Based on the context provided and the internal cues in the meeting (roll call, names addressed, and subject matter expertise), here is the transcribed townhall meeting with speaker names. Note: **Neil** appears to be a staff member (likely a Zoning Administrator or Consultant) who is not explicitly on your provided list but is addressed by name multiple times by the Mayor. **Derek Lindell** and **Glenn Lundell** are identified as commission members during the roll call. *** [7:11] **Matt Montgomery:** good evening and welcome to the monday august 17th uh planning commission meeting call it to order uh i'll do the roll call um daniels is gone duncan here uh hannah here derek lindell here glenn lundell here and matt montgomery here okay um can i uh have an approval of the agenda it's all moved second okay motion by the lundells uh all in favor aye aye okay public input citizens may speak to issues not on the agenda please approach the microphone and before speaking please give your name for the record please limit your comments to three [7:57] **Matt Montgomery:** minutes and what i can see everybody here is already on the agenda so we will end the public input item six is public hearing a variance of three feet for eric and lori smith at 1208 west state street they are proposing to widen their current driveway to within two feet of the property line current driveway setback is five feet and diana you taking that one [8:42] **Diane Johnson:** yep absolutely okay so the smiths had a curb cut put in when the new street was put in it's a 26 foot curb cut and they are just hoping to access that extra space right now their driveway is nine feet they want to bring it up to 18 feet does anybody have any questions on that for me [9:27] **Matt Montgomery:** were there any uh neighbor objections that you know nothing that nothing that came up derek okay okay uh i'll open the public hearing on this matter is there anybody that wishes to speak toward this scene none will close the public hearing commission any thoughts i went by there yesterday um didn't look like it would be too bad by adding it and if there's no if the next door neighbor doesn't object i don't really have a problem with it okay well with that before we vote on the resolution i neglected to ask for the approval of the minutes so we have a motion and i'll make a motion we approve the minutes i'll second that okay motion in a second all in favor okay discussion items resolution 2020-05 the variance for eric and laurie smith at 1208 west state street [10:13] **Matt Montgomery:** we had the public just had the public hearing anybody wish to make an emotion on that [Music] i will make a motion to pass resolution 2020-05 i'll second it second by bruce uh okay um all in favor all right the next discussion item is uh resolution 2020-06 an administrative sub division for jody ripple at 500 middle street administrative subdivision lot split for jody ripple currently one parcel [11:01] **Matt Montgomery:** it is being proposed to allow this parcel to be split into two parcels each parcel would have to meet the zoning requirements of the city of canon falls neil [11:28] **Neil [Staff]:** yeah this uh lot split could have been done administratively but i want to call your attention to your handout that was just handed out under 151.11. you'll see it highlighted it says administrative subdivision it says any subdivision containing not more than two lots fronting on a street that's the key right there approved improved not involving the dedication and or construction of any new street or road the extension of municipal facilities or the creation of any public improvements now we could have done this administratively but when this particular lot split that they want to do is on a unimproved alley and so i thought it'd be prudent to bring it to a planning commission to discuss and there's some there is some concerns with the with the lot split um i'd like to also call your attention to your packet and there's some highlighted areas in in your packet that talk about different parts of the ordinance that we have have talked about at the staff level so i talked about the it's not on an improved public street then you go to uh buildable land and it says uh contiguous land area occurring within the property lines of a parcel of lot of the lot excluding drainage ways wetlands watercourses park land rights roads away and slopes in excess of 18 percent so if you look in your packet there's a couple of surveys one provided by the ripples and one that was done by mass or samuelson and one done by massey and we have a conflicting buildable lot area the one from massey was provided by the ripples and the one was done by samuelson that we had on file this this particular area has been attempted before to be split off and has failed and now we're we're back again with the new owners of the the property and they would like to split it off also so we've got some uh we got some issues with the buildable land and and uh one of the things i'd like to talk about also is more of the of running water and sewer down that alleyway if you look where the the water main is and you look under i got to find it in the in my paperwork but it states that under subdivisions on page 35 it's in your hand now but i'll just read it to you under water supply the water utility extension should be consistent with the comprehensive water plan and offers the opportunity for water main looping to serve the urban subdivision this will be a 300 foot dead-end service and in my experience with uh services of that kind 300 feet is a long ways that's a whole block i'm guessing we'll have calls we have calls already with stale water and i'd like to know from the ripples how they're going to handle the the dead end water and in the sewer i guess you could pump it that's not a big deal but the water is concerning because it will come back and will be responsible for it even though it is a uh private