[Music] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] All right, I'll go ahead and call this meeting to order. Good evening and welcome to the July 24th, 2025 meeting of the Minnetonka Planning Commission. The commission generally meets twice a month, always on a Thursday. The schedule and tenative meeting agendas can be obtained by calling the planning planning division or by checking the city website at minnotonkamn.gov. The commission holds public hearings on land use applications. For all land use applications, the city notifies property owners within at least 400 feet of the site and posts plans and information on minnotanka.gov. For some applications, the city also places signs on the properties and places notices in the sun sailor. From a specific process standpoint, the commission makes recommendations to the city council on resonings, subdivisions, conditional use permits, and amendments to the city's comprehensive guide plan, zoning ordinance, and subdivision regulations. We also make final decisions on site plans, signage requests, variance requests, and expansion permits unless there are unless these requests are part of an application that must be heard by the city council. In that case, the commission makes uh recommendations and the council makes a final decision. Uh anyone agreved by a final planning commission decision may appeal the decision to the city council. If you wish to appeal, you must submit a written request to the city staff within 10 days of this meeting. From a broader standpoint, the city's comprehensive guide plan, zoning ordinance, and subdivision regulations are the city's best efforts to codify a balance between individual rights and community responsibilities. Individual rights are easy to understand. Community responsibilities are more subtle, but the idea is that we as members of the community agree to limit our individual rights for the common good of the group. The planning division, the planning commission, and the city council are charged with managing this sometimes difficult balancing act. We ask that you keep this broader perspective in mind as we review tonight's applications. Again, welcome. Uh staff, please call the role. >> Banks >> here. >> Brink is absent. Hansen >> here. >> Henry >> here. >> Minion >> here. >> Maxwell is absent. And Chair Waterman >> uh here. There are five of us tonight. All right. Next up, item number three, approval of the agenda. And I believe that there uh is a change memo. Uh, Chair Waterman, we do have a change memo this evening for both items 8A and 8B. Um, they are additional comments that we received uh after publication of your packet. >> Great. Thanks. I saw those posted online and we all have copies of those. Um, so with that, may I have a motion to approve the agenda with the changes noted by the staff? >> I'll make the motion. >> Motion, Henry. >> I'll second. >> Second, Banks. Uh, all those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. I. >> Great. Uh, motion carries. Uh, next up item number four, approval of the minutes. Uh, these are the minutes from the July 10th, 2025 meeting. Commissioners, any changes? All right. Uh, seeing no changes, may I have a motion to approve the minutes? >> I can make that motion. >> Motion, Hansen. >> I'll second. >> Second, Henry. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. Motion carries. >> Next up, uh, item five, report from staff. uh chair and commissioners just to report on the activities at the city council meeting their last meeting. There were a couple of items that were on the agenda uh pertaining to the planning commission. First on their consent agenda, they did approve the uh interim use permit for that temporary classroom building uh at Glen Lake Elementary. They introduced the item that you're uh going to see this evening, which is uh marsh run three. That's a procedural step uh in order to uh move that item along to the planning commission for your consideration. And then they also considered the forma null subdivision. That was that two lot subdivision just west of Eden Prairie Road um south of Glendale. Uh required um minimum lot area variances for both of the lots. If you'll recall that it was a little bit of a variance for each of the lots. the city council chose to approve uh that particular subdivision. So, we will go through the next steps which are putting together final plans that will go back to the council for final plat approval and we anticipate seeing two new homes on that property in the near future. Um so, that was the city council meeting. Uh reminder to everyone, we have our city council and joint commissioner tour um next Thursday evening. We will send out an agenda, but just uh to get on your calendars, we will be meeting um initially at Redale Commons Park. Um having dinner at that time, getting on the bus at 5:30. So, gathering at 5:00, um getting on the bus at 5:30. Um if you are not able to be there but want to join later, I've some of you have commented that you're not able to be there right at the beginning. I will give you my uh text or excuse me, my phone number. You can text me and I'll let you know um where we will be. Um any other updates, Miss Wishnack? >> I think you covered it. >> Okay, I'll turn it back to uh the chair. >> All right. Thanks, Miss Thomas. Uh, next up, number six, report from planning commissioners. Commissioners, anything to report. All right. Nothing. All right. Moving on to item number seven, consent agenda. There is nothing on the consent agenda, so we will move on to item number eight, the non-consent agenda. Uh, before we begin consideration of non-consent items, I'd like to review the steps in the process and the public hearing procedure that will be followed for each proposal. First, the item will be announced and staff will report on the subject. The commission will then ask questions. Next, the applicant will be invited to make a presentation or offer comments. Commissioners may ask additional questions at this time. After the applicant is finished, the public hearing will open uh and it will be open to give anyone present the opportunity to comment on the proposal. If you wish to speak, please come to the podium and state your name and address for the record. We ask that you keep your comments brief and not and try not to repeat points already made. Once everyone has spoken, we may allow speakers to return for additional comments at larger me at larger meetings. Uh neighborhood spokespeople are encouraged and will be given up to 15 minutes to present. Okay. And the first item on tonight's non-consent agenda is item uh 8A, a flood plane alteration permit with tree variance for a new home at 3440 Larchwood Drive. And this is a recommendation that the city council adopt the resolution approving the flood plane alteration and denying the tree variance requests. Uh four votes would be required in favor of this. And I think Miss Reigns, this is your item. >> Yes. >> All right. >> Thank you, chair. >> So again, tonight's first item is the Pulk Residence at 3440 Larchwood Drive. This property, excuse me, is generally south of Grow Tonka Park and southeast of County Road 101 and Minnotonka Boulevard. This proposal is for a flood plane alteration permit and a variance. The existing property is just over a half acre. It does have wetland, flood plane, and conservation and drainage and utility easements. You won't see the wetland on this map because it is underneath that conservation easement. Um the flood plane elevation is to the left that solid line setback is 20 ft. You can see the existing home is slightly in that flood plane um area and the setback. Currently the property is improved with a single family home with an attached two stall garage. The footprint is approximately 2200 square ft. Gross floor area 2400 square f feet. The higher areas of the property are where the home currently is and towards the northeast of the property corner of the property. The low areas is the west and south. The property currently has 29 regulated trees meaning protected by the tree protection ordinance. Um, of those 15 are significant and 14 are high priority. The property is currently vacant, although the home still remains. Uh, a disconnect permit, meaning disconnection from the water and sewage line, was issued and final in December 2024. And a demo permit was issued in May 2025. The proposed uh proposal is from the property owner Chase Pulk proposing the flood plane alteration and the tree variance to build a new home. The proposed new home would have a floor area, excuse me, floor footprint of 4200 square ft and a gross floor area of about 400 4,750 ft. So about twice as the size of the existing home included, excuse me. The flood plane alteration proposed is 65 square cubic yards. Uh the proposal meets setback requirements from the property lines, wetland, and flood plane, but it does not meet the tree protection ordinance. The proposed flood plane alteration shown on the screen again is for 65 cubic yards. Areas of green would be where material would be filling. So building up that area that would increase the setback to 20 ft making the the new proposed home meet that flood plane setback. And then the red area would be where they would be excavating to increase the flood plane compensation. Essentially for a flood plane alteration, no net fill is allowed. So anywhere you are removing flood plane, you must place it somewhere else on the same property at the same volume. For the flood plane, Riley Purgatory Creek wershed um is the jurisdiction. Staff does not enforce their regulations. However, it's a condition of approval. The applicant is responsible for getting any permits needed with that organization. For tree removals, the property per code is allowed to remove 35% of high priority and 50% of significant trees. The proposal um removes one more tree for high priority than allowed by code, bringing it to 35.7%. Those high priority trees are circled in green. You'll notice that four have X's and one does not. Um so tree number 45 was proposed to be saved. However, there is critical root zone impact of more than 30% and per our code if you have more than 30% critical root zone impact it is considered a loss. [Music] Staff is supporting the flood plane alteration permit. We believe those codes are standards are met. However, we do not agree that the variance standards are met. With the variance, there are certain things we look at and ask ourselves. First, does it um does it follow the intent of the zoning ordinance? Essentially, the tree protection ordinance is balancing property owner rights and preserving trees limiting tree removal. Um we don't believe that this proposal is meets that intent with the consistency of the comp plan as the second one. We do believe that um reasonable use of the property is something allowed by the comp plan um and that that can be done with a smaller footprint or massing which would meet the tree protection ordinance. For reasonable and unique circumstances, we do not believe the code was met or is met and it could be met with a redesign. Um for unique circumstances, they cannot be created by the property owner. We believe that the design preference is not a unique circumstance. And the last one is neighborhood character. A new home uh would not alter the character of the neighborhood. However, allowing a variance um could set a precedent to the unique circumstance standard. There are four comments that were received today. Those have been provided in the change memo. With that, staff is recommending approval of this variance for, excuse me, resolution approving a flood plane alteration permit and denying the tree variance. With that, I return it to you, chair. Thank you. >> Great. Thanks, Miss Reigns. Um, commissioners, any questions for staff. Commissioner Minion, >> will you talk a little bit about the uh flood plane and how it plays together with uh the watershed district and and kind of how that works? Um just how that process works. >> Yes, Commissioner. Uh when it comes to our review, staff does an initial review with any new project development. Um, and then when it comes to the building permit, that's when we require the review from the wershed. So, at this time, staff is reviewing, but we don't enforce or regulate those rules of the wershed. So, we're looking at our own standards at the time of the building permit. We require that permit from the wershed so we can verify that those rules have been met and then we would issue the permit. >> If I may add on just a little bit uh to what Ms. Rain said, which is um fully accurate. Um the city, just to reiterate, the city has our own flood plane rules and this project meets those flood plane rules. The the watershed district may have some different regulations. They're in charge of enforcing those regulations. Um and so that's why another permit is needed from them. Commissioner Hansen. >> Thanks, Chair. Um, Miss Reigns. Okay, I've got maybe a couple tree questions for you. So, in the packet, um, yeah, this is a perfect view in the Can you talk about how the city would view the grading of the condition of these trees? You have good, fair, poor. I think one's dead. How does that factor into the the math that we do on tree removal? >> Commissioner, so with protected trees, we look at species and the health as you mentioned for health. Any trees that are dead or diseased are not counted in those removals or overall protected numbers. Um, and then with species, if they're an invasive species, like for example, elm, that would not be counted. >> So, set another way, like yes, you guys have this table, but you could theoretically clean it up with all the eligible trees to be counted. And then that's where, okay, that's where you would miss the threshold of tree removal. Okay. I just had one, Mr. Reigns, not to um put you on the spot, but uh do you do you know roughly how many permits have been issued in the last number of years with the street protection ordinance in place for for this situation, new new home builds where you're demoing existing home building, new home, and they've been able to comply with the tree protection ordinance and haven't needed a variance. Is that is that any sort of statistic you might have off hand? >> Chair. Um, luckily we knew you had this question so I have the information. Um, so in the last 5 years single family homes that are proposed or applied for have been granted a variance of the tree protection ordinance out I have four out of 179 new homes issued. >> Got it. Thank you. Any other questions? I see any. Okay. Um, all right. So, at this time, we'll ask the applicant to come up. You're invited to make a presentation or offer any comments. Uh, welcome. Please provide us your name and address for the record, and then we'd love to hear your comments. >> David Stein gas, Steiner and Coppelman Homes, 21500 Fairview Street, Excelsier, Minnesota. >> Uh, Chase Pulk, 3440 Larchwood Drive, Minnesota. I mean Minnitanka Minnesota. >> I am uh I'm here to help the Pulk family. I've built their homes for their parents on Lake Minnitonka. I've been in the building business about 40 years, new construction homes. I've worked with the city of Weisetta, other areas that have tree preserv preservation and um other ordinances which allow different than Minnetonka does. And um Chase purchased the home 9 years ago and we have a situation where we had some roof issues which has caused the mold and the roof needed to come off. The city will not allow us to spend more than um what is it? $143,000 repairing it. >> 115 I think >> $115,000 to repair it. So we're faced with rebuilding a home. We are non-compliant because of a flood ordinance, the flood planes. We basically lose our lower level that's existing. So, we're looking for an area. That's why our footprint is larger. We do have an existing threecar garage, not a twocar garage. And so, we would like to maintain the three-car garage, and that's why our footprint grew. Um, we feel that because of the flood plane and we're having to raise the home to lose our lower level. That's why we're trying to build it to comply with our sideyard setback, our watershed setback, our flood plane setback, our street setback, and the volume volume that we're trying to maintain is all designed into this. We've worked for two years with staff and they've been very good for us. They've guided us very well. We've gotten an okay for the entire process all the way up until May 11th. Was it May 11th? June 11th, something like that. When I was to come here at planning commission and show last month and 11 days before that they told us about this tree issue we have. Um, we would like to come to some sort of resolution maintaining our footprint that we've spent time with the city who has allowed us to go ahead and design a home. We've spent nearly 150,000 in architecture fees because it all complied. Now we're down to one box elder tree. So, what can I do for the city to help move the project along and deal with one box elder tree that might live, might not live. I believe a boxelder tree is almost like a weed tree, but I'm not a tree expert. Um, so that's my situation and I'd like a help. I'd like help recommending how to replace the tree. You have anything else? >> Um, yeah. Uh, if there's a couple maple trees we could play, uh, replace with or three or four maple trees or we could put a tree whatever >> in a park or >> two trees in a park or whatever we have to do >> to make work. >> Great. Thanks. >> Any questions? >> Hang tight. Let's find out. Uh, commissioners, any any questions for the applicant? Commissioner Henry, >> thanks for coming up and uh giving us your your take on the issue. >> You said that you were working pretty closely with the city for a couple of years. And >> the way that you presented it, it almost sounds like you were blindsided by the tree ordinance. Just to let you know, this this is not something new. This has been in effect for at least uh city staff a year and a half to two years. In its current form, it's uh >> 2018, but before that, we've had even >> at least 10 years. Yes. >> Okay. So, I'm just curious, could you talk about the the conversations you had with city staff? You mentioned a couple of dates in early June and you said something about 11 days where Oh, now there's something in the tree ordinance. >> We I would assume with 40 years of construction experience that you'd have a little bit more awareness of our tree ordinance. So, if you could elaborate. I'm fully aware of your tree ordinance. We have a survey survey that has um given our all of our trees and our priority. We've gone through all of that. We were okayed a footprint. we were okayed that we were going to save these trees and until 11 days before I was to be here last meeting. Then we were blindsided by a root um a root complication on a boxwood tree. But until then they had given us full we have emails from Bria that says you're fine with your trees, you're fine with your setback, you're fine with absolutely everything. Was there a difference in calculations? So, initially you thought that the the was higher than what ultimately was going to be decided. >> Our our our house is the correct distance from the trees and it's where a retaining wall is is going to come too close. And Paul at your tree deal said that it has a greater than 30% root damage and could potentially die. And we did not learn that until 11 days before the meeting. I was here last month. >> So just to be clear, they gave you a different percentage or you thought that that tree was counted as something that wouldn't have to be technically removed. >> We believe the tree does not technically have to be removed. We we've designed and complied without tree with the tree not being removed. Correct. But now 11 days before the commission, they called and told me I needed a a tree ordinance variance because that box elder has greater than 30% root damage and that I that was never explained a year ago, 6 months ago, 8 months ago, four months ago, never explained to me that roots would be an issue. >> Okay. >> Okay. That's where I'm at. >> Okay. Thank you. Oh, I'm sorry. Uh, Commissioner Banks or uh, Commissioner Minion, >> thank you again and thank you for coming today. Um, it seems to be some difference in numbers. You're talking about one tree, the city's talking about two trees. Can you talk about a little more about that? >> I would have to ask Bria, but I think it's it's one tree that has a root structure issue. Um, can you help me with that, Bria? >> Commissioner, it's just one tree over the tree protection ordinance removal threshold. >> Just one tree. Um, and you said something about a actual retaining wall that was going to make that impact. Is that retaining wall the one that's like the brown wall now that's existing? >> There's not a wall there currently. >> Okay. >> But to to comply with the setback from the flood plane ordinance to the location of our house there. There has to be a retaining wall to hold the dirt high because we have a um from house degrade has to be a certain amount because we're right at the flood plane the 932 or 933. Um you know currently there's a basement there. Okay, but we've got to fill all of that up to get to grade. Well, currently the tree is lower and we want to save the tree. So, we're putting a retaining wheel around to save the tree and build the grade up around the house so we don't look like we're sitting