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A little plug for County Planner Phil Wheeler:  He saw this coming years ago.

USA today on the changing makeup of communities: USA Today

This is part of the reason why many of the downtown or close in developments like Orchard Hills Villas, The Hamilton, Cascade Creek have been successful while places like Pebble Creek in distant sprawled out areas have been failures.  It is also the reason Mac Hamilton’s new building and Metropolitan Market Place will be coming online (and there are more coming…)

From a policy standpoint I think it is crazy that we continue to heavily subsidize sprawl instead of make the users bear the full cost.  I opposed the rate increases to the Sewer fund because that in and of itself was a $60 million development subsidy.

Young Millennials and older Baby Boomers are rejecting traditional suburban lifestyles in favor of urban living and shorter commutes. Many want to live near city centers so they can walk to work, shops and restaurants or take public transportation. They also prefer smaller homes because they’re single or have no kids and don’t want to spend their free me maintaining their homes.

“It’s the kids (ages 18 to 32), the empty nesters (Baby Boomers with no kids at home),” says Chris Leinberger, president of Smart Growth America’s LOCUS (Latin for “place”), a national coalition of real estate developers and investors who support urban developments that encourage walking over driving. “These two generations combined are more than half of the American population.”

The housing bust of the last five years hit hardest in subdivisions in remote suburbs, drying up financing for such development. At the same time, gas prices soared and so did environmental consciousness, giving consumers pause about living in distant suburbs away from services, jobs and entertainment.

Here is the new language that appears to have unanimous support from the council.  In short, almost every affordable housing project gets some sort of Federal, State, or Local tax subsidy.  As such we have an obligation to make sure that money is well spent.  Our policy now more explicitly states what is affordable housing.  Our policy considers Housing costs, Energy costs, Associated costs, and Transportation costs.  As you would expect many properties that are cheap are not actually affordable when all costs are considered.

The Need for Affordable Housing

 

The City of Rochester is suffering from a critical shortage of affordable housing (housing that, through subsidy or other means, costs no more than 30% of the household income of households earning 80% of the area’s median income).  The proportion of households in Rochester paying more than 30% for housing has increased from around 20% of households in 2000 to over 27% in 2010.[1] There were 11,430 households in Rochester paying over 30% of income for housing in 2010. Read the rest of this entry »

A heart felt thanks to the 500+ volunteers that planted 1400+ trees on 5/5/12.  Your selfless determination has made a change to our built environment that will be apparent for the next 100 years.

People have different skill sets, but everybody found a way to help.  Many of you dug and planted trees, but others that were not able to do that found other ways of participating.  What an amazing event and an amazing group of people.

Great work everybody.  Read the rest of this entry »

Here is a link to an article from sustainable cities network that shows high standards and sustainability are not mutually exclusive with affordable housing.  As I have said many times affordable housing and cheap housing are not the same thing.

Sustainable Cities Network

While all developments – including luxury – can work towards LEED-ND certification, using it to measure sustainability in affordable housing may raise an eyebrow or two.

“A lot of green building is perceived to benefit the wealthy,” said Walker Wells, editor of Blueprint for Greening Affordable Housing and a program director for nonprofit Global Green USA.

For years Rochester and Olmsted County have been developing a bicycle masterplan.

Many meetings and opportunities for feedback have finally resulted in a plan that the city council got to review.  For this to be implemented we will need your advocacy and support at the Rochester City Council and Olmsted County Board meetings.  Even after we get these plans adopted we need to make sure that they are not ignored.  There is so many good recommendations here that I encourage you to take the time to read this, write down your thoughts, and make sure your elected leaders vote to adopt and follow the plan.

To make this plan a reality we will need to spend about 2.5% of our transportation funding on this system.  This SHOULD be an easy sell given the fact that:

• 12% of all trips in Minnesota are by walking or bike (higher in places like Rochester)
• biking receives about 1.5% of federal funding
• results in more than 9% of all traffic fatalities in Minnesota
• the industry represents has more than 1500 jobs in MN
• the industry contributes $145 million annually to the MN economy

And just in case you hear this nugget:

According to County Planner Phil Wheeler’s presentation to the city council, only 1.8% of transportation funding comes from the gas tax.  So don’t buy that tired talking point.  Biking is far more cost effective for taxpayers than more and bigger roads.

http://www.bikeleague.org/conferences/summit12/factsheets/State_MN.pdf

Here is data on bike commuting in major cities:

http://www.bikeleague.org/news/acs2010.php

Here is the link to the yet to be adopted masterplan:

http://www.co.olmsted.mn.us/planning/trnsprtnplng/bpac/bikemasterplan2011/Pages/default.aspx

Here is the downtown bicycle study:

http://www.co.olmsted.mn.us/PLANNING/TRNSPRTNPLNG/BPAC/Pages/dwntwnbikestudy.aspx

Here is a link to our Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee:

http://www.co.olmsted.mn.us/PLANNING/TRNSPRTNPLNG/BPAC/Pages/default.aspx

Update: Per RPU Board Chair Jerry Williams, this will not be on Tuesday’s agenda.

The “city” is considering a 3.5 million gallon water reservoir at St. Mary’s Park and I have a number of concerns about the process.  I don’t like the fact that many neighbors found out about this by reading the newspaper.  I don’t like how this process has seemingly played out in private, despite the fact that we own the utility.  I don’t like how neighbors have not been asked for comment or ideas.  While I currently have a conflicting meeting, I am going to try to head to the RPU board meeting on Tuesday April 24, 2012 to get more information.

