This transcript is from a White Bear Lake City Council meeting. Based on the context and names mentioned, I have attributed the dialogue to the following participants: **Mayor Dan Nlowski**, City Manager **Lindsey Crawford**, Community Development Director **Jason Lindall**, City Engineer **Paul Calpy**, Ramsey County Director **Josh Olson**, City Attorney **Mr. Anderson**, and Council Members **Walsh, Edberg, Gola, West, and Angstrand**, along with residents from the public hearing. [2:36] Mayor Dan Nlowski: 24th 2026. Clerk, please do a roll call. All will be noted. Please join me in the pledge of allegiance. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [3:05] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Well, welcome to everybody who has joined us tonight. Thank you so much for coming in. Um, and for those watching online, uh, welcome to you as well. Um, we're going to get started with item 2A, approval of the minutes of the city council meeting on March 10th, 2026. [3:23] Council Member: Second. [3:23] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any discussion? All in favor? [3:23] Council Members: I. [3:23] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any opposed? Okay. Item 3A, the agenda. Does anyone have any changes or corrections to the agenda? [3:23] Council Member: Approve. [3:23] Council Member: Second. [3:39] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any discussion? All in favor? [3:39] Council Members: I. [3:39] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Opposed? All right, we have an agenda. Item four, the consent agenda. Does anyone have any changes? Okay. Seeing none. [3:39] Council Member: Second. [3:39] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Second. Any discussion? All in favor? [3:57] Council Members: I. [3:57] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Opposed. Okay. Consent agenda passes. All right. Item number 5A, visitors and presentations. We have the Ramsey County fiscal health analysis. Miss Crawford. [3:57] Lindsey Crawford (City Manager): Thank you, uh, mayor, members of the council. Um tonight we're going to have uh Ramsey County come up and give us a presentation on a fiscal health analysis that they had commissioned uh for them. [4:22] Lindsey Crawford (City Manager): Um Wiper Lake is noted in here. So I said please come and give us this presentation too. Um and so that's kind of the first piece of this agenda item which does not require any action. But then the second piece is um opting into the Ramsey County EDA authority. Um but I'll pause there. We'll do the presentation first and then we'll talk about the EDA after. Okay. Thank you. [4:22] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Madam Mayor. Uh, council members, thank you for, uh, the honor to be here. My name is Josh Olson. I'm the community economic development director, uh, for Ramsey County. Um, I, in as listed in your agenda, I was supposed to be accompanied by Heather Worththington from Urban 3. Unfortunately, she was ill and she could not make it tonight. So, I'm going to be under study. I apologize. Um, and I she's a much better [5:07] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): uh presenter when it comes to this information, although I have a depth here, but um, usually when we walk through these slides, she has a lot of them and she speeds through them. I'm going to do my best to consolidate and and speed through them um, as best as I can. Um, so um, if feel free to ask uh, you know, pause uh, ask me to pause and and I can I can dwell on some um, some slides if necessary. So, um, back in 2020, just as a quick uh, ground setting. So back in 2020 um Ramsey County contracted Urban 3 to support um us uh at the county in the development um of a similar analysis. Um at that time one of the reasons we wanted to kind of um provide this level of information was to kind of you know [5:53] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): insert some new data. Um it's really interesting and we'll walk through to you can already see a few of the images. They're really illustrative exhibits at talking about property taxes which can sometimes be, you know, difficult to kind of get through, especially when you look at it um over a county scale. Um but also to talk a little bit about land productivity. So we'll I'll kind of speed through some slides here tonight, but really what we asked of Urban 3 back in that time was to begin to kind of merge that analysis um into some updated things. So in 2020 we did ask them to kind of look at land productivity, do this model for the entire county. It the first time we had done it um to look a little bit at um historic redlinining and its impact on wealth extraction um [6:38] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): just to to demonstrate and understand that in a different and new way um but also to um understand the wonderful differences that we have across the entire entire county. So that analysis was foundational. We used that to develop our economic competitiveness and inclusion plan. That was the first um economic development strategy for the county. And so when we look at it, that was in 2020, right before the pandemic or really kind of right during the pandemic. And so a lot of things have changed. And so we wanted to go back to urban 3, ask them to update the model um do a little bit more of a deeper emphasis um on understanding some dynamics that have happened um in the last five to six years. Um and then also to study tax exum planned um and we'll get into the why. So, this effectively [7:24] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): has kickstarted our our kind of update to that process. So, again, this is where um Heather does a much better job of talking about um property taxes and taxes. Um but what I wanted to start by saying is um Minnesota is a little bit unique. Everyone's unique, but a little bit more unique when it comes to its property tax system. And we rely heavily on property taxes. other um cities in which um Urban 3 does this analysis rely heavily on income andor sales tax. And so that definitely changes the way that we um one would look at land productivity when the vast majority of revenues to a local government um come through the property tax form. So um this is of course Heather um talking [8:10] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): about um property taxes and how they work and specifically how they're calculated. And so again, this is a this is complicated structure um of walking through, you know, starting with your market value and heading all the way down to what is your individual tax bill. Um what is interesting and maybe not necessarily interesting, but what does bear out in the data is that um properties of a similar um value um depending on what their uses are charged differently in property taxes. And so commercial properties um are taxed at almost twice as much as residential. And that has historically been how um uh the assessed system in Minnesota sets up. So when um we asked Urban 3 to walk through [8:57] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): um you know an analysis, they started with the assessed value and it's a very busy map, lots of colors, but it just goes to show you where areas of tax richness are. meaning that these are the individuals or the property owners who pay a lot in taxes. Um, but that doesn't necessarily always tell the story. And so this is where I think Urban 3's analysis can be very helpful and kind of can spur different conversations. Um especially when if you think about it um you know some of the largest tax um taxpayers in Ramsey County um you know not to necessarily point to anybody specifically but properties like their um our headquarters um of uh 3M or large big box retailers [9:43] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): may pay a large proportion of their taxes. Uh but when you layer in productivity, which is you layer in their acreage, you begin to look at this a little bit differently. Um so this is where the map changes. Um this again map is not necessarily the easiest to read. [10:00] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): And so one thing that urban 3 does really nicely is begin to turn it on its side um and begin to show kind of where the spikes um and the peaks are. You know, it's easy to fixate um on where the biggest areas are. downtowns traditionally are this. I I I'm not trying to tell you anything differently. [10:19] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): This is where, you know, if you think about um concentration, this is where you have the tallest buildings. But what this analysis begins to show though is the pockets amongst the rest of the county that really provide a a real high level of productivity. Um when we talk about Ramsey County, at least in Cam Ramsey County speak, we talk about we're the smallest county in the state of Minnesota. We're the most densely populated state or county in the state as well as we're pretty much built out. [10:50] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): And so everything we do is redevelopment, which means that every little parcel matters a lot when it comes to productivity. And so, um, this begins to show that yes, there's going to be areas of peak, um, in certain areas, but as you can see, and kudos to, uh, this community, you show up very nicely in this analysis, um, as well as some other communities like North St. [11:15] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Paul, you know, small communities, but yet really punch when it comes to productivity. So um one thing we we asked urban 3 to do um was to kind of explore um and understand for us a little bit more clearly the tax exempt piece. Again when I come back to the point that I mentioned before that Ramsey County is largely built out largely urbanized and everything matters. Well when you have a large concentration of taxable or non-t taxable property that can really put a strain on your property taxes. um of individual residents and businesses. And so um what we what we see from a land perspective is that about 50% of Ramsey County is in taxable areas now or non-t [12:02] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): taxable um pieces largely made up by water, um parks, open spaces, rideway, so lots of roads, things that are not necessarily um you know pretty obvious when you drive around um our communities. But we have a large concentration of exempt properties and that's goes beyond what has traditionally been the story of Ramsey County where you know state capital is located within it. We have a lot of services there. Um we have a lot of universities but we have a lot of property that is owned um by public um uh public owners. So just to give a again a quick little um perspective, we're different. We we are very different from our partners. Um Henipin County is our closest um competitor at least when it [12:49] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): comes to this kind of a map. Um if you look at other counties, Anoka, Washington County, they're going to be even more uh taxable in terms of their percentage than Ramsey County. So what we do in the county um how we work together and work in partnership matters a lot even on the smallest of parcels. [13:09] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um, so, um, I I included this in here just to give you a little bit of perspective because one thing we did ask um uh, we we asked Urban 3 as part of this analysis is what's changed. Um, and you know, what are we seeing? And, and I just kind of point out that what we have seen is that downtown St. Paul, and again, I know I'm in White Bear Lake, but downtown St. Paul is an important center of productivity for the county as a whole. It's not downtown Minneapolis. [13:40] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): It may never be downtown Minneapolis, but we'd like to see these percentages a little bit higher than 8% um or eight times the productivity. And what um if I think this unfortunately Oh, my numbers didn't show up. Um but what we did see was value um growth in the county. We saw a decrease though in in downtown. So, just to give you again a perspective of of like why that is important to the county, that means shifts are happening. [14:13] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Shifts are happening towards um away from commercial properties that may have been very highly productive. Um you know, these are the large office buildings in downtown St. Paul and are now shifting towards other areas of the county. Um and and so there's an opportunity certainly for the county and others including the city of St. Paul to kind of tackle that. But I I want to point out that this is also a situation that shows up almost in every single community. And so um one thing that they picked up on as as they were looking at um some different communities was just how much has changed across the county in some places and in case of like North St. Paul, not to put them on the pedestal and say be like North St. Paul, but even in a small community, they're doing incremental changes and making a [14:59] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): big difference. And so they saw a tremendous amount of growth. Um I think well over a hundred plus million dollars of new growth in 5 years. That's a lot for a community that's less than 9,000 people. So just to give you kind of that that's where they've made incremental changes and those incremental changes are making a lot of difference. So, um, one, uh, as I kind of just quickly do it, these are where slides kind of diverge from where she goes really rich into them and showing the wide range, um, of differences between communities and things that are really popping in a in a really, um, impactful way. um is that we what she did um Heather grabbed a couple communities um here in the north metro um in Ramsey County and [15:45] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): showed just really almost leaders um within um the county in terms of productivity. Um and so you know communities like Roseville who have a high tax base because of largely because of their commercial properties are doing pretty well. Um, but as they have seen incremental changes around Rosedale Mall, they're starting to see their productivity rise. In other instances, Little Canada has invested deeply in housing over the last 5 years. Uh, county has been really supportive of that. Um, they're seeing those incremental um, steps up and certainly um, White Bear Lake and North St. Paul are really leaders within our suburban communities. [16:30] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): So just to give you a perspective um again this is not representative of their actual tax bill um but to give you again a perspective on productivity when you take their property tax bill divided by their acreage you begin to see um property owners properties like the brick house here in in White Bear Lake being a significant contributor to the tax base um of of of the county. So, um, the last slide that I am going to or last couple slides I'm going to leave you with, um, Heather would like to call this the Brady Bunch piece, which may not resonate with everybody in the room. Um, but, uh, this is the slide that begins to talk about kind of where those those uses sit. Um, [17:16] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): this is not necessarily to project a value like a a personal opinionated value over what's better or what's worse. It's just to provide a data point that gives a begins to perspective on you know when properties have a maybe a large sea of parking in front of their bill of their business and it's not being utilized in a kind of a consistent um way that is an opportunity for new value to be created and a way that can be um supported. So, you know, this just gives you kind of a glimpse at, you know where you know, yes, higher density means a lot. Um, but as you can see, the middle um density and the lower density can still be impactful um when done right from a good design perspective. Um, so [18:02] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): this is a similar image um just to kind of put it on its side. So, that um I hopefully I was able to speed through that with some pace so I didn't lose you. Um, but I stand for any questions you might have. [18:21] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Mr. Walsh. [18:21] Council Member Walsh: Uh, thank you, Madam Mayor. Go back to the slide early in the presentation. Um, the county um taxable versus non-t taxable land. There's a big piece uh north the north northwest side um the Twin Cities Army ammunition property. So what's we don't follow closely. I know there's a lot going on has been going on a lot of controversy with the county and cities over the Arden Hills. What's what's the latest there? Because if you if you could shade that green uh you could make a make a big dent in your uh in the circle there I think. Right. [18:58] Council Member Walsh: And I know there's a plan for some of it but what's what's the long-term plan? [18:58] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Yeah, Madame Mayor, uh, Council Member Walsh, thank you for that question. Um, unfortunately, this this, uh, image is a little misleading because Rice Creek Commons is not that full square block. Um, it still consists of the, uh, Ardan Hills, um, National Guard facility, which makes up the vast majority of it. [19:19] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): With that said, it is a large site. It's 427 acres. Um the county um there if you haven't been out there in a while um they we the county has sold 10 acres of that 400 acres and is under construction of a new headquarters um of a of an advanced manufacturing. Um so things are starting to steadily go in the direction. um that part of the site happened to be the most ready in terms of infrastructure. And I think that's demonstrated to the county that when properties are primed and ready to go, they're more likely to get going faster. [19:55] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um the rest of the site's a little bit trickier um from an infrastructure perspective, but the county, I'll just say right now, is planning to do that in the next year because we think that property makes a big difference. Um there's properties um in other parts of the county including the River's Edge project which is in downtown St. Paul. [20:15] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um a uh the sell the cell and reuse of the ponds at Battle Creek Golf Course which is in Maplewood. Um that just closed. Um and so that will be approximately 200 units of housing. So things are starting to move a little bit, but I think what this analysis shows is we've got a lot more work ahead of us um to get it going. [20:43] Council Member Walsh: Is the is excuse me mayor is the is the entire site cleaned up now um from all of the work that was done you know over the years with with munitions. [20:43] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Yeah the 427 acres is clean to residential standards. It is ready to go. [20:43] Council Member Walsh: And then I know that you said the National Guard's out there on the south end but there's so much empty land on the north side coming coming south. Is that is there a plan for all of that? Is that is that Rice Creek's common or is there I think isn't that just the small part of the southeast that's... [21:16] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Yeah, it's a great question. So in many ways I man I this is this is a project I used to work on very closely with so I feel like I'm missing an opportunity to show you the map. Um it's really um almost the uh western edge of that box. [21:16] Council Member Walsh: Okay. [21:16] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): So it hugs um the highway basically the highway um at County Road H and goes all the way down to 96. Um it only goes you know in that direction. If I could probably I don't know if that's... [21:33] Council Member Walsh: Can we zoom? I don't think we can zoom. [21:33] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Yeah, it's not going to work. Um, if you can kind of see there's a little green box that's like kind of falls drops right below the M's in Rice Creek Commons. Um, it's right below it. That's about the extent of it. And then it's publicly owned National Guard facility and... [21:51] Council Member Walsh: Yeah. Okay. Thanks. [21:51] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Council Member Edberg. [21:51] Council Member Edberg: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Mr. Olsen. So, following that conversation, go look to the southeast corner of the of the uh uh county, the big gray area, is that the old Ford plant that's under re reconstruction or uh the airport or what is that big gray blob down in the lower right hand corner? [22:17] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Yeah. Uh Madame Mayor, uh Council Member Edward, um the it's a little bit of a combination of things. one, you can kind of see a little bit of the airplane outline there right on the other side of the river. So that is the airport, the St. Paul airport. The area immediately to the right is predominantly recreation. Um it's the Pigs Eyee area. [22:36] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um so it's a recreation and kind of historic environmental area um with parks and open space. So this is in some ways this is uh unfortunately misleading. I I feel bad telling this showing this because this shows exempt land and it includes parks, other institutional uses and it doesn't just highlight what might be, you know, developable. [23:00] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um we gave a presentation associated with this in the last week to the board and right now um there's about 6,000 acres give or take um within the county that would be deemed institutional things like owned by churches um schools um government governments for those land uses. about 900 acres of that is owned well 600 of it is owned by Ramsey County so just to give me about 10%. Um but also you know we have about 300 acres that is locked into other projects that folks are talking about. So there's a lot the University of Minnesota owns the golf course Les Bowlstead golf course in [23:45] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Falcon Heights. They've slated that for redevelopment here. Um that that property is up for sale. So just that's been taxexempt for forever. So there's a lot of opportunities here in the county. [23:45] Council Member Edberg: Thank you for that. So following on that, I'm trying to get in my head and I've got some possibilities, but what would you have us do with this information? So I can see that there is shifting and change. We read in the newspapers about the redevelopment and current financial challenges in uh downtown St. Paul, opportunities for for uh new business, for new construction, renovation, etc. Um [24:31] Council Member Edberg: I'm thinking about our community and we clearly share an interest in having uh growth in our tax base. At the same time, those come with tensions. Um, I don't think anybody's going to ask us to take our parks and sell them for corporate centers. Uh, maybe, but I doubt that. Um, because that's just a quality of life tradeoff that, you know, people live here. We want to live and enjoy the places that we live and so we can't develop everything, but we can develop something new or something more. [25:04] Council Member Edberg: What are you trying to tell us about the kinds of strategies or you uh that we could pursue the opportunities that we may have available or not? Uh and the kind of thinking that we need to do about um how we value or prioritize our work. [25:23] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Yeah, Madame Mayor, thank you uh Council Member Edber. Thank you for that um question. You know, I think, you know, certainly I'm I'm talking quite a bit about taxexempt parcels, and that is an opport that's kind of the lowhanging fruit, right? if I'm to use that overused cliche, that's the opportunity, the large opportunities that present ourselves. But I think what the rest of this analysis, and I feel bad that um Heather wasn't here to really kind of dig deep with you, um is that uh you know design planning um your whether it's your comp plans or your zoning documents um matter when it comes to land productivity as well. And so um it's it's you know I I this [26:09] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): analysis does not necessarily tell you exactly what needs to happen