good evening it is 6 30 p.m and i'm calling the monday july 27 2020 planning commission meeting to order tonight's planning commission meeting is structured to allow virtual participation on zoom or participation in person while following social distance mass guidelines members of the public are welcome and encouraged to participate when invited throughout the meeting if you are participating virtually and experience audio problems we suggest you leave the zoom meeting and then rejoin this has usually fixed the issue additional instructions on how to participate are posted online at www.burnsvillemn.gov in the public meeting calendar as usual tonight's meeting is available live and recorded for later viewing on bctv and on the city's website if you are unable to participate in this evening excuse me if you are unable to participate this evening and would like to submit public testimony i encourage you to email your comments to city staff or mail your comments directly to city hall you may participate in the meeting tonight online by going to zoom.us slash join and typing in meeting id nine one zero seven four nine zero zero eight eight zero once you are logged into the meeting please use the chat feature to tell the moderator which which item you would like to speak to you may also call in to the meeting at 651-372-8299 your call will be muted until there is an agenda item that contains a public hearing i will provide further instruction and notify you when you may speak please note there may be a slight delay due to differences in technology if speaking by phone please mutual computer to avoid feedback now on to our agenda and the first item on our agenda tonight is adoption of the agenda do any members of the commission have any changes to the agenda commissioner roberts no changes staff no changes from staff i move to accept the agenda all right move by commissioner roberts second by commissioner john um i guess any discussion any okay uh so all those in favor say aye aye aye all those opposed all right and the motion carries uh adoption of the agenda the next item is uh consideration of approval of the july 13 2020 planning commission meeting minutes commission members any changes staff any changes no changes from staff very good i'll second the motion all right we have a motion by commissioner anderson and a second by commissioner wad all those in favor hi all those opposed and the motion passes on to the third item the third agenda item tonight is a public hearing on the application of minnesota medical solutions for an ordinance amendment to title 10 zoning of the burnsville city code to incorporate changes to allow medical marijuana distribution facilities as a permitted use in commercial and mixed-use zoning districts city planner sarah madden will provide a presentation of the item and an overview of the background report ms madden thank you chair good evening planning commissioners um so as stated the item before you this evening is an ordinance amendment however different from many of the ordinance amendments we see this one was applied for by an outside applicant rather than something incurred by staff internally so medical cannabis is a use that is allowed statewide it's heavily regulated and licensed by the state so currently although the new batch of dispensaries and are opening the distribution facilities originally were limited to eight statewide they're increasing and after 2019 to 16 statewide staff was contacted by the applicant several months ago kind of letting us know that they would be moving forward with locating a facility in burnsville it was also in the news you may have seen that that they announced the two different licensing distributors in the state kind of announced the cities that they were planning on moving into so minnesota medical solutions is one of those organizations in the state that is licensed to distribute and they will be locating at a place a location in burnsville so the location where they're moving into is not part of what's under review this evening it's just the ordinance amendment for this to be in allowed permitted use in burnsville's code so the use as is the way burnsville's code is set up is that if it's not listed in the ordinance it is prohibited so we do not have a definition in our code for a medical marijuana distribution facility or any sort of regulation about the use so they have applied in order to allow this as a permitted use in burnsville and we are proposing it be allowed in our commercial and mixed use zoning districts so um seen here in section one of the ordinance both in your background packet and on the powerpoint is the definition we provided of both medical marijuana and the medical marijuana distribution facility this language has been provided both from the state statute itself as well as influenced a little by other communities that have amended their ordinance to allow this as a use so most communities that we were able to get some information about their city codes and ordinances have it either listed as a permitted use or they made no changes to their code and decided that this as a use fit into something existing that they had into their code because burnsville's code language is so specific we decided to continue that specific i shouldn't have tried that word specifically and add in a new definition um so that that is what you can see here uh section two of the ordinance because of the way our code is set up we do need to have parking provisions for different land use categories so included similarly to a medical office or a veterinary clinic in hospital we're proposing three spaces per 1000 square feet some of the reasoning behind that is that this isn't necessarily a retail or a pharmacy location where you would where people would anyone would come in and browse for a product it's an appointment-based business you wouldn't have many appointments all at once similar to a veterinary clinic so a similar volume of people that would be visiting at one time so three spaces per 1000 covers both employees as well as visitors to the facility in our chapter seven of the zoning ordinance covers overall general provisions um in that section we have many ordinances some are some of those are included as extra provisions for outdoor storage which is the cup and extra provisions for a accessory dwelling unit which is permitted so we went ahead and added another subsection to this chapter to just specifically outline that this is now a use and there are minimal performance standards that we've included in here related to some of the prohibited activities which are actually again kind of referencing state statute so the direction that we are heading here is we haven't added anything that goes beyond state statute but we are making reference to some of those provisions and then kind of the key areas that we are changing in the ordinance is where the use is allowed so it is proposed to be allowed in the b2 b3 b4 and mixed use district you won't see b3 in the ordinance because the way our code is set up is that anything permitted in b2 is permitted in b3 so it's not listed specifically under that chapter but is referenced elsewhere the transit oriented development district is something that we've been talking about a lot in recent months that ordinance hasn't been fully created yet and