I'll call our meeting to order. Uh, welcome everyone to the March 25th, 2025 city council meeting. I hereby meet call the meeting to order. Members of the public may attend the city council meeting in person or may watch and listen remotely by viewing the meeting on channel 8 WCTV and the city's website at weisetta.org/w. org/wectv public comment during the public forum and/or public hearing portions of the meeting may be provided in person or at the meeting in advance or by logging into the team's call and raising your hand during the public hearing. When your name is called in the meeting, you will be seen and heard in our council chambers and on the cable channel. You will be asked to unmute and then you may begin your comment. All public comments must include your full name and address. Before we move on to the next meeting, I would ask you all to stand for the pledge of allegiance if you are able. Pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Uh thank you. The next item on the agenda is uh roll call. Uh let the record reflect that all are present with a noted excused absence of council member Parkhill. I will note for the record that earlier this evening uh the council participated in a workshop and reviewed and discussed the following review of our short-term rental ordinance and provided staff guidance on uh future changes, potential changes to that. uh review of our public safety plan for police uh presence for the upcoming busy season in downtown Weisetta, plus a comprehensive review of our ordinances and fines and the review of a proposed citywide speed limit study. Um next item uh for us is to approve the agenda. Uh I need a motion to approve the agenda as is or would any council member like to make a change? I'll move to approve the agenda as outlined. A second. Okay. Moved in and seconded. Any further discussion? All in favor say I. I. I.................... That That motion passes. The next item is the public forum. And I'm just going to be a little bit more specific about this. I brought props. So, if you're here to speak on the public forum, uh you need to fill out uh a white card. If you're here to speak on an agenda item, which I think some of you are here to speak on the subdivision um application, you need to fill out a blue card and give it to staff. and then you'll be heard during that uh point in the meeting. So um so again if you are coming to the uh dis you need to state your name, address and indicate if you're representing a group and limit your comments to 3 minutes. Um if it's something you wish to speak about that is on the agenda. Uh again fill out that that form that I referenced earlier or uh raise your hand on Zoom and let staff know that you want to be heard at uh the agenda item. So uh with that we have a couple guests on our public forum that are not held to that same standard. We have Heather Eden, Henipin County Commissioner, uh District 6. I'll just give her a brief introduction and ask her to come to the DAS. Go ahead. So she has a distinguished career in public service having served in the Minnesota House from 2019 to 2024 representing district 5A in the western suburbs which included Edina and surrounding areas. She is one of the few politicians I know that was elected twice in 2024. Um I yes I did say twice. Uh she stood for uh a special election earlier in the year and then was reelected uh in in the fall um for the seat vacated by commissioner Latanra. And so she currently serves on the resident services where she's the chair the administration operations and budget committee where she's the vice chair the law safety and justice committee vice chair. And without further ado I'll let uh city manager offer any comments. We'll turn over to Heather. Thank you Mr. Mayor. Uh just one note before we get the PowerPoint presentation uh running. I know commissioner most commissioners for Henipin County they have just a few cities. I think you've got what 20 or so. So it's a really privilege. I know you've got a lot of cities that you have to attend. We're really thrilled to have you here. Uh thank you mayor for the introduction and thank you city manager D. Um my name's Heather Eden. I'm your Henipin County Commissioner. I was elected last May in a special election. Um, and then yes, mayor, it was uh my husband likes to say somebody should never ever do what I did again. Um, I I in the House I ran every two years for reelection. Um, but this was there was a special in May. Um, there was a primary before that and then special in May and then I was up for election again in November. So, um, all that said, it is truly an honor to represent District 6, which is 16 cities. And of the 16 cities, tonight is my 12th presentation. two of those 16 city council members or 16 city councils, excuse me. Um, and so I'm really excited. Kevin Anderson and I have uh both have 16 cities and um not that I'm competing and not that I'm competitive, but um I am a little and I think now that I'm on 12 and I think he might be at one. So I'm just saying I'm winning right now. I'm winning. Um no competition. Okay. So, uh, here is, uh, tonight my my whole goal is to, um, come annually and be able to update all of our city councils, um, in district 6. So, first of all, that you know who I am, um, and that you can call me when you need things. And I'll give you my cell phone number tonight. That's all for the residents that are watching, as well as people here. Um, I was known at the capital as being somebody that was very accessible, that worked on bipartisan work. I led the civility caucus at the capital for four years. Um, a lot of my legislation, over 95% was bipartisan. I'm somebody that likes to get things done. Um, and so otherwise, why are we in these positions, right? We all have better things to do, I'm sure. Like, go on this beautiful lake that we're on. So, um, just a little bit about me before I go into the presentation. Um, I live in Edina. Don't be mad at me. I know there's like a competition. My kids, I have three boys. Um, my son, youngest son, he's 12. He plays basketball and football, um, and soccer. And Weisetta is always a team to beat. So, I'm not going to lie. Um, and then I have uh two older ones that are 15. They have their permits. They are driving. I'm teaching kids how to drive, which is a whole different life skill you can't really control. But I will say that they are fully stopping at the stop sign. So, I have to let the police chiefs know about that. So, all right. With that said, we are gonna go. I'm gonna hopefully I got it. I got the the clicker right. Thank you. Um, okay. So, here's District 6. District 6 is 16 cities as we've talked about. Um, some are smaller, some are larger, but you'll get this from me. All of them should be treated the same. Um, you'll get the same responses and work responsiveness from me regardless of how big your city is. Um, so there it is. It's 182,000 people. Uh, Henipin County has 1.3 million people. It's uh the largest populated county in the state of Minnesota. In terms of governments, there's the state state of Minnesota with a $70 billion budget. And then there is Henipin County which is the next largest government in the state of Minnesota with a $3.1 billion budget. So we have seven lines of business, health, income, justice, education, employment, housing, and connectivity. And I'm going to go through a little bit of those today so you understand a little bit about what the county does because mo one of the biggest things I I get. Um in the House of Representatives, people kind of knew what I did. But I I am not um naive to the fact that absolutely no one knows what a Henipin County Commissioner does. Actually, in fact, if I asked and pulled people, I was like, and they 67,000 people voted for me, by the way. 67 of the 182,000. And I'm I'm pretty sure a small fraction of them actually probably understand what a county commissioner does. And I won't lie, before I ran for this seat, I had to totally look it up. I was like, what is what do they do exactly? And had to talk to some people like Jan Kalison. All right, so here's Henipin County's budget. Um we are at 3.1 billion. We just passed that levy increase. It was a 5.5% increase. And um just for reference, the year before was a 6.5 increase. Um Ramsey County this this past um this past budget year they were at a 4.75 at the lowest. Anokco County was at 6.9% for their levy increase. Dakota County was at 9.9 and Washington County was at 5.9%. So you can see Henipin County was trying to be as reasonable as possible. Um and a lot of our cost went to we have 10,000 employees at Henipin County and that means pay increases and cost of care for health insurance and things like that. We also had uncompensated care with the hospital Henipin Health and we'll we'll talk more about that later. So, here's the pie and the breakdown and council mayor, I can send you um and and city manager Dell, I can send you the 2025 snapshot which goes into more financial detail, but here's a breakdown of those seven lines of service. Um, as the chair of human services, um I it it's actually if you look at health and human services, it ends up being 42% of of our budget at Henipin County. And that's one of the things I worked a lot on um at the Capitol. My former career before I was um before I went into politics, I was an outpatient mental health therapist. And so a lot of work around mental health, it's a need that we're seeing grow across the the county and across the state. So human services, the one thing I really want to point out, and I'm going to try to be as succinct because I also have to go to Tonka Bay and I know that you have a full agenda. Um but what I'd like to really highlight here on human services um are the top one specifically access aging and disability services. So when you think about one of the big things the county does is we have um a person that has a disability or that's on an elderly waiver, they have to go through a min choices assessment every year that is administered through the county. Now the county is mandated to do that. Um, and there are federal fundings that go and that's essentially so the person can get the waiver. Now, every year if you're a person that has a disability, it could be into perpetuity. Maybe you're born with a disability, you're going to have it your entire life. That person every single year has to go through a min choices assessment. That's a federal requirement. It takes a lot of staff time and the state and the federal uh reimbursement on that are actually not meeting the needs and so the county has to subsidize that a great deal. And when you think about where that subsidy is coming from if the county or in the state and the federal are not paying for it is through property taxes. So um all right so I'll I mentioned that so mental health substance use we do a lot of work around um around mental health and substance use recovery. We have a facility at 1800 Chicago. Um I have not toured it yet but I'm look forward to doing that. Um it know it has uh a lot of our um it's actually we're building a crisis response for our youth right now that that are uh struggling with severe mental illness and really are cycling through our systems and don't have places to go and that should be coming online in the next few months here. Um but it has recovery uh in mental health and a lot of social workers that they're working with our our youth and adults as well. Um the we have child protection when you think about somebody calling child protection that is coming through um our Henipin County uh is and there's federal uh and state dollars that are coming with that as well. And then economic supports you'll see that graph on the upper right hand corner. Um so if you look at the call volume and the applications that we've received on economic supports. So economic supports are going to be cash benefits, food assistance, childcare assistance, and housing supports. you see that number has grown dramatically since 2020 and I actually do need to get the 2024 numbers on there but um we are working to mitigate and work with families to make sure that um we are helping them get to work, get housing, stabilize um and it's a growing need that we're seeing. So public safety, there's two slides on public safety because there's the things that the county does and then there's the things that the county elected officials do. So we support with embedded social workers and like the uh Weisetta has an embedded social worker. We have cope uh which is our mental health crisis response team 247 can go out if there was a mental health crisis response that needs help. And then we also have um youth specific crisis response teams through Nexus which will also be our vendor that we're working with with that crisis facility at 1800 Chicago. Um, we have county liaison in some of our cities and the radio communication which is in Plymouth. I just toured yesterday which answers all the 911 calls and it was really it's an intriguing facility. Um, and they're doing great work. I got to sit in on uh some of the 911 calls. An Amazon worker um in Minnetonka uh was was bit by a dog. And it was interesting just to see how they refer calls. I mean, a lot of these calls are not the emergencies that you would think, but they're the reports that are coming and they're making sure that they're passing it to the right um person. And it was really impressive um to see maybe hopefully the person that got bit by a dog is okay. Um so, and then there's Department of Community Correction. So, over every single day um Henipin County, we do we we pay for the jails. Um the sheriff's department is operating them, but we also are supervising more than 22,000 adults and juveniles that are on probation. that's actually in the county. Um the county employees do that work. Okay. So, public safety, I'm not going to spend a ton of time on this. I do um just want to highlight that the sheriff and county attorney are duly elected on their own. Their budgets run through Henipin County. We approve their budgets, but they are dually elected um on their own. So, they have a lot of flexibility in how they they run their departments. Um I will say very appreciative of Sheriff Wit. We just uh working with the Lake Min Minnotonka Conservation District um and actually David Huff, our county administrator who's here and is also a Weisetta resident helped with this. But we were able to just secure another water patrol um for Lake Minnotonka, which I'm really excited about and hopefully you all are as well. Um at at no additional cost because I think in prior years we were we're trying to fund raise for that. Um and and David and I met and with the sheriff and we we found a way forward. So that's positive. Um but we also have the crime lab. Um they they're both doing uh attorney uh Morerti is doing some work around autotheft prevention and um one of the things the be at school program we're seeing a lot of youth truency in the state of Minnesota and also in Henipin County and we were looking school by school that's oftentimes uh tied to crimes that youth are committing and so the earlier we can intervene at schools the better. And so on housing, we have I'll just highlight here on this slide, we have a housing for all shelter policy. So no child sleeps outside in Henipin County, which is great. And then you'll look, we have rapid rehousing. So if a somebody goes into a shelter, then we're automatically working hopefully within 10 days to get them into a stable housing unit. And then we're also working to make sure that they have employment and things like that. Um the metro sales tax for the repair and grow program uh generates about 20 million a year. And what that is uh looking for is we're trying to stabilize some of our our affordable housing developers who are right now having um problems building new housing um because there's just not the capital and there's unforeseen costs like I know there was I think AON had um some security costs that they weren't um anticipating. David, you could probably remember was it 1 million over or Yeah. Yeah. So, it was it there unintended costs are really uh challenging and so the repair and grow broke grow program is really helping with that. So, um all right just a few more slides you guys stay with me we're almost there. um Henipin Health highlights. Um today we just discussed the ballpark sales tax as well as um potentially looking at ways to address um with the h the hospital the uncompensated care which is growing nationally. This is not just a Minnesota pro uh problem um but people that are underinsured or uninsured um and just not having a place to put those costs. The county is picking them up and we need to figure out a way outside of just raising property taxes to deal with that. I'm really committed to that. Um hopefully this session we can come to a solution. I would love to see the ballpark sales tax um extension pass to help with that. Um but if we can get directed uh payments programs to work that's great too but that requires the federal government um to extend and approve that through CMS and I'm a little concerned about that. Um I am offering tours. Um hopefully you've received that uh tour for the medical examiner's office. We sent it out to all city councils. Uh city manager doll. Did you receive that invite? Okay, good. So, so mayor and council members, I would love you to join. Um, the medical examiner's office is in Minnetonka and we're opening it up. I'm opening all district, all 16 cities for district 6. We're going to be doing some tours this summer because I want us to get to know each other. Um, some of the most important work for just the community is if we don't know each other and if we're not seeing each other, it's hard for us to get work done together. So, I really want us to have a good relationship. Um, and also for you to know how these county facilities work. So we'll be touring that. Um David will be joining us as well. Henipin opioid response. Minnitanka hosted our first suburban opio opioid response. This is something that we're cons continuing to see grow our opioid response and also we need to make sure that we have the right prevention um and treatment and recovery um abilities to be able to intervene on those. Um and I already mentioned the crisis center. So education, you'll think what else does the county do? We do a lot. Um we also have some interactions with education. So, we're funding some of the school-based mental health. Um, we're funding uh the if there's a child that maybe has housing concerns, the school's calling us and we're we're going to that school to help and intervene there. We also I'm really proud we have 16 um at the capital. I was the chief author of the Read Act. Only about 50% of our kids are reading at grade level. Um, and so we've been able to at the Capitol when I was there for years I worked on this. This was bipartisan legislation to move to the science of reading model. Um, and we're still in the transition of that, but uh, we are doing that as well at the county and I'm really proud of that work. They actually started it before I was there. I can't take credit, but we're going to keep improving upon it. And then resident services. Uh, these are our libraries, the service centers. We help with elections. you know, when you go and vote and you're putting your ballot in the machine, we buy those machines as a county. We drop them off here and if they need to have repairs, we do that. Now, of course, your city councils, you guys are are providing the the staff um and the election jud judges and and that nature, but we're also picking up ballots and bringing them uh and certifying elections. So, your county is really interactive in terms of the election. We do assessment services for all the residents and hopefully you're having once a year having your assessor come and present to the council, take questions from the council and then we also do translation services. And this is my last one you guys before I go to grants and we're done. Um, so transportation, we do a lot of transportation projects. I just want to highlight the mayor and city manager and I are meeting on Friday with David Huff, our county administrator to to talk about safety um 101. And I want to thank the mayor for reaching out on that issue. I look forward to collaborating to address the community's concerns. Um and then also envir energy and environment. We do a lot with solid waste, working with cities on reducing waste and recycling more and composting. Um there's been lots of calls to close the HERK. Um but you can't close it overnight and HERK is the the incinerator that's downtown Minneapolis. Um and so uh trying to work on some solutions on that. we uh aquatic invasive species. I would really like to see more focus on that um because our district has the most water of all Henipin County. Um and so at the capital as well, I was on the environment committee. So trying to see if we can get more prevention dollars as well as um other dollars to make sure I know there's proposed cuts this year, but I think there's creative ways that we can really go to look so that it's not just residents that are are doing the aquatic invasive uh intervention. And then this is the last one is just encouraging our communities to apply for grants that we have the tree canopy grants, the youth activity grants, and the business recycling grants. I will send you a link with all of these. Um, but I just want to make sure that our community uh is is uh all the cities are getting all of the grants that we can possibly get, encouraging our community to do that. So, and any questions? I'm happy to take the mayor. Yeah. No questions of Commissioner Eden from council. Well, so uh thank you. Uh and uh you're serious about giving out your cell phone number because you gave it to me and that's the first time I've had a commissioner in 17 years give me their cell phone number and uh we talked which so I appreciate you being open and accessible. You mean that and I personally experienced it. So I want to commend you for that for being accessible to your constituents and the elected officials that you serve. Thank you, mayor. And actually I didn't give you guys my city council or my my cell phone yet. So my number if you want to write it down and if you don't want it, that's okay. It's fine, too. Um, it's 651-7858696. Genuinely, please call me if you have any questions or if you just want to talk and have like coffee with me because you think I'm a nice person. I'm down for that, too. So, I it's it's truly an honor to represent our community. Thank you, Commissioner Ed. Thank you. Okay. Um, next up on the public forum is an introduction of a new employee, Mr. Alex Sharp, our community development director. Uh he's coming to us from the city of Apple Valley where he served for the last eight and a half years. Uh we're looking for big things from you, Alex, and leading our planning function here in Wisetta. And I'll turn it over to the city manager doll. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Well said. Um if I could ask ask Alex to go over to the podium. I would love that. Um just to kind of echo the intro. Uh Mr. Mayor, um we really searched high and low for Alex. We're thrilled to have him here. Uh we took our time. This is a unique community and it needs the right leader in this area. Development's a big deal. I mean, full house tonight because of development. Um, so we really took our time and we're thrilled that Alex is here after quite a lengthy search. Uh, I feel that Alex is a great fit. He embodies our values as an organization. First and foremost, excellence, friendliness, uh, responsiveness, and teamwork. Those values are important to us because they really are the epitome of what makes a small town, especially a small town government excellent. Uh, and that's what we strive for and Alex embodies those. He also just gets it. Uh, he values relationships, whether it's with his team, council, me, and most importantly, I would say, is the community. And I've already seen that firsthand. So, we're really excited for him. Uh, he's been a great fit thus far. Uh, as the mayor mentioned, he comes from uh, Shakipi uh, and more recently in Apple Valley. He worked on a lot of uh, really exciting planning projects like chickens, short-term rentals. He I joke about that, but they're important to the community. Uh, also other cool economic uh, development stuff. If you haven't already met him, uh, give him a call, invite him for coffee. He's got some cool stuff that he's worked on in the past and I think some pretty cool stories as well. Um he comes for us or he he lives in the southern part of Henipin County towards the river. So he's probably attracted to water. I guess if you live by the Minnesota River and now you're at Lake Minnetonka, there's probably a correlation there. We should well we're we're we like it because you're here, so that's good. Uh and he lives with his wife Jess and he's got two dogs, Watson and Baxter, and he talks about them a lot, which is great because they're cute dogs and they make people happy. So, Alex, we're happy that you're here and I'd love to uh have you say a little bit more. Anything that I missed about yourself and uh keep it under 30 minutes, please. Okay. Uh 28. Uh thank you for the introduction, Jeeoff. Yeah, I I've been doing this most of my life. I knew that uh planning was a field that I'd really wanted to go into. Uh ultimately, it was that or civil engineering. So, that's how it allows me to get along with engineers as well, which can be part of my position. Yeah. But um I I've really enjoyed my time here thus far. And uh thus far what I can really highlight is that the community has been very welcoming and um I'd mentioned it at the interview when I'd first started looking at the position. I really didn't have an impression that Yisa would be 44 or 4,500 people. It really appears to be a significantly larger community in the influence that it has over our urban region and that's something that was of high interest and it has been a lot of fun to actually see others uh in the development community already within my short time here uh represent just seeing people immediately say well you're over 10,000 people right and then no you will be soon right no so that's been a lot of fun to and and a little bit vindicating because I I really had no concept. So, it's been a pleasure and I look forward to serving the community in this role. Thank you, Alex. Any comments for questions from uh council? I told him you guys would grill them. So, well, I mean, Park Hill's not here. He's usually the one that uh leans into that, but uh I don't have any softballs or hard questions for you, Alex. Just, you know, welcome and you got a big job and we expect big things. Appreciate it. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Next on our uh well no uh Mr. City Manager, do we have anyone on teams that wanted to speak in the public forum? Mr. Bay, we do not. Okay. Moving on then to new agenda items is item number six. Does anyone here on council have any new items to add to the agenda or bring out this evening? Okay. Hearing none, we'll move on. Next is the consent agenda. Item seven. Uh so here are the items that are on the consent agenda tonight. The approval of the city council workshop and regular meeting minutes of March 4th, 2025. Approval of the check register. Approval of municipal licenses. Receipt of the police activity report. Receipt of the building activity report. Award of a contract to Park Construction Company for the 2025 Milan overlay and water main loop project. Award of contract to National Power Rodding Corp for the 2025 sanitary sewer lining project. Um, I guess I would ask uh if there's a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented or uh would any items like to be pulled for discussion tonight. Okay. U Mr. Mayor, I'd make a motion to approve as noted. Okay. Do have a second. Second. Any further discussion at council? Uh all in favor say I. I. All oppose. No. The motion passes. Next is new business. And again, just to remind you, just because we do have a few people here, if you do want to speak on this next item, please fill out a blue card and hand it to our staff so that you can be recognized. But um the next item is uh item 8A uh under new business to consider adoption of resolutions 06205 approving the preliminary plat Ferndale Road West, otherwise known as Ferndale Bluff. This is more for me since I'm only 100 days into this, but the order of operations that we'll have on this is we'll have a staff presentation followed by council questions. We'll turn it over to the applicant for any comments or presentation followed by council questions. We'll bring it back to council for deliberations. Um and then uh proceed accordingly. Uh so with that, I will turn it over to staff. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I'm just going to just kick it off to uh city planner Corals. She's going to be the lead presenter with this and then uh might do a little tag team, but she she's primarily going to be walking through the presentation. Right. Thank you, city manager. Um I was a I asked uh city manager doll whether I should do the long version or the short version of this presentation. He said the long version. So here we go. Uh so we're checking out uh the preliminary plat at 565 Ferndale. Uh the owner and applicant is with us tonight. It's the Capin family. The project is located on the west side of town just before the border with Orino on Ferndale Road West. Uh for a little bit of context with the rest of the neighborhood, uh the back side of the property actually starts coming up against that hillside drive area. To the east are some R1A single family residences off of Ferndale uh Woods Road, Boy Road, and the other part of Ferndale Road West. To the south are single family residents on smaller lots. And then our two bodies of water are Pavey Pond, which is included in this property, and Lake Minnetonka, which is accessible via channel from Pey Pond. Uh for a street view, this is from Greener Times, but that first one is looking north from the driveway entrance where it sits today. And then the second one is if you're standing on Ferndale Road, looking northwest, sort of across that uh driveway entrance. Uh the surrounding neighborhood, this one's R1A lowdensity single family with a little bit of R1 uh to the south. And then in our comprehensive plan, we guide it as a state single family. That's um a quarter of a unit to half a unit per acre. And the lot is also within the shoreland overlay district as well. In uh reviewing existing conditions, that orange there, there's an existing house, a detached garage, and then a guest house. That guest house is accessible via that yellow uh gravel driveway that loops around the whole property. There's also an asphalt driveway that comes up from Ferndale Road West. You'll notice that asphalt driveway splits uh just after Ferndale. It's because it's also the driveway access for another property uh just to the east and they have an easement over that portion of the property. Ferndale Marsh is the wetland uh that you can see in green uh taking up quite a bit of the property and then PV pond is depicted in blue there. In terms of existing conditions, there's a lot to review with this and we asked the applicant to provide us quite a few uh pieces of information uh over the time that we've been reviewing this project. a budding PV pond uh directly. You can see pretty obviously if you're standing near there that there's a lot of steep slopes, a lot of bluffs that wetland. We'll review this, but each of those elements, steep slopes, bluffs, and wetlands have buildability restrictions uh either through the subdivision code or the shoreland ordinance and are also subject to additional buffers and setbacks which further affect buildability. And each of those elements has a strict definition which allows us to map uh pretty precisely exactly where those elements are on the site. uh particularly steep slopes, bluffs, wetlands, and other buffer areas. The site is extremely heavily wooded. Uh in total, there were 707 trees surveyed. Uh that does include about 70 ash trees. Our city forester uh automatically includes those in the dead, diseased, and dying category because of the presence of presence or potential presence of emerald ashbor. Uh that means that the total significant trees included uh is a little bit lower than that. Uh but overall 610 significant trees, 24 heritage, and about 9,700 inches of tree. Overall, this project has been in front of both the planning commission and the council before. Uh the council actually saw this as part of a 2023 environmental assessment worksheet. The project was initially submitted in 2022. The city triggered a discretionary environmental assessment worksheet through the number of potential docks that were associated with that project. Uh previously, it had four lots. uh instead of three. And so that was what set that off. We went through that entire environmental assessment worksheet process and found that the city's processes, the watershed district's processes, and other regulators existing permit programs would do an adequate job of managing any environmental impacts associated with the project. That doesn't mean that development has no environmental impacts. It just means that the cities and other entities existing processes are sufficient to handle it like any other development process. Uh since then that EAW has just become a tool for further um discussion of the redevelopment process and should this project proceed, permitting uh would also uh there's a list included in that EAW that's quite helpful to staff. That EAW was reviewed and approved by city council um and in 2023. Some follow-ups from that worksheet included a bald eagle assessment, a cultural resources assessment, and that wetland delineation. So in 2024 after that EAW uh they came forward to the city and uh applied for both a preliminary plat and a subdivision variance that was for four riparian lots and then the variance was for increased culde-sac length. We limit our culde-sacs uh our new ones to 600 feet in length and this one would have been longer. The outcome of that process that was that the planning commission recommended denial and then they withdrew before the city council meeting. So the city council did not see the preliminary plat application in 2024. Today's development application looks different. Uh the application is to divide the existing lot into three riparian lots. Riparian meaning they have access to PB pond. Uh and then to create a new public culde-sac to serve the homes. That's within uh the city's regulations for how long a culde-sac can be. So no variance this time. So the only request in front of us is that preliminary plat for three R1A lots. When we review a plat, we look at whether it's compliant with zoning and whether it's compliant with the comp plan. It is compliant with both. Uh in that zoning district, we ask for lots to be 200 feet wide and at least 200 feet deep. That uh width in particular is met via the creation of the public street. There's not enough front edge on Ferndale Road to create uh a bunch of of 200 foot wide lots. And then an 80,000 foot lot size minimum, which is met on all three. Uh we look at density in the comp plan. I mentioned earlier that you're supposed to have a quarter of a unit to a half of a unit per acre. The overall density of this entire development is 26 units per acre. So, right in there. Uh when we look at R1A zoning, we also take a look at lot coverage and impervious surface. Uh we didn't ask for house plans. We didn't ask for exact building footprints. Those are going to be left up to future homeowners. But we did ask for demonstration building pads and demonstration driveways to show that um you know those buildable areas were possible and reasonable and that we could evaluate them for other impacts. Because these lots are so large and because those buildable areas are affected by all of those other factors that we talked about, it's really tough to go over on items like impervious surface and lot coverage. It's just hard to get up to those percentages, which is good. Uh other subdivision standards, this one was particularly important on the last round. Side lot lines are supposed to uh be at right angles to street lines or radial to the lake shore. Now the street and the lake shore are not parallel to one another. So each of these lots has two lines associated with it. The easternmost one being radial to the street and the westernmost one being radial to the lake shore. So that's compliant as well. Setbacks are a big discussion with this project because of the way that our shoreline code is set up. Um, within our shoreline code, um, when you're abudding a lake or a body of water, we want your house to be 75 75 feet away from the water or if you draw a line between the two structures next to you, behind that line. Uh, this is this means that on a, for instance, a lake shore that's pretty straight across, you're going to have houses that sort of move back over time with redevelopment. But in this case, because the house on lot one to the north is actually quite far away from the lake shore, it pro it produces potentially some issues with having future setback variances be necessary for other homes to be built. The applicant has proposed to address this through including a covenant on lot one in their development agreement to staff satisfaction. Uh I mentioned those bluffs and steep slopes. This is just a quick review of how those areas affect those buildable areas. Uh there's bluff on every lot. uh bluff impact zones extend out from the top of a bluff where we don't allow grading. The bluff setback is also uh from other portions of the bluff and we can't put any buildings or structures placed within those setbacks. So those proposed building pads that we show uh which again are approximate and general are located in bluff compliant areas. Our subdivision code gets into a lot of detail about protected areas and specifically steep slopes are the biggest concern with this application. Uh the subdivision code gets specifically into whether those areas are going to be incorporated into lots within the proposed subdivision and it defines those as slopes over 18%. There are slopes over 18% affected within the entire subdivision application, but they're affected by the construction of the street. They're not affected by the construction associated with the homes, whether it's driveways or other potential grading activities associated with the homes. So that's an important point that was addressed between the last application and this one. Uh trees, we can't evaluate every single tree impact because again we don't know exactly what those uh buildable areas will look like, but it's been evaluated through a couple of different lenses and all of that analysis of which there is plenty is located within the packet. Uh the biggest thing to note is that the road construction does not affect any heritage trees. It does affect significant trees uh but no heritage trees. The applicant is proposing about 100 inches of replacement, which is certainly below uh the 577 inches of replacement that would be required with that much tree loss. However, the site is so heavily wooded that it's best practice not to necessarily go and replant all of those trees in those wooded areas just for the benefit of their survival. And then, as I mentioned, within those buildable areas, uh those demonstration building pads and driveways appear to impact significant trees, but also appear to have limited impact on heritage trees. And those exact numbers will be determined by the actions of future property owners. The street is uh certainly the biggest talking point of this application. Uh it's 526 ft long which provides sufficient frontage for those three R1A lots. There are two storm water ponds proposed. Uh one of which is on the north end uh in lot one and one of which is on the south end at the south end of lot three. Uh you can see from the road profile um just on the bottom of the screen that the road goes over a a significant sort of hump over the property and through the existing hill a little bit. And we'll talk a little bit more about uh what that ends up looking looking like from a grading perspective. But the important thing to note about the street is that it meets our minimum subdivision standards for a public street. So that involves a pavement width of 26 feet and an overall right ofway width of 50 feet along with fire code minimums. And those fire code minimums are not much less than city code street minimums. That's what they're based on. There are two outlots proposed for this project. Uh outlot A is across the street from lot three and outlot B is across the street from lot 2. The development agreement will include uh you know an agreement to tie those out lots to those two private lots and the idea behind that is that those outlots are going to contain one of the retaining walls. So the idea is that long-term maintenance of those retaining walls would remain a private responsibility and this is based on the city's city engineers recommendation about those retaining walls. This is just a quick summary slide but there's different types of grading associated with this. Some of this is associated with the actual subdivision application in front of us and then other parts of that grading will be associated with what those future property owners do in the future. For more details on those retaining walls, just to note, the one that's west of the public road and on those outlots will peak at 8t tall, although that's just in the middle on either side. It'll sort of come up gradually. And then that one east of the public road will peak at 7 feet tall and is squarely on lots two and three. Both of those are in red on the image. Uh the engineer has reviewed the submitted documents and the EAW and provided no additional comments at this time. Although the city engineer will be quite involved uh during that final plat and development agreement and subsequent permitting. We did our standard notification to the sun sailor and our property owner mailer and we've gotten a lot of public comments associated with this project. Um as of about 2 o'clock today, I've received 39 public comments e both before the planning commission meeting and since then. Uh the positive comments uh are thinking that you know the plan is aligned with the comprehensive plan that this a reasonable number of lots that overall it's been a very thoughtful and and long process. The negative comments are concerned with the environmental impacts impacts to PB pond and the western neighbor uh the size of the road tree impacts and overall land disturbance concerns. I will also note that out of those 39 public comments there are people who submitted multiple messages. So that doesn't necessarily mean that 39 different people have commented on it, just that I've received 39 public comments on the application. The planning commission considered the meeting at their February 20 or considered the item at their February 24th meeting talking about uh issues like dimensions, slope, and impact of the road, height, location, impact of the retaining walls, storm water, trees, and construction impacts. Uh but their overall outcome was that they voted 60 to recommend approval of the preliminary plat as it is. So, the motion uh in front of the council when you're ready will be to adopt resolution 62025 approving the plat at 565 for Dell West. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, Plano Corals. Uh questions of council to staff. Go ahead. Yeah, I um kind of going back and forth here with my my microphone. Uh I did a lot of study on this before the council meeting today and one of the concerns I have about the impact of uh 106.14 of our zoning code uh was about the protected areas within subdivisions and the restrictions regarding steep slopes. And I wanted to read some highlighted areas in our packet starting right here on page uh 7073 and uh I've highlighted them in my book as when protected areas are to be incorporated into the proposed lots the applicant must demonstrate that the design of the lots will not require construction on steep slopes which are over 18%. Uh the preliminary plat would create lots that would require construction on steep slopes for the construction of the public street. And since the public street has specific standards that must be met, such as a maximum slope of 8% and a minimum curb to curb width of 26 ft, staff acknowledges that that will impact areas of 18% slope or greater. So, one of my concerns is uh what do you have to say about the fact that the street itself that the city is putting in would so severely violate this particular part of the code? Thank you, council member. The closest reading of the code uh notes that when those areas, those 18% slope areas are incorporated into lots and the proposed subdivision has both lots and public rightway which is not included in those lots. Those 18% slopes are impacted by the public right ofway, but the applicant has shown through driveway design and potential buildable areas that there won't be impacts to 18% slopes within the lots of the subdivision. But again, the city is violating that for the public road. The applicant is putting would be the applicant is proposing the public road. That's it. Other questions of staff? Go ahead. Thank you. Um, as we're talking about the slopes on the public road, you mentioned the retaining walls. One peaks at eight feet and the other peaks at seven feet. Do they peak at the same place? That's a great question. I might default to planners waiver to answer in a moment, but I would think that I don't think that the grading is that uneven side to side. I think that when you're cutting through that sort of deepest part of the hill, I think it's probably going to be roughly the same on both sides. But can you give me a minute to Yes. I I could even ask another question. Well, okay. Um, sticking to the street. Um, so how many homes are actually serviced by that c by the culde-sac? Like the like when we talk about the culde-sac, are we just talking about the circle at the end or are we talking about the whole road? I'm typically referring to the whole road uh when I refer to the culde-sac, but when looking at the the map itself, the the culde-sac bulb has one driveway coming off of it and then uh the other two driveways come off the the lower part of the of the street. And this was so that they all the lots could have 200 ft of frontage. That's what it enables. Yes, that's what it of public frontage. And how much frontage do they have on Ferndale? I would have to double check. It's a little less than I think maybe 275, but I can verify that. But enough for one. And um well, uh Mayor and Council Member McDonald, if uh I can answer your first question. Uh can you go to the slide that has the uh retaining walls in red? So, um the location where the outlots split, which is equal to the location where the two lots split on the west side, that's where um that western retaining wall is 8 ft in height and then it goes down um pretty equally to the north and south. on the east side. Um the 7 foot in height is is a little south of where that curve is. So it's completely on lot two. Um that's the location where it's 7 ft. So it's a little bit more gradual uh gradually increasing from the south to the north and then uh dropping off as it goes around the curve for that driveway. Okay. So, those are the locations. And Council Member McDonald, the front edge on Ferndale Road West is about 230 square feet or feet. Um, and then wondering if you could just elaborate a little bit on this covenant that you're speaking about with the for the setbacks on the shoreline. Yeah, I can elaborate on it. That's also a really good question for the applicant as well. Um I can ask them. It just notes within It just would note within the development agreement that essentially we're the applicant can't uh produce