service line so there's uh there's another item that we're concerned with and then and then it's the level of the street that's a 16-foot alley typically you're supposed to have when you're going to divide a a lot like this or split off a lot like this you've got to have a a street frontage so this one is really uh interesting that's why i've got it sitting in front of you otherwise we'd have done it administratively um you take a look at the buildable areas that we have on the two surveys one of them is uh what 31 and three-quarter feet deep by and it's a triangle i don't know what kind of house that would be so that particular survey from samuelson you'd have to have a variance to uh of the building setbacks to approve a uh house on that one and then the other one i see the the difference between the two is where they established the bluff setback and the the other one that you see there is uh has the bluff set back further on to the back into the bluff so there's two different surveys i don't know uh i guess if you want to allow a uh a lot that's on an alleyway and not on an approved street and it's just questionable i certainly think as a planning commission i'd take a look at it setbacks on that property the um front would be 25 and the rear would be 20 feets [16:53] **Matt Montgomery:** okay um uh jody would you like to address some of the issues that have been mentioned and and if you well if you could you come up to the microphone here at the [17:38] **Jody Ripple:** um so the conflicting survey is news to me so i i guess i'd like to see that survey um it's you know it's older like this one the one from massey is was just done within the last couple months um so i guess i'm surprised that there's that they conflict um so i might want to just have a copy of that samuelson one and just analyze it a little bit um so i mean i need to i guess i need to think about that i have a i mean i have a very good blown up copy of just the buildable area i don't know if that would help um to to pass that out or send it around or i can email it out um but it's it's pretty clear at least from the massey survey that um two two houses would probably fit here um one comfortably two two are doable i don't i'm not looking to do more than two probably just one for for right now from just the one um i don't the the 16 foot alley um you know there'd be very little traffic because it would just be right now it's just anderson's access that alley and then if there were one other house there it would just be that other family so that would be the only traffic on that on that alley so right now it seems like it's actually fairly underutilized uh um the stale water thing you know i find that hard to believe if there's a lot if there's a full-time family living there i mean that could happen if somebody was only living there part-time and maybe wasn't you know wasn't flushing their toilets every day or wasn't doing dishes and and that kind of thing um so i don't know i you know like that's not i don't that just doesn't seem very realistic to me but uh i guess they would be curious to know how many calls you get on the stale water thing and what the situation is can the can the city put in like a like a one inch line and run down there i mean then it probably wouldn't get stale that would have to be the homeowner okay yeah instead of a full like six inch water main that would make sense right and yeah instead of a six inch just put in an inch which would cover probably two houses or inch and a half [20:45] **Neil [Staff]:** it is common when water is not looped for it to become stale and that's what we're talking here okay that's why it has nothing so much to do with the usage it's everywhere most everywhere in the city you the water gets looped so it's always getting fresh oh okay we did have someone here uh last month or two uh came forward because of that very condition and asking us to to look at that so okay it does happen uh if we're doing like one lot you know just do like a one inch service water line that would probably help quite a bit of that instead of having six inches of water sitting around okay [21:31] **Matt Montgomery:** as it's not a uh an improved street or anything who would do things like the snow plowing i got it all over the place yeah right now mr anderson does all that with just his own personal equipment so there would have to be some kind of agreement or maybe a mini a mini association you know someone could pay someone to do it i mean you'd only have to really have that agreement between two people so i think that could be breached i i'm not familiar with mr massey's work rick samuelson i'm very familiar i've known rick for years the topography doesn't change at all why massey put it back into the bluff we we do have a set thing that we do setbacks on on bluff property and this is awful awful tight just to be kind and i'll show you what she has there [22:17] **Neil [Staff]:** so if you're looking at yeah so it's sitting there just like that so this is the alleyway here right right no i understand that 30 foot setback 30 foot from the bluff that leaves 60 foot here but i don't i don't think uh well that's that's tight i'll let others here matt do you want to look and pass it down neil with all the information that we have here uh if previous property owners tried to do the same thing was it cited why they were rejected then i think it just i don't know uh um why the reasoning was but they just dropped it and the neighbor i think it was a struggle so from what i understand the neighbor next door said there at one time this whoever owned it before was talking like 20 lots somehow on that property [23:18] **Jody Ripple:** right i think he had more unrealistic expectations for that area because it i mean it's there's a lot of river bottom off the bottom that bluff so there's not you know that's the buildable area that what you see there that is that is it yeah i think he thought he was