in a hole and in a flood plane. So, we there there's a whole bunch that we've gone through with the city back and forth, elevation, height, setbacks, and everything to control. And the answer was keep the trees. They're lower, but the rest of the yard has to come up. So, we'll be hauling sand and fill in, but taking actually we're just taking it out of one side and setting it over on the other to keep it balanced. So, all the rules and regulations work, but I'm down to one tree. So, how can I make it through that one tree? That's all I need. >> And you're making a verbal commitment to plant extra trees, >> whatever. You could propose what what makes sense. And >> yeah, >> what are you proposing? Well, I think a couple maples like would make up for it. I mean, I I personally think maples are, you know, more beautiful trees. Um, >> I'm looking for a commitment. Are you I'm looking for you to say I will do this. >> Oh, yeah. I I will I will plant two maples on the property 100%. >> Okay. >> Um >> I I would I would like to I want to plant trees. I like trees. >> Okay. So, I might I'll probably end up planting more of the trees to match. >> For me, the tree is not a problem. I think you guys have a good plan going with that. Um, I would like to know and the city's approved the flood plane issues. I would like to know, they talked about the the uh watershed district, the permit, how that's going and kind of learn what your position is on that. The purgatory waterhed district is we we've applied for the permit and typically watershed districts are really more about my silt fence and during construction and making sure that I don't fill beyond that point and I protect that very well. I believe I have with the city 40 years of experience working with city of Minnitankka many subdivisions and we're very well experienced at that and we will take care of the Purgatory Creek watershed district. And tell me a little bit. I'm not sure if it's on your property or it's just past your property, but it looks like there's a little spillway off the street that goes into what looks like some sort of a rain garden. It was full of flowers and stuff. Is that in your property or how would you go about protecting that? that is on our property and that is within the the um the what do I call it? Um that's going to end up in that area where we are creating our extra flood plane. >> I don't see it on this plan, but I I know what you're saying as far as the the cutout. >> It's it's um the curb cut I should say is better say way to say it. >> Yeah, it's somewhere in there. It's right in that area. >> Will you talk a little bit how you plan on just kind of protecting that from extra construction debris, uh, runoff, that type of a thing? Is there a plan for >> some sort of a silt product there? >> Silt fence all the way around my whole construction site and I'll end up double silt fencing the areas where we're we're doing the exchange. >> Okay. >> The cut and fill exchange. >> Okay. Thank you. Commissioner Henry. >> Thanks, Chair. A follow-up question to your interaction with the city in the Sounds like you worked with them for a long time. Did they present any alternatives in your discussions short of having to change the footprint of the plans of your home? I know that's a that's a a pretty huge issue, but if it's a retaining wall, I'm just curious. Is there any other ways we can do aside from one or the other? Is there some compromise that we can get to? Um, I would be willing to do most any compromises. Um, I presented making the house 5 ft shorter to move farther away, but that still doesn't allow I would have to be moving 30 ft farther, 25 ft farther from the h from the tree in order to deal with the roof root structure. So, we couldn't find if we have a three-car garage, we wanted to maintain a three-car garage, etc. So I offered to remove retaining walls, but none of it really impacted the any less than what is presented currently on the tree structure on the tree root structure. >> Thanks, Commissioner Hansen. I'm going to try and pull on this thread, this root a little more. That's a terrible joke. Um, I'm I'm trying to probably better understand where when when you guys feel like this one tree emerged. And so if you've been on this journey for 2 years, that's, you know, God bless you for your patience. Um, I'm assuming that as you develop your plans, you had these iterative processes and then maybe had different plans along the way and not one time were told, "Hey, there's this tree issue that came up and the plans didn't shift around in between conversations." >> None whatsoever, sir. If you follow Bree's emails that we've received from her, she can tell you the date and how many times she's emailed us that your footprint is good to go, your trees are good to go, your setbacks are good to go, your volume is good to go. And that's how we started our architecture was after we knew everything was good and our footprint fit. We designed over the winter. We got this far with the flood plane alteration. And even after the flood plane alteration was accepted to come to planning commission, did we find out about the root situation in the tree? So, we were scheduled here last month >> to come and sit down. I came but it got postponed because of this tree ordinance. [Applause] >> Okay. I'm reading I'm just going to read out of our packet. Based on the calculations from July 15th, 2024, when the first proposed condition survey was provided, the amount of investment allowed into the non-conforming property was $1,113,700. staff confirmed that the proposal met the flood plane alteration standards and then in parenthesis no net fill but did not meet the tree protection ordinance or setback requirements due to the proposed home design. So maybe maybe this is for us to noodle on for a little bit, but I'm having a hard time between July of last year and July of this year and understanding that that if the applicant didn't know or not. So maybe we can I'll I'll drop it for a sec and think about I hear where you're at totally, but trying to understand what happened. >> Yep. Okay, thank you. Uh, any other questions? Okay. Um, we might have you back depending on what comes out of the public hearing. >> Just fine. Thank you. >> Thank you >> very much for considering. >> Uh, okay. Um, so I will now open the public hearing. Uh, if you'd like to speak, please come to the podium and state your name and address for the record. Uh any questions should be directed to me as the acting chair and not to the staff. We will accumulate and ask certain questions to the staff uh later in this meeting. Um so yeah, anyone here to speak about this? Welcome to come on up. Okay. Uh seeing no one, I will go ahead and close the public hearing. Um so no questions from the public. Uh commissioners, what what other questions do we have for staff? Commissioner Henry. >> Thanks, Chair. I do have a couple of questions for the staff. Whenever we have a proposal in front of us, we always need to vote on the proposal at as it is, and this is not the forum for making arrangements and negotiating. I think that's been made clear throughout the all of our tenures on the on the planning commission. So, just to be clear, staff, is that what you propose that we we should not try to make agreements to say, well, we we we agree to this. If you do these things, add conditions to it, or is that something that's within our purview that we could add a commitment of the homeowner to plant, like they said, two maple trees to offset the other? Just want to get your thoughts on that. Uh, Commissioner Henry, you are you are correct. The planning commission should make its recommendation to the city c this goes to the city council, this project. So making your recommendation based on the proposal that is before you. Um your commentary here this evening is also provided to the council who will again make the final decision. >> Thanks adds clarification. >> Commissioner Banks. >> Thanks chair. Um so in our um addendum packet there's a couple of letters signed by I would assume residents. Um there's a very vague statement. Uh although it it says that they disapprove. Um >> they do not disapprove. >> They do not disapprove. >> So they approve. >> Got it. Misread it. So yeah, I my and and my question was wondering if um because of the statement u was curious if there if there was anyone who disapproved of this and noting that there was no one from the public that disapproved of it. Okay. All right. Thanks. Thanks. >> Any other questions? >> Yeah, Commissioner Minion. >> Was there a site survey walk? I know when I've pulled permits in the past, um, somebody would come out and do a sitewalk of the trees and stuff like that. Is that something that has happened recently or sounds like there's a count done? Uh, was that done in that 11-day period they were talking about or can you say if that has been done or when it was done? >> Commissioner, so the walk around the property is done by our natural resources staff. At that time, they'll look for different items. So, in this case, trees. They were looking at the existing retaining walls, looking at the edge of the wetland. Um, and then I think there was one other concern that had to do with natural resources, maybe something with the flood plane, but they do walk around the site after we get the survey to confirm the numbers of trees as well. Yes, [Music] >> M. Reigns, I just had one question, then perhaps we'll move on to comments. Um the applicant mentioned that in in the recent period when they were trying to uh working with the city to try to adjust the plans, they proposed shaving back I think 5T but it would actually need to be like 30 feet. Is that roughly accurate to shave back from the I guess the building footprint >> commissioner? Um, so we received this formal plan in April and then in May received another plan that showed the slight alteration of the retaining wall showing that they could not meet the tree protection ordinance. Um, I don't recall there being a difference in the footprint between the two. >> Okay. So, it sounds like no recent discussions then after that. Okay. Interesting. Commissioner Hansen. >> Thank you, Chair. I hate getting into tick for tax. I don't feel like it's I feel like it's abnormal for the city to communicate that an applicant is failing to meet um any ordinance. So, I mean, what's the what's the city's perspective on like did the applicant know they were going to fail the the tree ordinance a year ago? I'll start and one of my colleagues may jump in. Um, so we keep our correspondence on file. So my staff memo has all the dates. I don't have it right in front of me, so sorry about that. Um, generally last year we knew that it was not going to meet the tree protection ordinance. Um, I was working with a different architect. Um, they said that they had plants ready. They were going to meet all the setbacks, tree protection ordinance over the winter. Didn't hear anything. Was waiting. finally got some new plants at the beginning of this year, was able to review those, sent them over to for our development review, which is engineering natural resources planning. Um, and that's when it was determined that tree protection ordinance wasn't met. Um, there was some little confusion because of the one the plan sent in April and May. We thought their new per proposal was the May one. Um, but it was just showing again that the retaining wall alteration still wouldn't meet the tree protection ordinance. Uh at that time our natural resources staff is the one who determined that the tree protection ordinance was not met. >> Sorry I'm I'm slow. Like when you say at that time is that April May. Help me. I'm always a half step behind. You know that >> commissioner that would have been May. And when I get that information then I need to move the project to the next meeting or do what is necessary. And I I do uh Commissioner Hansen and and Chair uh Waterman have the memo that was provided in your staff report o open. So as Miss Rain stated back in July 15th, 2024, we indicated that the tree protection ordinance wouldn't be met. Um then uh again in April 16th, a new project uh proposal was presented. staff confirmed that the revised plan did not meet the tree protection ordinance and provided that designer with latest correspondence so that that designer was up to date with requested corrections to meet the tree protection ordinance. Um then in May the applicant provided a what I would call just a a diagram or not an updated plan but a an effort to show that they could not meet the tree protection ordinance. and we again indicated that it would not uh meet the tree protection ordinance. So, um as Miss Rain stated just now, um as our development review team continues to review things up until the moment of the meeting, we continue to correspond and at that point we also again then pulled this item from the agenda because it did not meet the tree protection ordinance. So I I feel that city staff um while there has been some transition or or different players uh with the applicant and their uh proposal, staff has been clear about um the tree protection ordinance needing to be met for staff to support um this request. I think that's helpful. I think but I'm half step slow. So, all right. If that's all for our questions, uh, what are we what are we thinking, commissioners? Uh, stuff to chew on here. Who wants to kick us off? Commissioner Henry. Thanks, Chair. Whenever proposals come in front of us, it's always been the product of a lot of digestion, a lot of communication between the applicant and the city. And this is no exception. It's been a lot of work and and I second Commissioner Hansen's comments about it takes a lot of patience to to walk through a lot of these ordinances and that's uh it's it's admirable from my perspective and I've been on the commission for a while and I have a lot of experience with the city and I know that they they do their diligence very well. They're they're very communicative with with all of of what they need to to talk to that the applicants about. And I think this exemplifies it in the packet. There was evidence that the that the applicant knew that this proposal wouldn't meet the tree ordinance. And so for that, I'm inclined to deny the variance for the tree ordinance. That being said, and that's why I wanted to communicate and clarify with the city staff about what we as a planning commission can do in terms of negotiating. Uh I I really like the proposal and I think it's good to improve the the neighborhood. So, while I'm recommending denial based on the tree ordinance, what I would encourage you to do is to between now and the city council meeting where we provide a recommendation, you can do some homework on your end and you can work with the city and put together in writing some conditions about this. If if it's planting a couple of trees, if it's I'm not sure how much work it is to redesign the architectural footprint of the house, but there there needs to be some way to come to an agreement on here. So, my denial here is not a stamp of disapproval to say this. I don't want this ever to happen. I do, but just to know that I I side with city staff on this because I believe in the tree ordinance. I helped craft the tree ordinance and it's there for a purpose. So, thanks for coming in and I I wish you a lot of luck with with going in front of the city council. >> Thanks, Commissioner Henry. Any any other comments, Commissioner Minion? Uh, thank you for Mr. Henry for the reminder that you're right. This is not the place to negotiate. I appreciate that. So, my comments earlier, I would like to retract and thank you for making the offer for applying the trees, but that's not my place and please forgive me. Um, it's nice to see that the city likes the flood plane work and the work that you've done there. I appreciate the work you put into that. Um, I do think a boxelder tree is a good tree. Um, however, from what I read, we're looking at you still have nine of 14 high priority trees in this property. It's a little over was a 0.54 acres and you still have nine of 15 significant trees left. Having one box elder tree go is not a big deal to me. Um, if I met Withers, I would say we would move forward and say it's okay. Uh, I don't think that's the way it's come before us though is how it's written. If we vote yes tonight, as I understand, we're saying yes to the flood plane, but no to the trees. Correct. Um I trees are very important to me. We are in the middle of personally going through quite a bit of uh tree problems and removal of our own and every one of them is important to us. Um but if you're looking at investing, would you say well over $100,000 in planting so far? Um you've got a significant number of trees on a half acre. Um, I would be in supportive of of not basically letting this one tree go. And if it means keeping the property from being established or not being established, I I'm in supportive of just having the one tree go. So, >> okay. Thank you, Commissioner Hansen. Um, this is going to be a zoo. So, I'm I'm kind of where Commissioner Henry's at. And like the way this the way the process played out, I I have to feel like there was communication along the way where maybe it just got missed. There's the packets are really thick. It can happen. I get it. Um, so like if we recommended denial tonight as a group, I think my comment would be like I I would really support a variance for one tree at the same time, but I understand the way this played out. I I think the way the staff is presenting this is like, hey, you missed the tree ordinance. That's super important to us. And so I'm okay with the denial, but I'm also okay with the the variance because it's one tree. And I personally am not the biggest fan of box elder trees, but we can talk about that later. So, um, >> it's about the disease resistance for me. >> Yeah, I get you. Um, so I I the the home and the flood plane good with that. I mean, I want you to succeed truly. Um, it's just kind of the way we got here is a little confusing to me. Um, so kind of can be swayed either way. Either way, I think where I sit is I want this home to come to life and whether that's a recommendation to the city council that maybe flips over time, I'm cool with that. But whichever way we go forward. >> Great. Thank you, Commissioner Banks. >> Thanks, Chair. Um yeah, I'm inclined to agree as well with um Commissioner Minion and and uh Hansen. Um it it does seem like from the beginning of your process to um I guess yesterday uh before before this meeting um there's been something got lost in the communication um particularly about um this particular item with the trees and it sounds like there's been different architects or different people working on this project. Um, you know, we we know staff does a great job and and you know, they dot the eyes and cross the tees and the communications is big. Um, so I would just say for future projects or future endeavors or especially for your your next step in this, which may potentially be a meeting with uh city council, um, is, you know, really try to understand how important that tree ordinance is. And so something that may seem minute, one tree, uh is really big towards um you know, the city, you know, staff and what they recommend and and what we uh have to consider. Uh I will say, however, that I do feel like this is a really good project. Um you know, you you know, you have um significant trees. U there's you know you you'll be under um the threshold of what you can move with significant trees and you know it's it's one tree um but it's 7% right that takes you over u the 35%. So um too bad you know you can't just cut a branch off that tree and perhaps solve this problem that way. Um you know I would I would not I would approve the tree ordinance or the tree variance. Um however I will say you know for future and even if this project um you know really make sure you you understand like what that what that means for the for the city. Okay. >> Thanks Commissioner Banks. Um I'll try to repeat points not already mentioned. I I think it's a it's a good-looking project when you're talking about redeveloping a home that's limited. It sounds like there's a lot of uh um maintenance issues that are needed and so full tear down is is necessary and and sounds like there's a lot of work that's been done uh in in recognition of the easements that are there and the flood plane alteration that needs to happen and now we're down to this one tree. Um you know, I'm I'm a big believer in the tree protection ordinance. I remember when we were going through it, I really struggled with the potential limitations for non-subdivision situations like this where you're talking about redeveloping uh property and it seems like we've been able to develop a have a lot of homes built without running into that. And then here, this this might be one of the exceptions. It it doesn't it seems like the tree has the potential to live. And it's not like we're just kind of bulldozing dozens and dozens of trees to build a massive home. It still fits within all the other items. So, um, but I do agree with the the commissioners and what the city is relaying where they they I understand how they can't recommend this. They can't go against the ordinance and it does seem that this conceivably should have been known or could have been known a year ago. So, definitely a struggle with