As an expert transcriptionist, I have reviewed the dialogue and context to identify the speakers. I have corrected the phonetic spellings of names provided in your list (e.g., "Jagisich" to Dragisich, "Monuso" to Maruso, "Hearn" to Hirn) and identified the applicants and the City Attorney based on the verbal cues. **Note:** Since the original transcript did not provide specific timestamps, I have used a sequential placeholder format. *** [00:00:00] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All right, everybody. Welcome to the Lake Elmo City Council meeting for Tuesday, February 17th. Call this meeting to order. Please stand with me for the pledge of allegiance. to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right. The uh item B is approval of the agenda. I'll entertain a motion unless somebody has something to switch or add. [00:00:30] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: Motion to approve the agenda as written. [00:00:32] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: Second. [00:00:34] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All those in favor, please signify by saying I. [00:00:36] **Council Members**: I. [00:00:38] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Additional talks. We do not have any public comments or inquiries. I'm taking it. Anybody hand in any sheets? [00:00:42] **Julie Johnson (City Clerk)**: That's correct. None. [00:00:44] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Item D is approval of minutes from the 4th of February. Unless somebody has something that uh wasn't uh correct, I'll accept uh a motion to approve those. [00:00:50] **Council Member Nick Kragness**: So moved. [00:00:52] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: Second. [00:00:54] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: We have a motion and a second for approve the council meeting minutes from this 4th of February. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. [00:00:58] **Council Members**: I. [00:01:00] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All right. Item E is the consent agenda which includes approved payments and dispersements. Approve building permit fee reduction for the St. Jude Dream Dream Home 3767 Nightsbridge Lane North. Approve zoning text amendment public hearing notice distances. Approve zoning text amendment housekeeping items. Approve hiring of full-time firefighter. Um yeah, that's it on the consent. rather rather short this evening. I'll entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda as as provided. [00:01:25] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: Move to approve the consent agenda. [00:01:27] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Second. [00:01:29] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: We have a motion and a second. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. [00:01:32] **Council Members**: I. [00:01:34] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All right. Jumping right into our regular agenda. Uh we'll have uh city engineer Mr. Stanley talk about the 2026 street and utility improvements accept bids and award contracty. [00:01:45] **Nate Stanley (City Engineer)**: Mr. Mayor and Council, thank you. Uh before you tonight is an item, as you previously stated, to uh accept bids and award a contract for our 2026 street and utility improvement project. Um tonight I've provide a brief recap on a number of items. uh project location, uh where we're at with the schedule, um recap those proposed improvements for the neighborhoods, uh talk about some parking restrictions that are going to go into place post project, and then talk about um bids and next steps. So, um project is in the Lake Elmel Heights neighborhood, um which is um shown on the screen here. Um, just note that there is one culde-sac that's technically part of the Eagle Point Creek Greek Estates subdivision um, Inwood Avenue, the Culdeac north of um, County Road 6. And, um, tonight we are, this is a Minnesota 429 statutory process. Um, got a number of steps here that we've been through on the project schedule. Tonight we're considering um accepting bids and awarding a contract. To recap the improvements for the neighborhood, uh we want to complete a full depth reclaim of the pavements throughout the project area with installation of new concrete curb and gutter as well as um making some minor grade adjustments for drainage and um a new pavement section. Pardon me. Um, we're looking at uh some uh some minor drainage repairs throughout the neighborhood. There are certain sections of storm sewer that need improvements and uh other drainage ways that need to be cleaned up. Um again, talking about the um the no parking restrictions, uh streets in this neighborhood are adequate. they're of adequate width so that we're not anticipating restrictions on streets but rather um per public works policy just at the end of the culde-sacs that exist in the neighborhood. Public water main serves this neighborhood. It was installed roughly 20 years ago. The system is in good shape uh and no improvements to that system are proposed as part of this project. Um this area also resides outside of the Musa boundary and no extension of new sanitary sewer is proposed. So this is just a a high level graphic of the the neighborhood area. Once again, uh the Lake Elmel Heights neighborhood there. Um and then you know there's a couple culde-sacs off of County Road Six. the parking restrictions as just described a minute ago at the ends of the culde-sacs. Let's talk about the bids. We we received eight bids, good number of bids. The load responsible bidder is Macamera Construction or contracting rather um with a bid of about $ 1.57 million. Uh for reference, the engineer's estimate was about $1.71 million. So good bid below estimate. Um the total estimated project costs um have gone down uh from our previous estimate and feasibility report also from roughly 2.39 million to 2.15 million. Um we have previously done a calculation of a preliminary assessments for the neighborhood. Um and you know we we largely anticipate that to those numbers to go down but a full recalculation will be done at the end of the project. So I'm before you to ask that council approve a resolution accepting bids and awarding a contract to Minger Contracting Incorporated in the amount of 1,570,583.60 for the 2026 street utility improvements. And I also ask that council authorize the city administrator to enter into a materials testing contract for the project and not to exceed amount $30,000. And with that, I will entertain any questions. [00:04:15] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Questions for Mr. Stanley. Great hearing. None. I'll entertain a motion. [00:04:20] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: Motion to approve resolution number 2026-013 approving bids and awarding a contract to McNamera Contracting Inc. for the bid amount of 1,570,583.60 for the 2026 street improvements. [00:04:32] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Second. [00:04:34] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Discussion. Council member Holtz. [00:04:36] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: Just thank you again for the speed on this and getting the bid requests out early since we know that does help to drive down the cost. So, thank you for that. [00:04:45] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Council member Dragisich. [00:04:47] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: In our packet of information again, we talked about the financing for this project and there's a general obligation bond pay for property taxes and special assessments. We have very large amount of storm water improvements on this project which I said before and I want to repeat again tonight should be paid for from the storm water utility. We can talk about that when we get to the actual financing piece. Uh but to put those on the property tax roles unfairly Greg allocates those costs to people who uh some people who benefit pay nothing and other people pay disproportionately more. I'll let go with that. I just don't want it to go unsaid that it was in our packet and I didn't bring it up at the time we awarding the contract. [00:05:25] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Okay, fair enough. Any other questions or any other discussion? All right. All those in favor of uh authorizing the accept the bid, please signify by saying I. [00:05:35] **Council Members**: I. [00:05:37] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: It's accepted. Motion authorizes city administrator to enter into material testing contract for the project construction phase services in the not to exceed amount of 30,000 for the 2026 street improvements support. [00:05:48] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: Second. [00:05:50] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: We have a motion to second. Any discussion hearing? None. I'll call the question. All those in favor of authorizing city administrator to enter into uh an agreement for uh testing services, please signify by saying I. [00:06:05] **Council Members**: I. [00:06:07] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Passes. Thank you, Mr. Stanley. Item number two is reg registered land survey 1323481 Lever Avenue. Um, Miss Maruso. [00:06:15] **Ashley Maruso (Planning Staff)**: Good evening, council. Um, tonight you're being asked to make a determination on a proposed minor subdivision at 3481 Liver and A. This is the former crearyy building in the old village. Um, a little bit of background before we get into the application. Um, this is coming forward as a registered land survey. So, why does a registered land survey need to go through the minor subdivision process? Typically, an application that looks like this might be a uh division or and it can be processed administratively. However, because this property is Torrance, the county has required that it be processed as a registered land survey. Uh the city reviews registered land surveys through the minor subdivision process. So, that's kind of why we're here now. Um the last time we saw one of these was in 2021. So, just want to give a quick update on that. So background on the property or the application rather, the applicants tonight are Chava Mission LLC and John Pisha. Once again the property is at 3481 uh Leverne A. The request is to reconfigure the property boundaries to ensure that the former crearyy building the building on the west side of the site is fully contained within its own dedicated parcel. The existing and future zoning are both village and mixed use. Um a little bit of history, the western building again was the crearyy. east side of the site was previously used as a a lumber yard. There is no request for a change in use at this time. Um and no determination on use has been made. So on the left you'll see the registered land survey. This kind of acts as a plat for the property. On the right you'll see an aerial image of the the update. And same here um another sidebyside version that illustrates uh what the request is working to accomplish. Uh you can see the RLS is separated into tract A and track B. Um moving on to a review of the minor subdivision criteria. The RLS will will result in no more than four parcels. The property will become two parcels. The RLS will not require any new rightaways or streets. Uh easements are to be dedicated where applicable. The request will meet the VMX zoning lot dimension and bulk building requirements. the buildings are already existing on site. Uh the request will come comply with the city of lake almost access and space spacing location. No new driveways or access points are proposed with this request. So this went out to agency review in late September and conditions have been added with regards to the engineering memo and the um attorney plat opinion. The application went to public hearing uh and planning commission on October 15th of 2025. Planning commission reviewed the request and voted to recommend approval with conditions. An update since the planning commission uh the applicant reached out to discuss the conditions of approval for the for the RLS. Uh they have since been issued two extensions to work through the conditions, one from the city and one uh requested by the applicant. And uh there have been some revisions um between planning commission and city council meetings. Uh originally there were nine conditions re revised to seven. Two conditions have been removed and one condition has been revised and and we'll go over those shortly. And before we go to those conditions, um just wanted to get it on council's radar that uh between planning commission and now staff have identified a public works uh code that states that there must be a sewer connection ahead of a property sale. Um this property falls into that category. So basically we have a code that states that a connection must be made ahead of a sale. Um but there's no policy in place to enforce that. The council could discuss this at a future workshop. um since this applies to a handful of other properties as well. That being said, um this is a planning and zoning act and not the sale of the property. Um so it doesn't need to be addressed at this point unless there's a a desire to do so. So with that said, I'll move to the recommending conditions of approval. Conditions one through three are fairly standard conditions related to um the permits uh or obtaining all necessary state, city and governing body permits. Um the plat opinion and then the third one is special assessments uh would need to be play paid before recording. Conditions four, five, and six are uh recommendations from the engineering memo dated 92325. Originally these conditions were grouped together in a catchall for condition number four. So since then uh that condition has been separate condition four has been separated out that's regarding the driveway access. Um and that just states that the driveway access would need to be brought up to code ahead of any building permits. Um staff separated those out for clarity. And finally, the seventh condition um is a standard condition as well that the applicants shall record the RLS in the resolution within 180 days. So, moving back towards condition six, um just wanted to touch on that shortly or briefly, the easement is required to ensure flexibility for any future development to the east. Uh the in the engineering memo addresses concerns related to utilities to the site and how they will connect. Um this blank blanket easement is required at this point in time uh because there are no connection plans for engineering to review. So the city will want to ensure that when the connection occurs uh the the size and location of the easement meets the city's requirements. Um once there are connection plans for review, the applicant may work with engineering to reduce or vacate some of that easement area. Um once again, this is uh the reason you're seeing seven conditions instead of nine um is because the previous condition regarding the timing of sewer and water has been removed. Originally staff added this for transparency um about requiring that sewer connection per the engineering memo, but the applicant had concerns about being able to do regular