a condition that would need that setback variance later. So it would be limiting the timing on building on certain lots. That was the clarification I was looking for was just it's basically not on on selling but on when you actually build. Yep. it would have to do with that timing and then that entire thing is also affected on uh the existing house uh that's on the lot and if that were to come down and when as well. So another dimension. So someone could actually buy a lot but be unable to build on it because the other lots aren't built it built yet. I'll let the applicant elaborate on that. Fair enough. Okay. Thanks, Mayor. Yeah. Other questions? Maybe give Ken a chance and we come back to Alex. Good. No questions from Ken. Alex. Yeah, that was another question I had when you presented. It sounds to me like without any homes on these lots, there's no variance right now for Shoreland setback, but as soon as buildings start being put on those lots, then it it looks to me like variances are almost inevitable when you start building the the homes there. Is that correct? I would not characterize it as inevitable. Um there's a couple of factors with that. one being that existing house which sits about here uh on the on the lots today. So that affects uh potential buildability over here and over here. There's also a lot at I believe 513 Ferndale Road West that also is on PV pond and so further draws another line having to do with buildability. That one helps quite a bit because that one's you know set much more further forward towards the pond. But the one contrast between this application and the four lot subdivision application was that that one had a whole host of scenarios that could produce variances. This one has much much fewer. And I can let the applicant elaborate on that a little more. All right. Thank you. Okay. I just have a couple questions. If you could go back to the best slide that represents Ferndale and then the additional new road one of your slides. You can pick one as long as it shows both roads. That's fine. Okay. Um, so I've walked the property. I've met with folks on both sides of this. And this is just more for education for myself. you know, our subdivision code forces, you know, a city-maintained road as part of this. Um, can you tell me the width of the existing Ferndale road? I think you referenced that this road is 26 ft, but with 50 foot to to cover, you know, access or easement to it, but could you characterize the width of Ferndale compared to the width of this road? And then second, could you give me, and if you have to research it, fine. um the distance between Ferndale curb and gutter to this new road. Literally like if you were to measure from the curb to the new road, what distance from the street is the new road? Those are my two questions. Um looking at Henipin County, uh just off the top of my head, I think that Ferndale Road West is somewhere between 24 and 26 feet. That's based on Henipin County measurements. And would it would it also have, you know, up to 50 foot of of um, you know, rightway for us as well? It definitely has a much wider right of way than the actual pavement. And then the the width of this proposed city road on this private property is 26 ft wide and then uh rights of access up to 50. Yes. Okay. Um, and the distance between the two. So, if you were to go from Ferndale Road as is to New Road being built, what's the distance between the two? Uh, I'm a little bit confused by the question because they connect directly. Well, sure they connect, but like if you're driving down Ferndale Road, you're going to see a road to your right, right? And I understand there's a turn in. I understand there's a culde-sac, but there's either a buffer between the road and the new road or there there's no distance, you know, is it 12 feet? Is it 14T? Is it 18 feet? Is it right next to it? I'm I'm so sorry. I'm still a little bit confused. Okay. I'm driving down Ferndale Road. I see the turn to go into the new private road. If you were to walk in between the two roads, what's the distance between the two roads? None. Zero. They would connect directly to one another. Okay. So, zero zero between. All right. Zero feet. Thank you. Those are the only questions I had. So, now we will turn it over. If there are any other questions, we'll turn it over to the applicant to make a presentation if they wish and then stand for questions. If you would just state your name, um your address and who you're representing and then we go from there. We got it back from the commission. Other one that I'll make sure it's in presentation. Thank you and welcome. Good evening, Mayor Mullen, members of the city council and staff. My name is Mike Steedman and my address is 401 Lake Street East in Weisetta. I am with Compass Real Estate and I have specialized in new construction and land development for over 30 years. I've been in several projects in the Lake Minnetonka area such as Locust Hills, Island Oaks, Shorland Estates, and Willow Bay Sanctuary. I am working with Meredith Howell with COA Banker. She is a she is of course a former longtime resident of Ferndale, an exceptional upper bracket real estate professional and a highly involved wasetta resident. We have been working with the Capen family as partners and advisors for several years on this project. We are grateful for the time and attention of city staff and the many neighbors who have stepped up and supported the project. We would also like to thank you, the city council, for your time and dedication to the community. This is important work and we appreciate your service. Before we begin and I turn it over to Samantha for her short presentation, I would like to highlight some things, some themes that you you will hear in her presentation. This project is a culmination of careful planning by a family who have been residents of Weisetta for over 60 years, working with an exceptional group of consultants, land planners, engineers, environmental experts, and designers and have been working closely with staff for over five years. You have before you an an exceptional variance-free subdivision proposal for three lots on 12 acres that is compliant with city code and zoning that has been scaled down well below what would otherwise be permitted by city zoning and city requirements. It is attractive, environmentally sensitive, and very thoughtful in design. We are particularly excited to think that we could bring three young families into the Ferndale area. A neighborhood that used to be a vibrant year-round family neighborhood now tends to hold large seasonal homes empty for most of the year. This sort of reasonable growth adds energy and longevity to our community. I know that the family and our team are very proud of our proposal which beyond being compliant and variance-free is very low density, completely consistent with the established family neighbor character and designed to be environmentally responsive and sensitive. And with that, I'd like to introduce Samantha. Hello, my name is Samantha Capen Maldun. Um, I'm the property owner at 565 West Ferndale Road in Weisetta and I live at 1801 West Farm Road in Long Lake, Minnesota, just about five miles to the west. Um, thank you so much first of all to the city council for your um, service to the community. Thank you to the staff. Um although Val has left, but I wanted to say especially Val who's leaving. Um and the city staff has been working with us for many years now and it's been um we really appreciate their patience. And uh I also want to say thank you to my team who I couldn't have had a better group of professionals, more expertise, and just wonderful people to work with. Um today I'm just going to do a quick who, when, why, where. I won't I hope most of you have seen the application. I know 380 pages is a lot. So I'm going to try and do some highlights. Um some of you may have seen our planning uh planning meeting presentation. So I'll buzz through the slides as much as possible and at the end I'll be around to answer questions. Um ah so the who starts with my parents Gary and Joan Capen. They bought the property in 1964. They raised us on Ferndale in Weisetta. We all attended school here. Um, they're currently retired and my sisters and I own the property and are seeking to subdivide. I know you read the longer bio in the presentation. So, I'll just zip through this and say Heather lives in San Francisco, a landscape architect. Her husband's a landscape architect. Allison lives in Seattle. She's a licensed architect and a nationally known environmental consultant. and I am not nationally known for anything, but I am a community volunteer here in the area. Um, and conservation has been my focus. I'm the vice chair of the Long Lake Waters Association, which is a water quality watershed organization. um sort of a microorganization and um I'm on the former board chair of the Minnesota Zoo where I spearheaded the strategic plan and um a conservation chair of the Lake Minnetonka Garden Club where I advocated for native plants and wildlife on both the local and the national level. And I live here locally with my husband Paul and my two children. I have an expert team and I know this is kind of an eyeble bleed so I won't go into it other than to say just noting on the far column the decades of experience that everyone brings to the table that we've been working with and specifically that they're all local experts. They know this area. They know this neighborhood. They know the character of the area. Two of them are here today. Brad Sh here and Mark Gronberg here, our engineer and our city planner and bluff expert to answer questions about anything you have at the end of the project, end of the presentation where Ferndale Road Val took you through that. The only thing to note on this slide is that the comprehensive plan has this area um noted for redevelopment. So, this is something that the city has been aware of for some time and we're it's consistent with the plan filed with the Met Council. I love this picture here. Um, this is just a bird's eye view of the neighborhood. And what I love about it is that it shows sort of the evolution of Ferndale that has been going on since my parents purchased the property and continues today. You can see the public road of Ferndale, um, Boy Road, uh, Ferndale Woods, which is a public road. Um, then you can see the construction on all the different houses. Um, you can see uh the Martha house, the Johnson's house, you can see the long driveway going down to the former long house now owned by the Rex's. Um, all of this is sort of indicative of the change and evolution that is part of Ferndale. And I know people feel like Ferndale is what it is, but it's always been changing. We've watched it evolve over the years, and this is part of that evolution. So, what are we proposing? As Val mentioned, it's three conforming lots um and a small road. And the thing to note about the road is it's 526 feet long and 26 feet wide with a rightway on either side. Um it's designed to city standards and has been reviewed and approved by the city engineer and it lays mostly over the existing driveway. The character of the neighborhood is something that people like to talk about and so we overlaid the lot lines and the road as it would look in the future on the um Henipin County website onto the lot as it exists now. You can see that the existing almost 12 acre lot is oversized for the neighborhood at 526 feet. The proposed road will be the smallest road either public or private in the neighborhood. The next smallest public road is Ferndale Woods, which is also 26 feet wide and is 616 feet long, so over 75 ft longer than our road. And the next smallest private drive road is Pillsbury Drive, which is 687 feet long, almost 150 ft longer than our road. It's important to note that the properties within the different neighborhoods on Ferndale vary in size, shape, density, scale, and they all have services and roads attached to them for access. Lot size is another consideration. And again, there's a bit of an eyeball bleed going on on this slide, so I apologize, but I think it's worth noting that at 58,000 well over 500,000 square feet, our property is excessive when compared to the other properties in the neighborhood. The smallest property is the Martha property at 520. That's only 18,000 square ft. You could define the neighborhood as the properties around PB pond. You know, neighborhood is a loose term. So, if you only look at those neighbor those properties, they go from 1 acre to 6.3 acres. Um along Ferndale, it's 4.9 again to the low of 04. Each of our proposed lots are larger than the 80,000 square foot zoning regulation. Um, and I can go into this further if you need me to, but I think that's unlike many neighborhood properties which are less than than the allowable zone minimum. We are well within the allowable size. Um, this timeline has got a lot of information on it. It's just really to show that in 2019 we began working on this project. We've been working with the city since 2022. Um, in 2024 we brought a submission to the planning commission. We've had several different many different iterations of different plats that we've worked with everyone on. And today we're here with our final plan, three lots, three riparian, a 526 foot road. It's worth noting that starting in January of 2019, we get began meeting with the neighbors, getting their input both one-on-one and in group scenarios, and getting all of their um commentary and trying to work well with them as we move forward on this project. This project has really been an evolution. It started um and these are just four of the plats, but they're sort of four of the most significant plats that we've gone through. Starting in 2022, a four lot four riparian plan with a 600 foot road that would not have needed a variance. We then took a four lot four riparian plan with a 725 ft road to the planning commission. And there were three main concerns that Val discussed. The irregular lot lines, shoreland setback concerns, and then concerns about impacts to steep slopes on the lots. It's worth noting that the city code does not prohibit building on steep slopes of 18% on the road, just on the lots. In 2024, we came up with a four lot three riparian plan. When we showed it to the staff, um the response was this is a gamecher and this is exactly what we'd hope to see. And obviously that made us very excited. We were pleased. But we decided to go talk to the neighborhood once again to make sure that before we developed an entirely new set of costly drawings that this would be something that would be um to get their feedback after those meetings. Um some people were very enthusiastic about going to three riparian lots. Some people had always been supportive. Um some people weren't going to like anything that we did. and a couple people um specifically said that they would prefer to see a three lot plan and a smaller road. So, we sharpened our pencils and we did that. And I want to reiterate, we presented a compliant variance-free fourlot plan with a 600 foot road to staff that staff said was a gamecher. We then went on the road to solicit feedback from the neighbors and we then elected to go above and beyond the compliant variance-free P plan to come up with a variance-free three lot three riparian plan with a 526 road. So the plan we are presenting today is a direct result of the suggestions of the neighbors and this is not an insignificant concession. We have reduced the residential lots from 5 to 4 to three. We have reduced the riparian lots from four to three on over 400 ft of shoreline. We have reduced the road from 725 to 600 to 526. We've rerouted the road onto the drive to avoid trees and we added a curve to the road to improve aesthetics. We reduced the scope of the retaining walls by half. We relocated the culde-sac to be below the sighteline of the western neighbor. We improve we are improving the forest variety and health through native plant replanting. We are minimizing the tree removals within the tree preservation code to less than 16% of the trees and we are eliminating all heritage tree removals. We are regrading the drive from its current 15% slope which does not meet code to bring it to an 8% standard in current code. And we are eliminating all example lot and driveway grading on steep slopes over 18%. And we are minimizing 18% grading to areas on the proposed road which is not prohibited by code which is less than 1.5% of the proposed of the total property value. There have been a lot of um misconceptions and confusions surrounding this project. Um some people when I read through the letters from the neighbors, I could tell that people hadn't gotten up-to-date information. And so I thought some clarifications might be useful. The paved road is 26 ft wide, which is the same amount as Ferndale Woods. And the ride ofway on either side is not paved. It's going to be landscaped and it's going to be permeable. The road will be hidden con completely from PV pond and the construction of the road is estimated to be anywhere from 4 to 8 weeks and then the new road once in will provide staging for vehicles for the construction of the homes. So they won't be on Ferndale bothering the neighbors. The retaining wall again has been stated is 8t high at the highest point but it's only 10% of the wall where it's eight feet 8 feet high. it gradually slopes up as um you saw the the curvature of the hill um sort of dictates that the highest point on the east wall is only 7 feet and again that's only for a portion of the road. The walls will be going down from the existing grade to the new road below. I think some people thought they were raising up from the existing grade and that's not true. We're cutting into the grade. Um the walls will start 150 to 225 feet north of the entry from Ferndale behind the curve. So if you're standing on Ferndale, they're very far from Ferndale. You would have to crane your neck around and look around the curve to see the road from Fern the retaining walls from Ferndale. Um and they won't again be visible from PV pond or to any of the residents of the neighborhood. Both the length and the surface area of the retaining walls again have been decreased by 50%. The storm water ponds are not ponds. They are rainwater gardens that would hold um rain only after a very large storm which according to the weather app um is only um up to four times a year. Are the storms large enough where there would have any water in the ponds and even then it would only be for 24 to 48 hours. And we are intending for the trees and arbavit that currently line Ferndale to stay in place. We aren't proposing to remove them except for where the road obviously cuts through. The project was designed in harmony with the environment. And I'm not going to focus on this slide too much because I know you've read it, but there were no environmentals issues that prohibit development. And the environmental impacts according to the city's EAW, which was entered into public record, can and should be adequately managed by the city's existing permitting process, which we will respect and take very seriously. In summary, we are really proud of this project. It's responsive to the environment. It's responsive to the staff, the planning commission, and the feedback we got from the city council during the EAW and that I've gotten from those of you that I've spoken with prior to today. It's extremely responsive to the neighbor feedback back and direction. It's consistent with the code, the zoning, all city and state regulations. It's variance-free and compliant. It's consistent with the Wisetta comprehensive plan as submitted to the Met Council and it's consistent with the existing neighborhood character in terms of size and scale which is defined and expressed by the current city code. We feel like this is a great project for the community. It's attractive, it's vital, it's low density, and it's a thoughtful use of a large parcel of land. It will create a healthier forest, a safer road, and access to the property. And we are really excited about the potential for bringing young new families into Ferndale. We grew up there and the place was packed with kids when we were little. And we love the idea of it no longer being an empty snowbird, but full of families who were there year round. The planning commission's unanimous approval two weeks ago is a testament to the high quality and thoughtful nature that we have brought to this project and its appropriateness to the community. The reason we're here is because we grew up here. We love this community. We loved growing up on Ferndale. And our guiding vision has always been the stewardship of our property with a thoughtful small-scale development that was responsive to the city and the environment that is consisting with the consistent with the character and the code that would allow us to realize the value in the property. And the current project reflects that vision. It's three lots on 12 acres. It avoids and all wetlands, bluffs, waterways, shorelines, and heritage trees. It respects all the codes and variances. Um, somebody said to me, "Wow, it's so complicated." And I thought, "No, it's not complicated. It's it's detailed. We have been very detailed. 380 pages for a three lot subdivision. It's pretty simple. It's three lots on 12 acres and it's completely compliant. and I'm here to answer any questions you have. Uh thank you. Uh questions of uh the applicant from council. Did did we want to bring up the question you asked staff u earlier? See if we can get clarification on that. Yes. Um I was wondering if that you could weigh in or add a little color to how the covenant will work. Um I can bring up my lawyer. But I mean you could just some high levels to explain to me and the community what stand at the microphone so the public could hear you then that's okay. So briefly um the way the shoreline setback works is if lot one which is the northernmost lot builds first it would create that line between the two houses would um tighten lot two. Um so we've agreed with the city to come up with a covenant that would address the order of construction. And Pat, do you want to come and talk to it? I don't. Mr. Mayor, uh, members of the council, Patrick Bsteinhoff, Malcerson Gun Martin, I'm the attorney for the applicant. So, so there's basically one scenario in which a variance would be necessary. So, uh, the applicant will enter into a an agreement with the city. um I'll draft it or the city attorney will draft it and it will prevent that uh scenario from happening. So lot one won't build first, the other two will build first and that will uh eliminate the possibility that there'll be a need for a lakeshore setback variance for uh the other houses. So any questions about that? That was helpful. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. Uh any further questions of the applicant? I've got a few more if I should just kind of knock them out. Okay. Um, you and uh Mr. Steedman both mentioned that you were excited that this would bring young families to the neighborhood and I I felt like maybe it was just an off-the cuff comment of like of a hope, but you both seem rather con confident of it and I'm wondering if there's something I'm missing. Why is the We had a lot of interest from people with children. um moving in. So that's our hope is that interest will turn into fruition. Okay. Um you also mentioned tree removals to less than 16%. Um I'm assuming that's the road or does that include the building pads as well? Uh the de Eric can speak. I think the demonstration building pads and demonstration driveways obviously are just um possibilities, but when you factor those in, those were also below the threshold within the tree preservation plan. Do you want to 16% is road and storm ponds, but we did do the calculations. Do you want to So this is Brad. Hi Brad. I'm Brad Shy. I'm with HKGI. I'm the planner on the project. Um the 16% that you're referencing is literally just the impact that's part of the grading exercise which is the storm ponds uh and the road construction only. So that 16% is not including the the potential building pads. Okay. Appreciate it. And um I'm going to pass the question asking to my colleagues, but I just want to say I might come back and ask more questions. Um you said this isn't complicated, but I think that it is actually kind of complicated. So, I make no promises there won't be further questions. Questions? Welcome. Fair enough. Uh, any further questions from council to the applicant at this time? There is um I do have a slide prepared on the 18% if Alex would like me to show that because that was a discussion that came up. You asked a question about the grade and Well, I say more information is better than less. So, if you got something that can enlighten us, sure. Hold on. Let me find out where is Yeah, take your time. Cue the Jeopardy music. No. Okay. Sorry. It's No, take your time. You're fine. Slide 30. So, yeah, take your time. Um, could you pull up 30? Yeah. Thanks. So, and then just Sorry, I stepped to the microphone. I'm sorry because you have a vast viewing audience watching you on TV here so we don't want to leave them out. So the ordinance um 106.14 requires that the proposed design will not require constructions on slopes over 18%. However, this requirement only applies to sensitive areas where these areas are to be incorporated into lots within the proposed subdivision. Sensitive areas um in this section of the code are wetlands, drainageways, water courses, floodable areas, or steep slopes. And it doesn't refer to woods or vegetation. This requirement does not apply to areas that are not sensitive areas. I.e. a paved driveway is not a sensitive area. It's paved and it's not incorporated into lots because it's a public road. So the 18% grading that's happening underneath the road is um completely allowable under the code. And again for perspective, we are limiting that 18% grading to the road and it is less than 1.5% of the total property area. We have routed the road to avoid as much as 18% as possible. And here is the actual code. Uh thank you. Any further questions based on this information? Yeah, go ahead. So, I'd just like to ask staff that they agree with everything was just said about the 18% not applying to the roadway construction. Sure. Again, I can let um the city attorney or planners labor interject as well. Um my understanding of the code is is specifically centered on these where these areas are to be incorporated into lots. Um, you know, talking about steep slopes, uh, in staff's view, steep slope is environmentally sensitive, and so that's all included as a sensitive area. So, a little bit of a differing, uh, perspective than what, um, was on the slide just before this one. However, we do agree on the point that those lot those areas are not to be incorporated into lots as determined by the code. Any further commentary from city attorney? Okay. Uh, any further questions based on that? I don't think I'm following still. Like, what do you mean not incorporated into lots? Wouldn't it be incorporated into a lot? I think the the clarification that I can make is that the subdivision creates three new private lots, right? Those three new R1A lots. The street is not a lot. It's public right away. Uh, it's incorporated into the rest of the right-of-way system. It's not a lot. So that's where that um that's where that that small nuance of code comes in is where those areas are to be incorporated into lots. Our interpretation is that those are those private residential lots created by the subdivision. Okay. So we can we meaning citizens the city you can build on 18% for public roadways but you can't in private lots. So if you look at Minnetonka Avenue or you look at some of the roads in Wisetta that are on clearly above 18% lots, if it's a public roadway, that's acceptable. But in a private residential lot, you have to be able to build it without infringing on 18% slopes. That is that what you're asking? Yeah. All right. It took us a while. Clear that up. Um are there any further questions of the applicant at this time? Okay. We may call you up um again. Um but u if you go ahead and take your seat and we're going to move on to public input. Um so thank you for your presentation. Appreciate that. Um so this is the part of the agenda that will take public comments via teams or in per person. Before I do that um we had some pretty passionate uh emails including a video and whatnot. So, I just want to read into the record um letters that we received as of 2 PM today, which I think will loosely tie to to your number. Um in in um in the record against Martha, I'm going to read their last name and not their full address, but the road. Martha Ferndale, S. Hemsley Ferndale Schwabach Ferndale Birds Ferndale Saurin Ferndale High Ferndale M Hemsley Harrington Howorth Grace Point Johnson Ferndale McMillan Ferndale Pettit Pee Road Pad Harrington Reie Ferndale Rex Ferndale Spencer Lake View Sweeney Hycraftoft Winkley no address Brooks Ferndale Dresen Pavey Prince Harrington uh letters of support again only in the council packet not reflective of the previous planning commission I'm just reading into record. What was in our packet? One moment. Um, in the affirmative, Piper, H Highraftoft Road, Howell, Lake Street, uh, Joan Capen, which I assume is your your your parents, Ferndale, Atwater, Ferndale, Jones, Ferndale, Shiffman, Minneapolis, Sloum, Ferndale, Swanson, Harrington, Bennett, Breezy Point, Magguire, Ferndale. Um, I'm not intending to represent the collective, you know, affirmative or negative, simply what was in our packet for context because some of those folks couldn't be here, they're traveling, whatnot. I'm just, uh, it's all in the public record. Nothing that I read is not in the public record. Next um we are going to have uh those that are here to speak tonight uh come up to the dis and address and and I will give you a chance to come back to this topic um at a later at a later time. But I'm just going to call call these folks up and then um if you'd come to the dis state your name, your address, I'll try to keep your comments to three minutes. I'm not going to be you know particularly you know I'll be lenient but to a to only to a point. Um, so first, uh, Sue Schwabak, uh, you're up first, please. Thank you and welcome. My name is Sue Schwabuk. I live at 510 Ferndale Road West and I've been um, tuned into this loop since the beginning. And it's a pleasure to see all of you. I know there's been a lot of work that's gone on. I know that everybody's trying to understand what I think is also a complex application here and some of us have read every page and sometimes the pages several times. Excuse me for a second. I'm going to give you and Mr. Mayor, I believe that image is in our packet as well. Uh, is there any way you can put it on the screen or no? The public can see it. I don't remember seeing this in the packet. Oh, yes, I do. It was included in some of the feedback, but maybe just pause for one moment just so that we could help by uh giving a visual aid to the public and then we'll let you proceed. I know it's hard. It'll be a moment if Schwabach wants to proceed. Yeah. Okay. Um my comments are mostly going to be um specifically addressing the implications of the road portion of this application. And it's a question about what is it feel what's it going to feel like to walk or drive up or down this proposed road between these retaining walls? And what what also might it feel like when you look from the top of the walls down into the road below? To calculate these uh answers, I hired a landscape professional to create a cross-section to scale from the submitted line uh site drawings and the section is drawn at the point nearest to the neighbor's house to the west at exactly that cross-section. What you will see is um a difference in the opinion of what the height of the wall is at that particular section. The wall is 12 feet above the road grade. It's at nine. What does it say here? Here you can have mine. Cool. Sure. Just so you it's easier for you to reference it because I can see it on the screen. Okay. It's at it's at 968 at the top current grade as it exists and the road is at 956 feet and the road to build the road is going to require an additional 2 ft of uh excavation to um provide the footings for the for the ret for the uh road itself. And uh the width is going to be 70 ft of excavating. That includes the rightaways on each side and the extra width for construction of the of the engineered retaining walls. And it's important I think to recognize that um this excavation at this particular point and along this road does not even uh include the uh remaining road length, the excavation for the culde-sac and the holding ponds. While trees are going to be cut down for the road as stated in the application, we must be ready for a long and full 86 foot w swath of loss of trees within two years because of the damage to the roots during this kind of excavation. And we want to remember that in the first proposal, it was estimated by contractors that 500 to 700 truckloads of fill or cut or debris would be going in and out of this property. And at this time, those numbers are probably low because of the addition of these retaining walls. I've spent time reading the 2040 comprehensive plan, which outlines future goals for our city. It consistently states important goals such as preserving the community's natural amenities, including tree coverage, wildlife habitat, steep slopes, and wetlands. uh protecting property values and existing stands of mature mature trees on public and private property. The city also has multiple standards for approving a subdivision that require minimal grading or cutting and soil disruption. Just to notice um you're give you one minute warning. Oh, you're already at five minutes. So well counting all that. Okay. property valuation to the the property to the west will definitely be affected if this road is allowed to cut deeply uh along the property line. The property to the southwest will be um suffer as well. Several years ago, the black dog project was proposed for three homes at the east end of Lake Street and the city council wisely recommend recognized that problems would arise and the project did not fit into the neighborhood. The three home application was uh denied and two homes were approved. I ask that um we have had real estate professionals and engineering experts um make us feel that anything is possible. However, in this case, the intense research and analysis shows that this application and the road on it, the road especially needs more careful examination and by the city for all the reasons stated above. I ask that the council acknowledge the issues here and um recognize that this road should not be allowed on this property. I urge you to requ deny this request as it stands and hopefully we can come up with another way to access this road or this property than this wide deep uh amount of ex excavating that is uh needed to get to these homes. Thank you. Yeah, thank you very much. And I will also note that we we do have uh your submittal in writing as well in the record and thank you for your thoughtful comments. Um next up I'd like to invite uh Steve Hemsley to the dis please. Good evening. Thank you. Yeah, welcome. Um um catch you up on time a little bit. Um I'm Steve Hemsley. I live at 622 Ferndale. Um and I have been tracking this uh project uh through most of its uh life cycle. Appreciate the complexity of it. Um appreciate the motives of uh development and so forth. Uh but like many others, I'm a bit of at a loss. Um and I've written you more extensively, but I'll just get down to a couple of points. I think that property which is distinctive in your slides suggested it and the character that it represents to the community. Um the reason it's controversial is because if you just simply look at the scope of the development as proposed um it is hard to imagine that won't have profound effects on the environment and the aesthetics to the community etc. Um, and I think most of it really comes down to the introduction of a road. I believe there's two living structures on that property as it stands today. We're introducing one more structure. And to do that, we're suggesting a uh extensive public road be introduced into a property that is very unique, very sensitive, impacts other neighbors, and impacts the um environment and the um the character of the community. I don't know why I would ask the U council to engage with the developers and look at an alternative that just presents a more conservative approach that doesn't involve a road but could have provide you know sufficient access to maintain the character of that property accommodates the development ambitions around the three properties and um engage in that way. So, I think the road is the thing that seems to me that does the most uh potential harm to that habitat and to the community. And I would ask you to reject the proposal as it stands and consider an alternative that just approaches this as providing access to three residential properties um sufficient for them to develop the property, maintain its character, and um achieve the value they want to. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Shamsley. Uh, next up I have, uh, Phil Saurin, please. Uh, welcome. Thank you. So, Phil Saurin, 532 Ferndale Road West. And, uh, unlike Mike, I am a permanent resident there. That is our house. It's not our summer home or something like that. So, um, so first of all, when I with the second plan came out, my initial reaction was, let's check it out here. And to check it out, there wasn't any rendering to look at what it would look like. So, I sat in my driveway and looked at what it was going to look like here. And after I started putting things on the property, I was a little shocked and a little worried then. And I think as I look back, this plan is driven by three things. One, three lots. And the subdivision code requires 200 feet of of street frontage for each lot. So, that already causes some complications. It's not a place in Eden and Prairie or, you know, Shakipe or something like that. And then finally, I think the applicant did a good job of trying to have make sure there's no objective variances that would cause the city council to be approved there. But I think it's led to some unintended consequences that I believe don't meet some of the subjective parts of the code here. And you've gone over a lot of them. The 526 ft road, the 60 foot wide swath that's going to go, you know, to dig it out, the rideways, all that type of thing there. Um, we haven't talked much about the uh the ponds. You know, the one pond is going to be right across the street from my house there. It's 100 ft by 45 ft. I talked to Samantha about it. I I don't know. To me, it's just a bunch of rocks. I don't know what a rain garden is going to look like. She promised it'll be beautiful, but uh I don't rendering of it there. So, that's a pretty scary thing there, too. The retain walls in a tunnel, you know, that was scary. Also, as I looked at some of that there, uh it just didn't seem to fit the the character of the of the uh thing here. So, it's kind of interesting as I looked at the new uh my new vision of this lot here. All the action is kind of interesting is on the existing uh residents property. So the bird songs over here has a lot of impact on their property. We have a little bit but the whole frontage uh interface with Ferndale Road West is covered with either a pond or road now. So it is it is a big impact to our community here I think there. So I as I looked at this uh in my new visual I just one minute warning. I'll be done one minute. Thank you sir. So my request is that you table or deny the request and I really consider you the following consider a subdivision variance for a less invasive private road or uh driveway leveraging the existing driveway there. I brought this up to Samantha every time we've met here and take a common sense approach that I think actually will save the applicant a lot of money not having to build a road not having to replace tree as many trees the utilities not put ponds in. So I think it save them a lot of money. We have a nice turnaround for the fire department at the top. so they can be happy there. I think if you'd have a respectful, tasteful plan, I think you'd have support from the neighbors and the community and it'd be, you know, much more positive there. In addition to that, save a lot of trees, the topography, uh, a lot of traffic and help the bird songs out there. So, that's kind of my comments there. Uh, thank you, Mr. Saurin. Um, last chance if you want to fill out a card. Otherwise, our last uh individual, I'm I'm sorry, I'm having a hard time reading your handwriting, but Craig Benal Bentle. Okay. So, you're going to decline speaking. Okay. So, uh for the record, we'll withdraw Mr. Bentel's. Uh so, we have no more blue cards. So, next we would turn it back over to the council for deliberations. And um I guess I'll give a chance because I know you looked like you wanted to say something. Is there anything that I kind of cut you off? Is there anything else you'd like to enter into the record, Samantha? Okay. Are there any other questions that came up from the public comment that want to be asked of staff or the applicant? Okay. So, we'll bring it back for deliberation here. U we have before us, right, a an application for Go ahead. Did you have something? Oh, application for a subdivision. Um, I guess I would ask uh folks to start to to weigh in with kind of how they see this and we have our deliberation and hopefully steer it towards you know some sort of outcome this evening. So who would like to weigh in first? Oh before that we have something from could could you come to the das sorry I apologize hate to do that to you but we do have a quick clarification. My planner has something he wanted to clarify. Sure. if if if you could come to the that's okay. microphone and please state your name again and and um Brad Shyman with HKGI. I'm the planner working for the applicant. I don't want to get into a rebuttal situation. I just want to be clear. Um the retaining wall height has been talked about. From bottom of the retaining wall to the top of the retaining wall is 8T on the west side, 7T on the east side. The 12 feet that was mentioned by one of the uh represents was from the street surface but the street is here. There's boulevards here and then there's a retaining wall. So just to be clear on that so that it's understood. Okay. So does staff any further comments on that statement? No. Okay. So then the other part of that is is the retaining wall as Sam mentioned in her presentation. It's not um all the 8 feet and seven feet. Um there are a very short period of about the length of a car where that maximum height is on the west side and even less so on the east side. So just Okay, thank you for that clarification. So bring it back to council for deliberation. Um who would like to, you know, weigh in first? Uh council member Fleckish, please. Yeah, get set up here. First, I want to acknowledge there's a whole lot of thought and consultation that went into this uh with professionals and with the neighbors and sensitivities. So, I I really appreciate that. But I spent many hours studying this and I came prepared with a lot of notes. I added to them while people were presenting. So, if you would bear with me uh to capture it all, I'd like to read it. First off, uh pros on this development. Uh although the construction traffic and amount of disruption during construction may be highly disruptive, it is temporary in nature, even if it takes more than a year. Uh there was a time in the not too distant past when there were at least a dozen homes under construction or major renovation along Ferndale Road. Proposed subdivision does not comply with the uh excuse me, does comply with the comprehensive plan. That's a pro. Uh although the architectural appearance, scale, mass, roof lines, and proportions of the buildings are not yet known, considering that all of the surrounding homes are uniquely designed and essentially dissimilar to each other, I do not find this standard concern to be problematic. I do find that the layout of the building pads comply with our standards. Although not an exact science and always somewhat of a subjective assessment, I do not feel this plan will depreciate the values of surrounding properties given the uniqueness of all of the other properties. Another pro, the proposed subdivision does not does comply with the subdivision ordinance including lot coverage and impervious surface standards. The plan has been designed such that future variances would not require any anticipated variances for the construction of a home uh by the new owners. Another pro, it seems that all three of the current owners have a very sensitive and relevant background to project like this, including the environment, sustainability, landscape architecture, and watershed wetland conservation experience. And there is a history of development that seems to support this plan. Now, some concerns I have that are neither pro nor con. The shoreland setbacks are not a concern now, but the plan is such that it could be an issue down the road, although I think that was kind of addressed here tonight. Uh, it is unclear to me that the building pads preserve sensitive areas such as wildlife habit habitat or mature trees to the extent I would like to see, but the EAW, city staff, and planning commission all seem to be okay with it. I do disagree with the EAW quotation on page 89 which I'm reading here. Uh the proposed project is not expected to generate traffic during construction of the residential dwelling units. The project construction may cause minor traffic inconveniences to roadway where on Ferndale Road West, but it still have no effect on traffic congestion or impact the regional transportation system. I actually don't find that to be accurate. Uh the amount of dirt removed and the stream of trucks during that time will indeed have an effect on traffic and congestion on Ferndale Road during that time. However, I suspect it will be somewhat short-lived. Now, some cons. Although the pad locations may minimize filling and grading, the public road going in does not. It does seem to me that this plan adversely affects the scale, pattern, and character of the immediate neighborhood. And I'd like to read some more from PA page 88 out of our packet, which says here uh under character, the term character is imprecise. And as such, it is difficult to objectively define in order to assess or determine impact. However, elements that can be objectively qualifi quantified include and there's a bunch here, but the one I'd like to highlight is traffic. So, visual resources. The project will m this is in our packet here. The project will maintain the visual buffer of the trees and bluffs surrounding PB pond as shoreline and city setback and bluff regulations preclude tree removals and grading in those delineated areas. Additionally, the project is not continuous, excuse me, contiguous with Lake Minnetonka and will not be visible from Lake Minnetonka due to large-scale existing residential buildings and tall hedges already on the lakefront properties. And further down, the road that will be placed on the property is consistent with the city code and as such is allowed. There are several other subdivision roads in the neighborhood such as Ferndale Woods, Bovy Road, High Croft Road, which I live on, and Hillside Road. So, I just want to read that that was in our packet. But, u the visual impact would not affect the view from the lake, but the new road and tunnel effect is what I call it from the two retaining walls will certainly be visible and unlike any other road in Weisette Weisetta such as the ones that I just listed. Another serious concern is the steep slope grading which will clearly disturb a section with greater than 18% grade for the construction of the public street. It is a