Saturday, February 27, 2016

Contact Information:

Jay Arrowsmith DeCoux
218-370-1625
jay.a.decoux@gmail.com

Friday, February 26, 2016

City Council Meeting 2/24/16

The Council got together once again for its regular meeting this Wednesday, February 24th at 6:30pm. The agenda was full of updates on community endeavours and it was an exciting meeting to participate in. There were even a few community members who attended and said that they enjoyed it!

I called the meeting to order at 6:30 and noted that everyone was present but Councilor Kennedy.

The Public Forum was opened and two residents spoke. One resident spoke to the possibility of members of the City developing a buying group that could potentially meet the needs of some of the lower income residents of the community and even could provide a little extra money for whomever would be the person selected to make the "run" to Duluth to collect the goods ordered.

Another resident asked Councilor Benson if she could please pass on her research on the impacts of Dollar General stores on small towns because it would be interesting to look at. This resident also mentioned relief that the Council passed the moratorium on commercial development in the C/I Zone and commented that Grand Marais is quaint and needs to stay that way. There aren't any comparisons to Grand Marais and we need to create our own ways to meet our needs.

No one else spoke, so the Public Forum was closed and we moved on to the Consent Agenda, which was populated by the three usual items. The Consent Agenda passed unanimously.

Councilor Mills was the next person to speak on behalf of the Broadband Commission who were looking for approval from the Council to start doing some of the work required to turn the old Visitor's Bureau space into a new Co-Location Working Space as per their plan and grant funding to do so. What is Co-Location? It is something like this. So, the Council asked a lot of questions about what the model for the facility would look like and a lot of that information is still in the development stages, so there were just guidelines that were mentioned. For example: the facility would have cheap rent for people looking for work space away from their home to perform their business or do their writing, designing, anything that needs a strong internet connection and that would benefit from not having to buy their own printers, conference call equipment, etc. The Council made a motion to approve work starting on the expectation that before any occupancy begins there will be a lease created between the City and the Broadband Commission (or the County, who is the fiscal agent) to cover liabilities and other risks. This motion passed unanimously.

Next was Emily Marshall from the Cook County YMCA who came to give us her update on the past year. She wowed us with the incredible numbers that the YMCA has been pulling in. Over 1,600 members, about 90,000 individual visits last year, almost 7,000 out of town visitors, 35 employees, a new daycare with a waiting list of 29 people, and much more.
She gave us a breakdown of the expenses and incomes for the YMCA and showed that the organization is operating very well within its means and didn't draw the entire allotment of funds from the City and County because of its increased membership income. Good news.
She was also very realistic about the shortcomings of the Y and mentioned that they have done a locker room survey and area trying to figure out next steps to make the locker rooms work better for the members. They also created a strategic plan for 2016 that includes increasing member retention, developing a comprehensive building services, maintenance, and long range care plan, and striving to meet the needs of our early childhood community. Overall it was exciting to see the positive things the Y is accomplishing in our community and we look forward to another great year!

Following that update, it was Councilor Mills' turn to report the Northwoods Food Project results of their "Green Dollar Survey" where they attempted to get to the bottom of how much our local production of food impacts our economy. The numbers they came up with were nothing short of incredible. The study reported that the annual economy for Cook County (all economic activity) is somewhere around $207 million. Of that activity, roughly $78 million of it is related to food. This includes food sales, wages for food prep, food handling, wait staff, etc. That is over a third of ALL economic activity. Crazy. I did not know that and am trying to figure out the implications of that...
Here is the last piece of information that I thought was really interesting (the whole presentation was interesting; you can get more information about it from WTIP's coverage of the survey):
How much does food production take up of that $78 million?
$1.3 million. That's it. There are a lot of barriers to production up here from zoning limitations to arable land to equipment, to market availability. Restaurants and grocery stores also need to know what is available and need reliable sources, and sometimes local producers can't promise that. There is a pit of a disconnect there, but the survey did a great job of collecting information to identify the barriers so that the Northwoods Food Project can start working on breaking down those barriers. If you want more information on the survey you can contact Diane Booth at the Community Center.

Finally the Art Round Town group came before the Council again to request the City serve as the Fiscal Agent for their grant application to make new banners for the downtown light poles out of submissions from local artists. The Council asked a few questions about the process, which sounded very straightforward and simple, so the Council agreed to serve as their Fiscal Agent. Stay tuned for more about the application process to get your art included in the new banners!

On to Council updates:

It wasn't a very busy few weeks it seemed as Councilors Moody and Benson didn't have anything to report.

