This transcript features the **Hermantown Planning & Zoning Commission** meeting from September 20, 2022. The meeting is chaired by Corey Colquist, with technical presentations provided by Community Development Director Eric Johnson. [0:02] **Corey Colquist:** Good evening everybody we'd like to welcome you to the city of hermantown planning and zoning commission meeting tonight is september 20th 2022. it's currently seven o'clock in the evening we're going to open this meeting with a royal call of members myself corey colquist here valerie ollette samuel clark here beth winslow not here buckley simmons here dante thomasoni and john geisler uh second up this evening is an approval of the agenda this evening can i get a motion please thank you for that can i get a second thank you all in favor aye aye motion passes the third this evening is the approval of the minutes from the august 16th 2022 [0:49] **Corey Colquist:** regular meeting can i get a motion on that please thank you for that can i get a second call close with a second thank you for that all in favor aye aye that motion passes number four this evening is a public discussion uh we welcome public comment on anything that's not on this evening's agenda so if you're here tonight to talk about something that's not an agenda this is the time to do so anybody want to come up for anything that's not on the agenda perfect thank you for that we will move on from number four number five is this evening's listed public hearings we have 5a it's an application by blue moon properties slash rob stauber for a subdivision to create a 135 foot wide [1:35] **Corey Colquist:** parcel of one acres and a 3.89 acre lot accessible access by the way of a flag lot of 31.75 foot in width at 5140 morris thomas road the property is located in an r3 zoning district eric what do you have for us on this? [1:35] **Eric Johnson:** great thank you very much and if i could ask mr wicklund in the back to maybe reference a couple of these for um site purposes so people can see on a location map that way so as he's doing that what's before us this evening this is a five acre lot that's being requested to being split into a flag lot uh the basically the parent lot where the house would exist is approximately 1.1 acres in size with the flag lot being 3.89 acres in size as you can see here on the [2:20] **Eric Johnson:** screen this is the location of the property there in the red uh just a little bit off that intersection of morris thomas and levake road uh wagner road has an extremely deep lot in wagner road uh basically in the southern portion of the slot and morris thomas is on the north the flag lot location would take access from morris thomas road some of you who have been on this board for a while may recall this property this actually was approved for a flag lot back in 1920 at that time received the approval however the uh property owner slash applicant at the time did not finalize the paperwork for the creation of the slot split they did go as far as basically creating a driveway and a pad in the back which they're able to do [3:07] **Eric Johnson:** but they never finalize the paperwork to split the property this property now has since changed hands a couple different times with the uh the new applicant before blue moon property slash rob stauber looking to essentially recreate that flag lot once again here just to help everybody out how we look at a flag lot how we basically break into two pieces there's the pole which is the portion which contains the driveway as well as any utilities associated with it uh city mini city minimum requirements are 30 foot width on that uh pole portion and a maximum of 500 foot length and in this case uh that um there's 31.75 feet of frontage along morris thomas and the pole is a depth of 375 [3:52] **Eric Johnson:** feet so both of them are within that those ranges associated with those um those dimensional requirements and then the flag lot portion that's where the actual building pad is and the subsequent uh setbacks take place from that uh it's 3.6 acres in this owning district it just has to be a minimum of 0.5 acres so it's obviously much greater than that um the existing home is connected to city utilities and uh the property or the property owner and future person has indicated that they have a preference to connect the city utilities for this new flag lot and it would be utilized for a single family house in the future [4:40] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that eric commission members any questions or comments so far on 5a [4:40] **John Geissler:** i'm just a little confused it fronted just off of morris thomas yet the building is referencing 43 xx levite road the house that's to go on there i'm not clear if you go to the next slide where it shows the drawing of the home one more that one and i apologize we have snapped [5:20] **Eric Johnson:** okay all right perfect let's see there'd be some confusion on that part [5:20] **Corey Colquist:** commission members any other questions or comments so far before we look to hear from the applicant not hearing any is the applicant here this evening do you have anything you'd like to say or add to eric's presentation if you do please come on up and state your name and address for the record [5:52] **Rob Stauber:** rob stauber 4860 breezy point road uh island lake um obviously eric did a great job it was pretty clear there um when i looked at buying the property it took a walk along it and it wasn't too exciting the i call it the little red house it looks like it needs a little work and as i walked down that driveway i could tell somebody had put in some considerable work back there and it was obvious to me a house should be there so that's really all i have to say is i think eric did a great job and it's set up perfectly for uh what i would call a beautiful uh home back there thank you [5:52] **Corey Colquist:** perfect sir thank you commission members any questions for the applicant this evening eric anything else on this one this [6:38] **Eric Johnson:** evening no there is not [6:38] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that we're going to open up the floor for a public hearing at 707 would anybody like to come up and speak on 5a this evening if you'd like to come up and talk about this potential flag lot please come on up and do so not seeing any we'll close the public hearing as well at 707 pm commission members one last chance for questions or comments not hearing any i look for a motion on 5a please [7:23] **Samuel Clark:** mr chair seeing both lots meet the requirements for a flag lot i move to approve agenda item 5a as stated [7:23] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that can we get a second [7:23] **Buckley Simmons:** simmons with a second [7:23] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that all in favor aye aye aye anybody opposed 5a passes thank you very much sir moving on this evening to 5b it's an application by sumas construction inc for a special use permit for the construction of a twin home duplex at an address on stepner road the property is located in an r3 residential zoning district eric what do you have for us on this one [8:10] **Eric Johnson:** great thank you uh once again if i could ask mr wicklin to get the location map associated with this one uh this is a uh existing lot that had been on the market for uh last few months here at straddles stubner road associated with it there's an existing home on the [8:10] **Eric Johnson:** west side and this vacant lot essentially on the east side uh what the applicant was able to do is they also purchased some land uh to the north and was able to reconfigure this essentially property into potentially two lots one would be a single family lot that uh there's no no approvals associated with but the other one would be a a two family home lot that we're here this evening for the special use permit so for two family lots they are allowed in the r3 zoning district however they have greater requirements as