maintenance or emergency repairs on the building. Um so staff decided to remove the condition. um because conditions of code requirements are still uh applicable and they are expected to be addressed one ahead of the sale and two when redevelopment occurs. So moving on to the recommended findings, uh staff is recommending that council consider the following findings. Um, one meets standards related to zoning. The second meets the standards related to the comp plan and the third is related to the minor subdivision regulations. And with that, I can leave you with a recommended motion, an alternate motion. Uh, staff can answer questions and the applicant is here should you have any questions for them. [00:11:45] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Any questions for Miss Maruso? Council member Dragisich. [00:11:48] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: I'm confused by the road easement. Is is there not is 33rd not a dedicated street? It's not a dedicated rightaway. [00:11:55] **Ashley Maruso (Planning Staff)**: Uh I believe that there I'm sorry, can you repeat the question? [00:12:00] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: So there's a requirement from the city engineers about of dedicating an easement for the road and is that not currently a dedicated right of way? [00:12:05] **Ashley Maruso (Planning Staff)**: Are you saying uh upper 33rd Street? [00:12:08] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Upper 33rd. Yeah. [00:12:10] **Ashley Maruso (Planning Staff)**: Yeah. I think that's the reason for the engineering comment or in in that memo, but uh they do have an access agreement that the applicants are working on between each other to provide access. [00:12:20] **Nate Stanley (City Engineer)**: So, I'll I'll just say that Jack Griffin is here tonight to entertain any specific questions regarding the engineering review as he completed it. But as far as Upper 33rd, um I I think um the easement we're talking about is on the other side of the building. Upper 33rd is a right away. [00:12:35] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: The access is from the building that's existing. There's two tracks is to the front and they do show a 33 foot private driveway access between the two to handle the the driveway access. So they're not isolating the back track the back parcel from a public roadway. [00:12:50] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Okay. So it's not that land to the no lower part where upper 33rd is. That's already a public street, right? [00:13:00] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Right. Okay. I'm sorry. I just misunderstood where the rightaway was talked about. Yeah, it's the it's the uh utility easement that becomes an issue. Even though you have the rightway upper 33rd Street, you have a 60-inch storm sewer pipe and it's a very narrow rideway. I believe it's less than 30 feet and you already have a 60 foot inch uh storm sewer pipe and you already have a sanitary sewer pipe. You have no you have no room to put water main down that corridor. [00:13:25] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Can you point on the map where exactly where the easement is, Jack? I'm sorry. where the where they're requesting the e the easement. [00:13:35] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Uh it's this shaded area here. [00:13:38] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Oh, the shad. Okay, thank you. [00:13:40] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: So, there's a water stub right here and a sewer stub here. And that's an 8 in sewer and a 6-in water mane. So, this is large enough to serve both tracks. [00:13:50] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Okay. [00:13:52] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: So, you can get water and sewer without digging up either road. And you can't get water down this road anyway. So, this is really across the front if if you have two parcels. And if you create a parcel here and then they want water to this parcel, the only place you can get that from currently Yeah. is from Leverne. [00:14:15] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Thank you. I just couldn't for some reason I was drawing a a a blank as to where we're looking at. This makes perfect sense. Excuse me. [00:14:22] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Any other questions for Ashley? Did the applicant want to speak? [00:14:26] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Yeah, sure. All right. Uh, thank you. I have a one concern. Can you go back to that map that we saw in the Or is that me? [00:14:35] **Ashley Maruso (Planning Staff)**: I'll let you do it. [00:14:38] **John Picha (Applicant)**: This one? Yeah. Yeah, thank you. All right. So, our we have a concern right now. So, I'm I'm the applicant. I'm the purchaser of the crearyy building and then we've also got the seller. So, the seller and I are very much on the same page about how we'd like this to all happen. But, we do have a concern about this easement on the north side of the building. Um, the way it's worded right now, which feels a little bit open-ended for both of us. We have a concern that there could be um use or access from the city for future development to the parcel that is to the east of this right now. Cornfields to the east of the lumber yard. We don't want to have I don't want to get to a point where I've finished and paved this parking lot area, which is more or less what I'd be doing in front on the north side of the crearyy. I don't want to get to a point where I'm done with that work and then I find out that there's a uh agreement with the city and the developer directly to the east that's not pictured in this map where they're going to be bringing um sewer water and sewer or city water and city sewer through this parcel uh at some unknown point in time. So, that's a concern that I have about everything else is looking pretty good with the conditions. Um, but staying on number six right now, and this was a lot of back and forth that we've had with the city, but this is really the first time I've been able to kind of voice an opinion to the council. Um, I would like to see the wording tightened up a little bit regarding the in the engineering wording regarding that uh easement, the drainage and utility easement. Um, so yeah, that my hope is we could uh not leave that quite as open-ended as it is right now. Otherwise, things look really good. [00:16:15] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Isn't it the case that any access further to the east would require an easement through property that doesn't have it beyond what's being requested now? [00:16:22] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Yeah, but I I think this is a little bit the concern here and between both me and the seller would be it's uh it's could be setting in motion um another if they want if they wanted to say sell their portion um this could become a condition in the future for them as well extending all the way over to the east and and it has to go through it has to go through one two at least three other parcels, correct? To reach that, which are all owned by the current seller. [00:16:50] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Yeah. And so if there's no easement there, there's no way that that can happen and it would have to go before us anyway. [00:17:00] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Well, that's my concern is that it it could happen because I don't want to have my space developed with the parking and everything and then, you know, to go back to that. Yeah. And one thing that we talked about with the city was potentially getting our bids um for sewer connection and for a water connection ahead of time and then having the wording of the easement tied directly into those bids. um that would I would feel much better about that long term um versus leaving it open-ended and then relying on the city or the engineer um to abandon that easement after we've connected. [00:17:35] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: So, what language are you suggesting? [00:17:38] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Um I think I' I'd like to see us tie the easement to bids. So, more or less, I would like to hold off until we have our bids and or at least make that a condition that uh we strike item number six, but we put we reward it that there will be an easement, but the easement will be tied to the future bids. And as we're getting the bids, we present that to the city, to Ashley and to Sophie. [00:18:00] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Council, is that possible to tie an easement to the bids? [00:18:04] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: Uh, Mr. mayor, members of the council. My concern about that is what we're doing right now to get the easement is we're going to allow them to record the RLS and that's kind of their carrot to make sure this happens. But once they are allowed to record the RLS, we don't really have any control over things. [00:18:22] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: And the primary reason for that other than there's access off of Lever is that it's track A and track B. that track B would not have access if not for through track A, right? [00:18:32] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: Yeah. It's like a little bit of a catch 22. It is. And it's really it's been this item that we've uh spent time kind of circling around where we can't quite seem to land this one item. But I know I would imagine if we had bids um you know and Sarah you were part of that meeting too like if we had bids maybe it'd be that simple that now we can because we've talked about the idea of abandoning um this easement once we do have our connections done and final and that the intention is to do that quickly you know within about a year or less. And now once that happens, the abandonment would be great. But the concern that we have is that we have no guarantee that that easement language will then be abandoned. [00:19:15] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Can't that be written into the agreement? [00:19:18] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: Uh Mr. Mayor, members of the council, we might be able to write it into the easement agreement. Um I think technically you would still need to go through the vacation process because it's a vacation to have a public easement. But um you could do that or you could you could approve the RLS tonight with the condition that they provide us with an easement and then the easement needs to be satisfactory before they can record the RLS. [00:19:40] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Okay. [00:19:42] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: So that way they could come back and get their bids or whatever and then record the RLS. Although I know there is a deadline for recording. I guess it' be RLS's and plats. I think it's six months. six months. That would give us enough time, but you they could always get an extension. [00:19:55] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: I'm just looking for a way to protect ours and still meet the uh the buyers, you know, request. And I think there's got to be a way to do that through language in an agreement. So clarifying question, could that be a part of number six? Like a second sentence that whatever the language at stage X in the future, the city shall start the vacation process for unused easements or something like that. It doesn't say how much. It doesn't say which portion but is that or even something um you know upon approved um connection city agrees to vacate or abandon. I mean that would that's a little more specific. [00:20:30] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: Mr. Mayor, members of the council, that may work. Although, as you know, we've been through the vacation process. We have to vacate and that has to be in the public interest. So yeah, you can't agree ahead of time that oh it's I mean you can say that you'll initiate the vacation process and you know and that I don't know I guess you could I guess you can't bind future councils by saying it's already in the public interest to do so but that you'll initiate the vacation process and and because that that was kind of my I thought it's starting the process. It's not guaranteeing an outcome. Yeah, you can't guarantee an outcome and that's the issue I think. [00:21:10] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: So there in lies the rub. Yes, Jack. [00:21:14] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: If I may real quick, just to clarify what that process might look like as I think through it is um there's two ways. So we're not just looking for connection of one of the buildings. We what we're looking for is making sure that sewer that the track B is not landlocked from sewer and water, right? So we're looking for a path across the property to track B. So even if the track A gets connected to sewer and water, we still need to know how the sewer and water is going to continue across the property. There's two ways of doing that. So two buildings cannot be connected to a private water and sewer service. So right now these stubs are public and can stay public. So either one building can connect to these and then you have to cut into Leverne for the second one and bring additional lines across. Or the second way is to bring these lines across the property and then have two sets of service stubs from that line. So it if we're getting bids just to get the one building connected, that might not give us the full picture. [00:22:10] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: So, you're saying have the easement for the sewer and water to extend all the way to the track B, I think it's called. [00:22:15] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Yes. So that you don't have to if you don't have to cut back into Leverne, then those would be public. And I don't know that the applicant can do a public bid and do a public line. So, if he's getting bids for a contractor, he's going to be connecting private service stubs for this building only. We're still not that's still not answering the question of where's the private service lines going to come across for the second building. [00:22:38] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Then if we did a bid on both of those, would that and and again tying the easement to the bids or something along those lines, would that satisfy it? [00:22:45] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Yeah. And that takes us back when we've originally started the very first comments were we needed we asked the applicant for sewer water plans to how both buildings would be connected to sewer and water and we were told they didn't want to do that until after this process. And so then that that's when we came up with the blanket easement idea and then you can vacate it back once that's done. And they they don't like that one either. But yes, so it takes us back to the beginning where if we have a plan that we agree is a workable plan to provide water connections to both buildings, that's and and then we would ask for an easement over that for the track B, then that would satisfy