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HomeMy Public PortalAbout09/18/01 CCM205 MEDINA CITY COUNCIL MEETING MINUTES OF SEPTEMBER18, 2001 The City Council of Medina, Minnesota met in regular session on September 18, 2001 at 7:30 p.m. in the City Hall Chambers. Mayor John Ferris presided. Members present: Ferris, Lane, Smith, Workman, and Zietlow. Members absent: None. Also present: Police Chief Ed Belland, Attorney Ron Batty, Public Works Director Jim Dillman, City Engineer Tom Kellogg, Planning & Zoning Administrator Loren Kohnen, and Administrator Clerk -Treasurer Paul Robinson. 1. Additions to the Agenda A. Issue Regarding the gambling license for the Loretto Fire Department. B. Building within the Agricultural preserve zone. Moved by Jim Lane, seconded by Phil Zietlow, to approve the agenda as amended. Motion passed unanimously. 2. Approval of the Minutes There was one correction on Page 4, third paragraph from the bottom, insert the word "be" after "could". Moved by Carolyn Smith, seconded by Phil Zietlow, to approve the minutes of August 21, 2001. Motion passed unanimously. 3. Consent Agenda A. Resolution 01-50 Granting Final Plat Approval of Raskob's Lakeview Second Addition. B. Winter Help. Item B was pulled from the consent agenda. Moved by Phil Zietlow, seconded by Carolyn Smith, to approve Item A. Motion passed unanimously. Item B was discussed. There was some discussion about the wage being paid. Jim Dillman said that he is asking for this hourly rate increase to $ 25 hr. because he would like to be able to keep Ivan employed as a temporary worker and pay him enough so that he will want to help out Medina rather than work his other job. Moved by Phil Zietlow, seconded by Bruce Workman, to approve. Those in favor. Ferris, Workman, Zietlow, and Lane. Those opposed: Smith. Motion passed. 4. Comments from Residents in Attendance on Items Not on the Agenda There were none. 5. Park Commission Comments There were none. Medina City Council Meeting Minutes September 18, 2001 206 6. Planning Commission Comments Loren Kohnen said that there will be one item on the next Planning Commission agenda — a variance request. 7. Survey Results from the City Wide Survey Andrew Gustafson said there was a good response, 32% of the surveys sent out were returned. He said of those filling out the survey 94% responded that they read the City newsletter. Andrew Gustafson said the use of the City's web site was fairly low; around 18% of the people who responded said they had used it. He said the City may want to consider increasing the awareness of the City's web site. He said there were a lot of people who were upset or disgruntled with the cable TV service. Of those who had cable TV, over 50% thought that the service was poor to fair. Gustafson said that there were a lot of comments about the water quality as far as the coloration of the water. In the park section there were a lot of comments regarding walking and running trails, and biking trails — they got a high response. Gustafson went through a number of other survey responses. He said that he had been working on this project with the Scouts and there were 125 volunteer Scout hours and about 200 hours put in by the City staff. Robinson asked how many hours Gustafson had put in. Gustafson said he had not tallied that, but it was a significant amount of hours. He said that he began this project in October of 2000. Phil Zietlow asked how the results reflected the actual population breakout. Staff said that they would look at that. Andrew Gustafson said one of the next steps in reviewing the survey results was cross tabulating responses. He presented two examples. One showing the quality of the water by those who lived in different water districts. Gustafson said if a question was not answered, it was marked as no response. He said in the park section, there were a number of responses that were blank. Therefore, some of the percentages may not reflect the total amount of people who responded to the survey. Council directed staff to provide the Planning Commission and the Park Commission with copies for their comments. Once comments were provide by the Commissions staff was to bring their feedback to the Council. 