Mhm. >> Mhm. >> All right, I'll go ahead and call the meeting to order. Good evening and welcome to the April 30th, 2026 meeting of the Minnetonka Planning Commission. The Commission generally meets twice a month, always on a Thursday. The schedule and tentative meeting agendas can be obtained by calling the Planning Division or by checking the city website at minnetonkamn.gov. The Commission holds public hearings on land use applications. For all land use applications, the city notifies property owners within at least 400 ft of the site and posts plans and information on minnetonkamn.gov. For some applications, the city also places signs on the properties and places notices in the Sun Sailor. From a specific process standpoint, the Commission makes recommendations to the City Council on rezonings, subdivisions, conditional use permits, and also amendments to the city's comprehensive guide plan, zoning ordinance, and subdivision regulations. We also make final decisions on site plans, signage requests, variance requests, and expansion permits unless these requests are part of an application that must be heard by the City Council. In that case, the Commission makes a recommendation and the City Council makes a final decision. Anyone aggrieved by a final planning commission decision may appeal the decision to the city council. If you wish to appeal, you must submit a written request to city staff within 10 days of this meeting. From a broader standpoint, the city's comprehensive guide plan, zoning ordinance, and subdivision regulations are the city's best efforts to codify a balance between individual rights and community responsibilities. Individual rights are easy to understand. Community responsibilities are more subtle, but the idea that is that we, as members of the community, agree to limit our individual rights for the common good of the group. The planning division, the planning commission, and the city council are charged with managing this sometimes difficult balancing act. We ask that you keep this broader perspective in mind as we review tonight's applications. To make meetings more efficient, in 2026, the city's boards and commissions have introduced a new process for public comment. If you wish to speak at tonight's meeting, please fill out a public comment card, like this one, which is available right there by the speakers the staff podium, excuse me. Be sure to include your name and the topic you wish to address. The cards will be collected before the public hearing items, and I will announce your name when it is your turn to speak. Again, welcome. Staff, please call roll. Brink. Here. Sure. Here. Banks. Absent. Johnson. Here. Minion. Here. Chair Waterman. Here. There are five of us tonight. Uh next up, item number three, approval of the agenda, and staff, I believe there's a change memo. We do. Thank you, chair. And as you can see, Susan's gone tonight, so I'll be filling in for her and filling the Susan's shoes, uh if you will. So, yes, for item 8A, the Matson residence, that's a CUP for and the variance, uh there were some items submitted supplemental information from the applicant. They also there was some square footage discrepancies between uh city and the applicant and what they had. However, those discrepancies didn't change the request, but we just wanted to note those. And then for item 8B, that's the conditional use permit and site and building plan review for the athletic dome at Hopkins High School. The applicant submitted some supplemental visuals. Uh so those are also added in to that change memo. Great. Thank you, Drew. Um all right. May I have a motion to approve the agenda uh with the changes noted by staff? Motion Brink. I'll second. Second chair. Uh all those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. All right. Motion carries. Uh next up item number four, approval of minutes. This is the approval of minutes from the April 16th, 2026 meeting. Commissioners, are there any changes? No changes. May I have a uh motion to approve the minutes? Motion Johnson. I'll second. Second Minion. All those in favor signify by saying I. I. >> I. Motion carries. Next up item number five, report from staff. Thank you, chair. Uh so there was it's been a couple council meetings since uh our last meeting. One was a study session. There was not really much for planning going on at that one. Uh really the council talked about the budget, uh public safety master plan, an amendment to some council rules, then also uh discussion for the study session topics coming up. So um nothing exactly planning related, but that did happen on April 20th. And then uh there was a council meeting on April 27th, and there was plenty of planning related items that went there. Uh the conditional use permit for an ADU, the Marty residence, that one was approved. Uh also there was a short-term rental ordinance introduction that occurred. So that will be coming your way at I believe our next planning commission meeting or coming soon. Um that item will be got brought again here for uh public hearing and then also for discussion. Um, Minnetonka Middle School East, that one uh was the conditional use permit and site and building plan for some additions and some parking lot changes. That also was approved at that meeting. And then lastly, uh Fisher and Francis, that's off of uh 15815 Minnetonka Boulevard. That was a conditional use permit and ADU request that was approved on a split vote of 4 to 3. And that was Oh, and then just a note, our next planning commission meeting is May 14th. So, that's everything I have, Chair. All right. Thank you, Mr. Ingvalson. Uh next up, item number six, report from planning commissioners. Commissioners, anything to report? Commissioner Share. Thank you. Um, I attended for the sustainability um group, I attended an event this past weekend for the clothing swap birthday. And so, I have some information about how that went. So, 2025's event, I can I'll start there so you'll see what an amazing improvement it was or how much bigger it got. 2025 was 874 lb of clothing collected and reused. And then 687 was actually swapped at the event last year. And then 187 was donated to His House. Now, this year, um 2221 lb of clothing was collected. Uh 2176 was reused. 1800 was swapped at the event. Uh 374 donated. So, 98% of the clothing was reused. And there were 11 of us there volunteering. It was amazing. And 43 hours total of volunteer time. Wow. So. Thank you. Very good. Thank you for sharing. Commissioners, anything else? Commissioner Minion. Just a thank you to the city for the recognition dinner for all the different commissions. Great job. Uh hats off to the uh planning commission for winning the trivia. Thank you very much. And then just a shout out for the tree steward program. The city offers a tree steward program. It's a great group of people led by the city's great group of people, but a great group of people getting together volunteer making an impact on environmental around us and they're always looking for volunteers. So, I encourage people to sign up and get involved. It's a great group. Thank you. All right, thank you. Uh seeing nothing else, we'll move on to item number seven, the consent agenda. There are actually no items. Uh so, we'll we will move directly to the non-consent agenda, item number eight. Uh for before we get begin consideration of non-consent items, I'd like to review the steps in the process and the public hearing procedure that will be followed for each proposal. First, the item will be announced and staff will report on the subject. The commission will then ask questions. Next, the applicant will be invited to make a presentation or offer comments. Commissioners may ask additional questions at this time. After the applicant is finished, the public hearing will be open to give anyone present the opportunity to comment on the proposal. Uh as mentioned in the call to order, there's a new process for for public comments. Uh if you wish to speak on any item in tonight's meeting, this is your last chance to fill out a public comment card available over at the staff podium. Again, be sure to include your name and the topic you wish to address. Uh the cards will be collected before the public hearing and I will announce your name when it is your turn to speak. I apologize in advance for any mispronunciations. Additionally, this is actually the first time we're trying this out. We have a clock, uh speaker clock, at the podium. I believe each speaker will be allowed allotted 3 minute time limit. Uh So again, appreciate keeping your comments brief and your patience as we work work that into the meeting. Once everyone has spoken, we may allow speakers to return for additional comments at larger meeting for additional comments. Also, at larger meetings, we have a few things on the agenda. I see a lot of people here. Neighborhood spokespeople are encouraged and we will up the allotted time limit for that up to 15 minutes. I will say as a general matter, we we do have a fair amount on tonight's agenda. So I'd remind commissioners and the public that really the planning commission's role is to evaluate applications against specific land use and zoning criteria that's outlined in the staff reports. So I I ask that we keep our questions and comments focused on those criteria tonight. The first item on tonight's non-consent agenda is item 8A, a conditional use permit with rear yard setback variance for a detached accessory dwelling unit at 13131 Minnetonka Drive. And this is a recommendation that the City Council adopt the resolution denying the request. Ms. Rooney, I believe this is your item. Yeah, thank you, Chair Commissioners. Before you this evening is that application for the conditional use permit for the accessory structure with the second story ADU at 13131 Minnetonka Drive. Excuse me. The subject property is located just south of Minnetonka Boulevard just east of Baker Road. It's at the corner I suppose where Minnetonka Drive turns into Elm Lane. It is a relatively flat property with its lowest elevation at the corner of Elm Lane and Minnetonka Drive. The 0.88 acre parcel consists of a single family home and a a detached two-stall garage as well as an accessory structure as you can see from the images there. Um Here is what the applicant is proposing, so you can see um here is the 1,800 square foot structure um with the first floor three-stall garage and second floor ADU. Um this will be placed or is proposed to be placed just southeast of the existing home. Uh the image on the right just depicts uh an elevation that would be um looking at the proposed structure from Elm Lane. Um this slide here just proposing a aerial image of um what's to be done on site. So, the green um square is essentially the existing uh detached garage that will be removed during construction. The red um polygon shows the proposed garage and ADU, and the orange shed or the orange structure is the shed that will remain um post-construction. Here's an image as well um that depicts the driveway that will be removed in green, as well as the proposed driveway in red. Obviously, the um existing driveway when it's removed during construction, that access will be um paved over and a new access will be um put in off of Elm Lane. And then here is just a full scope of what the uh applicant is proposing on site. So, you can see the driveway, the tree buffer, um some landscaping areas, as well as a paver patio area, and the existing and proposed structures on site. Um when it comes to standards, um city code allows or requires, I should say, um ADUs to maintain a minimum setback of at least 15 feet or the code-defined height of the structure. In this case, the code-defined height is 17 and 1/2 feet. Therefore, um we would have 17 and 1/2 feet feet be required as that setback. With the proposed setback of 15 ft, in this case a variance is necessary. In addition, city code limits accessory dwelling units or ADUs to 1,000 sq ft in total size or 35% of the principal dwelling unit, um whichever is less in this case. Um so city staff had a number that was provided by the access assessing department. Uh that number totaled uh 2,800 sq ft. 35% of that number um would be 992.6 sq ft. Therefore, we're going with that lower number rather than the 1,000 sq ft. When considering the variance requirements alone, the city can approve a variance from city code standards if all of um the following standards are met. So, generally the proposal aligns with the intent of the ordinance as the proposal maintains consistent building lines and adequate spacing between structures. Um additionally, the proposal is consistent with the comprehensive plan as uh it would maintain and improve actually the existing setback um for the garage. Um however, when looking at the practical difficulty standards, um there isn't a practical difficulty that exists on site. Um so, for example, while the proposal is reasonable as it increases that rear yard setback compared to what's existing on site and the proposal is consistent with the single-family character of the neighborhood just for the setback in the circumstance, um the property lacks those unique constraints. Um the ADU technically could be placed closer to that front property line in order to meet the setback rear yard setback. Um therefore, in this circumstance, uh this would make the variance unnecessary. And then when looking at the CUP standards alone, again the City Council can approve of a larger ADU um through a CUP if there are no undue impacts created by the construction. Um so, in considering the size, obviously, the maximum allowed is that 900 number or just under 1,000 ft. Um however, the proposed structure totals over 1,800 sq ft. So, even when considering um essentially alternative calculations to reduce the amount of space um that would be calculated for the total area, the the proposed structure still exceeds the um the maximum allowed. And then, when looking at scale compared to the principal structure, the ADU under what the city determines is the total floor area would be about 66% of the principal structure's um total area. So, obviously, exceeding that 35% limit. At this scale, from staff's perspective, it reads more like a secondary structure rather than an accessory dwelling unit. Um Additionally, I'll note, typically, when there are other ADUs that have come in, there are circumstances where maybe the structure either exceeds the 1,000 sq ft or the 35% of the principal structure, but generally, never has it been approved for both circumstances. And this is something that we outlined um in the last presentation at the ADU in the Fisher and Francis application. Um unfortunately, despite measures by the applicant to mitigate some of the impacts on site, um by our standards, the proposal doesn't meet the CUP criteria and is inconsistent with the ordinance's intent for subordinate accessory structures. Um I'll note, as Drew did earlier, there was some um discrepancy between what the staff considers the total floor area and what the applicant considers total floor area. I'll note that staff is taking the total floor area that was provided to them by the assessing department. Uh the applicant is obviously uh providing something that's a little bit higher. In either circumstance, the proposed structure exceeds the standards regardless of what number is being used. Um with that, obviously, there is a um change memo uh with some attachments that I've included in my presentation as well. Um staff is here for any questions that you may have as well as the applicant. Um with that, um I will leave the recommendation before you, and I am here for any questions. Great. Thanks, Ms. Rooney. Uh commissioners, questions? Commissioner Minion. Got a couple of them for you. Um there was a line in there in page four, if I remember correctly, that talked about the garage be used as a living space. I understand what a garage is. I understand what an ADU is. Can you help explain that? I I liked your drawing with the green and the pink on it. Is that what you're That's Is that part of that that description? I thought it was Is the intent to use the garage as a living space, or maybe that's an application uh applicant question. There is I'll go back. Part of the first floor, which is depicted in blue, shows the access from And maybe this is what you're describing. Um from the first floor up to the second floor for the ADU. Perhaps that was what was being confused. There is a measurement um which covers the 24 by 24, which is what staff was considering in terms of, "Okay, what do we consider part of the ADU space, and what's intended to be used for the ADU?" So, someone living in the ADU be just using the one stall, if that makes sense, rather than the two. Does that provide some clarity to you, Commissioner Runyon? I guess what I'm saying is is is any part of the garage going to be used as a dwelling? Is that the intent as you understand it? And that's the application applicant question as well, I think. For the