that, right? [00:23:25] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Well, then I think the what I'd like to see happen then would be um we get the bids and that takes a little bit of time, but we have that um more or less table this item and come back to this item before we approve the entire uh um just minor subdivision. So, that might mean an extension or it sounds like there's still there's a six-month clock, so we might have time without an extension, but I would rather come in here with um with the bids knowing that the easement language is uh would be vacated after connection. Um that's that's where we're at on that. So, I don't know if that looks like approving it with a condition or if that looks like tableabling it, but I suppose I'd be looking to you for how to move that. [00:24:10] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: So, we wouldn't be doing the RLS until that. [00:24:12] **Ashley Maruso (Planning Staff)**: If I may, uh, council, we wouldn't want to um not make a decision. We wouldn't want to table this today because we're working up against an extension. So, um, we have room for a meeting for any amendments, but but with keep that in mind. [00:24:25] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: And Mr. Mayor, um, the applicant, not the city, but has to be the applicant can grant another extension if he wishes to, but that has to be him, not the city. [00:24:35] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Okay? And he can do that extension for whatever date he wants it to be, too. So, we but we could approve approve it. Uh removing condition six or with the condition that item number six needs to be I guess it would be struggling here. [00:24:50] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: Mr. Mayor, members of the council, condition six is worded kind of how we've discussed it. It does say that all proposed easements shall be subject to review and approval by the city attorney and city engineer prior to the release of the RLS for recording. So, you could approve it tonight and then we can maybe work things out and hopefully I mean then there's a a deadline ticking with the RLS that they have to get that recorded right within six months. But at least it's approved. [00:25:15] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: They can record the RLS if we have the two bids or the bids to get both track A and B. Is that what I'm hearing? [00:25:20] **John Picha (Applicant)**: That that sounds good to me. And I would just want to make sure that the as Ashley was saying there there's room for an amendment that there's a little bit of added wording about um what that about as I've said a couple times tying the easement to those bids or or upon approval of bids city agrees to vacate the easement. [00:25:40] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Well, we'll need the easement for the utility itself, not just a blanket easement over the whole parking lot because the utilities, they're public utilities. So, they'll need a public easement over them. [00:25:50] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: Yeah, Mr. Mayor. Um, I'm not sure if the applicants understanding it correctly. So, if we'd go this route, we would be basically you would be defining the easement before we put it on the property. So, there wouldn't be a blanket easement. Yeah, I don't think you want a blanket ement. Then we wouldn't have to vacate anything, right? [00:26:05] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Yeah. There that. Yeah, I'm sorry. That's more of what it is. Not vacating it, but just exact. Whatever those bids are, the city you guys have, whatever the line is, there's going to be need an easement over it. [00:26:15] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Yeah. We we don't want to mess up another parking lot anymore than anybody else. [00:26:20] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Yeah. So to clarify for the smart people, not me, [laughter] not necessarily hearing any specific amendments to the language. It's more so steps that need to be taken outside this chamber before it's the final recording occurs. [00:26:35] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: Mr. Mayor, members of council, that's correct. So you would approve the RLS tonight. It's still going to have the condition about the easement and then it's a question of getting myself and the city engineer satisfied with whatever they come up with once they get their bids so that they can record that easement when they do the RLS and then we'll let them record the RLS. The only downside with that is that you know there is a deadline on the RLS. They have to record it within six months of approval. But if they want to I mean you've done it before where they can come back in and get an extension if they need it. [00:27:05] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: So from a timeline perspective, you need to get the bids in and documentation in the next couple months. [00:27:10] **John Picha (Applicant)**: That would be doable. [00:27:12] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Is that acceptable to you? [00:27:14] **John Picha (Applicant)**: It is, but my only concern is I would like there to be a slight amendment to the language in paragraph six. So right now it reads, "The drainage and utility easement must be established along the entire north side of the building extending from the eastern property line to the western property line and shall encompass all areas outside of the building's footprint." Um, I would like there to be one more sentence in there stating upon approve something along these lines. Upon approved bids, city agrees Mr. Mayor. [00:27:40] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: I I think you could just take that sentence out because this myself and the city engineer will have control over the easement and take which sentence out? I don't think I'm looking at the in paragraph six. It says the drainage and utility easement must be established along the entire north side of the building. So that's describing the blanket easement. [00:28:00] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Okay. That's the part that's the part he doesn't like. [00:28:03] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: So So let's remove that first sentence and just have it start with the drainage and utility eas. That's the sentence. That's the one. Take out the second sentence. [00:28:10] **John Picha (Applicant)**: There we go. That's Thank you. That's what I'm saying the and shall portion of it the engine part because at the end of the day the final location is still to be determined by the engineer and location city. [00:28:20] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: I thought we leave that sentence except "The and shall encompass all areas outside of the building's footprint." We do want it to be running along the entire north side of the building extending from east to west. This still covers that because they're gonna you just need an easement where the utility line is. [00:28:38] **Sarah Werner (City Attorney)**: I do believe an easement the blanket easement is needed if they don't come back with a plan. So, and it's not based on bids. So I think if it if you add where he was saying add a sentence um or as reduced easement being or as reduced based on uh plans for um how the both tracks would be connected to sewer water. I think that might capture it. [00:29:05] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Can you say that one more time? So the reason behind that so it has so the beginning is all the way it is. I don't have it in front of me, but then it says it would be a comma or as reduced the easement being reduced um based on specific plans for how both buildings would be connected. [00:29:25] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: And you're saying it's important that we do include that versus just getting rid of it. What was the reason again? [00:29:30] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Uh in case in the six-month period they don't ever come back with plants. Got it. That would be the easement because then they'd have the We're only defining a blanket ement because we have no information in front of us and it would be up to the it's up to the applicant to bring us information to allow us to reduce it. [00:29:50] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Got it. So the concern would be if they don't come back. Now we have track A, track B, and track B doesn't have an say, but there's no specificity to it. Okay. All right. And it's already approved. Jack, just to to to re state that you're saying after the word footprint, after the word footprint, what? [00:30:12] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Comma, and see or as reduced um based on water and sewer connection plans for both track A and track B. [00:30:20] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Thank you. That accomplishes that takes care of my concern. [00:30:25] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Okay. If we add that or as reduced. [00:30:28] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Yeah. [00:30:30] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All right. or as reduced what? [00:30:32] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Or as reduced based upon water and sewer plans for track A and track B. [00:30:35] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Okay, thank you. I knew we could get to a consensus there. Okay so amendment has to occur afterwards. So move to approve proposed resolution of 2026-012 for the property located at 3481 Lever Avenue North based upon the findings of fact and the conditions presented in the staff report that we will amend later. Yeah, I should hit this one on four too. [00:31:00] **Ashley Maruso (Planning Staff)**: Council, I I have to interrupt. Um Mr. Mr. Picha would like to uh discuss condition four further driveway access area. [00:31:10] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Yeah. So, thank you. Driveway access area must be brought up to code ahead of any building permits for redevelopment. Um I just like yeah brought up the code but ahead of the permits makes it a little tricky because if I've got permits to run uh my bids for water and sewer and other things that might affect what happens underneath uh the pavement. I don't want to be required to pave anything before that. [00:31:35] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: So I think it's just talking about the driveway access the full parking lot. [00:31:40] **John Picha (Applicant)**: Okay. So just as as the apron comes in there, so from a from a construction standpoint, it would not interfere with the work that your water and sewer is doing. Okay. All right. Very good. Yeah. Right. That's it. No. Yeah. All right. Cool. Thank you. [00:32:00] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Thank you. We got a motion. [00:32:04] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: There's a motion. [00:32:06] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: A second. [00:32:08] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All right. We have a motion and a second. Mr. Holtz and Mr. Hirn move to amend the motion so that the recommended conditions of approval in number six after the word footprint there is a comma that then says you think I can read that? Yes. Or as reduced based upon water and sewer plans for tract A and tract B. [00:32:30] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: Second. All right. And we have a second for the amendment. [00:32:35] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: I appreciate the amendment. The good conversation. I fully support the amendment. [00:32:40] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: I do as well. [00:32:42] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Any discussion? All right. All those in favor of the amendment, please signify by saying I. [00:32:46] **Council Members**: I. [00:32:48] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Amendments accepted. Uh any discussion on the original motion? Go ahead. [00:32:52] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: I like I know this has been a ton of work for staff like you guys did hours on this. I appreciate the applicant as well coming here providing the feedback. It this is just one of those issues. It it required this amount of dialogue. This it doesn't happen often like this where there's this much over something. But I thank you to all for a being able to do it professionally and coming to a resolution. This the way it's supposed to work. [00:33:15] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Great. All those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying I. [00:33:20] **Council Members**: I. [00:33:22] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Motion passes. Perfect. Thank you. Item number three, High Point Crossing Revised Concept Plan. Mr. First. [00:33:30] **Nathan First (Senior Planner)**: All right. Uh, good evening, uh, mayor, members of the council. Pull this presentation up and get rolling. So, uh, the High Point crossing concept plan is back in front of you here. Uh, we're going to have a a quick discussion after, uh, this concept has been, um, refined and resubmitted for our review. So, I think uh, you all remember pretty well the background of this project, so I won't belabor that much. Um, in September of 24, the city council approved the OPPUD that would have included 65 residential units and in a homestead. Um, the property area is just under 80 acres. There are six wetlands on it. And, um, the applicant will be here and happy to talk about some of the background and what led to where we are now. Uh, in terms of public infrastructure considerations, we're looking at uh, city water required. uh no longer looking at community septic or public sewer and now looking at that individual treatment or individual septic systems for the lots. There would be a required roadway connection to Imperial Avenue from Inwood. Uh council last looked at a couple of uh very draft concept plan alternatives in in summer of 20. I should read. All right. So the concept plan as as resubmitted is is on the screen here. We can reference this and it was also provided for your review in this in the staff report. You're seeing 18 um lots here u on a rural development with again uh private septic systems and city water with a roadway connection. In terms of land use, um this property is a relatively unique um future land use guidance as you will recall that allows from between 0.1 and two units per acre which would result in a really wide range of units. Um but when we look at the rural development, it kind of constrains things because we have septic. So um your your lot areas have to be two and a half acres at a minimum. Um, in this particular proposal, the applicant would need to reszone this property from its current residential rural residential to residential estate zoning. The residential estate zoning is the uh allows the smallest lots in the rural areas of Lake Elmo, again at 2 and a half acres. Um, and actually from a from a zoning standpoint with that residential estate zoning, um, this is a fairly straightforward request. The, uh, lots