“The Aquatic Center opened in 1958 with some of the current infrastructure 67 years old. The original pump room has undergone retrofits over time and additions over decades but years of exposure to the corrosive gases and a very limited Headroom in height in a range of about 8 feet to 9 and 1/2 ft makes the space unsuitable for current equipment.”

“The setback was mandated by the Department of Natural Resources. It's not something that the city had a choice.”

“The existing pump room is too small for the expanded equipment that needs to be installed. We needed to expand in some way. Of course keeping the pipes coming in as they are that are already connected underneath for the drains of the existing water bodies made it difficult to try to think about moving those because you'd have to rebuild the water bodies if we were to move the existing pump room.”

“I'm struggling because we have previously on a couple of occasions in the city has recommended against putting things in high water level areas and one of them was for patio structure. I understand that the pool is an important piece of the city but I think if we as a city are asking residents not to do this I think we have to spend a lot of time kind of justifying why we can do it.”

“When I look at the conditions of what what needs to be achieved to secure a variance to me this is a very straightforward approval. The bigger the ask, the more discretion we have to make decisions. This is a very straightforward approval because the conditions for practical difficulties are met—the proposed use is reasonable in nature, the circumstances are unique to the property, and if granted it will not alter the central character of the locality.”

“This project delivers a public benefit rather than a private benefit. The main feature of the land between the new pump house and the pond is a two-lane road and that's certainly a different circumstance than anything we have seen in residential applications around ponds.”

“These are signs that were permitted back in 1977 when the church was originally built and we're basically just trying to replace the ones that are there in the same locations with similar signs.”

“The ground there is really swampy. It is around the church as well and it keeps decaying we lose about an inch a year in height. The sign so that's why that one went down.”

“I spent literally almost an hour yesterday trying to find that third sign. It was literally laying down in the image. Since you know commissioner alaire have found it, it makes sense now that you're replacing it because the bridge and the steeple are very iconic and you could see it on your approach easily, but that third sign just confirms that it's there.”

“The purpose and the intent of the code is to allow for Monument signs that provide visibility without causing impacts on safety or sight lines. The requested variances would be in harmony with the general purpose and intent of the code.”

“We've had our neighborhood meeting, our sketch plan, both Planning Commission as well as Council took some feedback and took your comments and what we heard and have made some changes. We worked with City staff on a handful of other variances that we had and I think all of them actually are off of there now.”

“The primary comments that sketch plan were this emphasis on Arcadia and really celebrating that in the pedestrian realm. A big part of it was shifting the building and the podium itself to really increase that setback along Arcadia. We shifted that Podium piece 17 feet inward and then the building kind of proper as it kind of touches the ground was also inset four feet.”

“I think it's a great resource for the city. In terms of the design I think it makes sense where the pump room is going to be located. The roadway I think it's like 7 ft from the edge of the road to the actual proposed pump line pump room wall the closest point. Generally speaking the ride of way and the setback requirements is like around 5 ft roughly for most buildings that are 8 ft tall so if this was a house it probably would be okay in that location.”

“There was a lot of discussion in the work that we looked at about how close you are to Transit and there was most of the information said it was a quarter of a mile and I understand that that gives you the ability to change the parking numbers function of how close you are to Transit but then in the Transportation memo it said that was a half a mile.”

“Why so much glass? How do you make that determination? Is that a function of utilities or exposure or cost?”

“From the development standpoint and from the leaseability standpoint within the office space, the all-glass facade is certainly the most desirable. That space is what people want—a lot of natural light. You're seeing a lot of office spaces transformed since COVID with more open functional spaces. When you have a lot of glass on the exterior you're able to get a lot of that light into the center core of the building so you can illuminate the whole floor and create a much better work environment from a leaseability standpoint.”

“What makes this building successful is the juxtaposition of the component that is kind of protruding out from underneath the building and then the building itself. We really celebrated more opacity at the podium element—our dock—and then letting the building proper be more glassy so that we can really create a nice contrast between those two elements. Additionally, both East and West sides will have horizontal shading fins so that when you get that warm Western Summer Sun you'll get some reprieve within the building.”

“I'm looking at the Cabana, I just want to get your sense of safety right. We have the railing there. Do you have any concerns at all with kids climbing over that thing, running out into the street, climbing up to get into the aquatic center?”