cityinduced issue, not the landowner's plan. So there was a lot of input from many neighbors including virtually all adjacent neighbors. Neighbors who live on nearby on Ferndale Road but not exactly adjacent. other current and former Weisetta residents who do or had lived here for many years. A few constituents who live in Weisetta but far removed from the site, and even a note from a potential new resident who was looking to build on one of the new lots proposed along with pictures of his family, including two adorable toddlers. Uh there has been a whole lot of interest in this project, which concerns just one residential property. I counted nearly 40 separate letters or notes from people. although several provided more than one note over time. All in all, there were more than two dozen individual contributors. This may be the single largest response I have seen over the more than eight years I've served on council, and it shows how engaged this community is. It was interesting for me to note that all of the input we received from the homeowners who live adjacent to or in the immediate vicinity of this project, about seven of them were opposed to this project as presented. Even though many supportive letters came in as well, it seems that the further away someone lived from this address, the more favorable the input, although not exclusively so. Nonetheless, the level of interest and passion was quite noteworthy. Some of the letters were quite detailed and well thought out on both sides of the argument. This has been an exceedingly difficult plan to ponder. Given that the planning commission passed this plan unanimously, I figured it would be a rather straightforward discussion. However, it was not. I have talked to some of our residents as well as stakeholders in the project. I have studied the arguments and analysis by the planning commission in which I hold a very high regard. I walked the property a few years back when it first came up and I have recently studied the property from the road in order to envision as best I could what the development might look like because I have discovered over time that it takes a great deal of imagination and study to realistically understand what a final project would actually look like when finished. I studied all of the provided materials in great detail without bias. I considered all of the data, input from neighbors, and pondered the long lasting impact of this decision. There is much about this plan that was painstakingly crafted with a great deal of sensitivity by everyone involved. But I'm left with two concerns. The first is the rather severe impact I feel the public road and culde-sac would have on the immediate neighborhood both structurally and visually. And secondly, our zoning code includes a provision that states, "The creation of lots shall not adversely impact the scale, pattern, or character of a neighborhood." And in my opinion, this plan does adversely impact the character of the neighborhood. And because of those concerns, I will vote no on this plan. Uh, thank you, me member Pleish. Uh, who would like to weigh in next? Go ahead. Thank you, mayor. Um, Council Member Plekish, you always do your homework so well and do those details. Uh, I'm not going to repeat or um some of the points, but I shared a lot of uh the sentiment, especially with the pros of the of the application and the the time, the work, the effort um is all very commendable. But I too really struggled with this road and do believe that this would adversely impact the neighborhood. Um, as you spoke about the responses we received for this particular application, it was definitely one of the most we've we've had, especially, you know, in the last four years that I've been here. I was reminded of the feedback we received for a recent zoning study in the R3A neighborhood, which really wanted to the neighborhood really wanted to focus um on how building our our zoning was building was creating uh an environment where we were prioritizing cars and garages over a character. And I think we got almost 200 responses for that. So the the values of the community I believe are to value character over cars and roads and garages. So, I really struggle with 500 26 feet wide for one additional lot for one additional garage. So, I too um will not vote in favor of this application. Uh thank you, council member. Um Mr. Sorenson, you're up next. Um, well, in some respect, I'm probably in between Molly and Alex, and I didn't write word for word what I want to say, and Molly's pretty good. I just kind of talking from the top of her head. So, I have some notes I'd like to uh use to kind of walk through my my thinking. First of all, um, in general, it's great to see the enthusiasm from the from the community and how much everyone cares about their uh neighborhood. I think in the end we all we all want the same thing. Um and I can tell you um like Alex, I pondered this considerably. Um I told the city manager today that I used to get paid a lot of money to stay up at night worried about things and trying to make, you know, our business better, but um uh now I'm doing it for um considerably less. Um, and uh, regarding the application, I mean, it's uh, clear that you care about this piece of property, the history you have on this property, um, the, uh, long road you've taken to get here, considerable time and effort and listening and, uh, thoughtfulness that you put to this proposal. So, um, I commend you for that. Um like many comments um I think there's two different issues here at least at least um and how you may think about it and evaluate it. Uh one is the lots and development of the lots and um you know I think the planning commission had it right. I think uh they focused on the lots and the criteria and the objective criteria things like complying with the comprehensive plan. Um pads and areas that preserve the sensitive areas um the uh combination of the lot shall be respect the natural topography and minimize filling and and grading um and on and on. I think the majority of the issues that the criteria applied to um the lots are in compliance and the the uh owner of this property has a right to develop this property. So I think we need to keep that in mind. Um the issue sounds like an for many of us is the construction of the road and the the cut we have which is significant through the hill. um we are exceeding the 8% 18% slope which uh still I think uh is a bit vague if that's um should be allowed or not and the criteria we're given and the factors considered pertain to possible adverse effects um which include uh the creation of the lots not adversely impact the scale pattern or character of the city and its neighborhoods. Um I I I think what we're doing with the lots here um creates some adverse effect here and um design of the lots and the site layout shall respond and be reflective of the surrounding lots and neighborhood character which has u been mentioned by others. So th those two things are um concerning to me. Um, but you know what what I'd like us to really focus on as this moves ahead is uh is isn't there a better way to build this road? And shouldn't we get together and find a way to minimize the impacts and be less disruptive and invasive? So things like um the re the relocation of the retaining walls now are off the right away because um the city would like them there and and for good reasons, but isn't there a way to really mitigate that? So bring the retaining walls in a bit, put them in the rightway. Uh I think you know if it's 50 foot now, you could probably get that down to something considerably less. Um flexibility on curb and gutter. I mean, we have concrete curb and gutter on this entire road. Um, if you look at other other um subdivisions, um, they don't all have curb and gutter. Some have asphalt, some don't have curb and gutter everywhere. Um, narrowing the road. Uh, if you look at some other subdivisions, we have roads that are that are narrower. And could we build a road that does exceed 8% in uh, slope? So, I think if we looked hard, we together all looked hard at this, there's a least invasive way to build this road and a and a real strong potential win-win in that regard. And I I say this because um in some of my thinking and investigating uh and you look at some other areas that were, you know, maybe compliant with at the time the subdivision requirements or maybe took a different approach and required some variances or maybe a PUD approach, you result in things like Locos Hills development. The width of the asphalt to the curbon gutter generally is in 20 feet. Uh it has concrete curbon gutter and serves many homes. Stone Crest development which is off of off of um 101. Yeah. Push away. Push away. Just north of railroad tracks. Serves five homes. It's 20 the asphalt is 20t wide. Uh there's no curb and gutter. Uh the subdivision just north of that off Bushway, which used to be called Enchanted Woods. I'm not sure what it's called now. Uh majority of that road is 16t wide asphalt with no curbing gutter. Um it serves 10 homes. It's considerably longer than 526 ft and uh parts of that road exceed 8% in uh slope. uh some of the some of the neighboring uh roadways to the property we're talking about. You I measured uh the width of the of the asphalt uh between the concrete curb and gutter right in front of the of um the Sauron house which is where the driveway is and it was 19 ft uh with concrete and curb and gutter beyond that. Uh, Boie Lane is 20 ft wide with no curb and gutter and Harrington is all over the place. Anywhere from 16 to 23 feet. Parts of that road exceed 8% slope and um part of it has asphalt curve and gutter. And as a reminder, the Ferndale uh application we're looking at here is designed to meet current city subdivision codes at 23 feet asphalt plus in uh the curbon gutter to get it to a 26 ft. And we're serving three homes and at the most maybe five. Um so the point of all that is to uh point out that it appears somehow uh we need to get to the point where we can build a less invest a less invasive road. Um and I'm not sure h exactly how we get there. Um but um I think that's that's that's a way uh that I'm thinking about it. think um because um it could result in lower lower construction cost. It could result in maybe a little little different approach from the landowner on on how we get there. Um I mean I came prepared to want to move this project forward. Um, I could support a motion to approve, uh, if we added some conditions on how we move it ahead to address some of the things that I've addressed here. Um, or, you know, a possibility of maybe tableabling this and give this some time to fester and digest with everyone to kind of come up with a better plan. But um this was this was this was difficult because the majority of it uh feels like this should be approved. But um I do feel the road construction we all could do a better job in building a road that's less invasive. Um thank you for your comments. Uh before I weigh in, I I uh need some clarification because it informs uh my commentary and I guess this is directed at staff and our city attorney. Um, are there any ideas that fall within the subdivision approval process that be considered as a conditional basis of approval that could help mitigate some of the land and topography concerns noted about the road? So, what I'm what I'm specifically referencing is can we can we vary from the rightway burden that we're putting on them? Can we, you know, what what are what flexibility, if any, do we have? I'll first go to staff and then to city attorney. um you know that might help us uh nudge a compromise here. Mr. Mayor, I'll say uh in summary, we have some but limited, but I'll ask the city attorney to expand on that. Go ahead, David. Yeah, mayor. I appreciate the question. Um and all everything that council has shared. Um so what you need to do tonight is is uh take action on the application that's before you. Um and I think has been alluded to you could approve with conditions. This is a preliminary plat uh requested approval. So the applicant if the preliminary plat is approved would need to come back with a final plat. Um you could request or or put conditions on on that preliminary plat that um modifications be made to address your concerns. Um, but I think your question was what would the code allow for at this stage. Um, the applicant has worked hard to comply with uh the public street standards of our code and that's what's driving a lot of the high impacts which I think some of you find as adverse impacts. Um, we're kind of stuck with that. Uh, that's what the code says. that's what the code requires the applicant to do and the city to to follow and and require. So to deviate from that, we'd need a variance. So that's one answer to the question. With a current application, um that would really be the only way to to really make those changes to the road. There's some of the other approaches that have been uh pursued in the past have involved uh PUDS where you can have a private street rather than a public street. different standards apply in that situation. So, I think those are those are the things that come to mind. I don't know if staff has any other thoughts about tools that are uh in the code that would allow for something different. Uh Mr. Mayor, City Attorney, the only other thing I would add and I think council member Sorenson alluded to it is the retaining wall and if because that isn't, you know, stipulated, I don't think whether it needs to be in the right away or not. In our subdivision ordinance, if city staff felt comfortable with putting it into the right of way, you know, based on a legal agreement or something, then that that could be um altered prior to what final approval of this preliminary plat or the final plat. Um what to what level that would mitigate some of the concerns, I'm not sure. We could find out. Um but that's something I think Can I interrupt? I just want to make sure I understand conceptually because I asked a really poor question earlier which I'll clarify but but when you say have some flexibility if we agree to move the retaining wall out of the rideway to where? Uh no actually into the rightway into the rightway. So out of the where it's currently being shown as on private and push it further to the street. So I guess my follow-up question would be it's probably for Val or or or Eric um under that hypothetical, right? And based on your knowledge of the slope, does that give the applicant any benefit of less retaining wall to minimalize, you know, because the grades I don't know the grade is is it lower? And if you push the retaining walls further towards Ferndale, does it somehow potentially hypothetically, and not buying you this, I'm giving a hypothetical. Um, does it allow it for it to be lower hypothetically? So to clarify, I think the point that city manager Dah is making is more that they would move inward towards the proposed street rather than that they would move southward closer to the road. So taking this sort of channel that we're looking at and making it narrower, I don't see the height of the retaining walls changing significantly in that scenario just because the the hill is masked the way that it is. Um it could end up reducing to some degree the amount of cut in terms of truckloads uh that has to come out of there. But the other big thing to consider is that one, there are always going to be considerations related to the fire code uh regardless of this if this is a PUD or a subdivision application. And second, there are other uses for the portion of the right of way right adjacent to the street uh for city purposes such as, you know, servicing utilities and all those sorts of things. when you move the right of way, when you move the retaining walls into the right of way, you start to lose access to that area right next to the street because now that area is, you know, potentially anywhere from, you know, 2 to 8 ft above the roadway now. So, some considerations there, but you could potentially gain maybe a few feet. So, that's sufficient to allow me to make my comments and then maybe that idea might trigger something else, but let me at least weigh in with my perspective and then we can come back to this. So, um I too have studied this deeply. uh I think I've uh talked to on the phone or met in person with at least 15 of the 30 folks plus the applicant twice. Um studied this, you know, did all the leg work, walked walked the property. It is challenging, but but you know, as a policy maker and as a decision maker, you're weighing two things, the objective criteria and the subjective criteria. and you're trying to balance, you know, that pendulum of of, you know, does it meet the objective criteria and then subjective is harder to to interpret and apply. I don't think anyone here says that the objective criteria for the subdivision hasn't been met. And uh I think it's being obvious here the the public road is a condition of our own code. We didn't we didn't they didn't come up with a a public road as their desired uh you know way to address this. our code drove it. And this isn't a new issue in the estate district. In the time that I've been doing this, many of the properties you referenced actually are private roads. Some of them got from public roads to private roads through litigation. Um, some of them uh go I hope that doesn't happen here, but but the fact is the the applicant has uh a choice, right? The choice is do I proceed through the objective standard of of meeting the subdivision code or do I choose a PUD which offers more flexibility but is fraught with more challenges shall we say in in coming to an agreement that that both parties can can live with. So they chose the uh objective criteria road and and it met our standard. I mean I don't think anyone can say that it does not meet the standard. You know point by point uh it's there. So then you go to the subjective criteria and is the subjective criteria enough to to put a finding of facts in place to deny right to grant a variance uh to table uh to approve or to approve with conditions right those are options approve approve with conditions deny table or approve of the variance right and so what I'd like to see us talk about we have four council members right so we need to come to some sort of consensus if you just nose count bas on comments. It's well, I haven't even given mine yet, but but I'll I'll tip my hand. I I have a hard time sitting here and saying, "Boy, um because of subjective criteria, we're going to say no. Uh our code dictated this. You followed our code. You spent a lot of time and energy and money." And then for us to sit here and say, "Well, sorry, but we're we're just going to kind of look the other way and say, um sorry." So, I'm thumbs up as is. Not because um I don't have empathy for the neighbors. I I have met with you. I have studied this. I have profound concern trying to think about what it would be like to be looking at this and whatnot. But but my job is not that. My job is to look at the objective criteria and determine based on that. And so I would be a thumbs up. Notes counts 3 to one. However, there's a second part of our assignment here. If we are to deny, we have to have a finding of facts and why we're going to deny. And I want to make sure that we go through that. I think our other options, correct me if I'm wrong, David, we can table, we can um you know, as long as we don't run out the clock um on ourselves, um we can um we can approve with conditions, we can uh look to create a variance and and and go through that process. So, I know each of those has its own set of criteria and I'm happy to have you guide us on each of those options and then I'd look to my council here to say if we're going to go the denial route, okay, what are our findings of facts? Yes, mayor. That that's a good outline. Uh, a couple quick footnotes to it. Um, you know, there isn't a variance on the table now. So, we couldn't act on that. We couldn't we couldn't grant that without uh the applicant going through. But, but that that you're you're correct to That's right. Um, that is an option for changing the requirements for the public street. Um, procedurally where council is at right now and it's a little tricky with four members too. Um but if you as a council tonight decide to go in a different direction than the recommendation from the planning commission for which we have findings of fact and we have a draft resolution. My advice to you would be to direct staff to prepare an alternative resolution to deny the application with findings that will support that. and we would ask you to articulate those findings better and we'd bring that back at the next meeting or the second meeting uh next month. Um, alternatively, somewhat similarly, if um, council feels like this application could benefit uh, with some dialogue with the applicant about some of the concerns you've articulated and other potential options for addressing the issues with the roadway. You could table action on this for a cycle or two to see if that bears any fruit. Um, I think we're okay with the the timeline under which we have to make a decision on this. Um, that's your other procedural option. Is there not one more? And just want to make sure hypothetically. Is there not approval with conditions? Yes. Oh, no. Absolutely. You could approve. Uh, we need to talk more specifically about what those conditions are, but we could go that route too. Yeah. So, let me clarify my my comment about variance. Um, I guess that would be a hypothetical if there's a denial. And then you know the elephant in the room is seems to be the road the grade uh the subjective criteria of the impact of the road and the grade the road is dictated by our code straight up right it is not to be disputed there's no dispute that our code requires a public road be built and all the other you know sort of qualitative comments about these other developments most of those are private roads so and I don't know all of them by heart but I I ruled on many of them many of them had a a a PUD or some alternative mechanis meism to allow the private road to be built to a mutually acceptable standard. I think that's a factual statement. So, so I guess I bring it back to council and I think our our choices are um you know to deny and I' I'd invite uh council who were in a denial position to state their findings of fact um and you'll get a chance to ask a question. Um start there. If we can get consensus on that, then we we'd move forward with that. If we can't, we'd come back with I would suggest approval with conditions or a tableabling. And then, you know, if we get consensus on that, then we'd take action. But I'm going to give everyone a chance. This is a lot to procedurally work through, so everyone will have a chance to ask clarifying questions at this point before we begin that deliberation. Go ahead, council me. Yeah, I mean um I guess my it depends on how we would do it or um how we word it and um how that might take place. But I think my word of preference would be to approve with conditions table uh approve it approve with conditions. we don't do that table um and give us some time to uh work through uh some of this and deal with some of the issues that we talked about. They mainly I pointed out that we could work on um anyway that would be my but but but it depend on just I think the details of what the conditions would be how effective they would be in trying to accomplish what we're talking about. So, at least in in the options that we have before us, your preference would be to work through a deliberation process to approve with conditions or table to try to find a path with the applicant. That's your preference. Um, does it make sense just, you know, for the two of you to weigh in what your preference of what you'd like to deliberate first? You know, just out of Would you be willing to do that, Council Member Fleckish? I'm just in favor of denying the application as it is. Okay. Deny. And the to me the elephant in the room is the road. And I understand