commissioner, um the intent is that the garage stalls are used as garage stalls, not as a livable space. Excellent. And then uh square footages when things get approved above the 1,000 square foot or the different um metrics that we have in past history, uh depending on how the math works out, can you tell me about some of those numbers that we we went over some of those things when we did the uh the Fisher uh um ADU? Do you have any of those handy by any chance? Just some of the things that were approved in the past as far as volumes over the the set limits. I don't have any of the specific examples at the top of my head. Um I know for this circumstance, there's two different numbers that we're looking at, so I can run certainly through those as well as the applicant. Um he might want to touch on that as well when he goes over um the materials. Generally, in their circumstance, it's odd because we use two different standards. For the setback, we're looking at whichever setback is greater. For the square footage, we're looking at whichever number is smaller. So, it gets a little bit confusing in terms of how I'm writing it and speaking about the different um standards, but I certainly if if there's any other clarification questions I can answer or the applicant can. Okay. Thank you. Commissioners, any other questions? Nope. Okay. Uh this time the applicant is invited to come up and make a presentation or offer any comments. Uh welcome. If you could just please provide your name and address for the record. And we welcome your comments. >> Good evening. Uh my name is Andy Madsen, uh the owner of this property along with my wife Elizabeth. Um before I get going, uh is there a cursor that I can use to point at things on there? Okay, excellent. Perfect. There it is. So, as the meeting material indicates, um there is a lot of history with this property. We consider our family of seven proud stewards of this historic home. Uh we bought this home in 2014 from the from only the second owner of the home, offspring of the Quam family, who were pillars in the Minnetonka Mills area for generations. Uh this house was being pitched as a teardown opportunity by the real realtors, but we always intended to build it back up. We've been on a mission to do this for over a decade now. We love telling guests about the history of Minnetonka Mills. Uh our favorite piece of history is that Minnesota's Governor Ramsey in 1852 overlooked the water from Steven's shack on this property and named it Lake Minnetonka. It's amazing that the lake used to extend as far east as Minnetonka Mills before it was dammed up as Gray's Gray's Bay. Though the house is not historically designated, we have treated our updates to the home with an eye to what is appropriate from a perspective of preserving the historic integrity, especially on the exterior. An attached garage is out of the question, as this would look alien to the house and certainly not vintage 1890, the year it was built. We have a close-knit family and have always had the dream of utilizing our generous size lot to be home to more of our family, as facilitating community and multi-generational living are aspirations that we've had. We looked into the possibility of splitting our lot to achieve this dream to be able to sell to family. With 0.9 acre we're one we're 0.1 acre short of that magic number to lot split. Lot split would make sense with our 300 ft of street frontage and the higher than normal density of our R1 neighborhood with three lots directly across Elm Lane that are quarter acre each as well as the recently approved Mills Church Habitat for Humanity project being built at a density of four units per acre. But we chose not to pursue this path as the relatively new ADU concept would also fulfill this dream. With our current dilapidated detached garage almost begging us to tear it down, the thought of achieving the ADU above a new garage made and makes total sense. Carriage house designs are a great way to utilize the volume of attic above a sloped roof garage instead of leaving it as lost enclosed attic space. This allows the structure to maintain a minimal bulk appearance compared to a true two-story design. As I was not anticipating a staff recommendation for rejection of the project, I have since provided staff additional information and visuals for tonight's meeting to show that this project is appropriate, a benefit to the city and the neighborhood and I propose should be met with approval here tonight. I do appreciate receiving the report the report in advance as it has allowed me the time to further develop the supporting material that I'd like to go through now. What you're seeing on the screen and hopefully in front of you, I've provided the floor plans of the primary residence. As noted, we purchased the home in 2014 and embarked on an ambitious renovation project of the interior. All of the black walls on the plans are new with the existing to remain wall shown in gray. The project was permitted, inspected, and the certificate of occupancy issued by the city of Minnetonka. The finished floor area of the home is 3,245 gross square feet. This differs from the area indicated in the report as as Riley mentioned. I want to point this out as the comparison numbers in the report make the ratio and percentage statistics appear more egregious than they actually are than reality. Um there we go. Thank you. Um Is this the whole sheet or is there another Okay, excellent. The first one's there, that's good. Okay. Um Since bulk since since building bulk seems to be one of the biggest concerns for staff, I took a look at revising the roofline of the east and the west sides of the house to reduce perceived bulk. This hip roof feature is congruent with the architectural feature on the primary residence and acceptable by the by me, the applicant, should the commission prefer the smaller roof volume. The revised roofline reduces the height of the structure to 16 ft 2 in on the north and the south gable elevations having a net reduction in height of 16 in. Note that the tallest heights are now on the north and south sides of the structure as opposed to the previous west and east, the east being the 15-ft setback from the church's property line. Grades Grade rises fairly sharply to the east of the carriage house to the property line setback in question. The revised roofline effectively becomes an 8-ft 6-in height at the property line because of the rise in grade. I'm I'm I'm circling that dimension here on the on the screen. Can go to the next one right there. Uh this is just an Okay, I'm sorry. Do you have the perspective images of just the Um it might be the next one. Oh, there is. Okay. Yeah, great. Okay, this is Okay, there we go. Okay. Perfect. So, I've I've provided the context of the proposed carriage house with the primary residence to show the subordinate scale of the ADU to the primary residence. I disagree with the report's findings that the ADU would be misconstrued as another primary residence. Uh 90% of the street frontage is taken up by the overhead garage door massing. It looks like a garage to me and with maybe a little something going on upstairs. The variance to keep the ADU at the minimum of a 15-ft setback is appropriate even though we are possibly only considering a variance for 14 in with the revised roof design. Due to the relatively shallow depth of the lot, the city and our goal is to keep the ADU as subordinate subordinate as possible in appearance to the primary residence. Any additional push of the ADU towards the street would be contrary to the goal of keeping the ADU subordinate in appearance to the principal dwelling. Nevertheless, I'd like to the commission to know that if the variance is a sticking point, the applicant does not want 14 in to get in the way of a potential approval. This is the the south elevation showing um the ADU in the foreground with the the principal dwelling in the back. I developed this perspective image to show the subordinate nature of the proposed ADU. The scale is appropriate. The dwelling unit is largely nested contained within the sloping volume of the roof. I developed a four comparison a four comparison perspective on the right-hand side with with an image of a three-car garage without the dwelling unit component. This rendering shows the garage at a setback from the rear property line of 10 ft as opposed to 15, which is which is acceptable for a garage. The stair mass has been removed. The roof line has been dropped a bit to show typical roof trusses in compliance with the 15-ft height. I'm hopeful that what you're seeing is not a significant visual bulk impact in adding the dwelling unit. This exhibit was developed to show that this dwelling unit is by no means exorbitant or far exceeding of the basic requirements of a livable one-bedroom residence. Minnesota Housing Finance Agency funds the majority of affordable housing projects in the state of Minnesota. MHFA has developed MH MHFA has developed design standards for rental housing that they fund. These standards establish minimum require requirements that each dwelling unit is to include in order to comply with and be eligible for their financing. In the diagram, I highlight some of the minimum requirements and how they compare to this proposed one-bedroom dwelling unit. For example, MHFA requires a minimum dimension in the living room of 11 ft 6. This red box in the living room shows the minimum area relative to the the space. Secondly, MHFA requires a minimum dimension of 10 ft in the primary bedroom and a minimum area of 115 sq ft. This red box shows this minimum area. MHFA requires a 3/4 bath minimum. This is what we are proposing. In addition, this exhibit tells the story that working within the volume of a roof, there are areas of the floor plan that have slope ceilings that are less than the code required 7 ft and as low as 4 ft. I I'd like to just point those areas out. It's basically everything to the outside of these blue lines. These blue lines identify the 7-ft ceiling mark in these areas. So, everything below that or above that in in these four cases are between 4 ft and 7-ft slope ceiling. These low headroom areas are a great way to utilize otherwise unused attic space and great for locating an entertainment system, a couch location where you're always in a lower sitting position, or for the head of the bed, but this should be discounted area. In my estimation, it should not be considered one-to-one floor area with actual code-compliant floor area with a minimum head height of 7 ft or more. The area in green that's kind of this uh Yeah, you can see it. It's This The area in green shows the code-compliant head height area with ceiling at 7 ft. Effectively, the code-complying usable area of the ADU is below 600 sq ft. Minnetonka likely does not have a lot of homes with detached garages. I know there are, but in as the larger lot sizes typically afford this amenity. Due to the historic nature of this house, an attached garage would not be appropriate nor desirable for us as we strive to enforce our own self-policing guardrails for what is appropriate for this historic home. A three-car garage is likely normal or expected for a primary residence of 3,250 square feet. Also, it's possible that the ADU would would or could use one of the garage stalls, but a garage stall would not be a requirement for the ADU as we plan to provide additional parking area in the proposed site plan. In summary, I hope you see that our proposal to combine our detached garage need with our ADU desire just makes sense. Please consider the higher than normal density of our neighborhood. Please consider the large lot that we have. Please consider the closest neighboring structures to this ADU would be approximately 114 feet, 130 feet, and 226 feet away. Please consider the support of the neighbors. Please consider the thoughtful restrained design to keep the ADU as modest and non-competing in appearance with the primary residence. I ask that after all that consideration, you vote in approval for this project to move forward. Thank you. Thank you for for your presentation. Hang out right there. We'll see if any commissioners have any questions for the applicant. Uh Commissioners, again, we need to withhold comments until after the public hearing, but any questions for the applicant? Commissioner Minion. Got all kinds of them. First off, thank you for keeping a little bit of history in Minnetonka. It's not uh always easy or cheap to uh keep an old home going. You got me beat by 18 years, so um first off, can you kind of help me understand that comment today? I understand it correctly in the bottom of page four. It kind of discussed using the garage as a dwelling spot. What is your intent just kind of your last comments? What's the intent of the actual garage space? As Riley said, it would be to use as a garage. There's no intent to use it as habitable space. So. And the overall height of your first option of actually having a dwelling spot up there, what's the difference in the overall height from the existing home to the current? Existing home to current, let's see here. I've got several dimensions here with the ridge height at 37 ft. Okay. The midpoint of the gable facing Elm Lane, which is the primary facade. Actually, the primary facade facing Minnetonka Boulevard is pretty pretty primary as well. That's 25 ft 6 to the midpoint of the gable. And then the grade to soffit typically is at 20 21 ft. And the proposed? The proposed is at it my original scheme, it's 17 ft 6. But my revised with the hipped roofs on the east and the west is 16 ft 2. And like I said, I'd be happy with either of those scenarios. In fact, I kind of like the hipped roof. Um, I like how I like how it reduces the bulk, quite frankly. So. So the difference is considerable between the two. It's considerably less height in the proposed. Uh, it's only No, it's actually I just knocked it down 16 in with that changing the gable the front-facing gable to the the hipped roof here that you see here. >> But from the 37 ft to what you're proposing and building? Oh, no. Okay, so what you're seeing here on the left-hand side, this is the primary residence. Yep. So what I'm This is the the Elm Lane elevation. And that is the midpoint of the the north and the south, the midpoint of the the hipped roof is at 16 ft 2. Okay. Um, and then as I read the addendum, you're talking about pulling it forward so you'd meet that 17 ft 5 setback requirement. Is that your intent? >> If if we go the route of the hipped roof, we would just do the 16-ft two setback and if if the if the variance is a sticking point. So. Okay. All right, thank you. Yep. Any other questions? Commissioner Brink. Yes, um in the staff report um we had an exhibit of that showed landscaping for the property and then we talked a lot about the ADU and the subordinate and the the primary residence and uh you know, the how those look next to each other. So, is there is there an exhibit we could look at for that? How it how it's ultimately going to look look from above? I don't know if we have a good visual from above. This might be the best visual in terms of showing what would be on site. Yeah, this is our this is the existing condition. So, this is not portraying any landscape buffer that we're planning to do. >> Okay. And and that driveway that we're looking over there at the carriage house, that's proposed to be demo demolished. Right. And a new driveway constructed. >> Yep. Okay. Any other questions? >> Okay. Thank you. Let me have you back up. Uh all right. I will now open the public hearing for this item. Um I actually don't have any public comment cards submitted for this agenda item. I just wanted to double-check just to make sure I got that right. Okay. Um seeing no uh comment cards, I will go ahead and close the public hearing on this one. Um bring it back to the commission already for any other questions or comments. Who'd like to go first? Commissioner Brink. Uh yes, for staff. Um there were notifications sent out to the to the neighborhood to um nearby property owners. What kind of responses did you get back? Commissioner Brink, there were no comments from neighboring residents or people in the community after uh postcards were sent out and it being put on Minnetonka Matters as well as in the Sun Times. Okay, thank you. And then one other question. Um and this this is in regards to the uh the total square footage. Um you know, weighing the square footage of the garage space versus the living space, you know, they're added together. Has there been uh times in the past where we've kind of separated those out? I mean, you you actually provide that for us in the report here, but um how often I mean, I just don't want to set any dangerous precedents here, but um Commissioner Brink, we don't typically separate the two out. We consider ADUs as the total square footage regardless of what is part of the structure. So, if it was just the ADU, it'd be a completely different situation. Um but it