codified so there are no changes proposed to it at this time but they would come later when um when staff move forward with the official transit oriented development ordinance so staff is recommending approval of the ordinance as presented um this item is a public hearing and as mentioned this was brought forth by an applicant who requested that we change our code to allow this as a permitted use and i believe they are available if there are additional questions um but otherwise i can stand if needed very good commissioners any questions uh commissioner roberts say this sounds pretty straightforward is it yes mr john are all the restrictions due to state laws yes we've the minnesota state minnesota very detailed statutes that kind of they have specific provisions within them about where they can distribute how far away from certain things where they can manufacture who can do it and what specifically can be done on-site at a distribution facility so we are making reference to that but not including any of our own additional provisions since it's permitted and not a conditional use all right i don't see any other questions from the commissioner so i will open the public hearing at 6 40. uh do we have anybody on zoom or on the telephone who would like to speak to this item the applicant is available if they would like to make any additional comments i would welcome that if they want to all right uh it appears he is on but he is muted so mr johnson if you could unmute yourself please about now perfect that's great okay sorry about that mr johnson if you would state your name and address for the record and then uh share what you would like with this sure my name is mark johnson uh business address is 1330 lagoon avenue south minneapolis minnesota 55408 i am the vice president of corporate real estate for varial health viral health is the parent company of medical minnesota medical solutions and as sarah mentioned we currently operate four dispensaries in the state and recently the legislature opened that up to allow us to now operate in the even districts we're currently in the odd districts the same is true for our competitor relief line um we're very interested in burnsville this is a really attractive location for us in terms of access for our patients we have a signed lease contingent on the approval to operate legally under this ordinance um we we do have plans we'll be submitting to the city uh very shortly building plans in terms of how we'll build out the space but as sarah mentioned it's more of a medical type doctor's office set up all our patients must have a medical card and a prescription from an authorized physician and then we also staff each dispensary with two full-time pharmacists um so they're to help consult and you know find the best medicines for for our patients that's kind of it is in a nutshell if there's more questions or you need uh some more information i'd be happy to answer those very good thank you are there any questions for mr johnson yes yeah mr johnson um whereabouts are you going to be located at so the location is in birdside plaza it's just off of burnhaven drive and county road 42. it's a strip center there's a buca the people out in the park out in the lot of the parking lot hopefully that gives you a general idea of where it is it's kind of southwest of the mall thank you for joining uh choosing burnsville i just want to mention that we really appreciate bringing business here absolutely another questions all right that looks like all the questions for mr johnson do we have anybody else who would like to speak to this item no we do not okay so i will close the public hearing at 6 43. um is there any discussion on this item commissioner roberts you guys everything else today i'd like to make a motion then okay i'd like to make a motion that defining commission recommend to the city council approval of the ordinance as presented okay so we have a motion by commissioner roberts and second by commissioner anderson any further discussion all right i just want to echo what was said here by commissioner john thank you for taking a look at burnsville i did talk with a few people in the area who are happy not to have to travel as far to get their prescriptions so i think this would be a very good location like you pointed out so with that i will take a vote all those in favor say i i opposed and the motion carries and i voted i by the way all right so that brings us to item number four which is a discussion um on the planning commission work plan item uh the solar ordnance check-in and i believe ms garros is going to be going over this miss carlos you have the floor thank you commissioners uh the this item is on the planning commission's work plan and it has been annually pretty much since the ordinance was adopted in 2016. what happened is there was about a two-year study that was done by the planning commission starting in 2014 it did also involve presentations and work with the city council at that point in time to put together our first solar ordinance i guess it we had a solar ordinance but it pretty much said you can do solar and that's about it so um i thought that there might be some things that should be added to that or provide direction so this ordinance was created there at the time that we created it there was a panel triangular panel that was available and manufactured you know at several locations throughout the country and the consensus of the planning commissioning council was that they kind of liked having you know those and a certain configuration of those panels so we put that in the ordinance and then and then after we adapted the ordinance manufacturers quit making them so we had some issues where we had some companies and property owners that wanted to install solar but they couldn't um meet the ordinance or had difficulty so we did an amendment back in 20 i think 17 or 2018 basically just reworked some things and since that time we really have not had any issues that have come up from either property owners or various installers and we did include in the packet just a brief graphic and um to date for this year in 2020 we have uh done six permits but i just approved another one uh today so i'm sure that that will go up as the year comes to an end last year we had 22 residential uh installations and then five commercial installations that was the most that we've had since we've been tracking these we have one installation that is a commercial installation by the mvta transit facility and it was actually incorporated as signage years and years ago so we have been you know operating with solar and having solar and that's been something that's been very positive and i think deemed important by the public too so with that i just wanted to advise the planning commission that also the city had adopted in 2009 its first sustainability plan and we are updating that plan this year that's primarily being done through our natural resources department and sue vast with a consultant and as part of that sustainability plan there have been a lot more items that have become kind of a regular operating procedure if you will and solar is one of those last year the city worked with the metropolitan council to become part of this soul smart program uh it's something that's kind of comparable to if you're a green cities a green