So, I’m totally out of blogging practice, I’m used to staying up later and not getting up early. Gotta get my sleeping schedule back to “normal”. So, I’ll spare you the gruesome and mostly boring and repetitive discussion on 800 E Washington. The meeting lasted 3.5 hours
Ok – here’s the highlights only.
GETTING STARTED
Roll Call – Solomon and Verveer were missing. Solomon excused and coming late.
Suspension of the rules – that passed.
HONORING RESOLUTIONS
Forensics Night! – They honored the forensics team at Memorial High School. One member did part of his presentation for the council.
Bill Knobloch retirement. He wasn’t there but the Mayor and several alders had some nice things to say about him. Mayor said he had a great commitment to his job and he represented an ethic that city managers have. All alders were added as sponsors.
EARLY PUBLIC COMMENT
None
CONSENT AGENDA
Items 2 – 9 are public hearings.
They are including the confirmation of the new Public Health Director Janel Heinrich.
The extra-majority item, 23 was included because there was no objections.
Items separated for discussion were 13 (union corners), 18 & 21 (800 E. Washington), 32 (E Johnson/Gorham Traffic Study) and 46 (not sure why it was separated)
73 and 74 have registrants to answer questions, there were none, so they included it on the agenda.
Clear says 102 for introduction – not in alder district 19, its now in 11.
Mayor asks Janelle to stand and says congratulations.
Everything else on the agenda passed or was acted on as noted on the agenda.
PUBLIC HEARINGS
Items 2, 3, 4 and 6 had the public hearings opened, closed and they were passed unanimously on a voice vote.
5 was referred to the first meeting in July.
7 was passed with the additional condition that that they work with zoning and planning staff to revise the family definition for up to three unrelated people and if there are three unrelated people then 3 is the maximum occupancy.
8 was recessed and referred to the next council meeting.
9 had one speaker in support and it passed.
UNION CORNERS
Three supporters of Occupy showed up to talk about the need to address the homeless situation said they thought that there should be a tent city as a TEMPORARY solution until there can be a longer term permanent solution to meet the needs of people who are without homes. He quoted one person who said on the last day of Occupy, saying that they can’t afford to be inside, it is illegal for us to be outside, where are we supposed to be?
No one says anything about the testimony.
Shiva Bidar-Sielaff moves a substitute that includes the names of the committee members that were added. They didn’t bother to read them or let the public know what they were.
Satya Rhodes-Conway moves a small amendment, in the 1st be it further resolved clause, number 6, Emerson east president or designee should be co-chair instead. That motion passes.
Larry Palm wants to refer it back to the mayor’s office because he objected to the alders that were appointed. He first saw the appointments at the council meeting and this was his first chance to object.
Bridget Maniaci notes that there is a deadline in the resolution for June 15th, so she asks what the implications for referral are.
Mayor says if referred upon its return it would have to be amendmed to a later date.
Marsha Rummel suggests that instead of referral they just substitute Palm for Cnare if everyone agrees.
Bidar-Sielaff wants a referral with a date certain for its return, thinks that would be friendly. She suggests June 12th and they say that is friendly.
Mayor asks to place it on the table, so much going on would like to consult with city attorney.
800 BLOCK EAST WASHINGTON
This went on F-O-R-E-V-E-R!! I think I’ve lost my patience, and I know I tuned out at one point, but recorded it but I don’t think that there was much to share with you. Here’s a few highlights, to the best of my ability.
They have the public speak, they are asked to speak to both items at once, and they have 6 minutes instead of 3.
About a half a dozen people testified. One talked about how this impacted the whole city since it was a gateway to the capital. This person urged them to stick to the process and award this to ULI because they worked well with her neighborhood and do good projects. Additionally, this was needed for economic development and they don’t need delay and additional costs that result. Metcalfe’s were late and if they reopen the process they will be sending a message that if developers miss a deadline they can get it re0opened and no one will have faith in the city process. If there should have been more meetings, that is the alders fault.
The rest of the speakers were from the Tenney-Lapham Neighborhood. They are thrilled to see development finally happening on East Washington. They know ULI is capable of good projects, they are just underwhelmed with this one. They are concerned about the phasing of the project, they didn’t like the timeline to get the project down, they were concerned about the surface parking lot and while they embrace technology based employment, they don’t think that should be the main thing. One person said that they filed a complaint with the Attorney General for violations of the open meetings law during the process since he was removed from a meeting he tried to attend about these projects. There were 6 – 8 union members in their orange shirts there to glare at the council throughout the discussion, they were in support of Metcalfe’s.
There were lots of questions of the developers and staff. Height and density (why so low), TIF, parking etc. They made it clear there will be many other decisions that need to be made along the line. The main one being that they are selling the land and giving them 90 days to work things out and if that doesn’t work, they will go back out to bid. Particularly, they have to look at the amount of the TIF support needed.
There was much discussion about the parking. Apparently there is a deal that if ULI doesn’t finish the project and the land is sold back to the city for another developer, the new developer could get stuck building the parking and ULI would have rights to some parking spaces. Also, a proposed way to finance the parking is for the CDA to issue taxable bonds, rent the space to the city who would rent the space to ULI until the bonds are paid off and then ULI could purchase the parking ramp. This is similar to what they did on block 89. They plan to rent the parking spaces for $40, and there was discussion about if that was the right price to charge since it isn’t downtown and not on the periphery where it was free.
