Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

years now with a state farm for six. Um heard a lot about the water reclamation district. My father-in-law, you know, does a lot of the work around that and uh it's constantly a point of conversation and uh frankly it's it's something I've been paying a lot of attention to. I was an insurance agent for here locally for a while and um 2020 was a tough year for that. Uh and the sewer systems were quite a concern at the time. So figured it's better to try and get my hands at great to meet you and really appreciate seeing all the work you guys been doing. Welcome.

Ray, is there anyone from the public who wishes to address the commission today? Uh not that we have received any requests for. All right, moving on to the consent agenda. Um does any member wish to remove an item from the consent agenda to separate discussion? Okay, with that, is there a motion to enact and adopt the consent agenda? So moved. Second.

It's been moved and seconded to enact the consent agenda. All in favor say I. I all oppose. Same sign. Consent agenda is enacted. All right. Moving to the regular agenda. Um today we have a list of items for information and discussion. The commissioners all received in your agenda packets. So would like to start um with some discussion uh if possible. So, uh, you were each provided with, um, attachment A to the packet, which is, um, our current public comment policy. Um, so, um, we all, um, take the open meetings act training at some point in our tenure and we know there's guidance out there from the attorney general's office. Certainly, we've been exposed to the county board, public comment policy, um, which I asked Ray to include. Um so county board, city of Bloomington, town of Normal. Um Amy significant experience with unit 5. Um Carl's in DC, but he knows from the the airport authority would have some leading practices. So just wanted to open up um if you've refreshed your memory on our current policy, you know, what's some feedback, what what are some areas you think we could improve? Um, I have some specific questions, but I'll just sort of open it out to there unless Ry, if there's anything else you think we need to achieve with this discussion.

Um, oh, I think you, you provide a pretty good background. I mean, the the current policy was last adopted in 2013, so it's been a while.

Uh, we, you know, generally don't have a lot of public comments, but we do from time to time, but we welcome those public comments. And so, I thought, you know, it's time to review, you know, if any changes, updates need to be made. the um um so we we will take whatever comments I assume you all have a chance to review the materials that were provided and uh then we can you know take our suggestions and then we'll uh prepare a draft and then run it by legal and and then bring that back for your consideration of the options at the

so I thought it was really short three minutes am are we talking about the same because I was looking at some of the other ones and they're like 30 minutes person had a chance to chat and that's a bit long obviously but can we can we maybe do five minutes if I may. Yeah.

Yeah. So yeah, I think uh the 30 actually the three minute is pretty not too uncommon actually you looking at other jurisdictions uh the 30 minutes is uh for the overall you what we have said like for 15 and but it's like three minutes per person and I think that's not too uh I mean there's a lot of information but I think it's not too unusual for like three minutes for individual comments. uh you know by local municipalities. They still some of them do set a time frame in terms if like a representation you know a representative then maybe allowing five or six minutes and then the overall still setting right 15 minutes and 30 minutes but as for the overall but uh uh but that's kind of the general obviously

yeah the county board allows three minutes for private individuals and then five for organizations. Is that what it is? Okay.

And that hasn't been an issue for anyone. People seem to present within that time. I've only seen a couple people present here at our meetings before. So, and it seemed like um I think maybe one of them probably wanted to talk longer, but most most of Yeah, if it works for most of the time, then maybe you don't need to change. Yeah, I think the the issue that we had uh was more administrative in terms of dealing with the issue of how we went into executive session um and and everything. So, um, not conflating the two necessarily, but, uh, from what I've seen on other boards that I've been on, three minutes is for an individual is pretty good. The goal is to provide the public an opportunity to share um and express their views, but public comment is not um the law does protect that it can't take away from the business of the organization, right? So you can't you know if you

for we've had public comment until two in the morning for unit 5 meetings. Um and you know we chose to continue to hear those and then conduct our meeting after for for valid reasons at the time but you know if we could not do that every week because you could never get to the business of the organization. So you can you can restrict um restrict time, place and manner. Um I and I would love to see a line that at the discretion of the the commission that we could extend the public comment period. So if we do have six people, seven people show up.