far as side yard setbacks associated with that in the case of once again two family homes they require a minimum of a 40-foot setback from the side yard and uh the front and the rear yards remain [8:56] **Eric Johnson:** the same uh 50 feet in the front 40 feet in the rear the lots are required to be larger in size as well they're required to be one acre in size versus a half acre which is a standard r3 zoning that way uh in both the cases of the setbacks uh the proposed setbacks for the two family home this evening is 46 feet on both sides and uh the lot size is approximately 1.5 acres so they do exceed uh that acreage and the setbacks associated with it as i've mentioned uh two family homes do require a special use permit uh basically in this case the planning and zoning commission is an advisory board to the city council the city council then would provide the ultimate decision associated with that there are wetlands at least for the [9:43] **Eric Johnson:** national wetland inventory located on the front portion of the site basically along that frontage on steubner the applicant has provided a wetland delineation that's going to be reviewed in the field this coming monday for that so any impacts associated with a wetland disturbance primarily for the driveway those would have to receive approval through the hermantown technical evaluation panel so it's a pretty standard process that way and uh that portion of the wetlands will be accomplished prior to this uh getting in front of city council [9:43] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that eric commission members any uh questions or comments so far this evening on 5b [10:28] **John Geissler:** did we expect any wetland filling for the driveways? [10:28] **Eric Johnson:** would be under the minimus the uh i think the way we're looking is they may have to uh get credits for that yeah it's it's because there's there's not much wetlands on this property that uh more than likely they may end up into a credit situation yes we will exactly but there is upland uh basically the buildable area on the east side of the property that seems to be more than if more than enough for our placement of the home [10:28] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that consular geisler commission members any other questions before we look to hear from the applicant this evening not seeing any is the applicant here [11:14] **Corey Colquist:** this evening sir is there anything you'd like to add to eric's presentation this evening if so please come on up and state your name and address at the record for the record i personally don't have any questions for you at this moment but we'll we'll find out commission members any questions that might be addressed towards the applicant before we hear from anybody at a public hearing not seeing any at this moment we'll open the floor at 7 11 in the evening for a public hearing on 5b is anybody here this evening to speak on this application not seeing any we're going to close it at 7 12 p.m commission members again this is your [12:00] **Corey Colquist:** chance for questions or comments on 5b not hearing any i look for emotion on 5b this evening [12:07] **Buckley Simmons:** i'd move to approve item 5b as stated [12:07] **Corey Colquist:** thank you very much for that can we get a second [12:07] **Samuel Clark:** clark with a second [12:07] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that all in favor aye aye anybody opposed not hearing any the motion passes thank you very much moving on to 5c this evening is an application by titan premier llc for preliminary and final plot for the subdivision of 25 acres into four lots the property is located at 5639 maple grove road and is located in an s-1 residential zoning district eric what do you have for us on this one [12:53] **Eric Johnson:** great thank you um this property did had an existing home on it up until about six eight months ago uh the property had been for sale for some time uh the previous owner as part of that i had the home demolished just to try to attract a little bit more interest in the purchase of the property the applicant before us this evening titan premier uh did purchase this property earlier this summer it's 25 acres total it comprises two different properties over there and that land portion this land is located in an s-1 zoning district the applicant looked at a number of different iterations on how this lot could potentially be subdivided and finally came up with what you see before us this evening so um there are four lots proposed for us each lot meet the minimum [13:38] **Eric Johnson:** requirements of five acres in size uh three of the four lots do have 300 feet of road frontage along maple grove road and one lot is uh is a flag lot just like we previously spoke about that uh we'll have 30 feet of road frontage along maple grove road we'll have 500 feet of depth on that pole as i explained earlier and then the portion behind that will be five acres uh just like we had talked about previously so the like i said the proposed flag lot does meet the city requirements associated with this uh these will each have private well and septic systems for those there are no city utilities in this portion of the city there's no required roadway work associated with it they'll just be driveway permits which the applicant or [14:24] **Eric Johnson:** the builders will need to get through st louis county and no required storm water pond is these are just individual building sites and with no new road infrastructure that way traditionally something like this could be accomplished from an administrative standpoint but it's before us this evening in the form of a plat for two reasons one it's a torrance property versus an abstract which requires a little bit higher degree of um survey work and then secondly with that flag lot so it's incorporated into a plat to see before the planning zone in this evening [14:24] **Corey Colquist:** thank you very much eric commission members any questions or comments for eric so far this evening on 5c [15:08] **Corey Colquist:** not hearing any is the applicant here this evening? [15:08] **Eric Johnson:** no okay nobody to hear from for that i know that the applicant does split time between he is originally from hermantown he does have a home in texas he tries to come up here every so often so um i believe he was going to try to join us by a zoom but apparently he was not able to make it [15:08] **Corey Colquist:** perfect commission members any questions or comments on 5c this evening the split of this 25 acres into four lots [15:08] **Buckley Simmons:** yes mr chair i have a question for eric the poll cannot exceed 500 feet is that correct is it what is the length of the pool on this one [15:54] **Eric Johnson:** uh this one does coming right at 500. right at 500. yes that's correct yeah the s1 it's uh those are pretty difficult usually to achieve uh flag lots out of but in this case this with the um the depth of the property he was able to to be able to do that [15:54] **Corey Colquist:** thank you commission members any other questions before we open it up for a public hearing um just i'm not seeing the um map split into the two the separate lots am i not do i not have that okay all right i see it now 34. gotcha okay perfect thank you thank you a little bit out of order yeah that's when i'm i'm getting confused here with this okay i got it commission members any other questions for eric on this before we open it up for a public hearing not hearing any will open up the floor for a public hearing on 5c this evening it's currently 7 17 in the evening if anybody would like to come on up and talk about this lot division please come up and do so [17:10] **Corey Colquist:** not seeing any we'll close the public hearing at 7 17 p.m on 5c commission members last chance for questions or comments on 5c this evening not hearing any i look for a motion [17:10] **Buckley Simmons:** mr chair i move to approve agenda item 5c as stated [17:10] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that can we get a second all in favor aye aye anybody opposed not hearing any motion passes 5d this evening is an application by bethany cemetery association for a rezoning of an 8.1 acre parcel located at 4938 hermantown road the parcel is currently zoned p public with a proposed rezoning to r3 residential eric what do you have for us on this one [17:56] **Eric Johnson:** great thank you very much uh the bethany cemetery association owns two parcels associated with that cemetery it's uh and joe maybe if you can get the location map up on this one again too please so while he's doing that on the western most parcel associated with this that's primarily where the cemetery uh next one still please joe that is where generally the cemetery is located uh headstones etc that way the west the western portion of this uh other property that's where the [18:43] **Eric Johnson:** driveway entrance comes into the cemetery per se so actually what you have thank you joe once you go up one slide again please thank you so what we're looking at there area in red where it says site that's the proposed eight acres that the cemetery association is looking to rezone from p public to r3 uh that is an area of land that is unused by the cemetery uh they're looking at uh divesting themselves of some property which has happened in a couple other cemeteries in the city here as well that these cemeteries are starting to find that they don't need as much land as they once thought they did and at least the cemetery association uh trying to look into the future as best they can don't [19:28] **Eric Johnson:** not see a need for this property that way so what they're looking to do is a couple different steps the first one this evening before us is rezoning of this property from p public to the r3 residential after that assuming that is approved uh they would then market this uh site for potential home development associated with it uh what they just prefer to do is this market the entire 8.1 acres as one lot someone could come into the future and subdivide this further into individual lot sites or just leave it as one lot as well that way so if there's a simple lot subdivision that would be handled at a staff level but any splitting of this property into more than three new homes or seeming actually more than four new lots would come back to [20:15] **Eric Johnson:** planning and zoning and city council so if there was end up like a plot that would happen for this for a subdivision of five or six lots uh it would come back to this group and require city council review and approval if it turned into anything else it would come back to this group for a review and approval that way there are no applications for this site right now that the cemetery association is just looking to divest themselves a property so this is the only discussions i've ever had on this property no one's ever attacked or at least contacted me saying i really want to develop this site so right now this is strictly a lot subdivision associated with that actually go back this is a rezoning request assuming the rezoning request eventually goes through the city council process then it would be administratively split into that 8.1 acre property [21:02] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that eric can i ask a couple questions what do you have for utilities there in studner road? [21:02] **Eric Johnson:** there are utilities located on i believe that the sanitary is on the west side i think water is on the east side but there are there is existing utilities within that roadway [21:02] **Corey Colquist:** you know if there's gas in there too? [21:02] **Eric Johnson:** i do not know that [21:02] **Corey Colquist:** okay and it looks like the lot's not super deep it looks like it's about 300 feet deep approximately 1200 long at 251 according to mr geisler and it's approximately 1200 feet long there is um at least for the national wetland inventory generally the lower quarter of this 8.1 acre lot so plus or minus two acres is uh up showing up as wetland for the national wetland inventory thank you for that i think those are my preliminary questions commission members any uh questions or comments for eric on this potential rezoning this evening [22:10] **Samuel Clark:** eric just clarify everything else around the public land is our three? [22:10] **Eric Johnson:** that is correct yes thank you [22:10] **Corey Colquist:** can you remind us what the width utility what is the minimum lot size? [22:10] **Eric Johnson:** the minimum lot size assuming there's both city sewer and water it's a half acre in size and a minimum of 100 feet of uh road frontage [22:10] **John Geissler:** consequently not including the wetlands 10 or 12 10 sites exactly if you just split this land up dimensionally yes at approximately 12 home sites associated with that it looks like there's nine across the street from it that's what i call it five six seven eight nine [22:34] **Samuel Clark:** eric just uh without getting into it too deep since we talked about it last meeting quite a bit with in terms of rezoning versus just selling the property and opportunity for a future buyer could you sell this eight acres or 8.1 acres and the future buyer proposed maybe like a pud or something along those lines? [23:20] **Eric Johnson:** they could except they'd be buying it at their own risk and that's the advantage of rezoning a property prior is a potential buyer would know what they have otherwise it'd be buying 8.1 acres of publicly zoned land that essentially can be used for a cemetery or an airport or very limited type of things the park exactly so it's you'd definitely be a buyer beware situation so that's generally why this is a process that we pursue first is you get you do a rezoning then you do any land splits associated with it and as i said before if this came in for multiple lot splits it would come before this group as a plat if it came before here as a pud it would come before this group as that so there is a process to go forward if something happened other than three new single-family homes on that property [24:08] **Samuel Clark:** thank you for those clarifications commission members any other questions or comments for eric before we open up the floor i've said one other question since it seems like things kind of come when something comes up it seems like it comes up again and it seems like it happens a lot but in terms of rezoning how often does that happen historically in the city of hermantown? [24:08] **Eric Johnson:** it's i've been here almost seven years and prior to this year i think we had one so we said that the two that we've we've had three this year uh two of them have been cemeteries once again looking to divest themselves of land one was hard on the corner at arrowhead and steubner we rezoned that to commercial and we proved a dental clinic over there and this one before us this evening uh from the p to r three and then obviously the one that happened last month from the r3 to the c so those are the three that um and they said i really had but one prior to that so you know i've been hearing in the works is another cemetery might be looking at the exact same thing when i can see you know with a cemetery property or a publicly zoned property like this i guess my overall concern because we talked about it last week is that if the precedent is as soon as a developer or anyone wants to change what a property is owned and it's just approved it kind of defeats the purpose of zoning in the first place so i just that's just my overarching concern with rezoning versus looking into other options first [25:40] **Corey Colquist:** right and i believe this one's a little different because it's starting out as p public like you stated yep this one's completely different i'm not saying this is like my opinion but it's just it's kind of the underlying concern with rezoning versus doing something true commission members any other questions or comments not seeing any right now we'll open up