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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2002-01-14 MINUTESCity of Cottage Grove Parks, Recreation & Natural Resources Commission January 14, 2002 Pursuant to due call and notice thereof, a regular meeting of the Parks, Recreation, and Natural Resources Commission was duly held at City Hall, 7516 — 80th Street South, Cottage Grove, Minnesota, on the 14th day of January, 2002. Acting Chair Diane Fredrickson called the meeting to order at 7:05 p.m. MEMBERS PRESENT: Eddy Wuorenma, Al Boche, Allan Dubois, Tammy Schwartz, Diane Fredrickson, Steve Morse, MEMBERS ABSENT: Jon Cheney OTHERS PRESENT: Council Member Pat Rice Associate Planner John Burbank Ice Arena /Recreation Manager Zachary Dockter APPROVAL OF AGENDA The agenda was approved as submitted. APPROVAL OF MINUTES Commissioner Boche wanted to make a clarification on page 2 of the December 10, 2001 minutes. Where it says the softball program primarily uses the school district fields and the softball program has requested the installation of Hollywood Bases. What they're looking at is for the posts to be installed at 60 feet for the Hollywood Bases at Lamar so they can be used for youth leagues also. The Hollywood Bases themselves are already there. The cost would be minimal because they wouldn't have to purchase the bases. The rest of the minutes were accepted as written. Morse made a motion to accept the minutes as changed. Boche seconded the motion. Motion carried. NEW BUSINESS A. Woodridge Baseball Field #43 Naming The Commission received a copy of an e-mail from Dave Altier about the naming of field #43 at Woodridge Park. The CGAA would like to commemorate the 14 years Craig Swanson has dedicated to the kids of Cottage Grove. Burbank assumes the Association will pick up Parks Commission Minutes January 14, 2002 the tab for creation of the sign and installation. Boche responded that Craig has put in 14 years as equipment manager as well as a coach for Baseball within the CGAA. That is more time than anybody has ever spent on a CGAA Board as far as he knows. What they are proposing is to put a small field fence sign with green lettering up. It won't be a very substantial sign, but it's a nice gesture. Fredrickson questioned if we have ever had this type of request in the past. Boche answered that there was the basketball courts at Highlands and Burbank mentioned Nina's Park. Burbank said that staff is looking for a recommendation for Council and the Council can take action on it. Boche made the motion to name field #43 at Woodridge Park, Swanson field. Morse seconded the motion. The motion passed. B. Outdoor Ice Rink Usaae Policies 2 Boche indicated that he spoke to Gary Sova about the outdoor ice rink usage memo in the packet and it was his understanding he would either have somebody there or contact Zac directly. Zac indicated that in the past they've always contacted the coach or manager directly when the warming houses would be closed. This year the Association wanted them to contact the Directors so they are only contacting one of three people and that brought a concern to the Rec Department that messages might not get through and that would reflect poorly on the Rec Department itself. They are looking for some advice on how to handle this issue. Morse stated that he believed it would be difficult for the City to contact the Director and then have the Director contact the coaches. If the Director isn't available, then the coaches don't get contacted. He felt if the City is willing to make the calls to the individual coaches why wouldn't we want to have that done. Boche agreed. Zac said he would contact CGAA to get the coach information. C. Capital Improvement Plan Burbank provided a copy of the plan for the Commission to review. He indicated it hadn't changed other than the items that were not completed in 2001 were carried over. For example the installation of equipment at Hidden Valley Park, as well as the $15, 000 that was dedicated for trail way /path way installation which will be combined with the $25,000 scheduled for 2002. In addition he stated that he is working on some DNR grants to make that $40,000 stretch a little further for connectivity. He just wanted to keep the Commission up -to -date on the Capital Improvement Plan. He further indicated with all the funding discrepancies going on at the state and local levels we have to take a closer look at these items. Some things may be put off. Fredrickson questioned which park was addressed a few meetings ago in open forum for improvements. The Commission indicated that it was Pine Tree Pond Park. Morse questioned if the CIP list was just monies from the Park Trust Fund or was it money allocated from the General Fund for park improvements as well. Burbank responded it was all out of Park Trust. Morse questioned if the Council had budgeted $0 for capital improvements in the area of Parks and Recreation other than spending trust fund dollars. Burbank responded that Rice would have a better idea on that. Rice responded it is pretty close to $0. There is some money set aside for contingencies and things like that. Morse questioned if vandalism and wear and tear would fall under that Parks Commission Minutes January 14, 2002 3 category? Rice confirmed that would be the case. Burbank responded that the Ice Arena would be funded through the same type of fund. Boche questioned where the Capital Improvements list from the CGAA would be approached? Burbank responded it would be through the budget hearings and the Capital Improvement process. The last Capital Improvement process was completed in 2000. We would start addressing some of those expenditures during the next update. Boche questioned if he was right in thinking some of these projects could be paid for by Park Trust dollars. Burbank responded that some of those improvements could be handled in the annual budgeting of the parks maintenance type funding. There are some specific improvements that could be handled with the Park Trust Fund and some of those bigger ticket items would have to be in a referendum or bonds. Boche is looking at a six year Park Trust plan and he sees lots of things for