8. Wild Meadows Jim Dillman said he had written this memo earlier in the week and was gone on Thursday and Friday. He said the issue has been resolved. They moved the trench. However, there were a few other issues that have come up such as the placement of orange safety fences in the front of the lots to limit the compaction of the ground in the front yards. Medina City Council Meeting Minutes September 18, 2001 207 He said that after some discussion with the contractors, this is evidently not a major concern of theirs; however, there are some other issues with parking. He believed that it probably made more sense not to put the orange safety fence and let people park in the front yards. Carolyn Smith said that the memo talked about a lot of things not being done. Were there other issues that had come up? Jim Dillman said that there is a pond along Evergreen Road that had been driven over and that portions of the open space were being compacted. Jim Dillman said that there are just some issues where everything looks fine on paper; however, when you are in the field things do not work out exactly as planned. He said he did not think that the developer was pulling something on the City. Bruce Workman said that he understands that not everything works the way it is stated on paper, but he was concemed that the developer's agreement be adhered to. Dave Newman said from their perspective they are not requesting any changes to the developer's agreement. There were some issues with the first model home. He said that there was a little disagreement about how the yard was to be dealt with, but they think it has been resolved. They are not looking to avoid any provisions in the developer agreement. He said as far as land compaction was concerned, they always had planned on compacting a certain amount of the soil around the home. There needs to be a certain amount of compaction in order to support the home. He said they are not concerned about the amount of compaction in the front yards because that was not factored in to the storm water treatment train and were also not included in Bonestroo's calculations. He said they have 200 acres of open space which will also be working as a part of the storm water treatment train and will adequately take care of the storm water runoff. Newman said he gave Paul Robinson a copy of a CD that includes a draft of the marketing materials they have been giving out to people looking for homes. He said to date they have only sold one lot which is the lot that the model home is on and they are not looking to finalize any purchase agreements until the work is done on the south end. He also said that the Sierra Club tour -de -sprawl was going to be this Sunday and they expect to end up at the Wild Meadow's site around 5:00 p.m. He said that there will be around 1,600 people (about 150 bikes), so if others were interested, come on up. Steve Apfelbaum said he just wanted to give a quick update. He said that the process has been working well, that they have had a lot of collaboration with the City and with other organizations on the water quality, that they have recently been doing a lot of chisel plowing on the site. He said that part of the compaction on the residential lots was being taken care of before the topsoil was placed. He said they did chisel plow in the front yards and around in the back yards up to within 15 feet of the house. He gave a quick update about how the other issues were going. He said that they are very pleased with the progress and with the grading going on. Phil Zietlow asked how deep the chisel plowing was being done. Medina City Council Meeting Minutes September 18, 2001 208 Apfelbaum said between 22 and 32 inches. Dave Newman said he has given staff his pager number if there is ever an issue, to please give him a call. They have an inspector on site, but they are not always there and they do not always catch everything, and so we can work collaboratively. He said that he is totally fine with anybody calling him any time if they see people driving over protected areas, or if they see anything else, please give him a call. 9. Land Alteration Permit Request from Medina Highlands Rick Denman of the Cudd Development Company said there has been great support from the Planning Commission, City Council, and staff, and a lot of encouragement on their project. He said their project has been delayed because of work on the County Road 101 alignment and working around some vacation schedules. He said they were hoping to break ground in September and now it looks like it won't happen until October. He said they are asking if they could get an early start on some of the grading and potentially some utility work. There was some discussion about this. The City Engineer expressed some hesitance with going forward with