Tag: Growth

Minnetrista city election – why care?

I’ve been meeting with residents in Minnetrista neighborhoods over the last several weeks and invariably someone always asks “What’s so important about this year’s city election?” The answer: Outside interests are running the city and none of them live or pay taxes here in Minnetrista. Outside consultants, contractors, vendors and organizations put pressure on the council to serve their interests ahead of yours. money electionsConsequently, taxes go up every year and will continue at an even faster pace going forward. We are growing and have important decisions coming up next year that impact your property rights, taxes, fees and freedoms.

I am also hearing from residents frustrated in their dealings with the city as they seek permits, variances, or access to information. Rather than having an excellent experience they often leave irritated and angry. Instilling a service oriented culture at city hall is important for residents to be treated with respect and for staff to understand their purpose is to serve the community. Unlike private sector businesses that know their survival depends on treating customers well, public sector organizations can become complacent knowing their “customer” has nowhere else to go.

The November election in Minnetrista is of paramount importance to every Minnetrista resident. Unlike the national elections where partisan politics divide the country, every Minnetrista resident can agree that outside interests should not continue running our city and public servants should treat residents with the respect they deserve.

 

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New water tower financing – Who assumes risk?

There is a big risk factor looming in November that could profoundly impact the direction of our economy. Minnetrista will be relying on revenues coming from current and future water users to finance a new $2.3M water tower in the southern sector and while we’ve been enjoying a robust growth period with a booming housing market, what if all that comes to a halt? We’ve seen what happened in 2008 and elections are known to impact the economy in profound ways.

The city council has heard from financial consultants, engineering firms, and staff urging

water tower

the city to act now but none of them are Minnetrista taxpayers. They are stakeholders benefiting, directly or indirectly, from issuing the bond, constructing the tower, or growing the city’s debt and size of the city’s budget. That’s just a fact, but an important fact to consider. They are all competent and good at what they do but their interests are, understandably, their interests.

Don’t get me wrong, we need to build the water tower and we need to do it soon. Our growth numbers show that by 2030, if growth continues at the current rate, we won’t be able to service the southern sector adequately. But it takes about 2 years to get a water tower online and there is no imminent crisis, despite what some stakeholders may assert.

There are two possible ways, with some very important differences, to finance this project. The council, however, was advised Monday night to consider only the first:

  • General Obligation (G.O.) Bonds – Pledge the full faith & credit of the city and require the city to use whatever means possible, including increasing the citywide tax levy, to cover the debt. These are called “General” obligation bonds because they are typically used to finance projects that benefit the general community at large, not just a sector of it. In this case, however, this project only benefits city water users. With a G.O. bond the entire Minnetrista tax base assumes the risk of whether our housing growth and associated water revenue increases at a sufficient rate to cover the bond.
  • Revenue Bonds – Finance income-producing projects and are secured by a specified revenue source, in this case water fees and new connection charges. A revenue bond would rely solely on the revenue coming from water fees to pay for the bond without putting the “full faith & credit” of all Minnetrista taxpayers on the line. That means the city would not be required to increase the tax levy to cover the debt if, for any reason, future water fees weren’t enough. Revenue bonds put the risk on the investor purchasing the bonds rather than all Minnetrista property owners, regardless of whether they’re on city water.

My preference was to hold off on authorizing the bond issuance until after the November elections when the risk associated with our growth projections might be better understood. If it appears the economy will remain on track going forward, a G.O. bond may be a good option then. Considering the economic uncertainly that lies ahead I am not comfortable pledging the full faith and credit of the entire city on a G.O. bond today. A revenue bond wouldn’t do that and is the only responsible choice today, in my opinion, to protect Minnetrista property owners.

Unfortunately the council succumbed to the pressure and voted 4-1 Monday night to pass a resolution (pg 57) amended to provide for the sale of $2.5M in G.O. bonds ($2M for the tower; $500K for CIP) with plans to award the sale of the G.O. bonds on March 9, 2020.