that. Um, so I'll I'll kind of leave my comments there and just try to figure out where we are as a commission in terms of what to recommend. Um, and maybe city staff, you could help me because sometimes I we go through these and this is not where I'm the I'm the strongest. We it it sounds like we get it, but generally would probably recommend approving the tree variance. Um, we could either do that and I think if we do that, we probably need to have some uh discussion about what is um what metrics we would use to approve it. That's maybe option A or option B. We could just vote on it as is and then we have these comments and maybe the city council sort of does with it what it will and maybe in between now and and that meeting >> there's some Yeah. >> Uh Chair Waterman and Commission, my first recommendation would be that you um vote on the um recommendation of of city staff. So vote that up or down. Then I think that you're going to want to make another recommend or another recommendation after that which would be to adopt the resolution approving a flood plane alteration permit and a tree variance. And the reasons that I heard you say are that um the site is very constrained given the existing easements giving flood plane um and given the fact that it's already a buildable lot because there is an existing home on it. um that all in in its entirety that that creates a unique circumstance and that uh given that there's already an existing home on the property, this would not negatively impact the character of the neighborhood. I think that's what I heard you say. >> And then also, if you wanted to add some conditions about planting, you could do that in them. >> I I will just add to that and I want some thoughts. I they're more minor, but I also thought some of the uniqueness was the the the um status of the existing home or the condition like the there I mean this cap of only being able to pour about 100,000 in I think might be somewhat uh unique. Um and then I don't know if this holds a lot of water, but we talked about he the applicant talked about there's a three-car garage there. I also think just the that might be a little bit unique in terms of not wanting to necessarily shrink the the current use of the property. I'm thinking a lot of homes that might be demoed might historically be smaller. So, that one might not be as strong, but just to try to add to it. Uh, Commissioner Minion, you had a comment. >> I think the applicant brought up a good point about uh the unique circumstance regarding the flood plane and flooding out the basement. sounds, if I understood them correctly, is that they're going to abandon the basement idea, do a slab on grade, and all of a sudden the footprint of the home is actually going to have to in order to make it more useful, make it larger. And I would say that would be to me a unique circumstance that was >> changed because of the way things are going as well. >> Great. Okay. And so, uh, just so that the planning commission is aware, when a project like this goes to the city council where staff's recommendation maybe differs from the planning commission's recommendation, not projecting what you're going to vote here, we do provide the council with our recommended um, resolution, but we also craft a resolution based on what you have said here this evening, so that they can see both of those and and vote on those. and the things that you have said, we will certainly add to a resolution if if that's the vote that uh occurs here. >> Okay, commissioners, if there are no other comments or questions, it sounds like we're probably ready for the a motion. We'll see how it goes. And this would be motion related to item 8A, flood plane alteration permit, uh with the tree variance. Oh, and this is a with the tree variance for a new home at uh 3440 Larchwood Drive. Currently, this would be a recommendation that the city council adopt the resolution approving approving the flood plane alteration and denying the tree uh variance request. So, we'll start with that. Uh may I have a motion? >> Motion. >> Motion. Minion. May I have a second? >> A second. Hansen. Uh staff, please poll commission. >> Banks. >> Yes. >> Hansen. >> No. >> Uh Henry, >> yes. >> Minion, >> no. Chair Waterman. >> No. >> Okay, that fails. >> That fails. So now, if I'm reading what we were saying, there's probably a second motion. Uh, Commissioner Hansen, I Okay, this I will make a motion to uh adopt a flood plane variance and adopt the tree ordinance variance. Clear enough? Cool. Oh, like with the conditions that were the um >> maybe not the additional conditions that were listed, but the the um what's the word I'm looking for? The >> the findings. >> Yeah, the findings that would that would validate the approval of the tree. Okay. So, um first by Commissioner Hansen. Do we have a second? >> Second. >> Second by Commissioner Minion. Staff, please pull the commission. >> Chair, may I clarify? >> Please. You did not have any conditions you wanted to add to that motion. Correct. >> I didn't hear any. I don't have any. >> Just making sure. >> I don't think that's our I don't think it's our purview to to add the conditions. If I understand right, >> I think what Commissioner Henry was saying is it's not a negotiation. However, if you want to add a condition based on your recommendation of approval, you certainly may do that, but it's not a negotiation with the applicant at the meeting. >> If that makes sense. >> Yes. Thank you. I would I think you have to say it though, sir. >> Uh with the condition that the applicant work with the city to meet the tree ordinance. >> Additional plantings >> with additional trees. >> Mhm. Thank you. >> Lots of trees. >> Okay. This may be the one of the longest items we've had. Okay. Okay. So, >> now I'm ready, chair. >> You ready for the roll? >> We are ready. >> Okay. We'll go to Banks. >> Yes. >> Hansen, >> yes. >> Henry, >> no. >> Minion, >> yes. >> Waterman, >> yes. >> Okay. F. It was 4-1. >> Four. So, the motion passes. Am I correct about Yeah. four votes and then it will that would be a recommendation to the city council. The city council will continue the or will consider the item. I apologize. I do not have the calendar, Miss Thomas. Uh, >> I believe it is April 11th. Chair Waterman. Most likely April 11th. >> Oh, August 11th. >> Yes. >> Sorry. >> Yeah. August 11th. Okay. >> Good luck with your project. Thank you. >> All right. Next, we will move on to item 8B and this is items concerning Marsh Run 3 at 11800 Wisetta Boulevard. And this is a recommendation that the city council adopt the ordinance approving the master development plan and adopt the resolution approving the final site and building plans with expansion permits and variances. And Miss Thomas, this is your item. >> Thank you, Chair Waterman and commissioners. Most of you are familiar uh with the site that we're going to be discussing tonight, but I do want to give a brief review of recent history in the immediate area before settling into this specific proposal. So, uh, in 2019, going to find the right mouse up here, uh, 2019, the city, uh, reviewed and approved what was then called the Marshrun project. Um, included removal of existing several existing, uh, small office buildings on the site and construction of a 175 unit apartment building, which we now call uh, the Burke. That apartment building was completed late 2020 um beginning of 2021. Then jumping to the west, in 2023, the city reviewed and approved uh what was then called Marsh Run 2, now called the Veil, which also included removal of existing office buildings um built in the mid 1980s and construction then of a 197 unit apartment building. In uh 2024, the city considered a or I shouldn't say considered, we we provided comments on uh a concept plan for redevelopment of the final Marshrun uh site uh existing office building on this 1.2 acre parcel. And that concept plan uh contemplated construction of 26 threestory uh rental town homes on the property. Following that concept uh plan process, the applicant uh went back and um refined their plans and came back with a formal development proposal uh this spring. In some ways, it reflected the previous concept. again for uh town home development of the site in four buildings uh 25 units at this time and the number of units in the buildings was kind of resituated um on the site. That project did go to the city council for introduction and the council referred it to the planning commission. However, before it got to the planning commission, the applicant uh decided to uh reconsider uh their plans. And so now we're at the current proposal that's before you tonight uh submitted by Inland Development Partners again. It shows removal of that existing office building constructed back in 1984. But now rather than uh town homes, the applicant is proposing construction of a 44 unit uh fourstory apartment building. The first story of the building would include garage space uh interior, so not underground garage space, but first floor uh enclosed garage space as well as just some mechanical um and operational type um rooms and a leasing office. Then floors two through four would be occupied by the actual residences. A combination of one and uh twobedroom units. 20% of those units would be designated as affordable to households earning 50% of area median income. As you know, the affordability component of a proposal is really the purview of the economic development advisory commission. uh that commission did review this project last week and supported the affordability uh levels as proposed. So back to design then um to accommodate uh the first story or the building uh and first story uh parking and proposed parking lots located north and south of the building. Uh earth work would uh certainly be done. about 2 to 4 ft of fill would be added to the property to uh raise the grade and that grading does include try to find my cursor here. Thank you. Um some flood plane fill in this area. You can see that the existing building is actually situated within the flood plane. Um 3.1 cubic yards of flood plane would be filled that would be recreated just to the west. Um this level of flood plane alteration actually is something that city staff can administratively approve. Um it's a very small amount of of flood plane and the um compensation is in excess. So we're actually gaining flood plane volume not losing it. The earthwork and construction of the building would remove 14 high priority trees and one significant tree. those are under the thresholds that would be allowed by the tree uh protection ordinance. The building itself would have access to public uh sewer and water facilities uh in Fairfield Road and in Weisetta Boulevard as part of this project. And to comply with city uh water resources management rules, uh storm water management would be added. Several catch basins would be located throughout the site. Storm water would generally be directed to underground uh chambers which are very typical in our community these days and then outletting um as allowed by uh code. I would note that because of the age of the existing properties there is no storm water management treatment on site right now. So this would um uh be an improvement to current sited conditions. The proposal does require approval of a master development plan which is required whenever we see redevelopment uh in the I394 corridor and then site and building plan review with two expansion permits which are noted here flood plane setback and wetland setback. uh the proposal would not meet the code requirement but would significantly increase uh setbacks from existing conditions and then variances to uh front yard setback and uh floor area ratio. [Applause] So now I'm going to jump into uh our actual analysis. The proposal uh before you tonight and all proposals quite frankly that come before the planning commission are reviewed by the city's uh development review team. That team includes a lot more than the planners you see here. We have 21 members of city staff who on our development review team reviewing um proposals in their area of expertise for their area of expertise. So we have engineers, storm water management and flood plane folks. Um just looking at my list here, natural resources protection, utilities, public safety. We have a member of the fire department and police department on our review team. So my comments moving forward here are the result of that collaborative review um and a consensus decision making of the larger group and that's for all projects and this reigns project uh this project regardless of the size um that whole group reviews these proposals. So the team first considered whether or not highdensity residential use is generally appropriate for the site and and we do find that it is. It's consistent first with the comprehensive guide plan for the property which calls for mixed use. In some communities that means a bunch of different uses on the same site. In Minnetonka we consider mixed use um to be that a multitude of uses may be appropriate for the site. Um, we also think highdensity residential is appropriate here because really it um furthers development activities that have occurred in this corridor. Some of them recent uh so the the Burke again and the veil and some of them more historical. Your staff report includes a long area history, which I'm not going to go into detail here, but essentially this entire northwest quadrant of Hopkins Crossroad and I 394 has been a redevelopment district since the mid90s. Um, what was 61 uh single family homes and a church is a retail center. Um, 212 town homes and condos. I apologize. I don't have the apartment numbers here. And a relocated uh church, which had previously been on the freeway, uh relocated to to Oberlin Park. Staff then considered um the components of the site design and whether or not we felt that those were reasonable. And again, that we find that they are. Um the building would be situated further away from the flood plane and wetland areas. I should note that on this screen or in these next few charts, whatever is shown in red is something that does not meet our current uh code requirement. So though the code requirements aren't met, um the building would be uh further away than the existing building and the setbacks from front property line and floor area ratio would be very similar to those previously proved. uh in the area. I'm going to add one more column to this. Hopefully, it doesn't make anyone dizzy, but this is going to now show um existing conditions, the town home concept that was previously uh put before the commission and then the apartment proposal. Next staff considered the the parking and we find that um the proposed parking here would meet not only city code requirements but would actually exceed the parking demand anticipated by the Institute of Transportation Engineers or it you hear us use that acriman from time to time uh for a building of this unit count. And I want to step aside for just a moment and talk about parking because I know um parking concerns have frequently been raised by um property owners and residents in this area. So many of the commissioners will recall that we did an update to our parking ordinance back in the summer of 2023 and that update to the ordinance lowered parking requirements for nearly every land use in our community. And Minnetonka is not the only community who's doing these types of parking updates. It's really going on, I would say, around around the nation. The new parking rates were based in our ordinance or based on two things. one uh the realworld parking data that's collected and analyzed by IT and then also the parking variances that the city of Minnitonka has approved over the years um where we have not seen uh parking issues resulting from those. So, parking at the Burke and the Veil, though they were reviewed and approved under the old ordinance, they would meet the parking standards of the new and current ordinance, as does this Marsh Run 3 building. uh staff and and obviously the commission is aware that on street parking occurred uh on Fairfield Road after the opening of the Burke and it lasted uh for quite some time until the city uh installed uh no parking signs and we're aware that some residents or visitors of the Burke continue um to occasionally park on the street and they continue to use uh perhaps the parking lot on on this property, the subject property this evening. Um, in our opinion and our traffic and parking consultants opinion, as was outlined in their report, the use of these areas is likely based on a number of factors and convenience is certainly one of those those factors. Um without the option of this uh parking lot availability, people may be more likely to park on their own designated properties. Though some are still going to choose to use other off-site areas and that's why we've included a condition of approval that there be a park a cross parking agreement between all three apartment buildings who will be managed by the same um uh company. I was really curious though about the on street parking uh phenomenon on Fairfield Road and so in addition to my own observations. I'm out in that area quite a bit. I did reach out to the police department for some stats uh earlier this week and they did notice that or they sent to me that in 2023 the police department received I'm going to read this so I don't get the numbers wrong. Uh 20 parking complaints related to parking on Fairfield Road and they issued 12 tickets. Um the 20 and the 12 don't correspond because by the time they may have received the complaint, the car uh had vacated the area. In 2024, the police received one complaint and issued one ticket. And this year, the police have received um no um complaints called into them. So staff would suggest that the installation of those no parking signs has uh helped uh that that issue. So jumping back to um then design staff uh site design, the proposal would actually exceed the green space requirement for that individual lot. Uh meaning the impervious surface is under the amount that we would allow. And really looking more broadly at the area, this area is is surrounded by protected green space, you know. So we have this large wetland complex to the northwest and Oberlin Park which is um 14 acres I believe 14 or 15 acres in size which is within a 5minute walk um of this site. The proposal in in addition to these larger areas in the neighborhood um would include on-site indoor and outdoor gathering and amenity spaces. staff looked at building design and we find that this proposal is reasonable and attractive. It incorporates materials and colors to complement um the two other uh apartment buildings that have been recently constructed in the area. And then finally, we looked at those expansion permits and variances. And we find that in in our opinion, they're reasonable. They meet the standards as outlined in in state statute and city code. So again, the flood plane and wetland setbacks would exceed would double those of the existing and the proposed front yard setbacks and FS would be comparable to others in in the neighborhood. Um, specifically the uh town homes and condominiums further to the north that were built in the mid 1990s were approved with that same uh 30foot setback from front property line. The site itself is constrained in its uh configuration and constrained because the city's comprehensive plan anticipates redevelopment of the property. So we have a property that's three times um as long north to south as it is wide from east to west and that east to west space is pinched by wetland complex uh and flood plane uh to the west. I would note that that wetland flood cling complex that runs north to south really separates it from the Veil property. Um certainly there there may have been an opportunity to redevelop at the same time, but I'm not sure that we would have um seen something different because of the the strong protections that the city has for uh those flood plane and wetland areas. And by see something different, I mean in terms of um building connections or or um roadway connections. And then finally, we don't feel that the expansion permits, so those setback issues or the variances would themselves alter neighborhood character. Um certainly a new building going in a location where uh a building was built 40 years ago, that's going to look different. Um, in terms of neighborhood character, it would uh we believe that this would fit in with the character that's been established really to the east and west and quite frankly the um land use pattern of highdensity residential that was established again many years ago. So to conclude then what is a very long presentation for me um uh in the opinion of staff we do think that this proposal is reasonable and appropriate. It continues those redevelopment activities that have long occurred in this corridor. We do understand that this would um continue um development in an area that has experienced development fatigue. Um we also understand that redevelopment of this site is inevitable, be it this project or another project proposed in the near future or the or the distant future. And so we do recommend uh approval or we recommend that you recommend approval to the city council for both the master development plan and those final site and building plans with expansion permits and variances. And I'm happy to answer questions you from the chair or the commission. >> Great. Thank