This transcript is for a meeting of the **Hermantown Planning and Zoning Commission**. Based on the roll call and context provided, the meeting is chaired by Commissioner **Buckley Simmons** (as Corey Colquist and Valerie Roulette are absent). [0:00] Buckley Simmons (Chair): okay good evening everybody Welcome to the Planning and Zoning Commission meeting for February 15 2023 it's currently 702 in the evening we'd like to start with a roll call of members I've got myself Corey colquist is not here Valerie roulette is not here Samuel Clark here Beth wenzloff here Buckley Simmons here Dante tomasoni's not here and neither is councilor Geisler moving on we look for an approval of this evening's agenda can I get a motion please [0:25] Samuel Clark: Sam Clark with the motion to approve tonight's agenda [0:28] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you for that can I get a second [0:31] Buckley Simmons: Simmons with a second [0:33] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you all in favor aye aye aye motion passes uh number three this evening I'm looking for an approval of the minutes from the January 18 2023 regular meeting can I get a motion on that please [0:48] Beth Wenzloff: Beth Wenzloff with the motion. [0:50] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you for that can I get a second [0:51] Samuel Clark: Clark with a second [0:53] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you all in favor hi hi motion passes uh number four public discussion is anybody here to speak on anything that's not on this evening's agenda already not seeing any we'll move on number five is the first of public hearings this evening we've got 5A it's an application by Titan Premier LLC for a preliminary and final plot of eight Lots on an 8.1 Acre Site located on stebner road the property is located in an R3 zoning District Eric what do you have for us on this one [1:31] Eric Johnson: great thank you very much on your screen right now is the location map of this uh proposed property in red it's located essentially in the south west quadrant of Hermantown road and stebner road this is an 8.1 acre property that's proposed to be divided into eight uh separate Lots this has an R3 zoning associated with this if we recall this past October there was a application to basically subdivide this property as well let me subdivide this eight Acres from the cemetery at that point and rezone it from P public to R3 that was approved by the city council back in October of 2022. so uh what is proposed this evening and I can zoom in a little bit more as well but um it's an eight lot subdivision of that 8.1 Acres as you can see the um how the Lots progress as you move down south on stebner Road all of these Lots uh meat or exceed the R3 minimums as far as size and to help you out with that again our three zoning requires a minimum of one half acre and a minimum of 100 and feet of Frontage lot one has the ability to take access either off of Hermantown Road or potentially off of stebner road with lots two through eight drawing axis off of stebner Road the Wetland that is shown on Lot 8 this is per the national Wetland inventory so one of the conditions of this evening is that that Wetland will have to be delineated this may when the delineation season starts and as part of that as well another condition is lot 7 and 8 no building permits will be issued on those lots until that delineation is done and approved but this at least um allows the applicant to uh to subdivide this property at this stage and then um progress on Lots one through six if any potential sales that they so desire and then obviously seven and eight uh would basically come online from a buildability standpoint uh later on this spring the um water and sanitary sewer are located in stebner Road the water is located on the East portion of the roadway and the sanitary is located on the west side so the applicant and or their Builders will need to coordinate with City staff I.E the city engineer as well as public works on the best way to connect these Lots whether there's a single cut in stebner Road or multiple Cuts basically to draw from that those individual services that way each property will incur Park dedication of eleven hundred dollars per lot as well as applicable connection fees both for sanitary sewer and for water purposes that way so uh if this is actually going forward this would be on the city council agenda for March 6th and Mayor and the city council will be the ultimate group that takes action on this plat as the Planning and Zoning in the issue in plats are a recommending body so that concludes my staff report at this stage [4:53] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you very much for that Eric commission members any questions for Eric this evening [5:02] Beth Wenzloff: I just have one uh City gas I think stops at that intersection do you know if City Gas keeps going past [5:12] Eric Johnson: I do not know that no we we don't have the greatest Maps because it's a it's a private utility versus a public utility sure so uh we try to work with the provider as best we can I know in the instance of uh this applicant it's Kevin kuklis of Titan Premiere uh he recently did some work over on Getchell Road in that case he did coordinate the extension of gas so I believe if there would be the option he would try to work with that group to extend gas supply [5:36] Beth Wenzloff: I think it goes to that intersection I don't think it goes further south than that because I think the Neighbors on the other side of the street have been trying to get it as well and it might be beneficial for everybody in there [5:50] Eric Johnson: okay well that's good [5:52] Buckley Simmons (Chair): okay commission members any other questions or comments on this before we open it up uh [6:04] Samuel Clark: Clark I just had one comment I thought with the uh rejoining R3 and the lot size and with at least how it's planted it seems very consistent with Hermantown and what people have enjoyed [6:16] Buckley Simmons (Chair): I agree it's no different than the houses across the street basically great very similar uh sir by any chance you're the applicant this evening or representing the applicant [6:23] Eric Johnson: uh no the applicant is Kevin kuklis uh unfortunately he's not being able to uh to zoom in at this point yet [6:30] Buckley Simmons (Chair): okay but we'd like to open up the floor for a public discussion it's currently uh 709 PM if you'd like to come up and speak on this matter please come up and do so please state your name and address for the record as well thank you [6:52] John Mulebauer: John mulebauer 37.85 stebner Road and uh my wife and I Carol only uh most southern the southern resident the closest southern residence to that sure to the plan on the same side of the road there so we just have some questions um and I don't know if you can answer them or not but one thing I know we were questioning is you know we've been paying on assessments for the last I don't know 15 20 years there will the new Lots be assessed and and will other residents of that road for that project be reimbursed anything how does that usually work [7:41] Eric Johnson: so how assessments are—were you assessed for sanitary sewer or for—do you know what the assessment was for? [7:49] John Mulebauer: Road and then sewer it was the sewer project [7:51] Eric Johnson: okay that's we got new sewer there back in 90s I think it was 96 or something like that sure with that uh basically all the the New Lots on here uh they actually have a new connection fee of five thousand dollars for sanitary sewer there are other applicable hookup fees for water and sanitary sewer I think in the past those are generally about two thousand twenty five hundred dollars so all told they'll be somewhere in the neighborhood of plus or minus seven eight thousand dollars right is what they'll incur as far as utility connections for this [8:32] John Mulebauer: okay so if we split that project amongst the residents that were there we basically are we compensating anything because obviously [8:40] Eric Johnson: no you're not no you're not [8:42] John Mulebauer: all right and that's the way it is in any project [8:44] Eric Johnson: okay [8:46] John Mulebauer: that answers that question uh so I'm assuming obviously these are residential homes correct there's nothing going up that's on that corner that's there [8:53] Eric Johnson: there are R3 Zone properties they're each being planted for approximately about 0.6 Acres so I mean just by subdividing that I mean it's setting it up for single-family homes [9:06] John Mulebauer: right um obviously with the with the wetlands that are just north of my house um we have concerns about how that's going to be affected too are we going to get more water because my driveway goes down and then up and I know I had to mitigate my Wetlands even where my driveway went when I built so I have some concerns about making sure that the water still flows we've always had problems at that location um kind of right where that lot eight seven and eight probably are going in the spring we always have water standing on the road there A lot of times so we have concerns there [9:45] Buckley Simmons (Chair): was a good puddle the other day [9:47] John Mulebauer: what's that [9:48] Buckley Simmons (Chair): there was a good puddle right in front of your house the other day [9:50] John Mulebauer: yeah there always is whenever we get rain this time of year or anything like that so I just want to make sure that there's a really good water slow through there otherwise my driveway is going to really have some problems [10:13] Eric Johnson: yeah right now as I have on the screen this is the lot eight and so right now they're proposing plus or minus 55 feet uh basically of what we call Upland area that a driveway can come through here with a building pad back in this area to try to be outside of that Wetland area but once again we'll know more when the Wetland delineation is done this spring [10:33] John Mulebauer: yeah and then we'll I'm assuming the Builder is going to probably be allowed to bring in Fill would that be necessary do we know any of that yet [10:41] Eric Johnson: we don't know at this stage okay yeah this is strictly a land split at this stage [10:47] John Mulebauer: okay um and then obviously we wanted to add value I think we were concerned that it was going to be maybe a larger uh multi-family building similar to what's on air uh what's it uggstead and 53 there [11:00] Eric Johnson: I heard those rumors too [11:02] John Mulebauer: good to know it's not that especially being we have the you know the beautification of Hermantown I talked about that the last time we were here um all the trails we're trying to do and keep our city beautiful so I'm glad to see that it's individual homes I was hoping that's the way it was will there be any requirements of the Builder to have certain specifications on how the homes either look or [11:32] Eric Johnson: no we have nothing like that in our city ordinance the only thing that we have it's a we have a minimum lot excuse me minimum footprint I believe it's 792 square feet and a minimum width of 22 feet so that basically prohibits someone from Trucking in a single wide home [11:47] John Mulebauer: oh so yeah exactly we at least that's as far as we go we have no covenants building restrictions materials Etc anything like that [11:55] Eric Johnson: in the city [11:57] John Mulebauer: okay great and then uh we expect that to stay R3 and and then [12:03] Eric Johnson: R3 it's not going to go to some other they can't go to some other more commercially you would I mean if they ever I mean the applicant is is put a lot of time and money into doing this yeah and they would essentially have to start back at square one and pretty well scrap the project if they tried to do something else and it would go before this body and be notified [12:21] John Mulebauer: okay but that's what I mean right now this developer that's what he does he does single family homes [12:26] Eric Johnson: oh okay he's just finished some things it's called radar run over on Radar Road in getchell it's almost the same type of idea it was an info of six Lots on that property uh he did a single family development called silky Circle it's just uh north of Arrowhead and uh just west of ugstad Road over there Square 37. [12:35] John Mulebauer: yep yep whatever that is so same guy she was happy with that it's very nice so I think that answers all of my questions and then just uh obviously being respectful the neighboring cemetery I know my wife has her entire lineage there so just a request so we can just make sure we're very respectful of that property too that's all I have thank you very much sir [12:47] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you appreciate you coming tonight have a good night thank you uh not seeing anybody else will close the public meeting at 7 15. uh commission members any other questions or comments on this this evening I have one question Eric in essence we're looking for approval on Lots one through six [13:08] Eric Johnson: we're looking at the entire plat all that we would do is uh lot seven and eight okay we would not issue building permits on those until the delineation is done [13:17] Buckley Simmons (Chair): if they did not get approved would he be able to adjust lot six or how would that work then [13:22] Eric Johnson: uh what you would probably do is uh we would you would turn seven and eight into an outlot and then subdivide those at a future time [13:30] Buckley Simmons (Chair): okay all right thank you [13:33] Buckley Simmons: I have one question on the Wetland can do we restrict does the city restrict um causing water to flow differently on another lot is that one of the restrictions that they cannot build up in such a condition that you cause damage to another property [13:42] Eric Johnson: the on the case let's just look at it from a wetland it would have to any Wetland impacts have to go through it's called the technical evaluation panel and they would recommend you know can fill happen or not each property within the city and wherever is allowed up to either ten thousand square feet of wetland fill or five percent of the total Wetland on site so what basically the the Wetland that's on this property yes it could—there could be a small amount of potential wetland impacts potentially for a driveway or if this Wetland comes in a little bit bigger that way as far as water flowing into other properties um generally are residential we usually figure for our storm water ordinance approximately 9,100 square feet of impervious surface is generally the number so it takes into account a driveway any sidewalks building pad Etc that way given the fact that this is almost a two and a half acre site in this particular case that we would see very little if any additional water really flowing into this Wetland more the concern from the technical evaluation panel is they want to make sure that water continues to get to these Wetlands as part of development to keep them—right exactly that we don't want to cut off water sources and dry up our Wetlands [14:56] Buckley Simmons (Chair): okay thank you thank you for that Eric commission members any other questions or comments not hearing any I look for a motion on 5A this evening [15:45] Buckley Simmons: Simmons with a motion for 5A approve [15:47] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you for that can we get a second [15:48] Samuel Clark: Clark with a second [15:51] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you for that all in favor aye aye anybody opposed not hearing any of the motion passes number six continuing business I think what I'd like to do is maybe just have a brief discussion but I'm going to flip the order uh since we have Mr Jeff Miller of hkgi on the line and uh basically address the new business first to comprehensive plan uh presentation [16:16] Eric Johnson: perfect and then once Jeff has done uh maybe go back to continuing business if we want to have maybe a brief discussion uh particularly on the sign ordinance and if there's any comments so far from the group but at this point uh Jeff and I'll attempt to make you the host on this as well I'm going to stop sharing and then like I said I'm going to attempt to make you the host [16:47] Jeff Miller: sounds good to me here we go oh great if you're the host so thank you yep that looks like it worked okay so let me see if I can pull this up are you seeing my screen now oops let me try that again there we go we have you know you're seeing that yes we are thank you okay all right uh good evening chair and uh commission Commissioners uh I'm gonna go through an overview of the project so far uh and then we'll have an opportunity for some discussion of the key issues and priorities with you all uh for the comprehensive plan at the end so I have a lot of slides I'll go through them pretty quickly so we have time to talk and uh we can go back to any slides you know once I've gone through them and if there's anything that's a specific interest we can talk about those slides and then we can make this available the presentation available to you after the meeting if you want to look at things closer there's a lot of maps in here and uh as I'm sure you're aware hermantown's a big city spatially so it's hard to see details on maps when you're looking at the whole city um and just in case people don't have—not met me before which is probably true—uh I'm Jeff Miller I'm a planner and an associate with hkgi which is a smaller firm in Minneapolis we have done planning work design work with Hermantown before we worked on the marketplace concept quite a few years ago now I think John Mulder said maybe 10 years ago I think it was back in 2014 yes yeah uh and then we also worked with the city on the let's see locating the alignment for the uh what was then called the Hermantown Proctor Munger trail spur which I think you're you've renamed now to be more of a community Trail uh so we feel like we know the city fairly well uh so I'll move right through these slides short agenda so I said we're going to talk about the project overview existing conditions both mapping data um kind of fly through some emerging trends that we typically talk to with communities and then like to get your perspective on ones you think are especially relevant for Hermantown at the end hkgi is our firm we are working with a firm called Civic brand and they will be uh really focused on the visioning part of the project and we're right now looking at that effort being focused on the end of