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Minutes
DISTRICT 16 PLANNING COUNCIL
SUMMIT HILL ASSOCIATION
Board of Directors Meeting
Thursday, November 9, 2006
Linwood Recreation Center
Members Present: Barrera, Breymeier, Broton, Haas, Hedberg, Lein, Lucke, Odman, Rathman, Rulff, Sutherland, Verweij, Wefel, White, Winsor
Members Absent: Biron, Clapp-Smith, Fervoy, Flahaven, Krogstad, Wichman
Others Present: Jeff Roy, Anne Hunt, Jane McClure
Meeting was called to order at 7:05pm by President Barrera. The President welcomed community members and guests.
Additions to the Agenda: Move #9 budget item to #5 on the agenda.
Approval of September and October Minutes: Broton moved to approve. Wefel seconded. Corrections: Tammy and Eric were at Oct. meeting.
Passed unanimously.
President’s Report:
- Election of SHA Officers for 2006 – 07
Slate of candidates for officers:
President: Elizabeth Wefel
Vice President: Mark Sutherland
Secretary: Holly Biron
Treasurer: Nancy Breymeier
Broton moved to approve slate. Rathman seconded. Brief discussion.
Slate approved unanimously.
Treasurer’s Report:
- Monthly financials: SHA has a deficit for 2006. Discussion: SHA can use cash reserves to make up deficits. Nancy says budget numbers are as low as we can get them. Shall we cut line items?
- CPC position
- Summit Newsletter costs: STS instead of mailing, ads, labor costs
- House Tour: Do we need a new revenue source? Is the House Tour not as viable as it has been in the past? Have we evaluated why the House Tour was not as successful as in year’s past? There will be a discussion about that. This year there were less expenses due to sponsorships. However ticket sales were down this year. Marketing for the tour was less and later than in years’ past.
- SHA needs to get more people on the Development Committee. They need to look at more fundraising options. Should we get some outside source to help us look at creative ways to solve this?
- Some ideas from board members’ emails to Nancy: Increasing the donations, increasing ad revenue by 33% or going with a single page of ads, decrease crime prevention which is now 20 hours/week.
- We need to make budget cuts for 2007.
Motion by Wefel, seconded by Breymeier: Table the budget approval. SHA Board members will put forward ideas to the Executive Committee. The EC will come up with recommendations. SHA BOD will vote at the Dec. holiday party. Unanimously approved.
(Break to introduce each other and welcome new board members.)
The Bridges of Saint Paul Project:
- Developer withdrew their application for rezoning. Dave Thune has asked Jerry Troien to meet with WSCO, CapCity, and W. 7th District Councils to come up with a plan.
Discussion: The Bridges Project will have an impact on Grand Ave. as a destination place. Rathman said MN AIA (American Institute of Architects) chapter sees the Bridges as out of scale and not a good fit for the area: scale, traffic, turns its back on the light rail coming to down town. Developer has not played the political game very well. White shared concerns about TIF money for project and the flood zone? Breymeier stated that Metro IBA (Metropolitan Independent Business Alliance) is not in favor of the project because it is not working with small businesses. There are not any provisions for small businesses. If they are asking for tax dollars, there should be provisions for small businesses. Generally, board members feel it’s not helpful for us to respond until the application is resubmitted.
Anne Hunt said that 3 District councils are talking together and communicating with Dave Thune. There are concerns that Dave Thune’s proposal excluded some groups such as Riverfront Corp., Friends of the Mississippi, and others.
Motion by Odman, 2nded by White: SHA will contact Dave Thune to express SHA’s desire to participate in the 3 District Council process regarding the Bridges Project.
Unanimously approved.
SHA president will contact WSCO to receive updated info. and express a desire to be involved in the process.
FYI from Anne Hunt: JLT is making efforts to have people run for WSCO board. It is unprecedented for a developer to be involved at that level with a district council. Annual meeting is Nov. 22.
Executive Director:
Update on Parking Task Force
The Task Force met again on October 26th to continue its work of reviewing and revising a consensus parking plan to resolve long-standing parking issues on and near Grand Avenue; with the hope of coming up with a consensus plan to bring to the public this winter or spring. During the meeting, the Task Force was unable to find consensus on the issue of stakeholder representation on a proposed Grand Avenue Parking Commission envisioned to manage and improve parking resources on and near Grand Ave.; or whether to recommend that SHA create a Parking Committee to serve the same purpose. There was some limited consensus on issues related to future permit parking expansions or new permit zones.