I’ll need to update this debt chart:

debt growth
2016 Includes all debt types, levied and unlevied (revenue pledged)

*The narrative in this post is publicly available by viewing the Monday 2/3/2020 council meeting video and listening to the 2/3/2020 work session recording.

Mayor Whalen’s blog on increasing your taxes

I think some clarification is in order here.

Mayor Whalen states on her new blog “When determining our levy one of the things we look at is growth. The County Assessor estimated that we saw a 2.0% – 2.5% overall new home growth. If you subtract that from the final levy increase (over 2019) of 5.66% it leaves an increase of approximately 3.2%-3.7%”

mayor's blogThat’s assuming, incorrectly, that for every percent in growth the city needs a 1:1 ratio increasing the tax levy. That’s simply not true. First, the 2-2.5% referenced here is the increase in the city’s total market valuation from new homes, not the number of new homes built. That could be a very small number of expensive homes or a lot of inexpensive homes. There is no correlation between market valuation increases and a need for higher taxes.

The tax levy should only be increased because of increased costs (plus inflation) due to growth, not simply because of market valuation increases. Theoretically you could have one home built that accounts for the entire 2% growth…which wouldn’t justify any tax levy increase at all. I’m not implying that is the case, just using an example that makes the point.

Minnetrista on top 10 list of safest MN cities, but will we stay there?

We learned at our council meeting Monday night that Minnetrista is #6 on the list of top 10 safest cities in Minnesota according to the FBI’s uniform crime report analyzed here. Aside from an error in our population count (shows we’re over 10,000) the analysis confirms why people want to live in Minnetrista and being safe is up there on everyone’s list.

One of the reasons for our low crime rate is the fact our population is spread out over a large geographical area and we don’t have the density that’s found in cities with higher crime rates. Our population is more educated and our median home values are higher than many of the cities lower on the list. Our public safety department does a great job too.

bad guyLet’s hope Minnetrista can resist the pressures of unelected influences (Met Council, League of Minnesota Cities, MN Dept of Housing) pushing for higher density housing in Minnesota cities that will most assuredly affect not only our crime rate but our traffic volume as well. Minnetrista doesn’t have many options for accommodating more traffic as our land is constrained by lakes and waterways with new or widened routes being all but impossible. High density housing, crime and traffic are things to avoid, not invite.

Minnetrista is a special place, a safe place to raise a family where most people feel comfortable taking an evening walk down a trail without a can of mace in their hand. That could all change.

 

 

 

 

Minnetrista’s rural character is at stake in this election

The slogan on Elroy Balgaard’s flyers, “Keep it Rural”, resonates with the people I’ve been talking with, even those living in the more densely populated Minnetrista housing developments. I was in Hunters Crest over the weekend and many of those homes border beautiful marshes and prairies that residents cherish and want preserved.

City Council members have the authority to approve Planned Unit Developments (PUDs) in areas outside the MUSA line that are zoned “Rural” as well as “Urban Reserve” that could drastically change the entire landscape of Minnetrista. Make sure you vote for someone who will not support higher density PUDs than current primary zoning allows in these areas. In the 2040 Comp Plan there is something called “Limited Secondary Zoning” that essentially allows higher density in these zones if the council deems it appropriate. It’s important who you vote for.

 

Minnetrista’s rural character is at stake in this election

The slogan on Elroy Balgaard’s flyers, “Keep it Rural”, resonates with the people I’ve been talking with, even those living in the more densely populated Minnetrista housing developments. I was in Hunters Crest yesterday and many of those homes border beautiful marshes and prairies that residents cherish and want preserved.

City Council members have the authority to approve Planned Urban Developments (PUDs) in areas outside the MUSA line that are zoned “Rural” as well as “Urban Reserve” that could drastically change the entire landscape of Minnetrista. Make sure you vote for someone who will not support higher density PUDs than current primary zoning allows in these areas. In the 2040 Comp Plan there is something called “Limited Secondary Zoning” that essentially allows higher density in these zones if the council deems it appropriate. It’s important who you vote for. #ElroyBalgaardForCityCouncil

 

“Keep it Rural Minnetrista” Elroy Balgaard for City Council video

The slogan “Keep it Rural” resonates with the people I’ve been talking with, even those living in the more densely populated Minnetrista housing developments. I was in Hunters Crest yesterday and many of those homes border beautiful marshes and prairies that residents cherish and want preserved.

