Dec. 17 Open House – “After Action Report” Part 1

To try to make this more readable, I’ll first summarize my observations of the event.  Then Part 2, separately below, will delve deeper into housing density, roads, and levy and related issues.

 Highlights:

 BIG Thank You to clerks Liz and Amy for greeting  attendees with a huge tray containing a nicely organized selection of cookies served with Hot Apple Cider!  What could be a nicer, more thoughtful reflection of community and basic values that we appreciate in Eureka! Mmmm, apple cider…

 Nice to see friends and neighbors for conversation. Count was about 20 while I was there. Too bad more of you couldn’t make it.  Maybe if Board picked a more realistic time instead of when many are still commuting home, having their family dinner, or making Christmas plans and shopping?  Duh. Obviously intentional.

 Reasonable opportunity to meet WSB Engineering team of Senior Professional Community Planner Nate Sparks and Graduate Community Planner Andrew Lupten.  They are based in the firm’s Minneapolis office. Nice, respectful gentlemen with a key characteristic of good consultants – good listeners and they moved around room to talk with attendees.  We’ll see how they handle Board’s direction….

 Other observations:

 No opening presentation Board had said in Board meeting would happen before breaking into small discussion groups around the room.

 No opening comments or greeting at all to at least identify the perceived challenges.  Reflected the similarly pathetic advance notice emailed to only those on Town’s email list. The other 80% or so of residents are supposed to know by checking the website at least weekly.  As was stated in one of their meetings, Board knows nobody reads unreliably delivered expensive postcards.  Such insight.

 There were three charts on display.  The centerpiece was the map showing lands lost from Eureka. The implication is that the sky is falling. I‘ll address that further below. I typically saw only 3-4 at a time looking at them, often leaving without talking with anyone else.  I’m not negative about them and considering the time of day, only the lack of engagement from our “leadership”.

 No effort by any of the Board or PC members present to move around room to talk to anyone or greet someone they may not have met yet. One exception – PC member and recent Board Supervisor Donovan Palmquist. He sat with a group of about 8 – better than nothing. But Chair and Vice Chair “leadership” MIA. I will say this is consistent with Board actions all year on several subjects.  Easier to not have discussion when mindset is to not listen anyway.

 There was a sheet for submitting comments.  Enter all your contact and address info, then lower half of page for comments. My final comment was “too much to cover in the space available”.

 Aftermath:

 I started by forwarding my blog post of Dec. 15 about the Open House to the two WSB Engineering consultants, with an extensive cover letter expanding on it with what I’ll describe below.

 Look, I know I describe a lot of things in detail. I seek to educate to help others recognize that some ideas that sound great may have unintended consequences not easily reversed, like quality of life.

 OK, the sky is falling?  Let’s start with 1967. That was the year:

1.         1. Airlake Airport was started as a private airport,

2.        2. the initial 1450 acres of Airlake Industrial Park was acquired from southern Lakeville Township property owners, and

3.        3. the Village of Lakeville was merged with Lakeville Township to form the City of Lakeville. This was also the first year of the Pan-o-Prog annual event.

 The Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC), which owns and operates the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport and 5 other “reliever”  airports in the region, acquired the Airlake Airport in 1981.  It has Exempt status, which means it pays no property tax to Eureka, Lakeville, or Dakota County. (Roughly 120 acres had been purchased from Eureka owners and 40 from Lakeville owners.)

 So the airport was a private land purchase, not originally an annexation by Lakeville. Some is now officially Lakeville by mutual consent with MAC because of needs for city services such as sewer, water, etc. But these services are not handled through property taxes,  I know not why, perhaps legality driven.

 The MAC recently purchased more undeveloped acreage on the southeast end of the airport to assure control of safe flight approach and takeoff clearance from man-made development as recommended by the FAA.  Eureka Township has no say in such regulations involving higher authority.  

 During approximately 2008-2021, 4 private landowners in Eureka asked to be annexed into Lakeville. Lakeville agreed to annex 3 of them but denied the other one. 

 But then I found a tragic situation reviewing the Open House map of land lost from Eureka compared to my property database. The map is a bit misleading, but here is what is important. I don’t know the Ruddle family or who handled the sale culminating in annexation into Lakeville. But there was an available housing right that could have been moved or sold before selling the property.  The sad part is neither they nor anyone on the Board or PC in 2021 recognized this, so the opportunity was missed. 