it isn't and in this case part of the stra- whole structure includes the garage. Okay, thank you. Commissioner Johnson. Thank you. Um if this were just a garage, uh three-stall garage, what's the maximum size in Minnetonka that it could be? And how is that different from the proposal? Yeah, Commissioner Johnson, we allow our accessory structures to be up to 1,000 square feet, so it'd be a very similar situation. If the garage was over 1,000, then a CUP would be required. Thank you. Any comments, Commissioners? What do we What are we thinking on this one? Commissioner Minion? Drew, springs back a lot of memories. Uh Drew is wonderful. He's He holds the a tight line and I very much appreciate that about him, but uh I did this uh I did this a number of years ago on my home. And uh Drew was a great guy to work with. Uh just uh as a side note. Um but I look at this and I have to say to have an existing uh property line setback at 7 1/2 ft, um I'm going to make the assumption that this home was built and then lot lines were probably set in day two. Um so to improve that to 15 ft or 17 1/2 ft, I think is a win. Um I'm in favor of either of those numbers. Um I'm a big uh supporter of larger garages. I think the 24 by 24 is too small. I'm I'm I like larger garages mainly because it's American condition. We collect a lot of things we don't always use or need. And it really bothers me to drive around the neighborhood and see people's well, to be nice, junk laying in the yard. Uh I think a larger garage is a good thing. Um I really do like the scale of both proposed uh the visual off the street. And I do have uh um the the argument made by the applicant that basically if you put in knee walls, we would be able to um this would be a different numbers game. Effectively, if you just threw a knee wall in at that 4-ft level or even 7-ft level, it would be a different game. I believe that would be correct. Is that Is that right? If he put in knee walls? I Commissioner Minion, I'm a little bit unclear of what So if instead of use if you went to a say a ceiling height, put in a knee wall, that would reduce his overall square footage level of square footage down to under 600 ft. Is that a correct assumption? I don't believe so. If even if there's a second floor, we're we're taking the square footage of both the first and second floor regardless of the height. >> usable or not, you're saying? Correct. Okay. Um either way, I do like it. I think its scale is nice. I think the neighborhood is changing and there's other tall buildings around. Um I know that we've approved things that were more square footage than um the uh allowable in the past. I don't think we've ever approved anything that's 739 sq ft though above. I'm not an expert in everything we've ever approved, but um I'm in favor of it generally. I see a lot of great things with it and I think it'll add a lot to the neighborhood. The diversity of the housing stock, I think it's a really nice place for for somebody to live. And I think it fits well with the neighborhood. Okay. Thank you. Other commissioners? Commissioner Johnson. I think um first of all, it's a wonderful property. I'm very pleased that you're keeping it up. Um I love uh the history of our city. It's a such a stretch though for me to um discount the livable space and to um approve something that is so far beyond our ordinance. If we do that, um we diminish the really the impact of the ordinance. I wish there were a way we could fit this in to city code and make it compliant. But I I just can't see the way. It's too big for what the city council has approved as their ordinance. Yeah, maybe that will change someday, but currently I don't see that um it's something I could approve because it's too far apart from what the city standards are. Even though it I do think it looks lovely. Thank you. Other commissioners? Commissioner Shaw. Um in looking at the image, uh seems a little forced perspective to me. So, if I were approaching this house from the opposite direction, I think the garage would look quite large in relation to the house even though it's set back. Um I think it's beautiful design, well laid out, and I love the idea of having um the bigger family on one lot being able to share that space. I agree that we have these ordinances in place for a reason, and perhaps in the future it will change. Um I would love to see something here. I don't know if a it could be redesigned so that it's smaller and it meets requirements and if that's feasible. So, thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Brink. Thank you, chair. Um yeah, I I I think it's a good design, looks good. Um I like the um I think when the applicant talked about the subordinate nature to the larger house that that all made some sense. I'm not real wild about uh the square footage being exceeded in the amount it is, but um I think it's been emphasized here that this is uh a unique property. It's a historic house. It's It's and it's it's the property itself is unique, the neighborhood's unique, and there doesn't appear to be negative impacts to the uh uh the neighborhood that I can tell uh negative impacts. Um I can ask staff, can you back up to the slide, I think in the beginning, that sh- um shows Yeah, this Well, CUP requirements. Was there one with a text, too? Yeah. Uh uh Yeah, this. Well, the variance requirements. I'm I'm fine with the the variance because it um it's actually better than what's with the the existing um garage and um and it talks about the practical difficulties and unique circumstances and so forth. So, um I don't have an issue with the variance, but um I thought there was a slide that just kind of listed the CUP standards. Commissioner Brink, it's just the variance standards that are listed. The CUP is was talked through this. >> All right. Got it. Okay. Thank you. Um but overall, I like I like you know, I I struggle with this, but um I I do think this is a good proposal. Thank you. Okay. Uh I will give my comments. I also struggled with this one as well. I'm usually highly adverse to um applications that request a variance when the structure could be built within the variance lines and for the CUP side of things, going above both of the limits here. Um That said, I do the the historical nature of the property and the uh or of the structure and the property and the location definitely give me pause. Um and I I would be inclined to actually uh to to agree with all the comments here, but I do think this actually could be uh a good project in terms of the CUP. I don't think CUP and the variance that that opens up, I think. Uh, there's already some concern I have about precedent setting. I think also a variance Um, I'm I'm adverse to that. Um but I think this could be a good project without a variance. It's It's outside of the box that I would usually approve even recently and I know we've seen a couple of these. Um, but I do think this one is unique in that regard. So, this will be interesting. Um my thought is we should probably I'm curious if there's a motion and maybe we have a motion as it was listed in the staff pack just to see uh and just to be crystal clear, this is item 8A. Uh, this is a motion for a conditional use permit with rear rear yard setback variance for a detached accessory dwelling unit at 13131 Minnetonka Drive. This is a recommendation that the City Council adopt the resolution denying the request. Would anyone like to make that motion? I'll make that motion. >> Motion Johnson. I'll second. Second Share. Staff, please poll the commission. Brink? Um, make sure I get this right. No. Okay. Share? Excuse me. Yes. Johnson? Yes. Minion? No. Chair Waterman? No. Motion fails. So, the motion fails. Uh, staff, I could actually use some guidance as to where we might go from here. Sure. I think what you could do, Chair, is um if you would like to approve uh the or recommend approval of the conditional use permit but deny the variance, that might be a I think where you were headed. Um and then do so with some reasons. Give us some reasons and then we'll present those to the council. So. Hopefully that helps. Yeah. So, is there anyone who'd like to make a motion? This would be a motion on the same property, but this would be recommendation that the city council uh adopt a resolution denying the variance, but approving the conditional use permit. Okay. Would anyone like to make that motion? Motion made. All right. I would like to make that motion, like you said. Okay. Motion Minion. Any second? All right, second Brink. Staff, please poll the commission. Um uh if I may, chair. Yes. Uh so, we need some reasons. So, My apologies. uh I can help you with that. >> Yeah. Uh I think I heard some uniqueness. I heard historic property. I heard other than design aspects, maybe some more I just need a few more things. I don't know to what extent, like design aspect of I would agree that adding um adding onto the structure might be uh not advised or just kind of not fitting with the the that historic character of it in terms of if you were to build this additional garage or or um uh living space onto the house. Mhm. I I see that as a different here than other applications we've seen. And commissioners, any other thoughts? Do you think we need more or One more would be great. >> More. Just to make sure the record's clear. >> I think that the fact that that the uh scale looks appropriate, the distance from the street looks appropriate. It fits with the neighborhood and it fits more particularly with the house uh that with the age of the house, I think it does a good job with the character of the house. And I do think the fact that the property lines were set after the home was built is kind of a big important part of the uh uniqueness to where we're going with this far as the uh setbacks and stuff go, but um in general the scale looks like it's right on. It's just a little bit physically larger than what our rules allow, but we definitely I think it's a great unique um opportunity for somebody to have a home. Okay, thank you. >> Commission Minion, yeah, and I would echoing that, just that that Minnetonka Mills area Mills area. particularly unique. Okay, thank you. Okay, so with that, I'm happy to repeat the motion, but I think we had >> don't. No, we had two. Okay. You don't have to, I think so. >> staff, please poll the commission. Frank. Uh yes. Chair. No. Ba- uh Banks is absent. Johnson. No. Minion. Yes. Chairwoman. Yes. All right, so the motion fails. I'm not No, a motion passes. >> Motion does Okay, simple majority. Simple majority. Okay. Cuz it's a recommendation. Okay, and so then that would be a recommendation to the City Council. They will consider on May 18th. Okay. Thank you. All right, moving on to item 8B. Give me a moment here. Uh this is a conditional use permit and site and building plan review for an athletic dome at Hopkins Hopkins High School, 2400 Royals Drive. And this is a recommendation that the City Council adopt the resolution approving the request. Mr. Englesson, I I believe this is your item. Yes, it is. Thank you, Chair and Commission. Uh so there are four four four votes needed to for the Council to approve this. Uh looking at a location here, uh we're up in the northeast corner of the city. Getting a little bit closer in there, you can see here Cedar Lake Road. Uh the school district, if you're not aware, is located between Hopkins Crossroad and 169. And here is a look at the existing site. So, uh it's a big property, 86 acres. It uh has three It's very unique in the fact it has three different buildings on that property with three very different uses. Uh you have the Hopkins North Junior High down here, you have Hopkins High School, and then Tanglen Elementary. The site Uh a lot of those buildings were built in the 1950s and '60s, so they've been there quite a while. And then looking at a lot of green area there, there are several different fields. Um so, I won't go through all of them, but they have a lot of there, and there's also some that are grass and some that are artificial turf. Uh and the one that we are looking at right now is highlighted or circled in yellow, the subject area, and then there's a star here. The star is here to show you the sort of where this picture was taken. So, this picture is looking at that field here, but angled towards a neighborhood over to the southwest, and then there's the water tower for references. There's a few different natural features looking at this site. Uh the first one I'll talk about is the topography. So, the field area is extremely flat, as you'd want with anyone who's playing soccer or a sport. Uh but as you go to the southwest, it does get pretty steep. Uh and there also is a little depression there. So, um it while it is steep over in this area, the field area is definitely not within steep slope, and that area is um either on private property or is about 150 ft away from the field. So, um pretty far away from those steep areas. The area in blue is a 100-year flood plain. So, you'll look water here. Um I'll show you a little better with a drainage map, but right now water eventually drains into that area off this um artificial field and over this off some of this green area, too. But uh but again, this area is pretty far away. It's over 40 ft away from the field, so definitely meeting those flood plain setback rules. The area also includes a wetland. So, you'll see that wetland is part of it's on private property. Some of it's on the school property. Uh but again, similar to the flood plane that's over 60 ft away. So, easily meeting those setback rule requirements also. Going to the proposal, um as you saw in your staff report, there's a lot of interesting history with the Hopkins School. It's gone through a lot of different phases. A lot of new things have been added on throughout the years. Uh since 1988, they've had eight different They've eight different times they've come to the city to ask for some different requests to change something. So, um the school is always morphing and changing with what they're doing out there. And is uh the most recent one One of those very interesting, not recent, back in 2003. Uh so, about 20 years over 20 years ago, there actually was a thought to have uh this exact request here today. Uh there is a part of that request they were doing was for some other fields and some other work they're doing out on the property, but they didn't envision long-term that this turf field area would be a dome. Uh it'd be I think in the report, if I'm remembering right, 64 ft tall. So, pretty similar to what we're seeing here today. But, um this area has been envisioned for this use for quite a while, looking back 20 year over 20 years ago. Oops. Went too far. Um so, what the applicant is looking at doing is adding um again, a dome here. And then there's two permanent buildings, I'll call them. Um one storage and then one is for a support building. And then this over here is not building. It's an area that's fenced off for mechanical equipment. Then here's a look at that dome that's being requested. Uh so, it is the total height of the structure is 67 ft. Which in our code, uh the requirement that if you're looking through there, it's 35 ft for the tallest structure. But, our code, like we've talked a lot here today already, our code measures height very uniquely. We measure it to the midpoint of the pitched area. So, just like was looked back in 2003, when they looked at this, we don't measure that and call this a 67-ft tall structure. We measure from the midpoint of the curved area. Now, this is unique because a lot of homes will have two walls and then a pitched area on top and we just measure the midpoint of that pitch. But, when the entire structure is curved and pitched, we take the entire pitched area, which in this case is from grade all the way to the top. So, instead of this being a 67-ft structure by code definition, it's um 33 and 1/2. Uh so, it's measured to and you can see it right here where it's measured to the midpoint of that area. So, if you were wondering a little bit on that one, that's how we've done that. We've done that not only for these structures for domes, but there have been other ones. Um I can think of one where there's a very unique curved roof of barn that we had in the city and we measured this exact same way. So, while it was quite a bit taller than what you'd envision for a 12-ft structure in that case was the minimum for that, um we had to take it from that midpoint. So, we've used that for several different things similar to this one, too. Here is some uh graphics that were provided by the applicant showing what that structure looks like would would look like and then also what that um support building would also look like. So, let me show you what the entire structure is. 78,000 sq ft, so it's um going to it's going to cover that entire field. And then um it's going to be made with a sort of this light light white gray fabric. And then the school district has talked about having it up about half the