on a particular site but I think it opens the door and new thinking to filter in to say well what does that design and what does that you know is this the most dense we can make on this site to meet it um to to maybe help with the property taxi side of the equation. um because you know um there's a lot of uh competing variables with projects whether that is desires for housing, desires for tax base, desires for um you know commercial opportunities, jobs for example and so this is just I would say another tool in your tool chest to kind of explore how that comes to to be. I [26:55] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): would also say that the reason in many ways I like being here with you all to talk about this is that you have a lot of the urban fabric that is productive. And so if I was to stand here and as your community economic development director, I would say let's do more of this because it's highly productive. Um uh and uh there's images that I left out and I probably could have dropped them in, but even some of your hardest sites, sites with historic preservation questions are some of the most productive pieces. Um one of the biggest jumps in properties, and I know this is a St. Paul example, but it it's a downtown project just on Seventh Street, um across from the Children's Museum. It used to be a dilapidated three-story [27:42] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): building. No one was in it. It was vacant most of the time. And a developer came in and developed it basically the exact same footprint. There was no change in it, but they really kind of cleaned it up. It's now one of the most taxi rich parcels um that we saw in the model um this past time. And that just goes to show you that like investments, reinvestments also matter too. [28:08] Council Member Edberg: So I can picture this being a tool to use to evaluate policy options to say we have a developable opportunity in X location and one of the criteria we might want to think about is what are the impacts on uh on tax base. Our community not unlike m many part much many parts of the county is fully developed. We don't have large parcels. [28:37] Council Member Edberg: Um certainly nothing like 427 acres. Um for us a big parcel is between 5 and 10. We might have there might be one or two out there that's a little bigger. Um so I can picture using the tool as one factor in evaluating in light of the um demand for housing um changes in housing patterns. Where does uh where does housing development uh fit on the scale of most uh value added versus least value added? How would we how would you have us think about residential and perhaps particularly single family residential maybe multifamily? [29:23] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Yeah, Madame Mayor, council member, thank you for that question. I I think maybe this the Brady Bunch slide might be a good one to kind of point you to a little bit. [29:23] Council Member Edberg: Which one's Peter and which one's Greg? Yeah. Yeah. Which one's Martha? Right. [29:23] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um, you know, I I think what this does demonstrate a little bit is that, um, the cost to services and that's the extra layer of analysis that can be done alongside of, you know, added work here with urban 3 is that you can begin to layer in not just what land productivity is, but also the cost of services associated with that land. Um, and you know, there's no surprise to some extent that when you have a few more people, you know, in a smaller period that you you can provide more services at a at a better, you know, um, at a price. I I [30:10] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): hate to use that word, but that's that's kind of what it is. Um, and so this is just kind of gives a little bit of that glimpse at what that is. And I think the next layer can be on that layering in of budget and and and cost of services. Um you know I I to the question around housing. Um so even in the few short weeks that we gave since we gave this presentation to our board um this has kind of rippled within our organization and asked ourselves you know what other land is out there. [30:43] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Yes I mean we have 427 acres. we have, you know, big clusters in there, but we have parcels amongst um uh the county, including areas where they don't even show up on a parcel map. It's like unused right away. It's been sitting there for a while. Um and so, you know, we've this has given us an opportunity to be like, h can this be used? Can this acre that has been kind of pushed to the side, deemed a little bit hard to develop, can this be an area where we can add um a little bit more density, a little bit more um housing into an area? [31:21] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um and in that process, we've there's a particular site in Maplewood um right along the Bruce Vento, you know, corridor. [31:21] Council Member Edberg: Mall. [31:21] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Oh, never mind. Not by the Maplewood Mall. Um but it it's a property, you know, it's an area where the county had purchased property a while back with the idea of transit. [31:40] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um but realizing along the way though that this was you know underutilized parcels and when combined with a little bit of city rightway and a decision around maybe we don't need this anymore now we can insert a little bit of gentle density into an otherwise you know um difficult area to develop you know large scale projects. [32:04] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): So, and when I say gentle density, that might be like a duplex um or two duplexes um you know, on a slightly larger um parcel. And so, that's that I think is what we you know, in our conversations with Maplewood that's been really productive where they've said, you know, this is an area that's underutilized. It's been underutilized for a really long time. What can you do? [32:25] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): And by just us looking at the same map and realizing we had shared assets at the same time, we're actually being able to spur some things. And so there's they're kickstarting a planning process with the community um to talk about what they can do. Um like I said, this has been tax exempt for probably two decades or more. Um so, you know, inserting new housing in an area that is in really dire need of additional housing is a pretty big move uh for both the city and the county. [32:56] Council Member Edberg: Last question. Um, so Maplewood and Roseville clearly are two communities experiencing massive economic transformation as as the viability of shopping malls changes and we see that all over the country. Um, those of us old enough to remember the Brady Bunch and the opening of Maplewood Mall back in the n early 1970s, that property is a is a shadow of what it once was uh in terms of vitality, business, um, viability, all that kind of good stuff. So, we've got shifts going on. If you were talking to a suburban community like us, like some of our peers, are we um should we be mostly thinking about [33:42] Council Member Edberg: taking uh advantage of under unused or underused opportunities or maintaining our just trying to hold even to uh to keep what we've got? or are we uh uh needing to be in a game of aggressively seeking, additional investment, uh density, productivity? How do you uh what's the experience of other communities and what would that what impact or guidance would that offer to White Bear Lake? [33:42] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um, madame mayor, uh, council member, that's a difficult question because I don't know where I I'm maybe want to answer that question in part because I think each community and what we learned when we did this analysis the beginning is that every community is very different in how they want to approach this. Um what I will just say is and and this is where the the strength of urban 3's work um comes into play because they have done a fair amount of this analysis across the country. So they begin to see um trends some rhythms to the work and to showcase what works well. Um, interestingly enough, they just they're finalizing some work with Henipin County and so now they'll actually we'll have a opportunity to see a model that is over two big counties here in the metro. Um, you you pointed out uh council member you pointed out Maplewood Mall. You know, Southdale Mall is the other mall that is of a similar era. And the [35:14] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): interesting thing is is in that case the city of Adina took a different approach to how they want to build and the property owner I want don't want to single out just the city of Adina but the property owner made a decision to begin to do development on the edges and what they've seen is a lot more housing in and around the edges of Southdale leading to a highly productive um incense and so I think it's a little different um I apologize for kind of skating the question directly because I it's you know I think there's a little bit of an exploration as you look at your you know your comp plan and your zoning code where are those like you know opportunities to invest um and [36:00] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): making you know properties rise in their productivity to exploring areas to maintenance um areas of strength and you know I I think in the case of um North St. Paul when we when we talked about this to them their main street is highly productive for basically a a singlestory you know area. Um and so that just I I think it just goes to show you that we can look at the data in different ways. [36:29] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um, but that community cares deeply about their main street, cares deeply about kind of filling in some of their um, you know, areas that are underutilized, parking lots, um, areas that have had environmental remediation challenges. Um, and what they've seen in just five years, five short years really, um, is kind of a jump um, in there. And, um, I would venture to say that their tax base is pretty happy um, that they aren't seeing, you know, significant rises in property taxes. [36:59] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you. Council Member Gola. [36:59] Council Member Gola: Yeah. Yeah. You kind of already referenced a little bit about like by the children's museum over there. And we I won't name names, but there was a certain real estate company investors who had them. [37:17] Council Member Gola: And then I remember being there when it was thriving and then I was there when it was not thriving by accident because I got lost with my kids trying to get back to our parking ramp from the children's museum. And I'm just wondering as you talk about development investors, what kind of safeguards is the county looking at or have to avoid I guess that happening again. I feel like downtown St. Paul it's kind of learn some from that. But when you have investors coming in it's like great they'll bring it but then if they leave if they're not like very invested or in from another state or that piece then those properties can sit and that can happen. So, I was just wondering based from those experiences what what the county has in mind or what they're doing to prevent that going forward. [38:03] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): U mayor, council member, I I um you know, I we do have a number of built-in safeguards when a project is proposing um support from the county. [38:18] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): um you know, in some of those instances, including that project that's right across from the um uh the Children's Museum that didn't require any county money. Um you know, I think, you know, I I would go without saying I think, you know locallyowned um folks who are deeply rooted in with the community are the best investors. Um but, you know, we we've seen that um outside investment can help spur some additional development, get projects over. um sometimes they look at risk in a slightly different way. Um and and so, you know, I I don't want to dismiss it as that's not helpful, but I do think, you know, folks who understand the dynamics um are definitely the ones who can probably execute the vision the best. Um just because they know the local scene, they know the local market. Um maybe they have really deep rooted relationships with partners who are going to, you know, whether that's residents or or um uh commercial businesses, you know, that that can really help add a a richness um to the to a project when it comes out of the ground from the get-go. [39:29] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay. Does anyone else have any questions for Mr. Olsen? Okay. Thank you, Mr. Olsen. [39:29] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): Thank you. Um, mayor, members of the council, I I'd just maybe add a couple of thoughts to the kind of the context of the discussion for for back for, you know, just some more to consider as the council uh uh looks at this study is so I I think to a large what so the the studies what I heard from Josh was the study really talks about tax base and land productivity and those are con you really concrete terms that that are kind of really bottomlined in the study. But I would offer some other maybe um less tangible kinds of of commentary towards this is that if we look at what the study finds as being the most kind of productive land, it really tends to be what I think what White Bear um you know the brand of White Bear, the fabric of White Bear really produced um as the community developed over time and I would call that kind of lowrise village scale kind of development and so that um approach was again not informed by the study but certainly considered when we were updating our zoning code. many of the kind of, you know, to the people [41:03] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): who were predecessors of mine and the staff that was here before me, the the information that they helped the community put together in a comprehensive plan that was guiding the community towards more of what we think the community itself wants is that old um historic kind of village scale development. um that came out of policies that we have in our comp plan and was informed and helped inform the zoning update. So, I think we're moving in a direction that the study is already both giving us credit for and encouraging other communities to do. Um so uh I and I think that again kind of the the the less tangible part of this [41:49] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): is not when comparing it to the you know the the productivity and the and the t and the taxable scale of development. It's that it's that hometown feel that White Bear Lake has as a result of that development style. The more walkable areas that are um more pedestrian friendly and provide that community um fabric or feel that exists in this community. Um and and I I'm you know we can we can put value on the tax part of that, but I think it's really hard to underestimate the value of that community feel that we have that's a that the community's benefited from for a long time. So, I I I hope that connection kind of makes some sense. So. [42:40] Lindsey Crawford (City Manager): I want to add on to uh what director Lindal just stated and some of these factors um we didn't necessarily create, right? The lake is a natural a natural factor that we didn't talk about, but that the the report that I saw certainly does. Um but it's how we've uh incorporated land use and planning around that natural body of water. And so when I saw this, I was um I was really excited to tell I mean, Mr. Olson, you were at that meeting and I was loudly haring, hurraying, whatever to to my peers, uh other Ramsey County city managers that it says, "Look at Wiper Lake. Look, look what Wiper Lake is doing." So, um I'm I'm excited about that. But it means keep doing what we've been doing. And as we've been talking about this council and and the HR have been talking about redevelopment and what does that look like? We have a lot of gray areas, gray parcels that are are city- owned. And so, how do we develop those? Um, not only, you know, for the best tax base, but also for the neighbors. What makes sense? Um, what, you know, what do people want to live next to? What all of those things that help make that community so strong? So, I was excited to to see this. And you know, I'm sure we could partner with Urban 3 if we if we wanted a greater deep dive into it, but hearing about all of Ramsey County is also very helpful. So, thank you. [44:36] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Madame Mayor. And I just wanted to add one thing to what the city manager said is, you know, one thing that the county wanted to do with this um you know, through this and and thank you for the invitation tonight was to begin to allow for that deeper dive for for cities to dig in a little bit, understand how that data might might really inform you all's decision-m. And so we're exploring ways in which we can kind of expand this work, go a little deeper. Maybe it's addressing your own taxexempt question which is you know sometime that's a question that Maplewood wants to have. Other places it might be you know incremental um approaches to it or how this this work can inform um future policy or future you know documents and such such like that. So you know I just want you to know I I wanted to kind of also mention that that's part of our plan. Um, and we're going to go seek some additional grant funding to help support that. Um, but regardless, I think we've got additional capacity within the county's HR and maybe potentially through the EDA um to kind of support that kind of educational work um and analysis because we think um this is an area that folks have maybe asked for in the past in a a myriad of ways and no one's really been able to kind of supply it. Um, and so this is, you know, [45:21] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): I know, you know, the dis the conversations when I was here at the county in 2020 when we were talking about this first version, it's amazing to hear folks referencing it in conversations um around development proposals or projects. Um, and I know that's the case, you know, in a couple instances like in Roseville where they were asked they asked us to come and talk about it a little bit around Harmar Mall. And sure enough, they started develop some things on the outside of Harar Mall because they were looking at, you know, simple opportunities to add density app ad tax base. [45:57] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you very much. [45:57] Lindsey Crawford (City Manager): The second piece, if I may jump in uh to this is is the EDA off authority. And so I'm going to let Josh answer your questions on that. But uh last year, it was actually last year at this meeting, uh the city council adopted a resolution, um supporting legislation to expand Ramsey County Housing Redevelopment Authority, their their HR to include economic development authority or EDA um powers. And so with the help of that support um and a lot of hard work by Josh and his team, they did receive that authority from the legislature. [46:35] Lindsey Crawford (City Manager): And so, uh, now the next step of that is, uh, every Ramsey County city opting in or opting out of of that EDA authority. Um, I'm I'm recommending that we opt in to that authority and support uh support that authority and Josh can elaborate on what that would get the White Ber Lake community or our businesses. [46:57] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Yeah, Madame Mayor, city manager. Um so really what it gets is an added flexibility in our um our our promotion and our utilization of our HA programming. So to date uh the line share of our affordable or our HA programming goes towards affordable housing as well as redevelopment uh programs. So things like down payment assistance programs, support of affordable housing like gap financing and an affordable housing project, those are harder to come by. There there's, you know, they take a while. Um but down payment assistance um we we have a critical corridors program which I know uh the city has been a recipient of to help do a little bit of that early planning related to projects. And so this is this EDA really kind of bridges [47:45] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): off of what we've been talking about which is um I think when I stood up here um about a year ago I spoke to you know we can't build ourselves out of an affordable housing crisis. We have to find ways to to raise wages. we have to find ways to grow jobs as well. And so we felt like as we were doing um you know our advocacy work at the state capital last year, we felt like this is the the second package. And so this is not a new tax. I just want to make that clear. That's that's goes in there. It's just our expanded eligibility of the HR um you know to include uh business programming, entrepreneurship um services um those kinds of things. [48:28] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay. Does anyone have any questions? Council member Edberg. [48:28] Council Member Edberg: Thank you, Madame Mayor. Um, a year ago, I'm going to give credit where credit is due, and this goes to member Walsh. Um, we were rest, uh, we were posed with the question, would we want to support your initiative before the legislature? And we did. Mr. Walsh's comment at that time was, there's no downside. our businesses get access or would get access to more service. I agree with that and I'm prepared to support the the resolution in front of us. I have a maybe this is a wonky policy question. Why is Okay, businesses in White Bear Lake have a line on their property tax statement that says Ramsey County. Why do they need our permission or our opting into this program in order for them to participate in your programs? Um, and what's what's the policy purpose for that requirement or am I misunderstanding the the policy question? [49:34] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): U, Madame Mayor, council member, it's a very good question and it's not wonky at all. Um, so by its by its title, the housing and redevelopment authority is limited to housing and redevelopment authority programming. So that's in the statute. That's where its focus is. Um because we understand and we've learned over time the intersections of, you know, think about like projects here in downtown White Bear Lake where you might have a a commercial facility on the on the the uh the ground floor and housing that sits above. Our programming would be limited to the housing that is above and not to supporting the project down below. and what it just it it creates some challenges for us in deploying project money and and support. And so um [50:21] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): the opt-in piece of this um we heard as we were going through this process um from other cities um is they really wanted to have a say in whether that was kind of a a policy objective of of this programming. So in a way it still will be called the housing and redevelopment authority but it's in a way it's the housing redevelopment authority and business authority um as as you know its titling and and its um uh collection of opportunities and services. Um so the business that is in White Lake who sees that Ramsey County HA on their tax base, they will actually potentially have the direct benefits of unlocking what's happening in that that that line item. [51:08] Council Member Edberg: But why does the city have to opt in and why can't they just work with you directly? [51:08] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): Um that is a okay that's a great question. Um so what we so when we put together this uh particular proposal uh in front of the legislature um we heard from a number of mayors um and and councils um that they wanted to have the ability to opt into this enhanced services. They didn't want to be told that he was to be given this, you know, three options. Um, they wanted to have two. Um, it's hard for me to stand up here and and justify why you wouldn't want more increased flexibility, but within the statute, that's that's kind of what it is. And it mirrors I'll just say it mirrors when we talk about an EDA. In statute, EDA has a little bit of a process piece. And so, in that case, cities do opt in. And so that was a response and a kind of a compromise that the the county worked with cities to do as part of the