I reported on several meetings that I attended and other activities:
-I joined the League of MN Cities' Coalition for Active Transportation on the invitation of the group's leaders. It seems that Grand Marais' activities in creating Safe Routes to School and the Hwy 61 Redesign has gotten us some attention...
-I attended a Bureau of Criminal Apprehension meeting in St. Paul that was for a policy group that I joined regarding Criminal and Juvenile Justice Information Policy. In other words, it is the group that works on developing the policies that oversee the Criminal Information System for the State. They are working on creating a thorough and functional electronic information system so that officers in the field can access all of the information they need to make educated decisions regarding enforcement or so they can see if there are outstanding warrants, orders for protection, etc for any particular person when they are stopped. It was VERY interesting and I believe some of the work that is happening there will dramatically affect Cook County in our rural location.
-I have still been having a lot of conversation with people regarding the commercial development moratorium.
-Administrator Roth and I traveled to Eveleth on Monday to attend the IRRRB Board meeting where they were going to decide if our Public Works Facility project would receive $100,000 in assistance from the IRRRB. It was a very interesting meeting and we did manage to secure that funding.
-The Library Board met Monday night and starting making plans for its Strategic Planning retreat. There were updates concerning the Friday Night Reels Film Nights, which have been very successful, as well as good news concerning programming and new book acquisition. The Board also decided that it is time to start the process of issuing Requests for Proposals for the "Poetry Walk" sidewalk that will be built to connect the front of the library with the Hwy 61 sidewalk. This should be done relatively soon.
-I have been in continuing conversations about the Art Commission being formed and will likely bring a recommendation to the Council soon.
-I also was invited to participate in some planning meetings concerning the Arts Economy in our area.

Councilor Mills reported that he has had some conversations with local contractors who are frustrated that there are all of these big projects happening around the community, but that they can't bid on them because of certain requirements built into the bidding process. It was clarified that anyone can bid on a project, but only contractors that can meet the financial obligations of bonding for such big projects are really the only ones that are qualified to do the work... I am not completely clear on this right now, but I think I understand it...
Anyway, Councilor Mills went on to report on a YMCA meeting where they reported that 85% of the lockers in the women's locker room are rented out on a monthly basis compared to 50% of the men's lockers and 40% of the family lockers. The Broadband Commission meeting also reported that they were working on 911 redundancy and TrueNorth is looking for cable options for its customers.

Higher Education is looking for Board Members as well. If you are interested, contact them here.

After that I asked for any further business, of which there was none, so we adjourned for the night.

If you have any comments or questions about this meeting, please let me know!

City Council Meeting 2/10/16

The City Council met on the 10th in the midst of a community debate concerning development to discuss a great number of things in addition to that. I have tried to summarize the comments made by the 30+ people in attendance at the meeting, but will not be able to catch them all... for this I apologize, but I have tried to summarize as best I can.

The meeting was called to order at 6:30 with all of the Councilors present except for Councilor Benson who was out of town for her knee surgery (get well soon Tracy!).

The public forum was then opened and many community members spoke. Several voiced their support for an incoming Dollar General store to the community saying that we should be welcoming new business and growth to our community under the right of free enterprise in our country. They stated that this store would sell low-cost items that would be a boon for the low-income residents of our community who struggle to purchase the goods they need on their income in our community. In response to other comments concerning the aesthetics of such a new development, they also pointed out that the top of the hill (what I call "Uptown" Grand Marais) isn't anything special to look at right now and it needs a lot of revitalization. These folks also made reference to the fact that there are already dozens of corporate entities doing business in Grand Marais, so excluding another doesn't seem fair and may not be legal. Another comment was stating that other communities that thrive on tourism dollars have allowed these stores into their cities and haven't become hollow shells because of it. This would bring in new jobs, availability of goods, more property taxes, and could jumpstart development in Uptown Grand Marais.

*This is a summary of the comments given, not the particular comments of any particular guest to the meeting.

The other side of the issue also spoke and commented on how our fragile economy up here wouldn't be able to support the corporate presence of Dollar General and there would be business casualties. One person commented that Dollar General expects its stores to produce $1.5 million in gross sales a year or else it is closed (I have not verified this claim), which could then take a local business out and leave a hole in our area. Others disagreed with the aesthetics of the buildings, others spoke that we don't need to be sending any more of our area's money to corporate headquarters in Tennessee.

With that the comments on the Dollar General/commercial development situation were closed.

We also had Jeremy Kershaw of Heck of the North Productions say hello to the Council and invite the Council to consider paticipate in his upcoming race "Le Grand Du Nord," which will be happening on May 28th. He hopes to draw between 100 and 300 hearty bikers to ride the endless gravel of the Superior National Forest in a 50 and 100 mile route.