playgrounds, trails and park development, none of these areas deals with sports at all. Burbank indicated that is one of the reasons the prioritization list was requested. Boche hoped we could have some more discussion on this in the future. Fredrickson questioned if the sports items would be supported out of the general fund? Morse verified that some of them could come out of the Park Trust, but we need to balance them out. Boche stated that some of them are not big issues and he wants the City Council to know that the CGAA is willing to do cost sharing and some of the projects they would pay for if they could just get the okay to do them. Fredrickson questioned about whether the Park Trust Fund supported the inventory of the park buildings and the upkeep? Is there a maintenance fund for these items? Burbank responded his understanding is that they come out of the Park Trust Fund, unless it is an emergency and then it is from the general fund. Based on the last joint meeting with the Council it sounds like there is interest in creating a long term repair and maintenance program for the park facilities which will be assigned a separate dedicated fund so we are not depleting our Park Trust Fund. The Park Trust Fund is more for development activities. Discussions will take place after that inventory is completed, the inventory has been delayed because of staffing requirements in the Building Department. OLD BUSINESS A. Public River Access -Grey Cloud Island Burbank wanted to update the Commission on this topic. He drafted a letter to the Washington County Commissioners requesting the participation in the creation of a river access park on Lower Grey Cloud Island. Currently it has been at staff level discussions within our City Council, our Parks Commission and County Parks Commission, but we are laying the groundwork for the completion of such a park. The letter drafted with Kim's signature will be forwarded on to the City Council for review and comment. It will then be mailed to Washington County. Burbank does have a meeting scheduled for January 22, 2002 with the DNR, Washington County staff, our staff and Council Member Hale to discuss additional logistics on the creation of the river access park down on Lower Grey Cloud. The Commission also requested some sketches of the proposals to look at. He did not get to the larger portion of the property but he did create a sketch for the area they are currently Parks Commission Minutes 4 January 14, 2002 focusing on for the boat access or site A. He walked through the sketch with the Commission. Once he has the staff meeting he can give the Commission a better idea about what the county's thoughts are. The next step would be to bring it to our City Council as well as the Washington County Board for possible action. Fredrickson asked Burbank to explain why we are no longer looking at using fill for the project. He indicated upon further examination, it would prove to be an uphill battle. In terms of timing and funding it is something that would have to be put on the back burner and looked at sometime in the future if conditions change down there. Fredrickson had questions regarding the National Park Service and the river between St. Paul and Hastings. She questioned whether it was a protected area or a national river way. Burbank responded that the Mississippi National River and Recreation Area, which was formed in 1984, basically follows the same boundary as the Mississippi River Critical Area. The Critical Area took effect in the late 1990's. While it is a national park they only own about 11 acres in the entire park corridor which runs from Ramsey down to the City of Hastings. There is not a lot of public parkland in terms of national ownership but there is city, county, state facilities there. The regulations with the national park are basically just policies at this time. There are suggestions that they try to get you to adhere to, but you don't always have to. There are some cities that do not. There are some components of it that our City has not adopted. We do adhere to the Critical Area regulations which are a little more stringent and basically do some of the same things. There could be some funding associated with the National Park Service. There might be some political things that have to happen before we'd be eligible for funding with regards to their regulations. Dubois commented on the draft letter from Lindquist where she said most of the county's park activity is taking place in northern Washington County. He is not complaining, but he uses the Ravine Park quite a bit during the winter for skiing and he has a notion that it is not a high priority park for the county. They do the grooming for the ski trails, but he doesn't believe the Ravine Park gets the attention that Lake Elmo does. Burbank responded that the comment is referenced to the development activities of regional and county parks, but certainly there are some maintenance issues with existing facilities. Fredrickson asked if a maintenance recommendation could come out of the City's Parks and Recreation Department since the Ravine is a park in our community. Burbank responded he would like to discuss it with the county and their staff. He further added that as long as he's been with the City there has been discussion of the county returning the Ravine Park to the City. Lately there has been discussion about joint use especially if we build a community center. Dubois asked how the development on Lower Grey Cloud Island would affect the roads leading to the Island. Burbank responded that currently we have some grant applications in to FEMA, the Army Corps and perhaps the DNR also, for doing work to flood proof the roadway. There are questions if you flood proof the roadway then you're putting more stress on the river so there's some engineering checks and balances that are in the work right now. We are looking at improving it so that we have a full -time access to the Island during events of flood. Parks Commission Minutes January 14, 2002 5 Staff believes that the Commission should recommend to the City Council that a phased public access and river park be developed on Lower Grey Cloud Island in a cooperative