that the plot the where the the buildable area is not violating an 18% grade issue, but the reason we have an 18% um code is because that does affect the property. The fact that the city is doing it instead of the property owner, it is like irrelevant that we're still going to be impacting the grade and it doesn't work for me. Sure. And uh I can't even envision conditions that we would come up with tonight to say that we should approve with conditions. So that to me is not even an option. Uh I suppos one one point of view. So yes, that is my point of view. Yes, Mr. Mayor. And um so I I can't see anything but denying the application as it is and they'll have to come back with a better plan uh sometime down the road that actually makes more sense to me. Um I could maybe consider tableabling, but I don't see why that what that would do for us at this point. Okay. Thank you for the clarity on that. Council member McDonald, just in terms of do you have a preference in how you'd like to see this venued and deliberated? Uh, yes. Um, similar to Council Member Pleish, I um I'm less optimistic about what we could come up with for a condition. So, um, and I I don't see what is to be gained from tableabling. It doesn't that that doesn't make any sense to me. So, um I mean I'm fine with moving on to findings of fact of why this um application doesn't seem like a good fit for me. So, that's where Okay, I'm at. So, I'm going to complicate this and say my preference would be, you know, now to move with approval for conditions. So, if we have two that want to make a motion for denial, we'd have to see if that could be heard and a majority opinion could be uh you know uh guided and and with findings of fact. And then if that deadlocks, then I'm going to suggest that either council member Sorson or I venue a a motion with conditions. See if that venues. Uh if we deadlock on two two on both then I think we move to an alternative. Mayor, I'm just going to go ahead and call the question here. Go ahead. I don't see any point in trying to come up with conditions. I'm going to call the question. So I I move that we uh deny this and direct staff to come up with uh findings of fact to offer a denial. Uh thank you. Do we have a second? Second. Further discussion. Mayor, may I just offer a friendly amendment to that motion? Um, I just think we'd be in a stronger position legally if it would be a direction for staff to prepare those denial findings uh for action at your next meeting. And I thought that's what I was moving. Yeah. Okay. Just then just just a clarification is that didn't you earlier want some indication from council on what those findings might be? Indeed I do, mayor. Um, what I want to make clear is that the direction is that staff would prepare a denial resolution with findings. And if that's the motion and it's been seconded, then during your discussion they could articulate what those should look like and we'll take that make sure that uh you know it's all put into a resolution for consideration the next. So So we have a motion on the table. It's been seconded. So I think we would then invite further discussion and during that further discussion per the city attorney's guidance um offer uh a narrative on on the findings of fact um so that can be brought back. So uh so we we've moved in second now we do further discussion for that and then we'll have an up or down vote roll call. So who would like to start? I'll just go weigh in. I think that the seminal event for me is it will clearly affect the character of the neighborhood. I know that's u poorly defined in code but it is in the code and based on my personal assessment and the the observations of virtually all of the neighbors that are surrounding that uh will definitely impact the character of the neighborhoods. So that would be my finding effect. Okay. Would you like to offer anything else to that? Um I can offer I can offer some agreement to that which is that um I do think it would adversely affect the character of the neighborhood. Um and I think that you know we're sitting up here and we're elected by the community and I really do believe that that's what's most important to the community. And we've gone through several applications, several deliberations on those applications that in my opinion tell me that's what the community appreciates and values the most. Okay. Is that sufficient? Um, city manager. Uh, uh, Mr. mayor, city attorney. I I mean, I think there were specific items that are in the staff report that came up that might be helpful to articulate in terms of the slope, trees, and others. Uh I think a little bit I would prefer a little bit more uh description before we before we take a vote. You know, I wrote down some notes that it's not really preserving natural amenities. I'm very concerned about the tree loss and the um the the adverse effects to the bluff. I'm concerned about the adverse effects to the neighborhood with the storm water pond. I'm worried about the neighbor's property value who um is going to have a loss of I think it was I just want to point of clarification financial consideration cannot be a finding effect correct um that's definitely true uh in variances mayor um I think possible adverse effects is the key as well as the criteria in the subdivision ordinance you know I think we have what we need based on the testimony that you've reinforced here and what the two of you said earlier that we could craft a finding of facts in that draft resolution should this motion pass. Okay. Just wanted to clarify. Okay. So, we have moved and seconded for a denial. So, um with the guidance provided by council member Ple and council member McDonald clarified by staff clarified by city attorney. So, I would ask the manager to call roll call vote for the denial. Council member Sorenson. Nay. Council member McDonald. Hi. Council member Pleish. I got to make sure we understand what we're voting. Eyes and nays here. We are voting to deny this. Correct. Direct to deny. I vote is to deny. Direct to deny. Okay. Direct to deny. Um did you all understand that? Okay. Then I have an I vote as well. And I vote no. So we deadlock. So our next option then is to um entertain a new motion potentially. Uh so the new motions I would entertain would be to table it. I understand your perspective that you don't think that that will bear fruit, but it is an option before us. The second option would be to uh have a motion for approval with conditions. So I guess I'll try that and just see how it works. I think we owe it to the applicant to have a full uh discussion and debate on on the pros and cons of this. So I'm going to attempt a motion, see if it gets seconded. I'm going to move that this application uh be approved based on the objective criteria of the subdivision code um with reference to the uh condition of approval that the applicant would work with staff to determine within the rightway criteria outlined in the um code that if there's any um potential adjustments to the road with um you know to meet that wouldn't trip our standards but but because of the the guidance that was provided around right away. Is there something that the applicant could work with with staff that could potentially come back and and alleviate that when it's read for the second time? So, my specific motion is approval with the condition that the applicant work with staff to uh try to address the public road and use the flexibility that was articulated by our staff about the rightway to provide some adjustments that might uh be uh advantageous to the neighbors. So, that's my motion. Um, and see if it can be seconded. If it's if it's dead on arrival, then we'll move to another option. So, I've moved it. Do I have a second from anyone? Second. Further discussion and guidance from our city attorney. Yes, Mr. Mayor. Thanks. Uh I if uh you'd accept a friendly amendment, I'd just say that you're you're moving adoption of resolution 625, which is a resolution to approve with all the findings from the commission with the condition you articulated. I think it's essentially in the spirit of what you said. Yes, I accept that friendly amendment. Uh does my second or accept the friendly amendment? Yes. Okay. So, it's moved and seconded. I'm going to call another roll call vote. Council member Pleish. Nay. Council member McDonald nay. Council member Sorenson I. Mayor Mullen I. So we deadlock again. So um we could debate this until hours and hours. I don't think our code um you know tells us how many times we we try to deadlock to try to be efficient. Um I think I would recommend uh now entertaining a motion to table this uh to the next meeting. Uh we don't have a full council. Um and perhaps the full council uh might if we have a full council at the next meeting um might offer a different perspective one way or the other. Uh so I would accept a motion to table this at this time. Mr. Mayor, I'll I'll make a motion to table, but I do know that the next meeting will not have a full council. So my motion will be to table this motion to discuss it at the next opportunity when all five of us will be here. Okay. So we have a Okay. Sorry. as city manager. I was just going to mention that that meeting where we hope to have all five that are all five are planned to be in attendance would be April 15th which is a regularly scheduled city council meeting. Um I believe the application the 120day rule expires on the 17th of April. So there would need to be final action taken place at that meeting unless we get a grant for an extension from the applicant. that would be the last opportunity to act on it. Let me play back what I heard and make sure that we're all in full understanding of of what's happening and what what could happen. So, we have a motion on the table to table to the next venued meeting where we have a full council. Um, and then further guidance was offered by staff to be mindful of the 120day clock, which by their estimation expires on April 17th. Our next meeting is April 2nd. The next meeting after that would be what? Uh, next mean is the 1st and then after that it's the 15th. First and 15th. So, we'd meet that. Um, but the other option would be if the applicant allowed the clock to run. So, I just want to be clear about the the guidance on the clock and then we have a motion on the table. So, I need a second for the motion on the table. Um, could I add that motion? I think the amendment to the motion. Yeah. So, um I think what we're after here is table because we'll have a full uh presence of the council, but also um I would like that amendment to acknowledge that during that time light staff work with applicant to review some of the adverse ch uh uh challenges that we have talked about pertaining to the road. So take that same same time frame and um use that to address the issues that we've all talked about which led to the denial. U so we have a friendly amendment. Just wait. So we'll just act on that and then you can comment. Um would you just one second would you accept that friendly amendment as proposed? I'm not sure it matters but yeah I'll accept that. Yeah. Okay. Now further discussion. Sorry. My further discussion is I'm curious um what would happen if we didn't agree to table this dead luck on that. Yeah. Can someone tell me what happens if we just all end up at 22? Like what happens to the applicant? What happens to question universe and spinning? Thank you for asking that. Thank you. So before we uh we have a motion, we have a friendly amendment. The amendments have been accepted. We have a further discussion question for the city attorney. If we deadlock on a tableabling, what what what are our options? Well, in order for council to act, uh we need a majority of council to vote affirmatively in that direction. Um if we go a different direction than the planning commission, uh and the findings made, we we really should have in the record findings that support that direction. So, um procedurally, we just have to keep moving until we get to one of those places. If for some reason before the end of the the the 60-day 120 rule under state law that requires us to take action, if we can't make a decision by then, the applicant would automat the application would be automatically approved under state law unless we've stated in the record reasons for denial. The minority has the applicant agrees to extend it. Well, right, that's always open to us, too. But assuming we didn't have that and we we ran out of time to answer Council Member McDonald's question, um as long as we've the minority has stated in the record reasons for denial, the application would be denied. Okay. Is that the guidance you were looking for? Yeah, that was that was the answer. All right. So, we have moved and seconded with a friendly No, we have moved and a friendly amendment accepted. We need a second on this. So, it's moved by uh council member Pleish. you offered. Mayor, I believe it was accepted by council the friendly amendment, but we still need the the motion seconded. Oh. Uh, okay. Sure. So, I never heard council member Sorenson say he seconded. He offered his friendly amendment. The amendment was accepted. I'm just pursuing trying to acknowledge that there's a second for this motion. Is there a second for this motion? I'm prepared to second, but I have additional comments on if I make them now or after the second. I think you make them now. No, if they're in the nature of discussion on the motion uh that's been I would suggest making if you if you agree with the motion, which I think you did, you offered the friendly amendment. I'd second it and then discuss. Okay. I will second the motion. Okay. And then further discussion, council members. Okay. So again, I mean the reason besides having all five of us at the next meeting, the big reason to do this is make headway on the issues that we're talking about. And there's a lot of things that could happen in the meantime. It could the application could be withdrawn. they may agree to take a different approach to make headway on some of these issues because if unless we make headway on some of these issues um we're not going to accomplish what we want potentially we don't we don't know the opinion or the perspective of the fifth council member I think that's a fair statement for the body that's here but I don't think we we could speculate on another council member's position I've not speculated on their position I'm thinking more about mine got it fair enough thank you for that clarification Okay. Okay. So, uh, so motion and second. Motion and seconded. So, now I think we go roll call vote on tableabling and then see where we go from there. So, if we could call the roll call vote, it's motioned by and seconded to table this to our next meeting or our next meeting with venued five council members and with the conditions that the applicant work with the city to try to to the best of their ability neutralize some of the concerns that were that were addressed in in today's meeting. Uh, council member McDonald I. Council member Sorenson, I. Council member Pleish, hi. Mayor Mullen, I it's tabled. So, uh, thank you for everyone's patience this evening. I know this is complicated and I hope that you see that your council, uh, is truly trying to deliberate all sides of this and trying to f find a path forward. Um, I'm going to suggest a 5m minute recess because we've been at this since 4:15 today. Uh, and just a 5m minute one function break and then we'll return for the next uh, item. So, we return to the here at 9:30, please. And if if you guys are going to uh have discussion, uh if you wouldn't mind uh taking your discussion out into the lobby so that we can continue on with our meeting at 9:30. And thank you for all being here. I appreciate all of your comments. We're mayor. Anytime you're ready. So, we are back in session. Um, and we're going to move on to the next item on the agenda, which is consider approval of a seasonal lease agreement with Tonka Boone Rentals LLC for boat rentals at the community depot docks. So, is this to you, city manager? Uh, m Mr. Mayor, I think we're uh I think you're u optimistically jumped ahead to the final item. I've had I got a lot of paper in front of me. Sorry. It's right here. We are on um I literally have four pages of notes that I wrote down today, which I've never done in 17 years. So anyway, we're now back to item B, which is consider authorization to solicit bids for the Clapper Park improvements. Did I get that right? You got it right. Thank you. Super. City manager. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And our our parks and environment planner, Keezer, is going to walk us through this item. uh he's been really the lead on this project for a couple years, so I think he's pretty excited to get to where we're at tonight and walk through the presentation. Thank you, manager Doll, Mr. Mayor and Council. So, tonight I'll be going through a presentation as it was stated to consider authorization to solicit bids for the Clappage Park improvement project. I'll go over a bit of background as to how we got to this point um and and how we got to this point here tonight and then go over the construction documents um themselves and then go over a little bit of the bidding process and construction timeline to that we are proposing. So to start here just to get a little bit more context of Clappage Park itself. So you can see here in this image uh is the entire property. it is uh disconnected by Park Street there through the middle. So essentially what we note here is the north side of Park Street is Bell Courts and then everything south of Park Street is Clappage Park. Uh you can notice there at the Bell Courtourts project, we just finished the two tennis courts and four pickle ball courts uh in that area along with the new parking lot there or enhanced improved parking lot. The main uh project here tonight for Clappage Park is essentially everything south of Park Street there that we'll be going into. So to go into this background here, um really going back to 2019, the parks and trails master plan was approved. And in that master plan, there was a concept planned associated with the Clappage Park improvements that I'll show here in a couple slides just to give a little bit more context. And then fast forward to October of 2022, uh the staff in the parks, Joe's board went to a council workshop to at that time look at a update to the playground itself. And in that workshop, council directed staff to take a more holistic comprehensive look at Clappage Park and the improvements proposed and bring forward a recommendation for um that plan. And in March in 2023, council approved agreement with WSB and HCM. We also have representatives from both those firms here tonight um that we've been working with on the construction documents as well. Uh but essentially that agreement was to go through the design re design plan and construction document um plan as well. Then in the September 2023 workshop, council reviewed the preliminary design plans, provided some feedback and input on those plans. And then in April of 2024, uh somewhat of the same thing, council reviewed the design plans and provided feedback. And then some of the more recent meetings in July of 2024, council approved the final design of the Clappage Park improvements and directed staff to create construction plans uh for the proposed improvements. And then in January of 2025 at the council workshop, council then directed staff to finalize the construction documents for all aspects of the project which are included in the packet here tonight and we'll take a look at. So the overall objectives for the project um as we noted in the existing conditions really the western side of the portion of the park um we are looking to activate and enhance then the eastern side of Clappage Park uh the goal is to keep it more natural and quiet. Some of the more specific objectives were to facilitate a more yearround usage. Right now, it's not necessarily used probably to its fullest potential in the warmer months, but it is heavily used during the winter months at this time. Uh, also create an ADA accessible park. Most, if not all of the amenities in Clappage Park are not ADA accessible, including the playground and warming house. So, this project uh fixes that and creates uh ADA accessible amenities. Another objective is fix headaches. You know, one of the biggest headaches is the winter flooding. You'll have around just over 20 inches of ice on one corner of the uh park and then six to eight inches of ice on the other corner of the park. So, fixing that uh will help with maintenance and flooding the rink in general, but overall fix those types of headaches. And then connecting the upper and lower park, like I noted, Bell Courtourts and Clappage Park. One of the goals or objectives was to connect those two areas as best we could um to allow that connectivity. So, as I noted, this is actually the concept plan that was incorporated into the parks and trails master plan. So, you can see a lot of different proposed improvements were incorporated into that concept plan. And really this is where we started with uh with the discussions uh with the parks and trails board to create a updated concept plan or design plan which is shown here. I won't spend too much time on this just because we have updated uh construction documents to go alongside this concept plan but I just wanted to show uh essentially the progression that we've been going through. So now we go into the construction documents which were created from those concept plans from those design plans um and through the discussions with with the community parks and trails board and council. So a few things to note here just on the site plan itself and I noted over on the left side generally how we are proposing to bid out the project. So, in the base bid, it really includes a lot of the site improvements, uh, being grading, drainage, irrigation, the parking lot, sidewalks, and playground. And in a separate bid, we would be bidding out the warming house renovation project. And I'll go through uh these projects more detail in a bit here. And then we also included alternate bids, that being the hillside stairs, and slides. It's not shown on this site plan, but I'll show it in a minute. the Minnitankka Avenue sidewalk which is sewn there on the very eastern side of Clappage Park and then the Bell Courtourts Cabana drinking fountain as well. And really these are separated out into different bids to get the most competitive bids possible. Also allow us a bit of flexibility when it comes to uh cost and potentially um doing specific projects over anothers if need be. So zooming in here a little bit to the playground and patio area. So, this is again putting a lot more of the activation on the western side of the park by adding the playground and outdoor patio here. Um, really to also utilize the warming house uh to its fullest potential as well. Um, and using the restrooms incorporated in that warming house. So, again, these amenities here would all be ADA accessible u mainly due to the new parking lot that we're proposing there just south. Um, but this is overall patio, playground equipment. I'll show a quick rendering there as well. Uh, went through some significant community engagement in regards to the playground and play equipment there, too. So, that was incorporated into these construction documents. The parking lot itself, 18 stall parking lot. Really the main goal of this was to uh add more accessibility and ADA accessibility to the park itself um by allowing folks to park down there and access the warming house and playground and outdoor patio and the uh ball field or the lawn area. We also are proposing uh the grass pavers on the eastern stalls of the parking lot as well and to improve connectivity by adding a sidewalk from Weisetta Boulevard down to the park itself into that parking lot and improving the uh crosswalk across that driveway. I added this in here just a quick rendering of what uh the playground equipment would look like. the exact locations