybe a map to show where the new playgrounds are. We could show off leash dog or just off leash dog I guess is what we said. Does that sound? Because it will get reaction for example if you put it in someone’s back yard and they don’t want it, you will hear about it. Hoffman: Yeah, we’ll prepare a map on the off leash dog area conversation and take it from there. Stolar: Right, and then I think each person at the booth then will solicit and if we could have a clip board and just some ways to note it, and then as we talk to people we can at least write our own notes. Spizale: I agree, yep. Stolar: Does that sound reasonable to everybody? Ann, does that meet what you’re looking for? Murphy: Yeah. Stolar: Okay, sounds good. Because it is a priority for us that we discuss so it’s good that we’ll be able to focus on that. Hoffman: Thank you. 23 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Stolar: And then, oh by the way. That doesn’t prevent us from talking to people about other issues. Feel free to ask what other things are on your mind with regards to parks and rec and if we can jot those down, that’d be great. Hoffman: Someone might…you never know. Stolar: That’s true. Was it last year or the year before, almost all of them were great park system. Okay, thank you. CAA SCOREBOARD AND ADVERTISING PROPOSAL UPDATE. Hoffman: So the recommendation from the Park and Recreation Commission was placed on a City Council work session. Mr. Todd Neils attended that meeting. The council talked about both of the proposals individually. They were less enamored with the advertising banner proposal. They didn’t have any great issues with the CAA scoreboard donation. They left it up to staff to continue to work with Mr. Neils. Not necessarily completing the advertising program but seeing if there’s alternative ways of facilitating the improvements that the CAA is wanting to see and that’s why they started to generate this idea about an advertising program to raise funds. And this is a conversation I had with Mr. Neils early on in the process is that there’s a couple different ways to take a look at this. You can come before the Park and Recreation Commission and ask them to make a recommendation to City Council for ball field improvements, or if you don’t think that’s the way you want to go and chose not to go that way, or that route first time around. He wanted to raise the money himself and put some sweat equity into the improvements, but the council isn’t willing to promote advertising at a public setting at this time I don’t think to see those improvements. They would rather see it go the general way. If it’s a priority, then the commission should note that and send it up to them in a CIP form and make that recommendation. We responded accordingly to Mr. Neils and informed him that the scoreboard donation would be accepted and that the capital improvements would be better suited in the general CIP than through an advertising program. Stolar: Related to that real quick, and just to clarify. The scoreboard though they said was okay to have advertising on the scoreboard. Hoffman: Yeah. Stolar: To pay for that piece but not the advertising on the fence. Scharfenberg: And Todd, given your discussion with the CAA, are they going to follow through then with the scoreboard issue or are they? Hoffman: They’ve not responded. Scharfenberg: They’ve not responded. Hoffman: I think it’s getting late in the season and I’m not sure if they’re going to. They’re about $900 apiece. So I don’t know if they’re going to do it. 24 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Stolar: Jack, I’ll just go around. Do you have any? Spizale: No. Stolar: Kevin. Dillon: No. Thanks for the update. I’m a little surprised at the outcome but that’s, I mean that’s good to know. Stolar: My only question would be then for the CIP, if we wanted to buy some of the things, lighted ballfields. We had dugouts and what was the other thing? Those were the two main ones, right? Hoffman: Yeah. We’ll divide them out by individual items. So dugouts and ballfield lights and scoreboards…but dugouts primarily. When you day dugouts, it’s not just an official dugout…to make that type of area. And we’ll talk to them about what their visions are so you can include those or make some recommendations. Stolar: Okay. Paula? Atkins: It’s okay. Murphy: Fine. Stolar: Steve? Scharfenberg: No, nothing else. Stolar: Okay, great. Next you wanted to talk about. Actually before we do the park concept plans, why don’t you give us a quick update on the skate park, since we’re on discussions about City Council. Any follow-up from what we recommended? SKATE PARK UPDATE. Hoffman: Well staff has been monitoring the skate park. All ears are interested in hearing…on a daily basis how the skate park is looking and it seems to be much improved. I think the numbers are down a little bit and I can’t tell if that’s just because of the heat of the summer’s kicked in, or if we turned, actually turned some users away during that 2 ½ weeks