legislation to say, you know what, we agree. We're not going to tax. That was not our intention. And two, we're going to give you the opportunity to weigh in on whether we should add this service um or collection of services into the eligibility of this funding. [52:22] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay. [52:22] Josh Olson (Ramsey County): So basically, some cities didn't want they wanted a say and they wanted to be able to say no, we don't want this. Yeah. And I think maybe it it stems a little bit back to the history of when the county's HR was created um where many cities did not have a say um on whether that was the case. And so this was uh a reflection and I think we have some communities who may choose I I don't know that to be true. We we'll find out in the next couple months, but they may choose to say, you know what, we want you to focus on affordable housing production and support. That's it. That's that's what we want. Um, and that will, you know, we'll have to live by those rules and we'll have to kind of work our programming around it for those cities. [52:56] Mayor Dan Nlowski: For those cities. Okay. Any other questions for Mr. Olsen? [53:14] Council Member Walsh: Move the resolution. [53:14] Council Member: Second. [53:14] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any discussion? [53:14] Council Member Walsh: Yes. I don't have a question, Mr. Olson, but I've just some discussion on the resolution. Okay. So, thank you, Mr. Olsson. I'm I'm I'm I'm chuckling a little bit because council member Edward brought me up in a year ago and I I I'm having a little buyer's remorse. I'm not not having a buyer's remorse on the I I'll probably I remember supporting this resolution. Say, "Yeah, go to the legislature, get this authority. Sure, why we we'll we'll back the county as a city and the county." And I think I'm going to vote for this resolution even and you know, we can opt in. it just just a little bit of this economic development piece as a role of government, you know, and I've read some of the background here. What's going to happen? What proposes to happen with some of this money as we carve out a piece for economic development out of the housing mix. Um I'll just read the resolution. The resolution the first whereas is can Ramsey County White consider small business be the backbone of a stability and growth for the respective communities? Yeah, absolutely. The second whereas the county and the city also consider continued investment in small businesses as critical for sustaining stability and growth in their respective local governments. Well, depends on where the investment comes from. I I don't know that I agree that the city should be investing in small business. I don't think that's a use of our tax property tax dollars that's appropriate. I don't even think the county should be doing that. Frankly, I don't think the state should be doing it either. I think we get we get caught up in this economic development discussion and we take tax money that we take from businesses and and citizens and then we put it in a little pool and then we give it back to some businesses and we do it to try to we're picking winners and losers constantly, you know, and if if economic development as a state is taking business from Georgia and get them to relocate here, maybe now now we're benefiting as as state taxpayers. But if we're picking Rochester over Mano with economic development or if we're picking the south side of White Bear County Road E corridor over downtown with city or county economic development money, we're taking taxpayer money from all the businesses and all the people and we're redistributing it and picking winners and losers. I I think we get caught up in that sometimes and then it's a little program. It's a few hundred thousand or a few million dollars here it looks like in the county program and pretty soon it's growing and growing and I don't I think most businesses look at a lot of other factors for whether they're going to relocate whether they're going to grow what are they what are they and I think government can affect those lowering the tax base lowering spending for county and city um getting rid of regulations I think if you talk to businesses those would be the top two things they tell you lower the tax rate lower the fees we have to pay lower regulations so that we can easily compete, you know, but so we're doing grants and we're doing, you know, entrepreneurship and helping businesses. It all sounds good, but I'm not I'm not sure it's the right role of government. Having said all that, I think I'll support the the resolution in front of us. I don't want to cut off my nose to spite the face of Wiper Lake and not participate in this that's already created and uh we might as well get in there and and um participate. Um, but I just wanted to make that comment despite what represent your way. [56:18] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any further discussion? Seeing none, we have a motion. All in favor? We have a motion and a second. We have a motion and a second to vote. All in favor? [56:36] Council Members: I. [56:36] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any opposed? And the motion carries. Thank you. Okay. Item six, A, uh, the 2026 pavement rehabilitation project. Director Calpy. [56:54] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Uh, mayor, members of the council, thank you. Uh, tonight we have our, uh, we'll go over our next steps in the 2026, uh, pavement rehabilitation project. I'll start by going over the project area scope of the project um and then get into next steps. Um so mine council and those watching at home in the audience uh the project area consists of um an area more of a residential area southeast of the core downtown area um consisting of Cook Cook Avenue Banning Avenue um north south streets and then we have a small segment of third street second street and then we have a small segment of alley that uh remains um as kind of the uh last uh residential areas to be reconstructed in in this area. [57:59] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um uh so the project scope uh so uh we have a mix of both mill and overlay as well as reconstruction. Uh Banning Avenue is a little bit newer from a reconstruction standpoint. uh yet the pavement condition um is uh deteriorated to the point uh kind of that 25 year period uh that we like to get in and and do pavement preservation on it uh through mill and overlay. We'll do uh curb replacement uh any utility repairs adjustments as well. Um so that when we're done we have a nice uh even uh pavement surface. Uh the rest of the area on Second Street, Third Street, and Cook as well as the alley will get full reconstructed. Uh meaning uh the curb is uh beyond repair. Uh it's very old. Um this one of the last areas that has not been reconstructed in town. Um so we'll get in, put new curb and gutter, uh just uh some major utility rehabilitation. um and then build it back up starting with the gravel base, the uh pavement, new uh curb and gutter. Um um basically making it a brand new roadway. Um one thing to note is uh storm sewer replacement um repairs, additions. Um there's an old clay tile uh storm sewer on Cook and Third Street that we're proposing to replace at this time. Um again, it's kind of reached the the end of its useful life. that serves a large area that uh to the north um that drains to uh White Bear Lake. So, uh now's the time to replace it. Um cuz it's going to be a 100redyear uh uh piece of infrastructure. So, we don't want to, you know, cover it back up and 10 years from now be digging in the roadway to make repairs. So, we look at all of these kind of items to make sure that they're the uh we're placing infrastructure under the streets to make sure that um the streets last, they're not dug up. Uh we don't have water may breaks, we don't have not that they're 100% preventable, but those that we can uh try to predict. Uh we like to get in in advance and and get those repaired as well. Uh we will also be working with homeowners to uh look at uh we've sent letters out over the spring here and done uh a number of uh sewer uh service uh televising. Uh our sewer department has gone out and televised a number of homeowners who had uh questions, concerns about their sewer services. So if we need to repair at least that portion within the street. Um, also as part of the project, we will be exposing the each of the water services to make sure that there's no lead galvanized uh poor condition water services that we're not able to do in advance of the project. So, we'll do that once the project uh starts. We will expose those through small holes uh with a uh um kind of vacuum excavation. So, we make a small hole. Uh we're able to tell the condition of the pipe at that time. And then we'll work with homeowners whether or not they want to move forward with uh doing that replacement. [1:00:58] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Uh a few minor water main sanitary sewer repairs. The manholes are generally in good condition. Uh those will be uh just spraylined. Um the actual structures are in relatively good condition. Um uh the kind of one of the bigger proposed improvements uh within the project area is addition of sidewalks on banning and second. I'll get into that a little bit more detail in my next slide. Um, and then also uh as kind of a uh cleanup um Second Street is a municipal state aid route uh meaning it needs certain it needs to meet certain criteria uh through the state of Minnesota um that the department of transportation overseas. Uh and that being we need to um extend no parking restrictions um all the way to Lake Avenue. It's on a portion of Second Street, but um the uh the last segment was not done in past projects. So, we're going to do that to clean it up um as the uh the street um width is not such that we can have parking on both sides as part of the municipal state aid system. Um and then we lastly, we work very closely with the private utility companies, Excel Energy, um electric gas, uh telecom to do any repairs. um um uh replacement work that they need to do at the same time so that they're not in two years from now, 5 years from now digging up things that we've already done. So hopefully they get in, get all of their upgrades done so that we don't see them for many years in the neighborhood. [1:02:29] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um that being said, I'm going to move on to the uh proposed sidewalk. Um again, uh the streets are generally going back um um as they are. we're, you know, uh, modifying a few WISH to to match so it's consistent throughout, uh, an entire segment of roadway. Um, but really, uh, one of the improvements that we look at, um, that's kind of outside the the typical road and utility work is where we might do pedestrian facilities, uh, within these projects. Each year we come and we review, um, really starting at the top, we look at our comprehensive plan. Um so each um you know you you heard Jason mention it in you know the housing stuff but we look it guides a lot of what we do. So that comprehensive plan lays out where we should consider uh were there sidewalk gaps, trail gaps and consider that as we move forward with projects. Uh in the 2040 comprehensive plan uh these are two segments that were um as you can see on the map highlighted in pink are the kind of the missing segments. blue is existing sidewalk and the uh orange is the Lake Avenue trail. Uh so that being said, um that was kind of our initial guiding principle. And then over the last several years, we had been working on the downtown mobility and parking study um that also um highly recommended access um you know uh for all um to Lake Avenue into the downtown throughout the neighborhoods. Uh this is a core area and you can see that um uh sidewalk is plentiful in this area and and kind of expected due to the parking the access uh between the trail and downtown. Um and again that was uh mirrored in the uh conference plan as well as that mobility study. Um in addition to that we start looking at um um different things such as connectivity um accessibility for you know the uh uh adjacent homes. where where parking is. Um uh to keep people from having to, you know, park out. You know, a lot of the different events that we have downtown, you know, parking starts extending down into these areas and people are, you know, in these areas that there's not the sidewalk, they're walking in the streets, they're um you know, trying to find those, you know, other routes. So, the more uh connectivity we can have between our major facilities, uh the better from a safety standpoint for uh pedestrians. Um uh again just looking at that you know the uh existing you know most of the uh the main uh connections between Lake Avenue and the downtown or sidewalks on both sides um just to provide that um uh you know relief of having people walk down the street uh then get them off to the street onto a sidewalk and um get into those uh desired areas. [1:05:27] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um, so I'm going to go kind of segment by segment kind of here's what we found and and uh if you recall at the uh the last time this came up at our February meeting uh we had the uh council adopted the or accepted the feasibility study. Uh so we take that and we move forward with more detailed design at this time. So we're basically sitting on a full set of plans. We've uh vetted all of the um uh uh um obstacles that we need to get around over through to to uh get these kind of things constructed. So, kind of starting on Second Street um uh the uh north side um that last segment between Cook and and Stewart Avenue or Lake Avenue. Um we uh it would be a um separated trail or separated sidewalk. So it' have a boulevard um between the curb and the sidewalk. Uh 4 tot wide. Uh we don't see any uh uh tree removal needs in that segment. Um and parking is allowed on the north side. So convenient access from, you know, cars that park on the north side can get out, get on a sidewalk without having to cross the street or walk in the street any distance to get to a uh a sidewalk. Um the south side um is going to be just a little bit different. Um so again, no tree removal needed that we um see within the rightway. Uh again, a 4ft boulevard. However, we would transition to a sidewalk behind the back of curb the closer we get to Lake Avenue due to some um obstructions including a uh and again this is an old part of town. Um uh we have a house that's built very close to the rightway. They have um a fence that extends uh up to 12 feet into the rightway. Um even if we don't uh just even the street improvements uh would affect that side that fence. So, um there is uh uh city permission to have that fence um in the uh in the rightway when when it was built. Um however, it it the uh um agreement also states that if it needs to be moved, it shall be moved. Um and that was those conditions put on in the early 2000s uh when that fence was put in. Um the difference here on this segment is there are parking restrictions due to the municipal state aid standards on the south side. So there so there is not parking or parking is not allowed on that southside. [1:07:58] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um so again those are the kind of obstacles that we look at to to move things around. Um I go to Banning Avenue or uh so I'll start on the west side. That short segment you can see how kind of the sidewalk has gotten almost there but not there. Um on the west side no uh tree removal uh would be needed. um a uh fortifi on the west side that would be right behind the back of curb. Um again due to looking at constraints there um the uh east side of Banning Avenue. Um there would be one tree that would need to be removed to uh uh facilitate the sidewalk. Um that is uh right about the uh location of first where first street would uh intersect. Um there's one 10 12in maple tree that would need to be removed. Um um again we would propose that 4 to 5t boulevard in that area as well. Um that being said um we would also um uh need to do some uh minor utility uh relocations, power poles, uh different uh uh pedestals that some of the telecom have. Uh pretty minor uh pretty regular or standard that we do that during our street projects. Um the other thing to note is that on the uh Banning Avenue side, there is no um parking restrictions. So parking is allowed on both sides. So again, uh folks that would park on either side of Banning Avenue and get out of their vehicles and uh immediately get on that sidewalk and and uh go in. Um one thing to note on the the east side of Banning Avenue, as you can see in that that small segment of blue, um uh the uh that's an existing piece of sidewalk. It's uh relatively old. If we move forward with that, we would repropose to reconstruct that com that piece of it. It's pretty narrow. Um kind of sunken in in poor condition and uh would uh reconstruct that to uh current standard 5t width um to match in with the rest of the sidewalk in the area. [1:10:16] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um so that is the uh proposed sidewalks. One thing I will note or a couple things I will note too is that all the sidewalks proposed are located within the city's rightway. um there would not be any takings or uh um movement out in outside of the city's uh rightway that we control. Uh next up, I'll go over the estimated project cost and funding. So the overall estimated improvement cost is one just a little bit over $1.7 million. Um to fund that uh we um typical of this we would do uh under chapter 429 a portion of the project would be paid for through assessments uh to the uh adjacent uh benefiting properties and then the rest of it would be paid for through city funds. In this case we would do uh bonding to cover the majority of those costs. [1:11:08] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um, as far as the estimated assessments go, um, so we, uh, go through the city's assessment policy, that kind of dictates how we that dictates how we move forward with, um, um, calculating those assessments to each of those parcels. And over the um course of the city doing uh many many years of these projects um the uh um we try to assess a third of the project those assessible costs of or what the city has deemed those assessable costs of the project. Um so typically those costs are the the the roadway, the uh the pavement, the curb and gutter, um the uh um storm sewer improvements that are needed to serve that. Um we do not assess for such things as the sidewalk. Uh we have not done that. Um we've kept that out of the uh assessment component um for the uh residential areas. Um we did provide uh draft assessment roles based on those assessment or what the uh assessments would be calculated through that assessment policy. [1:12:22] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um so on the screen in front of you or up on the on the screen we have uh estimated for the uh single family homes um the reconstruction would vary between uh 3,600 and 14,000 depending on the this depends on the length of uh property um frontage to the uh the roadway improvements. Um we would also uh depending on whether residents move forward with the sewer Y or the sewer um service uh repairs or the water service repairs, we would also have assessments on those. Um those the sewer Y is the you know the optional ones that they want to participate in. Uh as far as the middle and overlay goes, the um estimated assessments range between $1,400 and $2,200. and the alley. Uh there's five uh parcels that above the alley that have access to that. Um those are estimated at $3,500. [1:13:27] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Uh one thing I will note is that there are two commercial properties on the project. Um the uh assessment policy lays out that those are two times the uh res or starting point at two times the residential rate. Um we then um have an independent uh property appraiser or benefit appraiser review those uh to make sure that we are meeting um those benefit tests. Um the uh the key with any of our assessments is they need to be uniform so that we're treating all properties equally. um that they don't exceed um that the benefit to the property or the assessments do not exceed the the uh the benefit that they receive through those improvements. So if we do this improvement and the property value goes up by X dollars, our assessment cannot exceed that. Um and that's where we have our independent benefit appraiser review those to make sure that we are meeting those tests of of assessments through chapter 429. [1:14:32] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um commercial properties again um uh like residential properties are based on uh zoning. So these are in the commercial area. So they are uh through our assessment policy um uh zoned commercially. So that's where the uh um assessments are calcul or that's how the assessment are calculated. Um as far as uh payment of those assessments, um the residential, um the city has traditionally gone with 15 years for uh residential assessments, 20 years for commercial. Um the assessment rate is 2% over bond. I believe last year's was 3.7%. Um once we get the bond sale in, we would be able to uh set that final rate. And then uh these would be payable on the 2027 taxes. Um I'm going to go into project schedule here. So uh again starting early um or late last year we started with a neighborhood meeting. Uh council ordered the feasibility study. Um at the February 24th meeting they um council accepted that feasibility study and ordered order ordered the hearing which would be held tonight. Um so tonight, uh the two items in bold, uh council would hold the public hearing, um and consider, um ordering the project, um approving the plans and then authorizing staff to bid. So those are the kind of those are the things that are up for um um approval tonight. Um assuming the uh council moves forward the project tonight, uh we would um then anticipate awarding of a construction contract the second meeting in April and construction starting sometime in May once road restrictions are off and the uh contractor is ready to go. Um and then um typically, you know, we're kind of wrapping up late summer um before school starts and then some of the uh final um items are done um into the fall depending on on the uh weather, how um fast the contractor starts, when they start. Um and then uh one of the last kind of um 429 or the assessment process would be the assessment hearing that would be done in August. Um um that would then once we get the bids and we do final uh calculations on the assessments um uh we would bring that those assessments back to uh council for approval. There would be another hearing where um um the uh um property owners would be able to uh come and uh um uh speak for against those um uh assessments. Um, one thing to note, so tonight, like I said, we will be holding the uh public hearing. Um, so uh that is required by statute 429. Um, it uh official notice following council's ordering of the public hearing at this meeting. Official notice was sent to benefiting property owners and noticed in the local paper is required. Uh the purpose of the hearing is for interested property owners to voice concerns and support for the project. uh council then can uh take that information discuss um and consider ordering uh the project. [1:17:53] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um you can use the information that we provided within the feasibility study um that the council accepted testimony from the hearing or other information um deemed necessary to uh deliberate and make a decision tonight to move forward with the project. Um that being said, uh the next step in the uh process would be for council to hold the public hearing tonight and then following that public public hearing. Again, debate those um um project elements um and then consider adopt adopting a resolution. Again, this would require per statute a four-fifths vote supermajority. Um and that would be ordering the public or ordering the improvement uh approving plans and specifications and authorizing staff to go for bids. If that first um resolution is adopted, um staff would recommend that council adopt a second resolution which would establish those parking restrictions on that meaning remaining segment of Second Street. Um that concludes my presentation. I'd be happy to answer any questions. [1:19:11] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Council Member Walsh. [1:19:11] Council Member Walsh: Well, thank you, Madam Mayor. Just on the assessment, um you you said in your presentation we try to get a