Minutes - Council - 01/23/2001 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home

3.65 percent of the registered voters voted on the issue. Ms. Bertzyk's other concern had to do with the cost of the special election. She stated the she had talked to the City Clerk regarding the cost of the election and she indicated that the cost would be approximately $10,000. She stated that spending $10,000 for 3.65 percent of the voters when taxes just went up 22 percent is irresponsible government. The issue is already in front of the courts and the courts should be left to decide the issue. Ms. Bertzyk stated that there are facts not being shared with citizens when being asked to sign the petition. One of those facts has to do with the fact that the City Attorney has stated that a special election is not one of the three ways stated in the City Charter under which an ordinance can be adopted. Another fact is that the City Administrator has a letter from an attorney stating that it is unlawful for residents to decide land usage issues, that that decision has to be left up to the City Council. She stated that she had talked to several residents who had signed the petition and after she presented them with the facts they had a different opinion of the situation. She thinks that the City should work together and come up with a reasonable solution rather than dividing neighborhoods. Leon Fisher, 15113 Nowthen Boulevard, Ramsey, stated that he thinks the density transition requirements are out of place in a situation when there is too low density residential areas. He stated that a transition area is something that is used when there is businesses next to residential. There is no other City that requires such a transition area. What it does is effectively takes the people who are on larger properties and makes their property "technically larger". What a density transition ordinance would do is give existing neighbors rights over their neighbors property. In Apple Ridge the neighbors were given more rights than the developers. Typically people who live on one acre lots don't maintain the entire acre and so the residents could use a portion of their one acre as a buffer area, that responsibility should not be placed on the people behind them. The idea of neighbors controlling others people's property has gotten out of hand in the City of Ramsey. He was told by one resident that he would fight any development plan because he wants the land for his children to snowmobile on. Residents presenting the petition for signatures are telling people that if they do not pass the density transition ordinance then there will be apartment buildings next to them, which is not true. Transitional zoning is not something that should be in the water and sewer district and by doing so will force the City to prematurely extend the water and sewer line to the north. Patti Kurak, 15001 Sunfish Lake Boulevard, Ramsey, stated that during her election campaign for City Council and also after she took her seat as a Councilmember, there has been much talk about the property she and her husband own in the City of Ramsey. Opinions have been stated regarding the property she owns. Conversations are occun'ing during official City Council meetings, articles in the Star Tribune, ads and letters to the editor in the Anoka Union newspaper, and now a petition drive that is underway in Ramsey regarding a density transition ordinance have raised doubts about her character, honor, ethics, and morality. There have been statements made that she might possibly stand to gain financially from her seat on the City Council. So she thought the time had come to dispel any myths that residents have read or heard regarding her ownership of land in Ramsey. In 1981, she and her husband purchased a sheet metal building on five acres of property located at 14165 Ramsey Boulevard. They renovated the building and moved their machine shop, TKI Corporation, to that site. In I982, they purchased approximately City Council/January 23, 2001 Page 4 of 34