and layout uh will change a little bit with these with these updated construction documents, but the overall equipment would stay the same. Uh at the parks and trails board, really wanted a natural playground to blend into the hillside and the wooded area there on the north side of Clappage Park. Some of the main things that uh through the community engagement that we found that folks wanted was climbing structure, swings, and slides that were incorporated here. And just another rendering there. So now we get into uh an alternate the alternate bid of the hillside stairs and slides. Now this is different than uh what was recently shown at the council workshop. Mainly at that workshop we noted we still need to work on a few different options to um have this hillside stairs and slide there. And so everything essentially in shown in red would be incorporated in the alternate bid. So the main things obviously the stairway going up to Park Street and then a more unique feature of having a slide um being utilizing the existing topography of the hill going down from uh Park Street there. And one of the reasons for the additional sidewalk is that when we incorporate a slide on the hill, we need to have a similar alike experience of play equipment um that is actually accessible to all. That is why we have a accessible sidewalk ramp going up to a smaller slide just south of that longer slide there um in the play area. Again, this is a alternate bid. So, we will get specific numbers for this part of the project to determine if we um want to incorporate this as part of the construction construction plan. Just a quick note about tree removal. If you if you saw the this slide or this document in the packet overall there's be with the alternate bid itself since the incorporation of the hillside stairs and slide uh and the accessible ADA ramp going up on the north side of the play area pushes that um play area and impact a little bit more north. And so we reviewed these plans with our city forester. Overall, there be proposed 17 trees removed. In red, designated in red here are diseased blue spruce trees. So, our city forester noted that he would like to take advantage actually of this opportunity to remove those trees. Um, so he did not classify those significant as significant trees. In blue here are undersized basswood trees. They are undersized. So again, they would not be classified as significant trees uh as part of our tree preservation ordinance. So, the only significant tree that's proposed to be removed with that alternate uh bid would be an 8 hackberry tree. Um, overall, we're allowed to take with this type of project 10% removal of significant trees. So, we'd be significantly below uh that requirement. And then just as a note in the landscape plan, the proposed uh tree plantings uh with the base bid shown here 17 1/2 in and then with the alternate bid 15 12 proposed tree replacement caliber inches for those trees. Moving to the warming house and the proposed renovation here. This is the existing floor floor plan for the warming house. A few notes here to look at. Um mainly shown here, well shown here in red is the interior gathering space or the main warming house area. And I want to keep the number of 432 square ft um in the back of your mind as we move to the proposed floor plan for the warming house. But the main idea um or main concern was that there was a lack of interior space or gathering space inside the warming house. And so we wanted to increase that area to be also more flexible and comfortable. There's currently no AC. There's no cooling uh in the warming house. So that limits some of the potential opportunities in the warmer months. And another note, the southern door actually cannot open in the warming house. Uh so we want to fix that. And there is also no direct access to the restroom. So, if we want to open those up to the public or to classes that are using utilizing Clappage Park, we would need to open up the entire um interior space of the warming house. So, with the proposed floor plan, try to fix some of those or remedy some of those concerns. The interior space has essentially doubled. So by moving the uh southern walls more south and the eastern wall more east that has doubled the interior space to around 875 square ft. We have updated attendant desk that also incorporates some storage for the rental skates that we uh purchased via grant. uh a new door to the restrooms so it would have direct access to the restroom area so we could allow um that access without opening up the entire interior warming house space. Uh and then new gas fireplace both interior and exterior and then also adding cooling into the main area of the warming house there as well. So now going into the proposed costs and cost estimates. Again, this is a request to um solicit for bids. So again, these are general cost estimates. Um but at if council approves this authorization to solicit bids, we would certainly get more very more exact um numbers as to how much these proposed improvements would cost. And at that point, we can certainly have more of a detailed discussion on what aspects of the project, if not all of the project that we can move forward with. So, in the base bid, again, it's right around $1.25 million. The warming house is just over $800,000. I also note that also includes uh around $100,000 for outdoor patio and then additional funds for furniture as well. So, those estimated construction costs just over $2 million. And then the bid alternates that I noted there, there's three different bid alter alternates for the hillside stairs and slides, Mitanka Avenue sidewalk, and the Bell Courts Cabana drinking fountain. Those are just over $300,000. Then the indirect costs are the design fees, construction document fees, construction admin fees, and permitting fees uh associated with the project for a total estimated cost of $2.65 million. And then if we move to the left side of the screen here, just as a just as a note for what we have currently uh designated in the CIP for the total project was just at 22.84 84 million. So the proposed cost estimates uh certainly a little below that. And in the park CIP with that 2.84 estimated uh for the project, we would be at a deficit in 2025 of two just over $200,000. But that difference between the cost estimate and the CIP estimate, we would be at an updated deficit of around $25,000. And again, I want to make clear these are cost estimates. uh once we get the bid numbers back, we would certainly have uh a lot better idea of where we're at and where we would need to go when it comes to cost. Okay, thank you. Is that you have no one more? Yeah, I think just one more slide. Sorry. Uh bidding. Uh depending on the discussion and approval by council tonight, if council approves the authorization, we would look to publish the bids or publish the plans to solicit bids first week of April with a bid opening in late April and review of those um bids at the May 6th city council meeting and then the proposed construction timeline that we've discussed before. uh depending it would certainly depend on the specific projects that we would move forward with but have it phased out to have the site grading drainage irrigation done as soon as possible and then do all the other site amenities along with the warming house uh as it makes sense to have those completed before the winter season. Okay. So just bringing back to council then um I think what you're asking is uh you've organized the bid in the way that you have. you've made some tweaks since the last time we saw this. Uh looking for guidance from council if the organization of going out to bid is, you know, to our uh liking and if so, uh a motion to to address that. But before we get to that, I would uh open it up to council for questions of staff on what was presented this evening. Anyone? Go ahead, Ken. Just a couple comments and maybe questions. The hillside slide, I noticed it was by by others. I mean, look, what is that? This just a long straight go fast slide or Yeah, council member. Good question. More or less. Yes. And we would be working with Midwest Playscapes, who is our the proposed playground vendor for the rest of the play area as well. And so they um created these plans essentially be a custom slide. It's around 18 ft that slide to go down that hill. Oh, the big one's only 18 ft. Correct. Oh, that's about twice as long, but okay. You're just dreaming. I know. It's like an adult slide. Um, so, um, just a comment on schedule because all this work is subject to weather, right? It's all going to be weather work. I mean, my only input would be just let's build some contingency time in our schedule. Let's not schedule this thing to be tight because if we if we don't get done, we're going to have winter issues and it's going to cost money. It's going to, you know, it's going to not be good. So my suggestion is let's be a little conservative when it comes to our bid uh durations or our schedule durations to to get the work done. And then my last comment would be um what what are what do we do to hustle to get bids and how many bids do you would you say is a good number of bids? I might actually look at one of our consultants who've worked on some of these projects before to see if they have a better idea of that type of work. Just state your name and who you represent and then answer the question as presented, please. Bob Schlipka, landscape architect with WSB working on the site portion of this. Um, two items. Number one, the slide the slide the slide is 18 vertical feet. Thanks. So it ends up being about 40ome feet in length and there you go. Um so it is quite a bit larger than it looks like. That's a real slide. Um I saw you kind of like 18 ft. I was like I know what he's thinking. He's thinking linear feet. Um schedule and and bidding. So we we did talk schedule on our staff meeting when I reviewed with staff. I'm very comfortable thinking if we do get this to bid and it's awarded in early May. We'll have a contractor really starting probably mid to late May depending on their aggressiveness to do this project which would put a completion date in early fall which is I think and in talking with with Mike and Nick and other staff we feel it's very doable from a site standpoint to get in get the main lawn area if you want to call it that completed. I would see a park project like this. What we're seeing right now kind of in the industry is there's I would say anywhere from about 6 to 12 contractors that are aggressively bidding our park projects for something of the scale and magnitude. Um there's larger projects that are more specific to one contract and there's really small kind of an you know maintenance projects that are specific but on this kind of millionish dollars on a site project like I said there is probably I would say somewhere about 8 to 12 contractors could be how many bids you would potentially see on this project. So you think we'll get that many bids? I would say you'd have from what I've seen this in the last month or two, I would say there'll be six to eight probably bids for sure. Good. It's always hard to guess on on timing and schedule, but that'd be kind of where I'd be. No, no less than about six to eight probably right now. Yeah. Well, I guess my my only thought is on something like that, it pays to be a little proactive and also make some calls and make sure you're getting priority for these guys. Correct. And most of the contract they decide they're going to bid you or someone else. Make sure you're in there. No. And I Yeah, totally agree. Been doing this for 25 years. So, usually right after the holidays, that's where we'll start. We'll start reaching out to contractors and I let them know of, hey, here's the the eight or 10 projects that are going to be coming up this spring, right? They know what's happening. They know the budget. They know location. And that's always the trickier part. There's some contractors that are south metro and depending upon what their workload is, they may or may not cross the river. Sometimes we have east metro that that go west, some don't go west. So, it's always a little trickier in territories, but like I said, most of them know it's coming. So, further questions of staff from council. Have one mayor, please. Um, my question was also about the two about the hillside stairs and slides. Um, the they've the stairs have moved since the last time I saw this. And I assume that means the other stairs are not ready. Correct. Okay. There's not going to be two sets of stairs. Um, I think this move of stairs makes perfect sense. Um, my request is that the stairs and the slides when they come to us after a bid are two separate numbers, not together. If that's doable, we can do that. Yes. Thank you. Further questions of staff. I have one. if you could go back I think a couple slides where it talks about um the way you structured the bid maybe it's forward the other way right there go back so is this assumption that the base bid and the warming house go together as one package and are bid that way so mayor so the the base bid and the warming house will be separate okay mainly for the type of construction that those contractors will be doing. Some folks would only do the site plan or some folks would or some contracts would would just do the warming house. So, we want to make sure we get Okay. I just want to clarify because it was kind of boxed together. Okay. So, I I just have a comment. I mean, I appreciate that your revised sharpening the pencil drop the deficit from 210 to 25.1. Um, as I stated in the workshop, um, and I'll state it again tonight. um no matter what these bids come back, I'm not supportive of the full engagement of draining the parks fund to whatever the number is. And my second comment is we don't have a very good track record even using a construction manager ever coming with a bid in um anywhere near staff's original estimate, which is why we're doing this, right? We're we're going out to bid to, you know, check and determine what we're going to do going forward. And so I I'm supportive of the way you've organized it. I think getting more information gives us, you know, as decision makers what we might want to pull the trigger on. So, I'm I'm supportive of moving forward with Molly's uh recommendation of splitting the the stair from the slide because I think I know where you're going. I mean, the slide can exist for kids without the stairs for old people to, you know, walk down, right? I mean, well, I just think there are two different priorities and if there's um a situation where something has to be scrapped, not saying it would slide first, but I would hate to see the stair. I think the stairs are crucial. I would have put the stairs in the first part. Okay. But you're okay with lining them split out though, like as Okay, great. Any further comments or questions, staff? Otherwise, we'll move or accept a motion on this. So, seeing no further comment, I would accept a motion to approve this with the tweak that Molly's recommended around the stair and slide being split out. Uh, would someone like to make that motion, please? So moved. Do I have a second? Second. Uh any further discussion? All in favor say I. I. I. I. All right. So that unanimously moves forward. And now finally, these poor gentlemen. Consider approval of seasonal lease agreement with Tonka Boat Rentals LLC for boat rentals at the depot community docks. Is this going to city manager or Mr. Mayor? This is going to uh Mr. Keyser as well. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Kezer. Yes, thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council, and thank you for the applicants uh to sticking around with us uh all night here. So, this again, as you know, is a considering approval of a seasonal lease agreement with Tonka Boat Rentals LLC for boat rental service at the commu at the depot community docks. So, again, just a little bit of background here quick rentals. The company contacted city staff in 2023 about operating a boat rental service on Weisetta Community docks in 20 in the 2024 season. And at that time, um, this request and discussion went to the city council at two of their workshops alongside some other paneway and lakewalk and dock policy discussions. And at that time, council essentially noted that um the lakewalk and docks were just being constructed. They're still unknown of how they're being how they would be operating uh how they would be used. So they would like to essentially directed uh staff to table this opportunity or this discussion uh for the 2025 season which we are currently looking forward to. Um so with that in mind, Tonka Boat Reynolds went to the parks and trails board at their December 16th meeting um to uh present their proposal and gain their uh thoughts and comments. And at that meeting, the parks and trails board recommended approval unanimously, mainly for the reasons that it would enhance public access to Lake Minnetonka. uh mainly for folks that don't have access to the boat to uh get on to Lake Minnetonka, introduce a new recreational opportunity and generate some additional revenue for the city. So that was the parks and trails board recommendation on this request or proposal. So, the proposal itself, um, I'll go show a a map location of where the two boat slips would be located or proposed to be located, but essentially Tonka Boat Reynolds would be leasing two boat slips from the city. Um the proposed locations were chosen uh and recommended mainly due to the fact that they were the among the least utilized in 2024 based on the park mobile data uh for the boat parking uh payment system that we have. And in total those two slips uh had a total of 28 transactions generating just over $200 in revenue. And so the proposed cost for leasing the slips is 8,500 for Taco Rentals. And in this discussion, we looked at some similar um lease agreements with Excelsier where Tonka Reynolds actually had a location in 2024 and Excelsier charged $6,600. And so even in the parks and trails board discussion, it was noted that these are new community docs. they should be slightly higher and with their essentially their location in Weisetta um they should be slightly higher than what Excelsier charged. Uh so again with the proposal the boats would be stored overnight in these in this well in these two slips in this location. There'd be some simple signage designating the slips to be reserved for Tonka boat rentals. So if the boat rentals are out on the lake, folks don't um utilize those slips as transient slips. Uh we they're also looking requesting for storage boxes for life jackets, ropes, other boat amenities that would be placed at the end of the slip fingers. You can kind of see here. And mainly we're looking at putting the storage boxes at the end of the fingers to stay away as much as possible from pedestrian traffic and folks utilizing the docks. So, as you can see here, the two slips shown in red are the proposed two slips that Tonka Boat Reynolds would be utilizing, mainly again for their um lack of utilization in the 2024 season and um also some safety um uh improvements to to have a kind of a wave break for those those boats going in and out from the docks themselves. the operations of Tonka Boat Reynolds. Essentially, users or renters can reserve the boats by calling, emailing. There's a form online on their website for folks to fill out. Um, they currently have five boats available to rent. You can do different uh ways to rent the boats, either by hourly, half day, full days, multiple days. You can also have a um a driver or captain for free. uh at the same price for renting the boats as well. Each renter or pro prospective renter would receive safety training to ensure their ability to operate a boat safely. Talking with Taco Boat Reynolds, that is key to their uh operations as well, mainly because they do not want damage on their boats too. So, it is of concern to them as well. They would have a staff member present at the docks during the entire rental experience, helping people on and off the boat and helping them uh overall with their experience. And like I said, in 2024, Tonka Boat Rentals did operate in Excelsier, but they also have uh access to boat rentals all around the lake uh for folks to get on and off. So, in the draft agreement that we have um here tonight, uh one of the major things is that this draft agreement is contingent on the Lake Minnitonka Conservation District. We would need approval from the LMCD to change the use of these slips from transit slips to rental slips. Um so, there would be an application and approval process with the LMCD and would need to go before their board for approval. So this uh draft agreement before you tonight is contingent on that approval. The draft agreement is only for the 2025 season. So again, so we can re-evaluate at the end of the season to determine uh to have additional conversations, discussions, determine if we want to um move forward with talk about rentals for future seasons as well. operating season for May 1st, October 1. Operating hours from 7 am to 10 pm. Uh, and then also note there's a 30-day termination notice in the draft agreement as well. So, recommendations, next steps. Again, like I noted, parks and trails board recommended approval. The next steps, if approved by council, um staff would work to with the applicant to finalize the agreement and then we would work with Taco Reynolds uh alongside LMCD uh to submit an application and gain their approval and then Tonka Boat Reynolds contingent on that approval would then start operations in the 2025 season. So with that, I'll bring back to the mayor and council for any questions. Questions of staff council. Go ahead. Um, what overhead will the city absorb in maintaining these, if any? There would be no maintenance or operations overhead for the city. Okay. And the money we collect for this, where is it intended to go? Good question, council member. I'm not sure if we parks and trails. That's exactly what I was going to suggest. So, good job. Uh, other questions of staff? Uh, does the applicant have anything that they would like to say? If if so, uh, come to the dis. If not, you don't have to. No comments. Okay. Um, I have a another question for staff if that's a quid, right? Um, I'm curious how long the wait is for a resident to get a slip in the marina for the lottery on average. How many how many years? I mean, ballpark. It depends, but I would say around five. How many how many people applied for how many available slips? Oh, I don't have that that in front of me. could get you that, but I typically we have a weight list of of, you know, 50 upwards to 100. Okay. Uh, anything else? Question. Question. Well, just a couple comments. I I got to tell you, I just scratched my head on this a little bit when I first understood what we were doing, taking brand new docks for public use, and now we're going to rent two out for the year. I guess you believe they're not in demand much. I mean, it only makes sense to me if they're not being used much. And that's kind of the story here, right? Well, I had I had a related question if you if you would just indulge me just to clarify your point and I'll bring it back to you. Yeah. So, just because you know your data says X amount of dollars was was quote unquote paid, there's a whole lot of people that are going into those docs and not paying anything. So, I think that data at best is misleading to represent the use of the docks. So, my personal opinion. Yeah. Yeah. I guess I was going to add to that. Um, you know, I'm I'm probably okay with I think the fact that parks is enthused about it. I mean, uh, I mean, is is a meaningful um, but I think we ought to really monitor closely the usage of docks over by the depot, especially in this part of the dockage, cuz I mean, I wouldn't do it for the money. I think you're doing it more to provide people access to the lakes, but if these docks really are in demand, then I I'm not sure this is a good idea. So, I'm going to vote to approve this, but let's