City Council members have the authority to approve Planned Unit Developments (PUDs) in areas outside the MUSA line that are zoned “Rural” as well as “Urban Reserve” that could drastically change the entire landscape of Minnetrista. Make sure you vote for someone who will not support higher density PUDs than current primary zoning allows in these areas. In the 2040 Comp Plan there is something called “Limited Secondary Zoning” that essentially allows higher density in these zones if the council deems it appropriate. It’s important who you vote for.

Minnetrista preliminary tax increase highest of all surrounding cities

I attended the League of Women Voters city council candidate forum at Minnetrista city hall Thursday night. Once the video is available I’ll post it and give a recap. For now just wanted to post some information city council candidate Elroy Balgaard shared that night on the surrounding communities and how their preliminary tax levy changes compare to Minnetrista’s.2019 surrounding cities preliminary leviesThis information didn’t go over well with the incumbents who asserted these communities can’t be compared but it should be noted that the city of Orono is quite comparable to Minnetrista in size and growth yet their increase is 40% lower than Minnetrista’s. Yes, there’s always a chance preliminary tax levies may come down before they are adopted in December but I’d be shocked if Minnetrista’s increase came down to even Wayzata’s at 4.29%.

Minnetrista grew 2.5% last year. Why do we need a 6.01% budget increase to pay for that?

Even though there will be a public hearing on December 3, the Minnetrista final 2019 tax levy will most likely, given history, be adopted without change that same evening and the public hearing is not likely to influence that. Sort of makes one wonder what the point is of having a public hearing.

July 13, 2018

WE NEED ANSWERS to these questions before taking additional steps toward spending millions on another water tower and treatment plant in the Southwest sector:

1. Minnetrista’s new 2040 Comprehensive plan shows a total number of municipal water connections in 2015 as 1,648 but the commissioned study shows far fewer connections at 1,245 in 2015. We should have accurate data from 2015. Why are these numbers so different? When I see discrepancies like this it doesn’t give me confidence in our growth projections.

2. According to Minnetrista’s 2040 Comprehensive plan there has been a downward trend in Total per capita and Maximum Daily Water Demands for the past several years. Why does the commissioned study show Maximum Daily Per Capita Water use increasing by 78% in 2016 (from 198gpd to 353gpd)? Are these estimates or actual numbers, and if actual what was the cause of the dramatic rise?

3. Why are the Maximum Daily Demand numbers missing for 2011? All years preceding and post are there. We should have this number in our system.

4. If a new tower is built what would the estimated average cost be for city water users? What is the best case scenario (we reach growth projections anticipated) and worst case (we don’t). I’m asking for estimates, not actuals. I realize there are unknowns (interest rates, timeframe, construction costs, possible land acquisition) but we need to do a business case/risk analysis before going forward. Let’s identify the variables, plug estimates in and figure it out.

5. Will the cost for the new water tower and its maintenance be spread across all city water users or only those in the SW sector that are served by that system?

6. What is our break-even point, i.e., when we have enough new water connections and users to pay the debt service on the revenue bonds (money borrowed to build tower)?

7. How many new water connections are anticipated in the SW each year? What is the Average Water Use per connection in the SW? Have we asked the builders (Matamy, HP Holdings, etc) for their new construction estimates? It isn’t enough to just look at the total number of building permits throughout the entire city in projecting future growth and water use. Some of our past growth has occurred in other parts of the city. There is also the fact of diminishing land available for growth in the SW. Growth cannot be projected to continue steadily forever as it will undoubtedly diminish over time as this area reaches capacity.

8. Are we pulling annual water usage only on connections that were active for the entire year? If we’re not then the Average Daily Water Use Per Connection numbers are not accurate in the commissioned water study.