After these comments the public comment period was closed and we moved on to the consent agenda.

The Consent Agenda was composed of the typical 3 items, but included one extra, which was the request from the Hospital to receive payment for the first part of the IRRRB grant monies that were awarded to benefit the expansion project. This is our responsibility as the fiscal agent of the grant and was found to be in good order with the expectations of the grant, so it was included in the Consent Agenda because it is our requirement to approve it. The Consent Agenda was approved unanimously.

After that we had Maren Webb and Kristen DeArruda-Wharton update the Council on the Safe Routes to School efforts over the past year and remind the City of the three items that we committed to do in support of their efforts. The City has been executing those things or moving toward more full implementation, so that looked pretty good! Ms. Webb reported that the Safe Routes to School group has been successfully working with many groups in the community including the County government, the School Board, the City Council, Law Enforcement, and Public Health and Human Services. They have organized the annual Bike Rodeo and Walking School Bus program (which many of the City Councilors have participated in!) among many other efforts to create a safe, walkable environment for students coming to and leaving the school building. Councilor Kennedy reported that progress is noticeable and well defined and he appreciated those facts as well as all of the unseen work that the Safe Routes Committee has done. With those closing comments, Ms. Webb asked for a motion from the Council of support for the program (no funding, just continuing participation). This motion was made and passed unanimously.

The next thing on the agenda was a licensing logistics issue regarding the American Legion's Liquor License. Since the Legion is a "club," meaning that it limits the people who can be members and thus take advantage of their services, they have had a "club" license for many years. Since the Legion itself is turning over management of the bar and grill part of the business to a newly formed management company for financial reasons, this club license doesn't technically apply any more. Thus, the new management company is applying for a full liquor license to meet their needs. This was passed unanimously and the Council wishes them much success in this new model!

Following that, George Wilkes and Staci Droulliard of the Cook County Local Energy Project came before the Council for their annual update. They presented a summary of the 2015 activity they achieved:
-Solar Electric Toolbox which is available at the library and City Hall
-Solar Thermal monitoring and summary materials
-REEP (Residential Energy Efficiency Program) Summary
-PACE (Property Assessed Clean Energy) Program which provides up front financing for energy efficiency projects on private property
-39 Contractors and residents participated in the annual building workshop
-They worked with the company that did the City's building performance assessment to create plans for increased efficiency.
-They worked with the County on their Land Use Plan
-They worked with North House to develop skill shares for energy efficiency and renewable energy
**Their 2016 work plan is equally ambitious. You can find all of this information on the CCLEP website.
In conclusion of their presentation, they made a request of the Council for the same funding in the 2016 year as they received in the 2015 year, $2000. This money helps CCLEP offer its resources to City residents and put together the programs that many City residents benefit from passively or actively. The Council made and passed this motion unanimously.

The next item on the agenda was the Green Dollar Survey, which was tabled for the next meeting due to time concerns and that the materials were not completely prepared for the presentation.


Next we got to the bulk of the meeting. Followup to the Special Meeting called for 2-8-16.
To summarize, the Special Meeting on Monday, February 8th was called because of overwhelming community concern regarding the potential development of a "small box" corporate store within the City limits in the Commercial Industrial zone. At this meeting, which was attended by over 70 people, all but 2 present spoke against the store speaking of its impact on our area. Since that Monday myself and many City Councilors have been approached many times by people on both sides of the issue and have had some time to consider the City's options. At the Monday night meeting, the vast majority of those that spoke encouraged the Council to enact a development moratorium on commercial development in the City in order to prevent this business from coming in until the community has a chance to think about it and weigh in. No action was taken at that meeting, but much conversation was had.

On Wednesday, Feb 10th, though, the Council revisited the topic and were looking to take some action or decide that there was no action to be taken. The conversation started with me giving a brief recap of the meeting and the perspectives that were shared and then it was suggested that the Council take a look at what a moratorium would look like. Administrator Roth provided a sample "Interim Ordinance" which is the term used for an ordinance that is supposed to be effective in the "interim" of a specific action. In short that means that the City can only pass a moratorium if there is some outstanding reason WHY. You can't just do it for the heck of it, you need a reason. Our reason was simply for us to be able to go through our Comprehensive Planning process and thus see if such a business is in the vision of our community for the future. Our lawyer, who was listening on the phone, advised that we need to make the reason more specific than that, because the action you want to stop has to be directly impacting your ability to follow out the action that you want to take and Comprehensive Planning can be done with development happening.