year. So, during the cold months it would be up and then during the warmer months it would actually be taken down. So, it would not be up year-round. Here's a look at that support building. This building, which is easier to measure height because it's just a flat roof, it's 20 ft tall and then 1,300 sq ft. It uses similar architecture as what you'd see around the school and also the support buildings using brick and metal panels, um metal siding, um using gray tones, so really compatible with what they have again around the property. Here's that storage building. Um Um, mostly just brick uh across it. It has a obviously a garage door here for bringing things in and out. And this structure is 18 ft tall and 2,600 sq ft. And here are the floor plans. Uh, the storage building is very easy. It is just a big vacant area. They're going to be storing things inside. The support building has a few more things going on. It has a vestibule and office space. Uh, and then has your door here that's um, obviously air locked. So, when you go in, it's going to be maybe it'll give you memories of the Metrodome when you used to walk in there and get pushed through. At least that's my hope. Uh, and then looking over here you have bathrooms also there and a janitor closet. Now, looking at the proposed dome, we asked the applicant to provide several different things to show us what is this going to look like, what's going to feel like from the neighborhood area. So, looking here from the east, so here is where we're standing over and over here by these homes, this is what the applicant has provided. There's the tree line. And you can see the tree line here. Then there's the dome that peaks over the top of that. And then there is the water tower. Also, they showed one from the uh, facing north, so standing on the south side. Here is the Hopkins um, junior high parking lot. Uh, there you get into the trees and there you get to those existing homes. Here's some again, this is the one that we looked at before, but just to look at a little closer. Here is that tree line we talked about behind there and above, so both above and behind. It's about 25 ft higher up here where these homes are, 25 to 35 ft um, above the grade of the field. Uh, but there's the existing vegetation that was taken uh, a couple weeks ago. And then this is the existing buildings that are already out there, their concession stand and storage building. And there's the football field. Uh, one other last one that we got from the app that the applicant submitted uh, was a couple pictures. These ones show some other pictures that were submitted within the um, within the application within the change memo, but also one that was important to see was what it looked like from a back of a neighbor's property. So, looking at this highlighted yellow picture, this is looking to the northeast. Uh and here's the dome. It's a little hard to see with the gray with the gray sky, but the outline in yellow is the top of that dome. So, showing what this would sort of look like through the trees because there is quite a bit of vegetation here in this area. Uh lastly, uh drainage. I said I'd come back to this, so I'm keeping my word. The existing drainage on the property is pretty straightforward, so you have the field and then there are catch basins all the way around the field surrounding it. All that water is caught and collected, sent through pipes, and then sent south to that flood plain area. So, that's currently what's happening today. What would happen with this is there would be some new pipes installed that would sort of follow that same system, but sort of just curve around all those buildings. So, the area in red you can see are new pipes that will connect to those existing ones and then they'll still drain into the same area. So, after all this review, staff is recommending that the City Council adopt the resolution approving the conditional use permit and site and building plan review for the athletic dome and attached buildings at Hopkins High School uh for three reasons. Number one, the proposal would meet all of the city code requirements for protection of natural resources, including slopes and wetlands and flood plains. Uh number two, the proposed additions would be reasonably buffered from the neighboring properties uh as shown with all those different graphics of the vegetation. And then third, the proposed support and storage buildings use similar materials and are architecturally in the architectural style as existing buildings on the site. And the athletic dome, uh while not in that same architectural style, uh would be consistent with the site's athletic complex character. So, with that, I turn it back over to the chair and commission for any questions about this application. Great. Thanks, Drew. Uh commissioners, questions for staff? Commissioner Shurr? Yes, thank you. Um a quick question. Is the material that's on this dome translucent or you see in light? Yes. Uh Commissioner Shurr and uh commission, so that was something the staff had asked before about the applicant. They did not submit an official material. There was something shown in there as part of an example that was going to be uh there's an example that was provided sort of later in the walk through because we had those same questions. Um we can ask the applicant tonight a bit more about it, but I was informed that it would not send light through it through the existing material. So, um short answer is no, it would not be have light go see through it based on what the applicant submitted. Commissioner Minion. Thank you, chair. Uh handful of questions. ADA doors to access this. I see the spinning door like you talked about the Metrodome. Is the swing door also access the same area or will the turnstile be a an ADA capable door? Um so, this hasn't been reviewed by the building Oh, sorry. Commissioner Minion and uh commission, um this has not been reviewed by the building official yet. Um so, they usually see that later along the lines. I will assure you that they will meet all ADA at this time, but it hasn't been reviewed for ADA compliance at this moment. And do I understand the code correctly when you said 35-ft would be a mid-height rule? So, effectively 70-ft elevation would be correct and we're at 67. Um Commissioner Minion and chair, um yes, that's something we talked about very early in this process with the applicant. We went over those heights requirements, so they built the I'm assuming they made this to make sure they would meet those requirements. And just as a quick refresher, that water tower, how tall is that water tower in comparison to the property? Yeah, it's it's a pretty big difference between the two. So, that water tower that we are looking at over here, Um this would be 125 ft from the bottom to the top, but it's even higher than that. Um the this water tower is built up about 25 ft higher than the grade of the field. So, if you're comparing this the height of these two, this is if we're talking about zero is the field, this top of the structure of the water tower is 150 ft about a little bit more. Um this one's about 60 This second 67, so the water tower is twice the height So, we're more than twice the height is what we're looking at if you're talking purely looking at the two spots. By rough math, this is about another 85 ft above the proposed property. Correct. And then when we talked about the 20 years ago and that building was that building approved the 20-year deal at 60 at at 64 ft of height? Was that what it was approved in the past? Commissioner Manion, chair. At the time when that came through, it was something they envisioned for the future. So, it wasn't a part of the official approval package cuz they didn't end up building it obviously. Um it was something they thought about, brought up to the commission. It seemed like there wasn't an like the city didn't have much of an issue with it at the time, um but it wasn't approved at that time. So, that's why we're we're here today. Okay. But basically, it was about 3 ft difference if it was going to be approved. Is that Am I understanding that right? >> Correct. What they envisioned for it. And the current surface of the playing field, the fact that they have a drain tile around it, is it impervious or not impervious? So, it is artificial turf field, and that's a little bit in the eye of the beholder of how the water goes into it because water does go through it, but it does get caught and gets moved around. So, um we've looked at it for those for those requirements. I think for the practicalness of this, I wouldn't get too deep into the details on that question cuz it has been reviewed and we've looked at stormwater for it. Um so, I I would say it's it's going to sort of drain the same as it currently drains. That's where I'm going with it. Thank you very much. Commissioner Brink. Thank you, Chair. Um you know, these uh domes like this seem like they there's been quite a few of them built in the metro area and they're very popular and I think they're well received. Um is this maybe this is a better question for the applicant, but is this dome pretty consistent with what we see at other schools athletic facilities or is is there anything unique about this, you know, aside from you know, what's consistent with with domes of this nature? Uh Commissioner Brink and Chair, um I can only speak to my own personal experience. I used to live very close to Eden Prairie High School and this seems very similar to the one that they have there. Um similar to the other ones I've seen around the area. We could I think that would be a good question for the applicant to see if they've compared them to other ones, but it seems in my opinion pretty similar to other ones at other high schools. Okay, thank you. All right. Seeing no other questions, uh at this time the applicant is invited to make a presentation or offer comments. All right, welcome. Uh if you'd just please state your name and address for the record for anyone who's speaking. Yeah, all right. Uh good evening, Council uh Commissioner and staff. Thank you for the uh information here tonight and we appreciate the the conversation that has been ongoing throughout. My name is John Wetter. I'm the Director of Information Services at Hopkins Public Schools. Um so, I'm part of the Superintendent's uh Executive Cabinet and really helping to run many of our uh referendum projects here. What you're seeing this evening before you is our first project to come forward uh following our voter-approved referendum this past November. Um and this is part of that visioning projects around that we were looking to do uh improvements and betterment of all of our schools and facilities across the entire school district. Uh so, I appreciate uh the conversation here this evening. As you see in front of you, uh as part of our athletics complex, um putting the seasonal dome in place. Uh as you've already heard from staff around this being a seasonal type dome, uh to really be in place to help uh both our school uh facilities during the day uh with our phy ed classes to use this as well as our year-round sports to be able to practice in this in the evening. And additionally to have community use rental opportunities um uh as well. As you've mentioned already, uh this has become a fairly common feature of many of our athletic complexes around the Twin Cities metro area um with Hopkins, you know, as you've also heard um from 23 years ago uh envisioning this concept to where we are today with our voter-approved referendum to be able to move forward with projects such as this. So, I'm also joined uh by our construction uh management uh organization, Site Logic, and ready to really have uh any questions that you might have here this evening. I'll hand that over to our construction uh partners as well. Thank you. Thank you. Uh Mr. Weder, really quickly, what's your address just for the record? Yeah, so it'd be 1001 Highway 7, our main district offices in Hopkins, Minnesota. >> Okay. Thank you. Yep. All right. Alcum, the same thing. If we could have your name and address. Thank you, Commissioner Waterman, Commissioners, and esteemed colleagues. Um I'm Lindsay Kurasch. I'm the director of architecture with Site Logic, uh the partner that's working with Hopkins Public Schools and for the fulfillment of a variety of activities inclusive of the voter-approved referendum uh work that's going on at Hopkins Public Schools. We greatly appreciate the opportunity to uh present today for your consideration for approval for a conditional use permit for the dome. Uh this dome is a very meaningful project as my colleague John Weder has just mentioned, both for the community and for uh the students and the constituents that are served by Hopkins Public Schools. Uh, this uh, project is enabling new opportunities for us for year-round athletics. It allows for physical education activities and athletics to be available to the community and to the students from a year-round basis. And it is incongruous with a lot of the amenities that are being offered by other schools that are surrounding us as well. Uh, so with that in mind, uh, we are joined tonight by a wide variety of participants. Uh, my colleagues from the design team, uh, my colleagues also, and uh, those that are joining us from Hopkins Public Schools. We hope that's representative of our sincerity and our dedication to this process in fulfillment of our goal of an approval for this conditional use permit. Thank you so much. Great. Thanks. And if I could actually, um, get your address and then if you want to hang out here, we'll see if there are any questions from the commission. Absolutely. It would be 1600 West 78th Street in Edina for SitelogIQ. Okay. Thank you. Commissioners, any questions for the applicant? Commissioner Sherer? Yes. Um, just the translucency, no trans So, there would be no light coming out of this dome during night games, night practice, things. Yes, that's an excellent question. I'm uh, joined tonight by Michael Moore, who is a representative of Yeadon, who is the manufacturer of the dome. Uh, and Michael, if you could offer any clarity regarding the translucency of the dome, that would be helpful. Sure, yes. Yeah, if you come up to the podium. No No need to be formal, but we do need the name and address. Hello, yes. Uh, good evening, everyone. Michael Moore with Yeadon Domes. Uh, we are located at uh, 575 9th Street, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Um, to speak about the translucency, um, we do offer a translucent product, but in this case, uh, we also have an opaque product, uh, meaning that there is zero uh, light transmission through the membrane itself. Um, and so in this case uh it is seasonal, it would be opaque uh and so there would be no light transmission outside of the dome. Thank you. Mhm. Yep. Okay, thank you. Commissioner Brink. Yeah, just a quick question. When you say seasonal, is that like uh it'll be up like say November to March, November to April, something like that? Yes, that's correct. The the way that uh the code reads is that a seasonal dome can be up for 180 days uh per calendar year. And so many of the seasonal domes that you'll see around the metro area are just that. Yeah, I just wanted to confirm cuz all the exhibits show nice green leafy trees around the dome. So I don't think it's typically going to look like that, right? Yeah, sure. Uh well, maybe early spring if we ever get one. Yeah. >> All right, thank you, Commissioner Brink. Commissioner Minion. Just back to the question I asked earlier about uh ADA accessibility. Oh, sure. Um, I see that we had the uh rotational doors. Um, is there going to be that swing door is that going to be a an ADA accessible type of a situation? Yeah, great great question. So both the the main entrance through the support building has the revolving door and then just next to it it also has an ADA compliant personal airlock. Um, it is two separate doors uh because the dome has a positive pressure, you must open one door, enter, close that door, and then proceed through the following door. Um, that is ADA compliant and does meet uh both the window height viewing and the space in order to circulate around. Uh in addition to that, all of the exit doors around are 40-in clear, allowing for egress as well that meets ADA compliance. Okay. If there was to be a power outage, what would happen to this property? Great great question. So all of our domes that we supply also uh have a natural gas stand alone backup generator that is located directly on the mechanical pad and that allows for full inflation and heating should that power outage go during a snow event or a winter event. In addition to keeping the dome inflated and heated that also powers egress lighting to one foot candle per code. So to allow you to to be able to see and be able to get out through those exit doors. This is designed set up with a double layer where you push the heat through the layers to do snow melt first or is a single layer