step cities type of thing for environmental or sustainable things soul smart is something that is uh geared towards making sure that communities uh take care of or try to alleviate any obstacles for folks getting solar permits and then just to kind of get the word out and become you know a souls a solar use community so as far as the solar ordnance what staff is suggesting to uh planning commission and this is totally up to you because it is your your work plan item but because we now are part of soul smart and we do actively i mean we have a section that deals with solar energy as part of that sustainability plan that at this point in time to continue to work with solar on the sustainability aspect of it and then perhaps just remove it from just an annual review by planning commission every year on your work plan with that i did include in your packet the information you saw this last year as draft information before and then we did get the soul smart designation so we do actually have these solar handouts and information links already available on the city's website with that i'll turn it over to commissioners wonderful thank you so is there discussion or thoughts on staff's proposal to take this off of our annual work plan any commentary on what we've seen over the last year commissioner john i think it makes sense that um especially if this be being part of this new plan that we don't really need to have it on our plan going forward double whammy that way and yeah so i guess i can make a motion that's unless somebody else had something to say that we remove this ordinance or this um from our current plan i i guess i don't even know how to say it actually it's um not a public hearing or something of that sort so if you just want to you know provide that that's the direction of planning commission then when we bring uh your work plan item back to you you know when you start planning for next year um you can just address it at that point so without the formal motion is there anybody opposed to setting this aside no not at all i i think we can certainly look at it if you know something comes up in the future but we've looked at it pretty extensively over the last two years or longer um and we've got the literature out there so i i think that we've kind of done what we can do for now i'm pretty sure if something comes up they'll let us know yes okay yes we will so i think we're fine moving on to other items on our work plan then thank you all right thank you all right so agenda item number five um is a discussion again on the planning commission work plan item development review process and this is again for informational educational purposes so there's no need for action on this item and ms madden will be providing presentation on this item thank you and deb please feel free to interrupt if you have something to add but so last winter when we were going over items that would be on the 2020 work plan one of the things that came up as just a what if is if we gave a little bit more of an educational background as to what sort of planning processes going behind the scenes that aren't reviewed by planning commission and council or any of our other volunteer commissions so obviously our job is to be here and to present things to the planning commission and land use applications that involve formal approval by the city council but we have other duties and developments and buildings that you see go up in the city that are not related to any sort of a land use application and don't go through the public hearing process and so i'll kind of start from the top and then we'll move into just generally what what kind of work we do um so uh the laws that kind of bound our profession go as high as the federal government and then there are also rules within the state not just from by statute but by divisions within the minnesota government that have rules that we are the enforcer of in a way so we work with these organizations to to practice their their roles and their statutes but we are kind of the bottom line that when residents or business owners in our community are working with us to enact some sort of change on their property that we are kind of that first point of contact so part of our job is not just knowing the city code but knowing um supreme court decisions that relate to the field of planning for example a lot in the past two years there's been discussion on the sign ordinance and how we must meet a supreme court decision about content-based signage restrictions that are within city codes so as high as that to something like the minnesota state statute following the medicinal marijuana statute things like that as well as some of the variances that you see come before the planning commission are related to dnr regulations on shoreline provisions occasionally things about digging or filling in the floodplain all of that kind of leads back down to us as the issuing authority for these conditional use permits where we get feedback from other state agencies um so our provision our provisions again come from the land planning act for the state of minnesota which helped to create the metropolitan council who is the governing body who requires us every 10 years to complete another comprehensive plan all everything that's in the comprehensive plan implements our zoning ordinance as well as the kind of measures that we have to meet each year and report on so there are city council policies that reflect things that aren't in the ordinance and that aren't in the comprehensive plan and then they're called they used to be called the ends and outcomes now they're called the strategic priorities so those are the specific city council goals that we are given that change every few years as council kind of turns over with the election process um the burnsville in brief is a monthly reporting that we provide for all of the other departments at city hall and for the city council to review of everything that we've done that month so those are just kind of some of the ways that we share with the community at large what we're doing which may not get reflected to you as volunteer commissions but that gets shared with the city as a whole and our elected officials so um broadly the job of the city planner is kind of the steward of two sections of the burnsville city code so that's title 10 and title 11. title 10 of course is the zoning ordinance we are the interpreters and the um the creators in some ways you know i've brought forth in the last six months six ordinance amendments before this commission and we do about six or so of those a year we work with the city attorney on those interpretations for code cases or for just general questions that we get from residents or business owners the ordinance is what requires us to have public hearings to publish in the paper that all comes from state statute and it's reflected in our ordinance title 11 is the subdivision ordinance from that is what comes the requirement to plat on properties for example we see platts come before this commission whenever someone applies for a building permit on a lot that's not platted and our ordinance would require that lat to be platted in order to construct that structure or to provide a land use clearance so to do a cup on an unplotted lot have to plot that lot based on the subdivision ordnance there's