With little further agreed on, the Task Force has decided to collect all relevant documents created by the Task Force for archiving and meet again in December to determine whether to continue working on this effort.
Old Business:
- Draft 2007 SHA Goals and Objectives
Not ready for this meeting. Can be worked on in the coming months and completed in February. Roy can put something together for the Jan. board meeting after taking it to the Executive Committee. There was a request to make sure the Goals and Objectives jive with the budget.
New Business:
- Board Expectations Policy: Discussion about board members sitting on 2 committees, especially in light of other commitments.
Motion by Rathman, seconded by Breymeier: 4. I will serve as an acting member of at least one, if not 2 standing committees. Unanimously approved.
- #7: Discussion re: excusing oneself from discussions and votes….
Motion by Winsor, seconded by White: Check on statute for conflict of interest and amend according to the MN statute. Unanimously approved.
- Approval of Board Expectations Policy with friendly amendments. Unanimously approved
Nominations for City-Wide Neighborhood Honor Roll Awards:
Maureen Flahaven
Marianne Jurayj
Todd Wichman
Frank Zink
Final results: Final 3 Awardees: Flahaven, Jurayj and Zink. Their bios will be sent in to the Honor Roll Event organizers and Roy will contact those not at this meeting.
GABA Report
- Shop and Dine by Candlelight
- New members
- Boo Bash
- Meet and Greet: Wed. Dec. 6, 5 – 7pm at EQ Life RSVP to Jaimee
Committee Reports
- Zoning and Land Use—Marcia:
The ZLU Committee met on Thursday, Oct. 19, 2006 at 7pm for the public hearings re requests for a variance at 976 Goodrich in order to build a new detached garage. A 3 foot side yard variance is required, 2.25 feet was proposed on each side for a variance of .75 on each side. The out-of-state owner was represented by Tony Ammann, of Blue Chip Construction.
The family next door at 972 had been there for more than 50 years and opposed the variance as they would not be able to get their dumpster out or get to the garage. Two sisters, Natalie and Lynn spoke of the easement on the deed, dated Dec. 29, 1943 and gave the Document number. City staff had previously told SHA staff they were not aware of any easements, but had noted the need for a larger side yard setback of 6 feet rather than 3 feet they initially stated because this is a corner lot.
The property had been built as a four plex yet now zoned at RT 1. They are planning a conversion to condos but no approval has been received.
On an 8 to 0 vote, the committee denied the request and instructed the staff to apprise the city staff of the easement, the zoning and the lack of approval of the condo conversion. As a result, this request was not moved forward by either the contractor or the city. Also the contractor was asked to be sure the passage way was accessible by having it be at least 3 feet.
The second public hearing that evening was a request from Sean and Susan Truman, owners of 767 Linwood Ave for a rear yard setback in order to build an addition on the existing house. The required setback is 25 feet and the prosed is 21 feet 6 inches, for a variance of 3 feet 6 inches. The owners said the property is 80 by 90 feet and they need to add a first floor bathroom and eating space in the kitchen for their family. They said no neighbors objected and their plans were to have the addition match the house finishes exactly. The committee voted 8 to 0 to approve the request and sent a letter to the city to that effect.
- Development—Tammy: Committee will be reorganizing due to need for income generation.
- Communications--no report
- Pedestrian Safety and Traffic Calming Committee—Hedburg:
The PS & TC Committee covered several topics at its last meeting. The progress of the street reconstruction process was discussed and parts of the project still to be completed at that time.
The majority of the meeting time was spent on the Safe Routes to School grant application and how to pursue it. The decision of the City of St. Paul to pursue a city wide grant on the first round caused the PSTC to delay our plans for an independent grant. St. Paul did not receive the grant and the committee decided to push ahead with our own. Our plan is complicated by the fact that data we need for that proposal is under the control of the city and they are not readily willing to provide it to us. The city intends to resubmit its proposal and would rather we roll our proposal into theirs. Our committee does not favor that choice for a number of reasons and is trying to find a way to get cooperation from the city departments that have the information we need.
Adjourned at 8:50pm
Minutes submitted by Linda Winsor, Acting Secretary
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