Councilor Moody also brought up that the EDA was very concerned that a moratorium would limit or dissuade other projects that have been in the works and encouraged the Council to find a way, if there is to be a moratorium, that other projects will not be hindered.

In response to that, and because I was uncomfortable with the way the interim ordinance language was written, I suggested that we trim down the moratorium to only include the Commercial Industrial Zone, excluding all other City Zones from the moratorium. Councilor Kennedy agreed with this idea and explained that the C/I Zone's section of the ordinance is pretty outdated and needs some serious attention if we are going to be attracting any kind of new development to that zone. If that is our purpose: to rework the C/I Zone language so that it more effectively assists in directing developing in that zone, then that is exactly the reason that you would enact a moratorium on development. Our lawyer agreed with that and shared that he thought it was a pretty clear and clean way of putting it. It was also added by someone on the Council that reworking the C/I Zone language is clearly a part of the Comprehensive Plan and thus we are staying true to our intent in taking an action such as passing a moratorium.

**This was the first time that any of the Councilors have ever had to do something like this and thus it was a pretty slow process with a lot of questions being asked and a lot of "what-ifs." I know that I was uncomfortable approaching this topic because of all of the comments that I had received over the past week concerning the potential development and I was and still am torn on the issue. On one hand I believe that a large corporate business would have a hard time making it up here and would hurt our established businesses, many of whom operate at a loss in the winter to keep serving our community. On the other hand, there are people in our community who are hurting and this could really help them. We CAN'T forget these people. BOTTOM LINE.

I was encouraged throughout the conversation that the Councilors were talking about the moratorium not in the sense that it would stop any particular development, but that it would give us time to give due diligence to the process that we identified last year as being so important. This gives me hope that we can find a solution to the shortcomings of our community from within our community or at least being sensitive to the true nature of our community.

In the end, the Council authorized work to be done as a study of the C/I Zone language and thus enacted a temporary moratorium on commercial construction in that zone over 5,000 square feet. The Council decided on 5000 square feet based on the actual reported square footage of many of the other stores in our community (Johnson's Foods, Holiday, Super America, Buck's, IGA, Coop).

This action gives the City up to one year to complete this study. If we complete the zoning ordinance reworking in June and the community feels good about it, the Council will remove the moratorium and things will all be running under the new ordinance.

We weren't done yet after that though!
Jim Boyd from the Chamber of Commerce approached the Council looking for a partnership in continuing to employ Judy Erickson, who has worked with the Chamber for the past few years to organize and accomplish its initiatives on the Statewide level with the legislature. Mr. Boyd presented a summary of the activities that Ms. Erickson has performed on the City's behalf while with the Chamber and mentioned that with the projects that the City has on the docket (Boat Launch, Public Works, City Hall?) Ms. Erickson's services would be very useful in building relationships and tapping the City into potential funding sources. With that said he requested that the Council authorize Ms. Erickson to perform up to $6,000 worth of work on behalf of the City to assist in these objectives. After many questions about how all of this works and whether or not it is the City's place to be paying for this work when the Chamber is the entity that brought Ms. Erickson in, the value of the offering was realized and a motion was made and passed to authorize that spending.

In "Other Business" Administrator Roth and I presented to the Council an invitation from the IRRRB to apply for infrastructure funds to assist with our Public Works Facility. The representative of the IRRRB suggested that we apply for roughly $100,000 for our project, but the Council, knowing the complication and expense of installing new infrastructure in our area, decided that we should apply for the amount necessary to complete the infrastructure work, which we estimated would be somewhere around $250,000. The Council voted to authorize Mr. Roth to apply for the assistance in that amount.

Also in "Other Business" Councilor Moody made a request of the Council to develop a pilot project for winter fat tire biking trails on the Old Ski Hill Property, simply as an exploratory project. No impact to the wooded area is expected or allowed. The Council agreed to allow this pilot project to move forward.

We then moved on to Council and Staff Reports:

Councilor Moody reported on his beginning work with the ARDC and the connection that has provided him to USFS Recreational Access and Development. He will have more to report in future meetings. In addition, the EDA has received the first draft of the Assisted Living Study results and he will be reporting those to the City at an upcoming meeting.

I reported on my conversations with certain art leaders in our community regarding the founding of an Arts Commission in order to oversee and develop policies for public art and the role of art in our community. It sounds like a good idea to get an Art Commission started and then to engage that group in the Comprehensive Planning process so that they can have solid feedback and guidance from the community to develop these policies. The Council seemed pleased, but didn't take any action.