also an administrative process for lock combination i mentioned it at our last planning commission week meeting it's called the waiver of subdivision that's in staff led process that we can do a lot combination or division or lot line adjustment on two pieces of property that are within the same plat so let's say there's a for example with uh last meetings there's a one lot within a subdivision that can be split into two because it's a lot of record and um or two lots we could have combined it to one as long as they were in the same plot and nearby so that process the city planner approves it and then it's stamped by the city clerk and filed with dakota county and they would accept that as a valid survey of subdivision so primary responsibilities of our department um so this um here with us this evening is beth weber the community development assistant so she is not typically at these meetings but is kind of taking over as we do some of this coordination with the zoom technologies for our virtual meetings beth has is the first contact and the admin for both the planning department and the economic development department so what you're seeing here is actually only a list of things that she maintains for planning does not include any of her economic development duties so beth is the first person that people talk to when they have a zoning question whether they come into city hall or if they are calling as long along with being our admin and kind of guiding our projects along and being the person who collects and routes plans to the different departments she also administers her own programs through the ordinance so she there are certain permits that only beth signs off on she is the administering authority for those as well as all zoning letters and zoning letters are usually requested as part of title work or change in sale so those are frequently requested by our department and she processes and signs every single letter and public data requests that come to the planning department anything related to a foia request that has anything to do with a piece of property whether it's zoning property history comes to beth and she administers those public data requests um as i mentioned some of our permits she does all of the research for auto dealers licenses the state requires a city planner to sign off on an application for an auto dealer license so beth does the research and we and we sign off on it based on her research she assists us with general research questions she does all of the gis for the department that is at least at a manageable level before it gets moved on to our id to our i.t department and our gis coordinator so the development project map and the commercial property map that are seen on our website are fully maintained by beth or the community development assistant whoever's in that position so she also works on coordinating with anyone who wishes to incorporate a group home in the city of burnsville we do not license or administer any sort of authority over the group home that's completely done by the state licensing authorities however they always want to call and make sure that it's okay so she handles all of those calls and it's typically either the owner of the home occasionally it's someone from the state that just wants to confirm the language that's in our ordinance that relates to these even though we don't have any authority over the use as a whole she also does all of our documentation and backup of all of our planning commission and overall planning files dating back to the 60s so she is the steward of those documents and that's just her planning duties so wow so for deb and i as the city planners this is kind of the things that are beyond what we do that are the cops or beauties or anything that you see us bringing forward so we are the co-chairs of the development review committee so we meet bi-weekly on all development applications that come in a development application are the ones that come for this group um as well as any building permits that are kind of above and beyond a typical building permit review so um we're responsible for the comprehensive plan and the long-range planning of the city as well as all of the short-range planning like those daily building permits that we receive we review all commercial building permit applications for the use for the exterior of the building most residential building permit application not necessarily a roofing permit or a siding and windows permit but additions to the home decks sheds gazebos anything on the exterior of the home outside of sighting we review there are several long-range planning areas outside of just the general comprehensive plan that come up pretty frequently so the minnesota river squadron is one of those areas within that there's the quarry the mcgowan properties which are the previously closed landfill some of those soil remediations that are going on in that area i'm sure you've seen the equipment on off of 35 so that's soil soil remediation and then the gateway design standards so the minnesota river quadrant does have its own long-term planning efforts so each project building permit or otherwise that comes through in that area we have to go back to the is it the 2010 comp plan or 2020 maybe and we have to go back to look at those design standards from the older comprehensive plan and that regulate those lots when they come through because there is an effort for those properties to redevelop at some point in the city's long-term planning goals kind of other areas you see a lot with the burnzel sanitary landfill waste management we review everything that comes through for the excel energy black dog plant um as well as center point energy who you've seen me bring forth two projects in the last year um and then of course the normal things that you see that come before you the unit developments rezoning cups interim uses and variances we are also the administrator and the um contact for outside parties that want to talk about cell towers and antennas the floodplain environmental planning and some of that sustainability it goes kind of part in part with natural resources and with the planning department so along with them when they get in plans for native plantings in residential properties we help them administer that program kind of on the technology end with our land use reviews chicken licenses we review every chicken license that the city ducks are coming up um we review every chicken license that the police department gets um housing policies and programs kind of falls under my umbrella so deb and i do have the same job responsibilities but we kind of take different focus areas so policy and housing falls under my umbrella and some of the environmental long-term projects fall under devs umbrella permanent sign permits fall under me i'm the administrator of the sign ordinance and all sign permits so any exterior sign in the ground i review for easements utility lines things like that and i'm the final authority on that we also frequently have meetings with developers landowners and business owners um you know 20 percent of the time that turns into a development project where it comes before the planning commissioner city council but sometimes we're working behind the scenes with projects that never make it to development application stage so we're part of