 Conversation with a farm family with significant land holdings just this week indicated they regularly get calls asking if they would please sell a housing right. For their family, they don’t want to sell. If the Board and PC are so all-knowing of our Ordinances, what a shame this opportunity on the Ruddle property was missed that could have resulted in a new family and new house adding tax revenue to Eureka.

 In the same time frame, the Adelmann family knew of me by word of mouth and asked me directly about a housing right they thought they might have and whether it could be transferred before the annexation into Lakeville. I was happy to help guide them (for free) on their options, resulting in a transfer to another of their properties and the opportunity for another family member to build next to their parents. The destination had some complications, but I helped navigate through the issues (including a private railroad crossing and driveway sharing) and they got the ideal result they hoped to achieve.

 Well, here we go again.  Also about 2021, two large parcels directly south of the Hat Trick property (went to Lakeville in 2008) were acquired by MAC but are still in Eureka jurisdiction, so not shown on “annexation” map.  I don’t know who owned those two parcels (my database lists current owner as of 2022, not ownership history).  Each parcel has two housing rights. The original owner(s) could have opened up opportunities for FOUR more families to build and add 4 houses elsewhere in Township to our tax rolls. Nice bonus profit for them and more property taxes for Eurreka. 

 Now MAC owns them, so buying them is a donation to help run Airlake and MSP International.  But they technically ARE still in existence, so maybe Board should do something constructive and talk to MAC.  MAC should be amenable to private sales since they bought the property to assure no development growing under the most used runway direction. Oops, I should charge $100 for that advice since free advice is unwelcome these days…

 The current Lakeville website states that Airlake Industrial Park, the largest commercial development park in Minnesota, still has 650 acres available for development.  This presumably includes the two most recent annexations that have been zoned “Industrial-Preferred” by Lakeville, the same as Airlake Industrial Park that borders them on the north.

 The point is that Lakeville did not pursue them and what would be their motivation when they still had over 500 acres more valuable and saleable because of the 4-lane Highway 70 direct out to I-35, among other valued benefits?

 Fine, let’s have a discussion, but let’s NOT stampede to tear our Ag zoning apart jousting imagined windmills.

 An Ordinance to prevent an owner from asking to be annexed into any city is unconstitutional and wrong on so many levels, it deserves no further comment.

 Take a break, then on to housing density, tax values and levy in Part 2 with other related subjects.

Dec. 17 Open House – “More Considerations” Part 2

When I was on Board and Chaired it two years, I had the old-fashioned philosophy that public servants should actually help serve the public. I’m sorry, you may tire of my bringing it up again, but my property database was demonstrated to Board and deputy clerk Amy showing 4 reports I thought would be very helpful references to put on the Eureka website.  Besides a catalog of all the properties in Eureka, their acreage, school district, watershed, and construction year of current houses in place, it identifies every available housing right by type of right and whether any form of business permit may be in play.  Another report lists all 180 likely grandfathered housing rights (which can be accidentally destroyed).  How many owners do you think even KNOW they may have a grandfathered housing right?

 Some of You need to talk to Board, because I’m no longer inclined to waste my time trying to help them help YOU. I’ve tried to tell them, 3 times in written detail, flaws that still exist in the Zoning and Subdivision Ordinances, the needed steps to accept my unique custom database, coordinate with their tech support, copy my backup worksheets, and training on its use that necessarily includes learning Zoning Ordinance features.  Nobody on Board or PC for 2 years now would even bother to respond, ask any questions, and discuss it in a meeting.

 I admit I realized, when a Town Attorney pointed it out, I couldn’t simply donate it as planned. I would need to be a contractor so Township liability insurance would protect me if any of them made a mistake with it.  Liz even made a draft based on another contract making two changes:  the software license would be $1 per month and my technical support and training would be another $1 per month.  The program and all the analysis of about 950 properties would easily cost $100,000 to hire outsiders to produce, not counting someone with my knowledge to guide them and explain Ordinance features. No free help goes unpunished.