product? It is a dual membrane. It is an exterior thicker membrane with an interior acoustic membrane but that is all held up with positive pressure and the heat transmission is through both layers. Okay. Point is this to have a snow melt? Correct. Correct. Yes, the design of the mechanical units is to be able to put enough forced air into the space to transcend, melt and shed the snow off to the sides. Great. Thank you. Yep, no problem. All right, any other questions? I have none. Okay. Thank you all. Great. Thank you. Might have you back. I'll go ahead and open the public hearing. I have one public comment card from Sam Black. So you're invited to come up and uh give any questions or comments and then that is the only one I have on this one. So if if I am missing anyone that did submit a card, please let me know. But Mr. Black, welcome. Just state your name and address for the record. Yeah, hi commissioner. Um my name is Sam Black. I live at 2265 Cape Cod Place. Um pretty much across the street from Tangen Elementary School. So I can see the dome from where I live and also my kids attend right now they attend Hopkins High School. So, we use and are part of that park and have been as they've gone through elementary, middle school, and high school. So, we're extremely familiar with it. I also walk my dogs right by there about every day. So, my time is going quick. I have about page full of things that I'm trying to make it as fast as possible. Number one on the construction, I think I have a question about the mechanical. I want to know make sure that that it's not loud for us, especially when it's running, you know, quiet weekends and stuff. I don't really want to be able to hear the mechanical that's heating it or or inflating it. I just would love any kind of protection from that. Um the other thing is the I don't have a problem with the height. In fact, I I don't think it'll be very visible. I will be able to see it from my bedroom window, but it I don't have a problem with that. I voted for the referendum when I knew this dome was going to be get built. Um I think my hope was at the time when I voted for it that the school district would take a bigger plan and think bigger and not just not not for that site particularly, but across it's all of its property and all of its needs. They're kind of going very very This is a sort of a small scale quick fix for some project that's 25 years overdue. And so, they're doing it that way. I've asked the school district a couple times when they've done uh projects on this campus uh for a plan. Give me the 20-year plan, a 30-year plan for your site for this. And every time I've asked, the school district hasn't produced it. And I will ask you to ask the school district for some sort of a site plan. It's a giant site with a lot of land, a lot of people nearby. Um I'm down to less than a minute. Uh the other thing, and this is going to be um something that I don't know if you have any control of, but we'd like to make sure that we have uh um I looked at the drawings and couldn't tell where the sidewalks go. I didn't couldn't tell if there is going to be any loss of access between the buildings. All the students, my kids and stuff who walk from our neighborhood to North Middle School or to the high school, they need to be able to have access during construction and after construction. That needs to continue to be a walkway for pedestrians, including me and my dogs. And I'd also like to um put in a special request to try to en- encourage the school district to not be taking out, it looks like one or two frisbee golf course holes. I mean, it's a very small thing, but that that my family uses that park and I know others do, too, as a place to recreate all year long all year long uh playing uh disc golf. And there's about eight holes right there. I don't know they lost one of them, but I'd really appreciate it if we were able to preserve that and maybe even enhance it, get a ninth hole added. So, thank you very much. Great, thank you. Uh next up, I have Steve Thompson. Hello. Uh if you could just give us your name and address for the record. >> My name is Steve Thompson. I live at 2204 Hillside Circle. Just across the street from the athletic fields. Um I like the previous speaker, I had about five pages of notes. Some of the questions have been answered, but I still have a few. Um s- the most pressing right now is more I need more information about the blower system. And And the is this going to be on 24 hours a day? And what is the DBD level? Or DB level. I've forgotten the terms. Um how far away from the dome do you have to get before it is quiet again? Um I haven't seen nothing on that. Um Thirdly, the the school district needs to have a more comprehensive plan on parking. Now, they have an extremely large lot to the north south of the high school. I live on Hillside Circle, which is across from the tennis courts. Tonight, there were four buses, 60 person buses parked on Hillside Circle. Apparently, they're children that they um transported or at a I think it's a a track meet. I'm not sure. But there the consent or the feeling is among the residents is that no matter what's going on wherever in the school grounds, it's closer and easier to park on Hillside Lane. And will even kids will even hike over the fence, the chain link fence. But I would like to see a better plan on controlling traffic. They do have some fairly large, significant um parking lots, and there is still some green grass that could be converted to a parking area in the in the athletic complex. Um you got to make choices if you want if you want the people to come, you got to provide a place for them. I don't feel it's my job to provide parking in front of my mailboxes and my driveways all summer and all all spring for people that don't want to walk from the the existing parking lots. And those are my two two um burning issues when I saw this. Um but I on the good side is I think the new scoreboard will obliterate part of my view of the dome. Thank you. Thank you. All right. I will go ahead and close the public hearing. Um the applicant is invited to return. We heard several questions actually that I'm going to go ahead and ask. Uh so if if one of you might come up here, I'm going to bunch some of these together. Uh any of you are welcome to come up here and then commissioners if you could help me just make sure I didn't uh miss any of the more critical ones. Uh these are in no particular order. Are is anyone able to provide more information about the blower, whether it's on 24 hours a day, the decibel level, how far away do you need to be for it to be quiet again and just sort of a I guess related question about just on the mechanicals and is it loud? Sure. Yeah, completely understand. So when we have done decibel readings uh on an unscreened unit uh is typically right around 50 to 60 decibels when you are 70 to 80 ft away. Um in this case, this will also be surrounded with fencing and screening uh to further dampen that acoustics. Great. The next questions are a little bit more for um maybe not related to the dome. Are there any uh grander plans for the site, uh kind of master plans instead of ad hoc? I'll also fold into that uh plans for additional parking or conversion of any existing grass areas for parking. Absolutely. Uh, Commissioner Waterman, uh, esteemed commissioners, the uh, longer-term plan for the site is being addressed in a comprehensive manner, in particular with relation to watershed concerns. Uh, there is uh, additional phased uh, project as a part of the referendum work, which is coming the following season as well. So, we are looking for ways to ensure that we're addressing site-wide water management from the perspective of uh, the uh, hydrology and the uh, watershed. Uh, as far as the question that was very pertinent related to construction activities, it may be helpful to clarify that the intent of this project is to be constructed this summer in a fairly rapid manner. The hope, if this uh, is a process that continues for us, is that this building would be ready for occupancy this fall. So, hopefully with that, the minimal disruption that that provides to uh, the site and the coordination that will happen during construction uh, is intended to be thoughtful. Uh, the intent is to uh, both provide efficiency to that construction and to consider access, parking, and other aspects of it as well that we're we're coordinating. Uh, the questions that were also asked about parking, uh, parking is a part of the larger referendum work and also long-term facilities maintenance work that's going on for the high school. Uh, so we are addressing parking-related concerns uh, at a multitude of buildings in the district uh, in particular uh, the high school also be receiving work towards addressing aspects of the parking uh, that's uh, concurrent with uh, the activities that are coming in the aftermath of the dome. Uh, so I'm hopeful that I've been able to address uh, the questions that had been presented. Uh, we have been working very hard to think about the ramifications of this work uh, to the areas that were mentioned, inclusive of construction, uh, traffic, uh, and also parking. Great, thank you. Um, and I just what we have on the screen, I think does display the sidewalks and where those are going to go. Um, and I think you answered the rest of those questions. I get The last one I had on my list is just, uh, we're going to lose any of the frisbee golf holes and any any ability to replace those and potentially add one. Yeah, it's a wonderful question. Uh, frisbee golf is growing in popularity as we know. Um, I'm not I'm not aware of that uh, specificity. Um, there may be a uh, someone else on the team that could answer that question more particularly, uh, but we are thinking about existing activities on the site. Uh, we have, for example, uh, a ropes course and other activities. So, we're doing all we can to ensure that there's continuity with the activities that are ongoing on the site. Do you want You want to comment? Sure. All right, great. Thanks. Name and address for the record, please. Uh, Gino Mazzali, and then that's 1001 Highway 7. Um, at the Mounds View Community Center, I'm the assistant director of building and grounds. So, we would not have, uh, you know, any interest in eliminating a hole. If we're going to take one of the frisbee golf, uh, course holes, we'd like to add that back, 100%. As of right now, we currently don't have it in our plans to add holes, but by no means would that be a closed door that we wouldn't be, you know, open to discussing that. Great, thank you. Yep. Okay. Uh, commissioners. Onto us. Any, uh, I think that was all the Any Any questions I missed from anyone? Okay. Um, questions. What do we Questions, comments, what do we think? Anyone? Commissioner Johnson. I, for one, think it's a great use of the property because right now, when we have our snows and you know, it looks like we're going to have a snowy winter coming up. This allows for much more efficient use of the property and the kids can you know, use it for footballs, you know, all sorts of activities. So, I for one welcome it. I think it will be a good addition to the schools. I do have a granddaughter going to North and she is in athletics and she probably would enjoy this. Great. Thank you. Christian Million? Because I don't know, I had to look it up. So, some examples of sound at 50 dB is a quiet residential street or a quiet office. And I believe that was stated to be 50 to 60 at 70 ft. We're far more than 70 ft from the residences. Um I know with my background that if that was still too high, there's ways to make it quieter, but uh um that just helps me kind of keep a perspective of effectively a running refrigerator if it's inside your home. Um I absolutely agree. Um we live in Minnesota and if we can make better use of our school grounds, we can give uh school-age children and and and a number of people more opportunities to get out and exercise and to uh just basically have some fun, some good clean fun in the winter months. I think it's a huge huge plus for everyone in the community. Um the height, I know that in the past we've had some people who have been upset with our our height on some of the objects in this in this uh facility in these grounds. Um I think the water tower by my math is 85 ft taller than what this building will be. Um there's just so many great things to say about how this is done. Uh the screening around it I think is great and I think it's going to be a great um asset to our community. Thank you. Commissioner Sherer? Uh I think it's a great-looking building. Uh the accessory buildings look like they're going to fit in really well. Um looks like an amazing asset for not just the students, but the whole community. Um sounds like it's long overdue. Looks great. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Bring? Yes, I I echo the uh comments of uh the other commissioners. It's a It's a good plan, and it's going to be a great asset to the not just the school district, but the whole community to um for um students and uh whoever else in the community who wants to play on have access to turf grass in the wintertime. Um this is This is a big plus, so um I think it's a good use. It's uh the dome is consistent with domes we see in other other communities, other school districts, so I'm all in favor of this. Great, thank you. And I actually have nothing more to add. I concur. Uh so it sounds like we're ready for a motion, and this would be motion regarding item 8B, a conditional use permit and site and building plan review for an athletic dome at Hopkins High School, uh 2400 Royals Drive. And this is a recommendation that the City Council adopt the resolution approving the request. We would need four votes to pass this one. Anyone want to make the motion? Commissioner Johnson? I'll second the move. I second. All right. Commissioner Sherer second. Uh staff, please poll the commission. Bring? Yes. Sherer? Yes. Johnson? Yes. Minyon? Yes. Waterman? Yes. All right, the motion passes, and this will be This is a recommendation to the City Council, and they will consider the item on May 18th. Thank you. Good luck with the project. Okay. Moving on to item number number nine, other business. Um This section is reserved for items that do not require formal planning commission action. Rather, items may include a concept plan review and form informational topics or trainings. Our first item on this is item number 9A, concept plan review for Regina properties at 4508 and 4512 Williston Road, 14901 Lloyd's Drive, and two unaddressed properties. This is a concept plan review only. The commission has asked to provide informal feedback to the applicant and no formal action is required. Mr. Engleson, this is your item? It is. Thank you, chair. Yeah, just to reiterate that again, there's no formal action on this item. This is a concept plan review. So, the point of this sort of exercise, I suppose, is to discuss the concept plan and give the applicant feedback on this idea. I suppose the best way to describe it. Also, when you do that and while we're talking and while you're reviewing it, we have sort of three questions for you to think about. And I like to think of these as both things to help sort of the city to help and also for the applicants get feedback on. So, the first is is there merit for a concept plan to proceed to a formal development review? That's sort of us helping the applicant, letting them know, giving some feedback on, okay, what are initial thoughts on this? The planning commission is not beholden to comments given here. This is really just to give them sort of a guidance on if it's worth their time to move forward and then put additional investment into this idea. And then the second is if that is the case, if yes, why do you think it's worth that time for for them to proceed? And then the other part, and I think this is a part that's always really important with concept plan reviews, is what can make the concept better? So, not just giving feedback on things that maybe you don't like, but maybe things that you could do to make that enhance it or make it a better product in the end. So, with that in mind, I'll go through here and give some information on this the concept plan review and uh give it back to the commission. So, looking at location, we are located in the center of the city um here your good landmarks of Williston Road and Highway 7. And going to the next slide, here is a look at those properties. So, it is a very interesting long winding property grouping of properties like uh said earlier, there's five of them that are improved with three single-family homes. Two of them are vacant, so you'll see over here labeled with a 34, which is our um number four. No one lives there and there's no homes there. And um in total, the lots are 2.84 acres. And um moving to the west and these ones are vacant. And moving to here, looking at zoning, um and this sort of important part is it's the