Agenda - Council Work Session - 03/02/2010

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The Tinklenberg Group To: Kurt Urich, City of Ramsey Heidi Nelson, City of Ramsey From: Jodi Ruehle, The Tinklenberg Group Date: February 23, 2010. Re: RALF processes / ICO acquisition The following information is provided as an overview, brief history and description of guidelines associated with the Right-of-Way Acquisition Loan Fund (RALF) program and its application in the City of Ramsey. The RALF program is administered by the Metropolitan Council; the following description of the program is taken directly from Met Council documentation: Because MnDOT is unable to purchase highway right-of-way until a road is programmed for construction, many acres which will be needed for future road right-of-way have been lost to development. To address this, the 1982 Minnesota legislature established a revolving loan fund program to acquire undeveloped property threatened by development that is located within an officially-mapped metropolitan highway right-of-way. The Council decides annually-based. on expected loan requests from various cities-how much to levy for the program. Typically, a full annual levy raises about $3.3 million. The Council lends money to cities to purchase the right-ol-way from willing sellers. The cities are responsible for having the property appraised and negotiating a price with the seller. MnDOT reviews and certifies the appraisals. The cities are also reimbursed for costs they incur to acquire the property. Any income derived from the property while under city ownership is returned to the RALF account. When MnDOT is ready to purchase the land for highway construction, it buys the property from the city at the price paid for the property and the loan is repaid to the RALF account. The long- term savings occur because development of the land and its appreciated costs have been preempted. Over the last 20 years loans have been made to acquire right of way parcels for TH 10, TH 52, TH 169, TH 212, TH 610,1-494 and 1-35. The City of Ramsey made the decision to "officially map" a portion of the Trunk Highway 10 corridor in 2004 In an effort to preserve right-of-way needed for future improvements to TH 10. These improvements include the expansion of the roadway as well as access improvements at the three major intersections in Ramsey, as identified in MnDOT's 2001 Interregional Corridor (IRe) Study. The official mapping process also involved adoption of the H-1 Business District ordinance that set forth new regulations essentially limiting the amount of expansion, development and/or type of uses