the grading plan. He is a little more comfortable allowing some of the utility work. Ron Batty, the City Attorney, was also uncomfortable with going forward with grading before final plat was approved. He said with the Wild Meadows Development, this process took several months and here we are looking to do it in a couple of weeks. There was a significant amount of discussion. In the end the City Council was comfortable allowing the sewer and water to be installed along the Evergreen Road from the Wild Meadows Development to the Cudd Development so long as there was an agreement protecting the City financially. Batty said that it would be the developer's risk if they wanted to go ahead with that part of the project without final plat approval. Moved by Bruce Workman, seconded by Carolyn Smith, to authorize Cudd to install a sewer and water main along Evergreen from the connections at the Wild Meadows Development over to the east side of 101, and direct the City Attorney to draft an agreement with appropriate financial guarantees. Motion passed. Jim Lane abstained. 10. Variance to the Subdivision Ordinance and Lot Combination/Replat for Daniel Bennis at 2165 Holy Name Drive Loren Kohnen said, that Mr. Bennis and Bennis Investment Properties were requesting a variance to the soils requirements to replat a portion of their property. He said the property consists of three parcels, two of which have structures on them. The property is zoned rural residential which has five acres of contiguous good soil requirement. These properties are now served by municipal sewer, but the zoning remains rural residential. He said that the Bennis's are requesting a variance from the five acre soil requirement to rearrange the lot lines and replat the property into two lots. He said, at the Planning Commission's suggestion, this replat is being proposed so Mr. Bennis will not need a variance for his proposed garage addition. Medina City Council Meeting Minutes September 18, 2001 209 Parcel 2 and the outlot will be combined into one parcel and a portion of the new parcel is to be given to Parcel 1, which will also make Lot 1 meet the requirements of the shoreland ordinance. He said that the hardship is that they are existing parcels that all existing soils have been disturbed, no septic sites exist on the lots, and that existing Lots 1 and 2 will be enlarged. Both parcels are served by sanitary sewer and will probably be rezoned to urban residential in the future. He said the Planning Commission recommended approval. The Planning Commission approved the variance and approved the preliminary plat with four conditions. There was some discussion about the soil conditions and about the zoning. Moved by Bruce Workman, seconded by Phil Zietlow, to direct staff to prepare a resolution approving the variance and replat. Motion passed unanimously. Jim Lane said that he would like staff to provide an analysis of the Holy Name Lake area in regards to whether or not it should be rezoned to Urban Residential rather than being in Rural Residential since it now is being provided with municipal sewer. Moved by Jim Lane, seconded by Phil Zietlow, to direct staff to provide these issues and options. Motion passed unanimously. 11. Conditional Use Permit Request for an Office Warehouse from Steven Spraunqel Kohnen said that Mr. Spraungel is requesting a conditional use permit to construct a 12,135 square foot office/warehouse at 822 Tower Drive. He said this lot is at the end of the cul-de- sac, south of the Ditter Heating Company. He said that Mr. Spraungel was before the Planning Commission on July 10 and the Planning Commission recommended approval with the condition that additional information be given regarding the drainage at the site. Loren Kohnen showed an overhead regarding the drainage. A large part of the property receives drainage from a number of the other businesses in the area. Because of that, we need to make sure that the drainage is not altered in this area. Kohnen said this proposal meets all the ordinance requirements and setbacks, and the Planning Commission also recommended approval with three conditions: that there be no outside storage, lighting to be checked by City staff before occupancy, and that all landscaping is to be maintained. There was some discussion about the materials used in the building. Mr. Spraungel said the accent material is actually a fired clay/brick and the other two materials are a composite concrete. Moved by Carolyn Smith, seconded by Bruce Workman, to direst staff to draft a resolution approving the conditional use permit. Motion passed unanimously. 