partnership with Washington County, Met Council, Minnesota DNR and other interested parties with the attached list of the bulleted items. Dubois made a motion that City Council pursue a water park on Lower Grey Cloud Island in the specifics discussed by the Parks Commission. Morse seconded it. Discussion by Boche on cost estimates. Burbank responded in preliminary looking at the relocation of the road way from its current location to go around the parking area would be in the neighborhood of $100,000 just given the strict engineering process based on the linear footage of road way to rural standards. The parking lot and boat access would be covered under our grant applications and he didn't have any cost estimates on that. He was sure before it goes to Council he could have some rough estimates on projected costs for both projects. Some of this we didn't want to spend too much engineering time on until we firmed things up with the county a little more. Dubois' understanding from Council Member Hale was that a lot of the costs would be covered by outside sources. Burbank responded that outside funding is the goal. He also stated that there are some DNR grant deadlines in January that he is in the process of applying for. In terms of state monies, he has talked to City Administrator Ryan Schroeder and there was three million dollars allocated to the big Grey Cloud Island Park and perhaps some of those funds could be tapped. Boche inquired as to the distance of this route. Burbank responded he believed it was about 1,200 feet of new roadway. At the staff level indications have been we would probably work with some type of lease agreement where the City would be managing it in terms of county funds that are available and funds that are dedicated to other projects. There are not a lot of those county funds at this time and we're in the process of trying to change that and shift some funds our way. Motion is passed TRAIL PLANNING WORKSHOP A. Continuing Discussion Burbank thought he'd be further along with trail planning until he got into it and started looking at all the different documents we have related to trails as well as all these other projects we have related to parks. It was kind of encouraging to see some of the connections that we have currently and he thinks we have a good start there. He described the color map he had provided to the Commission. The map indicated existing trail ways, future trail ways, school sidewalks, missing links, existing parks and future parks. Burbank pointed out that some trails are just in concept from point A to point B. We tried to take some look at the terrain given the scale of the mapping. The trails may shift depending on the particular developer desires. For example the trails going up in the Pine Summit neighborhood some of those trails are going in and are real close to what was identified on the West Draw Task Force Plan. There are some trails that were added due to resident comments, common sense, and things staff have noticed when they've been working with Parks Commission Minutes 6 January 14, 2002 planning issues. So, if something jumps out at you that looks wrong or is needed, those are the kinds of things we want to talk about. Dubois questioned about site 5 and its location. He indicated it is fairly near his house and he doesn't know where that is. Burbank responded it is the wetlands along Highway 61 as you come into Cottage Grove. Fredrickson indicated that she had brought the trail plan to the Historic Preservation meeting and they had some interesting comments. She would like to get some input from them about including the historic sites on the trails. It would be nice if you could bike along the historic sites instead of around them. We may want to include the Historic Preservation Commission to come to a planning meeting. Fredrickson expressed that it looks like a very complete trail site. REPORTS A. Golf Division Burbank referred to the memo from Ryan Schroeder regarding River Oaks Banquet Service. This packet of information was presented to the City Council when they were discussing limiting the catering options and doing more catering in -house which has been quite successful. From patron comments, it seems like the public is very happy with the facility and what it has to offer. Dubois also questioned Council Member Rice about the definition of catering entirely inside and does that mean a City operated catering service? Rice responded in the affirmative. There was discussion about how staff goes about doing this. Basically, the staff does the set -up, serving, waiting and clean up, everything but the preparation of the food. Boche commented that the kitchen facilities are small. Rice indicated that expansion has been discussed. B. Ice Arena Zac summarized his update. High school games are larger than the past year partially due to the new conference bringing in larger schools and their fans. The arena did enter into a contract with IAC (Inter Arena Communication) they are going to assist us in soliciting local and national advertisers for the arena's dasher boards. We are looking for bids to replace the rubber matting which has been there since day one. The funding is in the CIP. That will be a project over the downtime. Morse questioned if the Hockey Association still has the opportunity to sell ads despite the contract with IAC? Zac responded that the current ads that they have are all right. CGAA Booster Club and Cottage Grove Ice Arena all have the opportunity to sell their own ads as well on top of IAC. Dubois questioned how this is different than the ball field advertising. Burbank responded that it is indoors. Boche responded as soon as we dome Hamlet Park we can do backstop advertising. Rice Parks Commission Minutes 7 January 14, 2002 commented that the chuck -a -puck event was very successful and everyone had a good time. C. Parks Division Zac responded due to the recent weather the rinks have been closed because of poor ice, but Public Works will start to repair them as soon as temperatures go down and try to get them open as soon as possible. Morse commented that he felt plowing the ice rinks could take priority over plowing some of the more remote trails. Boche