Councilor Mills reported that he has heard complaints from residents about the snow removal, how it is really hard to get around town in a few places because people are plowed in and just leave their cars in the snow banks.

Councilor Kennedy reported that the P&Z Commission has been working on the lodging language in the zoning ordinance and will bring that revised language to the Council on March 2nd. He has also been attending the County's meetings on Vacation Rentals By Owner and knows that they are starting to prepare their language as well.

I think that was it. It was a long one, but a very important one. As always, if you have any comments or questions, please let me know!

Council Worksession on Public Works Facility and Liquor Store: 2/10/16

A few weeks ago before the regular City Council meeting, the Council gathered at 5:30 to discuss and get straight some of the conversations concerning the upcoming project taken on of rebuilding the City's Public Works Facilities on recently acquired land on the West side of the City and how we can wrap our heads around what needs to be done with the Liquor Store.

We started with the Liquor Store and only briefly discussed it:
There is money to do work in the Liquor Store account, but we need to figure out what that work is and if it makes sense to do that work with the rest of City Hall in the poor condition that it is in. The Council encouraged the Liquor Store Manager to start gathering ideas and to go to other liquor stores and assess what it is that we need for flow, product placement, storage, etc. There was also discussion of seeing if there is any way we can get a market study to see how much more could be sold at our store if it was bigger and had a better selection (and more storage, which means larger purchasing power). These items were passed on and then we moved on to the Public Works Facility.

This part of the meeting began with a little introduction by Administrator Roth of a few things that are still unclear about the project:

1. Timeline

2. Scope

3. Strategy

We started at the top and worked our way through the list. As for the timeline, we are currently in the planning stage. This means that the City has contacted our architects, who already have a plan for a public works facility that a previous Council has prepared, and instructed them to work up these plans on the acquired land. This will not be very expensive due to the nature of the plot of land the City purchased and the fact that the majority of the plans have already been made. Once we see those plans (in a few weeks likely), the Council can either accept or send the plans back for adjustment. Considering that the plans are accurate and what the Council is looking for, then we instruct the architect to create actual buildable plans that the City will then make available for contractors who would like to bid on the project. Any contractor can bid on this project. After we have received bids from contractors for the project, we would have to sign a contract with our chosen contractor and then set the building schedule. We are hoping to have building commence in June and finish roughly in October. That is what we can up with for the timeline. Ambitious, yes, but realistic as well!

Ok, Scope. What does that mean? It means, how much do we want to include in the project? There was talk of the City simply building a "make-do" structure up on the new land so that we can house the Public Utilities up there for 10 or so years hoping for another opportunity for a better garage would come up. The Council decided that this was not a prudent idea because we have no guarantees that anything better would come up and then we are stuck with an inadequate building that we have to be constantly repairing or expanding... Let's build it right the first time with an eye on cutting out the frills and making it utilitarian in nature, but still something for the community to be proud of. With this in mind the Council directed the architect to create the plans with various models included:
-One model would be the "Everything in One Place" model. It would be able to house ALL City vehicles, inventory, and equipment. This will likely be the most expensive design, but would solve all of our issues.
-Another model will be the "Almost Everything in One Place" model. It leaves some City equipment and resources at the other Public Utility sites (Generator Station, Water Plant, Wastewater Plant). This would be cheaper and comes with a few trade-offs, but if it is tremendously cheaper, then it is a great option.
-Yet another model will be the "Just the Stuff Down in the Rec Park" model. We are replacing the garages and storage in the Rec Park, so let's just replace the stuff in the Rec Park... This model is a little more shortsighted than others, but will doubtlessly be the cheapest. If it is tremendously cheaper than the other models, then this will be a serious choice as well.

**Which model is chosen has a lot to do with the input of our department heads and the perceived growth/expansion of those departments. Are there any future acquisitions that the Electric Utility has planned? How about the Wastewater Plant? These things all need to be considered.

One thing that was clear was that the $3.5 million price tag that was put on the project by a previous Council was quickly deemed to be ridiculous and too expensive. The Council is eager to get the plans and estimates back to see what the next step will be. I will definitely be writing about that information when we receive it.

The final item is Strategy. This has to do with the how of this project. How are we going to use the land up there? Will we remove all of the buildings that exist? How? Will the City develop potential business space along the highway? Will the City just sell off the extra land? What model will we choose? Etc. These questions were largely unanswered, but were considered through a lot of lively talk.

It was at about this point when we ran out of time and needed to start the regular Council meeting...

If you have any questions about this or would like to weigh in, please let me know. I am very interested in your thoughts!

