This coming Monday, the city council workshop will include the presentation of the report of the Fish Creek Natural Area Greenway Ad-Hoc Commission (note: link is a 6.5 MB, 40-page PDF with numerous images, which will take a while to download if you a slower internet connection).

Labels: environment, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 1/27/2010 04:09:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

The Fish Creek Greenway Ad-Hoc Commission currently has a survey on the city's website, seeking public input about the greenway, how it's used now by residents, how it might be used in the future, and how people feel about things like spending money on conservation. If you are a resident of Maplewood or even a neighboring community, I'd strongly encourage you to fill out the survey. Even if you don't know how to get to Fish Creek, your input can still help (and there's even a "not sure where it is" option to answer the question, "How often do you visit Fish Creek or the Ramsey County Fish Creek open space?")

Please take a couple of minutes to fill out the survey today.

Labels: environment, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 11/30/2009 10:37:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

This week's Maplewood Review covers a number of city topics, including the candidates for the primary election that is now just two weeks away. Our printed copy hasn't arrived in the mail yet, but I can see quite a few new articles on the Lillie newspaper's website.

Under the headline "Seven vie for Maplewood mayor," the newspaper's managing editor, Holly Wenzel, offers profiles of six candidates, drawn from questionnaires filled out by the candidates. One candidate, Fran Grant, did not submit a questionnaire.

All eleven city council candidates did fill out their questionnaires, and the result is another article, "11 file for 2 Maplewood council seats." Candidates Julie Binko and DelRay Rokke also make an appearance on the letters to the editor page. Rokke observes that "Maplewood’s elected leadership has been sorely lacking in the eyes of the entire metropolitan community for a number of years," a chord similar to the "not been proud of our government" comment from running mate Dave Hafner in the Review two weeks ago. Binko, whose small claims suit and its failure have gotten her attention in recent newspapers, expresses her outrage that our legislators introduced bills to fund acquisition of land for conservation in Fish Creek, and that Peter Fischer and I testified in favor of one such bill earlier this year. Another letter that touches on the election appears from resident Christeen Stone.

"Applewood trail construction reaching conclusion" discusses the sustainable trail at Applewood Park, which was the topic of an informational presentation from city staff at our August 24 council meeting. Other article topics include the city manager's spending authority and when or if issues involving councilmembers should be referred to outside agencies for investigation.

Labels: campaign 2009, council politics, finance, media, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 9/03/2009 06:57:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Yesterday was Johnny Appleseed Day, an annual event hosted by the Maplewood Area Historical Society at the Bruentrup Farm. MAHS events often bring some of the oldest and youngest residents of Maplewood together for fun in celebrating the community's heritage.

One tradition at Johnny Appleseed is the hayride across the Prairie Farm Preserve.


Speaking of youngest and oldest, at one point the city's brand new electric GEM car was parked next to a collector's Model T Ford from nearly a century ago.

Labels: events, parks, photos

Posted by John Nephew at 8/16/2009 10:11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

One of the items on Monday's agenda is approval of an electric GEM car for the police volunteers, to be used in patrolling city parks and trails. From what I've heard, this is a welcome response to legitimate resident concerns about safety in the wake of incidents around Lake Phalen and Beaver Lake. I saw the car myself at one of the National Night Out parties I visited, and heard positive comments there and from other residents.

The original price was under $10,000, which would not require City Council approval; but with a delivery fee added to the final bill, it wound up at $10,149. Hence it appears on Monday's consent agenda.

In a number of recent e-mails copied to the rest of the council, Councilmember Hjelle has gone on the attack against this public safety initiative. I'm not entirely sure if he's more wound up by the fact that it's electric car (and thus might be seen as environmentally friendly -- Hjelle has a tag on the bottom of his e-mails that reads "Please Print this E-mail, help save jobs," to mock people who have tags asking people to avoid unnecessary printing so as to save the environment), or if he's worried that it might divert money from his fire department. Either way, it sounds like he will pull it from the consent agenda so that he can vote against it.

Labels: parks, public safety

Posted by John Nephew at 8/08/2009 09:58:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Mayoral candidate Ken Smart addressed the city council during our truth-in-taxation hearing on December 8, 2008. He expressed concern that the city was not cutting taxes in response to the poor economy, and suggested that one way to reduce the city's budget would be to sell the Maplewood Community Center. I am told that he repeated this idea at the DFL meeting last Thursday.



