HomeMy Public PortalAbout10/01/96 CCM143
MEDINA CITY COUNCIL MEETING MINUTES OF OCTOBER 1, 1996
The City Council of Medina, Minnesota met in regular session on October 1, 1996, at
7:30 p.m. in the City Hall Council Chambers. Mayor Anne Theis presided.
Members present: John Ferris, Jim Johnson, Ann Thies, Phil Zietlow, and Mayor
Theis.
Members absent: None.
Also present: Public Works Director Jim Dillman, Police Chief Rick Rabenort, City
Engineer Shawn Gustafson, Zoning Administrator Loren Kohnen, City Attorney Ron
Batty, and City Clerk -Treasurer Paul Robinson.
1. Adoption of the Agenda
Moved by Thies, seconded by Johnson, to adopt the published agenda with the
following additions: Spring Clean -Up and Tree Sale, Metropolitan Council Affordable
Communities Letter. Motion passed unanimously.
2. Minutes
Moved by Johnson, seconded by Mayor Theis, to approve the minutes of the regular
meeting of September 17, 1996, with the following subtraction: Removal of the last
sentence in the fourth paragraph on page two. Motion passed unanimously.
3. Consent Agenda
Moved by Thies, seconded by Johnson, to approve the consent agenda, as follows:
A. Resolution Requesting Conveyance of Tax Forfeited Property of Outlot A Cherry Hill
Farm.
B. Appointment of Additional Election Judges for the General Election. Motion passed
unanimously.
4. Presentation by Jim Strommen on the Suburban Rate Authority(SRA)
Mayor Theis introduced Jim Strommen and stated that he was in attendance to tell us
why the Suburban Rate Authority would be beneficial to the City of Medina.
Strommen started his presentation with a brief outline of the history of the SRA. The
SRA was organized in 1963 for the purpose of providing collective strength in
negotiating franchises with the Minneapolis Gas Company, which served the original
SRA members. In 1974 the legislature adopted the Public Utilities Act to provide for
state regulation of gas and electric utilities. This regulation takes place currently
through the Public Utilities Commission. At this time the SRA's focus changes from
regulatory to becoming a watch dog for utility rates and issues. In 1979 the SRA issues
expanded to include sewage disposal rates and again in 1980 to include
telecommunications issues.
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At several occasions the SRA lobbied on the behalf of the member cities to reduced
utility rates and to end the tiered pricing structure. Without the SRA suburbs would not
have a voice at the Public Utilities Commission.
More recently the SRA has begun working on right of way issues.
With deregulation of gas and electric utilities Strommen believes the SRA will be in a
good position to advocate for cities in negotiating gas and electric franchise
agreements as well as other right of way issues.
Strommen asked if there were any questions.
There were some questions from Johnson and Zietlow about the role of the SRA and
the LMC and if they worked together or if the LMC actually paid the SRA to lobby on
their behalf.
Strommen responded that the LMC and the SRA work together on several issues but
they are sperate organizations. The SRA does not lobby directly at the legislature as
does the LMC. They do, however, monitor very closely any legislation affecting the
member cities. The SRA is an advocate for the metropolitan suburbs, while the LMC
advocates for all cities in the state.
SRA has begun to get involved with right of way issues and will be expanding it role in
this area.
Zietlow asked when the SRA meets and Strommen responded that they meet quarterly
and next meeting will be on October 16. He stated that if the City wishes to take
advantage of the SRA's free trial membership offer, Median would be able to be a
voting member through June 30, 1997 without any financial obligation.
The City Clerk was directed to add the issue of whether or not to take advantage of this
offer to the next agenda.
5. Park Commission Comments
No Park Commissioners were in attendance.
Jim Johnson did ask about the relocation of the snowmobile trail. There was some
discussion on this issue. The exact location of the trial was not known. Phil Zietlow
stated that he would ask the Park Commission the exact location of the snowmobile
trail and get back to the City Council.