you, Miss Thomas. Commissioners, any questions for staff? >> Commissioner Henry. Thanks, Chair. question about the parking during the construction of this site. Seems like most of the comments from neighbors focused on that. Have you talked with the applicant and are there any contingencies in place to mitigate the the effects of of the construction? >> Uh, Chair Waterman and Commissioner Henry, uh, we do not have a specific plan for construction of parking. That is always a requirement of uh a building permit that we have a construction management plan. You'll also notice we put something in this condition uh of approval for a site management plan. So, not only where are uh vehicles going to be parked, where is construction material going to be stored? Um will there be a crane used? If there's a crane used, it can't uh impact road closure. So, we've we've added some other uh other constraints here to construction. I believe that during construction of the much larger buildings to the east and west, there was some off-site parking over in the Westridge area. I know there was some parking on Boulevard areas that was um concerning and and frustrating to to neighbors. Um, but that was a long answer to say that that would be something that would be a condition of approval. Thanks. Yeah, I appreciate the thoughtful long answers. Other commissioners, Commissioner Minion, we got all kinds of questions. Um, we just hit back on the affordability. We heard 20% at 50% income. Will you kind of explain what that means or what that means to uh help us better understand what that means? >> If you don't mind, chair, if I may. >> Um, >> thank you, Commissioner. Um, yes, there would be nine units of affordability. So, five for one bedrooms and four two bedrooms. the difference in rent, cuz that's the easiest way I can explain it, is uh market rent for a onebedroom would be about $1,800 a month. Uh the rents would be for the affordable units, $1,241. In the twobedroom, it's 2600 for a market rate and $1,4.90 for a affordable rent. So using that 50% of area income. Yeah. >> Great. Thank you. Um, another question is is how far is this from an R1 neighborhood? Sorry, that's a tough question to throw at you. >> Uh, Chair Waterman and Commissioner Minion, I apologize. I knew you were going to ask that because it's a question that you're you're interested in. I'm going to have to find that. And if we I'll circle back. >> Thank you. Miss Wishnack pointed out that I could just do quick math here. Uh, Oberlin Park. Um, there are single family homes just north of Oberlin Park. Let me find my So, we are at 0.2 miles here. The closest single family home is right here. So, probably that same distance. >> Good distance away is what you're saying then. Okay. Um, and then a little bit about watershed, how they're going to contain that. I saw some stuff regarding uh on-site storage. Um, would that be like an underground uh uh culvert or >> Chair Minion and or Chair Waterman and Commissioner Minion? Apologies to both of you. Um, the the city storm water management rule requires three things. It requires control of the volume rate leaving the site. It controls the VA oh wait rate sorry I got that mixed up. rate volume uh and quality. And so to get to all of those things and what we see a lot on these more constrained sites is an underground chamber. Um so under the parking lots uh those chambers do that engineering work uh before release from the site. So these proposals that come before the planning commission um come before you only when our uh water resources engineer is comfortable uh generally comfortable with the storm water management plan that it meets those rules and then if a project is approved a final storm water management plan has to again be presented. So there's a double look. This property is also located within the oh shoot the Basset Creek wershed district. We have four watershed districts in town so I have to get my geographies right. The Basset Creek wershed management organization and they would also take a look at this. So, we're confident that with two looks from our city uh engineer and then with Basset Creek uh also looking at this that storm water management um rules would would be met. >> Thank you, Commissioner Hansen. >> Thanks, Chair. A quick question on parking. Um it the applicant is proposing providing 70 spaces. Sometimes we see a plan where hey we're we're um striping 70 spaces but there's an additional five or 10 kind of floating out in the ether in your opinion or maybe in the application. Is there room to add additional spaces in the proposal tonight? uh chair and and commissioner Hansen and the applicant may be able to answer this. There may be some additional spaces, one or two, but we're not talking about significant uh areas of parking. No. >> Okay. Any other questions? Okay. Uh now that all the questions have been posed to staff, at this time the applicant is uh invited to come and make a presentation or offer any comments. [Applause] >> Welcome. Uh please provide your name and address for the record and then we'd love to hear your comments. >> Uh Mr. Chair, um commissioners, my name is Tom Dylan. I'm with Inland Development Partners, uh 100 West Lake Street in Weisetta, Minnesota. And along with me, I have a very tall architect, uh, Matt Zelmer, uh, City of St. Paul, 350 St. Peter Street. >> Welcome. Please let let us know your thoughts. >> Thank you. Uh, I'm going to try to respect what uh the what you outlined earlier, uh, Mr. Chairman, uh, and not try to repeat the presentation that, um, Susan made. She did a great job. Uh, covered most of it. I'll just touch where I can and then I'd like to have Matt walk you through the architectural uh concept uh that he designed. Um as you know the project does comply with the city comp plan and the current zoning. Um we think the design blends in very nicely with the Burke and the Veil two projects to the east and west of us. Uh this is obviously the last phase of a three-phase project and we're excited to get this started. We've worked very closely with city, city staff, neighbors, residents, uh our development team to bring this project forward and we're excited to have it uh completed, get it approved and hopefully get it completed. Um as you know, it does meet the city tree ordinance, the parking ordinance. It does provide the storm water uh system that uh we've already discussed here and uh where there currently is none. um a sign significant investment in infrastructure on the site. Uh natural gas, water, uh storm sewer, um uh cur uh parking lots, all those things uh on the site. Um we uh just touch on the the expansion and various requests as uh staff has outlined they are are reasonable and appear to be uh uh reasonable and should be acceptable. Um, one thing I did want to touch on to um, Commissioner Henry's question uh, about parking, the construction parking, as staff mentioned, we have not laid out a construction management plan that's required of us uh, in order to get the get through the process. Uh but typically we would uh whatever we can whenever we look for uh uh construction parking and it it es and flows during the construction process depending on where we are in the phase. Uh but we would uh try to find some place around like maybe the uh shopping center with the old Dick Sporting Good. That that would be a good location where we could work out something with the CSM company that owns that uh to park there. Um, and then, uh, with regard to a crane, uh, it is a four-story building. It would require a crane, but typically we would use the, uh, portable, there's actual brand name, which I can't capture right now, but we would put those on site. They would be on site, not in street. There wouldn't be street closures, anything like that. And they're relatively small in profile. And Potain, that's the name. Um, and um, I think I'll let Matt take over from here because uh, his his comments are probably a lot more interesting. So, thank you. And we'll stand for questions. >> Thank you. U, I think city planner Thomas did a great job with the slide uh, showing the design in relation to the adjacent projects to the east and west. Burke to the east, Veil to the west. One of the things we attempted to do in the design of this project um in addition to creating the setbacks and green space that were desired by the neighbors was to have a design that talked to both the veil and Burke but did not match either. Um so it's a a black and white kind of motif of design. We've attempted to with these black inset sections of uh or sorry black sections of siding to create the feeling of an inset. Um, and then a black base with a predominantly white uh top, black windows, black decks. Speaks back to both of the adjacent buildings. Um, and really kind of gives a timeless and classic feel in black and white. >> Wonderful. Thank you. Uh, commissioners, any any questions for the applicants? Commissioner Henry. >> Thanks, Tom. This would be a question for you. Just a general philosophical question. The previous proposal was for town homes and now it's for apartments. Why the change? >> Well, uh to be perfectly transparent, uh we didn't have uh staff support on that. Um we uh struggled with design. We ran through many complications uh with regard to indoor parking and uh setbacks, all those things. And when it came down to it, we didn't have support of staff. So, we decided not to go forward. We we post not postponed but we withdrew our uh we didn't withdraw we stalled our our application uh and then started working with staff again about okay what could really work here and what could you support and that took many months and so that's how we got here today >> sounds like a valid reason curious and this may be a question for city staff instead of the applicant but you know as a condition of approval we talked about the cross parking agreement as part of this. I'm just curious with these three marsh run proposals. What happens if one of these three gets sold off or is owned by a different management company? Will those parking agreements the covenants still hold through a transition in in ownership or does it get nullified? And I'm just want to assuage some of the fears of some of the the people who are living here. Uh, Chair Waterman and Commissioner Henry, I would say it depends on how that cross parking agreement is memorialized. Um, I don't know, Miss Wishnack, if you have anything else to add to that. Um, I do. I I think that, um, it is a condition of the approval, so that is recorded against the property, Commissioner Henry. So, um, I would say it would stay intact regardless of ownership and regardless of managers. Right now it's pretty convenient because the management is the same. However, I understand your concern and that is a condition. So whatever happens in the future, it has to be rectified. >> And I would also just add on to that now, Miss Ms. Rich, that I think the memorialization is um memorializing something that's already happening also um that there is this cross parking that's already happening. I know that in speaking with inland partners and Doran, they recognize it's already happening. They recognize it's going to probably continue to happen. And so this just memorializes it for all parties. >> And I'm assuming that this also applies to the sharing of the amenities, too. It's the same language in that. >> Good. Thank you. Uh, Commissioner, one thing I would like to point out. Um, I think if if you had an opportunity to review the, uh, parking study, and I think staff touched on it, uh, the parking, the guest parking, uh, in the Burke apartments, uh, pretty much indicated that that the enclosed portion of that parking, there are six stalls outside and there's, I don't remember how many stalls inside, >> 35. >> 35 uh, inside for guests. uh for whatever reason that being inside people seem reluctant to use. Um and part of that is just pure convenience. Of course, they can just walk across the street. That's going to change with this development. It'll force people to actually use the parking that's been provided. In addition, the Veil uh which just opened this month uh a couple weeks ago uh just to the west uh has 28 surface visitor stalls and 18 uh what they call flexible stalls available too. So we we have uh and and all three properties are managed by white cap properties which could change to your point if any one of these uh properties could be sold. Um, but there is an increase of parking available um, currently. >> Well, I'm I'm a really big fan of having increased surface parking in this marsh run 3. What I could envision happening and if if they were here, which they're not because they're not living in Marsh Run 3 yet, but I would assume some of the concerns those future people would have would be they have a lot of surface parking in Marshon 3. The Burke has only a few spaces. I'm in I'm anticipating a lot of people who visit their family and friends at the Burke are going to park in Marsh run three, but with this cross parking covenant, sounds like we have at least a contingency plan in place. >> Yes. And I and I um would like to stress that the Burke the available parking at the Burke that isn't being fully utilized right now. uh it's it's going to have to change and and whether that's white cap management really uh being more forceful in their management of that I think that's where the part of the solution comes from. >> Is there any ideas on your part to sweeten the pot let's say and have some incentives for people to go inside and try it out. Guest parking it's great. It's climate controlled and I know psychologically people don't want to go in. They just want to have the freedom to park outside. But there are a lot of benefits to parking inside too >> commissioner and certainly during the winter time there are benefits. Um what I would say is I'm I'm strictly at the development side of the business. Uh I'm happy to carry that me message to u the white cap management people who run it dayto-day. They know the property much better and the operational side than I do. >> Thank you. Yeah, I'll take you up on that offer. I think it's best if we communicate openly as possible. So I appreciate that. >> Happy to do that. This could be a question for for Matt. Has a sun study been been commissioned and how does that look for the neighbors to the west, the east, and the north? >> Yes, it's provided in the design packet. I don't remember if that was a slide. >> I apologize. We can bring it up. It is in your packet. Um it was an attachment to the plans. >> Oh, that's fine. Yeah, >> the closest it gets is the north property line, but with the increased setback that we've done, the hill that is there and the existing trees, um there was no impact on the existing properties. >> I know that was an issue with the Burke where we originally had it six doors all the way and then the sun was blocking the neighbors to the north pretty significantly. So, I appreciated that the work that was done by you and the city staff to mitigate that blocking out. So, this one with four stories, I didn't anticipate any issues with that. And it sounds like we haven't had any complaints from the height of the building from the neighbors. So, that's good. About pedestrian access, just by looking at the plans, basic sidewalk, is there any any concerns from your end of the the bargain about safety for people walking from Marshon 3 over to Oberlin Park or over to Trader Joe's to do some grocery shopping? Um, Commissioner, um, I we don't see any at this point. Um, I I believe, and Matt, you could correct me, but I think we're uh fully connected by sidewalks when this project is completed, >> so they should have safe passage as as far as uh we're aware. >> Thank you. One last thing. I'm a member of the sustainability commission as well too and I'm always trying to to plug the need for reducing our carbon footprint and have you maybe this is a question for Matt as the architect, but this is a pretty exposed site and it's a southern view right on 394. It's screaming out for solar panels in my opinion. Is there any any ideas of making it solar ready or maybe even well insulated so we can save on heating and cooling costs? Sure. Uh so there's kind of three ways that we address green building uh when we go through our designs. One is the storm water management that was talked about earlier. Uh very important to us, especially being so close to the creek. Um the second one is during construction. Uh we've got some stats from our construction teams that over 70% of material waste on site during construction um is uh skips the landfill and is recycled. And then from an architecture and design standpoint while doing design and construction documents, we go through the Minnesota um energy uh design assistance program uh which takes into whole building uh a whole building approach to identify and achieve energy savings. Um we've been doing that on all of our projects recently. So we've got great data on how our projects have been performing. um and veil which is uh recently completed to the west we were seeing a uh 20% uh reduction in energy cost from baseline standards and 24% savings in gas. So we work with our MEP design partners to make sure that we're using efficient um mechanical equipment, energy star appliances, um good wall insulation, good quality windows, uh efficient LED lighting um and then also make some accommodations for electrical car charging and ebikes. So, it is important to us as well. >> Thanks. I'm glad to hear that. Between now and the city council meeting, if it comes in front of there, I'd encourage you to put some of that quantitative data down so then the city council can review that as well. >> Sure. >> And I'll go back to the original point, too. This site does scream out for solar. So, I'd encourage you to to consider that at least, >> commissioner. We will look at that. Especially just being solar ready is a great idea. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner. Uh, any other questions? Oh, uh, Commissioner Hansen, >> one more. Sorry, it kind of piggybacks off parking. Um, moving in, moving out, how does that happen on in this facility? And maybe a dumb question is like, if I drive up, am I occupying some of the parking spaces? Do you have a dedicated spot for a moving truck to land here? >> Uh, there's kind of two access points into the building. One is through the north side and the parking garage. The other is through the south and the main entry. Um we work really hard with the Whitecat management team on properties to coordinate moveins and moveouts. Um on this particular property, whether they're doing that and choosing to do it through the parking garage. Um there is a drive lane that would allow cars still to move past a potential larger vehicle that is parked for move in and move outs. And then smaller vehicles that people would often move in could fit into an individual stall. We also in addition to that on the northwest corner of the site have um trash staging area which in times when trash is not being used could be used by a vehicle to park and facilitate moveins. >> Okay, sorry this is a dumb question. Is a moving truck going to park in a parking spot? >> Uh not a full moving truck. No, but it would pull in on the north side u and could use the garage door. Okay. All kinds of questions. >> Commissioner Minion. Uh first off, more of a comment and a little bit of direction from the city, but as I recall, uh I think we're all very sensitive to parking during construction and uh the neighborhood has been very good about communicating with us uh after construction about parking issues, but I recall um that there was a good amount of parking available in the Burke that the public has not bought into. Um, and I remember some talk about signage and the size of the signage. So, I'm going to kind of sideline you. I'm not expecting to give an answer, but as I recall, there was some discussions about increasing the signage to encourage people to use that space down below because it's a wonderful space and I I like Mr. Henry's comment about getting an incentive. But, as I recall, it's just a matter of some of the signage was poor and small in size. I don't mean to sideline you, so if you don't have know the answer, I'm fine. But has that signage been addressed or has anybody brought that up? Um, has that been improved or increased at all? Does anybody know that? >> Chair, if I may, >> Miss Wishnack, >> thank you, Chair and Commissioner Minion. Um, there has been back and forth about that over the years, of course, and yes, there is signage. Uh the interesting thing about the Burke is uh it works on a butterfly system if you're familiar with that at all. Are you familiar? No. >> Okay, then I'll go through it. So basically when you're visiting someone at the Burke, um you have a um a link to um a barcode and not a barcode, a what's >> QR code. >> QR code. Thank you. Um and then you're able to hold up the QR code either on the front door or into the parking ramp. Um, and that'll let you in and the visitor inside as well. So, I think sometimes if if you haven't called ahead or you don't have the link or you don't have, you know, that can cause somebody to stop and go, okay, I'm just going to park in front or I'm going to go park on this site or whatever. So, I mean, that's how it works. So, um, do people know about it? I would say yes. Do I think everybody