Comprehensive Planning Worksession #1: 2-24-16

In order to get some order to move forward, the City Council met 2 hours before the 6:30 City Council meeting on Wednesday night to get a little "Comprehensive Planning 101" work done.
In this meeting we talked about resources we could tap into to make the process go smoothly, identified a few strategies that will be used, and assigned the Council some homework so that we can move forward more effectively... Without any further ado; let's get started!


We started with a summary of what resources we have at our hands:

-IRRRB-- I went with Administrator Roth to Eveleth last Monday for the quarterly IRRRB Board meeting because the City's application for infrastructure assistance funds ($100,000) was up for approval (we got it!) and had the chance to connect with their planning director who informed us that IRRRB is pushing to have all of the cities in the Taconite District re-do their Comprehensive Plans for community resiliency and so they have an idea of what the future will look like in their communities. Thus, each city can apply for up to $20,000 of IRRRB funding to help pay for the process. This is great news and we will be utilizing this resource definitely. Also, the IRRRB has numerous connections with groups that can assist with the planning process as well as a number of recently completed strategic and comprehensive plans for us to reference. Check out Grand Rapids' plan!

-ARDC-- A few of the City Council members also met with the Moving Matters group and other Active Living Steering Committee members on the 24th to discuss possible directions that public policy can take that will assist in increasing public health and active living. Through this meeting we were able to tap into some of the resources that ARDC has available, which could be potentially funding, planning assistance, or other community resources.

-Moving Matters Cook County-- Another great resource, which I mentioned before, is the Moving Matters Cook County group that works out of the Sawtooth Mountain Clinic. This group, with funding from the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota's Center for Prevention, has a proven track record of helping to build useful and effective public comment processes through the Hwy 61 Redesign Project, the Great Place Projects, and many other efforts to promote health and safety in our community. They could provide some funding, some assistance with the process, and some assistance planning and carrying out the planning process itself.

-Our Community Itself-- We have some very talented people in our community that come from a planning background. We also have many people in our community that have essential connections to hard to reach populations of residents that may not know about the planning process or may choose not to engage themselves in it. We have to do everything possible to get AS MANY PEOPLE AS POSSIBLE to participate in the process. I think that it will be pretty interesting and fun to see what people's ideas are for future management and opportunities for our community!


Taking that last comment to the next level was the idea of creating a Steering Committee to help engage as much of the community as possible in the process. The purpose of creating a Steering Committee would be to assist the City Council in reaching as many demographic groups in the community as possible by selecting those people I mentioned above who have connections in those populations. We also need people for a Steering Committee that understand the planning process and that are willing to do a little work to see it happen effectively. If you are a person who has a knowledge of community planning and have a strong connection to a population in our City, then you should consider being a part of this!


The conversation then moved to some strategy. One strategy that is pretty unanimously used in comprehensive planning is to identify focus groups that will give us useful and representative information for our community. There were some great ideas that came out of this conversation, such as placing someone at the Java Moose in the morning to ask questions and get some feedback, placing someone at the South of the Border Cafe to ask questions and get some feedback, setting up a visit to the High School's Civics or Political Science courses (or equivalent) to get their ideas... If you have any suggestions for focus groups and ways that we can reach them, please let me know!


Another strategy that was discussed was to get full participation from local media resources, such as creating a weekly survey to be put on Boreal's homepage, putting a weekly question in the paper for people to think about and answer, having a weekly question on WTIP or weekly topic... The ideas were very exciting and sounded like they would provide good information for the process. AGAIN, if you have any ideas for good ways to engage the public, please let me know!


Ok, let's get down to brass tacks:

Budget-- How much does one of these plans cost? Well, that depends on what we want to accomplish. Our current Comprehensive Plan, written in the 1990s, doesn't have many/much of the categories/depth required for it to productively serve its purpose (compare it to the Grand Rapids plan).  If we would like a plan that explains the "why" of our ordinances and community direction as well as something that envisions a future Grand Marais that has solved the housing/employment problems that have been identified, it will cost a lot of money because getting people together, getting their feedback, effectively processing that feedback, and creating a plan out of that feedback takes a lot of time and energy.
If we want to fill in the blanks of a template to get some guiding principles down, it won't cost very much at all, but it likely won't be as useful nor will it last very long...
For example: Grand Rapids paid almost $100,000 for their plan. I don't think that we will have to pay THAT much, but other cities of roughly our same size paid around $40,000-$50,000 for their plans. I think that this may be realistic. Considering that $20,000 of that money would come from IRRRB and potentially some more of it from other agencies, I believe this sounds like a pretty good deal.