Many of you want to know where I stand on the issue.  This is a little difficult because even as the councilman for the area I have not been invited to the discussions.  My philosophy is that St. Mary’s park is an asset that we own.  I will never support any action of which the net result is that the asset is made worse.  This was my philosophy when it was suggested that we give away a portion of Soldier’s Field.  Not surprisingly no city council members have come out in support of that.

I really don’t know what has been decided, what is planned, and how flexible those decisions are.  I don’t know why engineers are suggesting that this would be a good place as opposed to somewhere more on the edge of the city.

There actually are potential ways to put a reservoir in the park and have it be an asset.  For example if it was put back in the NW part of the park, partially into the ground, with a green roof, and then filled around the edges, we could create an elevated green space in an underused part of the park with a great picnic area and an iconic view of the city.  That would cost more money, but again, hurting a park to save money is not OK in my book.

In speaking with RPU they did say that neighbors were notified of a meeting at CUDE.  Apparently neighbors within 500 ft. of the park were sent notices.  Also a notice was sent to the neighborhood association.  However, a downtown meeting during work hours is not what I consider a sufficient chance for input.  [edit: I am told this was at least an evening meeting] There will also be a park board meeting, but again I think the neighborhood deserves to have a meeting in the neighborhood.

I would like to see the existing reservoir removed.  I am interested in what the neighborhood thinks about the existing tower.  I see it as a historic landmark, and though it is not used (except for cell towers) I wouldn’t mind seeing that stay.  I believe the existing reservoir is about 1 million gallons.  To visualize how big a 3.5 million gallon tank would be, picture the existing tank, the same height, but 87% wider.  (OK math teachers, you can check my math)…

One thing that I can say with absolute certainty is that the more you are involved the better the outcome will be.  We had a number of successes on 6^th street which would not have happened with out citizen involvement.

This is a tough situation where pandering would be easy, but fiscal stewardship hard. Read the rest of this entry »

As many of you are aware, the city council sent a note to the County Board pointing out that Rochester now represents more than 5/7 of the county.  As such it is our expectation the 5 seats be contained entirely in Rochester.  Also we asked that districts be drawn fairly and respect neighborhood boundaries.   Since we are asking the County to redistrict fair, we need to do the same.  The plan that passed the council 6-1 does just that.  We adopted what is called Option 8.

Note that Ward 2 is pretty much the same (as it should be).  Ward 2 was actually the closest to the correct size of all 6 wards, and thus shouldn’t have changed much.  Basically I pick up all of the Historic SW, including the urban village and the Parkway Neighborhood.  I picked up all of Kutzky Park south of the river, which still divides Kutzky, but not as bad as previously.  I also lose Salem Sound and Bamber Valley Estates which are outside of West Circle Drive.  From a political standpoint I lose areas were I did well in 2008 (Salem Sound), and gain areas that I didn’t do as well (Kutzky Park).  So why am I happy?  Because the maps are fair to Rochester neighborhoods and that is what districts should be.

Edit:  I also gain 3 areas with a population of 0, but I was willing to take more…

Edit 2: Upon further review looks like I didn’t take the urban village?

Read the rest of this entry »

I don’t know if there is a way to embed KAAL (ABC 6) stories, but here is a link to their coverage here.  They once again went to the bottom of the barrel and interviewed me.

“Every year, the City of Rochester and Olmsted County send almost $90 million more to the State Treasury in taxes than they receive back in LGA, school aid, and other assistance,” said Governor Dayton.

“The reality is we send so much in income tax and sales tax up to Saint Paul and we get a pittance of that back,” says Rochester city council member, Michael Wojcik, who met with Governor Dayton on Thursday. While he’s happy with the Governor’s praise, he points out Rochester’s state contributions are a double-edged sword; especially, when programs like Local Government Aid are being slashed.

“We don’t have necessarily the means to keep funding the programs that we have and that’s why you see this constant budget struggle at the city and county level,” says Wojcik.

Since it is an election year and I haven’t decided to not run for office, I am going to be posting some of the feedback that I get that makes me smile.  I will not share names unless I have permission, and I certainly won’t when the writer is critical of other council members.  Even though in this case the criticism is fair and well deserved.  The decision does beg the question that if Bruce Snyder is not willing to pay for maintaining existing infrastructure is he still going to ask for more new infrastructure?  It is frustrating when I have the best excuse to cower but do not, yet others lose their backbone.

Hi Michael:

Excellent job at the meeting and thank you for your leadership and work you did with the 2nd St. owners. They clearly have challenges to face with these large assessments but it was also clear that you made them understand this was a situation that the city had to face for the good of the community. Some may be driven from their properties. Sad, but that often comes with development. Too bad so few understand who the losers are or speak for them when our open land gets developed. It would have been quite a sharp contrast last night had the Kwik Trip tree variance hearing been held.

I decided not to speak since I really didn’t have any skin in the game and it became clear this was a hearing about the assessment, not the design. I could not have added anything of substance to move the debate. I applaud you Mark, Randy and Sandra for taking a courageous stand – quite striking in contrast to the two who voted no yet offered no other ideas. Particularly telling was Ed’s commentary, praising you and your work, yet voting no. A real coward, recognizes what is right but chooses not to take a stand. Shameful. At least Bruce just sat there like the toad that he is – true to form and honestly an idiot.

Aside from your courageous championship of this issue, my favorite part of the night was the Rabbi from Chabad-Lubavitch. (Do you know his name? I missed it.) I have decided to make a contribution out of respect for his good natured and sincere “objection”. I feel somewhat responsible for his plight being one of those with the “good idea”. In my own small way I would like to support his faith that God will provide.

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