12.Comprehensive Plan Amendment Paul Robinson said several meetings ago the City Council discussed amending the Comprehensive Plan to change a portion of the Rolling Green Country Club from Public/Semi Public to Multi -family Residential. Medina City Council Meeting Minutes September 18, 2001 210 Robinson said that they are about to send out an announcement for this hearing and wanted to make sure that the City Council wanted to go forward with this amendment. Robinson said there will, more than likely, be a number of Cherry Hill residents that will not be happy with this proposal. Because of this he said he wanted to make sure the Council still wanted the Planning Commission to hold this public hearing. Phil Zietlow said for him it was a matter of what was appropriate and what was needed for the City of Medina, rather than the reaction of the residents. Bruce Workman said if we are serious we should go ahead, however, if there are a number of people in the room opposing it, he is probably not going to be in favor of it. Carolyn Smith said that it depends on what is the right thing to do. There was some discussion about the reasons the Council decided to hold the public hearing. There was also some discussion about whether or not a Multi -family Zoning would be the right density for that area since that type of zoning on a dead end road could cause some traffic issues. After some discussion, the Council thought that a Urban Residential Zoning would be a better designation. In the end the consensus of the Council was to hold the public hearing on this proposed Comprehensive Plan changing the property from Public/Semi-public to Urban Residential, not Multi -family Residential. 12. Issue Regarding Building Within the Agricultural Preserve District Carolyn Smith said this issue was being brought up because a homeowner was concerned about their neighbor building a fairly large barn and single family home on an agricultural preserve property and wanted to make sure that the Council was aware that this could be done. Additionally, she wanted the Council to know that large commercial operations can take place within the Rural Residential districts as well as within the Agricultural Preserve districts. The Council was concerned about the issues raised. Ron Batty said he was not able to get a copy of the letter from Kirstin Chapman's attorney. In looking at it briefly he saw that it was called a letter of intervention regarding the application for a building permit in the Agricultural Preserve. He said he would work on this issue with Loren Kohnen and provide a review and some analysis for the Council to consider at the next Council meeting. Kirstin Chapman said she was not only concerned for her property, but for the community as a whole, and that she would like to keep in touch with this process. Ron Batty said that her letter was basically a data practices request to have information regarding the application. He said that staff would provide her with that information. There was some discussion about the tax implications of Agricultural Preserve. Medina City Council Meeting Minutes September 18, 2001 211 Jim Lane said that there is a great property tax advantage to placing your property in Agricultural Preserve. Ron Batty said he would prepare a report to the City Council. The first portion of the report will be fact specific to the application. He said at this point he does not know how that will play out. He said it is very likely that they will have no choice but to issue the permit, however, he will look through the information to make sure that is the case. The second portion of the report will be a more general and broad discussion concerning some of the uses that the Council would want to reconsider allowing in the Agricultural Preserve and the Rural Residential districts. 14. Goals, Mission Statement, and Values John Ferris said that he thought that the Council should take another look at this individually and have this discussed at a future meeting. 