March so we'll be talking to you and others about dates at the end of March I really will dig in and try to get at what what the plan Vision should be for the comprehensive plan which is something that's not I would say that the vision's not um super strong in the current plan so we're really excited about this we know that Hermantown's done a lot with visioning and branding and identity already so we think that this is a really uh will be a really strong component of the comprehensive plan when it's done um and then this is a picture of the other people in our firm who are will be or have been working on the project uh so we have a you know we have a solid team to put together the plan and then as far as the project team from the staff side you can see the names there from Hermantown and then there is a steering committee that's put in place that will be meeting with periodically throughout the project five steps to the process we uh right now are in uh step three and uh are trying to you know after we get your input tonight trying to kind of wrap up the existing conditions analysis and then go into the vision part of it and then start talking about future directions Concepts and uh you know changes to the maps and that sort of thing and then the last thing you'll see on the list there is the work scope from the the city's RFP was to also do uh kind of a high level evaluation of the existing uh city ordinances the zoning ordinance and the subdivision ordinance so that will happen at the end of the project schedule um again we can make this available but the intent is to finish it up by the end of 2023 so right now we're in February so things are picking up we spent a lot of time this fall winter on getting data in GIS files together to create existing Maps as you may know from your current plan there's not many maps in there at all so typically uh comprehensive plan has quite a few maps and it really to land use and transportation and parks and natural resources and all those things so we you'll see as we go through the next slides we've we have created a lot of maps now that will really be helpful for the city to plan going forward um you know basics of a comprehensive plan uh it would be to have a land use chapter Transportation a section on utilities and parks and it's really the basis where planning decisions over the next 10 to 20 years related to Capital Investments regulations and Zoning subdivision but updating those to match up with the new plan setting policies and then initiatives that again support the comprehensive plan as you probably know the first plan was in 76 there was an update in 2001 there were some amendments in 2014 which were not super significant uh so this is a big deal the this plan update it's going to be it's going to be a new plan for the city so again I'll go through these Maps pretty quickly you don't have to try to see things necessarily just it's more of an awareness of the types of maps that will be in the plan and that we've been able to put together so far and we feel really good about that knowing that we started with very little map mapping in the current plan so I'll just jump right into those so just as a foundation these are the maps that are in the plan today I think that's the only two that are in there so as you can see they're pretty outdated they're they're not you know they're not GIS oriented Maps they're not detailed they really just talk about five different areas of the city in the uh the map on the left side excuse me and then on the right hand side the urban Services boundary which you know that's more than 20 years old now so um those are key parts of the plan that we'll be focused on as we put this one together we've created a just a basic map or I'm sorry a base map something that we we hope will be helpful for people to use as an orientation for the city when we're talking about different areas of the city again as you know it's a big city um you know the eastern half is more developed than the Western half there's the discussions about what's Urban versus suburban and what's rural uh but this this base map you know shows the The Creeks and the the major roads where the parks are today so far and really just gives you and some uh I guess some Landmark places like schools City Hall um and that sort of thing so just to help people as we're talking about the different parts of the city hydrology and Water Resources you know again trying to make kind of really clear simple maps of different layers of how the city comes together so this one just showing the the many creeks and the river and then the wetlands as you know there's a lot of wetlands in the city um flood Plains the city has a floodplain or overlay district and then a Shoreland so all that stuff that makes up the waterways of Hermantown existing landscape and land cover again showing the wetlands but also getting into like the forested areas the AG areas grasslands that sort of thing the existing land uses map which is the map that's taken the longest to put together uh typically cities don't have the greatest data for this so you know we started with County data related to tax classification and then went in and made this into more meaningful kind of categories that reflect the zoning districts that you have today and then also the land use designations that will be in the plan related to creating a future land use map so this also shows uh we we've taken a stab at land that you could look at as being vacant especially over on the west side of the city um we're not we feel like there's more work to do on that because of "vacant" can mean different things to different people and then also rather than calling vacant any lots that have been platted that have but have not been built on yet we've tried to identify those to show kind of the inventory of lots that are out there that are slated for residential and then we this map is just pulling that out so that we can get a better picture of where is there land that could be developed and start relating that to the sanitary sewer and the water lines a Parks map um that shows trails planned existing and sidewalks a roadways map one of them that just focused on focuses on how they're used so whether they're principal arterial roads or highways so 53 on the north side and then two on the south or the west side and then minor arterials versus collector roads and all the way down to local roads versus who owns the road so you know MnDOT has the red roads uh the county has the gold roads the city has the green roads and so forth the sanitary sewer system today and planned so showing the I guess kind of in the neon green the current plan for extensions whenever that might be and then also the water system plan or existing I can't even see this that well I'm not sure if uh yeah I guess it is showing I actually I don't think it's showing planned water lines yet [29:08] Eric Johnson: I think those are all existing right now Jeff [29:10] Jeff Miller: yeah yeah I think so too uh and then on to the zoning map showing the zoning districts uh which are probably the most familiar with in uh as being on the Planning and Zoning commission uh but as you can see and we'll talk about this as we go through the project but even later tonight uh you know for residential especially there's just not many zoning districts today so all this bright yellow is all R3 the lighter yellow uh I believe is R1 and then the this brown over here is the—help me out there [29:45] Eric Johnson: S1 [29:47] Jeff Miller: S1 yeah uh and then you can see commercial and Industrial obviously not all that is developed today and then one thing that's been really helpful when we worked with multiple communities is zoning Maps if I go back to that they get kind of hard to understand like what is that showing is that smart the way the zoning districts are placed or not do we have too much of something or not enough of something so we we typically try to zone just the kind of categories of zoning districts so this map's just showing residential so as I described in the first map this shows the three residential districts there is a fourth one on the map but it's very limited in where it's applied the r3a and and uh it's not even on the map but there is an R2 District in your zoning code that's not applied at all so that's the kind of stuff that will you know we'll update the plan first to identify where you want to go with in this case residential and then we'll update the zoning to align with that commercial you can see the commercial districts that exist today you know mostly along 53 and then the Hermantown Marketplace business or industrial zoning districts you can see where those are located today on the zoning map uh again existing conditions you know you know we're capturing where the population is at we know that Hermantown's been growing in a healthy way especially compared to the rest of the county um so we're working on projections for this plan since it's meant to be a 20-year plan um and you know relative to the county the County's not planned to grow so you can see 2000 the population what it was in 2021 it actually went down a little bit and uh you know based on actually the national projections and the state projections right now so the county dropping down to you know this low is 175,000 over that