 Taxes and gravel road maintenance. Yes, this is a more immediate concern because our levies have not kept up with national inflation the past 4 years, possibly aided by unusual wet weather timing as well.  Remember that next March when we consider the next levy at the Annual Meeting.

 Many of the small businesses in Eureka are not recognized by the County Assessor’s office, and that’s fine because most are very low impact and many are home businesses that no one has any issue with. But most also pay similar or less property tax than single family residences on a per-acre basis. No, of course I am not suggesting some crazy way to tax them higher.

 Why “tax per acre”?  Because that is the best way to understand the value of zoning changes, especially where greater traffic impact, for example, may enter the consideration. But at the same time, the lower tax on ag land is critical to maintain economic viability. Ag land and operation is fundamental to our Comprehensive Plan goals and commitment, strongly endorsed by the MET Council’s oversight authority at least through 2040. Large ag acreage also generates less road wear than more houses or businesses per mile. And we also have a lot of gravel under some of that land needed long-term for continuing development and replacement construction throughout the region, including highways and bridges. MET Council is aware of that, too.

 So what kinds of investments will increase tax income over our current situation? Let’s walk through some actual numbers, not sweeping guesses.

 An important example is housing density.  First, terminology is important.  Eureka’s (and most township) zoning is not “1 per 40 acres”, but “1 per quarter-quarter-Section”, which happens to be approximately 40 acres square. Where this is important is when we talk about a higher density using a misleading expression such as “1 per 10” acres.  Some also think this means minimum lot size of 10 acres.

 This is the worst possible idea that needlessly destroys both ag land and future growth potential. This also, by the way,  would create 102 more lots (between 2 and 9.99 acres) that are routinely buildable today that would fall into “grandfathered” status. This requires expensive property research and proof from Dakota County records in Hastings that the property qualifies for grandfather status under State guidelines. The approximately 180 grandfathered lots existing today are important because it is protection of 180 housing rights, but no value to push 102 more properties into this administrative category for no good reason.

 Think about it: Current minimum lot size is 2 acres, of which we have many. With our flexibility to transfer or sell housing rights (unique among Minnesota townships), 4 houses can be built in a quarter-quarter-Section using as little as 8 acres if desired, preserving as much as 32 acres that may be desirable ag land – and nice rural scenery.

 Out of curiosity, I looked at a typical middle-class house in Lakeville comparable to many in Eureka in terms of size, number of bedrooms, and number of baths.  Land, house, and total assessed valuation same ballpark as in Eureka, so same approximate property tax. 

 Oh, did I mention the Lakeville house is on a ¼-acre lot and the Eureka house is on 2.5 acres?  For the same house and property tax, maybe some of us think the extra 2-1/4 acres might be nice for the kids to play in, bird or deer watch, or host your friends for a backyard barbeque without being walled in by houses on either side and rear….  Do your property taxes look so high now?

 What price quality of life? Taxes are higher everywhere.

 Our current zoning preserves a “Cap of 4” housing density within State and MET Council allowances without creating new housing rights that MET Council will not approve until 2040 or later.  Why? Because we still have about 380 rights available and new housing in Eureka has only been going up at the rate of 3-6 per year.

 OK, let’s get back to housing taxes. A typical house is on a 2 to 2-1/2 acre lot (Eureka Estates was platted with 2-1/2, since then the minimum was reduced to 2 acres.  Put a typical nice middle-class home on it and the property tax will be in the range of 4000-5000 dollars, and an accessory building may bring it to the 5000-6000 range. Still in 1500-2500 dollars per acre range.

 Eureka’s share of property tax is about 20%, the rest going to the County and whichever school district you are in. So Eureka gets $300-$500 per acre in this typical example.

 The only real addition to tax revenue is if the building constructed, by whatever zoning  name or type, is valued 2-3 times higher than the average house with a modest accessory building like my 32x40 storage building.

 And, gee, if we are so concerned about squeezing every penny, as we should be, why do we pay $995 a year for simple software to hold our ordinances on our website? Then we pay hundreds extra for the service provider  to “review” each amendment. No, they don’t have the knowledge to actually review our language and features.  No other township and only three small cities in the entire State contract with them. Putting ordinances up as simple downloadable pdf files and having a table of contents linking to each section is NOT rocket science. The hard work is creating the actual text for public hearing and Board approval BEFORE sending it to them. Come to think of it, that isn’t even done diligently here anymore….