Ken Smart is running as a team with city council candidates Delray Rokke and Dave Hafner.

Labels: campaign 2009, finance, parks, video

Posted by John Nephew at 8/03/2009 08:42:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Delray Rokke, one of the 2007 candidates, has decided to take another run at city council.

In the last election, I noticed that Rokke seemed to switch his position on some issues after aligning himself with Rebecca Cave and her then-majority of the council with Erik Hjelle and Diana Longrie. For example, after being a skeptic about the mayor's conservation easements (saying in his Maplewood Review profile that they should be "not encouraged"), he signed on to make it a central issue of his joint campaign with Cave. Here's a joint flyer later distributed by the two of them (click on the image to enlarge):


This is from Gladstone, but I know they did a number of variations on this flyer, each focused on a different neighborhood, falsely suggesting that its local park or preserve would be on the auction block if Will and I were elected.

Cave is also on the ballot again, but this time Rocky is running with a different slate. I saw at the DFL Central Committee meeting that he had produced a joint campaign flyer with Ken Smart and Dave Hafner. I'll be interested to see what his positions are with a new set of running mates.

Labels: campaign 2009, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 8/02/2009 11:02:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

City council candidate Mary Mackey is a current member of the Maplewood Parks & Recreation Commission. She applied for the commission earlier this year, and the city council interviewed her during our workshop on January 12, 2009. She was appointed at a later meeting, after all the interviews for the commission were complete.

Here is her interview:


Ms. Mackey's application and resumé were included in the 1/12/09 workshop packet (pages 3-4).

Labels: campaign 2009, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 7/31/2009 04:04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

At the July 13th council meeting, we awarded bids for work in a couple of city parks, including resurfacing a basketball court in south Maplewood. Councilmember Hjelle suggested that we should just remove the basketball court entirely, because of the sort of people it attracts. In his own words...

Labels: council politics, parks, video

Posted by John Nephew at 7/20/2009 11:39:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

The Sunday Pioneer Press features an article about CoPar's property by Fish Creek in south Maplewood and the city's hopes to acquire some of the land for conservation. This follows another article in Wednesday's paper about the city's effort to extend the option to buy the land.

Labels: media, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 5/03/2009 09:06:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Yesterday morning Peter Fischer, Dewey Konewko, and I testified in favor of H.F. 2055 at the legislature. Audio of the entire meeting is available on the House web site, but it's a huge file, so I excerpted just the twenty minutes that was spent with our testimony and then follow-up questions and discussions of the committee.



I felt like it was a positive reception on the whole. The bill was “laid over for possible inclusion,” which I guess means it's moving forward and at this point still has a shot at getting Maplewood a share of the Legacy Amendment sales tax revenues that are dedicated for conservation.

Labels: environment, finance, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 4/01/2009 11:39:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Last night at our regular council meeting we talked about progress in the legislature on funding for land acquisition in the Fish Creek corridor. This afternoon the city council (and other interested parties) received an e-mail from Senator Wiger, who wrote:

Hi Everyone,

I wanted to let you know that I enjoyed the conversation the City Council had about Fish Creek during its meeting last night. I was able to watch the show on TV after getting home.

As you know, Rep. Slawik, Rep. Lillie and I have been working on legislation to purchase land along Fish Creek so that it can be preserved for future generations. We have introduced two bills that request funding in the amount of $2.4 million to purchase the land. One of the bills (SF 1821/HF 2055) requests funding from the Parks and Trails fund, while the other bill (SF 1822/HF 2054) requests funding from the Outdoor Heritage Fund. Since we received some mixed feedback on which funding route to pursue, and since the proposal could potentially be funded through either route, we introduced both proposals in the hopes that one will be considered for funding.

I will be sure to keep you updated on the status of this legislation in the Senate.

Warm Regards,

Chuck

Here are links to the status pages of the bills that Sen. Wiger mentions: SF 1821, HF 2055; SF 1822, HF 2054.

Labels: environment, finance, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 3/24/2009 04:53:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

Many residents identify Maplewood's parks, trails, and open spaces as key to our community's attractiveness. Besides their inherent benefits, a well-maintained system of these assets increases the appeal and value of property in our city as a whole.

Last August the city council held a joint workshop with the Parks & Recreation Commission. A major topic of that meeting was the challenge of funding our parks.