time period which we all know is not very predictable it's hard to predict 25 years out like that but that's that's the projections that are out there so just to be aware of that when we're looking at Hermantown's projections and then you know we've captured age Trends you know we're seeing that younger families with children are you know more more of them are moving into the City and also the population over 65 has been increasing significantly linked to the baby boom uh demographics or trend employment trends how many businesses there are uh you know how many households have college degrees how many employees are in the city major sectors all that sort of thing we'll be looking at uh where people work in Hermantown and in the region we can capture that so the really dark areas of where the highest concentration of jobs are today let me say that in a different way this is where Hermantown employees live so this is showing of all the employees in Hermantown where they're coming from so you can see the darkest spots are where employees are coming from for their jobs and then this one is showing where Hermantown residents work so you can see the obviously Duluth is has the highest concentration of where people are going to their jobs uh if you live in Hermantown today and then you can kind of see the numbers showing how many people are commuting in uh into Hermantown which is the 3,700 number here versus how many people are commuting out of Hermantown so not—not Hermantown is attracting more uh employees than people that are leaving which is a good sign and then just market trends as far as the types of businesses that are in Hermantown and which ones have potential or opportunity to increase their presence in Hermantown uh so lastly just some emerging Trends in in all communities that we uh talk about related to commercial Trends industrial Trends office Trends and then housing Trends so again I'm I'm just I'm not going to dwell on these I'm just going to kind of over them and then we can talk about things that uh you feel like might most be might be most relevant to Hermantown as we plan for the next 10 to 20 years so commercial as everybody knows it's changed and is changing dramatically retail in general is becoming more experience based rather than people having to go to a store and buy everything there it's more about going there and getting a sense of what they're interested in having to be a fun experience and then they may or may not actually purchase it there because as you know there's a lot of e-commerce and uh you know delivery to homes and that sort of thing which was happening and increasing but with the uh the pandemic you know kicked into full gear of course uh smaller store formats there's a lot of that happening even stores like Target Kohl's whoever they're when they're building new stores they're oftentimes doing smaller stores uh and then those stores may be supplemented by larger stores where there's more inventory but that means you know in theory stores can be closer to people if they're smaller rather than always have to be a big box store that can't be very close to as many people uh desire for commercial areas that have unique places to go so that people actually want to go there have a sense of place places that people can gather there can be things that happen there whether it's like food trucks or you know eating outside pop-up markets that sort of thing uh so in that way catering more to smaller scale developers and and retailers so it could be more unique businesses again not just areas with big box stores and then of course drive-throughs pickups curbside all that kind of stuff is you know it's been popular because of the pandemic and just things have changed with people you know some people working at home a lot these days delivery based food uh you know if people are doing a little more takeout than in in restaurants sort of business kitchens don't even have to actually be in the restaurants they can have kitchens somewhere and they they deliver most of it or it's takeout industrial Trends uh there's increased demand for warehousing based on all the stuff we've been talking about and supporting the shift to e-commerce uh location and design needs for warehousing companies are trying to get closer to customers we all see you know the trucks from different uh businesses coming into neighborhoods and dropping things off so you know they they like their warehouses to be closer so they can cut down in their driving costs um so you know warehouses are becoming smaller in some cases and then also if if a retailer has a big building and they don't need it all some of those building retail buildings are also becoming partially Warehouse spaces uh some of the challenges with industrial is that there's and we've all heard about this there's increasing challenge to find employees for manufacturing jobs and then there's also the shortage of housing that's affecting a lot of things but also being able to track and attract employees if you don't have the right housing or enough housing for the people to live in it's not affordable uh as you know a good example for Hermantown is the the expansion of Cirrus and we're aware that there's been discussions about how does that housing that's going to be needed for those employees uh get uh get located and get produced so that those employees can uh be attracted to that business office Trends big impacts on Office Buildings and where people are working so you know the some of the statistics out there that over half of Americans have the opportunity to work at least partially from home so just the demand for office space and Office Buildings you know in downtowns is much different than it was a few years ago and uh spend some opportunities for more what's called co-working spaces or hoteling places where people can go to work when they need to you know meet up with people or they need services that they don't have in their individual homes uh but as you can imagine that's resulting in a lot of surplus Office Space in a lot of places today and then lastly housing trends some of the things that are uh being looked at and considered today is demand for more Apartments um allowing missing middle housing which is uh trying to get at the need for a greater diversity of housing types or options for people especially as people are moving through you know their life cycle from you know moving out of their parents house uh you know living alone for however long maybe having a family then needing a bigger space the empty nester part of your life down to uh you know getting elderly and needing services with your housing so uh kind of a popular concept that a lot of communities are are really looking into is this thing called missing middle housing so instead of just having zoning codes I'd say where where can we have single family where can we have maybe a duplex or two family and then everything else is called multi-family a lot of times really honing in on what are other housing types that people are interested in or would need as they go through their life cycle and this graphic here is trying to show the broad range of housing types that not not fit into all communities but you know every Community probably would be interested in or benefit from having more housing options than they have today and that gets into things like live work housing um you know where maybe it looks like kind of a townhouse and the bottom floor is actually an office of some sort or an art studio and you might live above it or behind it uh modular construction is becoming more popular to cut down on cost to have more affordable housing and you know in theory it's actually it's supposed to be better housing a better build because it's being built in a you know non-weather situation uh looking at lot sizes and whether there's opportunities to reduce them in a lot of cases because—because maybe people some people want smaller yards or less maintenance um and then the affordability side to that uh and then even things like Build to rent single-family housing developments is something that's happening uh we're aware of that happening in the Twin Cities and in multiple places for sure so that was a lot um you know just we just want to give you a sense of what what are the things that we're looking at as we as we start to build Hermantown's comprehensive plan and get into discussions uh just in case you weren't aware of this this is what was identified in the RFP some of the city's priorities going into this planning process so uh it said you know cities interested in enhancing the quality of life and supporting land values you know over the future 20 years supporting economic development is important um evaluating the adequacy and relevance of the existing zoning and subdivision ordinances for development purposes housing has been a topic we have met with HEDA and then also with uh the steering committee and housings definitely come up as a priority so far and then some things may be related to the airport we might need to deal with and uh that's it so I'm sorry that's a lot of information in a short amount of time but we don't want to take all the time just doing presentation but just wanted to give you a sense of the topics and then see if you had questions about anything that we presented and