uses it? No. Do I think there's lots of vacancy inside? Absolutely. So, I'll just say I would encourage you to think about a way to try and make that a little bit better and I think that would help ease some neighborhood pains if that's possible at all. >> Yeah. >> Yes. We'd be more than happy to work with city staff on size of signing and lettering. >> Okay. Thank you. I think you're going to hear that from the council when you go before them as well. So, uh um got a whole bunch of notes for you. So, storm water, let's hit that real quick. Um, can you tell me a little bit about that construction? Are you looking at corrugated metal pipe? Are you looking at cementuous product? Are you looking at uh how is that going to go? >> I don't remember what they have in the plans currently. >> Uh, Commissioner, what I believe, which I hope is correct, uh, it's a um, it's a metal system um, which, you know, slows down the rate of discharge. Uh, it lets the u uh, material settle uh, before it discharges. Um, and it's a it's a series of baffles underground. Um, that's my best technical explanation. >> They're a Ferrris product. They're not a symmetous product. >> Correct. >> Okay. Um, and that's your personal stuff you want to get into, but I would encourage you to look at cementuous stuff and I would look for you to encourage you look at an exterior band. Um, I'm spending a lot of money on repairs on that right now and I don't want to go off that trail, but I understand that across Minnesota there's been a past history of people using a ballast around this pipe as a limestone and they've created a terrible uh pH and imbalance where the pipes are rusting at an accelerated rate. So, just a heads up. >> Interesting. >> Um, >> Commissioner, we'll we'll take that up with our civil engineer. And yeah, it's it's expensive. I'm nervous about it. Um anyway, uh will you talk a little bit about uh how we no longer need the flood plane permit? What uh when it was that was something that was posted in our in our writing and would you talk a little bit more about the flood plane permit? >> Would you want to go there? >> Uh Chair Waterman and Commissioner Minion. Um, when city staff first began reviewing this, we knew that there was a flood plane alteration that was occurring. And our brain immediately goes to floodplane alteration permit. Um, this does require a flood plane alteration permit, but not one that needs to be approved by planning commissioner, city council. The threshold, the dimminimus, this is well under that. And so when we published it, we said flood plane alteration permit that you would be acting on, it's not something you need to act on this evening. uh three cubic yards. Um which is couple wheels. >> Three of me lined up this way and that way probably not even. So, >> all right. Um and then one last question in regards to uh snow management and surface parking and and impervious surfaces. you talk a little bit about how you see that handled moving forward just where you're going to put your snow piles, how you're going to deal with that. >> Uh, Commissioner, I'll get out repeat. I'm not an operations person, but I'll do my best. Uh, thank you for the question. Um, in the event of a snow a plowable snowfall um uh during the day, it'll be pushed uh as far uh north or south as we can and then if necessary uh in the evening, it'll be hauled off site. >> Okay. Thank you very much. Yeah, great job. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right. Thanks, Commissioner. Commissioner Banks, any questions? All right. Awesome. None for me. Uh thank you so much. Uh stick around. We might uh Oh, uh Commissioner Henry. >> Thanks, Chair. One more follow-up question about the parking, too. The last thing you said, I'm really glad to hear that where if snow is is accumulating, it'll be hauled off site. One of the concerns I had was with snow remediation. If it was just planned to be bu pushed into the wetland, then I'd be concerned about having some contaminants, some salt primarily in there. But I'm really glad to hear that. So, thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right. Stay close. We might have you back up. >> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. Okay. Uh, next up, I will now open the public hearing. If you would like to speak, please come to the podium and state your name and address for the record. Any questions should be directed to me as the acting chair and not to staff. Although commissioners, if you would appreciate if you would help me inventory any questions, we will accumulate them and we will ask certain questions of the staff later in the meeting. Um, so, oh, welcome. >> Hi. >> Hi. >> Boom. Here I am. Uh, my name is Pam Lewis. I live at 980 Fairfield Court. I'm in the 20 unit um townhouse development that is most directly affected by this directly to the north of the proposed site. Um, I'm the only representative that was able to be here tonight from my neighborhood. So, I have a lot of notes. I'm trying to combine a few people's thoughts. So, I'm going to ask for a little forgiveness and jumping around a little bit. Um, first I I want to start with some of the information that was set up. I'm feeling a little off guard because there's some new pa faces I've never seen before. So, I don't want to assume that people are up to speed on the history here. Um, there's also a couple people that did weigh in in the past that aren't here anymore. Um, but I'm I'm going to start with a couple of the questions that you asked. Um, I'm glad, Mr. Henry, that you asked about the previous projects and why those as town houses didn't get moving because there were parts of those plans that we really liked that they looked more like us. In a lot of ways, I have to tell you, I feel like those first two plans were kind of non-starters. The first one did not meet this minimum city parking ordinance. And the second one, I'm going to call it like Tetris garage. It had like a tandem garage and no um driveways whatsoever. And I think when the logistics were really questioned of how things like parking and snow removal and and just how does this person back out, I I think that plan quickly dissolved. So I don't think that one got I don't think you guys even saw that the second time. Part of my frustration is just the fact that we're this is actually potentially one meeting away from this plan being approved. We as neighbors have not seen this since it was 20 town houses as a concept plan. And this is wildly different looking. It's hard for me to even process the, you know, 400page proposal um when, you know, we're still digesting the veil and some of those changes just being open for a few weeks. So, I kind of wanted to start at this because while it seems like we've been working on this a long time, those first two proposals to me were not viable options and we've had no neighborhood buy in in about a year or opportunity to speak because there's no longer as many public forums available at council meetings. So, that's why I'm here trying to say a lot. Whoa. Hello. Um, again, bear with me. There's times I don't know if I'm gonna laugh or scream or cry and I might end up doing all three here tonight. Um, so we're back here. >> Thank you. We're >> Oh. Oh. Oh, dang. I need a roadie or a tour guide or something. Anyway, I was starting to say I I feel shocked that we're already at this decision stage on a very very large program proposal. Uh a few of us, myself included, did ask for a neighborhood meeting and we were told that it wasn't required and that we could request a meeting with the developer. I really question how realistic is it to expect an individual resident to ask for a meeting with a developer? I have a job and a family and a life and do I really think that that information is going to get back to city and planning and council. So, I didn't feel that it was fair to put that back on us. Um, I also heard a statement from the developer about how we wanted these three buildings to look different and that's not true at all. We would very much like something that more mirrors that mirrors the Burke and has some sort of a step down like you mentioned. I think that's kind of lowhanging fruit in design of how we would hope a project of this size would evolve. There were many stages in getting the Burke to that and it feels here like we're just leaprogging over a lot of stages. And one of my neighbors actually said to me, Pam, why do you care so much? It's 40 more units. We've already got 400 that have been dumped us on us in the last few years. And at first I swallowed hard because not wrong and the number of people that are writing and coming is getting less and less because I think the view is our voice doesn't matter. We're not even being given an opportunity to express it anymore. But my answer to that question is this land, this last parcel matters more than anything because it's the last emergency valve that we have in this whole corridor. The Burke was admittedly underparked. The Deveil the the I shouldn't say that improperly parked in that it was very little surface. They have an abundance of underground parking that people don't want to use. Um we went through a lot to get no parking on Fairfield Court. Fair or Fairfield Road. Fairfield Road is very narrow. Um gosh, I'm jumping around again. I'm going to look at my notes and try to get myself back on track. When I looked at some of my notes, and again, there's a lot to cover here. I want to look at this neighborhood holistically, and I'll start with the veil because it's our newest addition. The veil has been open about 3 weeks. Um, we've started to see moving vans stacked up. So, I very much appreciated that question about moving vans. There's one small area for the veil. Um, I also am really concerned about the amount of surface parking at the Veil. I did ask the city because shortly after they opened, I went for a walk and was very surprised to see half of the surface parking lot at the Veil is marked reserved for residents. It was really important to us when the veil was approved that there be ample surface parking, not ramp, surface. And I believed that we were promised 36 guest and short-term surface parking spots at the veil. When I have gone over there, in reality now there's 26. The city responded and said there is opportunity for additional overflow parking in this proposed parking lot. And I do remember when they made a pedestrian bridge from the veil, that was part of the justification was for people to be able to use this parking lot. So I think it's really important to say that this parking lot has been promised to two large developments as overflow on either side of it. It was given by Doran as a remedy for the Burke guest parking as a way to get the veil approved and now it's being said that the surface parking that we were expecting in front of the veil is part of that bridge over to this parking lot. So, I'm really concerned and when I see a a screenshot that says it's just meeting parking requirements, that's not enough. We we've got we've got a parking crisis in this neighborhood. We've promised it from both sides and for it to just meet expectations is not going to be enough. So, I don't want anybody to ever say we weren't warned. Um I see I I see this being potentially a a nightmare with nowhere to go. Okay, back on plan. Um, I would really like to see the city look at a master plan for this de neighborhood. I think we really lost an opportunity for the developer to look at a master plan, but it's not too late for the city. And I'll talk about a few things with this. I've already talked a little bit and we've covered this neighborhood is in parking crisis. This lot has constantly a dozen to 1500 to 15 cars from the Burke in it at all times and a stream of people also jaywalking. I actually think we need a crosswalk up Fairfield Road a little bit. Um I'm glad signage came up because we've been begging for better no parking signs and the guest parking at the Burke is not intuitive. If I told my 85year-old mother, "If you come visit me, you got to do this QR code." I'd never see the lady. A lot of people aren't going to do the work necessary to find the parking there. We've we've learned that. So, we've got signage issues. We've got jaywalking. I think we need a crosswalk again around where that Veil Bridge is over to this lot. I can also see as a resident on Fairfield Road, the very highly likelihood that we're going to need a turn lane onto the frontage road onto Weisetta Boulevard. And if this building is packing in, you know, on the other side, it's going to take away the potential to ever build a turn lane there. And I can already see the need for it. We have a lot of seniors that live in the Bay Hill condos. the area is already challenging. Um, I've been asking for a long time for a bike lane or a better connection over to Ridgedale. With all these new people at the Veil, if if you look at how would you walk or how would you ride your bike to Ridgedale, it's not very nice. It's under an underpass. It's a broken up terrible sidewalk. Again, I think we really need to pause and look at the infrastructure of this neighborhood because it feels already at capacity and breaking and this is all we have left. Um there are some paths that go behind mainly through the gables um to Trader Joe's. It's where folks would walk to go up to shopping. And those paths are in horrible condition. And I hate to call out my friends at the Gables, but they're terrible. They're not safe to bike on. And I'm fully expecting some of these new renter neighbors to complain to the city about these paths to Trader Joe's. Um, I've heard a lot of conflicting information about who's responsible. We pay as associations to maintain all the green spaces around those paths. And that's been a huge increase in our expenses because of the dog elimination. Um, but those paths need to be resurfaced and I don't think that should fall on the gables. That might have been part of an agreement that was created 30 years ago before these new 400 apartment buildings or units were there. Um, sorry I'm jumping around a lot. Um, at the last planning meeting, uh, planning commissioner Su asked if the path connecting this lot to the veil was going to be private or public. And we didn't get an answer on that. There was actually a little bit of a deer in the headlights moment between Inland and and Doran up here at the podium. and Ben from Doran said they had not discussed civil planning. And to me, that's really concerning that we're not discussing civil planning as a bigger picture for this neighborhood. Um, I would like to know if those paths are going to be private or public because they are using our paths around the gables. Um, it's kind of become a dog park. So, we would like to be able to use any paths that would connect or go to Ridgedale in that area. Um, I'd like the city to take a comprehensive look at how these buildings relate to each other and the neighborhood. I think there should be some cohesion between the two buildings that are on the opposite sides of Fairfield Road with a step down and some similance of a neighborhood. I would really like to invite anybody who has any decisionmaking in this to come see our neighborhood. See how narrow Fairfield is. There's no shoulder. There's no bike lane. Please walk the paths over to the grocery store and see just try it on. See how it feels. We are currently I think about this close to breaking and the veil is at maybe is at early occupancy. It our neighborhood feels very full. And again, part of me thinks, you know, is the damage already done? But I think this need, this last tiny piece of the puzzle needs to be done wisely, with care, without rush because it's all we got. Okay. Now, I have a page that's actually addressing this plan. I mentioned we really would want it to have a step down. We would want some semblance of a neighborhood. I'll talk a little bit about the setbacks because to me at least keeping the city guidelines should be a non-starter. We would be going from 66 ft to about half of that. That's a huge difference. Um I'm very concerned about the Fairfield Road setback. the rear setback, that wetland area, that kind of section that carves through, that's actually where a lot of the really amazing big majestic birds for that huge wetland nest. That's where the cranes and the herand um they all come out of that little nest. So to push a giant building closer up there, we've already lost so much nature. We've already lost so many trees, huge significant trees that a a setback back that deviates our city recommendation there feels like another knife to the heart. Um I'm so dramatic. Um I care about our north setback and the tree removal because that affects my property value of my neighborhood. It's the only privacy for the residents, the the homeowners in our southernmost building. I don't really care a lot about the setback to the south. I think we need enough to be able to turn safely. That would be the setback that's right on um the frontage road. We just need enough to see to turn safely. Um and I'm going more into detail than I'd like to be, but again, this is maybe my only opportunity to talk to you. If there's no open forum at planning and we've had no other neighborhood meetings, kind of feels like my last chance to say what I need to. So, I appreciate your patience. Um, I question the shared parking logistics between the buildings. Who's going to manage that? Um, if you're expecting a visitor at the Veil to go from the west end of their parking lot all the way to the Burke, I think that's unrealistic. our parking spots and the parking spots for the gables at Fairfield Spur would be far closer. So, human nature, people taking the path of least resistance, they're much more likely to steal our um townhouse association parking rather than walk along the frontage road all the way from the veil. So, I seriously question that logistics. Um, I do want to say the affordability component is important to me for my own personal priorities and and values, but our area has taken on a tremendous amount of affordable housing. And I was never somebody who ever said not in my neighborhood because again, that's not part of my ethics or or values. I want people to be able to live in this beautiful area, but it's more important for me to keep it a beautiful area and a livable area. And part of the consolation of taking on the huge projects that were already pre-approved was knowing that we were helping a lot of people potentially with affordable housing where these program these plans that we've seen lately have been maybe three to nine units depending on when it was town houses and and this proposal. I don't see enough public good in that handful of additional affordable housing to completely disregard everything that we're saying about the neighborhood. Um the mayor asked if not this what and I agree it's most likely to be housing but it shouldn't be this. It should be done thoughtfully and carefully and it should be um we should be listened to. Um there's other there's other things there. It isn't just a matter of what being housing. It's also a matter of when the Burke or the Veil has been open for 3 weeks. We have not seen the full impact of that building. When people talk about construction fatigue, sometimes I worry that it sounds like we just want a break, like as if our neighbor was doing a kitchen remodeling and we're sick of a couple of trucks and the hammering. We have been subjected to punishing construction for six years by a developer reg who regularly broke the noise ordinance, who regularly made promises that weren't kept. So, I would also not assume that the who of building additional housing here should necessarily be this developer. They did not do a master plan and this is the tiny parcel that they left themselves with. I disagree that this could have looked differently. If you look at the whole area of the veil, this could have been a series of buildings. Um, this could have looked very different and I don't think the neighborhood should continue to pay for the lack of for the lack of planning. This developer was allowed to max out every parcel. They admitted mistakes. Um, they're now taking away the parking remedy that they proposed and promised. They're breaking expectations without consideration of this neighborhood. Why would we also reward them with setback variances? And why are we rushing this? What is the what is the hurry to get this done? Again, Veil's been open three weeks. This land isn't going anywhere. There's no expiration date. Um I I just think we need a pause here. Um bear with me. I know there's a couple things here I jumped over just cuz that's my brain. I think this plan needs to go back to a concept stage. I think it needs to include civil planning and neighborhood feedback. I think history here matters. I think expectations set here matter. And I think the uniqueness here matters. It's not just dogs barking and parking that you hear everywhere. It's a tiny island neighborhood that has huge new developments and this is all that's left. It's also homeowner associations that are responsible for green spaces that are being taken over by the other neighborhoods. Again, history matters, expectations set matters, and uniqueness matter. Um, yeah, I'm disappointed. I'm frustrated. I'll also say I've had glimmers of hope. If you I hope you guys watch the city council meetings. I saw a lot of empathy