the floor for a public hearing at 7 26 if you'd like to speak on 5d this evening please come on up state your name and address for the record [26:19] **Carol Mehlbauer:** um on your map there i'm the l-shaped plot on the stebner road we built about 25 years ago there and we were told that we were a wetland and we got a special use permit and my brother owns the properties next to us and they told us that maybe those locks would be buildable and they allowed him to put in driveway entrances there and then they said the end of the road the end of the road is unbuildable and it is wetland and that was told to us by john claire's lynn landers and david saylo they all told me that they said that is zoned public it will never change public zonings are for the utilities and for all these other things [27:06] **Carol Mehlbauer:** um and then in 2015 um when a neighbor that's in my backyard purchased property apparently the city realized that my house was zoned public and the house he was buying was zoned public and so i can pass this around but this used to be zones much larger public here and so at that time they re-zoned my house this was there they re-zoned um our house and then they rezoned my brother's land next to us and they said the rest of the road on or the rest of the property on the stepner road is wetland it will never be buildable nobody would ever approve that and so they left it as a p and then um they also rezoned the property that my backyard new neighbor purchased and so it wasn't always r3 around this property it was p and in 2015 when we came to the meeting i don't know if you have minutes kept or something but i said it seems like something a little fishy is going on here because if you change mine to r3 what's to say you're not going to just keep going down and changing everything to r3 and they said that will always be left p especially because it's on the corner for utilities but backing up my great grandfather his name was pete [28:39] **Carol Mehlbauer:** olsen and he donated the land that we're talking about today for the cemetery and so i have a personal connection to this because i was planning on being buried in that cemetery and i think it's going to really affect the cemetery i don't know if any of you have gone to that cemetery it's a beautiful cemetery it's a beautiful piece of land it's peaceful it's tranquil there's bear deers squirrel everything running around there and it's secluded and private and if you put public homes in front of that cemetery you're going to have i mean the veterans ceremonies are there every memorial day it's a pride i'm not here because of my house being down the street anything you build would probably add to the value of my home i am here because my grandpa donated that land for the cemetery and that was the purpose of his donation is to give that land to the cemetery and he was not a wealthy man he was the first dairy farm in hermann town and the fact that he donated that land for the cemetery and for the public there used to be a ball field on the corner there of hermantown and stubner and that's where all the kids in the neighborhood would gather and so i guess it bothers me to just think that we're just gonna have to develop everything in hermantown um i have wildlife in my yard every day [30:14] **Carol Mehlbauer:** and i think that the wild lake needs a place to go and the fact that the land is a wetland bothers me um what else do i have to say spray too much i guess if the cemetery doesn't need the land we'll give it back to my family i guess is my thought on it but obviously that's not a conversation for this oh the gas we got a letter in the mail about six weeks ago maybe from a neighbor who was proposing for national or natural gas to go down the road and he said the more residents we divide it with the cheaper it'll be so i think the fact that everybody's looking into um you know the city can get money from the sewer the city can get money from the gas the city can get money from the water it's i mean if you divide this into 12 lots well that's a lot of money for the city so i guess but at a certain point people moved to hermantown because they want um you know quality living and privacy and um and i just think that the cemetery is going to get wrecked thank you very much [31:18] **Jason Bright:** yeah jason bright 4962 hermantown road i'm the neighbor to them on the back side behind the cemetery okay uh i got the letter in the mail a couple weeks ago i've talked to them since then as well and one of the things that bothers me on is the fact that like you have land donated to something to make it public for anybody's given to the cemetery to use and then now the cemetery whether they ran out of money because they mismanaged it whatever their case may be now the fact that they want to sell it for their own profit doesn't quite make sense i'd be curious to see if we could dig up like even when it was donated like if there was any like what they what the intent was there had to be some kind of documentation saying hey i'm giving this to you for x not a year forever uh be curious to see if there's more like behind the scenes and how that all works and i don't know how that works but i think there should be something uh but i think i'm putting on with them as well that just doesn't quite make sense to them change it if it's public land for the other cemeteries where they own the land and they're trying to sell it and they always owned it makes more sense but something that i was like given to them is like just that's part that's like doesn't doesn't quite bode with my uh in terms of how i would perceive it that's all i got [32:48] **Corey Colquist:** thank you very much sir now our question is if there's anybody from the bethany cemetery association here this evening that might be able to shed some light on these things is anybody here this evening representing the cemetery sir if you want to come on up maybe you can shed a little light on a couple of these questions for us so i just want to remind you to please state your name and address for the record [33:15] **Dennis:** my name is dennis 3315 hutchinson road in duluth and i'm the president of the bethany cemetery association according to the public records the most recent conveyance of the land within a period of 24 months prior to the date of this commitment is described as follows there is a warranty deed from arthur w elliot a single man a widower and that deed was given to the bethany cemetery association a minnesota corporation dated june 5th 1939 and recorded august 9 1939 as document number 585 and to my knowledge then that would not be a part of peter olsen's request or bequest to the bethany cemetery that's all i have [34:01] **Corey Colquist:** can you uh tell us a little bit more about the fact where you might not need the land moving forward we like eric said we've had some requests from other cemeteries for similar stuff and just wanted to confirm that that is accurate [34:01] **Dennis:** now the cemetery has approximately another 15 to 20 acres of usable lot land up above this 300 feet and the land that is down below is unusable because right now there is a huge hill that cannot be used for cemetery purposes and so i cannot see within the next 50 25 30 years or whenever that the cemetery would need to have more lot land than what we have we just finished survey uh hillside and i think we have uh and i'm not positive on the number of lots in that but i think there's 150 or so and if you uh add to that the cremation sites that are available [35:34] **Dennis:** there's a lot of cemetery available for the burials of cremations and full burials and in addition we're planning if this goes through we're planning on building another mausoleum because the mausoleums are filling up rather rapidly with cremations and they're not looking for plot lands or full burials anymore i don't know are there any other questions that i could answer [35:34] **Corey Colquist:** i'm by no means an expert in your field or your background