Timeline-- The City Council has set this as a standing agenda item for its meetings, meaning that we will either have a worksession before City Council meetings to work on it, or it will actually be a part of the Council meeting. With that said, tentatively we would have the ground work done on what we are looking for (you can help with that as well... ALL ideas are welcome!) by April and then we could look more formally at hiring someone to coordinate the process and start putting together steering committees and focus groups and community events in the spring, summer, and fall, while we are compiling information from topics we have already completed. This is very loose right now, but we expect this to be well organized, a little intense, and broken up into topics/categories so that we can effectively deal with it.


It was very clear in our conversation this past Wednesday that the Council is very interested in engaging the history of Grand Marais and the area in this Plan. It is essential that we identify the things that have gotten Grand Marais to the place it is at right now and build on those things. In order to do this, we need to know about the things that have happened in the past that were meaningful or that benefited the community. This is one of the Council's pieces of homework. Another piece of homework is to dig up several citys' Comprehensive Plans and study them, taking notes on things that stand out as working well or that are confusing so that we can incorporate or avoid those things.


In summary, it was very helpful and gave the Council (and hopefully the community!) a jumping off place for these conversations. I can't say enough how important it is for our residents to be involved in this process in whatever way you can. You can show up to a meeting, you can write a letter to City Hall, you can take an online survey, you can take a mail survey, you can have a conversation with someone over a cup of coffee (or a beer!). These are all important!

I look forward to the process and am excited to get to know the people and character of our community better through it!

Thursday, February 4, 2016

SPECIAL MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT: Retail Development Discussion

Here are the details:

MONDAY FEBRUARY 8th

City Council Chambers

5:00pm start time

Here is the reason:

It has become apparent to me that there is a desire and need in the community to discuss how the City handles certain types of retail development in our city. I have received this message through the nearly 1,000 people who have signed onto a particular petition as well as the roughly 50 people that have personally contacted me with their feelings about said development.

In response, I have called a Special Meeting of the City Council to discuss how the Council would like to deal with business development in Grand Marais that will include at least the following items:

1. Public Forum for community members to offer comments concerning their feelings. 

*Let it be known that the Council will likely not respond to questions posed during this forum for need of consideration of the answers to these questions. The Council will do its best to address the questions upon drafting a plan to address the current sentiment of the community.

*As much time as necessary to hear the comments from the community will be allotted for this section of the meeting.

*Also, at the City Council meeting on Wednesday, February 10th, the Public Forum will be limited to 15 minutes of discussion on any and all issues, so if there are comments to be made during that meeting, please keep them concise or appoint a spokesperson to handle that discussion.

2. Council Discussion on Retail Development in Grand Marais.

*This section of the meeting will be for the Council to discuss among themselves the considerations brought forward by the community and the logistics that we are bound by as a Statutory City. Public comment is not appropriate at this time. Please be sure to make your public comments during the Forum.

**To be clear: This is a Special Meeting, which means that it has to be advertised 72 hours in advance, which is why Monday is the date selected. It is the soonest possible date for this meeting.

As a Special Meeting, the agenda will be set and there will not be any items added to the agenda at the meeting. To do so would be unlawful.

No action will likely be taken on any issues at the Special Meeting, but a plan will be drafted to address the issues deemed necessary by the City Council at the Wednesday, February 10th meeting.

As always, please let me know if you have any comments. If you have a comment that you would like to be considered, please come to the meeting.

Tuesday, February 2, 2016

Council Worksession: Public Utilities Facility and Comprehensive Planning

Last Wednesday before the regular City Council meeting, the Council met at 4:30 to hash out and get a better grip on the process that will be followed for the development of the Public Works Facility for Grand Marais. There was a set agenda for the meeting with 2 major items:

-Property Issues (what to do prior to development)
-Next Steps (Timelines, proposals, decision points)

There was another item though, and that was a discussion of the Council Priority Timeline, which carries a lot of significance for the work that is planned for 2016 and beyond. It was brought up by Councilor Benson that we should discuss these things in a timeline focused manner so that we can start making plans for the many projects that have been brought to the Council's attention and that have been planned. Here is a short list of the projects that fit that description:

-PU Facility (2016)
-HWY 61 Reconstruction (2018)
-Municipal Parking Lot (2016?)
-Public Bathrooms (????)
-Liquor Store Renovation (????)
-DNR Boat Launch (????)
-City Hall (????)
-Dark Skies Certification (2016-2017)
-Workforce Housing Development (2016-2017)
-Ordinance Re-Codifying (????)
-Community Solar Farm (????)
-1st St. Reconstruction (????)