meet the zoning standards for lot width. Um, the buildings appear to meet setbacks. Um, we do have a relatively unique standard here for um, the the lot shapes. They have to be able to encompass a 250 foot diameter circle, which these lots are doing. Um and the the lots also have to have at least one and 1.25 acres which are free of easements or encumbrances. I think essentially the code is kind of contemplating um having like wetlands or other things within the properties water bodies um that would need protection. So in a high level review of this concept against your development standards um you know beyond the zoning we're looking at the lot configuration generally the lots that were in the submitted concept were compliant uh with one exception which could be revised. Um there are wetlands shown on private lots. And so again, um we haven't seen that in most recent developments, but most recent developments have been more urban in nature with smaller lots. And so you'll typically not see in those contexts wetlands within the lots. It's generally an issue with um just the areas that are allowed for building on those particular types of developments. In this case, larger lots. Uh looking at tree removal and landscaping, these will be reviewed in in future development reviews. Um with respect to transportation and access, Washington County did provide a comment letter um on this project that would require a turn lane if access is proposed along Inwood. Um importantly, and one thing that we will discuss here this evening is the rural road section that's proposed within the um concept plan. Uh this is also not a a a standard that the city has for new development. You will see rural road rural road sections across the city of Lake Elmo um but none have been recently approved. Um we have um requirements for storm water management. Of course you you will see five storm water ponds that are shown. Uh this slide says on on public outlots, but uh in fact the developer's preference would be to have those storm water ponds on the uh private lots as well. So that's another thing that we'll look to get your guidance on this evening. Generally speaking though regarding storm water management the engineering memo does identify a number of corrections on the concepts that were submitted that would be those corrections would be required to correct things such as the high water level of the ponds relative to the city booster station or home low floor elevations possible impacts of outfalls from storm water pipes to surrounding properties. So things would need to get refined further before this development could be acceptable from that standpoint. Regarding the individual septic systems, uh those areas would the septic systems generally would be mound septic systems on these individual lots. Uh they have the developer has received a letter from Washington County reviewing generally speaking the proposed septic systems for this uh development. uh corrections uh would be needed as identified in the engineering memo to avoid issues such as drain field locations that are in conflict with certain water bodies or other uh development features. Okay. So, uh we circulated this uh concept for review and got obviously I mentioned the city engineering memo. So, uh that memo dated January 26th 2026 does provide a number of comments. three ones that I want to elevate for you. Uh the first is that the city staff recommends an urban section roadway. The the second comment is that storm water pond design uh doesn't seem to be fully compliant or it's not with the existing standards. And third, the individual septic systems uh drain field locations would would need revision. Uh the city's fire department provided a review memo with the same date as the engineering memo. Washington County memo I've already mentioned. I did want to talk about uh very briefly the city of Oakdale provided some comments that were specifically requesting a trail connection through a development on this site uh to the Lake Elmo Park Reserve. I'm going to go back to the aerial and illustrate this. So, generally speaking, the comments were either looking for a connection that would be in between existing um residential lots like along the side lot line connecting into a nearby roadway in the city of Oakdale or the comments were requesting some type of a trail connection through an outlot that's owned by the city of Oakdale. And I apologize for how small that is on this. Maybe I can zoom in. that outlot is here. Uh that outlot, if you're looking at the cursor, is almost entirely encumbered by a wetland, right? So, if a trail connection were requested, it's it's very it's unclear how would there be a boardwalk, where where would that trail connect? How? So, um both of those comments were were definitely um you know, fair fair comments, but I think the implementation of both of them would be a challenge. If you look back up at the aerial, you'll see um just the number of residential units that are to the west of this site. Um this type of a trail connection would be almost regional in nature considering that most folks would probably try to be going to and from the park reserve. So it seems that um other roadway corridors might be a better fit for a regional trail connection. So, I just wanted to talk through that uh comment because I don't know that we've talked about that before in relation to this property. Lastly, I know that the developer is working on or have met with the Valley Branch Watershed District and would have to continue working with them to meet their rules and requirements. So, um I do want to talk about those two areas that we we're looking for your guidance here this evening. So, the first one uh is storm water ponds and infiltration basins on private lots. um we're we're looking to kind of cover some ground talking about these non-standard elements to kind of provide you with generally what what would it mean to allow for these in the city and why might we or might we not recommend. So, uh, with the first one, storm water ponds and other basins on private lots, um, potentially the pro for approving something like this would be that the city actually overall would own fewer public parcels. Um so in in you know in looking at the cons for this and probably why the city hasn't approved these more recently um there are a number of areas where staff might have concern including um potential misunderstandings with homeowners when it comes time to maintain those storm water ponds on their properties. folks may feel like they have um you know have to uh you know create challenges or other things with the city to you know look into their own interests. There might be access challenges to get back to storm water ponds uh that are on someone's property. um as and you know if they were publicly owned it would be clear what is public and what is private. um, you know, if the city does have access challenges, then that could create maintenance delays or other inefficiencies. um, talking about the actual functionality of public versus private storm water ponds, typically the city or other public organizations will have a more rigorous maintenance schedule and so they might be maintaining or dredging ponds more frequently or doing that other maintenance that's needed. um, increasing the again. So, increased upon dredging costs and lastly, um, property value concerns. So, I will invite senior engineer Griffin to these are the comments made from Valley Branch Watershed District, Greg. [00:43:00] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Nope, sorry. U, these are these are sta city staff comments on considerations for storm water ponds on private lots. And I'll invite engineer Griffin to provide a little bit more color here. Thank you, Mayor councel. Um yeah, these are these are my comments just um basically um since I've been here, we've put storm water ponds on public outlots. We do u when we're in commercial areas or private ponds um large apartment buildings, they own their they own and operate their ponds and then we we encumber them by easements, but we don't maintain the systems. And then we have easement maintenance agreements. If they don't do the maintenance, we can go in and do the maintenance for them. But in all residential developments, we have them on out lots that are owned and dedicated by the city. And the main thing is it's it's mainly maintenance driven and access driven. Um in practice, um when you're maintaining anything, and we even experienced this every street project when we're redoing street projects, you guys get the emails on um when property owners put their irrigation systems in our rightway. So that is that is even our property and we end up in debates over who has to restore that. Now you can imagine going down side lot lines and being in the rear of lot lines and things like that when you do these maintenance activities. You'll run into fences, dog fences. You'll run into trees that they've planted. They don't know where their easements are. They know where their lot lines are. And so they encumber those easements. They put things in the way. Um and then we can't, you know, we have to use enforcement to get them out of the way. If it's our property, we can remove them. If they're if it's their property, we have to enforce the removal. So, it delays maintenance. It delays our activities um and access. Um when you're dredging those ponds, it's not done very often, maybe every 25, 30 years. When you're dredging those ponds, sometimes those that sediment is considered contaminated and you either have to haul it very expensively and dispose of it as a contaminated soil, but you are allowed to just put it on the banks and and pull it up and put it on the shores. If it's private property, you're most you're much less likely going to be allowed by that homeowner to do that. If it's your if it's your property, you're you're able to do that. So, there's just a whole host of things you run into. Um, it can be done either way, but it's a lot more difficult to maintain these systems and have access to them through enforcement than it is to have the property outright. [00:45:30] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: Just a quick question right on that. As far as for with the cons here for that, how would you say this differs from more of the the the areas of higher development that where we've put this into place with a lot of the storm water ponds where it's been in neighborhoods where there's much more dense uh buildout. Is there less of a concern with some of these things that you bring up since this is going to be a much less dense development? [00:45:50] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Um, you know, you're less likely. There's some things that are less um risky, you know, like you're less likely uh when they're going to put a fence up on a two and a half acre lot, they're not going to fence the whole two and a half acre. If you're on a urban area, they're fencing the lot line and they're going to be right in your way. So maybe a fence isn't or a dog fence isn't the obstacle, but that doesn't stop them from putting we we still see in your in your large rural areas, we still see playgrounds, we still see trees, particularly a lot of people put up trees to buffer and they plant those right down the lot lines and things like that. So there's still obstructions um that potentially will get placed in your way and you only come by every so often and so you know those then you have to deal with those obstructions before you can even access um access the pond. I think the biggest difference between the two and a half acre lots and your sewer lots um in the sewer lots we also require wetlands and other water bodies that we're not necessarily maintaining. We require them to be fully on out lots as well. And that main thing is just to provide a usable backyard and and make sure your flood management is staying off of those lots and things like that. [00:47:00] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: Are there specific storm water ponds in this as kind of just shown here in this depiction that stand out as more concerning than others? Are there certain ones that as you look at the drawing right now or with these this list of cons that doesn't even really concern you? lot. So, I think I'm just wasting your time. [00:47:20] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Okay. And that's what I say. It looks like in the drawing. So, you've moved them all to lots. [00:47:25] **Nathan First (Senior Planner)**: They I showed them just as they are right now. They're all in out. I was just going to open up the possibility, but we can accept them invest the pros and cons from the developer standpoint but I mean, I could argue these points. I think there is to do what Jack is saying as far as just their there can be issues but I I I just did three ponds in Janet utilities their city funds they're able to maintain them it's not it's not a black and white kind of thing there's some great but I access is an issue if they don't have it I think you're trying to provide access we're doing fair enough. Right all right so that brings us to the other topic here that we're looking for some guidance from council on and that would be uh the potential uh for a new rural road section for for new development to be clear. So um again looking at the kind of the pros and cons of this you know if the city created a new rural road section uh it potentially be less costly for uh for construction initially uh potentially could also allow then for new or different forms of development in the city in certain areas. Um looking at some of the drawbacks um potentially these roadways are more costly for the city to maintain um both the roadway and the associated drainage ditch. So let me back up and um kind of narrate what is the difference between an urban and a rural road section. Typically your urban road section is a you know batuminous drive uh drive area with two lanes most often with a standard curb and there's storm sewer that runs along that or brings the storm water that's collected on the road into a storm basin. A rural road section generally speaking is going to have drainage swailes that run parallel to the roadway which uh eventually direct storm water through conveyance on the surface uh into a storm water pond. So that's the primary difference between those uh and and the distinction. So when we talk about potentially being more costly for the city to maintain, that could include mowing those drainage dishes or doing other maintenance um you know more regularly. Uh reduced roadway or drainage system service life. So um I'll let Jack talk a little bit more about that particular one if you have questions. Generally speaking, it's understood that uh the urban section is is going to be constructed for and last for a longer period of time. Uh sometimes property owners have um concerns over how the drainage system in front of their property is maintained. So again, uh thinking about those drainage swailes in front of someone's lot uh when when the city comes out to maintain them. Some people may may not want to see the vegetation go. Some people might be excited. um, you know, again, the city uh would have to think about in a new section. Uh, what are what are our