keep an eye on it. Okay. Uh do others have questions? Otherwise, I'd invite others to weigh in with, you know, where they stand on this issue and then we can do a vote. So, questions first and then if if no questions, then I would ask uh I would like a little more information. I'd like more information on what exactly is going to be permanently on the dock. Um, you know, a storage unit looks sounds like visual clutter to me and I'd like a visual of what that what that is. Um, and I also am curious where your full-time employee plans to park and where your um guests plan to park. Uh perhaps you could come to the U podium and address council member's question please. If you don't mind just stating your name and who you represent and then if you wouldn't mind addressing the two questions of council member please. Yeah I'm Eric with Tabout Eric Hartman with Tonkabout Reynolds. Um address uh 2510 Shady View Lane. Thank you. Um, so we have been we direct people to the Berry Street lot over on that uh um over beh um on the what is that the north side of Lake Street there. Um and um that's been very I mean if that's the direction that we've been given to be able to direct people to it's um I believe that there's capacity there from what I'm understanding and that's where we've been that was kind of what was talked about. Okay. And then could you also reference uh the question about you know just what how are you going to organize what you see on the dock itself? So we we were very open that we're very flexible with whatever that is right. So we would like I mean we did talk about um a box to be able to have life jackets or you know an extra anchor or whatever if somebody damages anything. Um it doesn't have to be on the dock. We talked about uh you know the along one of the fence lines, over by the trees, over by the um over by the restrooms. We could you know any we're flexible on any of that and it whatever look that wanted that the councilor staff wanted that to look like. Uh we understand that the small town charming and we have no interest in impeding on that. We understand that the cosmetics of that dock is a lot of money and time and and effort has gone into making that beautiful. Um, you know, our goal is to to just to provide access to an amazing lake. I grew up here. I'm from Weisetta. I graduated from Weisetta. Um, it's I've traveled all over the country and it's one of my favorite places in the world. And I I I you know, it cost $100,000 to have a boat to get out there, right? And it's you know that you can't have a small boat out there. It's not safe. So, we want to just be able to provide access to one of the most amazing areas. So, that was our goal. And um the feedback's been fantastic. Um the people are very receptive to it and um so you know but this is my hometown and you know my kids graduated from Weisetta. I graduated from Weisetta. So this is this it makes sense. It was hard for me to go to Excelsier you know. Well thank you boy. But can you give me an idea of the size of this container that has to house all these life jackets and Oh completely flexible. I mean well it has to hold your stuff. So Right. We could put it in the truck in a parking lot, too, right? I mean, that's that's to me that shouldn't I I don't want that to be I understand the cosmetics and we're willing to work with you. I ideally, you know, if it could go up against one of the fence lines or, you know, over by the rest over by the restrooms or there's area over by the trees over by the boat works uh launch. I mean, there's places where it could be it wouldn't be we um objection. We don't think it would be objectional. We understand if you don't want it on the dock. Nobody's saying that. How big do you think it's going to be? How big? Um, you know, uh, I think probably our jetty cooler a little bit bigger ideally, you know. I mean, we'll fit whatever you guys tell us we can, you know. So, if you if you say it's a one square foot, then well, that's what we got, you But if we say no, you don't get to put storage on city property and that and then that's then we keep those life jackets and stuff in the back of a truck and you know in the and we would you know cuz that would be we would be we would be able to accommodate that. Okay. Any further questions? What type and size boats are they? They're uh 20 to 24 foot. We have three Monteray. The the last one is a Monterey M4, a 24T Monterey M4. Um, we have a C-Ray, um, and a Larson. So, all 20 foot. I mean, you don't really want to be out on anything smaller than 20 feet. Great. But you don't want to get too big where it's hard to handle either. So, we're try we try to find that. I don't know. I rent 1400 paddle boards a summer that go out there. So, anyway, um, any further questions of the applicant? Okay. So, bring it back. I think we have one council member that weighed in. Would anyone else like to weigh in with comments or perspective before we take a vote? Um, I'm I'm really hesitant about this um ask simply because the there are so many residents who wait so many years to get a dock slip in Weisetta and I feel like you're jumping the line. And I also am hesitant about um using our our public spaces, our public amenities to increase someone else's business. Um, from what I can hear, I I mean, I've put my name in that lottery. I still don't have a dog slip, which is fine. But, um, you're getting a black, you know, mark on probably like, don't give it to her. Um, but for Monday here, I mean, it's yearslong wait to get even a dock slip anywhere on the lake on a privately owned marina or privately owned residence. So, um, I I I I I'm really struggling with this. Adding accessibility to the lake. $1,600 on a Saturday doesn't feel super accessible. I'm not asking you to change your pricing. I know you have um you I'm not asking that, but the the accessibility I'm really struggling with this. I I think the people who have been waiting years and the hundreds of people who um put their name in the lottery for one to five slips available in our marina. It just it just doesn't feel fair. So, uh thank you, council member. Anyone else like to comment? Go ahead, council member. Yeah, that those are pretty good points. But uh the way I look at it is that uh the people if these slips were slips that would be available for people who put in for the lottery that would be one thing but they're not. Uh these are going to be public slips no matter what. Uh so I'm not sure that's exactly apples to apples but I understand where you're coming from on that. Um, I do think that we want to make the lake more accessible to people in our community. And if uh somebody doesn't get a boat because they don't have a slip, this is a way that they could get out on the lake easily and less cheaply, uh, if they have a boat and they don't have a slip and they have to park it wherever far away or maybe keep it on land, this might be an easy alternative for people. Um, this is only for one year, so I think it's worth doing this and seeing how it goes. And if the community objects or it doesn't work out, we can always say no next year. But I I think for this it's okay. So I'll vote for it. Um, okay. I'll weigh in. Um, I'm a hard no. Uh, no, not never, but not now. And and here's my reasoning. Um, one, we don't have a fully functioning lakewalk. We don't have fully functioning transient docks today. We're lacking step downs. We don't have the electricity worked out. I understand that you don't need electricity to run this, but we don't have electricity that meets uh marine code to put in bubblers. Um you know, the do the depot docks are heaved up right now. So that's going to another cost that's going to come to us to fix that. Um if you notice, like if you walk, I know you walk it, there's a big heave up that's going to cost money. So we got to get our house in order before I think we start opening up to um you know, this sort of concession. Well, it's not a concession. and it's a rental of transient slips. Um, also similar to what council member McDonald said, I mean my recollection as long as I've been serving, our residents that pay us, you know, decent amount of money for the marina have been requesting power upgrades to the marina. And every year we ignore them. We raise the prices. We have a big unproductive debate with our citizens about what we should be doing with the money. And you know, how can we justify taking in revenue from a private business when we're taking in hundreds of thousand dollars from our residents and we're not even giving the bare minimum of what they ask? So, I can't look those people in the eye and say, "Yep, I'm going to let these guys jump to the front of the line before we're going to up update our marina." And they've been really clear about what they want. They want power. They want updated to the decking. None of which is your fault, by the way. It's all on our side of the house. Um, and we have a responsibility, I think, to get our side of the house cleaned up. Um, and I believe that, you know, you can talk about Excelsier, you know, putting pegging these at at, you know, 9 and a half or eight and a half each. I don't think that's market. I think it's well below market rate. Um, also, uh, just my own personal opinion, when we have issues like this, we should consult our LMC rep. I called him today, Matt Thompson. He had no knowledge of this. Didn't know that this was going on. That's a red flag for me. I understand that would have to go to forward to the LMC, but I also took the extra step to calling the administrator from the LMCD today. He had no knowledge of this. Again, not required to have knowledge of it, and it's very clear that they would have to get their approval from them, but there's a process out of step here. Um, and then we talk about democratizing the lake. I I just don't buy any ounce of it. Um, the DNR data and the LMC data shows that there's 9,000 boats on average at peak times on Lake Minnetonka in any given peak summer day. There are 26 marinas on Lake Minnetonka, uh, of which we operate one of them. Uh, a significant number of them rent boats. Um, you also have the ability to uh get on an app and rent a boat um that comes transient to wherever you are. And the LMC is looking to regulate that now because that's become very popular where someone will drop in a boat via a trailer. They don't have a dock. They go on an app like Uber. You you request the boat and they say, "Well, what public dock would you like to meet us at?" It happens here. I see it all the time at my little business. They go to the depot dock. they go and again not your fault but this is a condition on the lake and LMCD is looking at regulating that because it provides an unfair advantage to people that actually maintain a boat get inspected um are on a marina right and have all that burden whereas these guys or gals are dropping in for one day 1 hour whatever and it's not fair so the LMC is looking into that so for all those reasons uh I cannot support this um it's not never it's not now until we get our house in order for all the items that I listed I can't look residents in the eye and say, "Geez, we're going to let these guys rent before we fix the docks before we, you know, I can't do it." So, that's my perspective. So, I think we've got two may and two nos. So, I don't know if we'll deadlock again, but but um you know, perhaps someone could make a motion to approve or deny and see how it goes and we'll go from there. Can I answer one or ask one question of staff? Um, if we if these the LMCD says yes, these can be rental docks as opposed to transient docks and then we give this a one-year shot and then they and we come back and say that didn't work out. For some reason, we don't want to do that. Now, what do we have to do to make those back into transient docks? Yeah, Council Member McDonald, that is a good question. Um, and we do go through a permitting process each year for those docs. And so I think we would incorporate that into the next round of approval with the LMC. Um, I did talk with the LMC, the code enforcement official out there um, for several discussions with them. And so we normally renew that each year and since we are changing it, that kind of Yeah. And I talked to the administrator and I talked to Matt. So we just talked to different people. So to be fair, yeah. Um, and so I think if we did change it back to transit slips, we would just do it through the annual review process rather than the one time approval process that we do each year anyway, even though there would be technically a change. Correct. Okay. Okay. All right. Well, we deadlocked earlier tonight. Let's see how we do. Who would like to make a motion? Well, I'll make the motion, but a comment in advance. If these docks are not ready for the city, they wouldn't be ready for this, but they will be ready. So, I don't think that's even a relevant argument. We'll see. They're not ready today. It's not a relevant argument. If they're not ready for them, they're not ready for the city either, and it won't happen. So, I don't think that's a relevant argument. Um, I think it's a low-risk proposition here. I think it is an amenity that we can provide to the city that we did not have before. Uh, it's worth the one year. Uh the money goes into parks and trails. So it's a revenue source for us. So I will move that we approve the seasonal lease agreement with Tonka Bay Boat Rental. You know, I could um if I could add a a friendly amendment to your motion of amendments are always friendly. Oh, good. um of saying no storage on the on the dock or the definitely in in Debo Park. I I I think that's not a great idea either. Um, I think I've let my voice be heard of my apprehension on this and the the but I do take a lot of weight of the parks and trails. And I hope this doesn't look like just a a flip flop. But I I am willing to support this for a one-year trial with the caveat that the the storage the clutter is not on our our our land and that we would be able to change it right back to transient afterwards. And I agree with uh council member Pleish that obviously the docks need to be in um good operating order and um adding some revenue to the parks and trails is um is a good thing. So I will take that as a friendly amendment and I'll accept it. Sounds great. Wonderful. Thank you. So we have a moved with a friendly amendment which has been accepted. Do we have a second? You have a second. Okay. Further discussion. Uh I I will just say for the record, you know, I'm certainly not against your business. Uh every all my comments were directed on our getting our house in order so that we could take a step of working with you. So I'm not, you know, against your business. I'm not, you know, in the future wouldn't consider it. Looks like it's going to pass anyway. So that's fine. So that would be my further comment. Um, so it's been moved and seconded and then we'll take a vote for approval with the conditions that were articulated by council member Pleish and Council Member McDonald. So take a vote. Maybe just quick roll vote. It's late. Just I'm tired. Do a roll call vote and let's get out of here. Council member Pesh. I. Council member McDonald. I. Council member Sorenson. Hi. Mayor Mullen. No. So that passes and good luck and you know please be a good steward of our little village here and uh good luck with this uh for your one year. So, now we're on to um city manager report. Um I just have a couple comments before you get into it, Jeeoff. Um I wanted to acknowledge the uh Wisetta boys basketball for their third state championship uh in the last 5 years. Also, we had a couple resident uh youth that were on the northern northernets synchronized skating team who took home gold at the 2025 Heatherless Cup in Poland, beating 13 teams from eight other countries. um and they um won gold for the first time and it's a huge accomplishment for those Weisetta seniors that were on that team. Uh so congratulations to our students from Weisetta High School. Uh earlier today uh a new community access TV program was launched called Mayor About Town hosted by yours truly. Uh building on a long-standing tradition of having, you know, some sort of community show hosted by the mayor going back to the early 2000s. Um the focus is to lift up the stories of residents, businesses, churches, schools, and nonprofits with an aim to support local and strength strengthen Weisetta. So check it out on Weisetta TV, the city's website and YouTube. Uh the first episode I chose to focus on uh local womenowned businesses that also are residents um working with Lisa Fenick uh from Candlelight Floral, Barbara Bros from Bros Clinic, and then also we talked to Becky Pearson from the Weisetta West Chamber. Um just want to note a couple meetings that one that happened that one is going to happen later this week. Earlier this week on Monday, council member Sorenson and I with city manager Dah, deputy manager Joerger, public works director Kelly and Chief Baker met with about a dozen concerned residents from the H Highraftoft neighborhood to discuss their safety concerns at the intersection of Ferndale and Moetta Boulevard. That was referenced in our workshop earlier tonight. Wanted to reference it in the meeting. On Friday of this week, some of the same folks will be meeting with Henipin County Commissioner Eden uh and uh staff leadership, the Minnesota DOT staff uh to discuss safety and traffic concerns on County Road 101 North. And um I believe staff has already briefed the county um via documents of the master plan. So that will be part of the conversation. It's an informal conversation. Uh we've all received input uh recently and in past from uh directly impacted neighborhoods on the north side of 101 including Holly Brook Pond, Wake Cliff, Shady, and Harmony Circle. And with that, I'll turn it over to city manager. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I only have one thing, but it's an important one. I'd ask uh our city planner corals to come up to the podium, please. Um I just want to acknowledge uh city planner corals, more commonly known as Val. Um she's leaving us. she's um uh going on to she's been essentially uh promoted in a higher level position with the city of St. Paul. Uh so we're really proud of her. We're really happy for her. Uh I just want to acknowledge her uh her commitment and service to the community, to this organization. She started in 2021, I think first like first real job that was indefinite maybe. I don't know how you but uh it was one of her first real jobs that uh in a in a short amount of time uh straight out of college she really accomplished a lot uh she was the lead planner right out of the gate for the Wells Fargo project which is a very complicated required a lot of detail a lot of relationship communication uh associated with that she uh with the help of our great community members really has reinvigorated the HPB um She's led planning projects, some fun ones, some not so fun. Uh, zoning studies, design guidelines, things like that. I think actually it was, uh, Nick who did chickens, but she's had her hands in a lot of things. Um, and, uh, you know, she's done it all. I think three things come to mind. She's really built a lot of great relationships. um not only in this room with staff and the council, but our other community members outside uh with our you know volunteers and just with random community members uh which I've observed. Uh she's been present uh whether it's here city hall or just community functions. She's come here when she hasn't needed to be here. Uh ran the 5K over in at for Halloween. Uh I saw her at many events. So, she's really kind of invested herself as a part of the community and she's just a great communicator um in city hall. I mean, you've seen her work in the presentations. She's really uh bestin-class. So, for all those all those reasons, we're going to miss her. Most importantly, I think she's just a great she's been a great fit to our culture, a great person. She's quirky. Um she's not afraid to I mean, I agree quit there. She's not afraid to not laugh at some of my jokes, my dad jokes, which I think is, you know, says a lot. She's That doesn't make her quirky. Well, hold on. Other things do. Uh she's got a lot of obscure uh comments that she makes that we all learn from, I think, uh but pretty random and just really helps keep a a fun and entertaining atmosphere. You know, sometimes we have to deal with uh things that are not so fun. and she keeps it light and she's very professional and uh overall Val, you're going to be missed tremendously. Uh really proud of you and look forward to seeing how how far you go and what you accomplish. You've made this community a better place and we really appreciate you and I know the the council and staff are going to miss you as well big time. Oh my god. Any comments from council? Otherwise, if you'd like to say something, you're welcome. I mean, I haven't prepared my rebuttal. I didn't make notes for this or anything. Uh, I'll just note, you know, first off, I have had other real jobs. Okay. Jeff, the Dunkin Donuts Corporation, for one. Um, no, I I I came here pretty much straight out of college after a number of myriad internships. I didn't know what Weisetta was. I had barely even heard of it. I am very much an East Metro uh person by the way I was raised and that's where I'm returning to. Um, but what an incredible place to develop as a planner, as a person. There is no other place in the metro that has um all the small town charm and energy that that we have here while also um providing such a volume of of projects and of passion and of interest. I think that a lot of other places with a small staff have a small staff because there's not a lot going on. And we have a small staff because we're a really high-powered group of people proportional to the population. So, it's an incredible place to learn. And it's only because I was able to be here that I'm even able to, you know, be in the running for for other jobs like the one at St. Paul. So, thank you to to staff, to council, and of course the whole community for for supporting me every step of the way. Thank you. Any any comments from council? Yeah, I'd like to make some uh you will be missed truly. Uh I've said many times, I'm sure the city manager will agree that when I know your youth and I listen to what you say, it's amazing to me. You're 20some years old I believe somewhere in there. Uh but you have the maturity of a 40some year old and that is a compliment. You are far beyond your age in terms of ability and you have a very very bright future wherever that takes you. You will be missed. Thank you. Uh others yeah I agree Val. I I love working with you and that dry humor just I'll never tire of it. Um, I'm you impressed me from day one and um I know you'll do really impressive things in St. Paul, but man, I'm super sorry to see you go. Thank you. Well, Val and I had a nice little chat this morning in the conference room, so had a chance to tell her what I thought of of working with her, which were all extremely positive. So, Val, you know, we're not very happy we're leaving. Um, I hope St. the state of St. Paul gives you rent control as your first thing that you need to deal with over there. Well, I'll leave that to the housing department. We have a whole other group for that now. Uh Val, I got to work with you a little bit when I was on the conservancy side a number of years ago and then we had a nice visit earlier tonight. I only had not even a 100 days with you here. So, but but uh you know, best wishes in St. Paul. I mean, they're they're uh picking up an amazing talent and I'm sure we'll be reading about you in the newspaper in a positive way. So, uh thank you for your service. Thank you. Stay in touch. We'll do. Thanks. All right. Uh anything else? Yeah. Applause. Anything else, city manager? Uh no. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Okay. So, uh motion to adjurnn. I'll make that motion. Second, Mr. Mayor. Second. Any further discussion? All in favor say I. I. I. We arejourned.