that… So our numbers are down a little bit. I feel that the skate park that’s been validated by the people as well and it seems to be that they’re picking up after themselves a little bit better and that’s the main thing. I don’t know Dale if you guys have been talking about it at all. Gregory: No, we have noticed a difference. We’ve had a few mornings that was you know a little bit more messy and that but it has been a lot better than in the past. 25 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 CONCEPT PARK PLANS FOR 2005 MUSA AREA AND WEST WATER TREATMENT PLANT. Hoffman: The City retained Brauer and Associates to take a look at a couple of park locations or proposed park locations. You recall this map. Park service area map that was put together to start to focus in on park deficient areas. One of those is up in this area. Inbetween Galpin and Highway 41. This is the Lake Harrison development. Lake Harrison specifically. So you have parks in the area. Pheasant Hills. Herman Field. And Sugarbush, but these developments came in, the Mancino property, Yoberry and then Lake Harrison. We started to take a look at well, these are outside of the park service areas or on the fringe of these park service areas. So we focused in on the center to fill in the circles and we have a future park system. The city negotiated acquisition of the property right at that location right in the corner, and then I’ll show you some concepts there. There will be a water treatment plant, called the West Water Treatment Plant, and then a small neighborhood park situated on a unique piece of property. It’s tied, the Park Commission toured it at one time. Concept 1, and all of them include a couple of two absolutes. The cul-de-sac in the north that comes off of the street coming off of Lake Lucy, and the water treatment plant itself. This is the building outlined in gray. Underground. Backwash tanks. In this concept labeled Concept 1, it has a single trail heading off out of the, down the slope and into the road. We’ve asked the consultant to include a trail that heads directly to the west to connect up here. That’s not going to be a problem in any one of these concepts. And then you have a few basic elements. Two playgrounds, one for older, one for younger. A view or a look out and a shelter, and then some trail systems. Concept 2. Stolar: Where’s the knoll then where it’s high? It’s right there, and we had talked about a gazebo, is that what you talked about with that shelter? Hoffman: Shelter, gazebo, yeah. Concept 2. I think a little bit more favorable concept just from my personal impression. It has kind of a looped trail. It makes some, it takes some liberty with this building which we have discussed with the consultant, SEH on that, to place it closer to the road to allow for more space in the park in the center of the park. This one and the next one, Concept 3 will show basically the same thing but Concept 3 with the building pushed up in this kind of originally concepted location. Conceptual location. So you have these nice trail loops that can come down through the property and then if you add this other trail connection here, you can start to envision people from any one of these neighborhoods accessing the park. Taking a walk. Walking down through some of these trail loops and back on these street trails. Very small park. This one just included one parallel handicap parking stall. I think the limited parking on the other plan is probably a better scenario. In this one if I had to guess would be probably the most likely scenario under the current set of parameters or current set of things that are going on with the cul-de-sac and the parking. Two playgrounds. Some type of shelter. The building location which is pushed farther…as the residents make their way to their homes. So those are the concepts. We’ll be discussing these as a staff. If you have any particular feelings one way or the other I’ll certainly enter those into the conversation. And then there may be a th neighborhood meeting on these type of plans as early as next Wednesday night, the 6 of July. Any reactions? Atkins: On this one down here, it’s kind of like wooded and sunny. 26 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: There’s one big oak tree down there and then it would most likely be landscaped, either as a part of the water treatment plant or by the developer. Atkins: I remember the tree I think. Hoffman: The tree and then some sumac is there currently. It would probably all be cleared out as a part of the grading and then it would be revegetated in a landscaping plan. Atkins: And the tanks are underneath the ground. Hoffman: Correct. Atkins: In Concept 2, does that mean that people could go on that property? Hoffman: Yeah, they can play on all of these. This is a buried water treatment plant with turf. This one has a larger area for turf. So they could be on top of it. Stolar: So like a future soccer field could go there? Hoffman: Not that big. What is it, 50 by 100 maybe. Stolar: We were talking a basketball court at one time too. Scharfenberg: Is that hill going to remain there? Hoffman: The hill itself? Scharfenberg: Yeah. Hoffman: Yep. This will be fitted into it. Remember it’s in two plateaus. You get the first plateau and second plateau so this is graded in. There will be significant grading on this site with any of the scenarios to fit that building in there. Off of that cul-de-sac. But there’s 1014 down to 980. 