 A Merry Christmas and a Safe and Happy New Year to all as we give thanks for all we have that matters. 😊

 

 

DO THEY REALLY WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK?

 Why would a governmental body schedule an important informational meeting during the holidays, a week from Christmas Eve no less, and over the dinner hour: 5:30-7:30 pm? Eureka officials are holding such a meeting about significant possible changes to zoning on December 17.

In the past, over the many years I served on the Commission and the Board, we were always careful to avoid such timing. We wanted good turnouts and for the people to be informed about whatever the issues were.

I’ve been checking the Township website for some time and only just now have seen the Open House mentioned on News and Notices. It still wasn’t on the Township Calendar even tonight. Only office hours are listed there for the 17th.

The Planner the Board hired is presenting, I believe, at the beginning of the meeting. If true, if you are late or think you can come from 6:30 to 7:30, you could miss the information the Board says it wants you to weigh in on.  

I do know that Pete Storlie earlier said he wanted the Open House “done before the end of the year.” Too bad it is this late; it interferes with family time during the holidays. The notice was evidently sent December 5. Not even two full weeks before the event  

If few people come to this meeting because of scanty promotion and unfortunate timing, how does that help your public officials? Will it be said that nobody must care because so few attended? How does this afford the Board with the opinions it claims to want to receive? How does this inform them? And WHAT do they go forward with?

What ever happened to the idea of sending a survey such as was done in the past? It was mentioned for a little while and then I believe the idea was dropped. Have you received a survey? We haven’t. 

I have yet to hear the Commission or the Board mention the oversight the Metropolitan Council will have and the history of the Township’s interaction with Met Council representatives on these very topics. Former officials have brought these up, but were largely ignored. 

I’m hoping students’ Christmas concerts aren’t held that evening! If at all possible, PLEASE ATTEND!

Cannabis Ordinance Hearing - Monday night 12/9/2024

Beware What Your State Wishes for YOUR Neighborhood!

What follows is written to be included in our Eureka public record of this hearing. 

I understand the structure of this Ordinance is based on recent Minnesota Statutes forcing cannabis operations and businesses on all local government units in the State, usurping local zoning authority on this subject. Basically, this means we are powerless to stop it.

This is the most egregious example of overreach and ill-considered legislation ever put forth by Minnesota. I know there are certain prescribed benefits in carefully controlled, medical contexts, but this goes far beyond into the realm of so-called recreational use overseen by non-medical monitors and bureaucracy.

 The balance of my comments, for our public record, are direct quotes from actual medical authorities and researchers studying some of the concerns about widespread cannabis use without medical oversight. The underlined blue words and name are links to the actual sources.

 From the Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Columbus, Ohio:

 “As cannabis is legalized and is more accessible in various forms across the country, there is increasing concern among health care providers about potential impact on children. Researchers at Nationwide Children’s Hospital have new findings to add to the existing evidence that cannabis exposure before birth can negatively impact children.

 “In a study published October 28, 2024, in JAMA Pediatrics, researchers found prenatal cannabis exposure was associated in early childhood with poorer thinking skills and behaviors such as impulse control, paying attention, planning ability, and more aggressive behavior, all of which play a vital role in how children perform in school and interact with others.

 “Although cannabis is a natural product, there are still many risks to using it during pregnancy,” said Sarah Keim, PhD, principal investigator in the Center for Biobehavioral Health at Nationwide Children’s, and lead author of the study. “Some women may turn to cannabis to help deal with some common issues of pregnancy including nausea, sleep problems and stress. This is not recommended. Consulting with a health care provider to find safer options to help with these issues during pregnancy is important.

“Our findings were not surprising – they actually confirm and expand on longstanding evidence from previous research,” said Dr. Keim. “With our more contemporary and diverse sample of women and children, and with much higher potency of cannabis now than in past decades, this study validates previous research and supports existing clinical recommendations for patients.”

The JAMA Pediatrics researchers analyzed data on cannabis exposure at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. The study was titled “Prenatal Cannabis Exposure and Executive Function and Aggressive Behavior at Age 5 Years”.  80 children born of mothers who had used cannabis were evaluated among a group of 250 children.