Board of Directors of the

Summit Hill Association

District 16 Planning Council Minutes

June 13, 2004 , 7:00 – 8:45 p.m.

Members Present: Barrera, Breymeier, Brostrom, Clapp-Smith, Hardy, Konstan, Lindner, Odman, Rathman, Reding-Galarneault, Siekmeier, Wichman, Zoltai

Members Absent: Dobson, Flahaven, Harrison, Johnson, Orman-Awe, O’Toole, Preus, Sanders, Smith

Clapp-Smith called the Meeting to order at 7:00 PM

1. Additions to the Agenda

Several items were added to the agenda and will be discussed under old business/new business, a.  Redesign of the Summit Hill News letter

b.  Develop of cookbook of the past many years of progressive suppers.

c.  Update on the Regional Area Watershed District

2. Approval of May Meeting minute

Brostrom requested that the statement about “misinformation” in that last House Tour Committee report be clarified.  The “misinformation” referred to the confusion over the two separate dates of the appraisal and home tour.  Some people thought that the date and timing was confusing about the two different dates for the antique show and the house tour.  Others did not.

The committee was setting up where to sell tickets and advertisement not “how” as previously reported.

Siekmeier said the Pedestrian Traffic Committee is not looking into the cost of traffic study.  There is no city money to do this.

3. Update on Formula Business Ad Hoc Committee

More and more small store businesses are replaced by national chain stores.  Formula Business ordinance restricts the number of chain stores allowed into a neighborhood.  Some areas are looking to see if it can be legally implemented in Minnesota.  It has been upheld in Washington and California.  San Francisco just passed an ordinance implementing Formula Business legislation

Once the committee has completed their research, a presentation will be made to selected people such as city staff and officials, Dave Thune, GABA, neighborhood and the local press. 

The city would ultimately have to take it on as an idea.  They would have to decide the extent of areas allowed to do this.  It is unclear who will do the reviews, whether it will be neighborhood representatives and/or city officials.  They have to meet as a committee to decide architectural styles, finishes colors. Spalding from MAC/Highland Park is on the committee and has been attending meetings.

4. District Council Funding Discussion

Barrera, District 16 representative, gave an update regarding the district council funding.  A summary was included in the information package distributed to all board members.

There have been multiple formulas to try to calculate a fair way to fund districts.  Although no plan has been accepted, it is anticipated that no council will go below a base-funding amount of $37,000.  If it were only calculated on numbers of poverty, diversity, population our district would go below the $37,000. 

City council members want accountability and inclusiveness.  Each council will be held accountable to provide the services that they submit every year and accomplish what they set out to do.  Beth Ulrich sits on the committee and reads all of the proposals.  Ken Smith also reads each proposal.  There is a perception by the City Council that the districts are not being accountable for the things that they accomplish with the money.  It will need to be documented better, quantifying results and accomplishments such as citizen participation and how much are we reaching out to our community with diversity. 

The funding provided by the city is the equivalency of a half time city staff person.   They are getting hours and hours of volunteer hours as a return on their investment.  All districts need to clearly document the clear savings that we offer by providing services and that we deserve all of the funding.

The group has discussed reinstating a staff liaison.  It has not happened yet.

The base amount of $37,000 is vulnerable of being phased out over the years.  It will be reviewed in 3 – 5 years.  No City Council can encumber future council support.  A new city council could demand change again.  If we can get a unified front it will make us stronger. 

We are looking for comments from board members on the formula

Wichman made a motion to accept the formula as presented.  In order to meet the June 29^th meeting, we would have to make a decision.

Either the formula would be accepted or the current funding would stay in effect.  Other councils have indicated support of the proposed plan.

The motion was seconded.  The Motion carried 11 to1.

5. Committee Reports

    A.     Communications Committee

The website has received numerous hits.  We will promote the website by placing address on each page of the SHA newsletter. The committee would like to see if they could get free space in the Villager, block leaders and signs outside of the building.

Eric Hansen, from August Ash (our webhost), is looking at how to sell tour tickets on line.  This was looked into last July, but it was not documented and followed up on.  The House Tour literature should include the website address.

Our website will be updated to provide a link between other district websites.  People have had a difficult time finding access to the website.  Our website is not linked to the city website which will be added.

The committee is going to do some training for selected people to update the website.  Committees need to select a person to represent each group.  These people will have access to change sub-committee information.  The information will be submitted to Jeff who is the only one that can activate it once approved.