then talk about get your input on some of those key things that uh trying to highlight in this slide with these questions so I don't know chair do you want to handle the questions or do you want me to [44:16] Buckley Simmons (Chair): I think right now if you just want to keep rolling with it that way and I'll kind of interact with some different things you know I've got some thoughts as you've been going through it and I might ask you to roll back to a couple Maps as we go on but I'll let you still take the lead on this [44:33] Jeff Miller: okay yeah so feel free to we're open to any comments that you have that don't relate to specific questions that we have here but just as a starting point we've talked about a lot of Trends are there current trends that you feel are most important to Hermantown as we look to plan for the long term [44:50] Beth Wenzloff: well I would think that you'd want to make sure that we're focusing on the housing issues you know the different types of housings that are available like you said a lot of places are just you know single family homes and that's what it seems like the majority of Hermantown is but I'm in favor of looking at other options for people because I realize that that not everybody fits into the single family home box so to say um and also you know any economic growth drivers that you can have you know either along the highway or in the Hermantown Marketplace are a couple things that you really got to plan for make sure that you city is uh planning for the long-range viability of those by making sure the infrastructure is there for all that stuff [45:41] Eric Johnson: yeah Jeff I might ask you to um go back to our um I think it was the commercially zoned properties in the city I think that one is really telling the I mean you can see where our is primarily right there I mean other than our 53 corridor we only have like a couple properties that are even could be construed as a neighborhood retail and you know is that something that potentially could be looked at um when Jeff presented to HEDA there were some discussions about okay mixed use zoning that you know you start looking at those maybe along as the higher use Corridor or maybe some intersections that are traditionally more traffic driven just to provide some more options you know it could be either it could be some housing it could be a small Commercial Business something that way because like I said once again I—I just had a call again today a property that we probably all know about along Hermantown Road that um been having issues for some time you know a person wanted to put a commercial based business on it and said nope it's R3 it's a grandfather non-conforming use but I don't ever see that property going R3 and I've had eight ten calls people wanting to put some sort of a business or service related activity on there and it's just not conducive it's not allowed in the existing ordinance right now [47:06] Samuel Clark: are you trying to say that you would have like a stackable zoning in those locations like it would be one or the other or both like they would be overlaid on top of each other [47:15] Eric Johnson: it could be or just it gives more people—it gives it more flexibility in how it could be developed right now we try to use PUDs as some of those things but the PUDs we've generally been seeing have been residentially disc driven [47:27] Samuel Clark: correct and not mixed use [47:29] Eric Johnson: correct [47:30] Samuel Clark: yeah and I can see somebody finally pulling off what I'll refer to as like a Lifestyle Center I can see somebody doing that where you like you've got you know office or retail on the first level and then three four five levels of of housing above it you know like the area up the highway for example if the first floor was you know commercial uses you know and something like that could slide into a couple different locations here in town pretty easily [47:50] Beth Wenzloff: when we were on the blandin foundation for Hermantown I attended that we identified several areas that we thought could be that very thing and it's never gone anywhere and I've always kept those back in my mind because I think they fit and they were they were—they didn't impact negatively the neighborhood because it's already got a feel for that I think we're missing the boat we are really missing the boat especially offices we don't have that here um we—we need this stuff we need some more commercial within closer to the more residential area and then [48:31] Eric Johnson: Jeff I might ask you to maybe just kind of dovetail on that uh if you can get this at pure residentially zoned map and right here I think this is another good map because it just shows you know how weird we are to this three types of residential in the city [48:47] Beth Wenzloff: oh for sure always have been I'm sorry we always— [48:52] Eric Johnson: exactly and it's—it's a question I mean do we want to continue to go that way do we want to open up some different areas you know do we have different zoning districts [49:03] Beth Wenzloff: well and so it's—it's hard to do with the Aging population of Hermantown that has lived here for decades that fight change it's true [49:12] Eric Johnson: yep [49:13] Beth Wenzloff: every time something comes up that's interesting that people go well there was a baseball field on that corner 40 years ago and I used to play on it well it's true you know and it's—it's hard to change people's minds and get them to think outside the box so to speak to different options for housing because again not everybody wants to own a single family home but they still want to come here and live in Hermantown you know there's uh I've had a couple other conversations with they've said people that are aging out of their homes or don't live in this community now but want to age out in this community right and they don't have those options they don't exist [49:54] Jeff Miller: yeah yeah so one thing I think we're—would like to get input on is you know today as Eric said that our three that's that's a big area of the city basically the that's the only area that's Sewered today or could have water the other two districts don't have utilities so what we would want to consider maybe is are there areas that are R3—could stay but maybe there's portions or areas or corridors of R3 that could become a new district and maybe it has you know maybe the lot size is smaller than half an acre and or it allows you know other housing types like you know Courtyard Cottages or maybe townhouses or you know whatever mixed use and where are those areas that today are R3 that could be something different and it's not to say that you don't have to build to the minimum right you can still if you say I mean if a developer says you know there's land available in this new District but a half acre lot is proven to me and you still have the ability to go larger if you so desire sure in there as well but we're just trying to provide some flexibility [51:17] Eric Johnson: because that's one of the comments that I've heard is people generally concerned about PUDs because they can pop up anywhere whereas if we identify at least a corridor or some different areas at least people know what you know could happen there you take out some of those the questions for these people [51:38] Samuel Clark: I think that's a good point do we have access to these Maps or are we going to be able to get them [51:44] Jeff Miller: I think right now—I'm sorry Jeff go ahead yeah we can—we can make this presentation—we're working on putting up uh project website so we could put that this on the website but we can also just send it to Eric and make it available to anybody [52:00] Eric Johnson: yeah we've been working—it's been conversations with Joe Wicklund and said how to at least you know partner as public input as well sure it makes it really—I anticipate over here the next four to six weeks that there's going to be a lot more push out to the general public here as well so it'll be busy [52:20] Jeff Miller: building on this conversation with housing types too when if there was you know exploration of other housing types other than say single family or you know in the case of this zoning map housing types that are even smaller Lots than the current R3 District what you know what what types of housing do you think people would be interested in Hermantown and they think it would fit in some places of the city [52:50] Eric Johnson: I'm going to jump right now I was just in the Lakeville Apple Valley area about two weeks ago as I drove towards Cedar Avenue and in a very short run I saw three four different housing products that say wow that would be incredible here and you know and one section was I mean there were small Lots single family I'm almost like a cottage style that could be great for affordability prospects um you know next to that was I guess more what you'd call I think they're more like the fourplexes but they're set up as a square as opposed to linear with like some interior courts and I mean it had some really nice stylings to it and to say you know you see this in other communities but um I think that if people were exposed to some of these things a bit more that they—there might be a bit more of an appetite for them or an acceptance maybe that's a good word for it yeah I