going to put in a very large development more like 20 lots well like i said i i have some issues with the water that you're going to have to water and sewer that you're going to have to bring in um unimproved road who's going to be in charge of it not just snow removal but other you know maintaining it uh i often walk down to where the road goes to because i live in that neighborhood okay and there's barely enough room right now for a car to go through um so how how are you going to address those those issues we don't want to create a future problem for the city where as you guys might own it now if they come forward and say well gee city you got to do this this and this you're putting us in a difficult position what i mean if it's something the city doesn't want to deal with could they do like a permanent easement to that owner where you guys just i mean that road goes into the end of that bluff so i don't think it's really you know something for the city is never going to develop anymore down there they're never going to develop it as a tar road right [24:50] **Neil [Staff]:** could you make it into where they buy the land or something then the city doesn't have anything to do with it anymore make it private if you did that you'd have to when you vacated it would vacate well it's 16 foot you'd take eight foot and give it to this property owner and eight foot would go to this property owner which would uh then it really would be tight okay because that's how you typically if you vacate a street half and half goes right right that's the other issue it still doesn't front a city street which is in our in our definitions and uh that that kind of can you can you explain to me what the what the concern is just more simplistically because if if someone's plowing it and maintaining it now and it's not an issue what what becomes an issue by adding another house there i guess is what i'm asking how would you want to explain that well two of them homes that is the alley is just his garage he faces the uh yep the street sure and then the other one has got a portion of the street your house yep and this one does not have any street frontage that's that's the concern and that there is a hydrant there too so at least there's that for fire too it's one thing that is right on the corner of that up called the sack right that helps at least two that there is a well there's not an address back there either it's an alley so i would imagine that whoever developed that would have to put in some sort of a street would if we made that part of the deal well yeah that's that's another issue i didn't think of that um and i'm still not sure if it's buildable uh because anytime you have a slope uh in excess of about 18 20 degrees it's and we've got to be have that set back so i don't even know if that's feasible it's got a limestone underneath there what's that does it have lime is it limestone base under under it i think so at some point in the bluff you can see on the back side there's limestone imagine there's i'm not familiar with the soil building on limestone or sand is what i'm asking yeah there's limestone at some point if you look on the bluff but i mean i'm sure the herb she's got a full basement right there it's going to be about the same elevation so i imagine it's not i'm sure there's some sort of dirt on top of it it would be a perfect for a walk out lot basically but the sewer would have to be pumped from the basement up because hers is already for the elevation wise lift station in the basement [28:28] **Matt Montgomery:** so so it's just just off hand it seems to me i need a little time with this to consider this a little more this is uh could be could be trouble it could be no problem we don't have all this right we don't have all the answers that we have all the answers yeah that's for sure right one of the questions from the uh city attorney also says structural capacity so i think if you have a study that shows where the building site would be with the composition of the soil how firm it is all that stuff uh that would probably help your cause other core samples from that area right because if we if we give you the thumbs up and then we find out it's no good it's all clay and you're all downhill right okay um does the city engineer need to get like maybe involved and say what i think a lot of this has got to do with our ordinance and whether it's allowed to be a lot away from a public street you know one lot away her house and then another one and if it's a buildable area you know we got conflicting surveys and i don't know i uh i've been in this business quite a while and i've taken a lot of calls for stagnant water and a 300 foot service i don't know if you'd find many of them in in any city to be honest with you that's a whole block long and um so i don't know i'm just spitballing this but we've had other people that have asked for a variance they have their own septic in their own well usually obviously our photography is a little unique and with the river right there would that be an option to avoid the would they water or i don't i don't know if they'd have room to put it in that little area there would be room for what i mean a normal three bedroom septic is like 40 by 60 feet my dad puts them in but there wouldn't be usually you have to have two sites i already kind of went over that with him before that to make it worth putting it in to have at least two sites you have to have two sites usually unless you have probably have to have alerts again no i have one or something i don't i'm not sure that we uh even allow right it was just it was discussed with a different property owner but right i think i think we've got something our ordinance says yeah if it's available yeah we have to we gotta put it down it's usually if not available yeah yeah right right of which we do have one or two spots in town that that it is an issue and if you're going to run a uh 300 foot service are you going