their performa process is meeting with us and finding out if this is something that works for them and then as you've seen over the last year ordinance development and ordinance interpretation sometimes those are really large scale with the transit oriented development ordinance that was a really large scale change that's still in the process rezoning all those properties after the comprehensive plan amendment that's a big process in our ordinance tonight's ordnance amendment smaller but is still a big change that changes the shape of our zoning ordinance and we review the zoning ordinance and try to update it many times a year and at least one time a year we try to do a catch-all and get some of those little things off of our list that we need to change so building permits we review as i mentioned every time they come in so along with kind of looking to see that the use that they want to do is allowed within the zoning ordinance every building that comes in we have to look at everything that you see in our staff report so the landscaping and the building materials setbacks height if it's changing the use from one to another is it a use that's in that pud if there is a pud if it's not they might have to amend the pud um parking um the grating the retaining walls the location of walls and fences the materials of those walls and fences every building permit so it's the same stuff that we review for a development application but it's a situation where we have the authority to approve it rather than it being a land use clearance that goes before the city council again review of permanent sign permits and then zoning permits are for accessory structures that don't quite meet the threshold for a building permit but that they do get reviewed to make sure that they're not in any setbacks or an easement and that they meet our materials standards so other things that we do um we're kind of the uh as well as with beth as the kind of the steward of all of our permanent data that we have for data requests and laser features are an internal database that we the whole city uses for all of our old documents and new documents too so we make sure that every file that we have is tied to a parcel identification number as well as an address and when that changes we go back and make sure that the history of that is reflected over time we review gas tanks that are located outside when those come in we were do review sexually oriented businesses and their regulations which is part of the police ordinance but are parts that we administer for the land use liquor stores have spacing requirements in the city of burnsville as well as in some areas they require a land use clearance home occupation home-based businesses there the ordinance that regulates whether you can have a business out of your home is within the zoning ordinance so we regulate that and provide that information to people that are wanting to start a business out of their home as mentioned before we review all the police department's chicken licenses transient merchants so rug sales fireworks sales most often they need a cup in order to be located where they are the ones that you see that are existing in the city got their cup many years ago but in the off chance that there's a new one we review that as well as their permits are issued by beth every year when they renew their permit and then we coordinate with outside agencies so currently in process metropolitan council regional plans the comprehensive plan with dakota county any traffic studies they do on county roads within the city one of us is on the committee for that so currently i'm on a committee for a traffic study for the entirety of county road 42 and then legislative processes so we review and comment on proposed legislation that's going to go before our state legislative groups and then our community development director occasionally attends hearings at the state to provide comment based on city point of view and staff point of view so i can answer some questions if you have it um that's what we do that was right yeah yes commissioner wod that was a great presentation thank you thank you city planners control the world or at least yeah i do have a couple of specific questions one is about planning like we make you know if you want to if a lot isn't planted you have to get it planted in order to development is that is that common amongst all cities are more unique to burnsville do you know it's common um amongst most cities except that they usually have them plant before they develop that is different here in burnsville in the 70s and 80s councils at that time wanted to be burnsville friendly and so they thought that well that means that they shouldn't have to plat which is great because it gets them in quick but what it doesn't do is it doesn't collect any park dedication fees because that is the only time we can collect park dedication fees is with a plat also it doesn't give you the ability to have right-of-way and trails and those types of things dedicated on a plat so a number of years ago it's been within the last 15 years because it happened while i was here probably 10 12 years ago as you know we get more and more developed there's less land and it's like huh well we have some shortages we're not able to really provide for parks and these types of things so the council when they adopted the subdivision ordinance they had a provision in there so that when there is any land use clearance that's required and those are the things that come before you conditional use permit variants planning and development amendment etc that if the property is not platted that they need to plat at that point in time so that's what generates it and then at that point basically the city is able to collect park dedication fees and then if they need right-of-way or easements or something of that sort they do that um it's not fun uh telling a property owner uh or a business owner that has a building that was built you know 40 years ago oh by the way you need to plat yeah and these are the fees that go along with and they're like what but this building's been here for 40 years um but that that's what we do and that's primarily uh primarily the reason uh usually you plant up front and don't you know you don't approve buildings and whatnot um yeah but that's kind of the short history behind that oh thank you yeah i was curious about that i do have one other question you mentioned that twenty percent uh about twenty percent of the kind of development project uh projects that you you know initia uh that you talk to um move it all the move all the way through the process that means eighty percent fizzle out is that right yeah um or either they we find a way for them to be able to go in somewhere administratively or it's something where they maybe they located in another city or maybe they just don't get that tenant for their space and so they or they don't get that buyer for their land and we have you know we'll have meetings with people ahead of time to make sure that what they're they can know what they're getting into so a lot of times they're just kind of looking around too they may have you know several communities in which they want to direct clients and they're just looking for information so we do a lot of a lot of inquiries and research for folks great thank you other