Um especially if we if we don't have all the business docket, why not? So Ruth, with that, does that mean um the total time comment period the 15 minutes and then we would still limit the speaker to three minutes?

Yes. Um, and then, um, I also wonder, I know with the county board, they allow you to just come in and you sign up, uh, your name on a sheet to speak to, um, which for accessibility purposes and everyone is so busy, right? that especially like today we don't have anybody making public comment but if somebody showed up and wanted to I would love to see the ability to do that maybe five minutes before the meeting just set up on a physical sheet here

yeah the county board yeah the county board for the committee uh they allow up to 15 minutes prior to the meeting and the board and the committees and then I think there's one uh another group that also uh uh 15 minutes apply to like the town and so I mean yeah I just want to share I think it makes sense that we follow or try to align ourselves with all of the other municipalities as much as possible so that people coming in kind of understand the whole process and they're not you know consistent

yeah and such. But I would agree that perhaps we need to add uh at the discretion of the board chair or the commission um you know a little different yeah a little extra time if we've got if we've got that someone remind me does the county board require um public comment to list their address in the request

okay I didn't think that we were supposed to do Yeah, it's depending on for for the OMA, the open meetings act. Uh it it's up to the policy established by the organization. If the uh like should organization in their policy established policy says yeah name and address uh then they know they could uh and if not it would be will be just that uh the name the contact information there there different views. What is for the organization or the B to view whether or the comments made is is you know by knowing the address then okay is it somebody from our state right and or is somewhere close by uh that type of issues and u and I've seen situations I've been in meetings that actually people from out of town say to actually come in for certain issues just FYI

yeah where they start to make the rounds on a on a particular issue. And we a benefit of having the address is that we've had situations in Unifi where we have have had to um give people warning for behavior that wasn't consistent with policy. um and and then take additional action of um not permitting future attendance because of behavior um that was in violation of policy. Um so I don't remember what the rules are for address but there that would be a case for why you would want it or need it

so you have some mechanism to follow up because that has happened. I was going to say I don't disagree with having the address, but in in ' 87 we ran into an issue with people who um and I think we looked into it and I think there is some thought that you cannot require it. You don't you can request it. Okay. For the same reason that um was suggesting that you know that way if you need to get back with them or something but you can't we it wasn't or maybe it just wasn't worth it to us to fight with people short over it. And she's also right people make the rounds.

Um ours wasn't as much out of state as out of district. I mean could we have a check box that says I am a resident of Mlan County? I I don't know because I do think some of the guidance from the attorney general states you can't limit it to geographically. So I think that would be edging up on Okay. I was just thinking about find someone um who does come in threaten to burn the place down or uh Yeah. Well, we can say option though or we can um whoever our legal counsel can give us some guidance as to

just what options we would have and then bring it back to us and say can be something as simple as a checking the box because to a certain degree um I think we all want to know is the person making the decision uh or making the comments do they truly have standing in our community um per se. So I'd want to know that. Yeah. To the the one concern I had is if we do work to support everyone in county, including people who might have some housing in security, if there isn't a set address for them, are they going to feel as welcome to So that's an item to get legal

which Yeah, there's like two two kind two sides to this to this very issue. Well, it may be as simple as just saying, are you a ML County resident? And you know, like you said, that legal council would have to determine is that something we can require or just something we have to request and they don't want to fill it out or not. But it does seem like a pertinent question based on matters which we consider because we are the ML County Regional Planning Commission. That doesn't mean that someone couldn't bring something valid from outside the county, but in most cases, most people I would feel would be have interest from.

So tell me again, the county requires you fill out 15 minutes in advance. No, five minutes. You just sign a piece of paper, right? That's what we do. I didn't know if the county was policy says 15 minutes. I know, but I didn't know what the count because Oh, yeah. I think we should be consistent with county and if yours said that, then that's fine. Yeah, that's where

yeah the the county uh for the county committees uh speak uh let's see they have to make whoever wants to to to make comments required to uh submit their request uh 24 hours prior to meeting online using a form below or in person up to 15 minutes prior to meeting for the board you the county board uh shall be 15 minutes for each uh for the meetings for appearance by law members and then they also can request uh online make a request online up to 24 hours prior to the start of meeting using the phone provided or in person up to 15 minutes prior to the start of meeting.