to allow it to be run down the alleyway or has it got to be run down somewhere else i don't know what the answer is to that we did discuss that earlier in this this project this thing's been tossed around a lot because it's a it's a tricky one you guys can see that and they said they would put the services on their property run it down the property line and bring it out to the out to the uh out to the roadway so that would have to be in the and they had mentioned that they they're not going to build right away i i don't know if that's still the case but all this has got to get down and writing and and make sure the next group of people that are going to look at this when this thing comes in knows what they're going to have to be required so not that it matters but were you planning on developing this for somebody or put it on the market and sell the land or i would prefer not to be the one to develop it yeah i mean that would factor in my marketing the cost the sale price i would rather have somebody else do it but i mean if i had to because of all the requirements i probably could okay so jody would you put a street in there other than the alley i hope not well but that that also goes goes toward an address right yeah that was an issue i hadn't i didn't think of right now yeah there appears to be more questions than answers at this point before yeah forward can i get a list of these questions because i i mean all of this stuff is kind of i haven't can you i haven't had time to think about it jody i'll get those two tomorrow would that be okay what's that i can email those to you tomorrow would that be okay yep that would be wonderful all right okay uh commission i assume we want to wait on this until we can get better answers i think one of the the main concerns is is the buildable area and the two surveys that's a biggie yeah can you tell me exactly what the discrepancy is between the two surveys the one um dave maroney had done last summer i believe by um rick samuelson yeah and he was uh dave maroney was our old city administrator samuelson yes sure yeah but is i mean is the samuelson one where they establish the actual bluff is that what's different yeah yeah look at the lines because this i mean the setbacks are standard they're just samison survey is saying that the bluff starts sooner closer [Music] okay to be honest the samuelson survey almost makes it look like the existing house is questionable with that line the highlight goes right to it and i'm just yeah yeah and that's not right i mean if you go out there and look it's actually a it's a fairly flat area it's like you said the depends on what they call a bluff i'm not an expert on that that's why that survey is but her house is in the little flat backyard in front behind her house i mean okay it's nowhere near the bluff so that doesn't i mean we did we did look at this and it just doesn't look accurate i mean anyone's welcome to come out and to the property anytime and look [35:22] **Neil [Staff]:** yeah do we have to uh notify neighbors within so many feet like we do on some other things hopefully we don't the only reason this the only reason this is here we could have done this administratively right and split this lot but there's a there was a lot of questions that we had and uh i don't know we're going to talk a little bit about administrative lot splits here in a little bit but this one is so touchy that i think uh you as a planning commission commission needed to uh look at this one well and i'd also like to know the history of why it was turned down before because that was right with some more clues as to what their city engineer because to me at first blush looking at the contour lines and stuff it looks like yeah that would be awful tight to put a house in there i mean if you look at it though if you actually go out there i mean you've been out there have you well i i live when i do my walk i go to that cul-de-sac there and then turn around so but i like look down and but yeah i mean if you walk around in the woods a little bit i mean it's it's it's a big area it's a lot bigger than it looks on a little piece of paper i guess no no i it's 60 feet deep on one end and 42 on the other and it's 91 wide before it even tapers down i mean so if it's 60 by even 40 feet or yeah 60 deep one side and it's 42 the other by 91 i mean that's you know way more than enough to put a house in but but if you've got to have a 30 foot setback because of the bluff lines yeah 60 foot all of a sudden comes 30 foot well and it's tough with the 30-foot setback already that's why they're giving his dimensions and i think this is more accurate than this other one i'm an excavator by trait two and i deal with a little bit of this not as much as a technical side but i mean so that's already got a 30 foot and a 30 foot setback off the alleyway is the way they have that okay all right yeah i mean i think we have to determine which survey is more accurate and [Music] i think just by walking out to the property you can see that this one this one shows like you said it comes almost up to my house and you can tell that's not right just by looking no of course as we need answers to a lot of our questions a planning commission only meets once a month so we're looking at next month at best to to give any type of answer and then a recommendation to the whole council so just so you're aware of that yeah delay well we can uh we can table we can table it for now yeah that's right so do i have a motion to table i'll make a motion to table this okay second i'll second it okay all in favor all right all right thanks for coming in diane i'll try and get you the information or questions as soon as you can okay thank you thanks for coming in yeah okay um the next discussion item concerns resolution 2020-07 administrative subdivision for bruce and uh kathy tildesquist at 616 minnesota street east administrative subdivision slash loan lot boundary line adjustment