guess that's just my you know—this my general thoughts and I encourage everyone here same thing as you know as you visit different communities or areas that if you say hey that's great I mean even snap a photo of it because they're going through this process I think it just it helps out [54:15] Samuel Clark: I think a challenge having grown up in Otsego Minnesota and witnessed a lot of growth in a short amount of time and having now living up here in the occupation that I work where there's a lot of looking into demographics and trends I think it—it's kind of a challenge and it's kind of an opportunity for Hermantown and the surrounding areas that a lot of people do live in this area because they don't want to live in the Metro and they don't want that community and the the college that I work that's a big part of how they attract and retain students and faculty and staff it's a lot different here than it is like in the Twin Cities or some of the other urban areas in the region so I think there's a lot of challenges there both the housing types of housing um lot sizes business and I think tying into that too is just the utilities that we have right I mean you're ultimately limited you can't just go anywhere in Hermantown and Zone things out and what are you going to do run water to the western part of the city and Sewer just so you can build in a different area that's underdeveloped probably not and like you—I agree with what you said Eric I think there's a huge opportunity for at least identifying zones around the city where you know if you—you live in a maybe not acreage area that's not a very good term but you don't have a apartment next to the house you've lived in for 50 years and just because something sold it—that's if there's anything bad with apartment complexes or working in commercial construction but I guess maybe add a little bit more of that predictability but just um coupler level for some of these things [56:15] Eric Johnson: Jeff do you want to get that map up basically that vacant or undeveloped property map you think that's one thing that's that's hard for us as a community and once again I'm just going back to Lakeville where you're converting 300 Acre Farms to Little House seats it's very easy to do that where that's what Otsego was [56:33] Samuel Clark: yeah same thing exactly I grew up on and everything surrounding it was all Farmland now it's all six hundred thousand dollar houses [56:41] Eric Johnson: yeah we're like you know we will be more challenged where this I can only think like two or three contiguous properties that have more than 80 or 100 acres and once again how much if it's actually buildable in in Wetland that way so I think Maps like this one right here are good maps as you start seeing like oh wow there's a nice you know number of parcels that are either vacant or vastly underutilized but for the most part you know especially if you start looking over in the the eastern part of the city not a lot of an opportunities for some of these things and then it gets into what you're saying Sam is yeah there's more opportunities in the west but those utilities are decades away [57:33] Samuel Clark: yeah and where the vacant land is here is an awful lot of very Wetlands [57:37] Eric Johnson: exactly that's Wetland because I think Jeff that was one of the things that we had talked about is possibly overlaying the wetlands with this map here as well [57:48] Jeff Miller: that would be yeah yeah we—and we—we have—we have draft maps of that that we're not ready to show tonight but we have done that we've also started to uh we figured out we could map existing lot sizes say in the Eastern app of Hermantown uh you know all the way from the ones that are you know half an acre or less half an acre to one acre and then all the way up so there are a lot of lots that are you know larger at different sizes that if the minimum lot size changed in some areas there'd be some additional lots that today don't look vacant because they they have a house on them and they might be you know two and a half acres they may be five acres they might be ten acres but over time maybe those are lots that people would be interested in you know subdividing part of it or something that that would change what this map looks like [58:43] Samuel Clark: yeah I think that'd be a very interesting map because that's what you know there's a lot of you know combining between the vague you know the bacon and such that there's a lot of acreage properties and in the city that are just not you know or could be utilized differently [58:58] Beth Wenzloff: well what that don't want to as well [59:01] Samuel Clark: exactly exactly as well [59:03] Beth Wenzloff: but if you did two overlays with water sewer and wetlands I gotta believe just looking at that here 78 of those properties off the table and now you look over towards you know the Eastern side and there's very little left after you do that those two overlays [59:22] Eric Johnson: very much so yeah I can imagine and that's been the great thing you know since obviously we did this 20 years ago is now with GIS and different mapping abilities you can see a lot more of that data right than uh you could have 20 some years ago [59:43] Jeff Miller: yeah I guess you know another thing to think about is you know Hermantown's not going to grow you know it's not going to be huge growth in some ways so you don't need necessarily a lot of land but if you're looking to have some of these other housing types you know this is the opportunity to say here's places where we could actually get some housing types and we think they would be acceptable in the community they'd fit in well they're near things like you know Parks or a school or something like that green space and you could be proactive about where those places are but they wouldn't necessarily have to take a lot of land wise—land wise—land wisely so [1:00:30] Samuel Clark: I like the map of the shows like the major arteries and most of the smaller major use roads and a lot of them are owned by the county it's come up on different projects I mean at what point you have to take that into consideration whether it's zoning I mean because eventually some of these streets can only handle so much I mean even just anecdotally I notice it driving on different roads during rush hour and we you don't have a lot of control over it is there County Roads right and they ultimately will decide to make changes or not and then I know a lot of other comments that come in with the school I mean at what point with either Road congestion or capacity in the school district I mean at what point is that not a city thing it's more of a school district thing or a county thing I mean where's the separation of that when you—when it comes to like overall planning and adding like if you want to grow and show areas you can grow how does that time for those two [1:01:21] Jeff Miller: and I'll start—I'm sorry go ahead yeah well I was just going to say it in previous meetings we've had so far one thing that has come up is adding you know more Road Network in some places so you know today I think the basic grid is kind of Mile roads but there's half mile roads or just some connections in key places as you know there's some places where the lots are really deep because uh—and you and they probably don't even necessarily want all those—that land for all those lots but they can't—there's not access to the other part of the lot so you know as an example if you split up some of those big boxes that you see on the map today in some—some manner that would open up some Lots [1:02:14] Eric Johnson: I guess it is part of it too it gets in twofold like when we have an application come in we'll send it up to the school district the uh St Louis County and the platting things like that for their comments as well but as part of this comp plan um Jeff has sent me a list I think it's like eight or ten different um stakeholders [1:02:44] Jeff Miller: thank you stakeholders [1:02:45] Eric Johnson: and one of which is St Louis County and just talking with them and I want to say a couple weeks ago the city has a yearly meeting with St Louis County traffic and said what plans and what projects do you have this year what projects do we have what developments are we all aware of so we do talk with some different things to try to make each other aware but they're—they're definitely going to be one group that will be reached out to as part of this comp plan here as well [1:03:17] Buckley Simmons (Chair): I think um an exciting part will be when Civic brand comes here at the end of March and we're working to kind of tie down a more what's going to happen in those two to three days the extent of um public meetings participations things like that as well and um isn't a big part of a kind of plan is you know what—a—is what are—what is people's images of the city and uh and what do you vision for it um Jeff shared with uh Joe Wicklund and myself a really neat tool that we're going to be bringing forward here that was at um that push pin lack of better—Jeff if you might want to [1:04:08] Jeff Miller: uh yeah the—the—the uh platform I guess the online platform's called social pinpoint uh we've been using it a lot it's basically an interactive map where people can go on to your—your—what the city's website and they