6. Planning Commission Comments - There were none.
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OLD BUSINESSS
7. Discussion on Pool Fences/Covers
Loren Kohnen said that he had read Ron Batty's letter and agreed with his
recommendation to change the existing ordinance to increase the height of fences
required around private swimming pools and to require self -latching gates.
Loren also mention that the reason this was being addressed was because a resident
wanted the City to allow pool covers in lieu of fences. Loren stated he went to inspect
this pool cover and it was not covering the pool. This illustrates one of the problems
with a pool cover.
Mayor Theis agreed that there a pool cover does not allow for human error.
Some additional examples were discussed.
Ron Batty stated that Loren basically summarized his letter and that his
recommendation came about from the holes in the City's ordinance pointed out by the
resident who requested that the City allow pool covers in lieu of fencing.
John Ferris agreed that four feet was too low and that the height should be raised.
The overall consensus was to make the changes as suggested.
Moved by Zietlow, seconded by Ferris to modify the city's pool ordinance to require self
closing and self latching gates and a fence at least five feet to enclose pool areas.
Motion passed unanimously.
NEW BUSINESS - Planning and Zoning
8.
Subdivision of Rita Juberts Property at 1182 Highway 55
Loren Kohnen explained that Rita Jubert was requesting to subdivide her property into
two parcels. Parcel A would be 10 acres in size and parcel B would be 62.12 acres.
Both parcels meet the soil type and quantity requirements. The septic system is
working fine and there is more than one site available as an alternate. Parcel A is
zoned RC/RI and the front section of Parcel B is zoned RC/RIU and the rear section is
zoned RR. On Parcel A are six assessory buildings. These exceed the number and
size permitted by ordinance. Lastly, Parcel A is a legal non -conforming use. If any
structures are destroyed beyond 50% of their value, they may not be rebuilt without
conforming to the City's zoning ordinance.
The Planning Commission and staff recommend approval with the following conditions:
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1. Drainage and utility easements per city engineer.
2. Acknowledge that Parcel A is a legal non -conforming lot and if any of the buildings
are destroyed or damaged beyond 50% of their value, they cannot be rebuilt.
3. Acknowledge that Parcel A has six(6) accessory structures which exceed the
number and size allowed by ordinance.
4. Recognize that approximately 50' of additional easement will be going to Highway
55 and will not affect this plat.
During the discussion on the proposed subdivision Loren Kohnen mentioned that
Hennepin County, as a part of widening Trunk Highway 55, proposed, in a concept
drawing, a frontage road through the property in question.
Phil Zietlow asked if this frontage road was in the City's Comprehensive Plan.
Jim Dillman and Shawn Gustafson said it was not and pointed out that there were
several issues in this area that were not included in the City's current Comprehensive
Plan.
Some concern was raised that the Hennepin County was proposing a frontage road
along Trunk Highway 55 and that the City Council was not notified. Jim Dillman
mentioned that the county did talk with city staff about this concept.
Phil Zietlow said it was difficult to make a decision on this property when there are
future plans in this area that the City Council does not know about.
Shawn Gustafson reiterated that the frontage road was a concept and that the issue
here is access to Trunk Highway 55 for these parcels.
There were some questions about the soils and the impact of the flood plain on these
properties.
Shawn Gustafson pointed out that a majority of the flood plain affected Parcel B.
Based on this information Jim Johnson stated that there was no access to Parcel B
from Trunk Highway 55 except through the flood plain.
Shawn Gustafson stated that the property owner would probably access the parcel
through the flood plain and that it would be a very expensive project.
Ann Thies asked if the City Council could approve a sub -division of a land locked
parcel.
Ron Batty pointed out that the parcel was not land locked but that the property owner
would be better served if there was an alternate access to Parcel B than through the
flood plain. He suggested moving the proposed lot line between Parcels A and B
slightly to the west to provide access to the northern portion of Parcel B.
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Shawn Gustafson stated that if the lot line was moved Parcel A would not meet the soil
requirements.