properties are all zoned R1. So, right now as it sits today, single-family homes are the only things that could be allowed there for a main for a typical use of this type of property, that's what we'd see with them as single-family homes. Um looking around there to the south, it um again single-family R1 is shown as yellow on your screen. Um all those properties to the south are also that same yellow, so they're also R1, same to the west. You go across Williston Road, then you see some higher densities, you see some office uses, some office, you see some commercial, same across across the road, too. You'll see those same different um non-residential uses. Looking at land use, uh and this is looking at what does the city see these properties used 20 years from now. So, these are from our compre- our 2040 comprehensive plan, which is our guiding to show us how we want these properties to be in the future. What does the city envision them for? This can change, in theory, there can be amendments to comp- to the comprehensive plan, but um again, this is sort of what the city's thoughts are when we went through that exercise in 2020 looking to 2040. Looking at again after that explanation, these are again the same yellow, which is low-density residential. Um it's interesting because low-density residential can actually be R1, two, and some of three. It basically means it's four dwelling units per acre or less. So, over four dwelling units per acre you get into medium-density, which is our more orange color, which we don't see on here. Uh, but again, anything under four units per acre is still considered low-density for the city, regardless of it being attached um, attached units or detached units. And then, oh, just to again explain everywhere around here in that sort of quadrant of the city is all or this quadrant here of Wilson Road and Highway 7 are um, low-density. Again, same as we looked before, the city envisioned non-residential uses across like office and commercial over here. And then, to the north, this purple is mixed-use, so it can be a lot of different things, but it's mostly commercial. Now, to the concept plan that uh, was sent to us. So, the concept plan has 11 attached dwelling units. And they are and that's total for the site. They are put together into three different attached buildings. So, you have four units here, three here, and then four over here. Um, this um, for example, for access shows access off of Wilson Road. There is an existing driveway here, so it's sort of utilizing that existing area uh, for accessing. It winds around and then follows sort of um, parallel with Highway 7, then comes to a hammerhead at the end. They show an infiltration basin here at the end of the uh, road. And then, to the farther west where those vacant properties are, they're actually showing those to continue being vacant, showing those as a tree preservation area is what they've labeled it as. So, but not looking to have it extend beyond there. Um, they also show an infiltration basin right as you enter the site. Again, this is concept, just just some ideas that they've uh, put together. Here's a building example. So, showing what that may look like. Um, here's a one of those four-unit ones. So, um sort of your standard two two level structure. Um traditional building as you'd sort of expect it with architecture wise. Showing gables on the the towards the street. And then just to I wanted to give this just information about what would be the expected approvals that would be needed for this type of request. So, the one thing would be a rezoning from R1 to R3. If you'll note here, I didn't put a land use uh land use amendment because it still would be under that four units per acre. Um we're going to two points of the weeds, but at this point based on this, it wouldn't require that one. Just a rezoning of the property. Then also a site and building plan review for those um new units. So, just to give you a little background on the process that this has gone to so far and where we're currently at. The applicant did host a neighborhood meeting at the Minnetonka Community Center on April 15th. We had very good attendance. Um sent out mailing notices to 40 properties and we had 21 people attend. The main theme of those attendees' questions and concerns were really uh regarding traffic, which is a pretty big one, density, and then also construction impacts for this type of um work that'd be done on the site. So, right now today, we're at the Planning Commission meeting where you where the Commission will give some feedback back to the applicant. And then on May 18th, it would go to City Council for the same exercise. They would also give some feedback to the applicant. I don't have this on here, but if the applicant chooses to proceed after this process, which they wouldn't need to, but if they did choose to, they would come back again to the Planning Commission and to the City Council for those formal approvals with a formalized finalized plan. Um So, with that, I bring us back full circle back to our questions that we have for tonight. So, again, no formal vote is happening tonight. Just uh some feedback, but again, is there merit for this to continue and move forward? If yes, why? And then last, what could you see what feedback to you give the applicant that they could possibly make this a better application if they choose to come back at a later date. And I'll turn it back over to the chair and commission. All right, thanks Mr. Engelson. Uh procedurally it has been a while since I've seen one of these and uh having done one of these chair, can you remind me I I recall we've gone through different iterations of concept plan review over the years. Uh is it we have the applicant next up we hold off on questions we have the applicant present and then and then and then what? Sure. I just want to say it probably it's less about questions and more about opinions tonight, right? So there's a tendency to want to ask a lot of questions. That's not the point of tonight. So yeah, we want to get kind of feedback so that the developer can um make some changes. >> Okay, and then public hearing. Yeah. Okay. You can hear it's not a formal public hearing. You just ask people if they're here. Okay. All right, so first up we'll have the applicants come up and uh provide any comments presentation. Great. Welcome. And if you could just give your name and address for the record. Thank you. Chair Waterman, uh commissioners. My name is Chris Ballas uh with FBC Holdings at 14451 Highway 7 in Minnetonka. This is my business partner John John Ressler, 3683 Northshore Drive, Wayzata, Minnesota. Um I think Drew did a great job of showing the the plans and I just wanted to kind of walk you through the concept and kind of our our goals when we were looking at this piece of property and how to develop it. Um so as as you see there it's five it's currently five lots and we were thinking that uh a cluster development like this would be better than five individual homes on these lots because we're able to preserve more of the natural vegetation on the site. So, that's where you see these 11 townhouse units that are positioned primarily with the already um the already developed portions of that piece of property. And I think there's another slide that might demonstrate that. Um Yeah, you do have the ability to use the keyboard and the mouse there to move it along. On the keyboard? >> On the keyboard. There we go. Yeah, so this slide, the yellow is the current configuration of the the developed portions of the property. So, there's three access points off of Williston Road, one off of Highway 7, and then three three building units. Um so, that was kind of the thought was to come up with something that was better than what was there. Um and moving forward, looking at the tree preservation area, this allows us to preserve this entire piece just like it was. And also, from the outside looking looking in, the property should look very similar to how it does today. We're not thinking of masquerading this site and cutting it down cuz there's plenty of elevation there, and I think that's what makes this this type of development work and nice in in the long run when it's completed. Um we're looking at adding a housing type that I think is not widely available right now in in the community, which is this townhouse style. Um they also most of these floor plans can have main floor primary suites, so it can be um desirable to a lot big range of residents. Um trying to look through the access point. So, what we've done with this plan is proposing one access off of Williston Road. And we're moving that as about as far south as we possibly can and we're eliminating two access points off Williston and that access point on Highway 7. Let's see if I can get back. This shows the current access points. And this is what our proposed access point would be for the property. So, with all that and we're here for questions, but we we certainly look for your feedback on this and uh John, am I missing anything? No, I'm all set. Yeah. Great, thank you. Um commissioners, sounds like we're going to mostly focus on comments. I think probably after the public hearing. Um but if there are any maybe burning questions that would impact your ability to comment. Okay, great. Thank you. May I have you back? Thanks. Uh next I'll go ahead and open up the public hearing. I have three public hearing comment cards. I'll call in the order I was received. First, Mike Haugen. Uh thanks. Yep, and if you just Yep, name and address. My property is on the south side of Lloyd's Drive up south of the middle of that proposed site. I'm at 14821 Lloyd's Drive. Um I don't know if you've ever seen something that was a good idea, but it was done badly. Um thing I'm I've only got two things that comments that I really think need to be talked about. I drive for a First Student uh bus company, a van. I drive Williston eight times in a day, five five time five days a week. That's 40 times. And I just really wanted to say I I really don't think that that access for that property works very well. I'd like to see uh going further maybe some kind of consideration for the traffic, um, plan, uh, I'm I'm not sure the word I'd use there, um, you know, where they you know, be might something where you look at the traffic, um, density going past that area in the you know, during the day. I go out there eight eight times and trying to, uh, turn left coming off of Lloyd's Drive going down to Highway 7 is it can be really really tough sometimes. And then you're talking about adding in not only that, you have that access that they're proposing, but if you're talking about 11 units and each unit has a double car garage, you're going from uh, three properties that had two cars each, that was six cars, now you're talking about 22 cars. So, you're quadrupling the amount of people that have to use that exit, that entrance and exit. It's just I think a a problem waiting to I mean, it's not going to be a problem. Second thing I just wanted to say is uh, I was hoping that there is some consideration, uh, in this development plan of the Min Dot plans for that particular intersection of Highway 7 and Williston. Uh, I heard one time that there might be some plans or uh, Min Dot had for that intersection as an overpass, Williston going over Highway 7 in in the in the you know, far future, be 2030, 35, something in the road. You know, I'd like to know that they are that was considered in whatever plan they do. And, um, I'll, um, wait to see what other my uh, what my other neighbors have in comments. Thank you. Great, thank you. Uh, next up, Jennifer Hausler. Hi there. Hi there. Hello, my name is Jennifer Hausler. I um, live at 14878 Lloyd's Lane. Um, I have two things. Um, at the neighborhood gathering, clearly, um, the traffic was the largest concern. Um, there's out on on Williston, there's turn lanes, there's a frontage road, and there's a lot of stuff going on at that corner. So, all the neighbors had a comment about the traffic. So, my opinion is before you can proceed, you absolutely must have some kind of traffic study done there, um, that is, you know, pretty comprehensive. So, that was number one. Um, number two, I do want to point out, um, that they are two of those houses back there are vacant. So, really what we're looking at is one family now becomes 11 families. So, that's a pretty big difference. As As you talk about, well, they're going to be in the same spot and you're going to be doing all that, it really isn't that. It's the difference between one family and 11 families. So, from a noise standpoint, from a dog standpoint, from all of that, it's pretty significant. So, those are two of my points. But, really what I would do want to say is I happened to be standing there when the people at 14810 approached the developers to talk about selling their lot. And, um, I don't I don't know what the situation is with those people, but clearly that changes everything in my view. Because in this property currently does not have any access to Lloyd's Drive. But, certainly if you add 1410 to that, which is this first Yep. It certainly changes the whole view. So, I'm I'm wondering if that proposal can, once it's presented, can expand beyond what is approved. Or if there's second parts to it or if it just will always live as it is here regardless of that property. So, those are my things. Great. Thank you. >> So, do you guys want to address that or I I mean I I was there when that guy was talking to you. We can discuss that. Yeah, we can. We can do that. Thank you. Uh next up we've got Dan McGill. Hi, it's McGee. But that's I it's probably my printing isn't very good. Uh so, Dan McGee, um we're at 14820 Lloyd's Drive. Um and my questions and someone's going to have to help me move this. So, what I'm looking for is and maybe I'll find it here. So, bear with me. Um Okay, this this might be able this might be able to work right here. It on page 102 of your agenda if that helps the commissioners with that. My questions are around um what are these circles mean? Uh they're circles from that are numbered 1058 to 1074 on the uh on this diagram right here. You You can't see the numbers cuz it's too small, but what what do those mean in terms of a user like me who's you know, a neighbor who is right next to this property. What does that mean? So, that's my question. Can somebody answer or is this the wrong form for that? Okay. Yeah. And then specifically 107.4 which comes very tight to our property. I guess I would be specific to that. What is that uh What does that mean? What does that interpret? Um The other piece is if if I'm correct here it uh 15 ft is the variance from property line to where a structure is within the city code. What is How How is a patio considered when it comes back out the the back door sort of speak of that? Um The other piece I'd want to know is um runoff construction. Um That property sits above us and you can't tell me that there's not going to be something that's going to flow into our backyard into our property. I understand they're the developers and they'll say, "Well, that's the construction crew." But I guess I'd like to know what the what the story is in that. So Um The other question I So two of final questions here. One would be um What is involved in rezoning? How How does that process work within the city going from R1 to My understanding this would need to be R3. How How does that all work? What's involved? And then again, a general question around traffic. What are the city's guidelines on traffic? What what How many cars? How much noise? What What are the And I don't know if that's if this falls into your bucket or somebody else, but what are those guidelines? I've I've never seen them. I looked for it today didn't spend 3 hours on it but I'd be curious what the uh what those guidelines are. So. Thank you. All right. I'll go ahead and close the public hearing. Um again we are trying to keep this more to comments but I did hear some good questions that I'd be interested in. So if the applicant is able to come back up might rattle off just a few. It sounds like you mark you kind of marked down uh a couple I don't know if you have any comments on um the there were ones that I'll ask for the staff but just the kind of some of the circles on the diagram the uh property I forget the address immediately to the south. Um how would patios be considered and what are your runoff considerations? Yeah again uh Chris Ballas with FBC Holdings uh 14451 Highway 7 Minnetonka. Um I'll address the circles I I believe what he's referring to are the elevation um indexes on the so what we're looking at. This one. So we're It's good. Or are we looking at the infiltration basins? Uh I was taking it to be the infiltration basins that the numbers that were thrown out there >> You were right. You were right the first time. Okay. Okay. Yep those are just depicting the the current elevations on the property. Um as far as I'm sorry what was the other