So not five 15 in writing it's 15 but I kind of come and comment five minutes before as long as the paper's out. We're pretty strict on 15. We have a clock that we Yeah. Yeah. We pull the sheep and we go, but given the fact we're part of the county, I think I just want to be consistent with the county.

City and town are the same way, right? uh the city it's uh you may register until five minutes uh before the for the meeting u for all boards and commissions uh except for city council and committees of the whole which allows for inerson virtual participation and then email public comments made up to 15 minutes prior to the meeting that's what we So far uh for the term uh they must register at least 15 minutes prior to the meeting uh on forms or they have to contact the city manager's office at least two hours before the meeting just to notify. So roughly about 15 minutes for for for both the city and the county.

And um does the does the county have a a line about statements must be related to commission business or that of the individual committee being addressed? Um not not not that we are aware of not that I'm not saying because they have like a a separate code. Uh but from what we gather online uh they yeah it just says 15 minutes in in the forms. They I think they encourage people to try to register 15 minutes. I was asking we have a number five on our policy statements must be related to commission.

Uh the county not the the summary I I got but I can double check but some I think the there's some other local municipalities or the school board they have that too. So it's like um we don't restrict the topic the topic there's some that has to be relevant uh germanine to the to the to the agenda but oh it's for the town of normal.

Yeah. I guess I just have a concern that if um if perhaps we're going to address issue XYZ next month um but we have a citizen who maybe is in the light or actually has a great suggestion for us that it's not on the agenda that is considered relevant. Normal has actually two public comment periods and the one at the beginning of the meeting is for the aspects that are for the agenda and then they have an open public comment meeting that is at the end of the meeting. So you get to but they make you sit through the entire meeting

um before you can talk talk about on any topic which is strategic. Yeah.

Yeah. So, so the the first part of that uh public comment period for the town of normal uh has to be germanine to the agenda items and so will be limit to 30 uh to 30 minutes overall. Uh for this part two uh toward the end of the meetings it will be uh overall will be 15 minutes but that will be only for comments and gain to town issues. So a lot there might be issues they want to talk about not on the agenda but just overall that section uh overall will be for 15 minutes but no person may speak for more than three minutes.

Yeah if you're representing a group you may be allowed up to six minutes. Um, are there any other thoughts about limiting it to the business before the commission limiting and topic again? I think whatever is consistent with the county. So, whatever the county is doing. I mean, I mean, at a minimum, it should at least have to do with something the commission deals with. I mean, otherwise, I guess technically you can have someone start I mean, three minutes. I guess

it could be anything. I mean, I'm not I just certainly don't want to limit what people can talk to us about at the same time. Yeah. I just I just worry that um we might be able we might miss something. Oh, I think the agenda item comment is is general just as long as they limit whatever comments are making to this commission to So maybe we need to commission business. That that would be my question. What is commission business? Yeah, I mean that's pretty broad term which is fine but it you know something that we would ever deal with is commission business right not necessarily an agenda item right which is probably consistent with what the I would imagine that's what the county

um and so Ray I guess the other question I would have for you just based on this topic um does staff have any recommendations as the changes um or was this really just to get our input? Well, for for today, I think we just trying to collect input. Uh, and then we'll talk with the legal because there's some issues still kind of it's not black and white, but we we'll also look into a little bit more uh uh deeper into the county uh rules because sounds like, you know, there's overall preference to conform to whatever the county does.

So, what do you propose as next steps? uh having that discussion and then generating a a draft with revisions or do you want to do it the other way around? Take the draft to legal counsel. I think we'll uh uh work on the draft, take it to the legal for the you know input feedback and so if they said yes or no or whatever uh whatever that version uh the updated version will bring to you for review and because you know it has been bettered through legal uh and then it's acceptable or not acceptable that might be easier for you to vote on it at the next meeting.