third assessed, but my math is we're at 15%. We're at half of that. And so, is there an explanation for that? The commercial property is going to come in or why are we so low on the assessment? [1:19:11] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Uh mayor, members of the council, um there are a number of items that uh I had mentioned during my presentation that we do not assess for. uh sidewalk. Some of the uh the um storm sewer uh replacement is a uh about a $200,000 cost to do that. Um that's paid through um that is not a traditional um uh the uh repairs of those um utilities are not uh or have not been accessible or the city has not assessed for those improvements. Um so those you take those those components out getting to that third and then we look at uh working with our benefit appraisal to say what is um this initial reaction do these feel like they're going to meet that test of benefit. [1:20:03] Council Member West: Uh thank you Madame Mayor. Uh, I have a couple of questions. Um, one of clarification just on Second Avenue or Second Street, I'm sorry. Um, you said that we were we will only be parking on one side of the street now fully after this is done. Is that correct? [1:20:03] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um, Madame Mayor, members of the council, um, uh, to answer that question, it currently is signed no parking. It's just that the official resolution from council has not been um p Minnesota Minnesota state aid requirements was never adopted by council. So, this is kind of a book or kind of a cleanup just kind of getting things up to standards um in order for um so the next step if council moves forward with approving the plans u uh the department of transportation has to sign off on those plans and that is a requirement that we have that um resolution of uh no parking along the entire piece of second street that we're working on. [1:21:14] Council Member West: Okay, thank you. Yeah, that clears up my confusion because I thought Okay. Y and the no parking is on the south side. Okay. All right. Um and the other uh question that I have is just can you talk a little bit about the sewer service televising. Um like I understand that that is not something that um all cities do and I'm just kind of wondering if you could talk a little bit about what what that's like and why we do it and... [1:22:01] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): uh thank you uh madame mayor, members of the council. So, um I'm going to start kind of maybe a little bit bigger picture. Uh we have uh a our sewer department out of public works has a uh sewer televising uh camera that they that we routinely go and televise um our main sewer lines. The services themselves by um city ordinance are owned by the homeowner. So, both water and sewer services uh from the main to their home are owned by the uh residents. Um, we could, uh, and I'm not going to, not every city, but we try not to turn a blind eye to if we're televising, we have the ability, what's called pan, and we can kind of turn the camera and look up a um, a resident sewer service and we can typically look at condition and say it's in good condition or, oh, there's a lot of roots in there, there's plugging, there's, you know, a joint that looks collapsed. and we obviously can only see up that from the main a few feet. So those are indications of something's wrong. Um from that point um we even do that when we're out south side of town, wherever we happen to be doing that televising. We see something that's wrong, we let homeowners know just so that they're aware of it, that they uh can address those issues as needed. in a project area, we really focus on that because if we cruise by and we say, "Oh, the the main looks good." And we don't do anything with the services. If there's an issue, um, and something happens to them, guess what? Two years from now, that homeowner's digging out in a brand new street, having to repair that. It's a lot more costly for that homeowner. Um, it degrades the condition of the a brand new road. So, we try to fix those issues before they become issues. Um and doing it while we have the street torn apart anyways is much more cost effective uh from both and financially um feasible for both the homeowners as well as the city um because ultimately if they have every hole everything that gets dug out in our city street um degrades that roadway. Um so we see something um we send letters to every every one of the homeowners and said here's what we're finding in the condition of your your sewer. will you allow us to come in and or would you want us to come in for a small fee to uh come in and televise? Um so we did a number of those on the project. Um and uh we'll be working with those homeowners whether they um elect to do that work. Uh some of it might be even uh work that's not part of the project but they might do um their own lining project. A lot of the plumbers now do lining projects of sewer lines. Um, so we try to work with them to make sure that we um get through that um, you know, get through the project and take care of any issues that we can. [1:24:40] Council Member Edberg: Thank you, Mr. KPI. Um, working off of council member West's question, presumably we will vote to approve no parking, formally approve no parking on the south side of second um to comply with the MSA rules. Um, but what then is the rationale that requires if we're not going to be able have parking there? Um, why do we need a new sidewalk running from Banning to Lake on the south side of the street? [1:24:40] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um, good question, uh, mayor, members of the council. Um, so again, as kind of stated up front in in my presentation, um, there's many factors. That is one of them. Um, so we look at um, if I can go back to the the map here, um, some of its consistency and and expectations of um, um, access to um prevents people from the southside having to cross to the north side at, you know, traffic. Um, it's a we look at safety considerations um, um, accessibility by homeowners. I'm again and that's um you know there's kind of from an engineering standpoint there's not a manual of here's where a sidewalk shall go. It is looking at a a number of different factors making uh the best professional judgment you can based on those factors and and making that recommendation. [1:26:11] Council Member Edberg: And then what is the unique um factor in the case of that part of second street that distinguishes second requiring street um sidewalks on both sides of the street? When we look at um Stewart uh Cook both have only one side of the street with sidewalks. What's unique about requiring uh requiring the need for the second uh that new new sidewalk? [1:26:11] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): uh mayor, members of the council, and staff did the review of the area. Um and and that's why I kind of extended the um sidewalk or existing sidewalk a little bit further than just the project area on the map uh in front of you is to show that it's kind of that continuity of that sidewalk on both sides uh in this general area. uh as we move further to the east and north in the neighborhoods, uh we start dropping out uh and sidewalk becomes more prevalent just on one side of the uh sidewalk. So, it's really provide that access mobility to the downtown area to the um Lake Avenue Trail. Um, again, there's not a this is a um um a review of a many different factors and uh making a recommendation to council that this is what staff feels is appropriate in this area. [1:27:34] Council Member Edberg: Um could you tell me I I may have missed this. What um type of sidewalk is it going to be on that south side of Second Street? Is it going to just be a solid cement all the way down to the street or is there going to be a boardwalk in between the street and the sidewalk? [1:27:34] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Uh good question. Uh mayor, members of the council, um uh generally speaking, um from Banning Avenue to uh where Cook would intersect with second there would be a uh 5-ft sidewalk with a 4 to 5ft boulevard. Once we get to um about Cook Avenue, due to the constraints of that home being um again you know surveying and a lot of things happen a lot differently a 100 years ago than they do today. um uh things got close um from an impact standpoint. Um felt that uh the best case to kind of minimize that impact to the property owners. Um uh but yet still provide that uh pedestrian facility is to um start transitioning the uh sidewalk to the back of curb uh from about where Cook Avenue intersects to uh Lake Avenue. [1:28:37] Council Member Edberg: Okay. And and can you break down for me, I don't know if this is possible or not, how much just that section of sidewalk would cost. [1:28:37] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um I actually have that here. Let me flip to that. Get to the right page. All right. Um so the south side uh from Banning to Lake um our estimated cost is approximately 45,000. [1:29:23] Council Member Gola: Yeah, I just have a few questions. Um, appreciate all I've received lots of emails around this topic input already. I know we'll get more tonight, but I did read them all. Um, and I was wondering a couple questions. I was formerly on the Environmental Advisory Commission, but the comprehensive plan mobility study were done before my time. Can you confirm that the environmental advisory commission was involved in that 20 240 comprehensive plan and then also they had a representative for the downtown mobility study is my understanding. Is that true? [1:29:23] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um mayor, members of the council, as far as the 2040 comprehensive plan that I would say predates me, but was being finalized as I was um but there was a number of different committees that with different representation. I'd have to look into that on who was uh part of that. Um, typically, uh, different the commissions, whatnot are part of those, uh, discussions. Um, as far as the downtown mobility study, uh, different representations from, you know, business owners, the, uh, downtown area, chamber of commerce, uh, residents in the neighborhood, uh, environmental advisory commission members, park commission members, uh, staff, um, tried to touch, uh, all different, um, aspects of the community. um in that that have that touch and and um have some connection to the downtown area get that representation. [1:30:58] Council Member Gola: Then I have a few follow-ups um for adding the sidewalks. Can you say what also the city's thought about as regards to storm water management with adding that and then runoff um management as they add the additional sidewalks? [1:30:58] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): um mayor, members of the council. So, um the majority of the sidewalk that is being proposed um has that boulevard. Um so, that's um I'll call it that ideal scenario. The sidewalk is designed so that the runoff that is created by that sidewalk um is called an disconnected imperous area. So, it's disconnected from that main street or or storm sewer system. So the water that falls on that sidewalk would just flow into the boulevard or the grass adjacent to it, infiltrate into the ground and not have a cumulative effect on adding the storm water. Small areas at the um intersections where you have the pedestrian curb ramps, yes, there's a small area that would add to it. Um the two small areas that I mentioned, um the one on the west side of Banning Avenue and then that small segment from Cook to Stewart on Second Avenue where um uh Second Street uh where the curb or the sidewalk is directly behind the curb. There would be a small incremental increase in uh runoff that would go to the street. Um, one thing to note is uh the city uh well before my time planned well in advance uh in this area to do upstream um storm water improvements that actually we have quite a number of credits with the watershed district that um offset uh and more than offset that the work that we're doing here as part of the project. So, um we always look for those opportunities such as those disconnected impervious surfaces so that the sidewalks not draining out of the road where we can, but uh we have uh a ton of uh um storm water credits up in the upstream watershed that uh from previous projects um that we've been tracking for many years. So, the the uh the city's been pretty good stewards of looking at what that communal effect of. Um, so, uh, we've got, um, um, that being said, we do have that, um, um, I'll call it conditional approval from the water district on the project. Um, the final being is is that the contractor that, um, ultimately would get the project needs to sign off on the permit. [1:33:21] Council Member Gola: Got a couple more unless anyone else has more. Um, so the 4681 Lake Avenue property is the one you talked about on that second. I've walked these a couple times, driven by them. It is in that awkward shape of it. Um, with how the not just the fence, but kind of the home sits. Um, are there any other properties that are flagged here that are kind of have unique obstacles like that or is this that the only one? [1:33:21] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um, mayor, members of the council, as far as uh I'll call it the free and clear of the rightway. Uh, yes. There's there's homeowners that have some, you know, hosta beds or plantings within the within the rightway that would have some that we'd have some effect on, but um relatively easy to move those kind of of things. It's harder to move a house that, you know, is right at the edge of the rightway. Um you know, so um definitely the the biggest obstacle um from a private standpoint, uh from a um I'll call them private, but private utility standpoint. And again, power poles, things like that that were placed incorrectly or put in wrong or, you know, not put on the property line as as they typically would be today. Um, some of those need to be moved, but but again, we work with the, uh, utility companies all the time, uh, in such projects. [1:34:41] Council Member Gola: My last one. Um, in regards to like Ramsey County, to my knowledge, this area of our city is inflicted as at risk of being a heat island or lacking urban canopy. Would you know or be able to confirm that or...? [1:34:41] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): um that... I'm not prepared to answer that question off the top of my head. Um obviously as we get into these projects we uh definitely try to preserve and and not impact uh trees. Um you know those trees uh not many trees in the rightway themselves in this area. Um homeowners have quite a few private trees. Um uh outside of this um outside of the sidewalk area, there's a couple other trees that need to be removed. um a couple of dead ash trees which you know are affected by emerald ashbor and need to be removed anyways. Uh the idea would be to uh try to replant those within the project. Um and then there's a small row of a uh ornamental pines that happen to be growing under a power pole. So Excel might as part of the project want them removed anyways. Um but uh there's no sidewalk in that area, but just due to the street grading and and um uh slight widening that they need to be removed, but uh we would work with the homeowner to have those replaced in their property away from the power lines and and uh so that they can maintain that screening if they so choose. [1:36:11] Council Member Gola: Thank you. Hearing from the county just kind of made me think of that. To my knowledge, we're not it's not flagged in the county reports as those. [1:36:11] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): you know, one thing I can note is that the DNR does do they have um kind of uh tree surveys of the entire community that I can definitely provide to council. Uh we can get that uh data. We have looked at it. We um it tells you uh what the canopy cover is, what the uh canopy cover by species is. So, there's a lot of different information out there that um we can uh get get for your information if you'd like. [1:36:48] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay. Any other questions for Director Copy? All right. Thank you. Okay. I'm now going to open it to the public hearing. I have 11 people signed up to speak. Um I'll call you up in order that you signed up. Um, please keep your comments as succinct as you possibly can so that everyone can have a chance to speak. Um, and I'll call the first person up. Susan Oven. Okay. And please state your name and address for the record when you come up. [1:37:22] Susan Oven: Hi, I'm Susan Oven. I live at 4681 Lake Avenue, which is the corner of Second and Lake. Um, uh, which is part of the project area. I see we've lost our little map. Can we put the map back up just for Thank you. Um, and I'm the exception that everybody is talking about because my house was built in 1900 and um I can't move it. And it's not because I we haven't wanted to move it be but um we did inquire about because it h the house has no basement. So we did inquire at one time when we first moved in about jacking the house up and rolling it forward and putting a basement in and then rolling it back. And our contractor at that time said, "Well, the house will collapse either on the roll forward or on the roll back." So, I am sorry to tell the city of White Bear Lake that the house is where it is. [1:38:31] Mayor Dan Nlowski: You tried. [1:38:31] Susan Oven: Um, uh, I just want to talk about the sidewalk portion of this project. Um, specifically the proposed sidewalk on both sides of Second Street. Um, I have lived in that house for well, June 1st will be 39 years. So I have a fair idea of who is walking on the street, how many times they're walking on the street, how many times they're walking on the sidewalk and and so on. Um I have received really very um comprehensive and understandable communications from the city of White Bear Lake. The maps are especially um understandable and uh I have made a couple trips down to the city engineers office and have been helped very much by Nate Christensen in that office. So I'd like to just um mention that. Um the one thing that none of the communications have mentioned at all is why we need sidewalks on both sides of the street. [1:39:40] Susan Oven: Um Mr. Kalpi has mentioned some reasons, but they seem to be um well cuz that's expectations. Um, in the old part of White Bear where I live and where many people live and stay a long time, the appeal is, as your community development director said, the appeal is the community, the neighborhood, the uniqueness, the weirdness, um, whatever you want to call it, where no two houses are the same. um somebody's houses are too close to the street. Um all of those little tiny things add up to what I think is the charm of living in White Bear Lake. Um I don't think the charm of White Bear Lake is sidewalks on both sides of the street. Um a person can can understand the need for pedestrian safety. Um but on Second Street that could be accomplished by sidewalks on one side of the street. Um especially since there's been there's currently no parking between Banning and Cook on the south side. And if I understand the proposal correctly, there would be that would be extended to Lake Avenue. So, why we would pay to put a sidewalk in where nobody's going to be parking their car and getting out and getting onto the sidewalk is kind of beyond me. [1:41:12] Susan Oven: Um, I will tell you that in terms of pedestrian safety, in the 39 years that I have lived there, there have been zero pedestrian accidents on that twob block stretch. So, pretty good. and we only have sidewalks halfway up that twob block stretch. So, either we have the best drivers in the entire universe or we have the most careful pedestrians or we have some combination of all of those things. Um, I suspect that when people are driving in the old downtown part of our neighborhood, they realize nothing is standard. My lot is a triangle. Many of the other lots on my block are not standard shapes, sizes, whatever. They're all weird. Um, but despite all of that, I think when people are driving around, they realize this isn't this isn't standard. I have to pay attention. And particularly if they're coming off Lake Avenue onto Second Street, um they've been used to driving in a single lane um before they turn. So they're probably not roaring around the corner, although some of them do. Um so I personally don't believe and in my experience of 39 years living there have not seen a safety issue for pedestrians. If they don't want to walk in the street, they in my block, they walk in my yard. So fine. Um I don't care as long as they don't let their dog poop. [1:43:09] Susan Oven: So if we ha have already in our current configuration with sidewalk on one side of the street, if we have managed to have a safe pedestrian environment, I don't see why we need to expend money and and I don't understand how it could be any safer than zero accidents in 39 years. Um it it just doesn't get any better than that. If we have to have sidewalks, one side of the street should be plenty and that maintains the charm of Old White Bear. Um, and uh, I personally know someone who lives at um, uh, the Lake Square Apartments who uses a mobility scooter and I see her on Lake Avenue all the time. So somehow or another she has managed to get down to Lake Avenue from Lake Square Apartments um without having a sidewalk on either side of our street in my block. So um I I am mystified why um we want to become more standard. I think we should want to become more unique. [1:44:27] Susan Oven: Um I think um if you look at the number of feet of sidewalk, we can we can have sidewalk on on both on banning and on second. We can have sidewalk covering one side of the street, which would be about 31 to 33% of the distance of the proposed new sidewalks. So, we could get rid of twothirds of the cost of those sidewalks. And I understand that um sidewalks are not part of the special assessment, but I also understand that even the parts that aren't part of the special assessment get paid for by my property taxes. And you'll all be thrilled to know that my property tax productivity has improved by 20% last year and 25% this year. So, I think you all ought to be just thrilled that your residential property is doing that well for the for the city and the county. So, um I would like to ask that you please consider the wishes of those of us who are paying for it and who live there. And I would like to leave you with one piece of wisdom which comes from a fellow named Abraham Lincoln. and he spoke of government of, by, and for the people. And so I hope that you will take into consideration when you vote of, by, and for the people, not of, by, and for the city staff. As lovely as they are, it's the people. And I thank you. [1:46:22] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you so much, Miss Oven. Thomas Kelly. [1:46:37] Thomas Kelly: Mayor Nickloski and members of the council. I'm Thomas Kelly, 4653 Banning Avenue. My wife and I oppose the construction of a new sidewalk on the west side of Banning Avenue from First Street to Lake Avenue. We're not asking you to spend money or do anything special. Instead, we are asking you not to spend money and not to build this new sidewalk. This sidewalk would be dangerous. It would encourage people to cross Lake Avenue on the west side of Banning Avenue while southbound drivers on Banning are struggling to look east up Lake Avenue around the curve for oncoming traffic. In other words, drivers attention is to the left while pedestrians are on the right. This is a bad situation, a dangerous situation. The sidewalk would also be destructive. Our rightway is right up against five large trees along Banning Avenue. And although the sidewalk is going to be along the curb, now I understand, not in from the curb, it's still under the canopy of the trees. It's still over the roots of the trees. It'll still stress the trees and cause them to die, killing the tree canopy over Banning Avenue in that area. Please maintain our neighborhood. Please save the mature trees that provide such a special character. And most of all, please ped please protect the pedestrians. Please do nothing. Please do not build this sidewalk. Thank you for your consideration. [1:48:10] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you so much, Mr. Kelly. Meredith Chelberg. [1:48:22] Meredith Chelberg: Madame Mayor and members of the council, my name is Meredith Chelberg and I own the house at 2224 second Street, which is on the south side of Second Street, where the city has proposed building an additional sidewalk from Banning Avenue