from um some members and I also saw braveness with being able to hold these developers accountable to promises that they made. I would like to ask Doran um about the statements they made regarding this parking that was less than two years ago and and does that not matter anymore? I don't understand the amnesia. Um, I'm disturbed to learn tonight that there's no construction management plan. There's no designated moving van area. Uh, I just learned tonight that the northwest corner, which is closest to us, would be the trash area. Don't really appreciate that. Um, if this is all neighborhood parking that is open to anybody at the properties, can our guests also use the Burke parking? I would very much like to know that because we see their folks using our very limited guest parking. Um I would also want to see something about snow removal and writing because I know based on our limited guest parking, we have lost some of our guest parking because the cost of snow removal is so expensive that we've actually made the decision to sacrifice some of our own guest parking rather than having to take on the homeowner's expense of removing that. It's very expensive. I no longer trust the developer to live up to some of their promises. And so when I hear we'll handle snow removal, I put it in the bucket of I would want that in writing. And if we give up this last parcel, we have no negotiation about the infrastructure in this neighborhood. If we get help paying for some of these paths and things that we need, what leverage do we have left if this project is approved? I'm going to peek one more time because I don't want to be mad at myself or have any of my neighbors mad at myself for forgetting something. I would just I I would really ask you I I think this plan is nowhere near being able to go in front of council for a vote and thank you for your time. >> Great. Thank you so much. Welcome. >> Hello. >> Hello. Please give your name and address for the record. >> I probably should put this down. >> Um, my name is Sarah Maloney. I live at 705 Fairfield Circle. I live in the Gables of West Ridge, which is north of Burke, goes 104 units. Um, I'm going to try not repeat what Pam said. She brought up so many things that are important and I hope you will listen to us. I am truly I'm just flabbergasted that this is coming back to us so soon. The veil just opened for um occupancy at the beginning of July. I think I heard Miss Wishnack say it was 30% occupied. That was at the last EDAC meeting. It's just not enough to know what effect that is going to have. I expect there's going to be some more unintended consequences of what we didn't think would happen over there at the Burke. Um, we knew when this was proposed, we knew there was not going to be enough street parking or surface parking. We knew it. It was past 4 to three. It was quite um contentious at that time. Um I think it was passed in 2018 and opened for occupancy I believe in the summer of 2020 and it took a couple of years because of COVID not very many people were were going in and out. Um, but in 2022 when things started opening back up, it exploded and we had lines of vehicles all the way up Fairfield Road as far as the condominiums. They also parked in our guest parking at the Gables of West. We saw it time and time again. Um, we lobbyed the city to get no parking at all times on Fairfield Road because at that time there was just no overnight parking. Since then, it's improved, but it's still people still park on Fairfield Road. And I have to say, I've especially since this new plan was proposed, I walk down there all the time. And I would tell you that almost every time I go down there or walk by there or drive by there, somebody is crossing from the office lot back and forth to the Burke. Um it appears to be residents. They've not been able to train their residents to park underground. Um there's also, I would say, a delivery truck, you know, larger trucks, vehicles parked on Fairfield Road as well. and they're longer. They take up more space. Um there was a UPS truck parked there when I drove by today to come here tonight. It's every time. Um I would say 70% of the time I go by there, there's somebody parked um on Fairfield Road or going back and forth from the Burke to that lot. There's often, I would say, 15 to 20 vehicles parked in that lot on some evenings when it's nice weather and weekends. So, this is going to be an issue there. If this large of a building is built with the parking as proposed, there's no place for people to park except for our property. It's just going to happen. It causes a real issue for us. If we were single family homes, we could report it. We would know that it's not our uh people are, you know, parking in our driveways or whatever, but because we have our own guests, we can't keep track of all our parking. We'd have to hire security and you've just we've really it's just really been a burden to us. It's also the init uh additional dogs. Um, I know the mayor got a little tired hearing about it, but it's true. There's a lot more dog waste left on our properties. Um, I live in an area where it's a lot of people walk their dogs, and I'd say once or twice a day, I definitely see a dog off leash as well. So, if they're off leash, they're not picking up after them. And there's a couple in particular I know that they belong they live at the Burke because I then I just happened to see them go into the building. So if we don't know who these people are, I'm not going to call the police on people. It's that's that's really a burden. And I want to go back to um what Miss Thomas said about checking with the police. So I think it was I think it was after the parking the no parking signs were put up. There was a pickup truck that was parked on Fairfield Road for two straight weeks. I finally called the police because everybody was complaining about it. And it turned out it was somebody who lived at the Burke. He didn't want to go. He didn't want to park underground. Um it was convenient. He lived in the north. There's at the Burke there's like a north entrance that's not the main entrance. And it would just it was just easier. He just come and go. So, the only reason I called the police is because I thought it was an abandoned vehicle. But I generally when I drive by there, I am not going to call the police. It's just something else to do. I have enough to do. I don't, you know, and sometimes I get to where I'm going and I'm not going to stop and call the police and say, "Oh, yeah, there was a car on Fairfield Road." It just it it just lowers our quality of life to have to constantly report things. Um, and then I do want to confirm that when I was talking about Yeah. because I'm one of the only letters that was in the original packet and I talked extensively about the parking issue and how Doran promised to get to incentive to pass the veil. Um, they would use that office lot. They said they had 15 stalls available on evenings and 40 or or maybe during the day it was and then another 45 on weekends. Um so this was talked about extens extensively at all the public meetings. They admit they go they goofed. I just don't see how this is going to change now. Um, I just don't see it. You know, if they haven't been able to fix it yet and get people to use their underground parking, it's just not going to happen. Um, and it puts a lot of pressure on a management company. And what do they care if they're if their guests are parking on Fairfield Road? What's it why do they care? They have no incentive. Um, and so our concern about parking is not related to construction. It's post construction. I honestly during construction, I'm I'm really not concerned. They have ample space to go over to, you know, there's that old park and ride um that's sort of closed down now. Um I'm not really worried about that. I'm worried about post construction. Um and let's see. I'm sorry. I'm not I'm just I don't want to repeat things that Pam said. Well, I I would like to talk about the the mass of the building because I didn't hear what all of the setbacks were, but I can tell you that up Fairfield Road, the closest sex setbacks to to from our condos and town homes are usually smaller corners. It's not just a big mass right on Fairfield Road, which this building will be. And I agree with Pam in that I think they need a turn lane there because I think it's just going to get too busy at that intersection of Fairfield Road and Weisetta Boulevard. And also the traffic speed. I hope we can work on something and then maybe get a crosswalk closer down to the Burke and the proposed building because people are just crossing at any place and I mean maybe they won't have the opportunity to cross anymore because they won't be parking there but if you expect them to go over to the veil that we need them to kind of you know cross in one area. Um, something I guess I just want to reiterate about our neighborhood, we we already contributed to density in the city and we had, according to my calculations, we had 190 owner owner owned units of either town homes or condos in the three associations that are most affected by this. We're now outnumbered. The apartments already have 372 between the Veil and the Burke and they have to go through our property to get to Oberlin Park. So that all the way there there's usually dog bags and dog waste all along the sidewalk and then they come back into our property. Some people throw dog bags under trees onto our property. Um, it it really has created an issue for us and it's it's like I said, it's just frustrating because I always hear about single family homes and the city wants to protect those neighborhoods, but what about us? You know, we really we coexisted for so long and all of a sudden we have so many new residents using our property. It's really frustrating. I just wish we would have as much care given to us and I hope you'll listen to us. Um I have a lot of neighbors who are just frustrated. They just don't want to come to meetings anymore. They don't even want to write letters. Um I'm here. I guess I am a glutton for punishment. I want to keep fighting. Um, and I agree with Pam. We just we need some more time with this. We need to talk. We need to have a neighborhood meeting so we can all get together, the city planners or one one at least one person from the city, somebody from the developer so we can talk this through. It should be paused. And I'll leave it at that. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. Welcome. >> Thank you, gentlemen. I'm Jane Gordon. I live at 11460 Fairfield Road and um I'm in the Bay Hill condominiums at the very top that were built in 1996. I can't believe that we're talking for an hour about one tree when there are going to be our little three places that are very beautiful were built well. Uh we're discussing that over and over and over again. And I'm getting older and older. So I let the pretty ladies and the young ladies talk first. I just want to give you a little history about me. I am Jane Gordon who served on the Minnitonka City Council from 1980 to 1992. I chaired the charter commission and was on the charter commission for eight years. And um I have lived through three mayors and four managers. I was on the original council when we decided to make this area as you had mentioned and staff has been wonderful. It was a lot of little houses and this and that and we made it a tax increment financing district. We did indeed move the church. We did indeed um make some plans. you have the original. Thank you so much. I was going to ask for that, but this was not at all what we had in mind. And um my husband, as a matter of fact, had the very first office in on this property. And Tom and I are just laughing. We've been going through this for 30 years. We both decided we had to stop meeting like this. And I know knew the original u Mr. Nelson, the original uh owner of what is now the Veil, and I called it the saloon. Um but um my husband had the very first little uh townousy thing there in those beautiful buildings in the beautiful offices which are there and there's nothing wrong with them. However, his flooded completely. So I I've told everyone for two and two and a half years now that flooded. He was a CPA with people working there and it flooded and so he went back downtown. But um with all of this wetlands and everything being taken away and this and that, I just remember that that um things don't just happen once. Um I am very familiar with this this area. I was on a council with six men and me and we worked on it and worked on it. We had a great staff at the time and um we wanted to make it something proud for Minnetonka which was this awful area. We put in that beautiful shopping area. We did I think it's an amenity to Minnetonka to a point and um I have to tell you that um I'm the one who has made so much money for the police department of Minnetonka and you gave us the stats. I called one day and got seven cars ticketed and towed. I'm the one. But I will tell you now that they send you over to 911, which doesn't really care about someone from Minnetonka. They're kind of rude, but I still call because they can't park there. I'm getting older. People in my building are really old. And to try and go around the park cars there, which there will be again, in which some of the uh building vehicles um from the veil were actually parked there doing some electric work and whatever. I find that to be a danger, including me, you know, I like to drive fast, but I want to, you know, and I just um I really think sometimes enough is enough. The little office building that is there, it's got psychiatrists, which God knows we all need. Um it's got, you know, it there's parking for them. It's not an old building. And this really is the last and and and my little gal pals said there's parking there every single day. and and it'll be really really nice this weekend and there's going to be so much parking uh you know for the pool at the Burke and um it's just little annoying things. I don't want to repeat what what other people um say. However, I don't know if you're all aware that the indoor parking at the at the Burke for the residents, that's a pay thing because our um careman uh lives for our condo lives there and you have to pay for the underground parking. So, nobody at the Burke wants to pay for the parking. That's number one. Number two, um there's a lot of low income, which I also think is wonderful because I was tired of only seeing people that uh look like they everybody else, but um there's not he says there's not just one person, there's four or five or six living in that apartment. That's at the Burke. And that's not going to happen at the Veil. But this little little tall building, I just um you know, I thought, well, gee, what could we do next? I I came up here originally. It was going to be a hotel a couple of years ago and then it was going to be the um town homes where there was no excess place to put the snow and then um we came up with with this. And so I was thinking it's small, it's little. Let's do something for why don't we put on some pickle ball courts there? It's very popular. Or why don't we make it a dog walking park? because we now have 400 apartments and I would say everyone has at least one dog or two. Um, as far as that's the danger issue and the density issue, but as far as the um, parking itself, it ain't going to work, guys. It doesn't now and it's not going to later. And I believe Pam said it that um, we will have no leverage. We don't really have leverage now. And um, you know what? I I live in the Bay Hill. I paid a fortune for that place and we keep it up nicely and where the town homes are and my daughter lived in the other town homes and um you know what they don't look like our place and I want you to know that the Dorne company president, I buy my snow tires from her father-in-law. So, I've been at this for so many years, but I have the history and I know in my gut this is wrong. We don't have room for them walking on our street anymore. I know it's probably a fade out comple because I we've been working together for so long, but um think think about it. Um I'm not so sure that the city council even wants to look at this again, but it's a shame because I think I helped create something lovely for Minnetonka and it's not lovely now. But I appreciate your care and your concern and I appreciate you being on the planning commission. Thank you and thank you to the staff. Thank you so much. >> Welcome. >> Hi. Thank you very much. I won't keep you very long. I know you've been very attentive and really appreciate that. I am Sandra Larson and I'm a resident of Bay Hill and I'm an original owner. I moved in 1999 and we have 68 units in three big buildings. So, it's very, you know, comfortable. We're not crowded. We have the town houses. And I think it's been a very lovely development. And you were asking where are the single family homes nearby? I feel like I'm in a single family home. I feel it's been a very nice neighborhood that's being overrun. We have potentially 600 people moving into this place. And the the place is not designed for it. So, I'm not going to go through everything that was said. I concur with everything that the former people said, Pam, on and on. But I also feel that we have a beautiful uh the it's tan. We have stucco. I think the design of the town houses and the Bay Hill homes are fine. I think these apartments, I'm sorry to say, I think are rather ugly. I feel like the black is like tar paper on the sides. I don't think it goes with our design at all, but that's not the main point. The main point is the crowds and the main point is the place is not designed for this number. I think the idea of a dog park, I know that would be costly to the city because if somebody's bought the place, I'm sure there's a the dollar amount would be a real problem, but that's really what it should be. Some more open space because the road is so narrow. There's no shoulder. There's only one sidewalk on one side. People cross all back and forth. I've called the city numerous times about can't we have more crosswalks even without these buildings because we we're old the people I'm one of the older people that live in Bay Hill. I have a dog. I have to cross the street to go to the sidewalk and cars come through there at 50 and 60 miles an hour. There's very little patrolling. The police come by once in a while. I've called and called. Um, but 10 years ago, one of my friends dog was killed. She was trying to cross the street because the street is narrow and people just feel like there's trees and it's I don't know why, but they just don't go the 30 miles an hour. And I've asked also to have, you know, those monitors put up that tell you what the speed is. That doesn't happen much either. So, it's it's it's getting more and more crowded and more and more dangerous and a lot of senior citizens. Anyway, I just think that that is really a problem. and the speeding. I just wanted to say that the garage in terms of the Burke, I think part of the problem was people were getting into the public parking and then when residents came in to go into the private parking, there was a lot of theft going on. So, there was a really scared people. They didn't want people to come in there. So, there's some there's some real problems with that that isn't just related to is it convenient or not. Um, anyway, there's many more things I could say that have been said, but I don't want to keep you any longer. And I really appreciate your attention. And I know that a lot of people haven't showed up, but I think we we feel all this, you know, money over money over, you know, what the what the residents want. It's like this would be better for the developer to build a real big building. Um, the city and I do think I I want to also concur that one of the reasons I moved into this development was it had lowcost housing. I thought it was important that we share all ranges of ability. So, I'm not opposed to that at all. It's just the numbers are way too huge for the way this place was designed and what we thought we were getting. And I think the city should think about what the neighborhood looks like because it does feel very it was very nice anyway. So, thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Hi. Do I look familiar? There's one point that one of my neighbors wanted me to make that I know that I missed. Um, it's parking on Fairfield Road. Shocking that that's the topic again. I'm really surprised to hear that there was only one call this year because it's it was me. Um, we are routed to 911 which feels awkward and nobody wants to bother 911 with a couple misparked cars. I take pictures all the time. I've sent some of those to Julie. I can provide tons of pictures of cars still to this day parked on Fairfield Road. It is not a solved problem. And one of my neighbors really wanted me to point out the fact that the Burke themselves are one of the worst um violators, offenders on Fairfield. They have landscaping companies that will park northbound, so on the Burke side of the street, but on Fairfield Road. And it's big, you know, trucks that drive the little mowers off of them. So, it takes a big section of Fairfield Road that happens once every couple weeks. There's also a company that comes and I think it's cleans their doormats. Um, but there's different vendors that service the Burke that are not parking in their own