questions the other part of what we do and um you're probably aware of this but as the planners we're really the coordinators for projects development projects and um we're the coordinators for the development review committee which are which is comprised of staff members and consultants involved in development reviews like our fire departments represented engineers natural resources department building inspections planning natural resources what not so what we do is we coordinate that meeting process you know or that review process for these plans and projects and then also the departments will then give us some comments or some conditions when we're writing our planning reports to planning commission and council and then we consolidate and put all of that information together into the planning report so there's been by the time an application gets to you there's been a lot of work by a lot of different staff people and consultants and then we kind of coordinate that process and we have some software that helps us do that you might hear us or refer to track it or it's changed names many many times but um we do have some software and beth is our is our primary person for for helping us to coordinate all these projects and things and keep everything on track mr roberts yeah because i have to say that being on the other side [Music] throughout different cities getting applications for stuff in the past coming here and doing this and seeing what you guys do the presentations that you give and this is kudos to you are well above what i've seen from other places that are just different and so when you guys present stuff and we get the materials i'm pretty much assured that every time we get that we're pretty extensively informed on what's going on so it really helps out when we want to discuss to have all that information and you guys bring that to us so very much a thank you for what you guys do yeah it helps it really does help it's confusing at times when you get a lot but knowing that you guys did the legwork and that you're comfortable with what you're giving us sometimes makes it easier to go through this a little easier you know i mean because there is a lot to go through and we don't have that much time to make a decision sometimes so exactly for what it is thank you yeah thank you i was just gonna say i i really appreciate the presentation today i think you should uh take this tape and present it to people as they come on the plan commission because you learn so much just listening to everything you go through the sections and i think it really helps so i appreciate that thank you for everything you do it's just the three of you that do all that with regina and jenny so we have our other staff but wow yeah very impressive thank you and one thing i didn't mention so just timing-wise so with a building permit the staff here in our building inspections department they try to get turnaround for residential building permits in two weeks and commercial in four weeks we usually beat that but that's kind of the you know max goal for turnaround for a building permit for our development review process that comes before the city council that's a 60 to 90 day process when there's a plat or a comprehensive plan amendment it's 120 days or more so it's a pretty lengthy process to go through it involves we get the initial plans we have comments on the plans we send them back we get revisions we usually in some cases we get six revisions before we come up with the plan stuff that comes to the public hearing um so in each time those plans come in we have to go back through the entire checklist of the code again and to see what changed on them so it's kind of a it is a lengthy process i think and it scares some applicants when they see that if they apply on the state they're not gonna they're only maybe gonna be before the city council on one date but that is because we try to at least the burnsville ways to be very thorough and we try to do all everything for the building permit up front so by the time they get to that building permit stage most of what we're waiting on is legal documents and filing at the county so that's kind of the reason for that and the fees that are collected are part of that too it covers uh staff time for all that gets put back on the applicant the city council probably many many many years ago decided that the cost of a private development would be covered by the the applicant itself and it's not it doesn't come out of general funds so and that requirement to review those deadlines is set by the state yes that's great so to go we get to keep track of all those dates too yeah it's like didn't get it just forget something so before the 60 days ends we have to send a letter so we don't need consent for that we can just send out a letter that's signed and scanned with proof that we emailed it and mailed it and then to extend beyond 120 days we do have to have them sign and they sign agreeing to a specific date um and they can change that date they can say well you said in this waiver that i'm signing that you would for sure have it through council by this date i'm gonna cross that out and put a month before and that's what i agree to so then it puts us we have to get stuff in and of course there is the legal process too we have to notify neighbors within 350 feet um if it's a development project nearby a residential neighborhood we typically require or ask them to host a neighborhood meeting that we attend as a just a viewer and then we publish in the paper as well so all of this is heavily timed and if we miss one deadline it pushes us back because of the way the paper works and when they will accept public notices so it's all very detail-oriented the schedule so we kind of move in cycles something that's unique for burnsville too um and i've worked with some 30 some different communities over my career and in different processes but for burnsville what is truly unique is they really do work to get people through in a 60-day time frame not in you know however most communities will send out a letter the day they receive the application saying it's going to be extended for another you know two months or three months or whatever burnsville doesn't do that another unique thing about burnsville is that the city council approves templates if you will for our legal documents so they've taken a look over the years at like the standard development contract language which would go with a subdivision uh the standard language for a planned unit development amendment agreement you know those types of things and it is very unique i've never seen this before where it is really the we're intended to get items from planning commission the next week to city council that's really unheard of in most communities usually they have a city attorney drafting those legal documents each and every time that doesn't happen here here the templates approved and staff you know we fill in the the details of it and they're they're not even reviewed by the city council so that saves time and money for applicants on on those ends and another thing we do routinely is bundle applications you know if somebody wants to plat and do a pud amendment we try to bundle everything so they only have to come in for you know one planning commission and one city council meeting there are a lot