34 feet of fall on that hill there. That’s a significant number. Atkins: I presume people can’t park at the water treatment plant or can they? Hoffman: They may or may not be able to. It will be a policy decision. Because depending on where your departure location is, arriving to this cul-de-sac and arriving to this parking lot is two, or they’re almost… If you would drive, you’d be hard pressed to get a person to drive straight by this parking lot and go all the way around through this neighborhood to get to that cul-de-sac to park and go play at this little playground. They would want to park here, and we may allow them to do that but there are some restrictions in these types of public facilities that may preclude that as well. I’m not sure yet. Stolar: Okay. 27 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: Second location that we’re studying is the 2005 MUSA area. We’ll focus in right here. So Lyman Boulevard to the north. Audubon right out of the Chaska schools on the left. The new Highway 212 so we’re talking about this 600 acre area more or less. Numbers being tossed around, basically 350 acres of it is developable. If you take…numbers of our park dedication, we say parks should comprise 10% of that. So we’re looking at a site of approximately 25 acres in size but there’s also other open space in there. The Bluff Creek corridor. So we’re not too far off. We also have other parameters or other standards we like to meet. 1 acre per 75 people. And so how many folks are we putting in here and our comprehensive plan states that we should have 1 acre for every 75 of them. And then we should have a park within a half mile of everybody’s front door. So this area is in a park deficient zone. We’ve located the park conceptually right in the center of the triangle and so you draw a green circle over the top and you fill one of the last remaining park deficient areas within the city. This would be the other one we just talked about up north. And then there’s some small infill areas around the Mike Gorra property and Prince’s property. Other than that, the city is served through the neighborhood parks and community park system. We have 3 concepts for the 2005 MUSA area. All of them focus on an initial 25 acre system. Stolar: Is this where the school is going? Scharfenberg: No, that’s separate. Hoffman: Separate. Originally we had talked with the school district about locating an elementary school with this park to build something similar to Bluff Creek and the Chanhassen Recreation Center but the school district is not interested in another elementary school in this area of their district so we left that. …going up to this location. So this is looking north towards downtown Chanhassen. These are all new roads that you’re using as reference points. This is the collector road running from Powers Boulevard off this direction down over the top of the creek and right here, and then ending up down in Chaska again on Audubon Road, right across from the residential development just south of, you go south of the intersection of Lyman and to where the Town and Country development, if you recall the sign that says in that big open field, future development of Town and Country. This is the creek that winds it’s way right up to Lyman Boulevard, and we’re sitting on what would be referred to as the Degler Farm. So you have 23.7 acres. Much of it is consumed with wetland and then it slopes down toward the creek. The 23.7 acres includes this dashed line and then this lighter gray line at the Bluff Creek Overlay District primary zone. So if you take that dashed gray line, anything inbetween there is in the primary zone and it needs to be preserved as a part of development. The secondary dashed line off here is what is called the secondary or second line. Secondary zone, and that also wants to be preserved but there is development rights within here so to preserve this you either have to purchase it or transfer density or use park dedication so you need to make sure you compensate the property owner for that. Very basic plan. Concept 1. Compact. It’s got good flow from the facilities that you park. You have a central focus point or shelter. Some picnic grounds. Small ballfields. We would want to move the soccer field off of the top of the ballfield. Playground and a basketball court. Views are incredible through the Bluff Creek corridor. You’ve got this nice wetland to buffer your entrance road. You would really feel like this is a great park location if you were within it. Concept 2. They tried to increase the size of the ballfield