That sounds good. Any other discussion before we move on? Right. Thanks so much for the input everybody. All right. And I don't know why vetted by legal is triggering to me because I still

wonder why you started twitching. So Ray, you're up next with the housing coordinator position update. Yeah, this should be really quick. Uh we finalizing uh the the the RFP. Uh we hoping to get to the legal for the review again uh for for the review and then we hope to after the review uh whatever remission made to be made and publish it. planning on allowing maybe three not more than four weeks you know for for responses with the that was a grant funded

are we so because that I can't remember when the grant started but are we behind then with because it's taken a while to get the position posted uh we had conversations with the state which uh the fund and they actually we we got the uh uh they make it start in November but actually by the time we work it out it's with them it was they had to back date that because the their own internal procedure so they said yeah you would get to later on you know we need to apply for extension certified oh yeah because it's the

you don't have their physical year and the cycles and they just have to do whatever they have to do so we're not on the the publish timeline but they just said apply for extension Yeah, when you get probably I'm thinking when you get to like 2027 when closer like six months prior to the actual what the agreements says few months talk it gets an extension and and that extension is like a a spending extension sometimes the grant will conclude but also for that person to continue to work and the funds are still there.

Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because that's what why we when we talk with the the ato. Yeah. Extension. Yes. Good thing it's not a federal. Yeah. Thanks, Ray. Any other questions about the housing coordinator position? With that, I think Luke, you have the floor for the regional housing initiatives update.

Hi, good afternoon everyone. Um for regional housing initiative updates. Um uh first we chair the February housing staff committee meeting last week and then this month we will be chairing the affordable and supportive housing ash committee meeting uh in less than two weeks. And then last week we attended the Illinois affordable housing forum hosted by the Illinois Housing Council in Chicago. So that's pretty much for the admin stuff. Then moving on, we're still updating the housing dashboard. Um and so hopefully by next month we'll be able to present updates. Uh and then we finished the draft 2025 area median income white paper. And so I have just a few highlights from that white paper. So just a brief overview area median income is the midpoint of the region's uh income distribution where half of the households earn above half the households earn below AMI and further geography is the Bloomington metropolitan statistical area which pretty much is MLAN county. Um and so in 2025 the AMI for MLAN county is 118,800 which is 8.6% 6% higher than 2024, which was $19,400. Um, also based on um the new data, a fourperson household in MLAN County is considered uh extremely low income if they make 30% AMI or $35,650. They're considered very low income if they make 50% of the AMI or 59,400. And they're considered low income if they make 80% AMI or $95,50, which is pretty high compared to 2024 numbers. Um, also median gross rent according to

the 2024 5-year ACS, MLAN County's median gross rent is 100 uh $1,09 which surpassed the 1,000 mark for the first time. And then um for the city of Bloomington, median gross rent $1,50 and down a normal $965. Moving on to other updates. Uh as usual, we attend the housing coalition and unhouse task force meetings. Um just uh save the date. There will be the central Illinois continuum of care conference on July 23rd with the theme of building strong foundations. Now I don't have any we don't have any details regarding that um conference just yet. So this uh it's just to save the date for now. Um for the pit count, according to their preliminary um count, they um they counted nine unsheltered people. Unsheltered or observation, as in they weren't able to interview them, they just um saw them because maybe they were sleeping or for whatever reason. And so they cited the bridge as the main reason why there's not a lot of people outside during the pit count. So that's great. Um they're expecting a complete count around midappril. And then last, the Salvation's Army, Salvation Army's emergency winter shelter will close at uh will close for the season at the end of March. You have any questions?

Has there been any reports, Luke, on how things are going at the bridge? Yes. So, I actually comfortable how things are going. Yeah. So, I actually talked to Matt about that. Um they're so he he doesn't like when I said the the term um success story cuz they're all success story, right? Um

they're currently working on the first batch of people like interviewing for jobs. So that's where they're at right now. So they don't have like people who I guess graduated or whatever term they want to use. So, but they some people have started interviewing for jobs and then eventually moving on to a more permanent housing. Thank you. Anything else? Um, when you take the median rent, is that for like all properties for rent, whether it's an efficiency to a fivebedroom house or like

That's a good question. I just I'm not quite sure how the ACS um measures that. I just use this one variable that the ACS says median gross strength. Um I could look into that, but I don't have the answer for that. Okay. Yeah, I would love to just out of curiosity. Yeah, it would be interesting because uh there are uh houses up in North Normal that are for rent, right?