expectations for street trees, um, sidewalks or trails or or what other features that we might typically have in the urban section. And lastly, uh, thinking about impacts to publicly owned and maintained storm uh, storm water ponds. Uh, if we don't have good enough conveyance of that storm water into the ponds, do they dry out or is there other issues that are created by that? So again, um there are some technical items here that I'll be happy to um lean on Jack more to to describe, but those are generally speaking the pros and cons for for this consideration. All right, the last slide I've got prepared, we have the again those two areas for evaluation. Um if you know skipping past the storm water BMPPS section just looking at the rural road um considerations. Number one, um if the city council wants to move forward with the creation of a new or allowing for a rural road section, uh staff recommended staff recommend that uh we be directed to review and create design standards for this type of a a rural road and um bring that back with uh recommendations. Um so that would be the first consideration. Uh the second would be to better understand what the expectations are. car. Do we want to see sidewalks or trails uh in a rural road or are we comfortable without those types of features? Uh the the third question here is um just potentially, you know, is the city comfortable with the potential for higher maintenance costs? And lastly, um if design of the storm water uh swailes is a concern, uh should the city consider public final design in these situations? So, um, that's really those are the those are the questions that we're looking for your help and guidance on. Um, the last slide here is simply uh the the development plan if we need to reference it. So, um, yeah, again, this is a non-binding review, but we will appreciate the feedback that we're given this evening. [00:52:15] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Okay. Um I will remind you that the obviously the developer Paul's here and uh he does have some slides for you as well just to explain kind of from his perspective and so I I just want to mention that in case you want to hear from him before you discuss or you'd like to move forward. [00:52:30] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Any questions for Mr. First or Mr. Griffin before we hear from the developer? Yeah, I think it's a question for the entire room really. Did we not just take out a rural road section? I think it was in like Kirkwood or something along those lines and weren't allowing them to put rural road back in. It had to be upgraded curb and gutter. [00:52:50] **Nathan First (Senior Planner)**: I don't know if that's the right neighborhood, but there was a there was a neighborhood that had rural road that needed to be upgraded with the ones we did just last year. [00:53:00] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Yes. Yep. I just want to make sure that that was we took out they have the two curb and gutter didn't they replace with concrete did we replace with concrete or ribbon curb yeah if it's so we have existing roads throughout the um you know all the county roads all the uh major collector roads 20th streets things like that are rural section once you've designed a rural section road it's not it's pretty rare to convert it when you reconstruct it so when we have a rural section road and we go into reconstruction mode, we we try to go in and redo that road with minimal disturbance to the drainage system. Otherwise, you have to revamp the entire drainage system and install storm sewer and it becomes quite cost prohibitive to to convert it. So um one of the main things we have done when we do uh an existing railroad and we reconstruct it is we are putting a concrete ribbon curb on it and that is the standard that was shown in your packet is that's for our reconstruction of those roads and that's just to hold the edge because we were seeing failure on those roads early starting from the outside cracking um where the shoulders would be washed away and things like that. [00:54:15] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Okay. So if it was constructed as a railroad, it wouldn't once it needs to be replaced in 25 30 years, we wouldn't have to reconstruct it and go back to curbon gutter. [00:54:22] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Correct. Thank you. probably get more into this too, but when you were talking about the storm water swailes and the the grass and the mowing of that, is that is that right away for the city or is that responsibility of the homeowner for mowing that? That responsibility um well the homeowner takes it over just like they do the back of the curb. Yeah. But it is the responsibility of the city. So that becomes the concern is along the entire side of both roads you have a rural drainage ditch and are you maintaining enough slope to keep that drainage going or does something now get placed as a home you know you get homeowners some will uh maintain a meticulous lawn right up uh through the ditch. Others will let the weeds grow things like that. So over time you end up with obstructions that can hold the water up and then the water soaks into the ground. And with our underllaying drainage sections, it's possible that you start to undermine the road through he's water is your worst enemy to a road. So what we're trying to do is get the water away from the road as fast as as you can. A drainage system is a way you can do that, but it becomes harder to maintain and over the duration of the system to keep it functioning as that's as it's supposed to. [00:55:35] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: And I don't want to get too far into it, but maybe this is kind of like, you know, if this was brought back with how do we go about if we did say, yeah, we do want to allow these rural road sections, you know, like when we're talking about the the trails and sidewalks and the responsibility of snow removal. I mean, is this something that can be discussed is if that's brought back and this is something we move forward with where, you know, this is the responsibility of the homeowner and just like if they're not keeping proper care of their lawn normally and it's cut to or it's too high of a length, you know, they they can receive a citation for that or is there something similar that we could do for this situation if we did go down that route to at least try to put some sort of um protection that the the grass would be kept so we aren't doing as much water issues. [00:56:15] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: I I think that would be difficult [laughter] but uh one of the reason so if the council wants to move forward the real road one of the reasons we say in this presentation that we need to be directed to go back and create that standard is because we don't really you know right now we have a requirement that sidewalks are along every along every new street that we build for developments. Are we going to put a sidewalk if we're doing rural roads? Um, we have Boulevard tree standards. Well, so suddenly Boulevard tree standards, our standards are put hydrants five feet back a curb. We're not going to put the hydrant in the ditch. We're not going to put the street lights in the ditch. So, suddenly our whole boulevard has to be redesigned as to where we're putting everything. Yeah. So, we would need to be directed to go back and put that together for the [00:57:05] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: Thank you, member Holtz. Was there any conversation about the road width as well? say obviously there's a storm water and a request to not have gutter. Was the road width still similar to what is directly to the north that it's connecting to or would is the I is the request to have a smaller road did I read that it was 70 ft of rightway. [00:57:25] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: He the the proposal is a 28 foot wide road and a 70 foot rideway. It is narrower than Lake Elmo Heights but it that's but it's our standard and there would be a transition into that. All right. Is that all for questions? We can listen to Mr. Robinson. Got your slides right. [00:57:45] **Paul Robinson (Developer)**: Mayor, council members, Paul Robinson, Rachel Development back again. You know, here we are. Uh third different, you know, our third proposal. I hope third time is a charm here. Um, I I have a we have a little bit to chew on tonight. And I, you know, I'm hoping we're getting to a plan that we all can approve. Um, I do think there's a little bit of help I still need to make this thing go. Um, and so let's get into it. And I'm going to I got a lot of thoughts that kind of came up as things were going along, so I hope I don't start getting off track. Um, but as you know, as was mentioned, this is a kind of unique property. It's rural single family. So, I do think that and there's really only two properties like it in the city that are bigger than 20 acres. So, if you wanted to start with some baby steps, you could just allow this enroll single family and see how it goes um without opening the floodgates. Uh you know, when we went through the OPUD process, and I will will note this that the OPUD does allow one acre septic lots. So, that you could get 78 lots on here. Why I didn't do that and why I picked the rule residential estate as well is we had so many issues with the community septic system failing or not being able to get approved. I didn't want to risk getting coming forward with something I couldn't get septic systems to work on. So that's why that didn't get used. So um but anyway, my point with the opud is that we we worked together and there was a lot of flexibility that we had to sort of decipher to get that to work within the code. Um, with the residential estate, I think we're, as was mentioned, I'm we're really meeting all the standards, but I do need some flexibility when it comes to the engineering standards. Can you guys hear me? Okay. Yes. Um, so last time, so it was back in um it was in October that I was here kind of with this sketch plan, kind of a rough sketch plan with the idea of like, hey, what if I came with just no public infrastructure, like you know, no water, you know, private wells, private septic, you know, wetlands and ponds and lots and just private driveways. That was kind of the idea. And um and then you know I think with that idea uh you we all chatted about it and this is what I came away with is that you you all like the idea of larger lots that there hasn't been that many large lot developments that have been coming along and that this seemed like a unique idea. We should try to make it work. I think there was some understanding of this challenge this sort of urban infrastructure but yet rural densities and trying to just make the numbers work with that kind of a of a metric. um and a willingness to just seek ways to reduce cost but not without giving away the bank. I mean you want to protect your assets and um I think there was some general acceptance with wetlands and ponds in the lots at that time and also okay with uh you know people were okay with private drives. So this was so in October. So then in November, I met with staff and you know, they were receptive to the wetlands and buffers in the lots, but they were unsure about the ponds and with many of the reasons you just saw tonight and they agreed that the city council liked this idea of larger lots and wanted to try to find a way to help me get there. um thought that they probably would need to create a new zoning district for it. And again, here I am, you know, in November. I I won't I would rather not lose another construction season. So I'm like, hm, you know, maybe that's not the best of things to just have to go through that process. Um, and then we talked about PVC versus ductal iron pipe for the water mane. And actually, I think that that um engineering staff was receptive to, you know, to PVC because it is very standard. It is I'm going to say 60 or 70% of the cities in the metro are using it now. But there was this four to five months of study that was needed and it was going to be needed to come back to the council. And so I was thinking, okay, you know, my is that going to delay my project by another six months if I push the idea. So I kind of dropped it for the time being. I'm going to bring it up again tonight, though. Um, and then there was just concern about private driveways and figuring out standards, kind of like what you're hearing tonight about, you know, changing standards. Um, also, and nothing to do with the city, the county indicated that no matter how many lots were on there, they were still going to require a full turn lane. um they just, you know, put new turn lanes on both the the Lake Elmo Heights and they put new turn lanes on at Tory Pines and they told me it was a half a million dollars for each of those projects. And so um but unfortunately we ran we were not in the right timing for that. Uh and then the Valley branch, we talked to Valley Branch and basically their treatment standards don't change. You know, we we have to basically follow the exact same rules no matter what we come forward with. So again, we picked the rural state because that the residential estate because that just seemed like the path of least resistance. You know, it's a known quantity. We have the standards and we meet them. And so and so we used this is the kind of quick sketch we put together because now I'm in November, right? Um I had to switch engineering firms too, which is another problem that just took a little bit of time. But but I I need to get all this testing done before the ground freezes. And so a little bit of a panic trying to pull this off in November. Um and and what I'm trying to just tell you right now is just what we did in this plan. And so we just we said, "Yep, we'll we'll add city water main." Um again, we gave up on this idea of PVC initially just because of the time, but when we looked at the cost of it, it's almost, you know, a million dollars in cost to do this. If we go to PVC, we sp we save around 20 to 30%. So we can save almost $200,000. So that still seems like something that's worthwhile. Um we also picked the city rules, you know, road standard. Again, we're in rural single family. It seemed like something in the engineering standards that said typical residential rural street section would be allowed in a rural residential neighborhood. um, we got an inkling of that with our meeting that that wasn't the case. That that I knew that Jack had wanted to look at, you know, coming to the council with an urban standard, but that but up until that we'd had many conversations back and forth with that kept talking about trying to get rid of the ribbon curb because I always thought that was the standard uh in the city. Here's what that looks like. I think staff just kind of wanted me to show kind of how that looks across the way. So, here you see the, you know, the the asphalt section, which it would be, you know, 24 26 feet. And then you see the two twoft concrete curbs. This is in um Park View Estate. So, this is just right here in town. And you can see, you know, a project that that that works in and how it looks. Um, and then we put this the storm water ponds in outs. Um, we