for bruce [39:12] **Matt Montgomery:** and kathy to allow a combination of two lots into one lot both of which are owned by the tilde quest and bruce go ahead been working with diane on that and we we did it and i don't know if you sent the paperwork to the county but you know it's as far as we're concerned we're done basically what it is is um bruce and kathleen own two lots they're side by side and what they're proposing to do is to join both of those lots and they want to do that to allow space for an accessory structure we we want to put up a 30 by 30 garage on the vacant lot that we combine together with the regular lot bruce can i ask a quick question where on the lot do you want to put the accessory structure are you looking at the center are you looking at the front are you looking at the rear of the lot the alley side the alley side okay so the rear yeah on the east side of the lot kind of next to where the garage that we have already what if we're the red car and this yep yep perfect thank you are you going to connect them or no no so there would be a proper setback according to our zoning just in case this lot well the lots are combined together but uh i don't know what how how many feet [40:44] **Diane Johnson:** accessories from one lot to the other lot yeah you know 20 feet or so accessory structures i believe are 10 feet up the off the rear lot line there's there's trees there and we don't want to disturb the roots of the trees so i'm sure it'll be at least 20 feet from the original lot line okay uh one of the concerns when i was looking at this is uh as a city we always want to especially now that we know if we can hit 5000 we can get a bunch of money from the state every year um housing lots you know and you you know the empty lot there next to you is a very nice buildable lot yup you said you're you have already combined them yes we have no they were going to combine them but the county wanted it done by resolution so we're coming we're going to planning commissions with it i i couldn't put a garage on the vacant lot unless there was a house structure there already right so that's why we combined them together right right i i'm trying to think farther down the road when when you and kathy you know decide to whatever sell or move it'd be nice well be able to have that lot talking to jerry husby he said that [42:15] **Bruce Tildesquist:** it would be more beneficial if we added the two lots together and we'd get a higher price on our when we sold or when we died and our kids sold it or something like that they would get a better price that way bill's question or his point before is if our community does grow would they be able to go back and split this again and make that a buildable site with a pre-built garage or a 30 by 30 shed right right that's kind of what i was getting so it wouldn't diminish the ability to put a house in a lot i right right i don't think so but maybe then they can't i don't know because right and especially matt since he's put it in the rear of the property because then the house could still front minnesota street so it would be good yeah right one of the concerns just as a city as a whole is and just putting another garage on there versus say a home being built there the city loses tax money also and uh that's you know housing doesn't make the taxes for us usually our commercial and industrial does but it's still something to consider as a city but as long as i know that we can uh i don't know anything about that yeah but but as long as we're paying taxes on both lots right but now the empty lot is a lot cheaper than the one with the home on it yeah that i do know i i'm not opposed to what you want to do here i just want to make sure that in the future as as matt mentioned you know 20 years down the road whatever and that lot becomes available and someone wants to split to put the house because it does make sense if they did put a house on it the it could be combined or you know linked up with the garage and and not to digress a little bit i i know you had been before the public works and the alley and the way the water runs did that ever get no okay that was going to be a that's when you get done asking me questions i got a question for you [44:40] **Matt Montgomery:** bruce um i guess uh commission what uh what what do you want to do make a motion to approve a second there to approve resolution 2020-07 um all right uh there's no other questions all in favor aye opposed on all right okay my question to you i don't know when was it 16 months ago yeah it was at least a year and a half i think half of you were there yep oh yeah and i just left it on the table but um right and then mike now mike left uh his position as public works director and we've kind of floundered a few things here well kind of at that time he said what what i wanted to do was tear up the alley and and when buddy byers was alive and he lived on the next door and he was a dirt contractor he said that there should have been three truckloads of gravel removed for the water to run decently through the alley and so then mike said well there's money in the slush fund to do that but then he left so nothing happened right because your alley is here and you're yeah level under your garage just dropped it off yeah and so the next door neighbor well yeah mine is that way [46:11] **Bruce Tildesquist:** and that's kind of why we want to get another garage i let my wife worry that but anyway my next door neighbor john soul behind there his slope down and there was always a pool of water there and even last night after i don't know how much water we had for rain but it was full again and so my question is if nothing's going to be done then i'm going to have to build up my cement pad for the where the garage is above the you'll have to we'll have to bring that up to public works again and see i remember mike we had talked about an in-ground drain i mean we they just started spitballing uh