“I just did want to make one more note. Obviously it's in the staff report it says you this pump house must be located here. Obviously it really needs to be located here. There would be extreme expense to move it and put it somewhere else. You're talking about rebuilding pools and relanding it. The only other comment I really wanted to make was that I'm going to abstain here. Don L did propose on this project so I'll be abstaining.”

“I'm new to the commission but I've got a fair amount of history with this the Grand View area. We talked for what seemed like years on that plan. We had a lot of vision for it. The rendering showed housing. I do like a few things about this. I like bringing 300 or several hundred people into the area to help support Grand View. I like the dock, the walking area, the front area where you have the little seating. It's nice to have the welcoming door on Arcadia. But the one thing we talked about at length on this site was that this is the one location in Grand View where height is really seemed to be okay. My feeling was that this site could support we always talked about going up to the height of the Jerry's Tower. It seems like that was what it was. You didn't go all the way up. It seems like it could have gone up a little bit higher. The building materials—not a huge fan of that glass. I kind of understand what you're saying about tenants and liking to see out and having the natural light come in. Glass is fine, it's just that there's a lot of glass and there's not a lot of the materials that we kind of had in that Grand View area plan—the stone, the brick.”

“The concrete we've got a couple ramps in town that made it through this and got built that aren't the prettiest in town. I'm thinking of the Southdale medical office building ramp. They made them some detail on it. There are things that could be done to it and stone or brick in my opinion would be nice and carrying it up through elements of the building and either columns or somehow showing that.”

“The renderings I think it seemed like you saw rings from the freeway somewhere. It gave me a feeling like a cut off IDS Tower, a shrunk down blast building that didn't really fit the area. Across the way we've got the brand new residential building that's there which put a lot of effort into what they did for finishes.”

“I'm having trouble and maybe you can explain why we can't orient the public space more to the north and west because I think chair Bennett had even mentioned like we don't care about the setback on the highway side push it that direction push the height. Why can't we preserve some of that space on the west for that engagement since this is supposed to be the jewel box and the entrance into Grand View?”

“One of them is our storm water mitigation strategy. Our storm water really the only place we could get it to fit was on the east side so there's a limitation on how much we can shove our building East. We did it as far as we possibly could. We can only locate it within our property so we've put the storm water tanks as far east as possible.”

“I think what we were trying to do is we were totally embracing the idea of activating and engaging Arcadia. The amount of vegetation and the amount of relief we have from the street is I think it is going to be welcoming. We really wanted to define that street edge and we're thinking ahead of what might be developed across the street and really embracing the idea that this might feel like an outdoor room framed by buildings on both sides.”

“I'm rethinking like on day one I just can't imagine like the why someone would circulate along the along the east and north like there's it seems like they I don't know if that it's actually a shortcut to get anywhere but if they're going to commute they're going to take the shortest route possible and without it available you're inviting people through the building and the parking instead.”

“I definitely have a hang up with not shifting the building East and so one of the questions that I'm just still thinking about is you know sometimes with the storm water mitigation you know it can get like buried under a portion of the building. You know you sacrifice some parking and you know you have your foundation wall kind of over to one side. Was that considered to kind of maximize because I I just see this and I think this is really great but the next step better is again to get more space on that west side.”

“I'm going to bring up the bike again. If I biked here to go to the Toasted restaurant because I would go to a Toasted restaurant, I'm going to go behind City Hall and I'm going to go on the Southside and I'm going to park in the back and I'm going to go in the back doors.”

“We studied that this will be our headquarters. We need space by the end of next year. We will be moving forward with this assuming that we get through the entitlement process. We've run the returns and the math on our end and we're confident with the building that we've proposed today. We do not have a TIF ask out to the city for this project so we will be fully moving forward—private financed.”

“What type of tenants this might attract under what circumstance? What size are they?”

“We've kind of seen all across the board whether it's financial groups or real estate groups or a wide array. You're seeing in some of the larger tenants that are looking they're typically actually downsizing. They were maybe in 80s or 90s office buildings with floor plates that didn't work anymore and they're going from 40 or 50,000 down to the 25,000 foot plate because they can be so much more efficient than they used to be.”