but i'm just curious if you see more and more people being cremated these days and not necessarily needing the large plots? [36:21] **Dennis:** absolutely and the way the state law reads uh any existing plot of of land with one full burial may have a another cremation placed on that lot and so if you own four full lots you have enough room for another four members of your family and we have a number of people of course who own more than five lots and so we're we're looking at uh uh really no need for full lots anymore and we're i think every cemetery is facing the same thing a lot more cremations it's cheaper less land right etc i think i only have one more question and it would be on longevity of the existing cemetery if you were allowed to sell off this land if this could be re-zoned and sold and you said you might have 30 or 40 years what happens after that point the cemetery is just full and there's no more admittance [37:07] **Dennis:** well hopefully not she's talking about her great grandfather my father my grandfather owned land along the hermantown road right across the street and my great great grandfather is buried there my great great uncle and aunts are buried there uh my dad and my uncles every member of my family are buried in that cemetery i do not want to see that cemetery full at any time i have a lot invested into that into that cemetery my wife and i will be there in the future [38:15] **Corey Colquist:** commercial members any other questions for this gentleman i think he's answered mine [38:15] **Buckley Simmons:** yeah i i do have a question now the document you have is from a mr elliot in 1939 is that right passing the property to the cemetery correct okay and no records prior to that [38:15] **Dennis:** not to my knowledge [38:15] **Buckley Simmons:** okay so i guess my question and where i have a concern here is that if this lady has documentation showing that the land was in fact belonged to her grandfather great grandfather if there's is something written somewhere saying that he's donating it to the cemetery prior to your document i just i i'm a little concerned about moving ahead on this without some clarification because if there's a legal document somewhere saying that i don't know that you know how that would all work here legally i guess [39:24] **Dennis:** yeah um how can i sound 87 years old and that i hear what happened prior to right my birth right that cemetery was there when i was uh when i was born she was there when my great grandfather was buried there back in 18 1913 and so that cemetery is quite old yeah i just wonder how this mr elliott got his name on the property if it was from the olsen family that's my that i don't question i guess i don't know i used to chase cows down in there so i know the property quite well [40:10] **Eric Johnson:** there's there's no question that cemetery owns the land today correct that's correct okay and it's part of the before this would be finalized the city does what's called an ownership and encumbrances report just to verify that uh to help you all out i mean this is what we're talking about with um agreements things like that that's essentially almost the same thing as we see as an hoa homeowners association uh they exist in a handful of areas all throughout the city the city does not enforce those the city does not dictate those so in this case if there's a question of what one descendant said to another that would be a mean that would be a matter between the two parties not something that this board of the city would have to take up [40:56] **Corey Colquist:** commercial members any other questions for this gentleman anything else you'd like to share with us sir thank you very much thank you for anybody else like to come up and speak this evening please come on up state your name and address for the record [40:56] **John Mehlbauer:** john mealbauer 3785 stebner road uh as my wife said we're the southernmost house that's closest to the property on the same side of the road on the west side yep and uh as far as donation and stuff i mean documentation we'll have to look into that and i know this isn't the place for it but right on the website for bethany cemetery if you read the about peter olsen's name the only one on it that that says it that it's donated by him so that's on a side note but as far as you know my wife said city of quality living i mean if we start eating up all these green spaces it's really neat there's a there's a webpage that i found from from the university of minnesota and there's aerial photos from 1940 and there's not a house on it and you can still see the cemetery there it's really neat stuff and we're losing a little that hermantown i think you talk about you know i know it seems far-fetched but we talk about global warming what are we doing for our part and we've always been a prideful city of green space i think it used to be when we built you had to have an acre to build anywhere in hermantown and those things change we were told that you will be the last flag lot in hermantown we were told that by those three gentlemen my wife [42:28] **John Mehlbauer:** just talked about john claire's and they're since moved on right and those things are being done again i just you know i think we tend to slip as a society that we make it easier for everything and i think it's just the responsibility of to not just i'll make a motion all second iii you hear that a lot just think about it you know because we really value green spaces talk about the trail systems that we're trying to get past and all those things i've worked walked all that property too it's gorgeous and it seems a bit macabre to me to have my backyard right up against a little kid seven-year-old that my wife was talking about that was killed and it's his uh his headstone is right there when you drive in on that driveway well that driveway is the dividing point between the properties we're talking about i mean and it's peaceful and it it's you know it's bethany cemetery and i think if you put all those houses there especially if you put 12 houses somebody's backyard and their trampoline and their pool is going to be back up against that i just think it's a little disrespectful thank you [43:14] **Corey Colquist:** appreciate that sir anybody else like to come up and speak this evening on 5d john could you do me one favor you're pretty good at math did you figure out how many lots you could really put in there with that depth at the overall acreage don't they have to be half acre lots and with only being 250 feet deep they're gonna be wider than 100 feet on the road [44:00] **Eric Johnson:** yeah i can help you out basically half acres 21 500 square feet if it's a lot depth of 255 and our minimum lot frontage is is 100 so essentially you could only divide it that way right because it was you know the 255 i mean you're within 40 feet so there's there's no other room that way gotcha so like said assuming there is no wetland at all on that property under the street r3 zoning the maps you could get it would be 12 lots right and we've already established that there is wetlands on the lower the southern part of exactly for the national wetland inventory i'm sorry about that please state your name and address for the record [44:47] **Brian Olsen:** brian olsen 5280 midway road thank you to carol nealbauer my name is brian olson so i'm a direct olson um i don't live in hermantown so it's not really going to affect me but it does affect me in that fact that my great-grandfather was a big contributor in donating land and also both my grandparents ernie and ruby olsen and my parents jim and jennifer olsen are buried there and going there like carol said beautiful it's peaceful it's quiet the last thing i want to hear is kids screaming in the background having the whether it's 12 homes or zoned for one big huge apartment building you know it's going to take away from the peace that i get when i visit the cemetery lot and i'm here to stand with my family on this thank you sure i appreciate your