possible ideas for that uh we'd have to bring that up again because when it got tabled it did not make it on the agenda again yeah well i just i don't know right no i i don't how did i leave it bill i just threw it out and said okay you guys do handle it it's more important i think to get it solved before winter and the snow and the snow melt and all that because that's where your greater problems is rain storms everybody gets puddles yeah but yeah so and matt's uh the chair now the public works nope that's steve well steve is i'm sorry you're still on you're still on public works so i don't i don't know maybe i should you know i'd like to get we can get going building as soon as possible so um another item tomorrow night at our council meeting we're going to be hiring a new public works director so i think i'm not sure how long it'll be before that gentleman starts but then we can bring it to him also you can come get a firsthand look at it yeah well then would that have to come back here then from him or well public works publications go directly to the council with an approval or with uh okay whatever gonna work so that's where we have to leave it at the moment for us so um well my thing you approve tonight we'll go to the council tomorrow night right so it won't make that agenda because it's within 24 hours it'll be on our next one right yeah correct so our september uh matter of fact september 1st will be our first meeting in uh okay so that's when that'll get officially approved okay so when will i be able to get a building permit because uh you know kind of kind of yeah the day after symbol with the contractors you know they try to want to get going and sure yeah december 2nd is what neil says right so okay council approval on the first and bruce we can actually turn that into the county and we can get approval and we'll just not have you pay for it until the county approve of it or before yeah yeah okay i'm reasonably sure it'll pass the uh the council because three of us here have already voted okay so okay i'm sure john's not opposed so you're gonna have the votes regardless so so september 2nd is when you i'll be on i'll be on the agenda on the 22nd or the second one on the 1st of september okay and then the second you can go do your stuff okay so um the person you're gonna hire tomorrow night how do i get the whole well get to see him or he would start subject to background character he probably won't start until after september it'll be after this it'll be a month maybe we can uh maybe we can go out there and take a look at it oh yeah bring tony with yeah so i'll wait until it rains and then come out and look all right well okay thank you very much thanks bruce i think it would be able to scrape it off we got a road grader let's go out there and see that lot and we it right yeah yeah okay uh compared to the lot okay uh next uh next item uh item d resolution 20 2008 administrative subdivision for andy haynes owner of minnesota woodcraft at 894 4th street south administrative subdivision lot combination for minnesota woodcraft to allow a piece of the parcel of the cannon falls mall property to be added to the current parcel of minnesota woodcraft to allow for business expansion who gets that one [50:48] **Matt Montgomery:** and it would be um they would be adding 10 200 square feet from the mall property on to andy hines and what he is going to do is expand his business in town with that property so we do we know if he's gonna add another building there he is going to yes okay cool wow one of the things i want you to consider is that there's existing assessments on that and when you make the motion please refer to that assessment so the mall ed reimers is going to keep all the assessments on his parcel so we'll have to get him to sign that agreement that you diane passed out to you guys and that's because the original assessments were for reimer he's going to keep not burden the new owner going to keep 100 of the assessment all right any comments uh if not uh take a motion and include the special assessment i will make that motion do i have a second decadent okay so we have a motion to approve resolution 2020-08 along with the special assessment agreement that mr reimers will have to sign keeping all the assessments for that uh property um okay um all in favor hi hi okay good um last item number e is a review of a concept plan for the first edition of towering bluffs and discussion to set a public hearing if approved i can take that uh mr jablonski cannot be here tonight he uh he is ill so i i'll take over for him this is a pretty basic subdivision if you focus on the square right in the middle of the page that's the water tower and i don't think you'll see more of a basic subdivision this one it's just a streak going in with a tee and lots going off of both sides the lots are uh 45 to 45 to 60 feet wide and i know in your goal setting meetings you wanted some affordable homes and the 45 lot foot lots bring that to the city 60 foot lots you can get a nice home on them and so there's a combination of of both 45 and 60. if you uh if you like the concept that that he's bringing forth appreciate a motion to uh set a public hearing and he'll bring it in as a preliminary plot are are these going to be a slab on grade um we'll have to see which uh what his grading plan looks like when he gets that it okay are we dealing with the same conditions of the soil as we dealt with across the street i would hope not god i hope there's nothing better to make sure we get some good core samples out of that area and has an integral that wouldn't be necessary for bringing forward the plan anyhow yeah okay we got to do is go john you're looking forward to some new [55:02] **Matt Montgomery:** neighbors now neil would yeah would we be able to because this goes right over that existing road to the water tower are we able to put one off a spring garden road it'll uh to get access to that water tower