*I want to be very clear that I put estimated dates on these projects and did not assign a date to other projects because they are estimates or simply have not been spec-ed out and accepted by the City yet and thus do not have a viable timeframe to mention. These are all simply projects that have been discussed by the City and that got our specific attention at this particular meeting.

Taking that one step further, these timelines were being discussed in the wider scope of Comprehensive Planning, which the Council is committed to taking on this year (2016). As a result of this commitment, the Council will have a "Comprehensive Planning 101" meeting in February to get the process started and to create some specific expectations concerning what we would like to accomplish through the process. This is very exciting for me because I believe that we have a lot that we can do to create a Comprehensive Plan that reflects the desires of the residents of Grand Marais and the type of City we want to be and can be.

So that conversation mainly resulted in the Council agreeing to set a date in February specifically for Comprehensive Planning conversation and that we would begin to pull in the expertise and resources of the Moving Matters group to assist the City in this process. It was stressed a number of times, however, that Moving Matters will be supporting the City in putting together public meetings and other information gathering events, but the City Council will be driving the process at all times. With that said, now would be a good time to start thinking about what Grand Marais means to you and how you would like to participate in the Comprehensive Planning process. The more people that participate, the stronger the plan will be.

Ok, moving on to the Public Works Facility:

We started the conversation by asking what we should do with the property before we begin construction on it. There are currently a number of buildings on the property in widely varying levels of repair that the City needs to figure out what it is going to do with.

It was clear that the buildings on the South side of the property, where the construction of the facility will mainly occur, will need to be removed. There has also been interest coming in to City Hall about the buildings on the North side of the property. The Council spoke generally in favor of having a sale/silent auction in the spring (April or May) to find new homes for many of those buildings if there are community members who would be interested in moving them. This has not been finalized, but it seemed that there was strong sentiment that this would be a good way of getting rid of some of those buildings.

Another consideration was the overall appearance of the property and the fact that it is now in City control. Should we invest any staff time and resources into performing any site maintenance? This could mean taking down various unsightly landscaping elements, it could mean adding landscaping to improve the appearance from the street, etc. The Council thought that there are a few things that could be removed to improve the appearance, but largely leaned toward keeping the lawn mowed and the trimming done, but not really investing much more time into it... this is because there isn't a strong feeling as to what should happen with that front piece of the land and thus we should hold our hand on it so we don't unnecessarily spend money doing something that needs to be undone later.

That was another conversation that we had: What DO we want to do with the extra land up there? The conversation really didn't bring up any solid ideas that were unanimous, so we left that conversation in the "brainstorming" status and will return to it when we have a better idea of what we will be using of the land.

Moving on to the NEXT STEPS!

The City's architecture firm, LHB, has been contacted and gave us an estimate for about $3000 to provide us with detailed drawings of how the facility would fit on that property. This piggy-backs on the plans that LHB drew up for a previous Council that was considering building this project in the Cedar Grove Business Park. That original design came back with a $3.5 million price tag, which included almost a million dollars of "grade and fill" due to the landscape of the lots identified. It is assumed that the estimates for the new property will be significantly less than that. The Council also charged LHB with giving us options. The primary estimate they will provide us will have the full buildout of the facility, which would allow the City to store and house all of its Public Utility equipment and offices in one facility. The estimate will then offer suggestions of different items that could be removed from the plan and how much money that would save the project and its consequences. We viewed this as an ideal organization as it gives us flexibility to customize the project and keep our costs down as much as possible.


That gets us to the timeline. When can we expect these plans? When are we going to start seeing something happen up there? There is a tentative schedule for these events and although it is ambitious, I believe that it is completely do-able. Here is the tentative schedule for this project:

February - March: LHB will prepare the estimates and site design/assessment
*Decision Point #1: Council will have to choose what the facility will include and total project scope

March - April: LHB will work up a full facility design for the new site which will include architectural drawings and material lists... In essence these are the building plans for the project.
*Decision Point #2: Council will have to approve the design for the project and the building plans

May: The City will have to put together a financing plan for the project that will include monies from the capital reserve accounts of the PUC and the City as well as some borrowed money. Once this is complete the City will authorize the bidding process and the request for bids will go out.
*Decision Point #3: Council will have to decide on the financing plan that the City will be taking and will have to select a contractor from the bids received.

June - October/November: Construction of the facility will take place.

This is the plan that the City is going for. It calls for a steady movement through the project and relies on good bids from contractors, which we believe is very possible.

That was the bulk of the meeting and the items that the Council considered. If you have any questions, please let me know!