Jim Johnson stated that it would seem responsible to require right of way for the
extension of Tamarack Drive. Loren Kohnen agreed that there would be no problem to
require a 33 ft easement for the west side of the road but the property owners of Parcel
B would need the adjacent property to develop in order to have a complete road right of
way.
Jim Johnson asked if the City Council was going to address the issues of the county's
right of way for Trunk Highway 55.
Phil Zietlow asked what the county's timeline was for acquisition. Loren Kohnen replied
in 1997.
There was some discussion about the amount of right of way that would be required
and about the way the City had handled similar issues. Shawn Gustafson then stated
that the City's subdivision ordinance did require the City to obtain right of way. In this
case it would up to the standard for an arterial highway.
There was some discussion about the amount of feet required. Shawn Gustafson went
to look up the ordinance. The City Council moved on to the next issue.
When they resumed, Gustafson noted that for arterials the City's subdivision
regulations require a right of way 250' in width. This would result in needing an
easement 125' in width on either side of the centerline of T.H. 55. This would mean
Mrs. Jubert would be required to dedicate additional right of way was less than 125'
from the centerline of T.H. 55.
Since the county was going the buy the property within the next year Mayor Theis
asked if the property owners would rather wait with their sub -division request until the
county purchased this property.
The property owners present said that they would rather wait.
Ron Batty stated that the City is required to act on this proposal within 60 days. In
order to delay further than that the City would need the owners to withdraw their
proposal or to give the City a waiver to the 60 day requirement. The owners agreed to
sign a waiver of the 60 day requirement.
Moved by Ferris seconded by Thies to table this proposal. Motion passed
unanimously.
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9. Request from Gladys Schlosser/APT at 4001 Highway 55 for a Conditional Use
Permit and Height Variance for Antenna Tower
Loren stated that American Portable Telecom(APT) was requesting a conditional use
permit and height variance to construct a 165' cellular antenna tower on the Galdys
Schlosser property. The tower would be located on the south side of Highway 55 just
east of County Road 19 northeast of the existing 275' tower also located on the
Schlosser property.
Mayor Theis asked if this would impact the 900 MHz tower. Loren Kohnen stated that it
would not.
Mayor Theis asked if this tower will have an impact of the development around this
property.
Loren stated that it would limit any other development within the fall zone.
Charles Wendle, representing APT said that they tried to use as little land as possible
by overlapping the fall zone with the existing tower.
Phil Zietlow asked if they were renting the land and if the property owner could kick
them off.
Wendle, said that they had a long term lease agreement.
There was some concern raised by the City Council about the number of potential
towers that could be built in the City.
Ron Batty stated that is a real possibility that there will be lots of towers.
Ann Thies stated that she thought the City Council addressed these concerns.
Ron Batty said that they were being looked at but that the City Council had not
specifically dealt with this issue.
Loren Kohnen suggested that the City require any new requests for towers to have
allow other companies to co -exist on their towers.
Wendle said they anticipate working with other vendors.
Moved by Thies, seconded by Johnson to approve a conditional use permit and a
height variance to permit construction of a tower 150' in height. Motion passed
unanimously .
1. Tower per plans submitted.
2. Egress to be on the present driveway with no additional cuts to Highway #55.
3. There shall be no strobe lights attached to the tower.
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4. There shall be no guy wires installed on the tower.
5. The 48 foot by 48 foot base area must be entirely enclosed by an 8 foot high
chain link fence.
6. American Portable Telecom shall execute a contract to make annual payments
in lieu of taxes to the City for public services provided by the City to the
broadcast facility, such as police protection, fire protection and protective
inspections. Said payments shall be equal to the amount of real estate taxes
that would actually be received by the City in each year if the antenna structure
itself were taxed as real estate under the laws of the State of Minnesota, using
the initial cost as the market value of the antenna structure.
7. No development shall be permitted in an area 165 feet in any direction from the
tower.
8. The City does not recognize the 48 foot by 48 foot parcel, described above,
leased to American Portable Telecom as a separate parcel.