we have since updated the plan. So, when we got the staff review memo, we actually responded and answered to all of the staff comments and provided an updated plan. That was about a week ago um or maybe even a week and a half ago. And you'll see that plan later. Um, we added back the county turn lanes. Um, and basically our simple 11 lot rule plan turned into a more complicated sort of rural urban 18 lot plan. And we needed we, you know, if I could have added more lots, I probably would have because we needed those additional lots to pay for all of that urban infrastructure we just added. So, here's our residential estate plan. This is our updated plan. Um, again, we meet all the all the requirements. Um, I'm just showing you these big yellow areas because anywhere in that yellow area is where a house could go. These are really nice large pads that would accommodate all kinds of housing types in a lot of different places. Um the only variance we're asking for is the same one we did with our PUB for the OPPUD which was just to keep the existing farmstead. We want we need a front yard setback because that's just where it exists today. Again we have that we put all the 250 foot radiuses. We did the 3 to one. I don't know if everybody knows what that means but if the width is 275 ft the length can't exceed three times that. So, we have to show that the length is less than 825 ft in this case. So, that's just, you know, what we went through for each lot. Um, the septic systems, there's a lot of talk about whether or not we complied with or didn't comply with the septic systems. I would say that we we intended to comply with all of the requirements. We had many conversations with the county. our my engineer inadvertently put two homes these these concept homes we threw on the plan 10 feet away instead of 20 feet away but other than that I believe we met all of the requirements um the 75 ft from water bodies was a little confusing but I clarified with the count you know with the county that you know like a lake is anything 10 acres or greater so when you have a water body that's less than 10 acres they call it a pond that's in their definition and so I think it's easy to then assume assume that maybe they mean storm water ponds, but they don't. They're talking about natural water bodies, like a pond that's natural, not a storm water pond. Any pond created in Upland is not does not have a setback to it by the county. And so we we we did there is a rule in in the in the engineering standards that says 35 ft to infiltration basins. And so we and now, you know, you saw in the staff report, they're calling it now BMP. So we we in this updated plan removed our ponds 35 ft from the from the areas indicated although I don't think that's a requirement personally. um, and so to get these these all these areas located we had to do over 170 soil tests. So we did we went all over did all these soil tests to identify the areas. Once you do that once you find four areas so you can get 10,000 square feet then the county comes back in and again we're in November trying to beat the freezing ground. So the county comes back and they have to do two tests randomly within your box and they did that and then that proves out that you have adequate area and so then those areas are 10,000 square feet in size. So like a primary system when you go get your actual permit for a septic site typically they're about 75 by 25. That's the size. So they're 1875 square feet. Let's call it 2,000. So you could put five primary systems in each one of these red boxes. So it's a very conservative analysis. the county will admit it. They they this is this is to cover their worst case so that they know that there's an area on the site that can handle the septic. I'm feel good about it because now I know that this is going to work. But when you go to then the next step which is actually so we received actually a letter that says we have subdivision approval from Washington County. It's not just hey you did a good job you're generally okay. It's actually this is what we needed. The next step when you go to the county is that when you get a building permit, you have to get a septic design. Then that's when you that's when the rubber hits the road on the septic site and then they look at the drain them and typically more than more than not they don't end up in any of the red box areas that I'm showing because they get to go put four more tests wherever they want to prove out their area and they did just do a fifth test to prove out their secondary site. I I think we have a lot of flexibility. I feel like what I'm showing staff memo, you know, telling you that it might have been a problem. And so then we also just took a a gander at all of the residential estate projects that have been done to date in this in the city. I I'm bringing back a vintage zoning again. I think this is u to the to the forefront. So all in all of those cases, all of the storm ponds are on the lots and and and in all those cases where there's wetlands, all the wetlands and the wetland buffers are located on lots. All of which and they're all located in drainage and utility ements. So and I'm just giving you examples. So if you look at all, you know, six, here's six I pulled up, um you can see where the wetlands are on the site. The wetlands are all on the lots. Just Tory Pines right to the south. um Lake Elmo Heights to the north. The wetlands are on the ponds or on the lots. If you look at where where the ponds are, ponds, you know, all over on the lots and they're within drainage utility easements and a lot of the drainage utility easements are located adjacent to roads, so there's access for maintenance. And again, I'm not fighting that fight tonight, but I'm just letting you know. [laughter] um, this is my last item that is really the rural road one. um, and I I'm going to appeal to your common sense a little bit. If you just think about driving across America and looking AC where we where everything in America, 60 to 75% of the roads in the United States are rural roads. They are asphalt with a gravel shoulder with a ditch. That's the most common road you can find in America. Here's a couple examples of two one from 1979 90 and 91 just in adjacent communities. I I would just submit to you that if the value were there for curb that you would likely not be the only community around that's doing like a ribbon curb to protect the edge of a rural road that most rural roads would have curbs if the value were there long term And I'm going to give you some examples and you can just keep thinking about it. I know this is not where you've been. um, I also don't think there's a need for sidewalk. We only have 18 lots with 78 acres. I mean there in in most rural areas people are very comfortable walking on these roads. They're they're real roads. There's very little traffic on them. The we we initially accepted the idea that we would just do this ribbon curb. We would do the real road with the ribbon curb. But after kind of thinking this through and having and putting this presentation together, I really realized that I actually don't think ribbon curbs even necessary. And that actually provides us even a greater benefit. And so I would like you to consider that. um, staff is obviously asking for an urban road section which when I was here last I was really trying to minimize my my infrastructure costs and that's really going to the almost opposite extreme by trying to take it even more into a higher realm. Couple other issues raised just even again tonight. You know where are we going to put fire hydrants? Well here's here's a fire hydrant. It's five feet back of the curb. It's down you know in the ditch. This is where all of them are located in most um urban road section or rural road sections. I don't really feel like there's a huge issue here. I think this is common and this is one that's here in the city. um, there was issues raised about ADA standards. Well, there won't be ADA standard problems if there's no sidewalk. So that's kind of sometimes when you have regulation, it creates more regulation problems. And then the maintenance concerns. I mean, just again on a gut level, this is these are going to be$2 to3 million homes. They are not going to be they are going to maintain their front yards just like you're going to see in any other upper end community. And you can drive through some of these neighborhoods right around here that are in this kind of upper Elmer realm. there's two I'm going to show you in Woodbury. could go done by custom one homes and you can see what people do and how they maintain their ditches. It's it is I mean it isn't an invalid concern. If somebody blocks the ditch, it does cause a problem and somebody's going to call the city. So, I get that part, but I don't I think it's very rare. So, if you look here, the first one on the top here, that one in Orno, I did that project 24 years ago that I called one of the residents there just this week and asked him if he's ever had any issues with that. It's called Willow View. um, and he he said they've they've chip sealed the road one time, but otherwise they haven't done any other maintenance to that road. So, that's just a real road in Orno. I guess I'm just showing you these because you can see a variety of years. You can see some that are really old. You can see some that are just done like the one in Corkran just a couple years ago. This is a very common standard. It's being done in very upper end communities. It's being done in not so upper end communities. It is. It's ubiquitous. Here's just a couple more examples. And there's two in Woodbury. I would just say that of another city, if you were, it's right here just south of you that has a very sophisticated engineering staff, very sophisticated city, I would just submit to you, they if they thought there was value in concrete curb, they would be doing it. And and just to just be real about what we have out there today, and you've talked about it tonight, which is very convenient. um you know in Lake Elmo Heights they had the asphalt curb so they did do sort of a quasi urban section with the asphalt curb and like you heard water kills roads and I think what happened on a lot of these asphalt curb roads is the the the storm sewers are actually quite a ways apart on them so I think that was just an older standard and I think water sat on these roads the concrete curb the the asphalt curb got kind of old and water seeps in and around these roads and I think that's really deteriorated to some degree a a lot of these rural roads that you have in your town. And then Tory Pines to the south, they have curb and gutter. I don't know how that happened. I know there's a couple residents residential state projects that do have curb and gutter, but again, I've I've kind of made the case that I just don't think, you know, that we can't really afford that urban standard. And so, and now I'm just going to summarize my my my presentation. And I I did write these up too, but just we're asking for the to just use the railroad standard 804. Ideally, we just like 3-foot gravel shoulders and no concrete curb. That would be our ideal as a backup. You know, we'll just accept the 80 the 804 standard with the concrete curb as you've been installing them recently. It's just it's an extra couple hundred,000 that I just don't think adds a lot of value. um, and I and I'm really concerned about just adding a lot of delay to any project that we're coming forward with where I mean we're hearing from Jack that he's going to have to go back and put together all kinds of standards and it's you know there's going to be so much time the staff's going to have to think about this. I just I really would like to find a way that we could move this forward without having to have months of delay to try to create new standards because I think that you've actually implemented these things in the city already. And then um I would like to have wetlands and buffers allowed in the lots. And then you know I put one more page just sort of help me. Let's work together. you know again um I would like I think that I would like you to tonight you know direct staff to allow PBC is for for water man in a way that doesn't necessarily have to slow down my approvals not have to wait four or five months for a whole standard to be created. There are just dozens and dozens of engineering standards just surrounding you here with for PVC. I I think it could be done quicker. When it comes to storm water, I I just if we receive valley branch approval, can't that be enough? Like does there really need to be a whole another set of review? We have so much duplicative review in this state on so many things, especially storm water wetlands. Couldn't I feel like for the most part I'm being pushed to just get Valley Branch's approval. So, if I get their approval, can that be enough? There's some additional recommendations that kind of came up on the staff report about synthetic pond liner and all these other things. Well, that's not really one of it's not really in the code. And so, I'd rather try to get approval than adding more and more cost. Septic design location. Again, if we meet the the Washington county's rules, why do there's why do I need to then kind of go through another the city interpreting the county's rules and trying to enforce them on me? because at the end of the day, the city's the one that permits it. So, and I appreciate you giving me the time. I really think that this is a good project if we can pull it off together. um, the planning commission and the neighbors have basically been asking for this kind of this development as I'm presenting it, which really mimics and looks like both of the two, you know, Tory Pines and Lake Elmo Heights. So, I I appreciate you listening to me for that long and I'm sorry, but I brought [01:14:45] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Any questions for uh Paul? [01:14:48] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: Get one. I did not get one. You took his so I took yours. [01:14:52] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Sounds about right. Do you have any Did uh have any questions for Mr. Robinson? [01:14:55] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: Question for staff like with Park View because we just redid their roads with 3M grants and we changed them as I recall. Does that do we have storm water? Do we have um park states is [01:15:10] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Park is rural with a ditch? Yeah, that's ditches there. Correct. [01:15:15] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: What do you mean by hybrid? [01:15:17] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Well, Whistland Valley is the same way. There were some areas that are urban. I mean, you can sometimes drive and you if you drive in our rural areas, there's no you have curb and gutter uh with a grade coming to the road on one side and you have a ditch on the other side and that swats, you know, it's it's all over the place. So, it's on the conveyance of the water. Depends. Okay. [01:15:35] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: So really, since there's no motion, we just talk. [01:15:37] **Nathan First (Senior Planner)**: Well, until there's a motion, you