of communities that do not do that and have it spelled out right in their ordinance that they don't do that so the timing takes quite a bit longer with other folks so i guess i just wanted to let you know that and you in terms of you know the unique thing about planning there are there are some really you know other unique things that i think really do save um the applicant's time and money and you know get them through uh our process and i think that's appreciated by by most of the developers that you talk to or applicants so that's it any other questions comments all right i just want to comment too um i really appreciate the work that you guys do for burnsville um i mean we are so lucky to have you um the three of you and you said regina as well as jenny um and so thank you so much for your hard work and dedication to the city um i'm going to review your list a little bit more because i i don't know i'm just fascinated by all of the work that you do and i think that you know it's a very difficult position that you're in where you are helping draft ordinance you're helping enforce ordinance you're helping citizens you're helping developers you're helping businesses and sometimes things don't always go as you expect and i think that um you've shown a really a really good thick skin for a lot of the the things that do come up um and conflicts that do come up in any of those things the other thing and i can't remember if you said this you have to work with consultants a lot it seems and i think that with a variety of projects whether it's reviewing ordinances or looking at the burnsville center or the heart of the city or the minnesota river quadrant or working with consultants from dakota county that dakota counties hired for counter road 42 i mean you are constantly creating good relationships for burnsville and i think that's awesome and i'm a little jealous you must get to meet a lot of really cool people yes you do very cool well thank you so much for the presentation i agree with commissioner john this should be something every time we bring on a new commissioner that we run through i know the commissioners all get some pretty thorough training that some of you have been involved with in the past and that our city attorney's been involved with but i think i think it's worth patting yourself on the back every once in a while too and bragging about all the good work that you do so thank you so much all right so that will bring us to agenda item number six which is updates commissioners do you have any updates staff updates all right um so previously it was advertised that our next planning commission meeting was going to be on wednesday august 12th there was some moving around with the primary and we are back on our normal monday august 10th so hopefully that doesn't impact you but that will be your next planning commission meeting and then the public hearing item from earlier this evening will be on the august 4th city council meeting so yes that's agenda yes do you have anything to add uh just a couple of things for august 10th we have got the kramer quarry development stage planning and development coming before you and that's the one to expand mining on the east and southwest they received concept plan approval last year last year earlier this year i don't recall but this is the development stage part of it so that is uh what's on the agenda in addition to um if sarah it's her building expression possibly a quick discussion about building expression new type of signage i e i don't know how to describe it exactly any type of sign new type of um potentially is it a building material is it a mural is it a sign because i mentioned earlier this evening that our ordinance if it's not listed it's prohibited we we need to address this because it's come up as a request and so it is a work plan item and there's not going to be an ordinance at the next meeting but probably a discussion to learn more about the topic for all of us so wonderful and i did want to ask i i saw that the city council took up the issue with dr wallen and his driveway i don't know if all of the commission members have had an opportunity to see uh the results of that but would you provide just a brief update on on how that went uh last tuesday yes we received word that council member keeley wanted to pull the application off the consent agenda and then when we got to the meeting the applicant was there he had provided a letter to the council that we just got that night just kind of identifying the process and whatnot the there was discussion at the city council level i don't know uh all i can say is that they they voted four to one to approve the variants coming up with practical difficulties there was a discussion there and the city attorney actually drafted the language for that the council discussed that they thought that the ordinance should be looked at in terms of driving with and that folks with three stall garages in particular should be able to have wider driveways and so they kind of came up with that's kind of the rationale behind it the mayor dissented we did have three of the council members you know indicate to the applicant that it was a very difficult position to be put into you know because they had stated as part of their review that they did know and they were advised not to do it and went ahead and did it anyway but the that's what the vote was from the city council you may want to take a look at the meeting and go from there i think from the planning commission standpoint and from a staff standpoint we followed the law which is what we're charged to do and then the city council it would be more helpful if they would let us know kind of their thoughts so that we could you know try to anticipate some things some things that we've discussed at a staff level i'm not sure how this would be but we had discussed possibility of instead of doing variances because you do have that practical difficulty thing you know maybe we bring these things forward to as a zoning ordinance amendment and that way at least you get the background information on why the ordinance is there and then this is the application and this is what they'd like to do and then you know you can forward recommendations that way um is this really difficult with variances they're probably the most misused uh things that cities do um it would be great you know if the law were if you want to do it then you get a variance unfortunately it's not it's these practical difficulties that that we need to deal with so um but the city council had some other ideas and and that's how they came up with uh rationale to uh to vote to approve it four to one so so is there an option if if we want to further discuss this with the city council from a planning commission thing or individually we want to do that to ask them really the underlying what you know not from what you're just telling us now but all the details based on what we saw and what they saw how it changed so dramatically you know from what we looked at how do we go about that from a planning commission do we have to set up a meeting with them i don't know what the actual we do have uh there is a liaison from the city council to the planning commission we could invite him to you know come in to meet with you i think i mean you always have the opportunity if you want