if that was 28 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 important. Was a top priority but this concept does however introduce too much road. Confusing parking and then a picnic area and playground which are too close to the collector road. This road will serve, probably be about 11,000 cars a day. So it will be a busy collector street. And then Concept 3. Very similar to Concept 1 but they changed the access road into the collector which is something that we would not advocate. And so again Concept 1 is staff’s favorite. Just turning the roadway off of the secondary access. And you could cluster all the developments. You can see just from a study, park planning study, you wouldn’t know where to go if this was your first time at the park. Do you park here? Do you park here? Is this your focal point? The basketball court is a long ways away if you park where if you go back to concept 1, it brings everything very close together so if you have some type of a group activity there…or any one of those concepts. If you’re familiar with, can you visualize the location? The relationship to this road is very important for this community. Almost every resident during the day is going to drive by this facility and it becomes part of their community. So a little bit more apt to visit it and use it on a daily basis or weekly basis. If this was set off of some secondary road, it would not feel like the entire community’s park or neighborhood park. It would feel more like a neighborhood park for that particular subdivision. So the location is strategic. Stolar: From the picnic shelter are you able to capture the views then, is that the intent? Hoffman: Yes, and then also from overlooks either at this location and/or this location. Stolar: Oh okay, so we’ll have it up there too. Hoffman: You’re still going to get a good panoramic view from here. Stolar: So total acreage is about 25? Hoffman: Total acreage on this area. You could, you can enlarge that or you can easily cut that down. You just draw a line here, you’re down to about 15 acres. Then you still have this land to be open space but it will be open space under some other concept like easement, dedication, density transfer. So how it all plays out, the actual size is quite a variable at this point. Stolar: Has this been discussed with the developers too? Hoffman: We’ll be meeting with the developers once we establish some primaries with the City th Council on July 11. Stolar: But generally speaking they’re already familiar with this type of, or this amount of space being needed and such and the general location that we’ve been looking at. Hoffman: I’m not going to say they’re in agreement with it but they’re aware of it. In fact I can almost state without hesitation they’re not in agreement with it. Stolar: In what regards are they, too much land or location or all of the above? 29 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: Yeah, for the most part every property owner in there, this property owner would like to see it somewhere else. Would like to see it somewhere else. Would like to see it somewhere else. Everybody would like to retain all of their property for development rights. To be able to market it to a developer for 100% development so we kind of, this is going to be a benefit for the entire area. This particular property owner sees it more as a detriment to their development so for the benefit of all they have to take the entire park. You can’t split a park and put it 10% on the neighboring property…so this is good planning and it’s difficult. It’s a tough process but when it’s all said and done, the neighborhoods are built. The developers move on and you’re left with citizens who come to your park or the city council meetings and say, either good job. Well done. Or they say, you know what were you thinking of? The developers talked you into this crazy plan and now we don’t have our needs met. We don’t have a park. It’s not where it should be. So this makes for good planning. It’s just can be difficult moving through the process. Stolar: Definitely keep us abreast of anything you need for us to do. Hoffman: I certainly will. You’ll be involved as we move through the development process. So as these plats come forward. Stolar: Any other questions? Alright. We have one more item, off leash dog area report and then actually I have, there’s one other thing I was going to talk about under commission member committee report so why don’t you talk about off leash. COMMISSION MEMBER COMMITTEE REPORTS. Murphy: Okay. Jack and I are finishing up a document listing all of our sites, proposed sites with pros and cons and then we are also going to approach it as a sort of a tiered approach. What we would need to just open a basic off leash dog area and then maybe list out our nights to have things that we would like to see but we don’t necessarily need to get one off the ground and going so, we’ll have a list of just minimal needs that we have, and then we can really evaluate the site one by