to Lake Avenue. I agree that continuing the sidewalk on the north side of Second Street from Cook to Lake Avenue is a good idea since people currently have to leave the sidewalk and walk in the street to get to Lake Avenue and that's not ideal for pedestrians. But I know the city of White Bear Lake values its green space. When we replaced our driveway about 10 years ago, the city said we could not replace our entire concrete driveway. We had to remove some of it and make it into grass. And according to the map the city sent me, our lot I don't I can't believe it's about 180 ft wide. It's a long triangle. Anyway, if it is that much, about 20 feet of it is the driveway. So that would be about 160 ft. And I thought the sidewalks, new sidewalks were to be six feet wide, but I see you said five. So that five times 160 would be 800 square ft of concrete going through the front of our lot that I just feel is unnecessary. When I go to the library, uh, I I take this sidewalk on the other side and cross at that four-way stop at Banning and Second. Never have had a problem. I do think the intersection at Third Street and Cook is very dangerous. Um, they do not have a four-way stop there. And I have been hit almost, not not totally, but very closely because the cars park right up to the edge on third and when I'm coming down Cook, you can't see. So, as I'm peering along, here comes a car at a pretty brisk speed. So, I think that there uh the danger should be addressed. [1:50:37] Mayor Dan Nlowski: That will be next year. Yeah. [1:50:37] Meredith Chelberg: And thank you. [1:50:37] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): um, so the, um, third and Cook, each of the four corners will receive a bump out. So what's that's going to do is it's going to um kind of bulb out the each of the corner of the intersection. that will reduce the crossing distance. Uh provide those four-way stop condition. Uh it will push those vehicles back from the intersection to make that sight distance safer for those that are crossing at that intersection. Um and that's going to be kind of the theme as we, you know, on Cook at Third, Cook at fourth. Um, and then as we move uh west into the downtown area, that's going to be a uh a design theme to um again help make things more pedestrian safety or add pedestrian safety at those intersection locations. [1:52:02] Meredith Chelberg: Okay, thank you. [1:52:02] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay, moving on. Laura Booth. [1:52:16] Laura Booth: Hi, good evening, mayor and council persons. My name is Laura Booth. I live at 2209 2nd Street and I purchased my home there about 5 years ago for that village feeling. I'm on the north side of the street, so the sidewalk ends after my home. I've never seen anyone walking on the street, frankly. Um, and I would ask you not to put another embankment of concrete across the street. Thank you. [1:52:45] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you. Dave Harrington. (Transcript says Harrington, Mayor says Hemerson). [1:53:07] Dave Harrington: Hi. Good evening. Uh Dave Harrington. I live at 2216 Second Street. So my neighbors, good to see you. Thanks for being here. Um and I live on the south side and I I agree with what everybody's been saying that I don't feel it's necessary to have a another sidewalk on the south side of Second Street. We also redid our driveway when we moved here and we're told that we had to take some of our driveway out to create more impermeable space or permeable space and now we're going to just put more concrete in the front yard. It doesn't seem reasonable. Um I also think just in general there's good reasons for pedestrian flow and I'm very excited actually about repaving the streets. We've we've needed that. I'm excited about the project in general, but the um the pedestrian walkway isn't isn't necessary there. I I think we've got plenty of walking spaces in other places. Um so yeah, I hopefully the committee will consider that. [1:54:08] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you. Anthony Years. [1:54:08] Anthony Years: Hi. Hello. Thank you for having us. Thank you for listening. Um I currently have two homes on Second Street between Banning and Lake A. Um I'm at the corner of Banning and Second Street now where we have both sidewalks which we enjoy. Um and I'm in the process of moving to the end of Second Street right as it hits Lake Avenue. Uh 2257 Street. Um as an avid runner and and family man, we use the sidewalks a lot. I fully understand pedestrian safety and and will benefit from that. Absolutely. Um I there's there's three homes between Cook and Lake Avenue on Second Street on the north side. Uh my home being one of them. There's a lot less obstruction there, a lot less resistance it seems. um plenty of space to do the boulevard and have what White Bear Lake sidewalks I think should feel like, not only concrete. Um and so I guess in in my opinion, I think that would be the place to do it. I think if we do a sidewalk on the north side of the street, uh we achieve the goal of having pedestrian safety to get from Banning to Lake Avenue, um and also preserve the charm. Um Susan's home on the corner built in 1900. She failed to mention she's a master gardener of a long time. That that house is iconic. It's it's White Bear Lake historic. Um I would really hate to see that change um for more concrete and and I think preserving that should be important. Um I'm not I can't speak for the other two homes on the north side of the street. Um, I think if they were opposed, they would likely be here to to speak their mind. Um, so it seems like there's just a lot less resistance to achieve the goal. Um, especially with the parking not allowed on the south side. Um, a lot more things in the way, one being a home and there's utility poles there. I'm not sure what the plan would be with the power poles and how the sidewalk would integrate with that. Um, it doesn't really feel like like historic White Bear Lake. So, I I would ask that you guys uh reconsider the the south side of Second Street sidewalk and me being on the north side, I'm perfectly fine with it. I have no objections. [1:56:31] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you. Marcus and Georgie Helker. [1:56:49] Marcus Helker: Hello, Marcus Helker, 4698 Banning Avenue. Madame Mayor and Council, uh, I live on the southwest corner of Banning and Second. We have lived there for about 40 years. And there's a couple things that happened a long time ago when we were there that you may want to be uh you might want to talk about this a little bit somewhere, but back in 1987, I believe there was a committee ordained by the city to propose new sidewalks and how the future sidewalks would be laid out for White Bear Lake. And they came up with the idea that in the future there would only be one sidewalk on every block. Now, you look at the maps and you'll see sidewalks around our area, but they're old. This is before that when they ordained this one sidewalk per block. So, that's one item. The other item is in 1985, Banning Avenue was redone completely and Mark Burch was the uh I think the city engineer back then and we talked to him and he decided that we would we would decrease the width of Banning Avenue from Second to the Lake to avoid employee parking on Banning Avenue because it was getting very crowded. And they also at that time put up the new Third Street parking lamp ramp lot. So they were trying to get employees to park in that lot. And so the width and I'm not sure if this hits with what you were talking about earlier with if a width is so big that it needs to be no parking on one side of the street and if that's steepmandated or not. But we might want to look at that. I don't know what we can do with banning. We have a lot of problems. That's now the width is so small in there, especially in the winter when you've got furrows of snow on each side, you have a hard time getting two cars to bypass in there, especially when you've got a lot of employees parking on both sides of that street. So, that's a little different than what we're talking about here normally. If that street is not in the width line, if it's that the state decides that that is too narrow, then I suppose we can think about either putting a no parking area on our street on one side or ordaining employees to just use the third street parking lot. Uh I don't think that's the only that's the only other thing I had to say. But just to keep that straight in terms of uh and especially if the the proposed sidewalk we have a really old sidewalk. It's it needs to go probably. So, one one answer could be to get in there and I would be happy to be assessed for say a rain garden or a pollinator garden, whatever, because I I look at all the concrete that's going in and I'm saying, well, you know, it's a lot of concrete and you know, we're putting a lot of extra water pvious services that don't need doesn't need to be there. So, that's another idea that I was throwing around out there. And I don't know what the city would think of that, but that's I know there are other rain gardens and other uh things like that around the rest of the the city. So, that's my that's my idea right now. [2:00:03] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay. Thank you so much. Thanks for coming in. Helen Deritza (Transcript says Durst). [2:00:27] Helen Deritza: Hello, I'm Helen Deritza. I live at 4675 Lake Avenue. Uh, thank you for your service to our city, a place I've called home since 1985. First on the south side for seven years and now in our beautiful downtown. was the past co-chair of active living Ramsey County for the 17 communities of Ramsey County and the developer of the White Bear Lake Bike Walk Task Force which was created in conjunction with at that point our assistant city manager Ellen Richter. I deeply value safe and healthy walkability and bikable roads and trails for citizens of all abilities. While many of the project plans for number 26-01 are needed for infrastructure improvements, I'm addressing several of the proposed sidewalks as to whether their placement is necessary to increase pedestrian safety near our downtown, which are based on our upon our city's comp plan and the recommendations of the downtown mobility parking study. Having watched the foot, bicycle, dog walkers, strollers, wheelchairs, scooters, and so on, plus the vehicle traffic on Lake Avenue, where I've lived for over 34 years, my conclusion is that for Second Street, sidewalks on the north side are sufficient for pedestrian use, and sidewalks on one side of Banning Avenue are sufficient. But what is sorely needed is education and enforcement as well as engineering to keep non-motorized users safe on our roads and crossings. In Minnesota State Statute 169.21 subdivision 2, and I won't read the whole thing, and I'll just do a little bit. You can look it up, but um in the uh rights and absence of a signal uh point A where traffic control signals are not in place or in operation, the driver of a vehicle shall stop to yield the right of way to a pedestrian crossing the roadway within a marked crosswalk or at an intersection with no marked crosswalk. I think that's a point worth hearing again. at an intersection. They stop, vehicle drivers stop at an intersection with no marked crosswalk. Unfortunately, rarely do I observe this law being followed, even by our very own patrol cars. Education and enforcement of the statute can go much further in pedestrian safety over a duplicate sidewalk where there is a sufficient sidewalk adjacent as well as engineering solutions. Education and enforcement adds value and safety to our community. As for in as for engineering, more frequent upkeep of sidewalk of crosswalk pavement painting could enhance safety and certainly more markings can go further in supporting compliance with the law. uh, also sidewalk crossings should line up with accessibility ramps and this is particularly missing near the library and at 4th and Washington Avenue at Railroad Park crossing to Lake Country Book Sellers. I also think about fiscal responsibility and environmental responsibility. They influence a large part of my recommendation of the sidewalks on one side of the street. Our city saves money by not financing a redundancy and the environment saves carbon output as cement is one of the largest producer producers of carbon global pollution as well as the extra carbon output we'd have from the heavy equipment noise and disruption. Plus the negative environmental and health impacts of excess non-pervious surfaces including the absorption and trapping of heat uh adding to the heat island effect and the smothering of natural ecosystems under this layer of concrete destroying habitat for insects, plants and animals. So those are a few of the points I'd like uh to make about the uh amending the project to remove redundant sidewalks. uh when Mr. Copy's uh was giving a presentation and I found a few more points. So um in lie of if the sidewalk on the south side of second is removed from the plan um in lie of sidewalk use we could have curb cuts and rainwater gardens which I haven't seen presented. doesn't mean it hasn't been, but I haven't seen it as there are in other parts of the city with the uh curb cuts and rainwater gardens. And I'm wondering if when we cut a tree down, can we plant another one? And if it's not in that location due to sidewalks or water, sewer, another location as a recommendation. Um, and I I am also wondering about pvious pavement if that comes in at all as we could use some pvious pavement which would help with uh rainwater uh infiltration back when... so and that's mostly it and I I thank you for your time. I'm going to pass out to the council back when I was on active living Ramsey communities and in conjunction with uh Main Street these cool little maps we made of downtown walk bike. It tells you the calories, the distance and it's sort of cool and it's just to give you a little tickle. I'm going to have to miss somebody so I can give one to uh the engineer. Thank you. [2:06:13] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Give them to the city clerk and she can make sure that we all get them. [2:06:13] Helen Deritza: Oh, I I don't walk around here. I give her to her. Okay. All right. [2:06:13] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you, Miss Trista. Thank you. John and Karen Taylor. Did I get that right? Is it Karen? [2:06:46] Karen Taylor: I'm Karen Taylor, 4661 Lake. Um, sidewalks. Uh, you said walkability, accessibility, and safety. Um, I do volunteer work where I see seniors and low-income people. And if, um, I see their addresses in downtown, I say, "Oh, I live in downtown. Nice place to live, right?" And people, they like living in downtown. But I also hear from people, "But those sidewalks." And I said, one lady, uh, I said, 'Oh, it's really nice to be able to walk to the library. And she said, 'I can't walk there. I have to drive because of that sidewalk. Um, so I'm wondering about adding more sidewalks when we're not doing a good job of maintaining what we have. And seniors appear to think that a bad sidewalk is the same as no sidewalk. I've never heard someone say, "I wish we had a sidewalk." They say, "I can't stand that tree, that rut that pushed that thing up, and my wheelchair doesn't go up and over, or my eyes aren't as good as they used to be with my tri focals, and I'm worried about tripping and falling." Um, so I'm not so sure that bad sidewalks are safe and accessible and walkable in the minds of at least the people I'm seeing. Um, and then, um, you talked about runoff. Um, there's more to more pavement close to the lake than just runoff. The DNR has rules about percent imperous pavement within however many feet of the lake. And do we really want to add a much more concrete really close to the lake when the DNR is trying really hard to minimize concrete next to the lake? Um, I guess that's it. Thank you. [2:08:50] John Taylor: So, I'm John Taylor. Hi. The other half of the party here. Um 4661 Lake. We've lived there for 42 years. We're one of six houses, I believe, on this in discussion today that Ramsey County doesn't know when it was last sold. So my point is my family's grown. Helen's family has grown. Susan's family has grown and we live there. Okay. So um I'm an engineer. I'm not I've never worked in the public sector. I've worked in the private sector. It's a little bit different there. We have to justify not just with a a a um a committee said we should do this and we'll go out and tax people for it, but we have to justify it. A million seven is a heck of a lot of money for for a 3M engineer to um to justify. They need facts and they need data. You all have received an email from me with links to a lot of different studies that I've done, including a traffic study. Um, a car going north on Banning happens every 40 minutes. It's a 16 foot wide path about here to the wall. tell me that I can't safely, even if I'm disabled, that I can't safely make that path. I'd like to talk about something else, too, and that is um clarification. So, the um it sounds like the the east sidewalk is going to be next to my fence line. It'll take down one of my trees. By the way, that's one of the trees that you've seen in the email, the the blazing um maple tree. I believe it will also impact the roots of many other trees along there. Probably four or five uh probably let's see, we got an a an ash. We got two two maples. We've got we've got a lot of trees there. I'm wondering how deep does do you need to go to to set your footings for your concrete so that so that we don't have eruptions like we have through through town next to every single tree. Karen just talked about it. How deep are we going to go? Is it a foot? Can I get the answer? [2:11:14] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Mr. Mayor, members of the council. So, uh, typical sidewalk section by, uh, we come in, we excavate it out, we put 6 in of gravel, 6 in of, uh, concrete pavement on top of that. Uh, so we're about a foot deep. Um, as far as the, uh, distance away from, uh, the trees in your yard, um, most of the trees that I think that you're talking about where we have in the downtown area where trees are are in other parts of town where trees are immediately adjacent to a sidewalk. So you have kind of the um the base of the tree that has actually and the and the main roots that are are coming up. Um myself, my staff walk the area. Um the trees are far enough away. We've done uh many of these types of projects uh in town, whether it be sidewalk, whether it be just roadway improvements. Um the roots that are um that far out on those trees are pretty um minimal from a surface standpoint. um we don't see the big roots that are that far out that would um potentially cause the heaving of the sidewalks. Now, if the tree becomes, you know, 10 ft in diameter or very big, but um the typical tree that's there, uh I don't see any issues with it. [2:12:38] John Taylor: Thank you, Mr. Copy. Okay. So, so I have a real fondness for trees. You know, among other things, this project is going to put out, I think Helen said a lot. I'll tell you 15 tons 15 metric tons of CO2 just to make the concrete and that was counting on a 4 foot wide and now we're talking five foot. So maybe it's a little bit more than that now. So 15 metric tons is amount is enough to send a family of four around the globe in an airplane. It's also allowed would allow me to drive my car entirely around the lower 48 and I would still have leftover carbon debt, you know, to match that. Do we really want to put that much carbon? When, by the way, we have an ashbor problem and we have something else coming up. It's called the uh twin stripe um chestnut bore. that's hitting a lot of oak trees around here. North Oaks is worried about it. Um, we have trees on our property that we're treating for that. And by the way, some of those trees are from the Lake Avenue project that were weakened by the Lake Avenue project and probably also weakened by that, you know, 6-in gas pipe that we went underneath all the roots of those trees. I don't know what it's going to take, but my personal opinion is that we really don't need more concrete for something that is not really needed. And the reason I say it's not really needed is you've seen the study. There just isn't enough um traffic on that street. Um I have a safety report that says in the last um year for banning and second the only incidents that were reported in that period of time are on banning and third and fourth street and in the parking lot and the only incidents on second street or second street are around the um the intersection of 61. I don't believe that we need we have a safety problem. But you don't have to listen to me because I'll tell you that in the last couple years I know that I've seen Paul O. Many of you know Paul OJ and you know you know his his story and I've seen um him going up and down Lake Avenue in the Sather Trail and coming up and down Banning and in fact he stopped and talked to me while parked in Banning Avenue. We had a good conversation and he didn't seem concerned at all. So, you don't have to listen to me. Um, I personally believe there is no safety issue. I personally believe that um the pretext that we should follow a map from a 2040 study, a a comprehensive plan for 2040 that really never had a public review because it was done during co it was approved during COVID. Um, I don't see any rhyme or reason to to how we chose to choose the streets. I believe Stewart is planned for two two sidewalks in the future. I believe every North South street except for maybe one or two and most east and west streets except for maybe one or two. Um, it it looks arbitrary to me. Paul Paul pointed out that the um that the guiding light is this plan and the only thing the plan says is we endorse complete streets and connected networks. Now, I'm going to say that we already have a complete street and a connected network. We've got a We've got a 16 foot wide northbound lane on Banning Avenue that sees 10 cars a day in some days. Think about that. 10 cars a day. Are we going to put 15 tons of of of carbon in the air for that purpose? that 10 that 16 foot wide lane. If we add two five foots on each side, that'll put us up to 26 feet. Where are they going? They're going to Lake Avenue, Sailor Trail, which in some places is only 8 ft wide. Does that really make sense? Now, I'll close. I'm taking a lot of time, but I will close by saying I did watch your the uh truth and taxation meeting in December. At that point, there was a lot of well, there was only one person that showed up, which is pretty pathetic to to voice their their concerns. Um, but there was a lot of concern that we have personnel pro personnel that we have to pay and we have debt service we have to pay. Now members of the council and mayor mayorowski, you don't have to pay that for this project. You have an opportunity, unlike most of the things you have to decide, you have an opportunity to say, you know what, there is no safety risk. There is no reason. And with that, I'll I'll certainly answer any questions. [2:18:20] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you so much. Thanks for coming in. Uh Kevin Tafffty. Is it Kevin? Okay. Mike and Pams. Oh, you're fine. Okay. Okay. So that is everyone on my list. Is there anyone else um who would like to speak on this issue going once, going twice? Seeing none, I will now close the public hearing and bring it back to council for discussion. Okay council what are your thoughts? Council member Edberg. [2:19:11] Council Member Edberg: I'll go first. Um, I've been out walking in that neighborhood. So, first of all, big picture, there seems to be no disagreement about the need for street improvements, the reconstruction, repaving, etc. Um, we've heard nothing that discourages us from advancing that, uh, which is the bulk of the project. Um, so let's acknowledge we've got agreement around that. Pretty much all of the conversation has been around sidewalks. Totally fair. Um, so as I think about um as I think about what is being proposed, I am not supportive of a full sidewalk on the on Second Street between Banning and Lake. I think that is uh redundant. I am supportive of completing the last block between Cook and Lake on the north side of Second. Um that that allows connectivity between uh the Saither Trail and walking paths on sidewalks into downtown. Um and that makes sense to me. I looked that we're not we don't have trees to move. It's there's relatively wide space. Um, I'm sure it's uh some level of inconvenience for uh owners on the north side, but um as one speaker said, it's there's three homes in in that block. Um so I support that extension