Changing Needs

Historically, as a growing suburb, Maplewood has relied upon the Park Availability Charge, or PAC, which is charged on each unit of new development in the city. Collection of this charge is authorized by Minnesota Statutes 462.358 Subdivisions 2b and 2c. As explained by a League of Minnesota Cities brief on the subject, the statutes authorizing park dedication charges like our PAC “are premised on the assumption that new development (and not existing taxpayers) ought to pay for the additional park and recreation facilities needed to accommodate the demands created by the new development.” The statute limits the use of the funds, which “may not be used for ongoing operation or maintenance.”

As Maplewood nears full development, there are fewer opportunities for new park and recreation facilities. However, the aging of our existing facilities means a growing need to fund their repair and replacement. In the future we can expect the need for funding to grow, when the parks and trails that we have been expanding in recent years reach the point in their life when they require repair or reconstruction. Thus the nature of our park funding needs is changing, and the trend will continue. Now and in the future the city council will be worrying less about acquiring land or building new park facilities, and more about replacing deteriorated playground equipment, sports fields, and trail segments.

This growing need must be set against the realities of the budget process each year. I believe many residents would support increased funding for our parks, trails, and open space; but as our city sets its short-term priorities, it is very easy to short-change our parks when their funding is part of the general tax levy. Unlike capital projects such as street improvements that can be assessed and bonded with relative ease, capital improvements to our parks and open spaces generally must be paid for from funds on hand.

I believe Maplewood needs to look for a dedicated funding source for the maintenance and repair/replacement needs of Maplewood parks, trails, and open space.

EFF as Potential Dedicated Funding

One option we can consider is to dedicate the Electric Franchise Fee as this funding source. I think there are several reasons the EFF may be appropriate.

The EFF is collected from every electric utility customer in the city. This includes entities that are exempt from property taxes (such as private and public schools, churches, and government facilities) but that do benefit from city parks, trails and open space. The EFF is thus an existing mechanism for collecting fees from a broad base of individuals and institutions that benefit directly or indirectly from our parks, trails and open space.

There several possible ways to dedicate this funding. It could be a whole or partial dedication of the current EFF, which is 50 cents per month on residential electric customers. The EFF could be increased, with the increase (with our without part of the current EFF) being dedicated to a park, trail, and open space maintenance fund.

From the standpoint of building community support, I think the EFF would make it easier for residents to see a direct relationship between what they pay and what they receive – for example, 25 cents per month on a residential household would equate to something over $90,000 per year that would go directly to needed capital improvements to our parks system.

Using the EFF has its downside. It has been controversial in the past. It can be seen as a regressive tax: unlike property taxes, it does not have any implicit relationship to the assets of the payer or their ability to pay. It is not tax deductible as property taxes are. I opposed an increase in the EFF three years ago, when it appeared to be proposed as a way to hold down property taxes on the most valuable homes in the city and shift the burden to renters and owners of less valuable houses. In that case, however, the money was going into general city operations (it was proposed to be used for energy purposes, but that umbrella covered things like the heating bill at the community center).

Of course, every funding mechanism has its drawbacks. For example, due to fiscal disparities contributions, in order to fund parks through property taxes we actually have to levy more taxes than would actually go to parks, in order to account for the program that redistributes a portion of our property tax receipts to neighboring communities.

Next Steps

I bought this proposal to the Parks & Recreation Commission as a Visitor Presentation on March 18th in an effort to move our discussion about parks, trails and open space funding forward. The City Council and Parks Commission have already identified the need for dedicated funding for our parks system; we need to move on to explore specific ideas of how to accomplish the goal.

If the parks commission is willing to explore this idea, my hope is that they will develop a policy recommendation for the city council. I am also hoping that discussion of this idea may bring forth additional ideas of practical funding mechanisms to help us assure a safe and healthy park system that will serve our residents today and in generations to come.

Labels: finance, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 3/21/2009 10:19:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

Today's Pioneer Press includes an article on the topic of protecting Maplewood's open spaces. I have a related item on the agenda for next week's council meeting.

The article states, "While still owning the land, the city would grant an easement to a conservation organization that would monitor the land and enforce any land restrictions. The restrictions also would be binding on future owners of the land."

Note the term "future owners." Conservation easements do not in any way prevent the city from selling land. On the contrary, they are the kind of thing you put on land when you expect it to have different owners in the future.