can ask questions. Is that what we were looking for tonight? [01:15:45] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: What's that? [01:15:47] **Nathan First (Senior Planner)**: Are we looking for a motion tonight? I thought we were more looking for [01:15:52] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: Well, yeah, there is no motion really. It's just asking for direction. So, because is the is the the goal coming back next month or based off of the feedback that we provide tonight? [01:16:00] **Paul Robinson (Developer)**: One thing I didn't I mean what I didn't mention it's like honestly honestly I started this because I thought this was the path of least resistance. I thought I was picking an engineering standard that was in your book that would work. I was picking a zoning district that was you know in your zoning code and and I guess I mean the direction tonight Yes, there's no formal the sketch plan has no formal direction, but I'm going to be at the mercy of staff if you don't give for formal direction and and I really I think at this point we you you've heard what I really need and I feel like if you could if you agree with me that would be great and if you don't then I got I guess I need to know and and I and and again I personally would my goal would be to submit a pre-plat within a week or two. That would be my ideal goal. um, and I mean there is, you know, if you read the staff memo, it says that they won't accept a pre-plat application until I resubmit a sketch plan, which I have. I resubmitted a sketch plan, but the sketch plan has no binding. There's no there's no binding thing. So So I don't know how you hold me up to coming in with a pre-plat if I'm waiting for a non-binding approval. [01:17:15] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All right. Well, I'll I'll I'll shoot from the hip here real quick. I don't think I was just taking some notes and so I'm cool with the rural section. I do think uh less my common sense leaves me that ribbon curb is something that we've done in other areas, I do believe in it. I did, as you were speaking, Mr. Robinson, take a look at the river willow Willow River Road. I think there's probably been something done more than just a chip seal on that road when I see some scaling of the batuminous in various spots and the cracking that's displaying. So, I wouldn't concede the point that I've made previously on concrete ribbon. Um, but to that point, if others on the council feel that it's not necessary, I'm not ready to die on the cross over it. I do think that that areas that we have rural sections do get uh taken care of by the property owners to the extent that it's isn't something that's dreadful. uh PVC versus ductal iron pipe. I have absolutely I know there's hundreds of communities that use PVC. I don't know that ductal iron has to be the end of the point as far as coming up with some uh requirement whether it's schedule 40 PVC or it's C900 or whatever that can be done just by I know Balden make has many communities it works in. I would be flabbergasted if they didn't have one that used PVC just to pull that and and make it so um that's just my comment. Um we don't really have to talk about the ponds because all those have been put in out lots. um, but I do agree it it creates a bit of an issue on the maintenance side when they're they're not in an out lot. I that that would be something I'd rather not get complaints on and calls from residents because we have to go maintain them and they think it's their property. um I don't I like all the work that's been done with the um septic fields. We as a city do not permit those. I feel like um I understand it that if Washington County is permitting them and they meet the requirements, I don't know why we would stand in the way of that happening. Uh as with Valley Branch Watershed District, the high water mark. I understand there's some concern with the uh what what is the station there? It's in it's on the norththeast section, the pump station that we don't want that affected adversely. So I'm sorry we move that where that the council's still still discussing this. So that's that's kind of where I I sit with my comments. That would be my direction. [01:19:40] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: If I jump in ahead um I I'm in favor of providing as much flexibility as possible. I think these are all very reasonable. Um I think when this came to us as the opud originally we had the discussion of you know does this really make sense anymore for developers from a financial perspective. I think we have to look at this from a similar perspective if we want some rural development. I think we do have to reconsider um some of our standards for that. And you know, I guess to your point about um wanting to have this go, you know, quicker than than not because, you know, this has been something that you've been working on for a while. um I I I am I am okay with all of these and I I I guess even with the rural road, I was I was a little surprised. I was I was thinking maybe you were going to push back on that a little bit more. So I was kind of waiting to hear your your comment on that. [01:20:30] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: I'm okay with the rural road. I I would like to see the the concrete ribbon because that's what our standard shows is the concrete ribbon on the edge. You can take a picture of a roadway in a rural section and and to to the advent that people would build more roads with concrete because the values there is kind of a two-edged sword. Sometimes townships and cities don't have that money to put into their roadway system. So, it's not an option for them and they get money sent down whether it's through the gas tax through a fairly complicated system through the legislature to give them money to maintain those. Yeah, we just see West Lakeland that they have some bit curb that's exacerbated the problem as it has in Lake Elmo previously by trapping some water, but they just had to do a very large uh bond bill that increased their taxes because they got to do a bunch of roads that are are rural in nature and and they're changing that. [01:21:20] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: Yeah. And so I I think that's where it's finding that right balance again of I don't want this to come off as you know we scrap the work that's been put into that with the the concrete curb for the more dense development that has taken place. But in this situation I I do think we need to figure out I I guess I'd always come back to this too. I feel like over the last 10 years we've allowed so much flexibility for developers to go the opposite way so we can overdevelop what what what we allow. And now we have somebody coming asking us to allow some variances and some flexibility to keep that number down. And I I just I'm much more in favor of allowing flexibility to keep the the numbers down versus giving flexibility to to go over what what we allow as a city. So I I do think I guess I probably don't need to continue. I think I made my point clear that I'm in favor of all of these and I think even with the um the ribbon curb I would be open to um not even requiring that. [01:22:25] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: I'm glad the ponding issue is not even before us. Um because that I think that actually will probably been a harder conversation in terms of rural road. The where I still come back to is the concrete edge. even if it's a rule section and it's not a curb to drain to storm sewer, the concrete edge still holds the road in place and that saves the city long-term costs. That that's the part where I I'm not as open to that. by if if it means it's draining into the ditch and it's being maintained by someone who owns a $2 million home, I don't necessarily have a concern from that regard because of the fact that someone who has that type of property is will be maintained yet. It is a valid concern to bring up because there are instances where that is going to be an issue. I don't think it would necessarily be an issue here. Um and this roadway is what a total of thousand feet long, maybe 1500 feet long. So, in terms of, you know, traffic impacts or not having a sidewalk, I don't I do not feel the need for there to be a sidewalk. Um, one could argue, you know, it would help provide access along with the road from the north at in Lake Elmo Heights. Um, but that's literally there's one row of houses that really benefit from that X. There's already a road to their north that extends eastward. So, I I don't necessarily see a need for a sidewalk to be there to then everyone's going to be on the road, all 17 houses. I don't I am not concerned from a pedestrian standpoint. And I if I had a concern, I I would absolutely say as much. Um, I guess I similar position as the two of you, but I I do support still having concrete on the edge to support the roadway. [01:23:55] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Oh, PVC. Yes, PVC. I'm fine. Council member Dragissuchich. [01:24:00] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Yeah, I I support the concrete edge along the roadway. Um, concern I have is, you know, we talk about $2 million houses are cutting their lawn right up to the road. That happens a lot, but that's not a guarantee because there's no requirement for them to do that. And you can go through West Lakeland Township where there are $2 million houses and they allow the brush to go right up to the right up to the road. And so I think if we if we go along with that and that's our assumption, we may find that may not be reality. And so maybe we need to take a look at our ordinance like we do with our sidewalks and say where there is a drainage you have to maintain that just like you would have to maintain a sidewalk in the city. You have to clean it. You have to maintain the boulevard. And that's more of a city I think issue than a developer issue. Um but we could in fact take a look at doing that to make sure that that swale, you know, is maintained. And you know a lot of times like you show they're very gradual. So they're not hard to maintain, but you still got to go out there and cut them and eat buckthornne or whatever and control all that kind of stuff. I don't have a problem with the PVC water man. A lot of cities use it. Um, personally, I think it's fine, but I would turn to our department and say, what is the standard we should specify for that that other cities are using or that in your best engineering judgment makes the most sense for the city of Lake Elmo. Um, but generally I think um, what's requested is reasonable. [01:25:25] **Council Member Nick Kragness**: Okay. Yeah, I I agree. I think the uh I agree with Councilman Holtz that I think the concrete ribbon to keep the road in place save the taxpayers money. I just I like the idea of having that concrete ribbon. I think it's more of keeping it consistent as well. Um and then the PBC pipe I'm no issues with at all. [01:25:45] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Mr. Mr. Mayor, members of the council, just regarding the pipe, um, you know, we have had over the decades cycles of where PVC pipe is cheaper and then we've had cycles where ductal iron is cheaper. It go it cycles back and forth depending on material costs and things like that. Um, but the one of there are probably more communities with PVC as a standard than ductal iron or maybe it's more equal. Um, I've personally have been in communities where PVC is our standard. So, it's not that the pipe doesn't work. I'm not aware of any city that has that allows PVC on this development, ductal iron in this one. I'm not aware of any city that just allows the developer to pick which pipe for which project. And so we have a standard for HDPE pipe, which is a plastic pipe that's meant for directional drilling, and we have a standard for ductal iron. My recommendation is if we're going to go to PVC that we change today for PVC moving forward for everything. It's not we don't want to start introducing a third pipe that we just start having now randomly interjected everywhere. That becomes something now that um your public works staff has to be prepared for. They start to have to have spare parts. They have to start having everything changes for your public works staff to be able to respond to breaks and things like that where they have to double up on tools and equipment. So, you want to have you want to go forward with either ductal iron or PVC and we can we can change. There is a time when communities change, but I I I I don't think it's appropriate to make a change for just one development here today. You should be thinking about this as your city your city standard moving forward. [01:27:15] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: I to that end u I would be okay switching to PVC in as much as um I think over the long term as far as flexibility, ability to work with, cut, fix maintain from what I've heard in the industry, it's typically easier to work with and so I would I would be okay with that change and and then the the process for the standards is important to talk about too because it's important to understand that um I stand before you as the engineer who does most of your development review but I try desperately not to work in a silo. I try desperately not to make these decisions on my own. When you do um when you do standards you get your team together. So, when you're designing a boulevard right away of are we going to have sidewalks? Are we going to have trails? We're going to have boulevard trees, are we going to what are we doing? Um, you get your planning staff together so that you blend your zoning ordinances together with them. You have public works staff involved from maintenance. You most cities have designets where you get together, you get all the department heads together. These aren't engineering design standards are probably the biggest misconception because I can design you whatever you want. A lot of those standards aren't mine. They're coming from the city from different facets and from different input. And so, um, when we do this, that's when I say I have to go back and create a standard, I have a lot of questions for public works. I have a lot of questions for planning. And we need to circle the wagons and come together with how what are we going to approve. I don't just take Paul's plans and go back on my own desk and work by myself and decide what it's all going to be. So, just we can do that as quickly as possible. We can work with them, but I just wanted to understood. [01:28:45] **Nathan First (Senior Planner)**: There there's a process that we that we that's important for us to follow. [01:28:50] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: Jeff, is there a way that we could just follow the use HTP? I know it's a directional drill, but you can lay and you already have all the standards. So that wouldn't be a change then. [01:29:00] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: I don't think that's a that's a harder to deal with a maintenance. Yeah, from a maintenance standpoint that that would be more difficult. [01:29:05] **Paul Robinson (Developer)**: I just one other one other way I think we could handle this and if it becomes an issue is that I mean we do have