HomeMy WebLinkAbout04-21-08 WSCity of Lakeville
• City Council Work Session
Minutes
Monday, Apri12~, 2008 @ g:oo p.m.
City Council Chambers, Lakeville City Hall
In attendance: Mayor Holly Dahl and Council Members Mark Bellows, .Wendy Wulff,
Laurie Rieb, and Kerrin Swecker.
Also in attendance: City Administrator Steve Mielke, Assistant to City Administrator
Brian Anderson, Finance Director Dennis Feller, City Engineer Keith Nelson, Community
and Economic Director David Olson, Met Council Judd Schetman, and SFR's Senior
Traffic Engineering Specialist Jeff Bednar.
The meeting was called to order at 9:00 p.m.
Mr. Mielke stated that a week ago a proposal from the Met Council was received. The
proposal outlines the position of the Met Council in consultation with MNDOT and some
discussion with Dakota county representatives of the joint powers board that has
recently been started up in an effort to entice Lakeville to join the transit taxing district.
The proposal has some deadlines that are due to the Urban Partnership agreement that
MNDOT and the Met Council have brought together. Because of those timeframes it
called for a quick work session to outline the proposal and give the staff and the council
a chance for a discussion about the proposal and get any questions on the table-that the
council might have. Mr. Mielke then outlined the terms and conditions in the proposal.
Mr. Schetman stated that the UPA bill passed last Friday in the House from the Finance
Committee to the Ways and Means Committee. It was steered away from the tax
committee because they were going to hang the taxing district language on there which
would eventually cause a showdown with the governor. The issue with the timing is that
this bill will have to pass the House and Senate floors no later than May 5 or 6 in order to
make sure that there's time to get it processed and get it to the governor's office for his
signature. They have made it clear that if Lakeville chooses to come into the district
voluntarily that needs to be done before that deadline otherwise they will reallocate the
dollars. That leaves a very short timeframe to make a decision. He also stated that if
Lakeville doesn't get this agreement in place, all of it goes away.
Mr. Bednar stated that the analysis indicates that adding the proposed park and ride,
generating traffic from local systems would result generally in acceptable overall levels
of surface under the bill conditions. That means that most of the intersections analyzed
are going to operate at acceptable levels of .service B or better. However the
intersections of County Road 5 and the l35 west ramps and the intersection of Kenrick
and 175th Street which are already degraded in both the existing and no build conditions,
are going to operate at unacceptable levels. Additional improvements were not included
or assumed other than an all-way stop at the intersection of Kenrick and 175th Street. If
Lakeville didn't do that traffic eastbound on 175th to go north on Kenrick spilled back to
• County Road 50 and then backed up and the whole network locked up on the model.
Mornings are not a problem but the afternoon could be a two minute delay if you're
• southbound on Kenrick going back toward County Road 50. There are many
opportunities to make some low cost minimal improvements to get the levels of service
back to acceptable such as signals or a roundabout. The bottom line is that the local
system. given some minor low cost improvements can support the park and ride
generated traffic at acceptable levels of surface.
Mr. Feller reviewed the economic considerations and provided a handout that calculated
costs to Lakeville residents for the tax levy and lays -out some financing options. Based
on the 2008 tax base and the tax capacity rate for the transit it raises about $743,000.
He presented five options as outlined in the work session packet.
After much discussion, the City Council directed staff to continue to work with the Met
Council and Dakota County towards reaching a transit solution and preparing
information to inform the public of this proposal.
Respectfully S b 'tted,
Brian J. derson
Assistant to City Administrator
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