Labels: media, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 11/21/2008 10:44:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

The mayor's column in the November city newsletter (page 5) again promoted her proposal of conservation easements for city parks and open space. I think it's interesting to contrast her account of a Parks Commission meeting with the draft minutes.

For example, while playing up the 4-4 split vote about the Priory, she doesn't even mention that another conservation easement was discussed under the very same agenda item, for Jim's Prairie -- and that the commission unanimously agreed not to recommend that easement. That pesky fact might undermine her dishonest political argument, which has been to suggest that questioning the appropriateness of conservation easements means you must want to see our Neighborhood Preserves sold to developers. (Remember the fear-mongering in last year's election campaign?)

In reality, as the minutes make clear, there are plenty of other reasons to question conservation easements on public land, starting with the cost. The city has already sunk about $8,000 on outside consultants, plus many hours of staff time, on this idea that the mayor has been pushing for the past two years. Proceeding with the easements would mean spending another $25,000. It sounds to me like some on the Parks Commission would rather see the money spent directly on restoration and management of our open spaces, rather than funding the mayor's political gambit.

Labels: council politics, environment, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 11/19/2008 03:20:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

This Saturday, September 20th, the Friends of Maplewood Nature are holding their 2nd Annual Picnic & Fundraiser from 10:30 am-1:00 pm. at the Bruentrup Farm. The purpose of the event is to increase the Friends Group membership and raise funds for the new Outdoor Nature Play Area kids climbing rock.

The schedule of events includes a "Protect Your Trees from Winter Class" by a certified arborist; a picnic lunch; a silent auction; and a farm tour, including a short hike into the Open Space Prairie.

The event is free to all Friends Members. New members are welcome to join at the party; membership donations are $15 for a household. RSVPs to the nature center are encouraged (651-249-2170, or contact Oakley at Oakley.Biesanz@ci.maplewood.mn.us), and I'm sure it will help them plan the right number of picnic lunches. But if you're reading this late and don't have time to RSVP, you should just stop by the event anyway.

Labels: environment, events, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 9/18/2008 10:20:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

It's about time.

Monday night, at a council/manager workshop, the city council majority finally allowed a discussion of a wider range of options for the protection of Maplewood parks and open space -- a discussion that Will Rossbach has been requesting for months. The packet prepared for the meeting by city staff includes various alternatives, their pros and cons, and their costs.

This is a meeting that should have happened months ago. The city manager and council majority invested a lot of time and thousands of taxpayer dollars in one option (the most expensive one), and advocated its use across the board, before even looking at what other options might be out there. The entire saga of conservation easements has demonstrated the flawed approach to decision-making that is typical of this council majority, putting their personal and political agendas ahead of the public good.

Let's take a trip down memory lane.

The first mention I can find of conservation easements was a column attributed to Erik Hjelle in the September 2006 city newsletter: "The council is also researching the steps necessary for conservation easements on open space." (Can anyone point me to an agenda item or meeting minutes where the council discussed easements in an open meeting before this date or directed staff to research them?)

In the February issue Mayor Diana Longrie then wrote, "The council's Conservation Easement initiative is moving forward." Rebecca Cave had a column in the same issue, and promoted the upcoming conservation easements workshop, writing, "Anyone interested in learning more about how the City Council plans to protect our City Open Spaces permanently should come to this meeting." Again, before the council had actually looked at this issue in the workshop or taken any votes, as far as I can tell, Cave describes it as the "plan" that the Council will enact.

Cave and Longrie also mailed invitations, apparently with their own funds, to residents living near parks and neighborhood preserves.

At last, on April 9th, the council held a workshop on the topic. (You can read my detailed notes from the meeting.) At that time the direction Copeland seemed to be taking, without any formal vote or directive from the council, was to place easements on all of the city's parks and open space. When the representative of the Minnesota Land Trust suggested that doing that would take at least a year, Copeland narrowed the focus to just the neighborhood preserves, to have something that could be enacted on a shorter timetable (coincidentally, a timetable prior to the elections).

After laying all this groundwork, it came as no surprise when Rebecca Cave made conservation easements a centerpiece of her campaign ("THEY ARE NOT FOR SALE!"), along with spurious claims that her opponents want to sell the city's parks and neighborhood preserves.