ramp. So, one of my neighbors wanted to see if we could address that. They they're I agree they're not training their own tenants well, but they're not even training their own vendors and suppliers and support. Well, so we'd like to see significant help with parking before we look at bringing more in. Thank you again. >> Thank you. Anyone else? Okay. Well, if not, I will go ahead and close the public hearing. Uh, in terms of questions, I heard um and I'm going to there were there were several questions. Um, going to try to sift through these. Some of them I'm going to start with the city and just let me know if these need to be passed to the applicant. Um, the first one I had my notes are a little bit muddled. uh regarding surface parking and maybe what was previously I don't know if it was agreed to with Doran or what was I don't recall what we discussed last time with maybe what was um what we what was said for the veil maybe originally down to 26 for I think guests and then overflow is this parking lot do are you familiar with like were any commitments made anything like that >> uh chair waterman I'll start and and Miss Wishnack may chime in. Um, but the surface parking lot at the Veil does include and was required to include 46 and they were labeled as uh in the report as visitor and short-term parking spaces. So, it wasn't a 46 visitor spaces, it's 46 visitor and short-term parking spaces um at the site right now. Uh we received some photos. We've been out to the site. All of the uh parking spots are labeled 1 through 46. Um off the top of my head, I think it's 28 or 26 uh on the east side that are specifically for visitor parking. And then there are some reserved they're they're labeled as reserved resident um stalls. uh Doran has indicated those are for visitors of residents uh that are coming visitors to residents that are coming >> right and I I think just the basic I think in summary there's 46 dolls outside on surface for that project veil in the agreements that are conditioned tonight you hear the conversation about cross arrangements with each of the properties So, they all have to have agreements to allow people to park. Um, if they would park in the front of the veil, there is a sidewalk in a trail connection to the back of the building uh to get to the um other project. So, or the project. >> So, it sounds like they comply. >> What was that? >> They comply. >> Absolutely. >> Okay. Thank you. That actually dovetales into the next question I heard was uh are the are the paths between the veil and marsh 3 public or private >> chair. I would defer that to the applicant. Um >> very well uh let's see uh who is responsible for the paths like over to the retail center I think around the gables. >> Yeah, chair. Um and we've talked through this a little bit before. This is hard to see, but I'm gonna use this old photo. There is a very narrow uh lane of property lane. I'm not sure if that's the There's a very bit narrow bit of property that runs between these town homes. Uh then is connected to this larger ponding area. This property is owned by CSM, which is the owner of the retail center. um CSM granted a easement and Rottland Town Homes at that same time granted an easement over the the connections to their property. Um we've looked at the easement many times. The easement says that uh they're granting the public use of those trails to um the uh residents of these town home associations and to the city of Minnotonka for public purposes. So any member of the public can utilize those trails. The easement agreement also says, at least the one that's recorded at the county that we brought up again this evening to look at says that the cost, the maintenance of those trails is on the ownership of that property. So the trails that are located on the CSM property, the cost of maintenance of those trails is borne by CSM. the connection point to those trails would be borne by whatever um HOA owns the property on which that connection point is. Um so that's what's recorded at the county. If there were other agreements that were made um between CSM and um at the time Rottland or the HOAs since then that haven't been recorded or that um we we can't find in the recording. I can't speak to those. >> Great. Thanks. Um, I don't want to get too much into traffic, but there were two questions on a need for a turn lane. We did see for the record I just to get it in the record, we there there was information on traffic study in the packet. Didn't seem like there was any. Just Are you able to affirm that there's really >> correct uh commissioner uh commissioners and and count chair waterman? Um the traffic study found that there were no uh required improvements. Uh in fact the traffic study found that a proposed multi-family residential use of 44 units would actually generate less traffic than a fully occupied if this um office building were fully occupied. And that's just typical um just in general. Office and retail uses generate far more traffic uh typically than residential uses. >> Thanks. And I think this this is the last one I have for the city. There were three questions about plans for a crosswalk. >> Uh chair uh and commissioners. Yeah, that was something that staff discussed at our development review committee pretty um thoroughly about crosswalks. And the city's philosophy from a public safety perspective is that a midblock crossing, a crossing that is not at a controlled intersection, is not a safe crosswalk. Um because some traffic will stop for someone in a crosswalk and other folks will not stop. Uh and so we actually see more um safety issues at a midblock crosswalk. So the appropriate crosswalk is at the um uh the actual stop sign on Fairfield Road. Now I would say that that is for a public um delineated crosswalk. I am not suggesting that people don't cross at midblocks um regularly throughout our community, but from a city engineer and a public safety perspective, midblock is not a good location. >> Great. Thank you. Um commissioners, any other questions? I'll have the applicant back up in a minute. Any other questions you heard for uh from the public comments for staff? Commissioner Hansen. Uh >> yeah, thanks, Chair. Um just couple of things that I heard just wanted to ask. Um can you explain if um there was a and I think I know the answer to this but was there a concept plan meeting for the change? Uh and if and my second question is um was there any um flyers or notifications that went out to the neighbors around about this new plan? uh chair and and council member now I'm I'm doing council meetings and Monday yeah sorry to me going to call you sustainability commissioner next here it's our third meeting this week um commissioner banks uh there was certainly a neighborhood meeting for the original concept in 2024 um I understand that the developer I wasn't able to attend the second neighborhood meeting uh Julie went to the second neighborhood meeting um it is true to say that we did not require an additional neighborhood meeting nor an additional concept plan review for what we felt is a a change from one type of multi- um unit development to another multi-unit development. It is true that we suggest that that the neighborhood if they would like to contact um the developer they were welcome to do so. I spoke with several people on the phone and suggested that um I would be willing to sit down with neighbors and talk through a plan. Um the plans that were received were posted on the city's website on the uh project page uh in June. We send out an email blast to anyone who has subscribed to that project page. I also have my own little I'll call it a list serve of uh emails uh from people that I regularly correspond with and so I also updated them uh about the plans being posted uh to the website and I would also just state that in in general and for communities that don't have a concept plan or a sketch plan review and as you know the planning commission is the forum um for uh public input and public engagement. >> Okay. Thank you. And then uh my last question, just want to get more information about a statement that was made about paid underground parking um and whether or not that's for the residents and may extend that to visitors or um or visitors. If you can explain that. >> Hi, Ken. Thank you, Chair and Commissioner Banks. Um there are charges for parking spaces. That's very common in apartment buildings. Um, if you've seen any of the contracts that we look at for affordability, we actually cap the amount of parking uh charges that they can attribute to those spaces. So, yes, absolutely. They charge for spaces. That's very common. Not in the visitor parking. >> Commissioner Hansen, this is maybe a probing question. Um, there was a couple comments made about the timing of this and so I'm curious for both of your perspectives as you think about it's been a long journey for the neighborhood. We're truly 3 or 4 weeks into opening this project and we're not at full capacity. So, what are your thoughts on um, hey, the the the applicant's ready? So they so it's they can choose to propose this project. This isn't the city doing that. So maybe maybe a little like education on how we got to a proposal here. And in your perspective, do we know enough now to make the right decision? Uh, Chair Waterman and, uh, commissioners. Um, I'll just start speaking generally about applications. Under state law, if someone submits a planning application to the city of Minnetonka and that application is complete, the city doesn't have the uh, legal right to say we're not going to hear this application or consider this application. Um, I shouldn't say that. We we could say that we're not going to consider it, but once 120 days passes, that application would be approved because the city didn't take any action on it. And so we um must bring complete applications to this um this body. If we felt we didn't have the information um available to us to make an informed recommendation to you, we would wait until we had that information making sure that we got to you within 120 days. So staff um we are we are confident in our opinion and in our recommendation in terms of um the traffic and the parking and I'm not sure how thoroughly um you read through that report the traffic study and the parking study because can be a little bit dense uh in there but we had the our traffic consultants do counts traffic counts at four intersections um in the immediate area and then look at um those same four that were counted in 2023 to determine if the traffic counts in the broader area um were similar to the counts they took in 2023. Let me say that again. They looked at seven intersections I think it was in total in 2023 and we had them go back and look at four of those same intersections for this study. They actually found that the trips generated in 2023 were greater than the trips that they were seeing right now. And so they used the 2023 numbers to be more conservative. They used the trip generation numbers and parking information from the Burke to inform what they believe is happening at the Veil. But then they found also that the Institute of Transportation Engineers actually would expect less demand than is uh generated by the Burke. So they used the Burke um trip generation and parking again to look at what they believe is the worst case most conservative um situation. So um their recommendation again a a traffic study does not recommend approval of a project or denial of a project. The traffic study and parking study says how will this impact existing um travel patterns and if it will negatively impact them what improvements are needed. It suggested it would not impact intersection capacity and no improvements were needed. >> Commissioner, did you hear another question from the >> I'm glad to have a question. kind of a question for all of us. Susan, may I ask you to pull up page four of the act architectural site plan and >> I I I apologize. I don't have the packet right at my um fingertips here, just the slides I put together. My question for the for the city and for uh fellow um planning commissioners is when I think about setbacks, I always think of the physical building. um if you have a chance maybe you can bring them up too is is on that page four there's a setback there for the parking lot and I've really not put a lot of thought into that in the past um but I think little things will help make this a little more palatable for the neighborhood uh when I read this at first I knew there would be much discussion about parking but is it possible for us to request a different distance on that blue line and I'm not sure if everybody has it up or not but there's a blue line there and if we were to reduce that setback one stall that would add three more additional surface parking spots. I think that would be um an easy thing for us to do. I do not know if that's appropriate. So I'll need your guidance in that. >> We're still trying to find your page number commissioner minion. So, >> um >> I think which pack are you looking on the online packet or your leg? >> The online packet. Yes, it would be page 47 of 93 if that helps on the on the PDF. >> Thank you. Thank you. Cuz page four is something totally different. >> There are number of page four. Thank you. >> Got it. >> Um I'm just kind of spitballing throwing this out there. Food for thought. Is it something that number one the developer would be willing to do is to add three more spots? Uh is it something that's applicable or palatable to the group here? Um I realize that this isn't going to save a huge amount of impact but you know what it will make a difference and if we can do a small thing that'll make a difference. I think it's important. Um >> chair and commissioner minion I think that's a great question for the developer there. I think there are some concerns I would have but um more about turning distance and but let them respond because the architect is here. So >> Okay. Uh and then another question before he comes up. Um tell me more about when somebody develops something and we look at improvements to like parks and areas around. Um, I heard quite a bit about more dog problems and um, is there a way, and I'm just throwing this out as a question to think about, necessarily a recommendation, but is there a way to encourage the development of this to maybe put out more dog stations that would I assume would be managed by the developer or the or the person running the properties instead of the city? I know we do things where we encourage investments into parks and city. Is that something that would be palatable to people as well? And that would at least encourage people make people more um empowered to make good decisions when it comes time to clean up after their dogs that nobody everybody should be cleaning up for their dogs and clearly everybody does not. And that's just common sense, but common sense isn't always common. And uh >> true. Do you want me to respond? >> Yes. >> Okay. chair and commissioner water or commissioner minion, excuse me. Um, dog issues have been talked about since the Burke uh has been constructed. Um, in fact, we had meetings uh to talk about dog uh waste management, not just for the Burke, but for everybody in the neighborhood uh not just the folks living there, because I think that's a little bit misleading uh that everybody in that apartment has a dog. That's actually not accurate. Um the last time we checked it, what was the 25 dogs in that project? Um and so there's um more units than that. And so I think that's a little bit misleading that every dog in every apartment unit that's not accurate. The second thing is have there been investments in dog stations? Absolutely. Um are there more in the bail? Yes. And in fact, there's a dog um containment area. I guess I'm not going to call it a dog park because I don't call it that. Um on the back side of the bale and also that's accessible from the trail which would have public access. It's privately built um privately maintained, publicly accessible. So there would be ability and there's also dog waist stations as well that are taken care of by the management. Now, for some people, um, if the management's not taking care of it or you see an overflowing garbage can, I've had those complaints before and we definitely call the management company. And that's not the case just here. That's throughout the city. That that happens in parks um where maybe we have a very busy weekend and we haven't our own city parks haven't been uh, you know, dumped at that point. Um, it can happen in an apartment building. It can happen you know, in an area where you have a lot of dog traffic. So, absolutely, all of those things are, I think, considered. I think though that it it has to be managed in concert with everyone. And um so that's how I would respond to your question. >> My mind goes to that northeast corner of the proposed property. Um I'm I'm seeing that, you know, as people are walking around the uh Fairfield there and and just kind of throwing that out there as food for thought. Uh just kind of raising the question and and seeing what people think and um trying to build that bridge, maybe uh find some solutions that would help. Just kind of throwing those ideas out. >> Were you able to was they be able to pull up that page 47 of 90 seeing where to go 90? The slides are prepared based on the report. The actual packet is online. So we don't have the packet right in our we have it in front of us. So I think we have what you're looking at. >> Yeah. And and so I I would say >> or use this one. I guess this works >> as M. Wishnack said, you know, the applicant can speak to that. Um I would tell you that the parking lot as it's proposed meets the minimum setback requirement for parking. adding additional stalls um to the east in in either of these locations would require a variance, a setback variance. Um what Miss Wishnack was commenting on and what perhaps the applicant's architect would also comment on is if I'm turning north and I want to make a a turn uh into a stall here, a very little stacking distance now to get out of the the site. So, I can appreciate the the thought that more parking um could be added. Just leads to some other um implications. >> Thanks, Commissioner. And uh yeah, I mean, maybe we'll we'll kind of discuss that in our comments. Um I'd like to get to uh if the applicant could come back up. There's just a handful of very short questions we've got. Um you've got a few for the Okay, let me >> first >> staff. We'll get we'll get to that after. Yeah. Yeah. Um okay. Uh first of all, are the paths between the veil and Mars 3 public or private? >> Um they're available for public use. >> Okay, great. Um and then we were just talking about the potential for adding three more parking spots. Obviously, the city is talking about that changes things a little bit with variance and stacking. Can you just comment briefly on that? Uh we would we would look at it as long as it makes sense uh from a design st use standpoint. Uh but we would we would certainly look at it. >> I wouldn't want to propose something that would be harmful or or not functional, >> but I'm I'm trying to find a middle ground to the bridge and and I realize that three more spots won't solve the problem at 100% but it'll be three more spots of solutions. So >> we would certainly check with our civil engineer >> conversation point if if we leave it at that. Appreciate it. Thank you. >> You bet. >> Thank you. Uh, commissioners, did I miss any questions from the public hearing for the applicant? Great. Thank you so much. >> Oh, for the applicant. My apologies. Go ahead. Uh, Commissioner Henry. >> Thank you. >> The one question I have is what was brought up was there was a amenity on the west side of the veil and it's a de facto dog area and have you thought about since there is a covenant to share amenities between these three areas? It sounds like, I'm just assuming here, that the signage for guiding people to get over there is is lacking. So, could you do some work to make sure that it's advertised that that's a good spot for people to go? That may reduce some of the poop on some of the neighbors. >> Uh, Commissioner Henry, yes, we we can certainly uh take a look at that. >> Thank you. >> Yeah, you bet. >> Okay, great. Thank you so much. >> Okay. Thank you again. >> All right. Well, all right, commissioners. Um, obviously time for questions, comments. Commissioner Henry, I think you mentioned you had some more comments for staff. So, let me kick it off. >> Thanks, chair. Not so much comments. I have a couple more questions for staff. It was brought up that there's no current construction management plan. Is that is that what is Maybe you can comment. No, I'll just leave it at that. >> That is not atypical at this point. uh a construction management plan is not a requirement for application. We require um engineered civil engineered drawings for a formal application, not for a concept plan. And we require formal architectural drawings for an application. Um things like uh snow removal plans, construction management plans, we require a chloride plan. So, how much salt are you going to put down on your uh parking lot? Those are things that we include as a condition of approval. So an applicant should their project be approved then is required to provide all of that information to city staff. >> Thank you. Another thing I heard from some of the neighbors was that their