to make that uh connectivity and provide safe uh safe transportation. The southside makes no sense to me. I just don't I don't see that one. Um, with regard to banning, um, I am not supportive of two sidewalks of building out two sidewalks on both east and west. Um, particularly to me, the east side is not necessary. It would be far more straightforward to complete the last block between lake and first on the west side. that would provide complete sidewalk coverage all the way from lake up into downtown for those folks that uh that desire it or need it. And um uh I'm not seeing a compelling case that justifies construction of a new sidewalk on the uh on the east side. Um I'm thinking about the comment from the Kelly's about um whether it's there's a safety issue. I get it. Okay. I I that's not crazy. Okay. But I do think there's a value in having um a sidewalk on one side of the street to allow for that uh for people to move from Lake Avenue up into downtown. So completing on that side where we have got most of that place uh most of that route already covered makes sense to me. I look at um Stewart and Cook on the uh one-sided streets. I don't Okay, maybe I'm just not hearing it. Maybe when I walk downtown, I'm not seeing it. Maybe I'm oblivious. Maybe I'm out to lunch or looking at something else, but I'm not hearing complaints from pedestrians or uh others about not having safe access. We've got one side that seems to work. Um, and I'm not feeling a great need to build more. So when we get into our 20 our next comp plan, I'll be looking at those that language, too. Um I I don't think there's a value in building infrastructure that doesn't serve a clear and and present need. One of the things that it just it's always and I'll say it's a minor annoyance. We talk about safety, but we never see data. We never hear so how many accidents, how many deaths. Yes, we may not hear about the close calls and I'm sure there are some of those, but um that data is just plain absent from our conversations. Uh we don't hear about fender benders and all of the other stuff. And so if an argument is going to be made about safety, there ought to be some data and we never see that. And so that's an encouragement to our our own deliberations and process that if we're going to make that claim, there should be some data that we look at that uh supports that. Um so those are the things that uh um that I think of and um anyway I think we should build two oneb block stretches to complete and provide one uh one-sided let it go at that it will give us all the connectivity and safe uh safe transport that we need I think. [2:24:10] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you Mr. Hedber. Anybody council member Walsh? [2:24:10] Council Member Walsh: Well, thank you, Madam Mayor. I just want to make an observation then and it's okay, but this council the council is is shifting, I think, on sidewalks over the years. I think I've been on this council 10 years or so now. So, uh, I'll just say the sidewalk conversation is pretty much the same every time. And it's the same tonight and it's been it's been for 10 years. when we come into a neighborhood and do a street project, many times, I don't want to say every time, but many times, the neighborhood says, "We don't want sidewalks." And mostly in my 10 years, the council has said, "We get that. We appreciate that you don't want sidewalks um in your neighborhood." But we make decisions for the entire city, not for your neighborhood. Well, for your neighborhood, but including the entire city. I represent the people in Ward One. We're a ward-based city council. We're not at large. So my con most of the notes I've taken have been the the most common uh objection to the sidewalks is they're not necessary. So you're you live there today. Um you're not going to live there forever. Other people will move in. We make decisions for the city for the for the his for the entirety of the city going forward. So you live there today and you're telling us you don't think the sidewalks are necessary. Well, people in Ward One on the other side of the tracks, the other side of the highway who walk through the lake may think they are necessary. So, I represent them. So, we got to make a complete city decision here. So, for years, we've kind of said appreciate hearing from the city, from the neighbors. Almost every time people say, "We love our neighborhood. We love our our streets. There's no safety problems. Our kids run in the street. It's all great. We don't need sidewalks. But there is some planning done by the staff. There is a comprehensive plan. I'm not a huge fan of the comprehensive plan for many reasons, but but it does exist. And and Council Member Edber, I I I'm with you. If we want to revisit our philosophy on sidewalks and how many we need and one side, two side, I I'd love to join that conversation because we're going to we're about to embark on the next comprehensive plan, you know, and we can all get in there and and do that. But and I don't I'm not arguing. I I I you know I'm sympathetic. Do we really need do we really need sidewalks on both sides of the streets? But I just want to say I want to make a decision based on this city, not on the neighbors. And I no offense, but you live there today, but there's a huge city and people walk there all the time, including visitors would come uh and and and walk on that sidewalk. So just from a decision point, you know, we got to make that decision globally here for White Bear Lake. That being said, I mean, I'm I can be convinced we don't need sidewalks on both sides. I'm just kind of making the observation that we have said no to many neighborhoods in this in over the 10 years I've been here where they've come all come and said we don't want a sidewalk. We said appreciate that. We're building a sidewalk because we got to connect and you live there today, but you could sell your house tomorrow and somebody else is going to live there and they may want the sidewalk. So, we make a decision for the future. We make a decision for the city, not for the current occupants of the houses on the street. And we've we've done that many times. And if we're going to shift, and we have shifted one, I remember one time I made the speech and and in for my one of my neighborhoods in one of my wards, in my ward, and y'all voted to kill the sidewalk and I felt like a jerk because I just talked against my neighbors. But that's fine. We can start shifting that philosophy. I just kind of just making that observation that we're getting a little flexible here and I just don't want to want to make decisions based on good good science. I think the staff is bringing us their recommendations for walkability, safety. It's everything. It's not just one thing. It's everything. And they're saying, "Look, let's connect. Let's put those those sidewalks up." I walk here all the time. I like sidewalks. I walk on the sidewalk. I If I was king, I'd say, "Yeah, put them up on both sides." Um, but I hope we can make this decision with this input. Input's great from the neighbors that live there today, but let's make a decision based on the entire city. [2:28:20] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you, Council Member Walsh. I just want to throw in um a little bit of my experience. Um I've been an orientation mobility specialist um working with people um with mobility needs for 33 years. I have a master's in orientation mobility. Um and I look at this from a very different perspective because I've worked all around the Twin City area, all around um lots of states in America. And um there are many many people this is not necessarily about safety. It is somewhat about safety but it's also about accessibility. And in this I live in this part of town and this is the the neighborhood I live in. And I realize that we share our neighborhood with a lot of people. And there's a lot of activities that go on on Lake Avenue, at the parks, at the lake, and connect with downtown. Roads are connections from Lake Avenue into our town. And for somebody with uh mobility issues, especially I can attest to Marketfest, the cars are parked on both sides of the road all the way up to my house, which I'm way on Sixth and Johnson. And so on in this area, I know they're parked there. And when people are leaving and kids are walking down the street and there's cars parked on the road and they have to walk out in the road or if somebody's blind or if somebody has a wheelchair or if somebody's elderly, walking in the road is very dangerous. It's also an accessibility issue with getting lost and not knowing where you are. Um so I'm I'm I sympathize um with the situation. I am agreeing with council member Walsh about we are making a decision for the whole city and that means everybody in the city. Um and I want to take their needs um into account as well. And I think it's important um I I'm back and forth on the two sides of the street. I I have a real um the the side of the street uh south side of second is a tough one. Um and I I think that the accessibility can be made on that side of the street while saving the city some money. Um and having enough room for people to walk if we're not going to have people park on the south side of the street. Um that being said, I can go either way. Um and on banning again, um somebody brought up the safety issue about the crossings. I as a mobility specialist, the crossing on the east side is actually more dangerous because there's a lot of uh trees and the way the Lake Avenue is coming. Um it's because the west side is sticking out more. Um you have better view of people coming from Lake Avenue, so it's a safer crossing on the west side of the street. Um, so, um, I could go either way. Uh, I really want to encourage people to consider, um, everyone in our city and and and the safety of walking on the streets and also the, um, visitors that come to visit our streets and accessibility to town. Um, so that's that's my feedback. [2:32:12] Council Member West: Thank you, Mayor. Um, thanks everybody for coming out and um, sharing your examples and your experience. Uh, my experience is though I've lived here for 33 years and I I don't live in that ward. Um, I grew up in a city that had sidewalks everywhere and I walked all the time. Um, I really loved walking. where I'm living right now. Um, on the four sides of my block, one side is has two sidewalks, one has one sidewalk, and two have zero sidewalks. And it is a challenge for me to walk because of that. Um, I feel much safer and I'm an able-bodied person, um, being on a sidewalk area and especially on both sides of the street. So, I don't have to cross at this point. I have to cross over, um, County Road F, which granted is much busier and faster than everything in your neighborhood. So, it's not, you know, apples to apples that I'm talking about here, but um, but that is my experience. So, so for me for safety and again like I I say this all the time on the dis my biggest concern is safety about um pretty much everything I would if it were up to me wouldn't be king but um like if it were up to me um we would have sidewalks on both sides all the way down. I I can live with um and would a agree to if we can't get to um a four to five any other way to one side. Um I think it's a the the quirk is going to continue if we don't have the east side of banning with that little little stretch of sidewalk and then no sidewalk. So we keep the quirk then. Um but yeah, for me um for greater safety it would be it would be on both sides. But again, thanks again for coming. Thank you. [2:34:27] Council Member Gola: All right. Um I appreciate one thing. I do think director copy from the engineering perspective this is the best proposed from that the nice thing is and why we have a council is we can provide further perspective. Um I would say up here I probably represent uh family with young children. I have two kids and we walk so I live over by Birch Lake but we walk all the way downtown often. It is frustrating going down um Fourth Street and then going down Birch Lake Avenue um when there is only one sidewalk because walking with two young kids it's like oh now all of a sudden the sidewalk stops now we have to cross to the other side and it's adding that extra element um which I think just objectively do sidewalks make it safer for pedestrians? I my understanding is studies say yes. Um, and so that is my one piece. We do have like I strategically because I know the areas will when I walk with them down Lake Avenue and then cross and same thing um when we're walking down Fourth and other ones like go on the sides where I know the sidewalk, we won't need to do an extra cross um for that reason. And so it also is just I don't always like to make decisions or those things based on this is how I feel or what I think. I like council member Edberg said the data there. Um it does make me feel safer when I'm walking with kids and I know my spouse uh he's a firefighter and does come home and we'll be like yeah a kid got hit uh in the road and then it puts us all kind of on edge. Um, so I think for young families there is that security piece on the sidewalk because I can let them go further ahead. Uh, that being said, I do think the 4681 property with Miss Oven is a unique situation and I am um I've seeing that one and I've probably driven by these properties. My kids are like, "Mom, do we really have to go by again on the way home to see it?" I do see that situation and so that would be one where I would be more partial to say okay don't put it on that side simply for it being weird the way it would bump up to the home. Um and that's where again I do think from an engineering perspective best to propose it but then from the council I in these I put myself in these situations. Okay, how would I feel? Um, kind of like council member West said too, if I lived there and if I lived on that corner, I probably would be like more asking um at that property to not have the sidewalk go right there. That is my perspective. [2:37:26] Council Member Angstrand: I'll make the motion to accept the project minus the south sidewalk and the east sidewalk on Banning. [2:37:44] Council Member Edberg: Second. [2:37:44] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): Mayor and council, can I just uh clarify for the record um so the the motion would be to approve the resolution as presented um but remove from the project the entire sidewalk along the south side of second street and the entire sidewalk along the east side of Banning Avenue. [2:38:04] Council Member Edberg: Correct. I think it's the the proposed new sidewalk on the east side of Banning. There is a partial from a starts between first and second on the east side that's there. It needs some repair. But um I I think the the plan is the the plan as proposed is we're going to fix the existing sidewalks. We're just not going to install a new one. That's my interpretation of the motion. [2:38:30] Council Member Angstrand: I take it out. [2:38:30] Council Member Edberg: That's a separate... we used to have in that little section there. Don't you support? Take it out. [2:38:30] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): u mayor, members of the council, the piece, the existing piece of sidewalk on the east side of Banning Avenue south the second is in pretty poor condition and um would need to be taken out or would recommend to be taken out as part of the project um and reconstructed if that were to stay. Um it would not be advisable to leave that uh in it in its existing condition and with... [2:39:08] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you. Does that clear it up? So just to clarify your motion is... they got the whole south and east. Okay. Whole south of second street and the all east of Banning Avenue east side. Right. Okay. So we have a second on that. Is there further discussion? [2:39:39] Council Member Walsh: That wasn't I didn't interpret the motion that way. Oh, we'll have a tessle. Does anybody want to offer another a different motion? [2:39:39] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): Well, yeah. If the intent if the intent of the motion wasn't correctly interpreted by Council Member Edberg, I think it's fair that he didn't second that motion. So, I guess before we move on there, there is a motion. Um, and I think we would need to to have a second before we discuss it or potentially discuss an alternative motion. So, is there a second to that motion? [2:40:04] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Motion dies for failure of a second. Okay, so we're back to square one. Would anybody else like to propose a motion? [2:40:20] Council Member Angstrand: Well, my my motion would be to accept the resolution as presented. [2:40:38] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay. Do we have a second? [2:40:38] Council Member West: Second. [2:40:38] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Seeing that. We have a second. Is there any discussion? [2:40:38] Council Member Edberg: I want to understand the uh requirements of the of how many votes is required for a successful motion. [2:41:16] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): You need four. So if there are two of us who object who do not support this motion, I mean the motion does that pass but we don't implement or what's the inter what's your how do we deal with that situation? That's a good question, Council Bre. So if if the motion if it's a 3-2 vote in favor of the motion because it requires a four-fifths vote, the the act would fail. Um so we would I guess continue debating the project if the council so chooses um and look for alternative paths forward. [2:41:37] Mayor Dan Nlowski: So we have a motion and a second. [2:41:37] Council Member Edberg: So I think it's entirely fair game for us to vote on this conversation on this motion up or down. Uh if it gets four clear that's fine. Um if it fails I will be prepared to offer a different motion which would be differing from uh member angstrand's motion simply by taking out the new uh construction on the east side of banning. But let's take care of this topic deserves its own discussion. [2:42:11] Mayor Dan Nlowski: There further discussion on this motion. Okay. Should we take a vote? All in favor? [2:42:11] Council Members: I. [2:42:11] Council Member Edberg: No. [2:42:11] Council Member Angstrand: No. [2:42:11] Mayor Dan Nlowski: motion does not pass. Okay. Council member Edberg. [2:42:27] Council Member Edberg: So, to try and split the baby, uh, I move that we approve the project minus the southside sidewalk on second and the new construction on the east side of Banning. [2:42:44] Council Member: Second. [2:42:44] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): is um mayor, members of the council, um as I had stated previously, that segment that exists is not in... [2:42:44] Council Member Edberg: I would support the intent of the motion is that that would be repaired and uh and and fixed up to uh retain its original walkability. [2:43:11] Council Member Gola: So, let me can I ask a question on that? So, wouldn't that wouldn't that be in the plan if in the proposed resolution, weren't you going to reconstruct? Are we we not planning to fix the sidewalk on banning that north piece? [2:43:11] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Uh mayor, members of the council, um it would be from an uh uh staff engineering perspective. Yes, we would um reconstruct it if that south segment were to be added. Um the north segment again just it's kind of a sidewalk to nowhere. Uh people start walking down it and you... And there's no point awkwardly. There's no crossing. [2:43:50] Council Member Walsh: We're only doing mill and overlay on banning. So you you you could do mill and overlay and then never even not worry about touching the because you're not doing curb anyway. So you just leave it you'd leave it as is. [2:43:50] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Um we'd have to do something. It's in poor condition. [2:44:08] Council Member Walsh: Now we're now we're adding... We're talking about that east side of Banning right? Yeah. this that little piece. Yeah. Well, we're not going to do the south, but okay. Maybe, you know, maybe the compromise is to do banning and not second. Maybe maybe we should do banning the entirety of banning, but then kill the south side of Second Street. Part of me too though I do as a young family we walk to the library a lot. That's the one thing that has me. [2:44:42] Council Member Gola: What does that mean? That second street thing. Yeah. Yeah. Right. It puts an extra crossing in there to cross to the library. Yeah. [2:45:00] Council Member Walsh: What was No. What was you Can you kind of something? I mean, so the the sidewalk to nowhere on banning isn't great. So if we kept if we kept the new Let me just understand if in your original in your plan as presented, you're going to add sidewalk on that that that red piece would be added. Would you also then redo you would also in the what you proposed today going to going to fix the north piece of Anning? [2:45:00] Paul Calpy (City Engineer): Uh mayor, members of council, that'd be correct. So the kind of the blue segment between second and the um the the new segment on the east side abandoning we would reconstruct that to uh current 5 foot standards. Um it's pretty narrow right now. Um i think it's less than 4 feet or less kind of poor condition. So we would reconstruct that as part of the project as well that's built in on this proposal you're presented today. Yeah. [2:45:46] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): so so can I jump in mayor and council? So, as I understand it, the the motion that's been seconded is to effectively not put in the new portion of sidewalk on banning, leave the existing well, reconstruct the existing piece. So, the sidewalk to nowhere is is brand new and and nice and still there, but um reconstructed. I mean, that that's effectively what the motion, I believe, is and that's what's... [2:46:25] Council Member Gola: But then what was the second street part? [2:46:25] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): It's south the southern side of second street. [2:46:25] Council Member Gola: take back my second on that or I guess we still have to go forward with it and then vote... [2:46:25] Council Member Walsh: or or we could amend we could amend the motion on the floor to say I amend it. I I'll propose to amend that rep member Edberg's motion to include the banning piece in it the full banning piece. But then you're saying both sides of second or out? [2:46:48] Council Member Walsh: No. South. Thank you. Sorry. Yes. And now just just to clarify too, we have we have a motion to amend the the original motion to include um everything on banning... [2:46:48] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): and that would need a second if we're going to continue. [2:47:08] Council Member: Second. [2:47:08] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): Okay. So, so just to clarify now, we're only going to be voting on that amendment whether the uh the main motion will be amended as stated by council member uh Walsh. [2:47:24] Council Member Edberg: So the reason I'm not inclined to support the east side of banning is that that that's where we get into trees and a whole bunch of other stuff. We have had a u a partial sidewalk there. It seems to work. Keep it fixed. If we can't do that, I'll I would I'll defer to the uh original motion if we have to. But what we have, so maybe this is just an old guy talking. Learning how to look both ways and crossing the street is a core human competency. And I don't want to expose people to risk, but whether you are crossing a side a cross street, a major street, learning how to cross streets, especially in residential neighborhoods, especially in a track record with no massive safety issue, ought to not be our issue. So, it's like I i we got to figure that out. [2:48:34] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Well, well, people who can't see can't look both ways, so that's a a different issue with seniors and some kids and so it's a that's a different issue, but... [2:48:56] Council Member Edberg: on the other side of the street, right, where there is sidewalk and they will still have to figure that out when they cross first street or any of the others. So it's like I am I am completely supportive of having at least one side of second the north side and one side of banning the west side complete from lake to downtown and from lake up to uh banning. Okay. It's like we should absolutely have sidewalks on at least one side of those streets in their entirety that people with mobility issues are still going to have to