Since the April workshop, the mayor has continued to promote conservation easements -- effectively campaigning for Cave -- in the taxpayer-funded city newsletter, in August and October. Ms. Cave did as well (in June). I don't know if they actually did it, but they at least planned for the city to produce a cable TV program promoting the idea as well.

(Let's keep in mind that, while keeping the drumbeat for conservation easements going, they also eliminated our Parks & Recreation Department and their city manager proposed a 72.8% cut in capital funding to parks.)

After more than a year of building up this campaign for conservation easements, linking it to Rebecca Cave, and stonewalling Will Rossbach, the council majority finally gave in to Rossbach's request for a public discussion of alternatives.

What do we find at the end of the discussion? Well, apparently conservation easements are not suitable for all of the Neighborhood Preserves; many of these alternatives cost little or nothing to put in place; and the protection provided by the other alternatives is actually more appropriate to many of the pieces of land at issue.

It sure seemed to me like at the end of the meeting both Mayor Longrie and Councilmember Cave were more or less agreeing with the position Councilmember Rossbach took all along -- that conservation easements might be appropriate for some neighborhood preserves, but probably not for all, and it was important to apply the right tools for each situation -- and they were claiming that this is what they really intended all along.

What to make of this? Like I said, it strikes me as another example of this council's bad policy process.

I suspect this all began with a political goal, to create a campaign issue for Rebecca Cave and manufacture a controversy. In order to put Rossbach on the record in opposition, it appears they needed to promote as extreme a version as possible at the beginning. Then, when Rossbach predictably stood up for common sense and reason and the not-so-crazy idea of looking at the alternatives before committing a lot of money to a specific course of action, they misrepresented his concerns to portray him as wanting to sell the city's open space. The campaign for easements had two key aspects: one was riling up fear and anger in neighborhoods (making people believe their neighborhood preserves and parks are threatened); the other was presenting Cave as essential to the only possible solution, with her commitment to conservation easements. In this way, the entire conservation easements "issue" has put the interests of the city behind the self-interested political agenda of the council majority.

As the high cost of actually enacting easements has become more apparent, as have the city's budgetary woes, the importance of actually putting the easements in place has waned for the council majority. But to my mind, the whole exercise (including the use of a lot of taxpayer dollars along the way) was a political gambit from the outset. I'm not even sure how much attention the council majority will have for the issue, once the election is past.

A better way, I believe, would have been to have an explanation of the problem that needs fixing, and a survey of the alternatives that might solve it, at the beginning. Explore the options, build consensus as you move forward, and settle on a course of action that has broad support and political investment, and public confidence that the best available option was chosen out in the open and the light of day. Building this kind of cooperative political will is not only a less-divisive way to govern, but it also makes for stronger and more-enduring policies. That's what Maplewood needs for a better future.

Labels: parks, process

Posted by John Nephew at 10/17/2007 11:05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

In each neighborhood of Maplewood, it appears that candidates Rokke and Cave are distributing a customized joint flyer that identifies a nearby park or neighborhood preserve as needing "saving."

The flyers say that the "#1 issue of concern" from meeting with homeowners in that neighborhood was how to save public parks and open space. (This is funny to me, because after talking to people in every neighborhood of Maplewood, I'm pretty confident in saying that the #1 issue of concern to residents is, "When can we get rid of that mayor?")

It says the problem is "how to stop developers from smooth talking your city council into selling your Parks and Open Spaces for building condos or apartments." The flyer also says "The crucial thing that our opponents want to 'Preserve' - is the ability to sell to developers at the simple will of the city council!"

What is ironic about this is the fact that, as far as I am aware, only one candidate has suggested the possible desirability of selling public open space -- and that would be Delray Rokke, one of the people producing and distributing this flyer.

Take a look at the candidate profile that Rocky completed for the Lillie News, presumably before he decided to team up with Rebecca, turn 180°, and dump his own positions in favor of her campaign's talking points. In response to the question, "What does the city need to do to preserve Maplewood’s parks and open spaces? Do you think conservation easements should play a role?" Rocky wrote:

We need to let the voters decide again whether they still support the city controlling large quantities of undeveloped, non-park land. We need to let residents know how much this costs in additional taxes per household. We should consider some additional safe, attractive and affordable senior housing so that more young families may move into many neighborhoods to enjoy the parks. Conservation easements should be considered on a case by case basis—not encouraged.

Am I reading this wrong? It sounds like he was saying that some neighborhood preserves (the "large quantities of undeveloped, non-park land") might better be developed with senior housing.