Maniaci was very concerned about ULI not finishing the project and ULI getting parking built by another developer and made a motion to address this requiring ULI to pay for half the costs of the parking ramp. This caused people to call the developer back up and they said that the parking was paid for by the increment from the TIF, the parking fees and then they paid the balance. Chris Schmidt thanks Maniaci for paying attention to the details. (Ironic, eh, given how they tried to shove the Edgewater through!) But he doesn’t support it. Cnare and Bruer said they thought the conversation was worth it. The mayor had to warn people (Bruer) to actually ask questions instead of speechifying during that point and had to remind them that they can speak twice on an item and for a maximum of 10 minutes. The Mayor also speaks at the end and tells the council that it is the staff job to negotiate these things and this has been through hundreds of hours of meetings and these things should have been brought up there. He also said that they are 90 days to work out the details and if they have details to be worked out, they should add it to the list, but not try to negotiate on the floor like with the Overture. He was going to say something else, but stopped – I’m dying to know what that was. Clear agreed with the mayor. Palm doesn’t support Maniaci’s motion and notes there is a lot of land to be developed and that they should stick with their process despite its flaws.
Maniaci is the only one to vote for her amendment.
On the main motion, Rummel says she had concerns and voted against at Plan but will vote for tonight. She has strong opinions and dreams for the site and had great expectations. Given how much people wanted height and density in the corridor, she was shocked to see three stories in one of the first projects when it could have been 12 stories. Many people liked Metcalfe’s and they wanted something that would be more of a catalyst for the neighborhood. She says that she wanted something that fit better with the artist and funky nature of the neighborhood. She also thinks that grocery store jobs are still jobs that are needed, we need a whole range of jobs.
Again, Maniaci is the only one to vote no.
Maniaci makes a confusing motion that needs much clarification but she wants to go back out to rfp for the last piece of property. Staff says that there is a glimmer of hope and that they are not prepared to drop the project yet despite reports that Rifkin has pulled out. So, they place it on file without prejudice to find out what happens and will bring it back later. That passes unanimously.
TWO-WAY JOHNSON AND GORHAM
There are about a half a dozen speakers and registrants again. The main issues was that people agreed to go ahead with the construction in 2012. They just wanted to make sure that the construction would not prohibit 2 way in the future and that it would be considered with the rest of the larger multi-modal transportation plan coming up. Neighbors noted that strong neighborhoods help with a strong economic development strategy and that it is short sighted of the business community to be concerned about getting cars to the downtown instead of the small businesses on Johnson and having a strong neighborhood that attracted people to Madison. They also noted that several other cities have found that two-way helps them economically and that other streets in Madison are two way and treasured (Willy, Monroe, Regent). There was criticism of the study that was done and concern that it was taken out of context and that the strategy needs to include surrounding neighborhoods. They also noted that we could have told them that the study results would be to keep things they way they are given how the study was done. Speed on the streets is a concern and they hope there will be traffic calming efforts made in the construction.
Maniaci moves a 2nd substitute that is on their desk. The language just says that this will be part of the larger study instead of excluded. Rummel clarifies that the concerns will be covered in the plan. Steve Cover says it will. The traspnartation master plan will look at every area of the city and the study just done will feed information into that plan.
Skidmore makes an amendment to not include this in the plan. He doesn’t want to spend any more money on it. The motion fails with two or three people voting for it.
The mayor then asks engineering staff how much this will cost. They talk about it costing $1M dollars. Maniaci says that study was more detailed. The 2nd substitute passes.
ITEM 46
Passes, don’t know why it was separated.
TABLED UNION CORNERS
Mayor says eferral is beofe them, there is some urgency, one developer has made an inquiry, that devleoper has a proposal that would include all of the elements that have been identified for the site. Problem is that devlepers client is looking at several sites, some outside of Madison and when they originally came to us wanted to make an offer to aquire, I said no and that htey need an RFP. He’d like to suggest that if no there is no objection, they could withdraw the motion to refer, he says that they have copies of the individual committee apointment applications, he would ask that council accept it now to fill last citizen appointment, and if can’t come to agreement on one alder, that one alder slot should be referred and the rest of the appointments should go through so they can get started. He says there are several east side alders that are interested.
Cnare amends the motion to refer to only include the referral of her seat on the committee. Clear moves to add the citizen member. That will be back on June 12th.
Mayor suggests that the alders that might fill the position should go to the meetings. Palm, Johnson and Clausius, in case they get appointed.
Motion passes.
INTRODUCTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Cnare – Legistar item 26416 – letters of understanding for WPL and MG&E for water meter upgrades – referred to water utility and boe
Solomon – 26422 – vending site size and equipemnt restrictions to allow mobile grocery store – referred to vending oversight
Solomon – 26423 – signage on mobile grocery parked on private property – referred to Urban Design
Solomon – 26410 – zoning district a permitted use for mobile grocery stores – referred to plan commission
Resnick – 26401 – requiring yearly change of door lock pass codes – referred to Building Inspection and Fire, Public Safety Review Committee and the Housing Committee
ADJOURN AND ANNOUNCEMENTS
Happy Birthday Verveer.
Time of death. 10pm