9. The Applicants shall pay to the City a fee in the amount determined by the staff
to represent the actual cost to the City of reviewing this conditional use permit
application.
10. Any violation of the terms and conditions of this conditional use permit or of any
related section of the City's ordinance code shall be grounds for revocation of
this conditional use permit.
10. Rear Yard Variance from Dawn Crawford/Ross Lewis at 4600 Pine Street
Loren Kohnen described that Dawn Crawford and Ross Lewis requested a rear yard
set -back variance to construct a 16'x14' deck. The deck proposed is of modest size
and as stated no other homes can be constructed on the rear of the applicants' house.
In addition no other variances were required. The hardships for granting this variance
is the depth of the lot and that the lot to the rear of this property is un-buildable thereby
creating a natural barrier between land uses.
Moved by Johnson, seconded by Mayor Theis to grant a 8.3' foot variance to the rear
yard set back with the depth of the lot and that the lot to the rear of this property is un-
buildable thereby creating a natural barrier between land uses. Motion passed
unanimously.
11. Extension of Interim Ordinance
Ron Batty stated that last year the City placed a moratorium restricting movement of
large amounts of fill across City streets and the creation of ponds within certain
wetlands. This moratorium will expire on October 3`d. Minnesota Statues section
462.355, subd. 4 allows a moratorium to be extended for up to an additional 18 months.
Phil Zietlow stated that it would be O.K. to extend the moratorium.
Ron Batty mentioned that this may affect the county's public works facility project.
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Loren Kohnen stated that the county would be keeping fill on their property.
There was some discussion about how long to extend the moratorium and the
consensus was to extend it 6 months.
Moved by Ferris, seconded by Zietlow to pass a resolution extending an interim
ordinance regulating development activity within the City of Medina and directing a
study to be conducted thereon. Motion passed unanimously.
12. Ordinance Pertaining to Unclaimed Property; Abandoned, Unauthorized and
Junk Vehicles; and Forfeited Property
This issue was postponed until the City Prosecutor's review.
13. Computer System Upgrade
Paul Robinson proposed upgrading the City's computer system this year instead of
budgeting for the upgrade next year. One of the rationale used for this was the money
that would be saved from not having a fifth officer for a majority of 1996.
The main reasons for the request were, to upgrade the computers in the police
department(which have 386 processors), to have everyone working with the same
software and on the same operating system, and to prepare the City for conversions
from DOS based applications to windows based applications.
There was some discussion about the timing of this request and the rationale used.
There was also some discussion about the details of the request. This allowed all
computer literate folks in attendance to go hog wild about mega bites, RAM, Hard
Drives, CD ROM drives, Windows 95 vs. Windows NT vs. Windows 3.11, etc.. From
this discussion came some suggestions from the City Council that staff make sure the
computers purchased included adequate backup capacity, that the City was practicing
good backup procedures and that money was not wasted on unneeded labor for
installation.
Moved by Johnson, seconded by Ferris to approve the request to upgrade the City's
computer system. Motion passed unanimously.
14. Resolution to Dissolve the Suburban Alliance
Ron Batty stated that he would recommend the City Council vote to dissolve Suburban
Alliance but that he was not ready to make a recommendation on the pay back of the
Suburban Alliance's debt and other issues. Therefore, he would like to bring this back
to the City Council in the first meeting in November.
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Moved by Zietlow, seconded by Ferris to table this issue until the November 6, 1996
City Council meeting. Motion passed unanimously.
15. Speeding and Speed Limits on City Roads
John Ferris had recently received calls that there were speeding problems in the City.
Ferris stated that Ron Batty had reviewed the matter and agreed with the police chiefs
often repeated statement that the City had little control over speed limits even on City
streets.
The City Council discussed this issue and agreed that, in general, people were
speeding on all City roads.
Rick Rabenort stated that they enforce the posted speed limits throughout the city and
will work on increasing speeding enforcement.
16. Spring Clean -Up and Tree Sale
Jim Dillman stated that based on the success of the tree sale during the City's Spring
clean-up he would like the City Council to approve selling trees again at next years
spring clean-up.