    B.      Environment Committee

The Mayors office has appointed one person, Mark Granlund of the Park and Rec Dept.  to improve the look and landscaping of the community centers.  This person tells the community center what they need to do.

    C.     House Tour Committee

Things are moving along well.  They had to replace a house that dropped off the tour.  There has been interest in the tour so far.  Brochures will be ready after July 4^th. 

We are now working on getting volunteers for the tour.  One benefit to volunteering is that you get a tee shirt, free ticket and free volunteer party afterwards.  They are going to set up the volunteer submittal on the website.

    D.    Pedestrian Safety and Traffic Calming Committee

The next meeting is Monday June 17, 2004 at 7:00 pm.  Eric Thompson represented “Livable Lexington” and works for Parks and Recreation. He is the biking coordinator trying to make Lexington more of a parkway instead of a thoroughfare.  His goal is to continue the bike lines to north of Summit. People questioned where will all the traffic of the 4 lanes go to if adding bike lanes to Lexington?

Neighborhood signs have been ordered.  Jeff is just waiting for the House tour signs before they get picked up. Purchase of the signs for $10.00 has been published in the “Summit”.  The little people that hold the signs can be ordered out of catalogue.  It would be good to share this information to those who purchase signs.

    E.  District 16 Plan

There is really no update.  Larry Soderholm has been overwhelmed due to a staff shortage. Yong Chang has been assigned to read the plan.  Not much has been done.   Dan Corneo and Merrit Clapp-Smith would like to meet with Thune to review the plan.

There is no deadline to review the plan.  It took 1 1/2 years to approve Merriam Parks.  The committee would like the plan sooner then later so there is some guidelines for the neighborhood.  Clapp-Smith would like any comments so they can be worked on.

The District 16 plan is not showing up on the website.  The latest edition should be posted.  It was just missed.

    F.  Zoning and Landuse

The smoke has affected “Just Grand”, occasionally people return clothes purchased because they smelled like smoke.  Patty did not realize they restrictions on their license.

There are still disagreements between Peter Quinn, Café Latte and the owners of Bon Fire, who refuses to mediate.

Bibilot has been using their corporate headquarters to merchandise for their four stores.  If warehousing, this is not legal for them to store in that facility.

Lund’s has purchased the Italian Pie shop. They are looking long term to purchase the rest of the property from the Acropolis.  Zoning and Land use wants to meet with Lund’s to discuss their plans.

6.  GABA Report

Grand Old Days has come and gone.  The behavior was better than in the past.  The wristband sales were up 7% over last year, but the beer sales where only up 3%.  300,000 attended but only 24,000 where thought to be drinking. GABA did not sponsor two MTC buses so school buses were used instead of the MTC buses.  MTC Buses cannot cross Ayd Mill Road because of last years train accident.  People had to get off the bus, walk across the bridge and catch a bus to continue.  There was a call about a violent activity late into the evening.  The police said that it was unrelated to Grand Old Days.  It was domestic violence over a custody case.

Blooming days is coming up in July.

It may be nice to posts job openings on Grand on the website.

Has GABA seen any change with traffic at Chipolte at Grand and Victoria?   Business has been down for a typical Chipolte. 

Formula Business information has been circulated via email there has been a positive response.

7. Executive Director’s Report:

A brief Executive Director’s report was provided.  A newsletter was distributed to get more volunteers.

8.  Treasurer’s Report:

 Brostrom made a quick treasurer’s report.  Audit will be rapping up in the next few weeks.  Old debts need to be written off.  They really had few concerns.  We need to decide what to do with the cash reserves.

9.  Old Business/New Business/Announcements:

The Capitol Area Watershed District is sponsoring its third annual festival at Como Park.  It is an event to raise awareness of the water quality issues.  They did a good job planning the festival.

At the last progressive supper, a group of people thought it was a good idea to collect a cookbook based on all the years.   It would include anecdotal information and also photos.  They have 4 – 5 people already interested in participating.

The timeline would have it complete in two years to coincide with the next house tour.  The proceeds would go towards the living at home block nurse program. 

The city is trying to do a better job promoting district council’s elections and have them all occur in the same month so that every district is consistent.  October would be good to coincide with the general elections. 

10.  Adjournment:

A motion was made to adjourn the meeting at 8:55 P.M. The motion received a second and passed unanimously.

Next meeting will be held Thursday, July 8, 2004 at 7:00 P.M. at the Linwood Community Center Meeting room.

Minutes recorded by Deborah Rathman, Secretary