question the flow uh flow of water during property during construction? Mhm. That will be mitigated 100% with silt fencing and any type of other mitigation that the city would require or we would fully comply with all of the construction um code as far as that goes. And then um the property to the south any uh What was that? 148 14810 which is this one right here. Yes um that property owner did come to us. Um talking about potentially selling that piece of property. We haven't considered that in this plan. Um this this property does also have access to Lloyd's currently. Which is right here. So that even if we were to obtain that piece of property, I don't think it changes our position on access points. Um that's This is where we felt the safest access point was, but again I think it's appropriate to do a traffic study to make sure that is the the right choice. Great. Thank you. Think the other questions we had here possibly more for city staff. Unless you have anything else. Uh John Ruster, 3683 North Shore Drive. Just once again, I just to maybe just hone in and clarify a little bit more. Um so in a survey, these lines usually are deeming elevations changing. Um so the circle represents a higher and a lower and a lower. Um or in this case kind of going in, that's where the infiltration of where the water goes. Um so all the lines that kind of go through, the tighter the lines, the steeper the slope. And so um what you're seeing in those elevations is just kind of showing where the water's going. Um so I just wanted to address that a little bit more more specifically, but I'm certainly available outside of the meeting to discuss that with the neighbor. Um But also one of the questions about the deliberate density, just to restate what was already mentioned in our opening discussion. Um part of this is just to um try to find a way to preserve um the trees that are there. Um and um placing it in a more concentrated area allows us to preserve more trees candidly. Um so you do have a compromise when you do that is you have um common walls, which again is not going to be as favorable as if you have single family lots. Um but the exchange for doing so is you're preserving a a more trees. Um and so we're trying to do that and that's kind of the main spirit of doing that, but you also um, have to as we say, pencil it out. So, hopefully that helps. Great, thank you. Thank you. Um, just a couple questions for staff. Uh, Drew, just around rezoning. Um, city traffic, like what's involved with that and then just I think this might be a little bit too specific, so if you don't have it, just like how would a patio uh, considered be considered in terms of a variance. I think we're, you know, I don't want to get too much into the specific building planning cuz I think that's outside the scope. But, any comments you have, I appreciate. Absolutely, Chair. So, I was writing down questions, too, as they were going through. So, I'll go through a, I think a couple two here. One was a question about the project expanding. So, it's important to note that right now this is a concept plan. So, there is no final project that we're at right now. This is a idea. Again, it's the way that I always like to describe it. It's an idea that someone has. Um, the applicant could come back with something that's completely different, could come back with the exact same thing, could be adding properties onto here. That's really the applicant's prerogative at this point because we have nothing submitted. So, I just wanted to answer that first question. But, as of what we're looking at right now with this concept is these five properties um, in front of us. So, that's what we're giving comments and feedback on, not a not anything else that's in cuz that's all that's been provided to us. Um, contour lines, I think everyone sort of explained that well. Um, but just the speaking to that exact location, this is sort of a knoll area. This is the top and it all drops down here. These thick black lines, just for an education moment with contours, these are showing what the proposal would be. So, it's sort of flattening this out a little bit. It'd make it a little bit lower, but still this would be quite a bit above. This would be above this home here. But, that's just a part of that. And then, I just didn't think I would didn't want to get into specifics with setbacks and rules, but you forced my hand into it. Um, setbacks, it's a 15-ft setback for side property lines. Um, it's a 40-ft for rear, uh, but for side it's 15-ft plus 2-ft for every foot above 25-ft. So, I can't provide any information on it does this meets code or is there variances needed uh because we haven't given a full plan for the height of the structures, things like that. So, but 15-ft's the sort of minimum that it could be hypothetically for a side yard. And then patios, um we don't have any setback for patios because they are not a structure in our sort of sort of code definition. So, someone could put a patio at the back and that would meet our code. It's um we don't consider it as a structure. We're looking more at things that are above ground, not things at grade. Uh traffic was also brought up. That is on a case-by-case basis for when the city requires for information. If there are concerns about um access and amount of traffic, the route that typically the city goes through is requiring a traffic study to know that that's done and that's done by an outside agency. It's not done by the city. We get someone a third-party consultant who will uh review the site and then there's specifics with that with what we ask depending on what the situation is. Um I have no more feedback on that right now cuz of where we're at. Um I think noise came up, too. We follow MPCA standards. Um it's hard to get that with noise cuz it's just measured in a funny way of timing and based on the amount of noise for a certain length and things like that. Um so, I won't get too deep into that with traffic, obviously, but those are the questions I heard for staff. Uh but with that, I'll turn it back to the commission for comments or more questions if you have more for me. Great. Uh thanks, Mr. Eng. Listen, um do you mind flashing back on the screen the question or wait, did we have a slide with the questions that were asked to consider? I There we go. Um so, we could move on to if there are more questions, we could ask them, but it could also weave in comments. Uh the main things are is there merit for this to proceed to uh formal development review? If yes, why? And uh what would make the concept better? Uh so, commissioners, what what do we think? Commissioner Johnson. Personally, I like the plan because it would appear that these would be more affordable units than stand-alone single-family homes, and I do like the preservation of the natural area. I think that would be a benefit. It's so you're not just clear-cutting this beautiful area. Um I agree that, you know, there are valid concerns about traffic, but they can be addressed at a later time when there's a formal development plan. City generally does a pretty good job of having traffic studies and looking at those issues for the residents. Great, thank you. Other thoughts? Commissioner Share. Um I like the idea of preserving the trees. There's some beautiful trees on this site. Um I think it's a very interesting site. Um it almost feels like a plateau. So, I kind of worry a little bit about the area being built on and how many variances might be required. Again, we don't know what what this will actually end up looking like. Um so, I just kind of worry about the narrowness and how much earth and such will be moved to be able to create um a fairly level building site with this density. And again, traffic is something I'd like to see make sure that that's uh addressed. Great, thank you. Commissioner Mike. Uh thank you, Chair. Um yes, this is a a plan that I think does have merit to move forward in the process um continuing on. Um could I get a slide of the site plan here? I wanted to just make a comment about traffic and access, which um you know, it's it's been brought up quite quite frequently tonight on this. And I I'm just uh curious or if if um the access could be somehow if it's been looked at to move it down to Lloyd's Drive, which would, you know, put put the access much further away from the Highway 7 Williston intersection, which, you know, has a lot of traffic, backs up quite a bit. Plus, Lloyd's Drive align lines up with the the south service road on the other side, but I don't know if that's feasible under the scenario we see here. It may, you know, require, you know, the acquisition of that other property to the west, but just just a comment, but I think the traffic and access is a is a valid concern. Thank you. Commissioner Minion. I like the diversity of the housing stock, and I like your approach to that. I think it's a a great concept. Um, I too agree that it'd be nice to see if there's a way to pull it into Lloyd's. Uh, the simple fact is is that your design, I believe, is much better from what it was existing there with a number of curb cuts. You've been able to pull that farther away from the Highway 7, so I think that's a huge improvement. But, I encourage you to look at some way to probably put it on the Lloyd's in a safe way, obviously. Uh, one of the things that we do know about the future is I think Highway 7 is going to get um, more traffic on it. It's going to be busier in time. You can obviously install triple-pane windows for sound for the people that live there, but I think the real blessing to the rest of the neighborhood is that this will provide a small sound wall. And uh, it'll actually make the the neighborhood behind, I think, uh, more attractive over the bigger view. Um, I'm not going to ask questions tonight, but some of the questions I will be asking is uh, the retaining wall and the distance where the three units are together seems small. And uh, I can see some questions coming up in regard to that, how far it is, and in and really where my heart's going is is for a firefighter that's going to going to address this building in an emergency situation, will they have the ability to access and uh, handle that type of a a rescue type of situation, whether you're getting somebody out of the building or trying to fight a fire that type of a thing. Um another thing I'll I'll be asking questions about is just snow removal. How you actually be handling the snow and and where you plan on putting that for a salt mitigation and and the infiltration ponds I think are wonderful. It's a it's a great idea. Um I'm very much a supporter of it and uh I'm kind of excited to see it come together and encourage you to continue on. Great. Uh thank you Commissioner Minion. I Oh, go ahead. This is why my main note I brought up. We have often um comments about uh I assume this is going to be an HOA. I don't know that. I assume this is going to be an HOA, but we often have comments about landscapers. I.E. uh lawn mowing trucks and trailers. The current design I see would be very difficult to number one either turn a truck and trailer around and or back one out. And some sort of a curb cut someplace not necessarily to but pull into, but someplace that it could be pulled off to the side I think would be a good improvement. Um just thinking about a truck and trailer type of a setup. Just a side note. Thanks. Great. Thank you. Uh I also think that this uh project has merit. Uh I like just echoing some of the comments and just adding to it. I do like that it sort of follows the existing building uh pads isn't the right term, but sort of where the structures already are. Um I mean it will be a change to the neighborhood in terms of additional intensity of traffic, but at least structurally uh I think that could make sense. Um Commissioner Minion, you you bring up a good point about that sound wall um that does create somewhat naturally in addition to the vegetation. Um I also agree Commissioner Sherry brought up a good point just echoing that about curious about the variances that might be needed here uh with the with the preservation area I would hope that this meets the tree protection ordinance. Um generally I'm I'm I don't love when we have to have a lot of variances for a project. Uh but overall, I mean the townhouse style I do think is needed. I think it could do well right there in that in that part of the city. Um you know, it would be helpful to eliminate an access point off of Williston. Uh the rezoning I'm agnostic at this point. Uh possibly. But the the point is well taken about the probably the need for a traffic study that would make this better. Uh just to just to really help understand what's the right access point. Is it Witz Drive? Uh does does that access point as it's prescribed there create a problem with that service road on Williston? Um Yeah, those are those are my comments. Um If I can if I can step in just for one moment, Chair. >> Yeah, yeah, please. >> I've I've been writing down a lot, so I just would want to go back through. So, I've heard a lot of positives about the tree pres- tree preservation. Um housing type um so, the type of housing that's there, I've heard positives with that. Concerns I heard a lot were traffic, I think from just about everyone. Um earthwork. One thing I just want to make sure the commission sorry gives feedback on to is the density of this. So, I haven't heard maybe I've heard some comments a little around the outside edges of that. I want to make sure we get sort of on record of our comfort with the level of um being shown here of 11 units on this size. If we can get a little some feedback on that for the applicant. Yeah. 2.8 acres. Yeah. Yeah, so it's two So, it's uh just a little bit under 3 acres for the total entire site. And they're showing 11 and it's just below the four units per acre. If I remember, it's like 3.8 something. So, just a little bit below that. So, it is still in the low-density area. I'm um I understand it almost meets the density um however, the buildable area um it's doesn't seem like it could fit this V11 units, especially with being able to get trucks in there. I mean, where do guests park? So, getting additional um uses in there, is there open space if there's children? Uh just those kind of things. What if someone wants a garden? But, I just thinking about how usable the space is that's not the green area that's on this the slopes. So, that would that's my comment. Thank you. Other commissioner's comments on the density? Commissioner Manion. So, if I do the math right, is that 2.75 acres for this product to work? If we do four per acre. Yep, CD4 per acre. So, it's just a little bit So, if I remember right doing the numbers, it's 3.8 something for the units per acre. So, we're actually an acre shy, is what you're saying? 