Jim Johnson mention that he would like to like the City to increase the number of trees
especially good trees such as oak , etc.. Johnson also asked if the City could sell its
own fertilizer.
Jim Dillman stated that they could.
Moved by Johnson, seconded by Thies to approve ordering tree to be sold and spring
clean-up in 1997. Motion passed unanimously.
17. Metropolitan Council Affordable Communities Letter
Loren Kohnen stated that he was preparing a letter for the City Council on how the City
was trying to encourage affordable housing.
There was some discussion on this issue and Loren stated that he would have a draft
of the letter for the next City Council meeting.
18. Pay the Bills
Moved by Johnson, seconded Thies to pay the bills as submitted. Motion passed
unanimously.
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19. Adjourn
Moved by Johnson, seconded by Mayor Theis, to adjourn the meeting at approximately
9:58 p.m.. Motion passed unanimously.
Anne E. Theis, Mayor
ATTEST:
Paul Robinson, Acting Clerk -Treasurer
October 1, 1996
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ORDER CHECKS - OCTOBER 1, 1996
16332 B & B Products $ 730.93
16333 Bonestroo, Rosene, Anderlik 3,521.37
16334 Bryan Rock Products 47,490.7'
16335 Classic Cleaning 505.
16336 Commercial Life Inc. 71.60
16337 Commissioner of Revenue 835.09
16338 Delta Dental 581.95 'f ,`�
16339 E-Z-Recycling 2,132.58- '
16340 ESS Bros. & Sons 582.56
16341 Farmers State Bank of Hamel 3,682.57
16342 Feed Rite Controls 1,557.06
16343 City of Golden Valley 10.00
16344 Grafix Shoppe 1,027.65
16345 Hamel Fire Dept. 16,080.00K-
16346 HDR Eng., Inc. 45.00
16347 HealthPartners 1,706.0
16348 Hennepin County Treas., Acctg.Svcs 710.0
16349 Hennepin County Sheriff 108.9
16350 Jude Wholesale/Advantage Paper 55.38
16351 Kustom Signals 1,039.64
16352 Leuer Farms 300.00
16353 Medica 2,881.46
16354 Metropolitan Council Wastewater (Treatment Chgs.) 7,803.00
16355 Metropolitan Council Wastewater (SAC Chgs.) 1,782.00
16356 Minneapolis Community College 285.00
16357 Minnegasco 39.60/
16358 Minnesota Dept. of Revenue 1,181.0� 7�j
16359 Mothers Motors/Loretto Towing 12.00 ` d/
16360 North Memorial Medical Center 8.00
16361 Northern States Power 2,477.85
16362 P.E.R.A. 2,276.97
16363 Randy's sanitation 154.73
16364 S.L.E.A. 15.00
16365 Schoell & Madson 91.25
16366 Total Office Products & Svcs 266.25
16367 U.S. West Communications 352.97
16368 Uniforms Unlimited 905.60
16369 Warning Lites 45.96
16370 Wright -Hennepin Electric 1,278.55
PAYROLL CHECKS - OCTOBER 1, 1996
14952
14953
14954 John B. Ferris 138.52
14955 Philip K. Zietlow 138.52
14956 James R. Johnson 138.5
14957 Paul A. Robinson 773.3
14958 Steven T. Scherer 951.5
14959 Richard R. Rabenort 1,191.60
14960 Michael J. Rouillard 1,012.79
14961 James D. Dillman 1,141,28
14962 Robert P. Dressel 1,137.50
14963 Edgar J. Belland 1,136.45
14964 Cecilia M. Vieau 644.94
14965 Laura L. Sulander 885.78
14966 Sandra L. Larson 742.34
14967 Joseph R. Heyman 861.95
14968 Jon D. Priem 799.66
14969 Jeff J. Weiler 236.07
$104,632.18
Anne E. Theis $ 207.79
Ann C. Thies 138.52
$12,271.07
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