And um they're not going to rent for $1,000. they're going to rent for several thousand dollar and so it may be that number may be skewed up although in the white paper there are I have like ch a table of based on your income this is what's what your 30% rent should be so I'll once I have the final white paper I'll be happy to like share it with else.

Okay. So, I think Ray is going to be standing in on the next topic, human services transportation plan updates. You have the next couple.

Yeah, I'm here for for Jen who who's under the weather. So, I'm Jen for the next minute or two. uh the there's a for HSTP uh human service transportation plan the the there's a a committee uh actually right now there's two committees uh but we having joint meetings uh so the next quarterly meeting is going to be March the 16th to into Mondays and also we uh have start drafting of revised bylaws you go to the uh HSTV uh committees and basically right now we have two committees we're trying to consult into one and so by uh looking at some of the I do uh agreement language in in the grand agreements that we we try to to make it work because so far we have seen it two committees kind of confusing because there's some people who have not been attending but you know depending on who they represent you know they're by counties involved and sometimes there are some absentees there and some people not on the county their county board or they are and so it it seems like it's more efficient to run uh under one committee versus two and that's also acceptable to us. So we we kind looking into some of the examples from other NPOS's. Another thing that we are working on is revision to the uh HSTP plan that was adopted uh update some information some and also to remove some of the outdated informations are no longer applicable such as some of the rule service providers you know that's been some changes as you're aware and so uh so we doing you know more BBO and see

how that plan uh needs to be updated that plan was last adopted uh in June of 2024. There lot quite a few changes since then too. And in terms of the information hub that staff mentioned before uh Thomas have done uh and some of the staff have help you in terms of we put information what we call information help on our website regarding HSP. So for people in the rural areas, they like to know within those five counties uh you know who do we uh contact and whatnot and and so we building that but a lot of the basic information we uh have put it up on the on the website and thanks to Thomas others who have so right now uh Europa County is the one out of the five county region that don't have a provider because as we mentioned last time there were some some changes uh and so we don't know who it's like a uh one of those things that uh we got waiting because I think similar to other uh residents uh in in that area waiting for okay who can provide the service but for now Mckin County as you know a connect go is the rural service provider ki remains to be so bus and for they have the operators under futures connections. Um, so the only one that's missing uh operator is your so we'll let you know more questions.

Thank you. And how about an update on the Veterans Parkway corridor plan?

Okay. Uh, the project stream committee uh will be meeting next Friday on the 13th. uh and they it will be in the form of of a workshop. So be more than an hour that typically uh would take will be hour and a half. It's going to be at the public library that we using for the committee rooms. And at that meeting what we anticipate is for the for the consultants you to work with the committee you to to narrow it down to a prefer alternatives because as you recall there's like different alternatives they were looking at you working with the uh project committee and then they will be uh setting some uh metrics uh some performance criteria you know uh for for the um for the plan. And so that will be a cover uh a workshop in the form of a workshop and we'll we'll report back at the next meeting how it goes.

Question on the during

Oh uh many people including some around here there um we won't name any names. They have folks from uh uh ID do they have uh from the county uh public works city public works engineering uh same for talent normal also folks from the um uh DC uh BMDC we have folks from the chamber of commerce from the uh there's there I got 13 people. I don't have the list in front of me. Uh but it's well represented. Uh we uh related to uh kind of the the role but it's not all engineers, right? I mean we we are also serving on it. There's like airport directors on it. We have uh from the from the business sector. Um so it's yeah a good representation but if you need the names I can definitely provide

um are there any um citizen representatives it's not so so-called citizen representatives per se uh because when we have uh members of PSC uh usually we envision them wearing different hats I mean one person could be wearing two three hats at the same time so not necessarily because they also So usually residents so they also bringing input and feedback and insight a lot just because their job but also you know because of belief and brief in the community but there were stages where there were surveys that were done community surveys and the public forums to to gather that.

Yes absolutely. Yeah well said. Yeah, the in addition PSC is just one of the ways to to guide the process but definitely public engagement you're using different tools utilize and even after the report gets completed um nothing is going to be done without the approval of both the town the county and also more importantly ID do the street is owned by that state vice the road the world will change.

