HOW'S YOUR "VISION?" 20/20???

A recent Lakeville Sun ThisWeek issue (Sept. 29, 2017) contains a story about the AirLake airport annexation by Lakeville.

There are a number of things in that article on which I would like to comment.

It states: "After decades of failed negotiations, Airlake Airport is poised to annex into Lakeville to accommodate growth and receive city water and sewer."

"Decades of negotiations" is something of an overstatement, in my opinion. Any actual negotiations have been relatively recent and followed the Metropolitan Airports Commission's (MAC's) letting Eureka know it wanted city sewer and water services and now desired to be annexed in order to receive those services.

While it may be true that a possible annexation of the airport by Lakeville has been on the radar screen as a topic of concern and discussion off and on for quite a while, there certainly have not been negotiations for a decade. When Gary Schmidt of MAC came before the Town Board some months ago to inform them that the airport would be asking to be annexed by Lakeville so it could receive city sewer and water, his visit triggered the Board to direct the Planning Commission to conduct a Boundary Protection Study.  The Commission undertook this study with the assistance of Chad Lemmons, the Township Attorney, and Sherri Buss, Senior Planner at TKDA, to see what options may be open to Eureka as an alternative to having the airport be annexed. (The study is posted on the Township website for your information.)



After those special meetings were held, the report went to the Board. Then there were actually two meetings with Board-designated Supervisors Jennings and Behrendt and the other parties exploring especially the idea of a Joint Powers Agreement with Lakeville. (This has been explained in other blog posts.) Lakeville was ultimately not interested in entering into such an agreement with Eureka Township. 

After the elections and a change in the Board, there were then two more meetings with the Board-designated Supervisors, Jennings and Palmquist, and the Township Attorney with MAC and the City of Lakeville. These latter two Supervisors requested a third meeting, which was never arranged. 

Supervisor Hansen then stepped in to "save this mess" at a meeting also attended by Supervisor Jennings, Chad Lemmons, Township Attorney, and MAC. The Board had required that the Attorney accompany Hansen and that he not go alone. Jennings also attended when she was notified of the meeting by MAC. Hansen even complained about her attendance at this meeting at the last Board meeting. 

The article then states:
"Hansen said he was selected by the town board to meet with MAC representatives 'to save the airport' and he proposed multiple ways to provide the airport sewer and water, but the board did not want to act on them."

Whatever "saving proposal" Hansen presented at the meeting with MAC was apparently met without any actual/real buy-in by Gary Schmidt of MAC, because even Hansen (at least at first) certainly did not allege Schmidt was in agreement, even if the Board was not. Maybe that is due to the fact (correctly reported) that MAC's adopted policy requires hookup of all its airports to sewer and water within a certain timeline when it becomes available. This policy was discussed at an earlier-mentioned Special Planning Commission meeting with the Met Council reps, Boylan and Colvin, with Gary Schmidt and the Board also in attendance. (The only approach Hansen has brought up before the Board of late is the well and access of the sewer interceptor. I do not actually recall any other suggestions from him. Not quite sure where "multiple" comes from?) 

So Hansen did propose to the Board that the Township provide the well and also access the sewer interceptor. He still doesn't seem to want to acknowledge that this ability to access is an involved process with the Met Council. In fact, I don't think I have ever heard him address that directly. This motion was one of two motions failing for lack of a second. (See previous two posts.)

The next portion of the article I would like to comment on is:

"He said the airport would have stayed in the township if the town board had been willing to consider allowing commercial development on its northern edge, but without making that change the township will eventually get annexed by Lakeville and Farmington."

I would like to know, Supervisor Hansen, exactly when and where Gary Schmidt of MAC ever said anything like this. The airport is not concerning itself with what Eureka does with its land on the northern border. It is concerning itself with its own needs for sewer and water.

Last, the article states:
“'At the end of the day, the board has no vision for our future,' Hansen said. 'We are on the edge of major development, and if we keep those people happy, they have no reason to go to Lakeville. If we continue to have a lack of vision for our northern corridor, Lakeville’s going to just keep coming.'"

Apparently Hansen's "vision" for the "northern corridor" was to let it be annexed to Lakeville in return for paving a road, among a few other things that there has been no indication that Lakeville would even be open to. That's what he proposed to the Board. 

For some strange reason, the Board "did not want to act," as he told the reporter, to release hundreds of acres to Lakeville, as that motion died for lack of a second also! I STILL don't see how this is of benefit to Eureka.

To Be Continued...