voices weren't heard and they fear that some people were losing faith in the process. And I just wanted to make sure that and I'll address this comments to the neighbors too that in my experience that your voice absolutely is heard and don't lose heart because this is your forum. But I just want to make sure for everybody here in the audience and for the people listening at home. I know there are myriads, you know, use plural and myriad, but I thought I should add that. But can you let everybody know here and those at home when this will be heard by the city council? This is another avenue for people to make their voice heard. >> Uh the city council will consider this project on August uh 11th. Um I had some email correspondence with someone yesterday and indicated that we will continue to accept written comments. Um even though they didn't make it in the planning commission packet, we will provide any written comment to the city council that's part of the public record. Um uh just to make people aware, whatever they put in their written comments is is directly provided uh to the council. So opportunities for public input uh continue. If someone does not want to email city staff directly on the project page on every project page, there is a button that says provide public comment and you can enter your public comments directly on that project page. Also, >> thanks for the clarification. >> All right. Thank you. Um, procedural question. It's it's 9:00. Is there is there some requirement that we need to extend the meeting proposed? >> Uh, Chair Waterman. Uh, good question. The planning commission can take a break at any time if you need a little break. It's actually 11:00 that you have to vote to extend it at. Yeah. >> Awesome. You guys good to >> That's not good. >> Yeah. Yeah. Got a lot to say. Uh you guys good to check in. All right. Okay. Um sounds like there have been a couple questions. A lot of questions asked, a lot of discussion. How about comments? Commissioners, I'm new to this, so I'm I'm trying to see who's in my field of view here. >> All right. Commissioner Henry, thanks for >> Oh, sure. Yeah. Thanks, Chair. It's a it's a long process and rightfully so. There's a lot of feedback that we need to hear from the developer, the applicant, from the the neighbors. And again, I I'll reiterate this because I'm a really big believer in what the city is doing where what the planning commission is doing. And you heard chair read that this a or this evening that the purpose of this is to codify a balance between individual rights and community responsibilities from the neighbor's perspective. If I were living there and I I shop there a lot too. I understand all of your concerns and I would I would feel 100% the same way that that you'd feel if there was more massive housing coming in. And would I think that it would be a a better higher use of the property to have a dog park or pickle ball courts? I'd love it. I think it'd be great, but it's it's not our area to say that, okay, developer, you own this property, you have to do this. So, in some ways, I I echo the mayor when he said, well, if not this, what? And I think there's the developer has a right to put on some housing in there and it's our responsibility to do it in as thoughtful of a way as possible. So all that to say, we hear your your feedback. We understand it and I hope that the the developer acts on it. I'm a little bit disappointed in hearing the neighbors that there's a lack of communication between after some whole different proposal comes in that even though it's not required by law, I would really encourage you as a developer to do due diligence to be a good partner to the city to make sure communication lines are more open. And sometimes that's all it takes. People need to be heard, concerns have to be heard and then in that way some of these things can be mitigated. So, all that being said, tactically or strategically about the proposal at hand, in terms of massing, I know there was some of the the neighbors talking about they wanted a stepped plan, I wouldn't disagree with that. I would like to see a step plan. Would a lack of a step plan prevent me from from voting in favor of this? I'm I'm a little bit torn. I I don't think it would because the other plans were a six to a fivetory step instead of an all sixtory step. And with the sun study, there was a lot of shadowing on the neighboring houses. And I I completely disagreed with that. So, I'm really glad that the process played out, that we did have some cooperation, some some give and take. So, the developer understood that. I think in this case, four stories seems appropriate. Is it too massive? I think it does look monolithic. I'm glad that you have some different colors to break it up, but I would encourage you and I would encourage all the neighbors to come to the city council meeting that write to the powers that be and talk about the need for less massive or different design options that could be beneficial to the public good. So, I'm really glad to see that the applicant is taking notes here, too. Generally, I'm really glad to hear that from the parking study and the traffic study, the city does a great job with working with their partners to make sure that the the diligence is done to make sure that there there is no outstanding public safety issues with lack of a turn lane or with the crosswalk. Commissioner Minion, I really like your idea about trying to do what we can to increase the number of parking spaces. What I don't want to have happen is just this critical mass of people parking on grass or something else that would require people to call the police. And I I don't think that happens. I don't think it will happen. I hope it won't happen, but we can't live on hope. But there is quantitative data to back that up. So that's some of the things I'm basing my opinion on here, too. So just in general, I'll stop it there because I think people understand what my point is, but I do support this, but there are reservations. There's caveats on here too where I do want further communication between the applicant and the neighbors to do some honing of of this project and generally that could help things albeit marginally but it is it could help. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Um, so I think the the 394 corridor that rolls through Minnitaka is really interesting and like all of us you can drive across the city and I think our portion of 394 is really special and it is unique cuz it's thriving compared to some other retail areas. So, I I we've got retail that's growing and we've got apartments that are coming together and I think that's cuz we have a thoughtful plan. And then I get to this application tonight and I I almost like felt really lost and I'm not the we all know I'm not that smart and I'm not being self-deprecating. I had no idea what project we were talking about tonight because it was totally different from the concept plan. >> I was I was just like stunned. And while that's not um the way to to Miss Thomas' point, that's not required in many other cities, that's also not the way we do this in Minnetonka. And so I feel like while the project itself is probably a B at this point in my mind um and it's something that I could live with. I I was just like bewildered at what was in the the packet because it's just it's not the same housing stock. And um I I totally respect like that's you got that feedback from the city. Um, this is maybe just feedback too for the staff like this housing stock changed in my opinion for sure. It's probably different. It might be in the same classification of multifamily, but but to the citizen, the average citizen, including myself, uh, twin homes or town homes is are different from apartments. And so for me, like I I lean no tonight mostly out of process, not out of what's actually before us. So that's probably my like feedback for the city council in some weird way. Um is to be like, are we getting the the right product? Maybe this is a good product, but is it a really good or a great product? And my head says not quite yet. So, probably leaning no for tonight myself because I think we can inch incrementally forwards. >> Thank you, Commissioner Banks. >> Yeah, thanks, Chair. Um, yeah, I 100% agree with you. And that's one of the questions about the, you know, I know, you know, it's been a a long summer already and I missed a couple of meetings and I was like, did I miss a concept plan meeting on this? because it's not um at least my years of being on um commission um it's not typical that we would see something um this this big of a plan uh without it being a concept first and perhaps even um planning commission being able to have some input even on the design and and layout and things of that nature in terms of uh it being a concept. But um you know I think um hearing the the the concerns of uh the the neighbors um there's a lot of shared um for lack of a better word I guess roads over in that area. It it sounds like um residents from the Burke and and the new uh building will be using the um public access way into um the the shopping mall area and then there's you know other other roads that are being shared and then there's a lot of talk about uh Fairfield Road as well. Um so I think there has to be um some cohesiveness between new neighbors and existing neighbors uh in that area. Um, now how how that works out, I believe that's going to be on, you know, the developers and uh um uh the the management company, right, to figure out how how that best works. But um there it there just seems to be a lot that needs to be worked out. I think there's been some um potential issues that were exposed as uh you know the the Burke was filled with residents. Um seems to be causing you know maybe not major issues. You know the the the dog waste um and uh it sounds like there's a you know the parking situation on the main road there. I think those are some things that could be um worked out between the management company and the and the the neighborhood the residents in the neighborhood. Um but it but it doesn't sound like it there has been any discussion yet between the two. So I think that needs to happen. Um and I guess I'm just also you know I I see that we're talking about the one of the variances would be a setback. Um the code requires 35. it currently is uh 66 um but we would be we would need a variance to go to 30 and maybe you know there's perhaps a design in this plan that you have where you don't need that variance. Um, so, you know, going from the the town homes, um, you know, almost doubling the units with the building. Um, I I'm I'm also, um, at a no on approving this because I think this probably needs, uh, a little bit more um, discussion. um perhaps a little bit more input and not just you know something that was just brought before me tonight um for the first time. So >> thank you Commissioner Minion. >> I have a different opinion but for the same reasons. Um, I remember when we went through this with the town homes and I applaud you for coming up with a new design because I thought the design we had before was really poor, particularly the management of the parking and the way people are getting it out of their stalls. I think this is a really good solution. I remember there was a number of um setback issues that really bothered me as far as location of the street. I think you did a good job of solving that. I also remember the neighbors were saying issues about being close to the wetlands and and how that was happening and and uh I think this does a good job of that as well. Uh with my fellow commissioners though I'm in favor of this in a reluctant way. Um there's we need buyin from the neighborhood particularly the people that are living in the buildings in the Burke and I would encourage the developer and to work with the city and come up with some way to maybe get the Burke to use their parking more. If there's maybe a a fee for parking there, maybe that can be reduced. I realize I'm not trying to dig in people's pockets, but um if I could hear the word marsh and know that we're going to be talking greatly about parking, it's a big deal. And every parking spot, it's going to make a major impact for the neighbors, for the entire neighborhood. This isn't just one or two people that it's impacting. It's impacting entire neighborhoods. Um, so while I'm a supporter of this, I' i'd also encourage the developer to one find some sort of other solution for parking, whatever that is in regards to better buy in on on the uh parking in the gra in the garages. I do like the idea of the system that you're operating. I don't think it should be just open to anybody because it can be kind of a security issue if you let anybody drive in there at any time. Um, but I'll leave that to you to come up with a plan. I'm sure you're you're bright people. You come up with a good plan. Um the meeting bothers me a little bit in that I would encourage you also to work with the city and uh reach out to the neighbors and and uh give them opportunity to speak and and listen to them. You guys have done a great job of making some planned changes. Um I understand why the neighbors are hurt, but I also really encourage you you I I think you guys have proven yourselves well to listen and make changes and you've come up with some really great ideas. I encourage you to continue doing that. Um, the dog thing. Obviously, you can't go out there and please the dogs, but I'm real big on finding ways to make it easier for people to make good decisions. How do we empower people to make good decisions? So, whether it's something that's required by the city or not, um, personally, I would ask you to just get involved in ways to maybe make more dog waste stations, maybe u better signage like uh was was talked about tonight as well. Um but ways that we can help improve that, make that better. Um the other thing I'd like to encourage the developer is is that the noise ordinance I think is really important. Um this is a neighborhood that's been under quite a bit of construction stress for a long time and to hear that there's uh issues with noise and construction. Um I think there's ways that that could be managed easily. Um, and I would encourage you to uh continue to work with the city and find ways to really um be respectful of the neighborhood and the people you're working with. Uh, in general though, I would support this, but I'm reluctant as far as uh I would encourage you to work with those issues. Thank you. >> Uh, thanks, Commissioner Minion. Um, so for my comments, I walked the neighborhood. I walked of the veil. Uh turned out to be a beautiful project uh this past weekend. So really nice day. Um surprisingly I didn't really I was expecting more traffic and parking and just seeing people crossing between uh I didn't see that. That doesn't mean it's I do believe it's happening. And it looks like a lot has gone into this project. A lot of focus. There's been we've had a lot of discussion on this parcel in in conjunction with the other ones. Um, and though the project is great, I I I am really sympathetic to to the what I'm hearing from the neighborhood and what we see in the letters just it's a burden. I thought I think it was a good summary term. Um, and I know I know there are a lot of parking concerns. I remember that from previous discussions and the intensity of the development and it's a fair point um that it's kind of unclear what the impact of the veil is um on just the intensity and use of that area and the street and convenience and parking issues. Um in terms of it coming back for a concept plan review, I um understand I actually disagree. I don't think this needed to come back for a concept plan review. Um, I do think this is a good form for it and it'll be interesting to see what how we vote and and I think the the discussion will go uh that we have will go to the city council. Um, I I do think in I don't know enough about city planning generally or development, but I do think we need to make sure we're allowing in the metropolitan area for enough development and I don't want to have too many meetings um on topics though I do want to allow public input and I think that's what this is for and that's part of why I wanted to have this go on like I want to hear everything you have to say because we really we really really do consider these items. I if this goes to the city council, I do encourage if people don't show up because it doesn't sound like it's necessarily an open forum. Do write in because like I we I read the letters. I think everyone reads the letters. I think the city council does. So to to the extent you're you want to tell that to your neighbors like please uh please do that. Um so where am I headed with this? Overall, I am in favor of this. I do think that the the variances are very reasonable and rather minor for what this development is. And I think that the city's logic is reasonable. um after all the diligence and all the reports. Um and I I really generally I mean Commissioner Henry, you you uh you said a lot of the things I was I was thinking as well kind of in your in your intro, so I don't need to rehash that. Um I I really think there was there is a benefit to codify this link between uh link to parking among the various properties. It's not perfect, but that was one of the the things I was really interested for the other times that we saw this. Um so I'm glad to see that that's there. And frankly, I mean, this this area is intended for higher density development and that that so this does further it I don't think going overboard to your point about six stories or or something like that, four stories. Um, so I'm in support of this. Um, so where does that put us? Because it sounds like we might have two nos. Um, we could do a vote uh on the existing one. Ju just curious if we vote and it's voted down it still goes to the city council or is that just our recommendation? >> Chair Chair Waterman, this is a recommendation to the city council. So, um even though there are variances here because this is a recommendation, your recommendation needs uh just three affirmative votes. What whatever it is that you recommend, if three of you make that same recommendation, then that's the recommendation to um the city council. >> Okay, there's that. I also heard some discussion about potentially changing a few things. No, I haven't heard anyone talk about tableabling it for additional discussion. Okay. So, if anyone would like to make a motion regarding item 8B concerning Marshon 3 at 11800 Yetta Boulevard, uh this would be a recommendation that the city council adopt the ordinance approving the master development plan and adopt the resolution approving the final site and building plans with expansion permits and variances. >> I'll make the motion. Motion. Minion. >> I'll second. >> Second. Hansen. Uh staff, please pull admission. >> Banks. >> Uh no. >> Hansen. >> No. >> Henry, >> no. >> Minion. >> Yes. >> Waterman. >> Yes. So, the miss the only two yeses. The motion fails. Um any other motions to make? >> To make a motion. Figure not. Okay. So, that uh even though the motion fails, it still goes to the city council. Um and they will consider the item on August 11th. Is there anything else, city staff, that I need to >> Chair Waterman, if you would like to um if someone would care to make a motion to um recommend that the city council deny the project for the reasons that you um stated here, you could also make that motion. >> Okay. Open to that motion. Would anyone like to make that motion? And chair, the reason for that is it's best to go to the council with an official recommendation from the planning commission, especially of a project this size. So, and you would definitely have you have three the other way. So, >> so specifically maybe you're saying, let me make sure I get this right. This would be a potential motion or a motion. Items concerning Marshon 3 8 11800 Weta Boulevard. This is a recommendation that the city council deny the ordinance approving the master development plan and denying the resolution for the final site and building plans with expansion permits and variances. So would anyone like to make that motion to Miss Wishnack's point about providing some clear feedback to the council? >> I'll make that that motion. >> Uh motion banks. >> I'll second this motion also. >> All right. Second, Hansen. All right. Staff, please pull the commission. >> Thanks. Is this a yes? >> Yeah. Just to clarify, if you vote yes, you are recommending denial. >> Yes. >> Hansen, >> yes. >> Henry, >> yes. >> Minion, >> no. >> And Waterman, >> no. >> Okay. Then that's three two for recommendation. So the so then that that passes and that's what will go to the city council and that will be heard by the city council >> on August 11th. >> And and to be clear all all of the commentary that you had here this evening goes to the city council. Your official recommendation is is for denial. >> Yeah. And I know that a lot of them watch the meetings intently. Uh u Okay, great. Well, thank you for everyone's input uh and sticking with us tonight. Um, next up on the agenda, other business. There is none. And so, moving on to item number 10, adjournment. I have a motion to adjourn the meeting. >> I'll make the motion. I'll second that one also. >> Um, motion Henry, second hand. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> I. Meeting adjourned. Good night. [Music] [Music]