Council Meeting Feb. 13, 2019

The City Council met on a night that was about as different on a temperature basis than it could be...

-20F to +28F

Anyway, if you want to check out the recording of the meeting, here it is.

All Councilors and administrative staff were present for the meeting, no public were present, so the Open Forum was opened and closed and the Council moved on in the agenda!

The Consent Agenda had the typical three items on it (Approve agenda, approve previous meeting minutes, and approve bills) and apart from a correction from Councilor Kennedy that stated that since he wasn't at the previous meeting he couldn't vote in motions even though he was listed as having voted, the Consent Agenda was approved unanimously.

The next items were brought to the Council by the Planning and Zoning Commission (which is looking for a member if anyone is interested in participating!). They included an Ordinance to resolve a zoning issue that was discovered last year and a response to the Council's request for the Commission to look into how the City can remove barriers for additional housing development within the City.

-The first topic was a rezoning a chunk of land immediately to the east of Creechville Road that was initially zoned Recreational Commercial (RC) and not Residential Single Family (R-1). Most of the lots in this area are used for single family homes and one of those property owners sought a re-zoning last year so they would be able to better utilize their property, which called the entire piece to the attention of the Council. After asking the other affected property owners, the Planning Commission drafted the ordinance, which was passed by the Council. Since it is an ordinance it must have a second hearing though; that will happen at the next Council meeting. Councilor Moody brought up a question about the adjacent City-owned property to the west of Creechville Road. This property is also zoned RC, but was identified as a potential location for additional home development by the EDA's housing site suitability study (which was done to help identify potential locations for the Nordic Star housing development). Since there isn't any plan to develop this land right now, no action needed or could be taken to rezone this land R-1, although it could be done in the future.

-The second item was the Planning Commission's response to the Council's charge to look for City policy changes that could remove barriers from housing development within the City. The Planning Commission came forward with a plan with two parts:

Initial Data Collection 
1. Housing Inventory and Maps -Number, type, lot size, residential/non, vacation rental, seasonal, vacant building, vacant land, utilities, parking
2. Ordinance Review -identify regulations related to housing construction, improvement
3. Housing Solution Search -gather innovative housing projects or regulations in other communities

Workshop
1. Identify participants
2. Brainstorm possible housing solutions
3. Identify favored ideas and barriers to success
4. Select barriers to address

*It was identified that the first part of this plan is very important as the City needs to be able to speak intelligently about the realities of housing in the City before any decisions can be made. Gathering all of this information could take months to a year depending on how many resources are put toward it though. The discussion circled around possibly hiring someone to compile all of this information so that it could be done in a more timely manner, leaving the Workshop section to be organized and executed by current City staff. That was only one way that this could be done and further definition on how this will be taken forward will happen at the Council's Strategic Planning Retreat next week when the Council will sit down for a half day of assessing projects, strategies, and priorities for the upcoming year or two.

Councilor Swearingen added that there should be information gathered about home prices per square foot, land prices, and tax values to fill out the information. Administrator Roth noted these and will add them to the list.

Following that discussion, the Council took up two items from the Personnel Committee. (The Personnel Committee is comprised of the City Administration, myself, and Councilor Swearingen.)
The first item from the Personnel Committee was the final re-evaluation of City supervisor job descriptions. A little history: In 2017 the City was faced with some significant changes in employee responsibilities due to retirements and changes in workload. Due to this, there were requests to re-evaluate these job descriptions to make sure that they accurately reflected the work that each employee was doing and was asked to do. It then became clear that other supervisory positions had not been reassessed for quite some time, so it was set out to re-evaluate all of the remaining supervisor job descriptions. There was one done in 2018, but the remaining position (Property Maintenance Supervisor) was just recently completed. The City uses a system that was put in place in the '90s that isn't perfect, but works and is consistent across all employees, resulting in an equal rating situation based on responsibilities and workload. When the re-evaluation of the Property Maintenance Supervisor position was done it showed a modest increase in responsibility over how the previous assessment was done and put the position back in alignment with the other positions at the City with similar responsibilities. A motion was made to accept the revised scoring of this position and that passed unanimously. The next step is for the employee Union (AFSCME) to be notified of this change and then the Personnel Committee will enter into negotiations for how that rating change will impact this position's compensation.

The second item from the Personnel Committee was an update on the progress on identifying a new superintendent for the Gunflint Hills Golf Course. The City opened up the application period late last year and received eight applications for the position. Some were under-qualified candidates, some were partially qualified and intriguing, and a few were well qualified and exciting. The Personnel Committee is in the process of not only sifting through this information and attempting to find the right fit for the golf course that will both provide a positive experience to users and that will also promote the course in the upcoming seasons. The Personnel Committee is working to create a "Plan A" and "Plan B" so that it will be assured that there will be proper staffing at the course no matter what happens. More to come on this in upcoming meetings.