one. Stolar: So if we could have this as an old business item in July. And we did, because the people that have already seen some of the sites were the main people going to be in the tour today, we decided to postpone it so I guess Kevin and Ann and then Tom, I don’t know Paula if you’ve seen some of them. If you guys want to just look and get some of your own thoughts on that. Murphy: Right, I plan to do that on my own. Atkins: What sites were you going to visit tonight? Lake Susan? Stolar: We were going to do Lake Susan. Hoffman: Bandimere. Potentially Lake Ann. Marty Walsh did make an editorial comment in that all the people that have been visiting their proposed site, they all think it’s the best site that they’ve worked with so the site at Minnewashta Heights is gaining favor amongst a broad spectrum of users and consultants. 30 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Stolar: Okay. And we probably should have that on our list too because we still could choose just to participate in that. Murphy: Can I clarify? Minnewashta Heights? Hoffman: No. Minnewashta Regional Park. Murphy: Regional Park, okay. Stolar: I guess what we’re looking for is, once we have an idea of where we want to go, then it will be up to staff to help us figure out what are the costs? What are the activities? Those sort of things but right now our goal is by July to just have a recommendation to staff of what sites we think are the best ones. And obviously with your input that you’ve already given us and showing the Lake Susan, some of the ideas that we have there. Murphy: Oh, and just one more update. Eden Prairie just opened 3 new off leash dog areas. They’re using hockey rinks in the summer, and they opened one off Flying Cloud Drive. I went to look at it and there wasn’t anybody there on a Saturday morning, but it’s pretty small. It’s off behind, off Flying Cloud. Behind a business area and it’s just kind of the highway’s on the other side. I don’t know what direction it was but the highway’s on the other side of it so it’s just kind of set off on it’s own but there is a fence. And there’s some chairs there. There’s no sign. There’s no extras. It’s kind of a no frills, but they did just open it so it’s there for use. Scharfenberg: Is that on that ballfield across from the old Best Buy site? Murphy: No. No, I know what you’re talking about. No, it’s behind. It’s across from the back of a bunch of buildings and there’s nothing else on the same side. There’s nothing near it. There’s no buildings near it. Scharfenberg: Does it have a parking lot? Murphy: A parking lot. Small parking lot. Stolar: And I think no frills options are great options for us too. I was talking to Ann and Todd, I showed you, you know Lotus Lake has this hill behind the hockey rink that has parking right up to there and a short walk. It’s already asphalted. Murphy: That’s North Lotus, right? Yeah. Stolar: I mean it’s a no frills area. It’s set off enough from houses and you can keep it set off from the path that’s currently being used as a dog park. Off leash dog area both. But you know little no frills ideas also if we can look at. Any other questions? Alright. Then move to commission member committee reports. The only things will be the off leash area next time and then depending on what this task force has reports for that. The other thing I was talking to Todd about, and Todd if you could re-send the City Council meeting assignments. 31 Park and Rec Commission – June 28, 2005 Hoffman: Sure will. Stolar: If we could start attending those and reporting in this committee member report, because there’s a lot of things that seem to be going back and forth. We had the skate park. We had the ball, the CAA proposal. We’ll have the off leash dog area. There will be a lot I think activity as these development projects, as they go along so what I’d like to do is just, whoever’s responsible for the two City Council meetings prior to our, inbetween our commission meetings, we’ll just put it in there that they can do an update, if no one objects. And it may be nothing. Again if there’s nothing park related, there would be no report. Hoffman: You’re welcome to come, I know the Planning Commissioners are coming to the work sessions. That’s a chance for a little bit more, a chance for input into the city governing process at a work session level. Once we get into the council chambers, you’re rarely going to be called upon. You may be called upon on occasion but in a more informal setting, the council may be talking about one of these items and if they know you’re there, they’ll ask you for your opinion more freely. Stolar: Does it start at what, 5:30? Hoffman: 5:30. Stolar: Over here in the conference room. Okay. Anything else? We don’t have an administrative packet so do I have a motion for adjournment? Dillon moved, Murphy seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The Park and Recreation Commission meeting was adjourned. Submitted by Todd Hoffman Park and Rec Director Prepared by Nann Opheim 32