relayed a comment from a resident regarding warming houses being closed on New Year's Day and there were a lot of kids there. Morse said he talked to Diane and that the warming houses are traditionally closed on New Year's Day and maybe we should rethink that. D. Recreation Programming Division Burbank commented on the Winter Medallion Hunt. He indicated that cable was filming kids searching for the Medallion. It was nice because it showed kids doing something they should be doing instead of out on the street. He thinks it's a good program. E. Planning Commission Technical Packet Review Burbank commented on the proposed Kohl's development project. He stated if that project were a success, we would have more Park Trust Fund dollars coming in. Robert Vogel, Historic Preservation Officer, will be writing a memo regarding the Acorn Ridge Subdivision. There is the Old People's Cemetery, which Burbank believes is in the northeast portion of that development and is owned by the City. He would like to see some of the Park Trust Fund dollars go towards improving the facility with fencing, maintenance and such. It is an inactive cemetery, which for a while was being cultivated for crops, and the City took an interest in preserving it. Fredrickson indicated that Vogel has tried to find out who's buried there but still does not know. It is believed to be early settlers. Burbank indicated a lot of people don't even know it is there, so a nice sign would be appropriate. The last item is the Comprehensive Plan amendment for the 70`" Street/ Hidden Valley commercial and senior housing development which is a neighborhood commercial district. During the Planning Commission process the question was raised about land use density allotted for senior housing so the applicants opted to bring in a Comprehensive Plan amendment to bring the land use into consistency with the proposal for the senior housing component. One of the things staff has talked about as part of that land use change is either justifying the land use densities by decreasing the amount of traffic related to that particular type of land use. So, if this project doesn't go through we wouldn't see a high density type apartment complex in that particular area. It would be a conditional approval based on our recommendation. So look for that to come before the Planning Commission and Council. Parks Commission Minutes January 14, 2002 F. Council Agendas Burbank highlighted a couple of items to discuss. On the December 19'" City Council agenda, under consent, was for the authorization to solicit bids for new golf carts for River Oaks. They are looking to replace 75 of those between the years 2002 to 2005. The catering for River Oaks was on the agenda, but we've already discussed that. The Ice Arena advertising was on the agenda for their review and direction. N On January 2"' there was reference to the Park Trust Fund and a moratorium on commercial development outside of the MUSA. We were running into premature development activity outside of the urbanized portion of the community and looking to keep that in check. G. C.G.A.A. Boche has updated the improvements list for the CGAA and forwarded it on to John Burbank. Fredrickson asked if that was in prioritized order now and Boche answered in the affirmative. COMMISSION COMMENTS Fredrickson commented that there is a new Historic Preservation brochure available siting the different landmark sites. Fredrickson pointed out how remarkable it is that we still have so many historic sites and she thinks Cottage Grove should be very proud of what they've done. Dubois questioned about future parks and open space plans. He understands there's a point of interest in the golf course down towards the river. Burbank indicated if you go to the north there is a private maintenance road for the golf course, the trail way access to that is an unapproved trail way directly to the south of that. At this time of year it may be difficult to see. In the fall it may be easier to find. Again it is unapproved. It does have some good vistas of the river and at the end there are some native prairie grasses that are rare and endangered. Therefore, you have to tread lightly while you're there and there are some steep bluffs. A while back a university student from the landscape architecture program did some studies encompassing a line directly to the east of there to make it a more usable area. Burbank would anticipate if and when that area does develop we would look at some of those plans and improve that public access. Morse indicated it is a nice little bluff. If you get back there to the bluff line there is a nice overhang. Boche asked if Morse had ever been down to the bottom by the tracks there. He said there are some really neat areas down there. Fredrickson thought that it would be of interest to Morse that one of the grants the Historic Preservation Commission is applying for this year is researching lost peoples. Apparently along the river there was a huge "bum town" during the depression. Also, on Grey Cloud Island a whole village of Native Americans is gone. If they get that grant it would be interesting to provide educational information on what people would've seen over the different years. She hoped they would get that grant this year, because it would follow well into this overlook. Parks Commission Minutes January 14, 2002 STAFF COMMENTS Burbank wanted to provide a response about the shovel issue. They are going to do some labeling and color- coding of the shovels to see if they can keep them around a little longer. What seems to be happening is some rinks end up with a couple shovels and others with none and sometimes they're found in snow banks after the spring melt. They are going to change their policies about that to see if things improve. Burbank also wanted to thank Diane Fredrickson for her service on the Parks Commission. This is her last meeting tonight and we appreciate all her efforts, including her service on the Historic Preservation Committee. We're sure she'll be missed there too. Fredrickson said thank you and she enjoyed her work here. ADJOURNMENT 0 Morse moved to adjourn. Dubois seconded it. The meeting was adjourned at 8:15 p.m.