they'll actually use the road and they'll use the oh sure use the street that's oh they're gonna yeah that tease there it's uh yeah that'll be a nice access for us and are there any rules about um how close you can be to a water tower no okay against cease to exist it's not in the plans [Music] yeah i think it looks good come on the soil is good from uh footage to acreage what would those lots break down to okay okay um [Applause] do i um you just need us for an approval for uh for the in favor of the concept plans what you're looking for i set a public hearing for the next planning commission meeting okay um do i have a motion to uh uh to approve the concept plan i will make a motion we approve the concept plan okay have a second oh second okay we have a second uh also so uh all in favor aye aye yeah i might also okay uh you had um [57:00] **Neil [Staff]:** something else neil you wanted to talk about the administrative uh yeah one of the things i uh i want to bring to the planning commission as we work through these uh lot combination administrative lot combinations and and lot splits as we uh bring in these subdivisions and you take a look and you got uh some 45 foot lots i think we got to be a little careful on how generous we are with the lot combinations i think the goal here is to put homes in the in the city i know you guys in your goal setting meeting is looking at affordable homes and and more homes and if we allow lot combinations administratively um you know what we're going to get there's you're going to buy two 45-foot lots here and you want to want to combine them and i think that'll happen more often than not and if we end up with two three subdivisions which i think we might hear we got another one in the works that may be coming at the next uh meeting and and we've got to be i would like to carry on that conversation with the planning commission on how how your feelings are on on combining lots that are two buildable lots and put them together so they can put a garage on one such as mr kildurquist and and in the future because it uh it does use up a lot of uh uh street frontage uh you take a look at that and and you know residential uh housing districts don't pay for themselves anyhow and then you uh take a a good lot and and just build a garage on it it does hinder how how the taxes are laid out in the in the city um i know people like to have the wide open spaces and and the bigger lots but i'd just like to have your opinions on uh and maybe think about it it's nothing that we have to decide about tonight but think about it and we can talk about it again uh at the next meeting um because you know you're all these lots here now will have services stuck to them and i would imagine the one that we just approve has a service stub to it and we could put a house on that and have another two three thousand dollars in in taxes paid but now we just put a garage on it and that'll be the way it'll be so i think it's something that we should look at and i don't think administratively we should be doing it i think it should be coming to the planning commission for these things and and uh diane and i you know just such as as jody ripples one here that was a difficult one and i think staff could end up with having some issues with either you as a commission or them as the requesters saying well if i would have turned that down then it was me and diane saying no and i don't think that's right i think i think the commission needs to make that decision so that's why the commissions and especially the council that's what we get paid the big bucks for so you know i would like you to think about that and we'll continue to have the conversation um and it goes both ways with the lot splits and the lot combinations [1:00:56] **Matt Montgomery:** because you know if you look at what we just did that was two perfectly good lots and we just put them together and and and made one that could have been built on made it so just an idea that you you think something could be written in like like when they come and um show a survey or show whatever they're gonna do you know that that we could put something in there that you know they can't lots can't be combined or something or if it's a buildable lot yeah of some sort yeah i think that would be fair because uh um because then you just pulled one house out of the city of cannon falls or for now for now for at least next five ten years yeah and glenn a really good example that um neil gave was if you look at that there's what 26 lots there and not everyone would combine them obviously but if they did i mean you could be down to 12 lots or 12 families moving into town as opposed to 24. that's a big difference yeah so we have to change our our ordinances to reflect that if we went that route and then well and another reason why i brought that one to you because the administrative subdivision says on an improved street well that one wasn't an improved street that's why you guys got to take a look at that but mr tilterquist uh his is an approved street and i still felt uncomfortable because i know as as part of the planning commission but more on the finance side on how much taxes are produced on these lots in the in the front footage of streets and and knowing that it doesn't pay for itself in the first place it i look at it in the financial aspect of it all i guess i do know we forgot the question even though i know this is going to happen he already has two structures on his property so the the small shed is going to get torn down because we can only have two external going back to what you said about combining with developments like this uh [1:03:16] **Matt Montgomery:** would we encourage there to be like housing associations then because then they can set the rules of what style houses and what and then they can say no we you don't double up they'll probably have covenants on that subdivision more than likely the city doesn't enforce covenants that will