2. Where are we at? Did I get it right? We'll go We'll go back to 2.84 is what we're looking at. >> There the the total acreage for the site is 2.84, I believe, if I'm not mistaken. The The number we're looking at dwelling units per acre. So, the number of units you're going to have for every acre that's out there. Um they're at about I think if I remember my numbers right, it's like 3.8 something. So, they're just below that four number that sort of is what triggers for a comprehensive change. So, it does require It would require hypothetically require rezoning. Hypothetically. At this point, doesn't appear that it would would require a land use amendment and change. But, still it would be a an increase in the number of units. So, I guess my question just if you're if you're thinking about that, I'm thinking of what's the commission's comfortable level with going from what's out there right now, which is three homes, to 11 units, and just getting some feedback on that. I'm for it. I like it. Commissioner Johnson. I think, you know, we're looking at trying to diversify our housing stock in the city and I think that the townhouse concept particularly with people boomers who are looking to downsize that there's a market for it and the area is well suited for it too because it's convenient to shopping and a number of things. So I like it. I think it's something that would be a benefit to the city. Commissioner Share Thank you. Um I am not really very familiar with this area but is there um public transportation available to this area since we would increase density? So it's it's always nice to have public transportation adjacent to density. So just a thought. There's not I can answer that uh Chair and Commissioner Share. Uh there isn't an actual stop right here. Um we can show that when we come back uh where the stops are but uh not near this area. So thank you. Uh regarding my thoughts on the density. I'm I'm not particularly concerned with it. Like I said I I think that in it could make sense in this area and I guess just the devil will be in the details in terms of the points raised about um meeting code for access, fire trucks, parking, minimum parking like that that might push it. Um so and you know, like without a lot of variances if it works it it could work. That's my thought. Okay. Good on that? Okay. Great. Thank you. Um moving on to item number 9B, a presentation of the Opus Alternative Urban Area Wide Review, the AUAR. Uh and for this one the commission is asked to receive the report and provide public input but no formal action is required. Um I believe we just need to have a uh public hearing. Um, so Ms. Wishnak, I believe this is your item. Uh thank you, Chair and Commissioners. Um, I'm just going to provide you a little history about how we ended up here and then I'll invite um WSP to come forward and they're going to show some of their findings for the um environmental review. So, AUAR is kind of a fancy acronym for alternative urban area review. And that doesn't make a lot of sense to people because it it's hard to understand and so I think the biggest probably the easiest way I've described it to people is you know what an environmental assessment worksheet is or some people do. Um, you're trying to look at the cumulative impacts of what a project would bring to an area. And so, think of that just on a larger scale and in this case, it's the entire Opus area. So, 1 mile by 1 mile um 640 acres of area that is analyzed and um kind of looked at for a number of reasons and and they'll go through all the different areas of study that they have conducted. And we originally did this 5 years ago because um we had such a number of projects happening at one time. If you recall, there were and if anybody was on the Planning Commission back then, you'll know how many projects we looked at. Um, I can say safely in last 10 years there's almost 2,000 units in Opus that were built. And so, and not only that, you had different things with commercial buildings going on and we just thought it was a much better more comprehensive way to look at environmental issues in that area. Um, light rail also had, you know, just started construction that sort of thing and um there's just a lot of going on in that area where we wanted to know, are the roads going to work? Are we uh having wetland issues? What's stormwater look like? All of those things. And so, that's what we did 5 years ago. You're required to update it every 5 years, and so that's why we're here. So, it's not like we started from scratch. These are generally updates to the plan, and with that I'll invite uh WSP forward, and she'll go sit through the slides and educate us more. Thank you. All right, thank you. Welcome. If you could give your name and address. Yeah, good evening, commission. I My name is Alison Harwood. I'm with WSP with an office out of 540 Gateway Boulevard in Burnsville. Um and Julie gave a nice overview. I'll maybe be repeating a little bit of the information that she just provided um as a general overview of the AUAR process, what uh the purpose of it is, and then um go into some details on the Opus area update itself. Oh, one more. Thank you. So, um an AUAR is was described as acronym for alternative urban area-wide review. It is a type of environmental review that's outlined by state statute. Um other types of environmental review at the state level include environmental assessment worksheets, which um you may be a little more familiar of. Those are typically done for specific development types, and also environmental impact statement, which is the um highest level of environmental review. Those are done for uh projects, if you think like mining projects or like the Viking stadium, things like that. Um the AUAR is a hybrid of those two types of projects that is intended to provide local governments with the opportunity to evaluate how different land uses, so not specific development um developments, uh but general land uses could impact the community's environment before development or redevelopment actually occurs. Um again, it's used when there's not a specific individual type of development proposed. And the purpose is to really help guide local planning and land use decisions and provide information for for future development when it occurs in in called a mitigation plan. These are not no type of environmental review document is a an approval document and a UAR is not an an approval document and as mentioned they are generally valid for 5 years. They provide environmental review coverage for any developments that occur that meet the assumptions of the AEUAR and it provides those coverages for 5 years at which time they need to be updated which is what is going on now. An AEUAR reviews a variety of resources including both natural resources such as wetlands, soils, wildlife habitats, as well as public infrastructure such as utilities and transportation networks. The the entire list of what an AEUAR reviews is there on the screen and a new thing for this update that was not included in the 2021 original AEUAR is that environmental reviews now also include an evaluation of climate impacts including greenhouse gas emissions and carbon footprint which for an AEUAR is quite high level review because again we don't have known in known project types out there but for an area like the Opus area which is already quite developed we would not anticipate that there would be large changes to the greenhouse gas emissions when compared to the existing. So as I mentioned one of the outcomes of an AEUAR is is the mitigation plan. It maybe is the most important outcome of the the AUAR process and that lays out a variety of commitments that can be carried out by either developers, um local governments, or agencies to either prevent or mitigate for impacts. These can include things like design recommendations, um recommendations for infrastructure improvements to roadways, sanitary sewer, water main. Um it can include it does include often a variety of permits that a developer might need to get to carry out development, agency coordination, um often especially when considering wildlife impacts, it will include some information on construction timing or avoidance seasons that um development might have to occur around, and then also can indicate the need for potential future studies or assessments. So, the original AUAR for this area was completed in and adopted in 2021. There were two development scenarios studied. Um typically AUARs are completed for a a multiple multiple uh land use scenarios. One of those scenarios always has to be the comprehensive plan. Um so, in this case the comprehensive plan or the uh land use development that intensity that was assumed under that comprehensive plan was studied as well as a more development intensive plan which included at that time additional high-density residential areas and additional commercial. The 2026 or this AUAR update also studied two scenarios, one being that same comprehensive plan, so no changes from 2021, and the second being again a more development intensive plan, um which included again more high-density residential, um more office, and actually removed the research and development areas that were previously studied. And um I'm going to go to this slide that shows those two scenarios, but I'll also add that one of the other things that we considered was that since 2021 there have been four approved developments within the study area. All of those were high-density residential and they added um, just over 1,100 units within the study area. So, again, the two study areas that this 2026 update included was again scenario one. So, that was the um, can That's consistent with the growth plan you identified within the comprehensive plan. There were no changes uh, between the scenario one evaluated in 2021 or the scenario one evaluated now. Um, scenario two, there were some changes in in what was evaluated between uh, what was studied in 2021 versus what was studied now in 2026. Um, again, it is a more development intensive land use scenario than scenario one. And on this next slide I'll talk a little bit about what some of those changes were. So, the changes um, from what we evaluated or what was evaluated in 2021 to what was evaluated in 2026 are highlighted there in yellow outline. And so, um, primarily they consisted of a change in the land use type of these Boston Scientific parcels. These were previously identified as research and development parcels. Um, those have been changed to evaluate a mixed a variety of mixed use and then open space parcel or development areas. Um, the United Health campus was previously evaluated as an office land use. Um, that has been changed to mixed use. Similarly, the 10350 Bren Road West also uh, was previously office, changed to mixed use. And then there were a couple of parcels that were previously identified as office and commercial, but have since developed. Um, these are two of the uh approved developments have developed as um high-density residential areas. And so, the the purpose of, you know, the the two that um have developed as high-density residential, those were obviously changed to um make this scenario consistent which with what has actually been uh developed in the area. For the other three that changed to mixed use, um that change to mixed use was to allow more flexibility in future development um versus just having it be an office or research and development land use type. That said, the transportation, sewer, and water modeling does actually assume an office use as that is the most intense type of development use within um that land use category. And I'll also mention that the changes to this scenario um are being incorporated into the city's sewer and water models to identify potential capacity concerns. Um, although the city does continue to monitor actual flows versus capacity as the lots are developed. Um, the last thing I wanted to mention is um there are the the mitigation plan of the document um is included. It includes a variety of items, but just for an example of some of the mitigation items mentioned. And again, these are more um general uh general in nature because there aren't specific developments to tie them to. But for example, um development may need to uh go through soil suitability studies um for foundations. There would potentially be reporting requirements if developments um had contaminated materials like gas stations or things like that, there would be an ongoing evaluation of the need for stormwater BMPs to treat runoff either through construction of new or modification of existing BMPs. Um, in terms of wildlife, there's often a variety of I mentioned seasonal restrictions about when you can cut trees down, when you can impact certain types of wetlands. Um, the other one is the implementation of the mayor's monarch pledge. And then, of course, there's a variety of permit approvals at the the local, state, and in in some cases federal level for any development that occurs throughout an area. And as development is proposed throughout the study area, these mitigation items and the AUAR will be reviewed by city staff against the proposed development for consistency, and and mitigation would be applied as necessary. So, in terms of next steps, the AUAR update document is out right now for public comment and agency objection. So, if an agency objects to any item within the AUAR, they would provide an objection. Uh, that ends on May 5th, so next week. At that time, we would be responding and working with city staff to respond to comments, revise AUAR update as needed, and assuming there are no objections, the anticipated adoption date would be in May. Um, and then that would mean the required next required 5-year update would be in the spring of 2031. And so, with that, there's no no action for you all tonight, but if you have any questions, I'm happy to answer those. Great, thanks, Ms. Harwood. Commissioners, any questions? I mean, all right, Commissioner Brink. Yeah, just uh reiterating from uh 2021 to uh the present uh uh AUAR version. It looks like the main difference, if there is a big one, is is it's it seems like it's heavier more heavier into mixed use to give it flexibility, is that correct? Correct. So, one of the reasons for that is um as development come occurs within a area is proposed within an area, the city would be evaluating to see if what is proposed um fits under the assumptions that are used so that those developments would then um have that environmental review coverage. So, certain types, sizes of developments um require EAWs typically um based on state statute, and uh if a land use is identified as only office or only commercial, um it could it can create some uh potential inconsistencies if a different land use type were to come in. And so, changing that to a mixed use um when the city anticipates that it could potentially develop as a variety of uses, um just provided that additional flexibility for um future development to work come with into the area. Okay, thank you. Commissioner Minion. I've got a tough one and an easy one, so I don't expect a If you don't have a answer for the tough one, but on page seven, um there's a a line item in there talks about geothermal closed loop as a well. To me, those are two different systems. So, closed loop typically are 8 ft or higher. Uh but when you're drilling a well, that's a whole different system. Can you talk a little bit about what that is? Are actually looking for them? Are you looking at the history of them? We talked about how that how that plays into the study. Um well, I might look to the city for a little help on that because I my understanding is there may have been there may be some interest in that in the future and so it wanted they wanted to have that included as again uh the mitigation would be that there would need to be additional study and obviously some additional permitting efforts. But we actually can help. That's a good point, Allison, if I may. Sure. Uh Commissioner Minion, uh there already is a um a well uh geothermal well system at Opus. We talked about that during their um when they were going to demo the north side of that building. And so I think our thought process is that could come up again and how does the AUAR address that? And I can't remember the exact language about what mitigation requirements would be, but um it's really an alert to the city to say, "Hey, pay attention to this issue because you're drilling all kinds of wells into um uh the water system." And so, you know, what mitigation are we going to do in that case? So, we need more study. That's what I took it to say. I don't know if I had it right, Allison. Yeah, yeah, and that I think, you know, was the intent there was that it was just to flag that as, you know, that could potentially happen in the future and um but there would need to be some additional study and additional permitting through, I believe, the DNR. Uh permits that type of project. I think we said the same thing about um electric use. So, it's kind of like it was kind of some watch items because um high electric use and we don't say data centers. We don't use that wording in there. We just say certain amount of data or um electric use would require further study, blah blah blah. Um so that it wasn't out and out just covered by the AUAR because we didn't dig deep into how much electricity services, that sort of thing. So, um we tried to be trendy as much as we could thinking about what was happening. So. Okay. Thank you. You've got a cool job, by the way. Um And then the other part is the I uh the IPaC, the endangered species. Would you just talk a little bit about that? It was It was fascinating. Would you just kind of give us a few comments on that? Yeah, so the IPaC uh it's a a program information for planning and consultation that the US Fish and Wildlife Service, it's a public tool um that you can use to evaluate what species could potentially protected species at the federal level could potentially be within an area. Um and so you, you know, put that in the system, it tells you which species are um listed as protected or uh um proposed to be protected within a particular area, and then uh you can use that information to further identify if there's any mitigation needs or additional studies um that could be needed for whatever those species are. Yeah. All right. Any other questions? Okay. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you. >> Great. I do need to open the public hearing, I believe. So, I'll go ahead and do just to see if there's anyone that wants to comment on this. Seeing no one, I will go ahead and close the public hearing. Uh Miss Wishnek, anything else needed on this? No, I think that was good uh conversation and uh we will go I forgot what the date was. I'm losing my mind. The date is May 18th. Is it May 18th? Okay. We're going to the May 18th Council meeting. Thank you. Very well. Thank you very much. All right. Moving on to item number 10, adjournment. May I have a motion to adjourn the meeting? I make the motion to adjourn. All right. Motion Minions. Second Share. All those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. Meeting is adjourned. Thank you.