Expressing frustration with slow progress and unresolved issues, the Minnetrista City Council voted down a preliminary plat request for what was proposed to be the largest housing development in the city.

At the Nov. 19 Minnetrista City Council meeting, the panel unanimously voted to deny a preliminary plat request for the proposed Park Place development that that would have seen the construction of about 850 housing units on nearly 290 acres, located just northeast of Highway 7 and Kings Point Road.

Placing a large housing development in that location has been talked about for years in the city. Right before the city council enacted a development moratorium in March of last year, there was an application to place more than 980 units on about 470 acres in that area.

In January, a plan similar in scale and presented by the same developers as the one that was denied Nov. 19, was brought in front of the council for an initial review. Since that time, the council and city staff have spent hours discussing the project and attended several special workshop meetings that were exclusively scheduled in order to hash out remaining issues with the developer.

At the Nov. 19 meeting, the development team looked to address 14 concerns the council had expressed at their last workshop.

Councilor Al Roers said that some progress had been made, however he also expressed dismay that the team was presenting just those concerns and asking the council to clarify their positions on them and not giving a presentation of the entire proposed development, with those concerns already resolved. Roers said the council had asked the developer to provide a new drawing of the overall project, without taking up any more city staffor council time clarifying their positions.

Councilor George Zenanko agreed and said that in his opinion the whole process with the developer, “... has been a waste of a lot of time.”

Mayor Cheryl Fischer and Councilor Lisa Whalen both said they were surprised to see the development scheduled for review so soon after the last workshop because they also believed the developer would present them with new drawing of the whole development with all of the outstanding issues resolved.

However, the snail's pace of the developers’ progress was not the only concern of the council. Perhaps the most perplexing issue for the panel was how to deal with the increase in traffic that many feel would come with the development.

Councilors pointed out that even though realigning the intersection of Kings Point Road and CSAH 11 and putting a roundabout on Highway 7 at that intersection has been discussed, no concrete agreement has yet been reached. They said that they wanted a decision hashed out before approving a preliminary plat for Park Place.

They also said they wanted to be assured that the city would not be stuck paying for any of the road improvements, something councilors feel is the developer's responsibility.

Marc Anderson, who spoke on behalf of the development team, said that all improvements to Highway 7, such as the roundabout, would have to be completed before any certificates of occupancy were given to homes in the development. He also said that it has always been his understanding that the city would not pay for any of the improvements.

Fischer said that she would still like to see these issues resolved before granting a preliminary plat request. “I am so uncomfortable with this,” she said.

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