So yeah, so uh but the plan has to be done in the first place and so when when opportunities come, funding opportunities come, then we'll look for those opportunities to do kind incremental improvements. Any other questions? I think the public house uh or sorry the public open house presentation has the steering committee members listed in the slides if you want to reshare that. Yeah. Yeah. I think like one of the first slides had the list of steering committee members.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We we have uh yeah it's a it's a pretty good good group uh young people really representing usually whatever PSSE we uh set up we really would uh want to cut diverse representation even to have somebody on that PSC uh and so yeah we want to have that perspective but but that's not the only way to collect

and and Ruth I I think that's a good point. So when typically when we're um undergoing a new project and we are voting on to hire the consulting or whatever that's usually part of the discussion is like who's going to be part of that. So typically we'll have some input on the front end for some of the larger I mean I'm not promising that for every but that is typically the discussion in larger projects like this. All right, everybody. Anything else on Veterans Parkway? Or wait, am I supposed to call it the road? Close to the highway, but it's not it's not controlled access.

Am I calling this the right thing? Okay. And finally, last but not least, um an update on the regional comprehensive plan. I think a big update and Ray.

Yeah, I just give a a brief uh few few sentences and then uh Anthony is going to uh to give your short a few slides. Uh but basically what we have is um since last month if you recall uh that we were having discussion with the county administration and since then we have had a convers uh confirmation from the county admin in terms of uh proceeding you with the timeline that Anthony is going to talk about and just said that uh and this is just one of the slides he will be presenting so I don't want to do you don't worry about you know distracting you yeah from from this yet but just to say that yeah so we this is a a major uh starting point and we know how far you know how much time we have you know to to undertake this project and Anthony is going to go into that uh but it's it's we are at a good point or that this is the starting point because we have done some work in the past uh as as you we call the strategic land use plan actually was something that we we thought we going to do as part of the overall regional comprehensive plan but that's an outgo so so uh Anthony is going to talk little bit briefly what is comp plan you know because uh you may or may not engage that process or understand the process so maybe it's good for everybody to understand what's a comp plan what does it take what's process looks like so in the next many months. You know what we're talking about. So, Anthony.

Yeah. So, big update like Ray said, um we've had some common understanding of what the timeline's going to look like for a plan of this size. Uh we'll get to that. It's the last slide I have here. Uh but this is kind of the kickoff presentation uh preview. I want to run it by everybody here first. uh kind of get everybody thinking about what a comp plan is and what to expect over the next roughly year and a half. Um as you can see up there, we got some bullet points of of what exactly a comp plan is. Kind of some of the same stuff you've heard before. Um it's a it's a guiding document helps analyze growth, development, conservation, typically over a 10 to 30 year period. We're looking at a planning horizon of 2045 uh for this comp plan. Shared vision for the future. So that means it's really important for us to get public engagement, early public engagement to establish what the ML County public wants to see for the future. Um, you know, they want to see more conservation, more emphasis on transportation, whatever it may be. We want to get as much of that input as early as possible. Um, transparency and thorough public engagement are what make good comprehensive plans. Um, kind of mentioned that already, like comprehensive analysis in the Queen County, there's a lot of different aspects that go into a comp plan. Uh, a lot of which we've been continually working on. Housing, transportation, um, economic development, infrastructure, all of that, education. We have pretty much a plan already done for each one of those elements. So we'll pull a lot of information from those as well as of establishing an existing conditions. Here's what's happening now document. And then again kind of the disclaimer comp plans are solely

advisory. Uh they're established as a guide for policy makers uh for them to reference when they're making decisions. So this isn't us creating zoning ordinances that are legally binding. It's a this is best practice. This is what people want to see and this is how we think you should do it. Take that as you can go to the next slide. Uh this is kind of a flowchart of the process. This is a general uh general process. Uh it's it's a It's a cycle. So, we are kind of in the monitor and update process right now where we have a plan from 2009. Uh, and we're getting ready to initiate and organize the the development of of the the new plan, the updated plan. And then kind of outlines what I already said, community visioning, gathering the data, putting together an existing conditions report, putting it all into one document, having public engagement, review, adoption, and start it all over. Uh the real exciting one is this last slide here. This is the timeline. So we're currently in phase one about to go into phase two which is project initiation and setup. So right now we're working on establishing a project steering committee. That'll be our kind of first big hurdle other than getting the timeline approved. We have been working on getting website up and running. Uh and then we have established the project timeline and we have a scope document uh that is also in the works. We're hoping to kind of establish our start phase two here shortly. Um some of the pre-planning work of where we want to host public events. Uh we