can give input on the map by placing little pinpoints things you know areas of concern places you think should be preserved you know maybe shouldn't change as much places where you think there's opportunities to look at you know say mixed-use areas or something like that but you can zoom in and out on the map and you can leave your input and people can you can see other people's input and it's been really helpful for communities to—to get their input you know kind of on a geographic uh map like that and that said we'll also have a survey with some questions linked to it as well and that's something we think might be rolled out in the next a month or two or [1:05:08] Eric Johnson: yeah well we can—we can show you a draft tomorrow probably we can roll it out pretty quickly [1:05:13] Jeff Miller: okay well that's great all right yeah yep we can get out there pretty quickly yeah so there we have these questions up are there any other are there any key challenges that we haven't talked about so far that you think we really need to wrestle with with this plan as we get started on you know the planning part of it so far we've been doing mostly the existing situation [1:05:43] Beth Wenzloff: no nothing you're not aware of already you know just uh you know Logistics like schools fire departments that kind of stuff as a city grows you know people are always concerned about that and of course utilities and the re-organization I—I would suggest really looking at—I know that's probably a taboo subject but the marketplace um re-looking at how that is being zoned and um regulated I think that really needs to be some serious looking in that area [1:06:29] Jeff Miller: in what aspect [1:06:31] Beth Wenzloff: um it is restrictive enough that we're seeing too many businesses go away by the time they sit in my office I—I tell them it's not going to be a chance to get any further and they walk away I don't like having commercial places walk away from our community um and so that's—that's one thing I think we could do much better in re-examining that again and not—not—not a total makeover just some of the issues need to be looked at carefully open it up a little bit [1:07:11] Jeff Miller: so kind of the last bullet point yeah I think that exactly right there is—is it related to the types of uses or is it the not as standards they have to meet [1:07:23] Beth Wenzloff: the looks—the—the feel they—it's—it's the only place in town that's very restrictive as far as um the feel of the property how the building finally ends out um there—there's several things in there that um it has been just—I mean look at it—it's still vacant after all this time and there's reasons for that um if that was a little more open I know we could—we could have seen a lot more growth there but there's just no reason to start that down that road if there are some—especially with some Nationals with changing their models they want a whole new thing and it just doesn't fit [1:08:14] Jeff Miller: that's more the building or the site design requirements [1:08:17] Beth Wenzloff: right and we don't have that anywhere else why—why are we all of a sudden doing it too in that area I think that was—it was a fun little idea but I think it's really hurt us [1:08:30] Jeff Miller: are there any other issues along Highway 53 that are that need to be addressed outside of the marketplace to get more businesses [1:08:39] Beth Wenzloff: well there again we've got a lot of old things that need to be hopefully redressed and um you know there's a lot of places that they're starting to look at putting on the market to have Redevelopment I think that's going to be really helpful once we get some balls rolling in that way we're going to see a lot more opportunities for some new buildings to go with some of the other buildings take over a few buildings and put them back in but in a new space some of that I think is going to look good having some that have been remodeled again it's—it's a great deal so not much more you could do we've got a narrow with the airport behind and Wetland behind it's sort of a tough area to to hit on [1:09:37] Buckley Simmons (Chair): I think a little bit on the transportation plan I think we've talked a little bit before about like a backage road particularly in the south side of Highway 53 as this is Beth had indicated it's tough on the North side because we're hemmed in by the airport but on the south side we're really uh because of lack of that infrastructure opening up some of these extremely deep Lots I mean yes there is a lot of wetland but there are some other opportunities that you just can't really reach because of lack of the you know roads and utilities going into those [1:10:14] Beth Wenzloff: and not being able to turn off 53 they don't want very many more accesses on to 53 so a backage road would be great [1:10:24] Eric Johnson: I think that's an important thing too and people are used to those [1:10:28] Beth Wenzloff: exactly [1:10:30] Jeff Miller: any other uh input that you think would help us go in the right direction [1:10:37] Samuel Clark: I guess the last thing I'll say and we kind of already re-mentioned it but for housing issues and opportunities my three years I've been on here I think balancing whether it's a plan unit development or different types of housing with the existing R3 and existing property types I mean that's the biggest—it takes the most time and I think I see both sides of the—the coin I get where the developers coming from and I get where the homeowners are coming from so just there's got to be a better way to streamline some of that so it's not such a shock and awe every single time over and over where I get where the developer's trying to do I really do I get what the homeowners in the surrounding area are coming from or if it was my property I really do so just maybe even just like Eric had mention some direction or mapping all different places in the city here a little bit better too different types of development that way different density for lack of better words and [1:11:42] Jeff Miller: that's because today the PUD can—I think somebody said it can be applied anywhere in theory right [1:11:47] Samuel Clark: I think that's the challenge right in every single one it's—you take residential houses single-family homes and you want to put anything under the sun almost for PUD [1:12:00] Eric Johnson: not really but yeah it's basically the PUDs can fall more into place obviously outside of your traditional subdivision per se so we're seeing those generally more along the county roads some of those things [1:12:15] Samuel Clark: right that's like the gentleman who was here earlier he was concerned about the possibility apartment would have gone up on this property that we just you know spoke of so um yeah I mean the Specter of PUD is out there on different properties um it's not the PUD in and of itself it's just more you know—as you—I wouldn't want to see I personally wouldn't want to see a map 20 years from now that shows how everything's owned and the types of Housing and it's just little blurbs all over the city all hodgepodge but that's just my personal [1:12:53] Eric Johnson: a lot of it is going to be interesting with growth projections as well um the right now we typically get about 30 to 35 new house starts a year and so you know and then we've been you know obviously as a couple apartments have popped up one's been built one keeps getting talked about but nothing's happened on so um yeah it'll be interesting and like I said I think at least I'd love to see more opportunities for either this—the smaller lots for infill whether it's empty nesters or—or just people who don't want to maintain a half acre lot anymore give them some more options but I think our next pnz meeting let's say plus or minus March 21 so that'll be before when Civic brand would be coming here so I can share with Planning and Zoning more of the plans what's going to happen in that last week of March right and you know these are you know sessions open to you know either the different boards or the public in general or what—we're still trying to figure those things out right now but I hope to share those with you at the next planning and zoning board meeting so but Jeff thanks for your—your time I hope we gave you some information and uh thank you [1:14:26] Jeff Miller: yeah thanks for all your input we'll talk to you in March for sure [1:14:30] Eric Johnson: well Perfect all right yeah if you just want to give me the uh the host back [1:14:35] Jeff Miller: okay let's see how do I do that let's go off in the night we—like—oh forgot to do that [1:14:48] Eric Johnson: uh and so it took me a while to figure it out too um we're gonna be here until midnight it's because I started to be a quick meeting I'm happy I think Jeff while you're doing that maybe um yeah kind of roll backwards at least from our standpoint um if we want to entertain a brief discussion just on I had emailed this to you last week just some different uh I looked at five different communities based on um kind of our conversations that we had at the January meeting regarding the sign ordinance you know the big questions were how do we handle uh multi-tenant buildings multi-story buildings Etc so try to find some different um cities throughout the the state that probably have addressed this