be public roadways so that'll all be public right-of-ways and and housing associations probably won't be in effect but covenants as well and it will be incumbent upon the developer to put the streets the stuff in and all that sort of stuff in the reason i say that is if you know where i live right across the street now they started building on the first house that's fine but there's supposedly three lots there the middle one's not stubbed in we refer to it as a mcmahon special a former city engineer so if they ever want to build in that middle lot or they have to build on the two right from my driveway across the street they got to tear it all up and put stuff in and then we patch what is considered according to tony uh one of our better streets i mean there's some crack seals and stuff like that so we got to pay pretty close attention when things are getting put in so we don't run into this situation now for me personally if they do that it's just a hassle for a couple days but the road's integrity has now been and typically if you do a lot combination you're going to require the the services to be capped especially you know take cap it at the water main so you don't have that possibility of leaking and the same with the sewer so now you're digging into the street again so it it's something to talk about something to think about and maybe have uh some more conversation at the next meeting so so when they do a subdivision like this do they have to stub water and sewer in on the lots okay yeah every lot will have a water sewer service they're all ready to go okay if i had a disappointment with jablonski is it the 45 foot lots he's thinking split level homes on all those lots now i'm not a split level hole i wouldn't want one no that's why i'm like [1:05:34] **Glenn Lundell:** if i was to go into that development i'm looking to downsize i want a 60-foot lot myself but yeah you got to watch this you know where you know they buy a couple lots like you say and they want to combine them or so could we make him make 60 foot lots instead of 45 foot or yeah that'll be uh that's part of the planning commission process the preliminary plat is not the final plot you'll see this thing twice yet one of the things is when you talk affordable homes every foot that you have in front of your house is worth a lot of money as far as infrastructure and then to keep the lot prices low that's why they have the affordable or the the 45 foot lot to be affordable homes and unfortunately nowadays affordable homes is 250 000 and and crawling upward and that's what he's trying to uh bring here is uh affordable homes and then a and then a mid-sized nicer home on the 60-foot lots if he went to 60 foot he'd probably be another 50 000. yeah it would be tough and we know out by the school we have a potential for that great development but the owner doesn't want to do what's necessary to to allow us to go forward on that both in pricing and infrastructure that would have to put in the ones he did build out there there was already was a 72nd street or something like that i believe right out there yeah uh so he was able to do those without having to you know other than the stubborns do much but you know the gazette i can't remember how many houses he was originally talking but i think it was like 50 to 75. there's a lot and there's two out there on where you're talking about that street right across the school yeah right on right on 19 yeah that's a nice development could be could be absolutely but but the owner's a little bit high on his lot prices and and doesn't want to quite pay the money it's going to take to do the infrastructure all right nothing else another question and that's uh have we heard anything from midnight about sidewalk upgrades they came through last year that for next summer i don't know when it's going to be but it'll be a long 19. i don't have we heard anything more from them you're pretty darn interested right there well yeah because they're yeah i'm right in the heart of all that i think it's important to couple notes here anybody noted in the big rain that we got eight eight inches or whatever it was that night that my sidewalk uh became a river there was a two by four floating down onto highway 19 from up up came up from the gully up there i don't know how much damage it did but it was it was a two by four out six foot two by four floating down the highway and i had the debris up against thank goodness i had a uh flower barrier i guess there's a flower bed there that stopped the water diverted it around the house and went down the front sidewalk and then just went down the sidewalk too it was a major i've only seen it a few times but i think it's good that we i might make note to uh not that there is a possibility of an issue update on that project i can't hear you what that's a cold but i think everything's gonna drop oh okay since the cove and nothing no no no development you never know what's gonna surprise you with those people i've been surprised a few times and then then we should make them make them if they leave those signs up that say yield put a sign underneath it yield left turn only because people come there and they get just about in the corner yeah and they see this yield sign they slam on their brakes and like yeah i don't supposed to yield two ways yeah on my on that corner there where i live your house too i saw three semis within an hour one tried to go straight up the hill of course but stop before he went straight up then the other made a right turn and tried to go up the hill and the other turned the corner and stopped right there there's a problem with signage or something or yeah it's just it's just a really a bad deal map all those semis they're trying to go to park but i've never seen it happen like i've never seen it so first let's let's end the meeting here first do i have a motion to adjourn motion second all in favor all aye okay [1:10:56] **Matt Montgomery:** okay