want to do workshops, what type of content we're going to show, uh what information we want to gather. So this is the timeline. This is what we've agreed upon with the county. Um, and and keep an eye out for the website. That should be the next thing that comes out which will kind of have this. What is the comp plan? What's the timeline looking like? How to submit public comment? Where, when, all that information on there, when we're up and running. Any questions? Still a little bit preliminary at this point. It's not a whole lot of I don't have the website to show you yet. I don't have the scope yet. Um, we do have those things, but those are kind of something that we want to show the project steering committee before we go totally public with it just to make sure that we haven't missed anything. Um, we're covering on our basis.

Can you cover who um this timeline's been shared with and who we've received approval from? Yeah. Uh, we we uh we show this to the county administrator uh and to share with uh as far as we know uh from the uh county board chair and also share with the chair of the uh the use and transportation committee chair. So those individuals should be aware of this timeline and

yeah and gave their place at least we got the uh the permission to to proceed with this timeline from county administration and we'll be happy to share this you know uh you know tomorrow just email you a copy of this slide this flowchart the timeline so you have something as a reference as as in any planning process right we hope there won't be any surprises and sometimes just it those happen and so uh but this is what at least for now we can foresee but things can you know can be modified and adjusted along the way.

Yeah, this does a pretty good job of of kind of what I anticipate will happen. Obviously, as we know from the last go around anything could happen. Um that bottom the lighter green is meant to reflect the specific and intentional public engagement uh opportunities. um three different ones. So the first one is going to be more that vision setting. What do you want to see? Second one is how do you want to see that achieved? And then the third one will be a little bit later on in the process. Um it'll be similar to the proed land use outreach that we did where we have a draft now. Review it. We have ample time. So review it and let us know what you want to change. We'll change it. Send it back out.

Yes. So in theory, not every single solitary county board member has seen. Uh in theory, yeah, it had a public meeting now though, so it's it's out there. We can we can reference it. Um we have not been to the last couple land use and transportation committee meetings, but I believe that's that's on the topic for next month. I think there was the last one was yesterday, so we'll go next month. Do they have any other like involvement with the steering committee or the process or do they get updates on the process or how does that work? Yeah. Um I believe Ray has a list of project numbers to now I believe.

Yeah. If we plan to I mean there's like selective bodies, right? And so we have ex uh extend invitation to the chair of the the land use and transportation committee chair as one of the PSC members. And our hope is she will also you know share with the rest of of uh the committee members and staff will provide uh monthly updates to committee will uh uh would go to the committee and give them monthly reports and I hope also uh somehow uh the county board uh chair or whoever will share or update you to the other members of the county board And so we rely on on really a number of people to help us to get the word out and we really have nothing to hide to be honest. Uh and same thing true there like uh city of Boomington staff u uh town normal staff serving on the PSC. Uh we hope they will help to get the word out to the elected official that department heads to the city managers. Um uh otherwise it's hard to get 107,000 people informed of what's going on. Even if we put a press release every month, I can guarantee you nobody know all everybody will read that. So So we rely on you too to help us to get the word out. Is there any reason why the commission couldn't send emails directly to each board member?