15. Hiring Someone to Take Minutes Robinson said as a part of the 2002 budget $4,800 was included for a recording secretary to take minutes at City Council meetings. He said that approval of this service was not a foregone conclusion, but that it was to be approved by the Council with some additional justification at the time of the request. He said he would like the Council to consider using this service. He said that it will provide a more objective view of the meeting, help free up his time at meetings to focus on the issues being discussed, and on implementing the Council's direction. He said at this time he is not looking for complete authorization to go ahead and hire a service, but would like to try the service for one meeting to see what the Council thinks about the product. After some discussion the Council believed that it would be better to try this for several meetings so that the person could get to know the City better and the way they liked the minutes done before deciding whether or not to go forward on a more permanent basis. Moved by Bruce Workman, seconded by Jim Lane, to have the minute taking service do minutes at four meetings before deciding whether or not they would like to continue it. Those in favor: Workman, Lane, Smith, Ferris. Those opposed: Zietlow. Motion passed. 16. Issues Regarding the Fire Contracts There was a significant amount of discussion about the fire contracts and whether or not to review them. Staff was directed to do some additional research, but not necessarily open up contract discussions with all of the fire departments. There was some discussion about the fire contract with the City of Maple Plain. Moved by Phil Zietlow, seconded Carolyn Smith, to authorize staff to sign the letter to the City of Maple Plain regarding the fire service contract. Motion passed unanimously. Medina City Council Meeting Minutes September 18, 2001 212 17. Pay the Bills Moved by Carolyn Smith, seconded by Phil Zietlow, to approve the bills, order check numbers 22862-22934 for $89,295.00, and payroll check numbers 17247-17262 for $19,883.95. Motion passed unanimously. 18. Adjournment Moved by Bruce Workman, seconded by John Ferris, to adjourn the meeting at 10:55 p.m. Motion passed unanimously. B. Ferris, Mayor Paul ='meson, Administrator Clerk -Treasurer Medina City Council Meeting Minutes September 18, 2001 213 ORDER CHECKS - SEPTEMBER 18, 2001 22862 ORCHARD TRUST $880.00 22863-80 VOIDED CHECKS $0.00 22881 ALLSTAR ELECTRIC $4,837.98 22882 AMERICAN EXPRESS $1,214.22 22883 AMERICAN PLANNING ASSOCIATION $65.00 22884 AMERICAN SUPPLY GROUP $24.95 22885 AMERIPRIDE LINEN & APPAREL SVC $50.97 22886 BUDGET PRINTING $1,766.79 22887 CANDLELIGHT FLORAL $59.25 22888 CERES ENVIRONMENTAL SVCS. $2,410.00 22889 CIPHER LABORATORIES $2,421.32 22890 CULLIGAN $52.66 22891 EHLERS & ASSOC. $375.00 22892 FORTIN HARDWARE $67.85 22893 GENUINE PARTS $6.36 22894 GLENWOOD INGLEWOOD $144.91 22895 HAMEL BUILDING CENTER $55.36 22896 HAMEL FIRE DEPT. $3,752.50 22897 HAMMEL, GREEN AND ABRAHAMSON $1,083.57 22898 HENNEPIN COUNTY $52.47 22899 HOLIDAY $14.89 22900 KERN, DEWENTER & VIERE $450.00 22901 KRAEMER, EDWARD & SONS, INC. $41,710.40 22902 LAKE BUSINESS SUPPLY $55.88 22903 LAKESHORE WEEKLY NEWS $135.00 22904 LAWN DETAILERS $1,520.00 22905 LEAGUE OF MN CITIES, FIN. DEPT $2,989.00 22906 MEDICA $248.00 22907 MEDINA POLICE DEPT.-PETTY CASH $95.26 22908 METRO WEST INSPECTION $7,684.15 22909 MINN COMM $30.69 22910 MOTHERS MOTORS/LORETTO TOWING $15.00 22911 NYSTROM, JAMES $16.00 22912 OIL AIR PRODUCTS $73.21 22913 PRIEM, JON $11.89 22914 PRUDENTIAL INSURANCE CO. OF AM $146.80 22915 QWEST $104.00 22916 REYNOLDS WELDING $88.35 22917 RIDGEVIEW CLINICS $103.00 22918 SALVERDA, DONALD & ASSOC. $2,279.25 22919 SAM'S CLUB #6309 $30.00 22920 STREICHER'S $1,728.45 22921 TALLEN & BAERTSCHI $2,670.38 22922 THIBAULT ASSOCIATES $333.21 22923 TRUGREEN CHEMLAWN (OSSEO) $871.19 22924 TWIN CITY WATER CLINIC $20.00 afilg5ity cou l5eefrl gfaWATERPRO $4,543.23 r 18, 24gLTIMATE OFFICE $252.33 22927 USPS $500.00 22928 VALVOLINE FLEET SERVICES $88.75 214 ORDER CHECKS SEPTEMBER 18, 2001 (CONT'D) 22929-30 VERIZON WIRELESS $538.64 22931 VIEAU, CEC $57.03 22932 VIKING INDUSTRIAL CENTER $97.63 22933 WRIGHT-HENNEPIN ELECTRIC $82.28 22934 ZIEGLER, INC $389.95 $89,295.00 PAYROLL CHECKS - SEPTEMBER 10, 2001 17251 DILLMAN, JAMES D. $1,545.11 17252 DRESSEL, ROBERT P. $961.71 17253 BELLAND, EDGAR J. $1,905.35 17254 VIEAU, CECILIA M. $992.56 17255 SULANDER, LAURA L $1,075.51 17256 LARSON, SANDRA L. $896.11 17257 BOECKER, KEVIN D. $910.20 17258 PRIEM, JON D. $1,691.69 17259 CHRISTENSON, JEREMY $1,147.49 17260 NYSTROM, JAMES $1,228.85 17261 DERMODY, WILLIAM H. $637.96 17262 NELSON, JASON $1,241.78 17247 ROBINSON, PAUL A. $1,305.97 17248 SCHERER, STEVEN T. $1,317.40 17249 MCGILL, CHRISTOPHER R. $1,765.35 17250 ROUILLARD, MICHAEL J $1,260.91 $19,883.95 Medina City Council Meeting Minutes September 18, 2001