The next report was simply an update on continuing planning for the Sawtooth Bluff Regional Park (SBRP). You may remember that the City approved the SBRP master plan last year with a contingency that, in order to have the City's support, there must be an adequate and mutually agreed to management plan for the property. This would answer questions like, "Who owns what?" and "Who builds what?" and "Who maintains what?"
The update provided states that the City has Councilor Moody as the City rep on a committee that is being formed to put together this management plan, but the City gets another voice on the committee as well. A representative from the Park Board will also serve on the committee. There was a bit of confusion about which Park Board member it was, but any of the people we have serving on that board would be great.
There will be more updates coming as progress is made on this management plan. Until then, the City has no commitment to the SBRP other than working to put together the mutually agreeable management agreement.

Following that item there was an appointment that needed to be made! The City received an application from Ann Possis to serve on the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) since Karl Hansen completed his terms at the end of 2018. Thank you to Karl for all of your years of service and thank you to Ann for stepping up to fill this position. There will be quite a lot of work for the PUC to do in the future as I will mention shortly...

That left the time for the Council and Staff Reports!

Councilor Schulte reported on a full Park Board meeting where 2019 Golf Course rates and strategies were discussed in detail, coming up with some exciting ideas to help draw new golfers to the facility. He also gave a brief update on the DNR Boat Launch project happening in 2020, stating that the DNR should be finalizing the lease for the property relatively soon. Administrator Roth acknowledged that the DNR has been asking for information piecemeal to complete said lease. Still in the same meeting, he reported that there were a number of permits that were approved for festivals happening in the upcoming summer season, but that there were some questions about whether or not beer sales on City owned property needed to be confined to a "Beer Garden" type space. There is on-going research into this subject and more information will come in the future.

Councilor Moody reported on an equally busy EDA meeting where updates came in on the Lutsen apartments (the first renter has moved in and it is expected that the third building will be occupied by April 1, which is on schedule), sales of the Grand Marais Nordic Star homes (all of the first stage homes are sold and occupied, the first of the second stage homes recently sold!), and an update on the finances of Superior National Golf Course (which made its 2018 round budget of 12,000 rounds and has budgeted for 13,000 rounds for 2019).

Councilor Kennedy reported that the PUC was presented with a draft of the City's Climate Action Plan, which has been developed through grant funds from the Lloyd K. Johnson Foundation, technical assistance from the Great Plains Institute, motivation from the Nordic Nature Group here in Grand Marais. The plan is very ambitious and lists numerous potential solutions that may not end up in the final draft. The reason that this was brought to the PUC was to make sure that the content/direction of the plan was something that the PUC could get behind and support going forward. The PUC voted to move the draft forward to receive public comment and made a few comments of their own. When the draft is ready to be brought forward I will share it here on the blog so that anyone who wants can access it and comment. It will also be on the City website and on social media. Kennedy then reported on a less glamorous duty of the PUC, which was approving the replacement of a septic lift station historically called the Gopher Lift Station, located at the Building Blocks development where Cty Rd 7 meets Hwy 61.

Councilor Swearingen did not have any meetings to report on, but sent her heartfelt condolences to the Grand Portage community as they mourn the loss of their Tribal Chair, Norman Deschampe.

I followed up on that by commenting that it was my privilege, in conjunction with Norman's family,  to issue a proclamation that February 26th will be Norman Deschampe day in Grand Marais to honor his life of service to not only his community, but to our community here in Grand Marais and the many other communities across the state he impacted. Giga-wabamin Menawah Norman.
I also updated the Council that the Cook County Hazard Mitigation and Emergency Response Plan is being updated this year and the City section needs to be proofed and commented on. I will be working with Administrator Roth to complete this.
Today I also met with a representative of Representative Pete Stauber and listed out our concerns that he as a federal representative needs to be aware of.
I attended a Creative Economy Collaborative meeting where there was ongoing organizational discussion and discussion of how the group can be most useful to the City.
Finally, there was an update concerning the Hwy 61 Redesign Project. There was a meeting yesterday of the Hwy 61 Steering Committee and the MN DOT representatives working on the project and there is some information that needs to be communicated.
#1. MN DOT admits that they have not communicated well through this process. This was refreshing that they acknowledged this. We have been pushing them to not only acknowledge, but improve this.
#2. MN DOT admits that there were errors in the initial survey work done in October that has resulted in a delay in the letting of the project, which is resulting in a delay of the project.
#3. That means that the Hwy 61 project will NOT be a 2019/2020 project, but will be a 2020/2021 project.
**This is definitely an unfortunate development on the surface, but it may turn out that this could work out better for the City. This means that the City and businesses will have another year to prepare and plan for the construction. It means that the construction in both of those years could start much earlier in the spring/summer than the initially planned July start date. We are definitely talking a May start date now and potentially earlier, which could complete the work on an earlier timeframe or at least insulate the busiest times of the summer from the worst construction. This means that the City has more time to advocate for this schedule to make sure that things turn out how it is planned this time.

MN DOT will be putting together another meeting in Grand Marais to update the public about the schedule changes. I will also post concerning this meeting when the date/time/place is set.

That was all. We adjourned at a few minutes before 8 and went home in the (relatively) warm winter air!

As always, please do not hesitate to reach out to me if you have questions.