words [45:34] **Corey Colquist:** anybody else has seen me like to speak on 5d yes ma'am absolutely you can retrieve your other picture if you'd like as well the letter that i got saying they were rezoning my foot because the property initially was not surrounded yeah come on up [46:25] **John Mehlbauer:** john milbourne 3785 stabner road thank you again as far as and i and maybe this isn't the place for it i get it but you know if this goes through i am curious we talked about reinvesting and other property from for another um cemetery i i guess that's a little i'm a little unclear with those funds and and it would or maybe it's a mausoleum yeah i believe you said it mausoleum is that that's what it would be used for for sure can you say that no but any profits from any sale of land would be used for that and only that is that correct but no other property outside of that cemetery it's okay it's bethany cemetery improvements only is that correct we can get that in a minute [47:36] **Corey Colquist:** against it i don't want to see it go through but i wanted that for the record anyway thank you perfect sir thank you again anybody else like to come up and talk this evening on 5d now is your chance you know gentlemen may i speak from remotely uh yes yeah absolutely i was going to check with the zoom world before we close the public meeting but go for it just a moment [48:30] **Peter Miller:** my name is peter miller i live at 4905 hermantown road directly across the street from the site and my question is i want to be clear does the zoning change that you were talking about would it allow multi-family or apartment buildings to be built on that strip of land [48:30] **Eric Johnson:** eric can answer this question any zoned land within the city has the ability to become or be a pud land unit development commercial districts residential et cetera that way there's a process that has to go through if something is wants to pursue a planned unit development in this case what we're looking at is an r3 zoning it's for single-family residential it also allows two-family uh residential um if for some reason in the future someone bought this and they wanted to pursue something other than that under plan unit development process they can do that they are legally able to do that as with any other zoning district in the city it does require a process of which is what we're doing tonight and we've done in other ones require planning commission and require city council so like i said right now we're just looking at an r3 zoning i can't speculate in the future like i said before i have not been contacted previously before on the site at all with anybody having an interest in this site it's not to say that might not change if this was indeed rezoned and put on the market but if something came forward other than in r3 r3 single family homes it does come before this board and the city council [50:02] **Peter Miller:** thank you for that clarification i hope that answers your question sir it does i would like to follow up with one thing though uh understanding what was said and that there would be further process associated with any change beyond the single or two residential use of the property i would just raise the concern that this is a very inconsistent use of that land with the surrounding land uses surrounding residences and the cemetery so that further process we would be paying very close attention to it thank you for listening i appreciate it [50:48] **Corey Colquist:** thank you very much sir ma'am you were coming up again if you could you have to please come up and state your name and address are you sure okay i just want to make sure anybody else want to speak on 5d this evening either in person or via zoom not hearing or seeing any we will close the public hearing at 7 51 pm commission members any questions or comments on 5d this evening [51:33] **Samuel Clark:** i just have one more comment uh just to be consistent as with our last meeting i think with the review of the comprehensive plan and in terms of rezoning my my personal opinion as a volunteer on a recommending board is that this would be tabled until the comprehensive plan is is reviewed okay [51:33] **Buckley Simmons:** um from my perspective i'm i'm on the fence on this one it's it's really tough i think we can't read into mr olsen's intentions but i i have a feeling when he donated that property to be a cemetery it was his intention for it to be a cemetery forward on the other hand it doesn't make sense to have that property sit there dormant because the cemetery is never going to need it so i'm struggling here a bit knowing what's the right thing to do because i can see both sides you know selling off that property makes sense put it to use it benefit the city on the other hand if it was mr olsen's intention to give it to the cemetery i can only believe his intention was for it to be a cemetery and it would be really helpful if maybe we could look back in the records and see if there is anything specifically written as to what his intentions were and then on the other side you give a gift it's a gift and you give it away and you take control back from whatever happens with it going forward so i'm struggling with this one and i just don't know and i guess i'm with sam i think maybe we need to put this one on hold and maybe you folks could do some more research and and um i don't know i just don't know about this one i'm struggling thanks [53:06] **Eric Johnson:** i'm going to interject right there is um at least from the comp plan standpoint that's generally that's not the nature of the comprehensive plan to look at small individual lots in a base case by case basis that way you're looking at big picture broad brush sort of things that way we're looking at 50 100 acres type of things that way we're looking at corridors those things we're not looking at a three or four acre or an eight acre site that way so i understand your concern that way but just wouldn't clarify that that's generally not the nature of a comprehensive plan [53:51] **Samuel Clark:** so just just to clarify too i do understand that eric and i'm not i'm not saying that the comprehensive plan is going to look at this specific agenda item but in terms of rezoning from public to r3 and you know one of the things with the public zoning is preserved parts etc think that's what would be more important to be looked at because it's more for me setting the precedent going forward right just as in our last meeting if every single time someone wants to sell a property to do something different or wants to develop a property because it's zoned differently than what they want to do and they just request it it happens to me that's not from a planning perspective that doesn't make sense so that's my overarching kind of thought process on this [54:38] **Dante Thomasoni:** well and respectfully commissioner clark that is the job of the planning and zoning commission i mean our job is to look at lots look at requests look at how we can preserve property rights and and that's one of the reasons that zoning comes to us in this way it's not to keep things the same forever so i i think what we're doing today is we're looking at um this is surrounded by r3 right eric um you know even if we had in my view even if we had a comprehensive plan i mean this would be part of an r3 zoning site part of our job too is to to value the individual property owner and the individual property owner here is looking to rezone this in a way that maximizes the value and fits the surrounding area in the reverse if the surrounding area was uh you know was industrial and it didn't fit it would be our job to preserve the nature of the surrounding neighborhood in this case i would say that from my perspective we have an r3 area we are surrounded by r3 we are protecting the property the property owner's rights to be able to zone consistently with what we're doing in the city uh that's that's where i stand on this and i'll be voting uh yay in favor of this one [56:10] **Samuel