declarations we will have declarations that guide this community and one and something and we could add in the declarations the responsibility of maintaining those those ditches. It's, you know, it's not quite like an ordinance, but it definitely at least allows some teeth and then you'd be able to see that and we could show you that. [01:29:30] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Yeah, you can do that. I still agree with Council Member Dragitch that maybe we should address that as a as a city overall so it's consistent throughout. Based on comments from Jack, maybe maybe we should ask public works and engineering to give some feedback at the next meeting about the Dr. Lion PVC piece and what the diff what difficulty would we they would encounter in changing that over what equipment public works would need to acquire. um I don't know that one versus is a deal killer for this development or not. Um, and I think he's generally heard our our thoughts, but it would be good to get that feedback and then consideration changing our design standards to be consistent. I think you bring up a good point, Jack. We shouldn't have one here, one there, and just depends on who's making a decision or who's a developer. [01:30:15] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: It'd be nice to be consistent. [01:30:17] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: I agree. I've just I've run into an instance not with water and sewer where it was uh metal conduit. Yep. Uh resistance has changed non-metallic conduit, but the savings were significant over the long term. Ease of repair, ease of laying it down was by far better for the owner in the long run. um and until that was brought forward by a certain uh procurement process the u the minds were hard to change but they changed very quickly. um let us not forget that you know the ductal iron that pipe comes from Minnesota. [01:30:50] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: There is that there's a lot of PVC made in Minnesota as well but the iron comes from Minnesota. A certain place up in the northeast perhaps. Perhaps. Yeah, perhaps I I would be fine as I think that's a rational idea at so when staff are able to have provide feedback if if this is something we would want to update the engineering standards on. I don't know if it needs to be the next meeting per se, but I I agree with council member Dragoich. It is a worthwhile endeavor. [01:31:25] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All right, we square. [01:31:27] **Paul Robinson (Developer)**: Yeah, I think so. I just like I think maybe it's a question for Jack, but I just can like can we move forward with a pre-plat? We know that it's going to be a pipe, right? We know it's going to be a certain size and and we know and we put the location in the depth, but the the material could be worked out. So, it seems like we could go through the process, approve a pre-plat, and with our final plans by that point have the final the final material selected. Nathan, are you comfortable with the direction that's been given to the questions you had? Are you comfortable moving to a pre-plat position? [01:32:05] **Nathan First (Senior Planner)**: I think from uh on the planning side, I would feel comfortable with it, but I do want to, you know, let Jack [01:32:10] **Jack Griffin (Senior Engineer)**: Jack, would you feel comfortable moving forward with the direction that council's given to this point? I'm I'm comfortable with the direction council's given. My I see my role of taking that direction back and trying to get circle the wagons with the department heads on the rural roadway and talk about what we need included in that or not don't need included in that um on some of those specifics so that we can get those to Paul. I'd like to have I'd like to be able to get some feedback back to him before he's submitting again. [01:32:40] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All right, one last question for me. I apologize. So on the rural road section, we've talked about potentially not needing to require a sidewalk. u thinking about boulevard tree plantings in rural developments. You may have similar thoughts there. I just wanted to ask the question in a rural development we would have landscaping of course required, tree replacement required. u would you be looking to have all of our trees in your standard? [01:33:05] **Nathan First (Senior Planner)**: I mean this is this is a it's a farm field with literally no trees to begin with. Yeah, there will be, you know, if there's a disturbance, you know, properties or projects do have to have tree plantings in the city, right? Customarily require Yeah, we have some standards related to that in our landscaping requirements, right? Yep. Fair enough. [01:33:25] **Paul Robinson (Developer)**: So, okay. Thank you. Maybe I think his point was where where the maybe they get placed and like instead of in the ditch, maybe they would be in the front yards. That was I think they can't be in the rightway. Yeah. Okay. in the rightway. They can't be in the rightway because that would be in the ditch and that's not a good thing. [01:33:45] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: All right, moving along. Public hearing notice process enhancements. [01:33:50] **Nicole Miller (City Administrator)**: Thank you, Mayor and Council. Um, at the December workshop, council talked about some potential enhancements to the public hearing notice process. So, um, one of them was, um, exploring increasing the mailing distance from the 250 to 500, I believe, or 350 to 500, which you adopted earlier tonight. Now, increasing that mailing distance um to 500 ft. And then also what we talked about was utilizing our new website for um, improving this process. So, we've added the public hearing notices so they are housed on the website as well as creating a push notification group so folks can sign up to get notified when a public hearing notice is added. And so, there was one outstanding item that we did talk about which was using social media for public hearing notices. And so, um included in the the staff report um were some pros and cons that um staff talked about. Um and so while while uh posting it on social media does you know get a lot of attention, it's much wider network of people looking at it. Um some of the cons that I think are most important um is that we want to be consistent with how we're doing things. So, um, if staff were to forget to post on social media, maybe people will get confused and think that, um, it wasn't just a supplement to our required process, but maybe that somehow voided the process, you know, or something like that. So, confusing people on what is actually required. Um, and then also the staff time. Um staff did um test that even if we did disable comments that we cannot disable the direct messaging. And so then um the staff time that would take to receive the public comment figure out are these like Elmo residents or not incorporating all that comment if you know if that were to happen um into the packet. And then also we did ask Sarah our city attorney to give some opinion on that as well and that's included. So, we just want to know if council wants to proceed with this or not and then we can incorporate or not incorporate that into our final version of our communications plan. [01:35:45] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: I am fine indicating a no on that. The risks to me do not supersede the benefits. I I think it's good feedback from council and from staff. I it was a worth to me it was a worth an endeavor worth looking into but I don't see how it outweighs the the cons in this case. [01:36:00] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: I agree. [01:36:01] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: I agree. [01:36:03] **Council Member Nick Kragness**: Same same here. [01:36:05] **Nicole Miller (City Administrator)**: Sorry for asking you to do the work. That's okay. It was a good conversation and we did make a lot of I mean to the council for you know going above and beyond what is required. [01:36:20] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Yeah, you know, I I did see that there were some comments in the consent agenda, you know, regarding the increase distance beyond 500. And I'll just say that, you know, that's the one thing about government that can sometimes be difficult. You'd like to be able to address all situations, but not every shoe fits every foot. So to try and get that distance, while that may work in a rural area and then you have to go define all the rural areas, it's not the best fit for an urban area to increase that distance. You're increased mailings, you're getting a lot of people that it's not it doesn't impact. So u if people are watching and and they wanted the increase, I understand that. um apologize. It's it's not exactly what you wanted, but we're trying to cover that in in some other ways with with the u side on if you want to get notified. I think that's a a a fairly good u compromise. So, with that, we can go into council reports. Council member Dragisich. [01:37:15] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Yeah, I want to have a discussion um at some point in the future and I'm hoping one of my fellow elected official agree to talk about agenda items. You know, we went through this discussion a little bit at the last meeting or last workshop. So, if I'm this is a council meeting, it's for council elected officials to have a discussion. As an elected official, it can take me up to seven weeks to get something added to a council agenda. If I'm a department head, I can put it on an hour before the meeting. And somehow there seems to be a disconnect there for me. And so I don't think we should have a a free-for-all with the council agenda either. But I think there's a compromise process. So if I have an issue I want to put on the agenda for the meeting on March 3rd, I can't put it on there. I'm elected official. It's elected officials meeting. I can't put it on there. And if I come to the meeting and we want to add, we don't have a process for adding it to the agenda either because I has to go to a workshop first. And so it's seven weeks and in the worst case it's seven weeks. In the best case, it's 11 days. And yet this is a council meeting. It's our meeting. We're the council and we can't affect our own agenda in any reasonable amount of time. And so I think we should take a look at it and say, what's a reasonable compromise to that? Perhaps if we want to add something to the agenda, you could make a and we go to the agenda part. It could take a supermajority, you know, two/3, which would be four votes to add it to the agenda. I think we have to be respectful of the fact that we shouldn't be adding stuff that staff has had no time to prepare for either, but I think it's a better compromise in seven weeks. Certainly something we can discuss at a at a at a workshop which will be you know a long time away but I just think it just [01:38:50] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: You can talk about in the April workshop in the April well I think we have enough time to actually talk to it about the March March workshop. [01:38:55] **Council Member Nick Dragisich**: Yeah we could do that too. Yeah. I just March or April. I'm not it's not a burning thing, but I would like to have a discussion and try and find some more reasonable approach to it that doesn't create the chaos where Nick comes in and says, "I want to add to the agenda that we're going to give away free peanuts every Friday on the corner." You know, I mean, I I I understand all of that part, too. But I think sometimes that's your example. It's the best I could come up with on short notice and Nicole wouldn't let me add it to the agenda tonight. [01:39:25] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Well, you can add stuff to the agenda. What's that? You could add it to the agenda if you want. You just have to have somebody vote to add it approve adding to the agenda. So I mean you can bring that anything ordinance. You can't. It needs to go to a workshop first. Has to go to a workshop first. So you're saying you'd have to bring it up to get across to the workshop. Okay. So I'm just I just let's just have a discussion about the process that if I'm wrong and I lose out in seven weeks, it's seven weeks. It's it's just let's talk about the practicality of that and see if we can come up with a system that avoids all the problems that we had Sarah drop an ordinance for but still gives us just a little bit better flexibility. Let's see if we can address it if you I need one other person to agree with me to get it on the agenda. You you you will need one other person. Yes, mayor. I'm counting on you. [01:40:20] **Council Member Jeff Holtz**: I have no official report, but based upon that, I think it is a as we are no longer in those years of Lake Elmo where this ordinance was put into place, I think it is a valid discussion to have to see if there is room for modification. And if there's not, there's not. But I think it's a worthwhile discussion because the reason that was put into place was because of horrific meetings that were occurring and people were abusing the process. And I think we as a city are past that hopefully forever. [01:40:50] **Council Member Nick Kragness**: I have no official report. [01:40:52] **Council Member Matt Hirn**: I don't have anything this week either. Um just a quick report for the Lake Elmo Airport Commission. Um we have a there's an open house for the new viewing area this summer. They don't have a date quite yet. That will be coming. And if you guys want any tours of the airport, Phil Tedman, the Lake Elmo airport manager, said that you could reach out to him directly and get a private tour with him. Um, complaints are actually down over 5,000 complaints from last Q4 of 2020 24. So 24 to 25, we're down 5,000 complaints. Um, runway 422 is extending by 254 feet. That's going to start on June 1st and run through the end of July. So, looking at two-month construction, but other than that, nothing else. They just get rid of the complaint box or what? Thank you. Well, there's still 1100 complaints, but we're down 5,000. So, yes. Uh, staff reports. [01:41:40] **Jennifer Doyle (Administrative Services Director)**: No report. [01:41:41] **Clarissa Hadler (Finance Director)**: No report. [01:41:42] **Nate Stanley (City Engineer)**: No report. [01:41:43] **Dustin Kalis (Fire Chief)**: No report. [01:41:44] **Ty Jacobson (Police Sergeant)**: No report. [01:41:45] **Nicole Miller (City Administrator)**: Nothing further. You do have something to report. do have a public work uh public works director now. Uh Pete, he was unable to attend tonight, but [laughter] he started last Monday. Not this last Monday, the Monday before. [01:41:55] **Julie Johnson (City Clerk)**: Nope. Nothing to report. [01:42:00] **Mayor Charles Cadenhead**: Council, uh just a reminder, there is a special meeting close session after this meeting. So stick around. All right. But I don't have to announce that until we actually go into that meeting. Right. We're doing a whole separate meeting for that. So you can So I can adjourn this meeting and we can take a little break. All right. Meeting adjourned.