cross the side streets safely. So they are not im they're never going to be immune, right? But we should provide them at least one way as both connectivity and access. [2:50:07] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): That would be the first one we were voting on. No, we're still we still have a a motion to amend the main motion and that voting is uh we should vote on that first. Okay. So this is simply to amend. It does not require a four-fifths vote. It's to amend the original motion on the project. So to include all of the sidewalk uh work along banning. [2:50:07] Council Member Walsh: Yeah. And madam mayor, my final pitch on that would be just that it's just it abandoning that stretch seems kind of ill- advised. Um either you know redoing it is spending money to redo a sidewalk to nowhere. Um because it won't connect. So my my motion would be just do banning and let's not do second. It's a compromise today. But you're saying just one side is... I'm sorry. the south side of second. We're going to eliminate eliminate the south side of second and do both sides of banning. Both sides of banning what... and we had a second on that and we have been discussing and would we like to vote on that amendment? All in favor of that amendment? [2:50:52] Council Members: I. [2:50:52] Council Member Edberg: No. [2:50:52] Mayor Dan Nlowski: No. Okay. It does not carry. [2:50:52] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): Yeah. The motion to amend carried 3 to two. Now we are Now we have a a motion back before the council to uh approve the resolution with the removal of the south side of Second Street and all of the rest of the sidewalk work. The only the only modification would be to remove the segment of sidewalk on the south side of Second Street. That is now the motion that has uh that is up for discussion and and ultimately a vote and would require for this vote. [2:51:28] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Correct. Okay. So is there anyone any more discussion on that? Okay. All in favor of that motion say I. [2:51:28] Council Member Walsh: I. [2:51:28] Council Member West: I. [2:51:28] Council Member Gola: I. [2:51:28] Council Member Edberg: No. [2:51:28] Council Member Angstrand: No. [2:51:28] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Opposed. No. Motion is denied. [2:51:45] Council Member Edberg: Yeah. as a way of uh getting partial progress. Um I move that we approve the north side of second between Cook and Lake and we remove from the project the uh south side of second between Banning and Lake. Now that's that that's only partial. This this is not intended to improve the entire project. I'm trying to make progress to settle some issues so that we can figure out how we're going to deal with the other parts of the project. [2:52:30] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): Are are you making a motion? Uh because I I'm not sure we can do partial motions on a on an improvement project here. So, I think that's that's a fair discussion point, Council Member Edber, and I would encourage you to have a discussion about those kind of moving pieces, but um ultimately the project has to be voted on as one one uh motion, one action. [2:52:50] Council Member Edberg: Okay. [2:52:50] Mayor Dan Nlowski: So, can we talk about uh Madame Mayor? [2:52:50] Council Member Walsh: Yes. Let's let's figure out the the the blue area on the east side of Banning because that's the sticking point, right? All right. there's at least a couple of votes that are saying it's it serves no useful purpose. We should remove it. And if that's where our center of gravity needs to be, I can I can live with that. So it's like um so with that, would you accept another motion Mayor? [2:53:24] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Yes. [2:53:24] Council Member Edberg: I move that we accept the project including the sidewalk on the north side of second between Cook and Lake, not including the south side of second between Banning and Lake, including the west side of Banning from Lake to first and the removal uh no construction on the east side and the removal of the port the partial sidewalk that is essentially between first and second. So... [2:54:02] Council Member Walsh: I think I've heard that one before. [2:54:02] Council Member Edberg: Well, yeah, we've changed our minds. I was saying I didn't I didn't want that to be repaired. It's just so disappearing now. [2:54:02] Council Member Walsh: I I think I think the only... Well, any further discussion? I'd second that as well. So, that's good. [2:54:18] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay. Any discussion? [2:54:18] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): And and uh just for the record, I want to make sure I understand because you you listed off the various segments of sidewalk. Council member Edber, but what you're talking about, what your motion embodies is um all proposed sidewalk construction in in the staff report and in the plans except for what's on the south side of Second Street between Banning and Lake. [2:54:45] Council Member Edberg: No. Going... uh and the east side, sorry, and on the east side of Banning. [2:54:45] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): Um and the removal understanding segment on the east side of Banning. Yeah. Thank you. [2:54:45] Council Member Walsh: I'd support that. He's got a second already. I know. I'm just I'm speaking that in support of the motion. [2:55:02] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any further discussion? Seeing none, all in favor? [2:55:02] Council Members: I. [2:55:02] Mayor Dan Nlowski: opposed. And the motion passes. Thank you everyone. Okay, moving on to item 7A, unfinished business. Um, Miss Crawford will do a second reading. There's another... Oh. Oh, right. Sorry. Thank you. Okay. That's fine. Sorry. Should I stay here? No. Um, we have another uh we have another resolution before us ordering the improvements. prohibition. It's removing parking on the south side of second. [2:56:05] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): Oh, that's not here. [2:56:05] Lindsey Crawford (City Manager): Before the council is the resolution designating no parking restrictions on Second Street from Cook Avenue to Lake Avenue already in place. We don't have the formal resolution done. So, this would clear things up, but it is already signed. No parking. [2:56:28] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Correct. Okay. [2:56:28] Council Member Walsh: I'll move that. [2:56:28] Council Member West: Second. [2:56:28] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any discussion? All in favor? [2:56:28] Council Members: I. [2:56:28] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Opposed? And it passes. Resolution passes. All right. Uh, moving on. Item 7A, unfinished business. We're going to do a second reading of an ordinance amending the city charter regarding special elections. Mr. Anie. [2:56:52] Mr. Anie (Legislative Staff): Hi. Thank you, Madam Mayor and Council. I'll keep uh my remarks more brief than uh the final or the previous meeting. Uh last meeting, I presented the first reading of an ordinance to amend our city charter to align with state statute 205.10 subdivision 3A, which designates five dates on which municipal elections may be conducted. Our charter in sections 4.04 04 and 4.12 give a timeline for special elections and that timeline has the potential to conflict with the dates that are allowed by state statute. Uh for example, if there was a June 1st vacancy, our charter timeline would make the election happen around mid July and state statute would make that uh have to wait till the second Tuesday in August. So, the proposed amendment will align our charter to meet the state statute requirements uh as painlessly as possible and also be flexible enough so that if state statute should change again in the future, our charter should not need to be amended again to meet that statute. [2:57:59] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any questions? Any questions? What um can I add one thing? [2:57:59] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): Yes, Mr. Anderson. I do want to add one thing too before a motion is made on this one. I did catch a a scrier's error in the ordinance that I want to have corrected just before it's adopted. Specifically, the the language in the heading in article one states chapter 2 of the municipal code of White Bear Lake, and that phrase should uh read chapter 4 of the White Bear Lake City Charter. It's correct in the second part and in article two. For some reason, it it transferred wrong on that part, it looks like. So when a motion on this ordinance is made by council, if it is um please just include that that amendment to to address that error. [2:58:43] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you. Okay. Is there a kick off the topic? [2:58:43] Council Member Walsh: I'll move approval of the ordinance as recommended to us by the charter commission with the changes uh addressed by our attorney just now. [2:59:00] Council Member Edberg: I'll second [2:59:00] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any discussion? All in favor? I. Any opposed? Motion passes. Resolution passes. Thank you. All right. Um, item eight, new business. We have nothing scheduled. Item nine, discussion. Um, 9A, a concept plan review for 3772 Hoffman Road. Director Lindall. [2:59:36] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): Thank you, mayor, members of the city council. The item before you um is a concept plan review um from Redbird Real Estate and Kelly Cardinal uh for the property at 3772 Hoffman Road. Um the concept plan includes a design uh for three twin homes on the property um accessed by a private road. Um as a concept plan, no formal action is required from the council. Um um this uh is a discussion and comment kind of item for the for the council. Um the public um um is encouraged to comment but has provided comment um both at a neighborhood meeting and at uh the planning commission that occurred both those meetings back in January. And I'll talk more uh in detail about those um in a few minutes or in a moment here. Um so in included in your packet um so when we're looking at a a concept plan review item again there what staff does in your staff report is try to outline the issues and potential um either ways an item conforms or is inconsistent with the zoning standards um um but doesn't offer a specific recommendation in concept plan cases. Um so, to help kind of uh provide some context to the discussion uh staff included in your packet um six questions uh to consider um that I think would provide that staff believes would help provide um comment back to the applicant about um how they might move forward um with this application. Um so, um the first one and those are on the screen were included in your packet. Uh first one is um the density that's proposed is significantly lower than the comp plan uh recommends. Is that a fundamental challenge or uh for this proposed concept plan? Um second, are the number of inconsistencies um in um this proposal with the existing RXC zoning a fundamental challenge for the concept plan? Um, should the applicant continue to seek approval of the concept plan as designed or redesigned to comply with all the zoning standards? So, there's the the two and three kind of go hand in hand. Uh four um starts down um the path of talking about alternatives um for the than the zoning proposal and looks at um the possibility of a PUD or plan unit development for this application um and that um given the standards for um approving a PUD is that a viable option for this? And again, we'll talk to you more about what those standards are in a moment here. [3:02:38] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): Um, does the planning commission or in this case the city council still support the RXC zoning on this property? Uh, that was adopted in the most recent and then in the recent update to the zoning code. Um, and finally, should the applicant consider reszoning to another category more closely aligned with the concept plan as designed? So, um, those are just some questions that I would ask the council to consider as we go through this information. So, uh, just to give you again a little bit of background here, um, the property in question is located, um, along Hoffman Road in between Cedar and County Road E, um, closer to the north side or, uh, Cedar Avenue. Um it is zoned RXC which is our residential mix corridor category. So it is intended um for um uh relatively higher densities along the corridors um within the community um which was again the intent in the conversation we had with the zoning update. Um that mixed use. So the X that's included in this in the the the title of this um gets into that mixed category um and includes um both building type and design standards intended to produce a more pedestrian friendly walkable environment more in line with um the um what I talked about before the village scale low-rise village scale of white traditional scale of Viper Lake. Um the other part of the zoning is a is a more standardized residential zones that we retained um from the current code. Um and an example of that would be, you know, just to the east of this you see that more mustardcoled area. That's the Lynen Hills area. That's R5. That's a more standard um um suburban class of zoning. um and doesn't have the same um um design review uh or design standards associated with those mixeduse districts. Um just again to give you a little bit of background um existing conditions on the site. Um this was previously a single unit dwelling that was demolished um in late 2025. The applicant did donate the property uh to the city so the fire department could do uh training on that exercise. So after the property was used for the training exercise, it was uh demolished. Um you can see from the aerial that this neighborhood um is heavily wooded um has access offman road which just should be noted as is a is actually a county road in this particular case. Um and then so the town homes to the east um and single family or single unit dwellings kind of um on on either side of it north and south until you get again to the to the edges of the of this kind of neighborhood where there's multifamily development at both Cedar and uh County Road E. Um so here's the overall concept layout again. Um, it prop pro proposes uh three twin home units um accessed by a private road that leads to some guest parking on the far east east end um and a storm water pond. Um these are some examples of renderings submitted by uh the applicant. So, um the um development or the you know the unit they're proposing that's shown in the upper left hand corner um is just one half of a twin home. It's a single unit. So that's the ren the the the digital rendering picture that you see here um is just for one unit. I'll show you a second more sketch plans that show the entire unit. But then the other three draw images are are of some of what the interiors may look like. So here's what you would see from the twin home unit. So that the the garages in the middle above each other with the units on the outside of them. So when you were looking back at this unit, this would be the in the upper leftand corner. That would be the unit on the outside with the garage in the middle and then another garage and unit uh to the left of that image. [3:07:13] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): And so by comparison, just to give you um you know, the applicants kind of proposed here image shows um again what's more a suburban design um of a um a garage front kind of unit, single level um um um um design. And just by comparison um from the zoning code, this is an image of the vision that the zoning in the RXC zone tries to produce. So again um it's more of a um a slightly denser environment where units would have at least two stories that they would have access um directly from a street in front of them and be closer to the street and not set back from that street. um and that they would have some sort of front porch and entry feature to those designs. So um we then get into detail in your staff report um about how this um concept plan either um is consistent or inconsistent with the RXC zoning that's in place. And so, um, to try and summarize this a little bit more for you, there are, um, probably about half and half with things that are consistent and that are things that are inconsistent. But the things that are inconsistent are really very fundamental to the the intent of the zoning ordinance to produce images more and and development more like the images you see on the right hand of this slide. So really as designed, the applicant's image is really inconsistent again with um the orientation and setback from the street, the position and access of the of the garage units, um the number of stories of the units. So, it's just um um it it it's it's just a different concept um that's really more aligned with our R5 zoning than this section. That's the RXC. Um so, there's a lot more detail in that staff report and I'm can certainly go into those um with you. Um but the next few slides, you know, the the first category you'll see here, this is building and sighting kinds of things. So, positioning of the buildings on on the lot. Um um the zoning seeks to pu push them closer to a public street, excuse me, with street trees and sidewalks and a main street rather than a a full public street, I guess, is what I should say, rather than a private street that is really just an extension of a driveway. So, the next set of standards looks at parking and access ex um accessory structures, but really that gets into the comments I made before about all of the images you see here are are aligned with the standards within the RXC zone that um advocate for garages to be um either behind or underneath um or or or at least set back from the front face of of the of the units themselves and to not be accessed right off of the main street in front of the units. [3:10:47] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): The next set of slides or excuse me standards here have to do with height of the building. And so one of the things to note here is that the this section of the code again includes both a minimum and a maximum height related to stories. So, it advocates for units that are at least two stories again to help promote that um more walkable village design and some of that density that comes along with a two at least a twotory kind of unit versus a singlestory um kind of walk out kind of unit. And so then um we move into kind of the subdivision part of the application. So if the applicant if this application would move forward um it would need to go through subdivision. So it would have um an overall lot that would with common area for the private road, the storm water pond and the and the parking and then the green space around the units and then individual lots for uh uh containing the the individual uh dwelling units. Um and just um we've noted for the applicant throughout the staff report in this process and and just in the other meetings that as since the property is located on a county road, the subdivision approval is also subject to comment from uh uh Ramsey County and not just uh the city's standards. Um and then so the the all applications like I guess are circulated to other uh departments within the city. So um this includes the the engineering and fire comments that were included in the staff report. Um and just to kind of summarize these um really the engineering comments and and and uh Paul can chime in here as as uh or or answer questions if you have them. Um so um the drainage in the area generally flows from the south to the north. So the proposed development appears to block the natural drainage pattern in the neighborhood. Uh the proposed private road is offset only by five uh feet on on on the north side. Um and so from an engineering perspective, it's unlikely that that five foot area provides adequate room to grade to um accommodate proper storm water uh management in that areas. And then um there's some challenges with the drainage pattern to the east side of the property um and the where the pos where the stormwater pond is located versus drainage um um out to um Hoffman Road. Um there there was some questions from the engineering department about snow removal, but the applicant has indicated um in previous uh uh meetings with the neighborhood and the plan commission that they would um have an association that would handle storm uh excuse me, snow removal on the site. And then uh the fire department has talked to the applicant about either needing to sprinkle these buildings based on the design either need to sprinkle these buildings or install a fire hydrant. And I think they they've settled on the concept of um um providing a fire hydrant. [3:14:07] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): So um just to talk about review process here um for a second again um as a concept plan there are no entitlements or or action that's required by the council. This is a feedback and discussion item so the applicant can decide how and if they want to move forward. Um so the concept plan process again included a neighborhood meeting that took place back on the 21st of January and then shortly after that the planning commission meeting that also reviewed and commented on the item. And um the applicant had asked for the the the natural progress of this item would have been for it to come before the city council in February. the applicant asked um for a pause in their application in February to move it to March to allow them um more time to consider the comments from the neighborhood and the planning commission that pointed out some of the challenges in their design. Um and then they did actually come forward and have submitted house a replacement house plan for the lot that is currently um submitted to city and and under review. Um um but the applicant did then also request that we move back to the city council so they could complete the process and hear comments uh from the full council. So um the future review process um I would just say the best way to describe that is is not there isn't a clear path I would say um forward for this proposal. Um, they certainly could redesign to meet all of the zoning standards within the RXC district, but that seems very challenging from staff's perspective given the things that we've talked about that there are some of the inconsistencies with the zoning are really just um fundamentally change um um um the consistency with the overall intent of the zoning district. Um and then there's also some challenges that we've talked about from an engineering perspective with their design. Um you know that may be able to be worked out if they move forward but again the engineering department has kind of given their best um analysis to the concept level plans we have at this point. Um, a second option would be to do a plan unit to development, which would allow for some deviations from the zoning. Um, but basically be in in exchange for providing some other public benefit or a better um um development or public benefit for the city. And there's been really no conversation with the applicant about what that might be. Um, and we'll talk a little bit more about the PUB standards here in just a second. And then again, in can just providing a a kind of a full uh spectrum of other possibilities, um, you could reszone to the R5 category that is the suburban residential mix that's more that would be consistent with the neighborhood to the east here. Um the challenge from staff's perspective with that is we just went through a very extensive res or a zoning update process and and and the zoning for this area was based on that comprehensive review with um you know a a committee that uh vetted that process all the way through. looked at goals and policies from the comprehensive plan to guide that zoning and then um you know uh uh several different public meetings and then a review by the planning commission and public hearing and ultimately review at two um hearings by the city council. [3:18:35] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): So, um, the comments that came out of this project, um, from the neighborhood meeting were concerns about drainage, as we've talked about, um, the the density that's being proposed on the lot and especially, I think, in the context of the narrowness of the lot and the the surrounding neighborhood, um, that really just has single units in it. Um and then um fire safety again raised by the uh public about concerns about being able to navigate um down such a a narrow