Clark:** i i would like to say just to follow up on that i think we might fundamentally disagree on what we're doing on this commission so my understanding as a volunteer is that if it's just about zoning it should go right to the city and i'm ultimately wasting my time because we're not reviewing if something's zoned correctly or not or meeting requirements as the city puts in the handout it's more as a volunteer looking at hermantown as a whole something can be zoned correctly and it could even be planned correctly but maybe it doesn't make sense you know in the actual day-to-day for the individual residents of hermantown or who might be impacted so that's just where i come from when i look at different agenda items as they come forward because my time is valuable and i know that the people that come to these meetings time is valuable so if it ultimately gets to the point where it just has to be zoned correctly based on what's surrounding it then i would i would think i was wasting my time [56:56] **Corey Colquist:** no and i think everyone has you know great thoughts and the family donation mr olsen gift i think that's a completely separate matter than what we're here to deal with today and should be handled elsewhere you know when i look at hermantown as a whole i personally feel that this fits our three zoning other projects that have come forth i feel it's been spot zoning in no way do i feel like that was this is spot zoning i haven't got a chance to read through this letter here um but at one point the host did sit on public land which was then zoned to r3 it sounds like if i'm understanding this correctly to make the house fall under the proper zoning it seems to be that's kind of what we're doing today just in a little different nature 25 years down the road green spaces climate change not enough schooling things of that come up a lot and it's interesting that as a volunteer committee we're in this room every month and we hear these same things but yet the people that are concerned about green spaces schooling trailing it just seems to be when it's relevant to something that's right next door to them um so i mean when i take a step back and look at this i'm saying okay what's best for a community i feel like there's a major housing shortage i feel like it's consistent it's not spot zoning um and it's something that's very much needed how many houses are going to go on there i'm not sure i'm sure 25 years ago people might have thought you know they were building too close to the cemetery then as a community or as a society i guess we're growing every year and ultimately we're going to consume more and more land and i don't feel like we're throwing anything inconsistent uh by letting you know right now single-family homes go up in that area commission members any other open comments or questions [58:28] **Buckley Simmons:** well i guess i would agree with you about it makes sense to re-zone it practically it makes sense to re-zone it because everything around it is r3 but my heart is saying i don't know that i could vote for it tonight until we're given the opportunity for these folks to do a little bit more research as to what the original intent was for this property maybe it doesn't need to be cemetery but maybe it could be something else that would fall more in line with what the original donation was rather than a housing unit um and i guess to me personally you know when i show up i'm trying to do what's best for the community and the growth and this is a a very bad situation i feel horribly for you guys i'm sure that was the intent but based off the information provided who currently owns it um i'm looking at everything big picture and that's kind of where i guess i feel comfortable you know approving this tonight [1:00:12] **Corey Colquist:** commission members any other questions or comments eric is there any evidence of any clouded title at this point i'm sorry say again have we heard of any cloud the title is there any restrictions? [1:00:12] **Eric Johnson:** no but at this stage we've not looked at that it's an ownership and encumbrances report that we'll do prior to city council that way you know once again as i said before someone's gift to somebody we don't get into those things yeah right so that'd be a personal property matter not not for the planning of zoning [1:00:59] **John Geissler:** mr chair my only comment through this i think samuel had mentioned about setting the precedence i think we kind of did with the other cemetery that we re-known a couple months back so you know i just think we should remember that when we're thinking about it yeah and that one we re-zoned to commercial right right yeah actually if we can get people to come up to the podium we are recording this four minutes please and well [1:01:16] **Jason Bright:** for 4962 uh for the other cemetery you guys talked about the arizona commercial how did they acquire that land originally? [1:01:16] **Eric Johnson:** we don't know that and that's not what this body here is okay so are we putting it on the person that purchased the land when they do the title like the title search and all that kind of stuff to figure out that portion of it all that we look at is if the applicant owns the property they're the ones we deal with that's what we deal with we don't get into my ancestors said this their ancestors said that we don't look at that we deal with the owner of the property making the request [1:02:02] **Jason Bright:** i'm not talking about what they said or you know anything like that it's just how did they acquire the lane if you acquire the land they're purchasing it and then you go we don't we don't get into this body does not get into that okay that that might be valid this doesn't seem correct the only thing to add to that [1:02:49] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for those additional comments commission members anything else we'd like to talk about on this uh application 5d this evening i myself i i've listened to all the kind words this evening i can hear it uh that's personal to you guys uh i also believe that the cemeteries got the right to sell off the land if they want to if they're the legal owners today there are multiple homes directly across the street it's an r3 district i personally don't have a problem with this any other comments or questions anybody before we put it to a vote this evening not hearing any i look for a motion on 5d this evening [1:03:35] **Dante Thomasoni:** thomasoni moves to approve 5b as stated [1:03:35] **Corey Colquist:** we have a motion to approve can we get a second colquist with a second all in favor aye aye anybody opposed hi hi so the vote is five to two this evening i believe the motion passes thank you very much everybody we appreciate all your time on that number six is continuing business eric do we have any? [1:04:20] **Eric Johnson:** no there's not but just to give an update uh the the uh comprehensive plan steering committee is going to be having its first meeting uh a week from tonight i anticipate probably being back in front of this board with an update at our um october meeting provide some information and where our consultant is in the process and i anticipate uh sometime probably in november maybe december the uh consultant would be up here speaking personally to uh this board as well [1:04:20] **Corey Colquist:** thank you for that any new business under number seven? [1:04:20] **John Geissler:** no can we talk a little bit about the maybe on the continuing business property and they actually taken last night um if you haven't heard the city council uh approved the rejoining of the worlds property uh to see commercial um the process didn't come easy i abstain from the vote uh as my employer does some work for p r properties so uh it was four to supporting nothing with the vote and i with myself abstaining um but the one thing i know this body has a concern about what if the deal falls through with pnr and maybe eric can you just explain and we've all been through