and I've had Blaine Brainerd Elk River Bloomington Maple Grove in there um I think some of them at least all those address multi-tenant buildings in some way Bloomington seemed to be the only one that got into actual multi-story um I'd love to see a seven-story building in Hermantown but I don't know if we'll ever get to that point as Joe's ripping his hands but uh you know if at least we have an opportunity to start addressing some of these things so um hey I've heard from a couple of you that um you like some of these they think there's some—some good ideas and maybe I say this uh you know I wish there's more members of the board here tonight but uh entertain any you know questions or comments you have right now just to help facilitate when we're back in March together on this [1:16:53] Samuel Clark: I guess honestly I—I briefly read through this and I'd like to read through it again and I feel like in uh the whole reason I volunteered for the planning zoning commission was to help balance you know like what a wide wide variety of opinions and uh in terms of commercial signage I have never thought of it and as much as I have to date but I think Hermantown so far has done a good job I think there's a lot of—I personally think you could do a lot more signage without making it look like East Central entrance when you're driving down you see just stuff everywhere so I think this is a good—I don't think most people honestly think about it myself included and so as long as my lay opinion would be as long as it's not over the top there would never be an issue but for what it's worth that's my two cents [1:17:41] Eric Johnson: no that sounds good and it's good to hear the lay person because like you said that obviously it's a couple of members here or more have you know the experience from the commercial standpoint or development standpoints but it's good to hear except someone just driving through the community what they think you know you know there's some talk at last meeting about um the ability to have a sign in each side of a building if it doesn't have a road Frontage a couple of these communities address that yes you can you can have it all four sides a couple says no it's just on public roadways so it's you know it's different communities have kind of handled this differently so um like I said at least I just wanted to get some information out there that you know we're trying to think at our end too and just to give you a little bit more you know I guess uh background you know some of these communities are handling this [1:18:27] Samuel Clark: some of these are really good yeah I guess just say it I guess rewrote what I just said I think one thing I noticed was I thought Central entrance was bad when you're coming up and you see Advanced Auto and O'Reilly's and McDonald's and Burger King and there's just a bazillion signs and I honestly thought the—the new buildings next to Sam's Club could use more science it would probably look better I mean at least you know what tenants were in there I’m surprised Famous Dave's didn't want more signage [1:18:59] Beth Wenzloff: I'm shocked too but remember though on Central entrance that has been forever an automotive strip which is a different zoning than downtown or West Duluth [1:19:12] Samuel Clark: yeah I get that I think it's more just if you're you know you're driving down the roads right now and not everyone acknowledge and logos all over in a big you know highlighting like everything looks like Subway and McDonald's and Burger kings [1:19:26] Beth Wenzloff: yeah I mean we talked about this last time I can't name one in Hermantown that's over the top [1:19:33] Samuel Clark: I did have a chance I visited that one building you had referenced and it did until—until you said that it didn't jump out at me and I also would say I think it was particularly one or two users that the sign was like "that's big that's bright" right but you had to go looking for it [1:19:54] Eric Johnson: yep exactly the average person would never see it driving by yeah it sits back there I—I like um a couple things that jumped out on me here was at least one of the communities had um almost like a guaranteed minimum for lack of better words for multi-tenant buildings which is something that I think has some good Merit to it um I think it's interesting as well that I think the majority of this commercial—like we measure ours in a lineal footage of the building where these other communities seem to go on a—um—the square footage of facade right so that in the multi-tenant buildings multi-story buildings it could help out some of those things so um [1:20:41] Samuel Clark: I think there's something that never made sense to me why it was just lineal [1:20:45] Eric Johnson: yeah it is that square footage yeah so I think that gives a little bit more Merit almost if you try to figure out between those two if you look at total facade and then um guaranteed minimums for lack of better words that I think that that would maybe go a long ways towards at least the people who have for the commercial interest that way and the last thing you don't want to do is restrict it so much that somebody doesn't want to come like you were talking about the marketplace if there's something that's so restrictive that somebody's like "well if I can't put my three signs up I'm not coming" you know you just don't want to cross that line to try and be that restrictive again I just—I'll say the same thing I said last time I don't want to look like a NASCAR where it's got the sticker on every square inch I get that you know but we're a long way from there to here [1:21:40] Beth Wenzloff: exactly [1:21:41] Eric Johnson: yeah there's a huge difference between between what we have now because again I—I can't think of one in Hermantown that is over the top and shouldn't be allowed you know I—and I look at all of them because that's kind of the world I live in you know but uh I understand not wanting it to be the extreme on the other side of that either I didn't bring my stuff tonight so I apologize but there was—there's a reference in one that uh that you didn't meet—didn't fall under their criteria you could work with the city basically it's almost like—it's like a sign special use it's how I think of it my mind is—do you think there's any opportunity or something like that where you can have some sort of not appeal process maybe but if it's really within reason you're requesting something that technically doesn't fit so that not every single person can just say well I want to do whatever I want but you could try to—or is that would that be way too hard for the city's perspective [1:22:36] Eric Johnson: I guess we'd have to think about that because part of it gets more into lack of other logos I think because we've tried to work around that in the past where we have some that if you—some communities measure trapezoids and triangles and squares and circles you can get a full-on square footage we in the past at least have tried to look—no let's actually look at the sign band per se and maybe some of these other pieces this discount I mean we do have some flexibility at that point and when we were—when we were talking one of the staff point we did not want to write it so tight that there wasn't the room for some interpretation so I think that at least from a staff standpoint and even talking to our City attorney that we still want to keep it that way that we still have some openness in the interpretation of it but still provide enough guidelines that people know what we're trying to accomplish it's almost the same that we did—we went through this with the PUD it was the same thing too that we've enacted some more requirement standards per se but we still had that ability to work with the developer to create something I guess that's what I would ask um in the next month's period if you have a chance to kind of look through these I—I think these are good examples that kind of hit on what we were trying you know questions that we had last month and um and just you know be prepared back on the 16th to have a bit more of a conversation with this and um I don't know necessarily if we will have an ordinance at that meeting more than likely it would probably come to April but at least have one more good discussion to try to hammer some of these things out discuss these things and then uh come forward in April then with a basically an ordinance at that point [1:24:21] Buckley Simmons (Chair): sounds good perfect any other questions or comments on the sign stuff this evening not seeing any will move on number eight any other Communications [1:24:34] Eric Johnson: Eric no there's not [1:24:36] Buckley Simmons (Chair): uh number nine commission member reports um Beth wenzloff [1:24:43] Beth Wenzloff: no report [1:24:44] Buckley Simmons (Chair): Samuel Clark [1:24:46] Samuel Clark: report [1:24:47] Buckley Simmons (Chair): Buckley Simmons—myself nothing this evening uh we look for a motion to adjourn it's currently 8:28. [1:24:59] Samuel Clark: Clark with a motion to adjourn [1:25:01] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you for that can we get a second [1:25:03] Beth Wenzloff: Wenzloff second [1:25:05] Buckley Simmons (Chair): thank you all in favor aye aye motion passes uh thank you very much everybody we'll close the meeting at 8 28 pm