private road that is doesn't have an outlet on the end of it. The planning commission provided more highlevel kind of concept feedback. um they generally like the single level maintenance redesign and saw a a a need for that related to the housing needs in White Bear Lake. But generally I I think it was a consensus of the group that this wasn't the good a good location for that kind of um proposal um given the zoning and the guidance from the comp plan. Um there were concerns about the inconsistencies with again that comp plan density guidance and the RXC zoning standards that um the there there that led to a conversation about the planning commission really being split on either keeping the RXC zoning or considering another zoning category. Um there were some that um advocated uh for maintaining uh uh the the current RXC zone because of the process that we had just gone through um to define that area. And then there were some that were um open to considering um a reszoning uh uh consistent with kind of the neighborhood to the east. Um, and then specifically, um, two residents spoke during the planning commission meeting, Gary Piklick and Kevin, uh, Tatley, I hope I'm pronouncing that correctly, and they generally spoke in opposition to the concept plan for the restating kind of the concerns that came out of the neighborhood meeting and I believe there are a couple of them here also in the in the audience here tonight. [3:20:52] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): Um, so in considering the plan unit development option, the zoning code does include some guidance or some standards that are supposed to be part of of approval of of a plan unit development and um those are listed on your screen here and I just again review them for you here quickly that it promote that the plan unit development should promote um implementation of and consistency with the comprehensive plan or other other relevant plans and policies. So that that's just the catchall to say if there was a small area plan done in a neighborhood that we should look at those things too. Um but again the the it it just asks you to look at the comprehensive plan and is is there some inconsistency between the comprehensive plan and the zoning that the PUD could help fix? and um staff doesn't believe that exists in this case given the zoning update that just happened. Um can uh uh PUD be used to accommodate development that may be impossible to carry out under otherwise applicable development code regulations. And there you know that that we're in a situation where there is a a challenge with what they're proposing. Um, but the challenge uh staff would say is is really is it inconsistent with the zoning that we've put in place. It's not that there's some physical condition uh that's impossible that a PUD could help fix or or or the like. Um um as I mentioned u PUDS are intended to secure some sort of public benefit that is at least commensurate with a degree of development flexibility um for a development. Often times that comes in some sort of um environmental or sustainability goal that um a development offers that a nor that a typical development w wouldn't. um some sort of um pedestrian or bicycle improvements, uh affordable units of some kind. Um and again, there really hasn't been any um conversation from the applicant about um um what sort of public value might come along if they decided to go down a PUD route. And then again to promote master planning of larger of larger development parcels. So the PUD would seek to look at, you know, all of this area that hasn't redeveloped kind of in between Cedar and and um County Roadie and and try to promote kind of an overall what's an overall master plan for that area rather than looking at the one individual parcel um and and and in and kind of that snapshot in the middle of it. Um and then again just talking about the reszoning process of this. You know certainly if they went to the um kind of standard residential zone there are fewer design standards um um again but produces a very different kind of um um um uh development pattern. Um and then um the applicants design uh could design the project uh to meet that red uh resoning category. So uh with that that's a quick review of of the of the information that's in your staff report. So I hope that's kind of a grounding um reminder of the information that's in there. The applicant is present here and and can um I'm sure answer specific questions that you had. Um but I just wanted to end on this kind of come back to my last slide here is um to try to give feedback kind of based on these questions that would help I think guide both staff and the applicant as to how they might proceed and then I'd stand for questions. [3:24:13] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay. [3:24:13] Lindsey Crawford (City Manager): Mayor Nlowski I and city council I do have to jump in as we are approaching that 10:30 mark. Um we do have a resolution uh that the council has to vote to go past 10:30. Um, and so I don't want to jump in when an applicant is here and interrupt their time. Um, so, uh, council needs to decide if you want to go past 10:30 or if you want to table this item to the next, uh, city council meeting. And it's just a simple majority vote. [3:24:42] Council Member Edberg: Unless you think you'll be done in seven minutes. Uh do we have if we extend do we have to extend to a time certain or can we just say we're going to keep talking and thinking and engaging the topic? [3:24:59] Lindsey Crawford (City Manager): Uh there is I do not believe there's a time certain. [3:24:59] Council Member Edberg: Part of me that says uh that we extend we stay the applicants are here. We've just had and I would want not want to have to have this conversation repeated in the future. Uh, an extension of 30 minutes to 11. [3:25:18] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Uh, Council Member Walsh, do you want to extend? [3:25:18] Council Member Walsh: Well, sure. I don't think we need to do the 11. I think you just need to We just need to get past 10:30. [3:25:18] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Just need to get past 10:30. Yes. [3:25:35] Council Member Gola: Yes. No, I just for the same reasons. I know everyone here has been sitting. [3:25:35] Mayor Dan Nlowski: You want to hear Council Member Walsh? [3:25:35] Council Member Walsh: I'm fine with the motion to simply continue our conversation. That's fine. And we'll be done when we're done. [3:25:35] Council Member: Second. [3:25:35] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Second. All in favor? [3:25:35] Council Members: I. [3:25:35] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any opposed? Okay. Thank you. Okay. Does anyone have any questions for director questions or again the applicant is is here if you have questions for her. [3:26:11] Council Member Angstrand: I can go. Um I was at that planning commission meeting and I think um you know we changed the zoning the way we did because we had an idea of what type of um housing we wanted in the um uh more used um roadways or near the more used roadways. And so I think um looking at trying to change that um it's very premature. I I think that we we stay the course with that personally. There's just and there's just a lot of um things that would need to change to to meet that um code. Um yeah, there were a lot of concerns from the community um as we were as there was the discussion um as well as um from the planning commission. I um as it stands, I don't think um you know that there's like good storm water, the drainage issues, the um not meeting the um sort of some of the minimum requirements. There's there's just a lot of things. So, I don't I don't have any good ideas. I'm really sorry. Um but I don't I don't um see where I would support. [3:27:42] Council Member Edberg: Um so there's a part of me that wonders whether we got the zoning right when we did it in the first place. Um, it's murky and I it's probably as good as we could get, but I'm not con I don't recall that we had specific conversation about strawberry acres in our uh zoning committee uh discussions. The we received the recommendations, they seemed reasonable. Um, but that question of did we get the right zoning when we did the reszoning, um, I I'm not completely confident one way or the other. I think this whole series of parcels along Hoffman is really tough because they're all long. They're deep and relatively narrow and there's a whole string of them that that make the kind of denser um what seems to me to be a more profitable no not profitable I not money more um a better solution is to try and figure out is there a way of someone aggregating parts of those partial uh parcels that um say halfway along those and doing a whole string of them, accessing that from uh from Cedar Cove, the the other side of the uh the development and developing that to get our the density that the comp plan envisions and and promotes that, but that's not what the applicant has current capacity for. And and there's and there's just a whole ton of other stuff to go with that. But we've got a really challenging geography to deal with and I don't have any good answers on that. I do think the as I drove along Hoffman and looked at that whole stretch from Cedar almost down to uh uh to E, they're almost all long, narrow, and single family homes. And to put in a multi-family, I'm sorry, a multi-unit um development that's been envisioned would not at all be would not all fit the neighbor the neighborhood. And so, um, it's like I won't say a no, but it's like, oh, is that and then how does that fit with the rest of the vision for the doesn't seem to be an easy fit. I won't say that. I won't say no, but I'm not seeing an easy way to say yes. [3:30:22] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you, Council Member Eber. How much does it cost to get your car realigned? [3:30:22] Council Member Edberg: I stayed on the road. [3:30:22] Mayor Dan Nlowski: That's my point. Well, that's county. I know. Council member Walsh. [3:30:54] Council Member Walsh: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Um, what would you say? I I love this housing. I love this style of housing. I love the proposal slab you a single story. This is what we need. This is what I think we need um in the city. So, I saw it originally. Oh, great. Awesome. Four units. Do two duplex or is it three three six units? Three duplexes. I think three duplex three duplex, you know. Awesome. So, um I was surprised to hear there was all these issues. I mean, because I didn't look at the details, I understand it now. So, I guess that's where I start. I love the housing. I love the the result, you know, so I'm inclined to try to make it work. My my think would be I don't I don't have any problem. I was on that zoning committee, you know. Uh I don't have any problem reszoning. I mean, we we don't have to get every piece right uh on the first time. The question would be what what do we reszone? If if we wanted to go down the reszoning route, you just draw a line around... Well, you wouldn't just do this piece. You would do the block Hoffman Road. I mean, what would what would a reasonable reszoning look like? Would you reszone just you wouldn't just reszone the one because you'd be you'd be an island then, right? You'd want continuity probably. Not continuity, contiguity. [3:31:37] Council Member Edberg: Contiguity. [3:31:37] Council Member Walsh: Contiguity. Thank you. [3:31:37] Mayor Dan Nlowski: That was a question. [3:32:27] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): uh, mayor, members of the council, I I I guess I would agree with the general idea that there should be continuity in the neighborhood. Um the previous zoning was all of these lots, all of the single family lots between um the senior building on the north and um the uh apartment buildings on the south end. And um so the comprehensive or the update and the update of the zoning code um then proposed a zoning category to for that entire area as well and that was all again based on the land use classification for that area all being consistent. So where the line gets drawn in there, staff's best answer would be that we would like we would do what we did before. The first zoning was consistent for the entire category. [3:33:12] Council Member Walsh: Yeah. And the the the zoning that came out of the update was consistent with the entire I I would agree with that. I would say if if we went the reszoning if there was a do that then you just do that whole piece and seems to me that's the easiest thing to do. I I think trying to cram this this this these town homes, these duplexes into the the mixed with the walk up isn't going to work. It just it's it's I just I would reszone I guess is what I'm saying. And then now that doesn't get you all the way there because the water issue is super important. So I mean I just my assumption is with all development that it doesn't work if if engineering doesn't say the water is done right. I tell residents that all the time. Well, what about the water? We we would never do anything to put water in jeopardy. We would always get that right. So, I I want to I would stay with that. So, unless they can sign off and it looks it didn't look good, you know, with the east, west, north, south issues you got in that in that property, but maybe there's a way. And if so, they'd have to have to solve that for me. That's a no no that's a I'm trying to say deal breaker. That would be a deal breaker. Um but I think that's always a deal breaker. We always want that kind of sign up and we always get it as far as I'm concerned. As far as I know. So that's those are my you just looking for thoughts and feedback. That's my feedback. [3:33:55] Mayor Dan Nlowski: And and my thought is you know those those lots are so narrow like even the things that you showed us that could look right for the RX residential that it's zoned for. Wouldn't that have the same problems with such a narrow lot? [3:34:23] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): um, mayor, members of the council, uh, the general answer to your question is yes. Um, but the the the zoning the zoning wasn't designed to meet this project. The zoning was designed to be consistent with what is in the city's comprehensive plan. and the feedback we heard from the public throughout the process, the feedback we heard from the members of the committee who guided the process um and and the overall intent of the city to um try to guide development that happens in the city. the development pressure that exists in the city if we want development to happen. It's based in the concept that we wanted to keep that out of neighborhoods and closer to um the corridors. And so um you know again staff isn't providing you a recommendation as part of concepts but it's not what we're supposed to do here. What I what we are supposed to do is advocate for consistent planning. And so we've looked at the zone we've looked at the comprehensive plan. We made an update to the zoning code based on the comprehensive plan and based on a nearly two-year process of talking with the community. And so I I would I would I would again I would just say we the staff your planning staff tries to provide you with a consistent 30,000 foot level um um review of zoning outside of a particular project. Um and so when we and when we get to the particular project then um it comes down again to situations like this where the property owner is saying they would like to do something other than um what the community has decided over I would say an extensive planning process. [3:36:34] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any other feedback or questions? [3:36:34] Council Member West: Oh, Council Member West. [3:36:34] Council Member Walsh: Yeah, just maybe one clarification. So, this has been reszoned, but you said that there's a plan for a single family home to re be replaced. I think I recall from the planning commission that there's a certain period of time that it's okay to put uh a single family home in there to replace it. [3:37:03] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): Correct. Um uh um mayor members of the council. So un and I want to make it clear that under the before the zoning change, okay, the same condition existed as with after the zoning update in that single family homes weren't a permitted use in that zone. So every single family home that's there um is grandfathered in and that means they can repair, maintain or even replace apple for apple kind of development. Um they're just basically once uh the the the the use would be discontinued or demolished, removed for the site, they have a year for that grandfathering status. And once we get beyond a year, then the city could um and I'm sure the city attorney will kind of uh provide a little bit more detail to my response, but basically the city could deny the development or at least more um um um influence it a lot more through a permitting process. Is that a fair summary? [3:38:14] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): Yeah, mayor and council, they have they have a year to come in for a building permit to build in the same single family footprint. And if that year lapses, um, they lose legal non-confirming status and they have to adhere to zoning. So the site would have to be redeveloped consistent with your code and your comp plan. [3:38:32] Council Member Edberg: Thank you, Mr. Anderson. Um, so or Mr. Lindell, when does the one year did that start in February? Does is is does that do they have one year to get to finished product or footings in the ground or permits drawn? What what marks the evidence of you know they are pursuing what's in my what's in my head is they ought to be able to develop something. They have a right to do a single f to replace apple for apple. Um if we can't provide an easy pathway to um doing getting higher density, higher value from the use of that entire lot, uh we should at least encourage they should at least encourage the consider building a single family home. Potentially the all the members on Hoffman should be looking at their backyards and those back woods and saying, "Is there some way we can um figure out how to get value from that?" unless they like those single long lots and you know in that case that's theirs to decide but anyway I think we should try and make give them all the options for rebuilding if we can't find an easy straightforward pathway. [3:39:51] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): So, mayor, members of the council, um that's almost the exact conversation we've had with the applicant after after she received feedback from the neighborhood meeting and the planning commission and she approached us and said, "I want to put this project on hold so I can figure out a single family design um and consider if I want to move forward with replacing the single family home or or getting comments from the city council." Um the applicant has already submitted to us a single family home to replace the one that was there generally in the same area uh of the one that was there. Um um and staff can support um um the design that they've proposed under that grandfathering status. So, in this case, the applicants kind of doing a yes and they they've come in for the single family home um that uh staff can support and now they're asking uh uh for feedback from the council. [3:41:00] Council Member West: Um question about the in the same footprint. Um these long lots. Um there's a lot of space there. Uh what about um an ADU? Would that be if if if a person would decide um if the applicant would decide to build a home and also an ADU, would that be allowable under the kind of provisions that we've been talking about? I'm not suggesting you should do that, but it's, you know, [3:42:07] Jason Lindall (Community Development Director): mayor, members of the council, um, I'm hon I honestly don't know the answer to that question off the top of my head. I would need to consult with the city attorney and and and review that plan and what the code currently says. Um because um the new code allows by right ADUs in single where single family homes are permitted. Um this is not one of those zones. [3:42:07] Mr. Anderson (City Attorney): I hear the distinctions. And counsel from from just a more of a global perspective on how non-conformities are typically perceived. It's the the the intent is to not encourage expanding a nonconformity. You want to phase those out and bring property into alignment with your code. And so to allow an ADU where you have an existing non-conforming home would would run a foul of that I think spirit. So okay, I suspect not especially based on um Mr. Lindall's comments, but I that that's what I would say. Thank you. [3:42:40] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Anyone else? Any questions, comments, feedback? Okay. Thank you so much. What does the applicant want to speak? Any questions? [3:45:25] Kelly Cardinal (Applicant): Thank you very much uh for all your time and work that you've put into that and that was a really good presentation. I was simply trying to help increase the density. Um, if it's not going to happen with my lot, it's going to be a huge challenge for any of the lots along Hoffman. Families have lived there for decades, you know, to the north, to the south. I was trying to do something that was well, first of all, when I purchased the property, I was simply going to do a remodel, but I was encouraged by the city to do something that had higher density. I did it before this RXC zoning. So, it was within um the concept of of like the R5, it was R six zoning, but R5 to the rear uh to the east of this property. Uh it's very much pretty similar to that. Um, so I was trying to increase the density, which would, by the way, I thought it was ironic that, uh, there was a discussion on property taxes because, you know, calculating the difference in property taxes would be over a 10-year period with just those six um, units would probably bring in an additional $250,000 if you just use today's dollars. Um, so I thought, you know, I I did the best I could. Um, it's impossible to have front-facing units on that property, and it's going to be really difficult for anyone, I believe, to develop any of those properties under the RXC zoning. I have a timeline, one year from the day I donated it to the fire department for training. Um, so that's why I did put in the building permit because I do have to do something with the property. I can't just hold the property. I can't. Um, so I do need to at least build a single family home, but it's, you know, if it if the intent is to increase the density, I just this was an opportunity to increase the density. Maybe it's not perfect. Um, but it's going to be very sad if I see a year from now that now I could have built it, you know, with some tweaking and of course we would take care of drainage issues. Of course, maybe it had to be reduced to four units, you know, to take care of some of that. Whatever it is, I mean, this was a concept plan. the initial I realized that we would need to make some changes on some things, but I did design it with the R5 type of zoning in mind. Um, and it did fit with R six also, which it was previously zoned. So, kind of sad, but I tried. Uh, so I just I almost was going to cancel this and just go move forward with a single family. And I thought, "No, I just really want to hear what the city council what they really, you know, what they think and do they feel like they got the zoning right and is there a chance of of changing it?" Um, that's it. So, I mean, I'll move forward with the single family home and, you know, but it just seems like such a waste of all that property back there. But, um, yeah. So, that's it. But, I thank you for your time. It is really late. You guys are amazing and thank you. I love White Bear. Uh have for 25 years. So, thank you for trying. [3:49:05] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Thank you. I tried. Thanks for trying. Thank you for coming in too and talking. All right, moving on. Um item 10, communication from the city manager Miss Crawford. [3:49:27] Lindsey Crawford (City Manager): Uh thank you, mayor. I don't have any update uh for the sake of time tonight. We have an H meeting after this as well. So [3:49:27] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Okay. Thank you. Um item 11. Um I Does anybody have a motion to adjurnn? [3:49:27] Council Member Walsh: So move. [3:49:27] Council Member: Second. [3:49:27] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Uh all in favor? [3:49:27] Council Members: I. [3:49:27] Mayor Dan Nlowski: Any opposed? We are adjourned. So we'll uh rec will convene as the HR.