this and we know what the process is that the commercial development wants to go in but maybe just explain now that that is c commercial everybody seems to be concerned can you just explain the process of what's going to happen or how it will happen? [1:05:52] **Eric Johnson:** sure exactly so under the commercial district uh i believe there's either 56 or 58 basically permitted uses under what's called a commercial industrial development permit so what that requires is uh review and approval by this body so this is the one of the things that um that you are actually direct you're actually the approving body on not a recommending body so uh what it requires regardless of what it is is generally a full set of engineering plans looking at architectural renderings site plans associated with that depending on the scope and the scale of the project there may be other documents associated with it i.e environmental documents traffic studies etc that way once again that all depends on the scope and the scale of a particular project that way so in the case now that this is a this is a commercially zoned property uh you know i said the planning commission will be the deciding vote for projects coming in at that stage once again there's approximately 56 different permitted uses under that cidp which require a number of different elements associated with it and once again for review and there is a public hearing associated with that as well as a public notification to adjoining property owners upon an application [1:06:38] **John Geissler:** thank you i just want to make sure everybody is aware of what stands in front of this commission to look at moving forward with that property when will that happen do we know yet? [1:06:38] **Eric Johnson:** unknown it's uh we're starting looking at some um working with a consultant named ellers that does a lot of financial research um the um looking at the viability of that project leads from the uh applicant standpoint um it's really in their court now from an application standpoint and not really quite sure when that would happen but there are different steps that go through now in the case um assuming it's a p r project if there's any public subsidies if there's any public utilities i.e roads water sewer etc that require development agreements those are basically approved by the city council a development agreement typically does not stop at this level it goes straight on to a city council that way but once again your this board from a really the planned standpoint is the approving body does that help? [1:07:24] **John Geissler:** i'm now more confused okay so i go in commercial we could approve it and it's done okay right? [1:08:11] **Eric Johnson:** yep exactly well these are north shore dental that we came through here two months ago right this that was the one stop they provided essentially 80 construction drawings from their engineer they provided architectural renderings associated with it storm water plans etc that way and this the body reviews those plans here's that opens it up the public comment receives those and then makes a decision on the process or in the project that way we look at it does it meet the underlying requirements of the c zoning i.e setbacks heights etc amount of land area for buildings those are some of the criteria that we look at that way we don't get into architectural we say i don't like that color stone i don't like that color siding that's not the nature of what we do so in the commercial zoning it's it's pretty well open as far as the building materials that way in the hermantown marketplace that's a different story there's actually set materials it speaks about in there under the straight sea zoning it's um it's uh no real requirements that way got it okay [1:09:43] **Buckley Simmons:** and eric is is there limits to the scopes of this body and review at that next step like as long as it fits within certain requirements of the statute um we're in a duty to approve or deny based upon how it fits in there or is it you know how much uh latitude does this commission have? [1:09:43] **Eric Johnson:** it does say it removes much removes a lot of the subjectivity associated with that and a planned unit development for instance a lot more latitude for this commission to make comments make requirements etc that way uh commercial zoning a little bit more cut and dried that way said before there's no landscape requirements there's no building material type of requirements we look into setbacks we look into building heights we look into parking lot ratios we look into percent pervious on a parking lot surface that way so we're really looking at pretty much the facts associated with it [1:09:43] **Buckley Simmons:** thanks eric that was i just wanted everybody to know sure what was moving forward thanks uh number seven or number eight is communications looks like we have some log correspondence [1:10:29] **Eric Johnson:** yes this was actually a document that was provided to city council two weeks ago uh from one of the property owners belong along oakerstrom road so we still just put that into the log correspondence and wanted to make planning and zoning aware of that [1:10:29] **Corey Colquist:** perfect thank you for that number nine is commission member reports uh myself nothing this evening mr colquest? [1:10:29] **Samuel Clark:** i guess just thanks everyone for their input tonight it's nice that we're not always yay or nan you know across the board so i thought there was great discussion and i honestly liked hearing everyone's opinions and thoughts on the matter so i guess just thanks for that [1:11:15] **Corey Colquist:** i agree discord's important it's good for us to disagree and that's why we're all here and that's why it's not just one vote so val roulette samuel clarke beth wenzloff buckley simmons down to thomasoni report counselor geisler? [1:11:15] **John Geissler:** i think this was the first one we had in this situation of his grandpa donating the land well no he didn't mr elliot donated a land i mean that's kind of crazy i mean it's going to be interesting see the way i look at it though even if mr also going into the land they're taking the proceeds from that to better the cemetery so i think i i think you know those gentlemen aren't lining their pockets with it so i think i and again yeah i mean we're here to right only work so i think i understand everybody's position but i think moving forward was the right thing so other than that the uh community recreation and educators that mr needle power was talking about that you've been making phone calls there's lots of different groups going around trying to uh you know get community support to to vote you know vote yes for the for the hockey rank expansion trails and the uh baseball field project so just everybody keep in mind that that as you're talking people in the community all all three could pass two capacitors one could pass and the amount of the sales tax increase is the same at half a percent so um there's a lot of misperception out there that i'm gonna vote for each thing and it's a half a percent for a total of one and a half percent not true just you know if you're talking to people if one passes or all three it's a half a percent of increased skill and at sunsets after 20 years if i recall like 20 years ago so anyways that's uh but there will be a lot of community push on that uh the city provides information the city can't promote the department of the boat they can provide information there was a mailer that went out from the city to everybody with with specific information there are other groups now being involved that you may get some more information from as well you can only provide information that's what the city's trying to do the show that's it [1:13:36] **Corey Colquist:** thank you very much council grassler uh with that i look for a motion to adjourn thank you for that can we get a second colquist to the second all in favor aye aye aye this meeting is closed at 8 13 p.m thank you very much everybody