to your citizens you know in addition to being a commission member to to contact council members um but yeah it would that's why i say it really is important for the council to have clear direction um so that we're all you know hopefully moving in the same same direction here um i would i just have probably four questions that are going to be huge to ask why this because now we have this or now we have this so if this now happens where does it come back to us so i want to find that out not only as a person who lives in burnsville but also part of this commission here because we are we were way opposite obviously what their you know and that's their vote we headed our vote but i just want to make sure because we never really had this to happen where it was so opposite and i'm just curious how we present that so going forward maybe a liaison would be able to answer those questions i don't know is that something that has to be formal i don't think so it doesn't have to be televised it doesn't have to be so i think we could ask you know if you want to um ask the city council you know if they want to have like a joint meeting to discuss things we could you know work on that um yeah it's really up you're you're the commissioner so you let us know what uh kind of what your thoughts are what you'd like to do and uh you're working on setting that up we could kind of go a couple different options we could ask to you know be included in one of their work plans to have a discussion on this with the entire city council or or one of their work sessions and the other option have the the liaison come to one of our meetings for you know one of these discussion type agenda items where we kind of talk through it i mean i i certainly think the conversation would lead to you know maybe this specific uh instance but it'd be nice to be able to you know from their perspective and ours kind of yeah try try to avoid this in the future um that being said i want to echo what dev set is and i was was kind of prompting this with my compliments earlier um you do have to work through some ambigu ambiguity see why did i pick that word um and and sometimes you don't always know you know what the final results are going to be so i really appreciate your ability to um to kind of work through these things and and i want to echo what uh deb said um staff did everything they should have done we did everything we should have done i mean our job is to really take a look at the projects take a look at the ordinances and apply those um and i think that staff and our commission can be proud that we've done that um so that being said the mayor did in the meeting express a lot of the same concerns that we had as far as setting a precedence of um you know shooting first apologizing later and i think that uh she made that very clear so uh anyway commissioner john i just was good i was very frustrated when i watched that meeting i i found it um calling to um like eric said shooting first and then uh pushing forward i don't think it sets a good precedence for the city um and for staff actually it just it feels like it was kind of pushed from the back i don't want to belabor the point at all however i think it would be good to have a conversation about these things and to understand because like commissioner roberts said we were on the complete opposite side of this and it's very frustrating to watch it really is and i i literally lost sleep over it i don't say that as a cliche i literally lost sleep over it it was very frustrating me too so i wanted to put that out there but thank you i think the liaison is okay but i still would like to ask certain questions of the people who were there just there's certain just certain questions to ask okay and i'm gonna bring it up now of course but it would be nice to have them actually give their opinions of why they voted the way they did certainly um we can check with uh with the city manager and see how best you know we'll explain what kinds of things that we're talking about and how is the best way to get that done you know work session or have someone come here whatever and we'll bring that back to your next meeting yeah and i and i do do want to respect the fact that we are a recommending body and and so i think that to have an open dialogue with them is is a very good thing to understand kind of their thought process on some of these things commissioner anderson did you mention that one of the council members tried to have it removed from the agenda uh yes it was council member keeley um did they say why remove from the consensus so that they could just so that they could discuss it not other than we didn't know except for the discussion um when the council was discussing it and it came up that they thought that there should be other standards you know and people should be able to if they have a three car garage should be able to back straight out so they wanted to look at the width standard along with i guess everything else that they'll be looking at it but yeah i i agree it would be there there are better better ways i think just to make sure that we're all moving in the same direction would be very helpful commissioner anderson just stop me if you know this but um basically if we vote unanimously those items typically go onto the consent agenda which is a laundry list of 15 20 items each each council meeting and typically it's just one vote that they approve that consent agenda they're all the backgrounds typically they're the city councilors are expected to you know understand and read through all of that information and the city council members as well as members of the public have the ability then to request an item to be pulled from the consent agenda and given further discussion and so that's what happened they we had approved it or rather denied the variance unanimously and so typically that goes on the consent agenda that is what happened and then um councilmember keeley um you know as as he's allowed um asked for further discussion and that's what happened okay makes more sense thank you any other questions or comments i i will say just for now the one thing as far as reviewing the ordinance change that did not come up in the city council meeting that does concern me is what the city engineer commented on and that was um you know if every three-car garage property going forward were to go to a 40-foot driveway what does that look like for our storm water sewer system and what will the you know future costs for the city be on that obviously all things that'll be researched as the ordinance is reviewed um but that is you know that's the top of my mind yeah commissioner one on my yeah what type of pandora's box are we opening yeah and can i go out on my driveway right now and make it a 40 foot because i've got three car garage commissioner roberts i would suggest if you're interested in doing that watch the city council meeting from last tuesday because because there were there was actually conversation on that so so all right thank you so much for the updates thank you so much for everything you do and with that i will stand for a motion to adjourn i would like to present the motion to a turn mr anderson thank you i'll second the motion give me the opportunity all those in favor of adjournment say aye aye and opposed motion passed thank y'all you