Like can can we send this individually to all 14 county board members or to ensure that like yes in fact we know you have this in your inbox? Oh, we could uh we could work with the county administrator uh uh you know to appreciate it with kind of

Yeah, it would be good if we could make sure that the county administrator shares it with uh or the land use committee chair shares it with the rest of the county board because that's one of the problems we had with the last process here was that um we were trusting that everyone was sharing things appropriately and it wasn't the case. But but but that's why my suggestion we just it takes two seconds to send this long then we know you yes you did receive

well it's I guess we don't know what protocol is with that. Yeah, I think that's the word the protocol. I mean we can you know I can uh ask you know the county administrator uh to say hey this is the desire of the of the planning commission to have uh this timeline uh to to be shared with all the county board members. I don't think it's a problem. Be nice if it wasn't the same. Yeah, this is a puppy, too. I mean, we want people. We had a lot of public meetings on the strategic land use plan, too, and there was a lot of uh under engagement, I guess, at the elected official something happened

so yeah until until it became it came to a head, they started hearing from constituents and then all of a sudden it wasn't that always the case. I mean just you know we have so much on our radar on a daily basis but it's like it doesn't become an issue until all of a sudden is an issue and you're like oh

but I think the problem with that was is there was there was a question posed a fundamental question posed all along and Anthony you got this question I think a fair amount of times is where is this coming from who's asking for this what what is the and I think there was a whole lot of there was misinformation out there that basically the planning commission was out there running rogue and we were doing this just on our own to try to kind of take over the world. And I think that's absolutely not the case of what was going on. But the lack of information disseminated, I'm just going to say it, through the county board and through the city and town to their elected officials exacerbated that problem. Had it just been put in front of them as an as something information provided. It sounds to me as though based on the answers we've been given that wasn't the case until very late in the process. So that that's a fundamental problem. I think if you're going to try to get buy in if elected officials that represent our constituents in the community aren't aware of it going on that's a fundamental problem. So I think it is something we need to make sure gets addressed.

And I just want to like reiterate my comment from last meeting that like that's the lessons learned. Yeah. like make sure that that stays on a postit um so that we don't that kind of push back at late in the game again on this.

Yeah. Because quite honestly, Ray, you and Anthony were the ones that were willing to be out in front of all the people making the comments and you guys took a lot of comments and a lot of uh anxiety from people because of the lack of information that we shared at that level. I personally, not only from a constituent standpoint, I'd love to see that happen, but I'd also love to see that information be shared with those folks so you guys aren't the ones that are wearing the shirt in all these meetings and being the one kind of targeted for were you just out there doing this on your own kind of thing. It'd be kind of nice if you had someone to back you up on that. Um, and you know, I I also want to encourage staff that if you need us to go advocate to the county board for more resources, like use us to it is a time issue. Be happy to do that, but I'm not going to do it unless you

So, so R, I think a request I have is given the input received. So, if I'm looking at my calendar, we meet again on April 1st, but the land use and transportation committee would not be meeting before then. So, if you can sort of establish with our county administrator and the chairperson of the land use and okay, transportation committee how this information is going to flow, what that cadence will look like so we can talk about it at our next meeting. That would be helpful. So whether that's you or Anthony that reaches out like how how are we going to get information out um and then I think leaning heavily I don't I appreciate the position you're in having to gather the steering committee but I think like saying hope um that they will help us with public engagement like I think it needs to be stronger like the expectation and I love this visual like you're the key to helping us get public engagement so we can focus on planning and the deliverable goals we have, the projects we have that go beyond this. Um, we expect that you help us get some engagement.

Like I think hope is not strong enough and I and I you're very respectful and and I appreciate the challenges and getting that steering committee together and but I think at least we message and and like this visual is very helpful. Yeah. And we don't want to get ahead of any of the No. And that's the real problem that we've got. And the last thing we need is to have someone in another um somewhere in the county say that they didn't know something was happening. Um because they should know

uh and such and we were getting blamed for what ultimately should have been someone else's work, not ours. We're saying it's not our work. Why do we proceed? It's not our job to communicate with the county board. The protocols would say there is another way of getting that done. So, I just want to make sure that those people are indeed getting that done. No one's surprised. Do you need us to reach out to our county board representatives to see did you get this?

I'm curious. I know the county is out of town back to office on on business on business and then we'll be back to the office in Friday. Any other questions for Ray and Anthony on the comp plan?

Thank you so much. Okay, so that concludes our list that was provided in the agenda. Is there any further business to come before the commission? Um, hearing none, the chair will entertain a motion to adjourn.

It's been moved and seconded to adjourn. All those in favor say I. Those opposed say I ready to go. The March 3rd meeting of the ML County Regional Planning Commission is adjourned at 4:58 p.m.