Perhaps he misspoke? Well, at the Chamber of Commerce debate on August 30th, Rocky again suggested that the neighborhood preserves needed "development" to make them more useful and accessible (I think he meant trails and amenities); then he went on to say that some should maybe have parking lots built on them! (I guess that would keep them "open.") Listen for yourself (228 kB MP3).

He also seemed strongly opposed to conservation easements in the candidate profile; this was the impression I had from a conversation I had with Rocky in August, too. Now, he apparently has decided that conservation easements are not only OK, but a centerpiece of his campaign.

I have wondered how Rebecca and Rocky could team up, since on Rebecca's core campaign issue (at least, what she says is the most important issue), Rocky was the one candidate who held the most extreme opposite view. I guess it makes me wonder how important it really is to either of them.

Labels: campaign 2007, development, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 10/15/2007 04:05:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

Maplewood's Independence Day bash is at Hazelwood Park tomorrow, starting at 5:30 PM. I suppose I should be there in any case because I'm a candidate for office, but what sealed the deal for me was the report that deep fried cheese curds will be available for purchase.

Labels: campaign 2007, events, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 7/03/2007 12:52:00 PM | Permalink

Our day had an environmental focus yesterday. In the afternoon Michelle and I visited the Maplewood Nature Center for its Arbor Day celebration. We enjoyed a walk around the Nature Center paths, heard about the new purposes Wipers Recycling has found for old leather goods, bought a pound of shade-grown fair trade coffee, and came home with two trees for planting. Everyone who attended was offered a free tree to plant to celebrate the occasion; Michelle chose the swamp white oak, to complement the numerous pin oaks that already adorn our yard. We also won a drawing for another sapling, and for that Michelle without hesitation chose the pagoda dogwood.

While we were there we picked up our kit for Maplewood's Great Tree Search (info PDF). I doubt any of our yard's trees will make the #1 spot (though some of them are very tall and old), but it will be fun to measure their height and girth and make a record of them for posterity.

After we got home we even had an environmentally conscious DVD to watch — our current Netflix rental was Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth. It was a sobering film, but it also gives me hope — a world that successfully addressed the ozone hole can rise to this challenge as well, and a big part of the battle is just to spread the message that the problem can and must be addressed.

Labels: events, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 4/29/2007 03:41:00 PM | Permalink

This past Monday, April 9, I attended the city's workshop with a representative of the Minnesota Land Trust about conservation easements. Motivating the workshop was the idea of establishing easements on city-owned open space and parks. (I've seen Mayor Longrie promote this idea in various meetings in recent months, but the council has never formally discussed or voted on it.) My notes from the meeting are available on Maplewood Voices, and I've also added them to this site's archive.

I appreciated the chance to learn more about conservation easements, which seem to be a useful tool for landowners and communities. In brief, a conservation easement splits off certain rights associated with a piece of land — namely, development rights. The specific easement varies from case to case, depending on the nature of the land and the purpose of the easement. In one instance the land affected might have to be left exactly as it is, while in another the easement may allow for trails or limited structures to be built or maintained. Perhaps a parcel of land has a scenic section of lake shore, and the easement may keep any development a certain distance away to preserve that valued asset; or an easement could allow farmland to continue to be farmed, while preventing future development into a housing subdivision.

The easement defines those specific rights, which are then given to a third party, such as the Minnesota Land Trust. The Trust commits to monitoring and enforcing (in court, if necessary) the rights that it now owns through the easement. While the land itself can still be sold, the property rights defined by the easement would remain the property of the trust, limiting what a future landowner could do.

Labels: parks

Posted by John Nephew at 4/12/2007 09:34:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Besides the Planning Commission meeting, last week I also attended the Parks & Recreation Commission meeting. One topic brought up by city staff at the meeting was news of heavy metals in the Gladstone Savanna. (Not a buried collection of Mötley Crüe albums, no, we're talking about arsenic and lead.) The city planned a public meeting to talk about the environmental consultant's findings and possible remediation plans.

Today the agenda and packet for the meeting, which will be held at 6 PM this coming Monday (March 5) in council chambers at City Hall, was posted to the city website. It includes some basic Q&A and a map of the site with the locations and results of various soil tests.

Labels: environment, events, parks

Posted by John Nephew at 3/01/2007 02:47:00 PM | Permalink