Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

All right. How's everyone doing tonight? Happy New Year. It's our first meeting back. Welcome everybody to the January 14th, 2026 City Vina Planning Commission meeting. We are grateful you are here. To those who are here in person and as well as those tuning in remotely, we are we are thankful for your curiosity, your participation, and your feedback. It is vital as we navigate this process of change in Edina, specifically regarding the ways in which we'd like to use our land. So, tonight we do not have any public hearings. Instead, we have two reports and recommendations which follow kind of a similar process, but we'll get into that later. Uh, regardless, the city is committed to hearing your feedback. So, for [snorts] any reports, recommendations, public hearings, or future or past proposals, uh, head to the city's engagement website, ww.betto togetherina.org, org and there you will find anything related to land use and change. There's a nice map that you can find what's going on right around where you live and helps you engage closer to home that way. Uh there is another note just for security reasons. So we we're going to if you'd like to speak during community comment period the the process has changed a little. We talked about this the last time. If you would if you do not want to share your name and um address, you can bring and fill out a speaker registration card with your address and hand it to the senior communications coordinator, Lauren. Hi.

Uh before speaking, if you're okay sharing that information while it's televised, just you'll head up to the podium and I'll give you the cue when we get to that period. Uh the typical process uh that you can expect tonight is we'll call the meeting to order, do a roll call, an approval of tonight's agenda, as well as the prior meeting minutes, then we'll open it to community comment period, and then no public hearings, but then two reports, recommendations, and then we close with chair, member, and staff comments. So without further ado, we'll call the meeting to order. Commissioner Just. Then roll call.

Sorry, [laughter] someone's excited. Commissioner Just, Commissioner Bournestein here. Commissioner Felt here. Commissioner Haniman here. Commissioner Smith here. Commissioner Padilla here. Commissioner Nelson here. Commissioner Alky here. And uh Chair Bennett here. Next, we have the approval of tonight's meeting agenda. A motion to approve tonight's agenda. Second. All those in favor say I. I. So moved. Next we have the approval of the prior meeting minutes from December 10th, 2025.

Motion to approve. Second. All those in favor say I. I.

I. So moved. All right. Next we have the community comment period. Similar to a public hearing, this is your chance to testify about an issue, but one that's not on tonight's agenda. So, you must be here and present. You can come up to either podium. You have three minutes to speak. When the light turns green, you may begin. When it turns red, your time's up and we'll ask you to wrap up your comments. Uh, I'll just reiterate the note that was shared earlier. Uh, please state your full name and address, but if you do not want to divulge your full address while televised, you can present the speaker registration card to Lauren over there before speaking. Is anyone here for community comment? All right, seeing some heads shaking side to side, we will move on from that. So, next we will move to our reports and recommendations. The first of which is a sketch plan review for 6016 Vernon Avenue, an EV charging station. Uh just just so you're aware of what this process includes. Um unlike a public hearing, this is a chance for a potential applicant before they put in a formal application to provide an idea or a sketch plan to the commission and staff. staff puts it together in uh a presentation here and we allow the applicant to provide their own presentation. We'll kind of exchange back and forth with questions, comments, recommendations, and this is our chance as a body to provide non-binding feedback to the applicant. Again, this is different than a public hearing. Should they be interested in moving forward after this and potentially tweak their plan based off of our and the city council's feedback, they would then put forward a formal application and that would trigger the public hearing process

where then you would get to testify about this matter. So without further ado, Carrie Teague, take it away.

Thank you, Chair, members of the commission. This is a site you're all familiar with. It's the Keys Auto Body on Vernon, just west of City Hall. We've had three projects probably in the last three or four years that have come through planning commission and city council and have been denied. Just to run through some of that history quickly, the first was for a restaurant. It was an expansion of the existing building and it had rooftop dining. That was denied. The second was a proposal by Green Drop. It was a donation dropoff center. That also was denied. And the last was a small restaurant remodel of the existing building. uh for a pizza restaurant that also was denied. The request before you is for an electric vehicle charging station. Part of the issues that we've struggled with with those previous requests and more or less with this one as well, the site is guided PCD4 planned commercial district where only gas stations, car washes are considered permitted uses in that district. With this use, it's a permitted use. However, the comprehensive plan, as you recall, guides the site for medium density residential. You could get based on the density that's allowed there about four units. We've had over the last couple of years some residential developers take a look at the site. You recall we did have a sketch plan for that memory care facility that came through and they just couldn't make the numbers work either. So, no formal request was made. Um the big difference here is we've got a use that's actually permitted by zoning, but we still have to rectify that comprehensive plan. Um so a gas station is defined as a principal building, an accessory structure used for the sale of motor fuels. So again, it would be a permitted use, but any formal application, we still have to bring the

comprehensive plan into compliance with the zoning. So likely neighborhood node, that's our smallest district. Um there would a site plan review would be required and there would be a number of variances. You recall the shape of this lot is triangular. You really can't get anything on the site without the need for a variance. Most of the variances would be really just resurfacing the parking lot, the canopy, the pump stations. Um we'll take a look at a site plan here in a minute, but it's those um setbacks to those uses that would require variances. So looking at our neighborhood node land use description, it's described as in general small to moderate scale commercial, residential or mixeduse building serving primarily the adjacent neighborhood. So that would that's the most likely uh category that we would pursue here. Um, other neighborhood nodes in the city have similar uses. Um, the 54th in France area, we've got a gas station and an auto body repair or auto repair. Uh, the Valley View Wooddale area, we had a gas station there. It's now the town hall station. And, uh, 70th in Cill, we had a gas station there. It's now a auto repair site. So, quick look at the proposed site plan. They would resurface the parking lot and the the uh the charging stations would be along the north lot line and the south lot line and there would be a canopy over the top. So here are some examples of what the project might look like. These are examples of other stations uh that they have across the country. So it would primarily be a waiting area. We remodeled the existing building for a rating u waiting area and then you can see examples of the canopy. They've provided uh three different floor plan

options uh that we can discuss. Uh again the primary use is the lounge area for customers to wait while their car is charging. Uh some of them have a little mini convenience store could be employee operated or potentially um self-s serve. Could be vending machines. There's also a potential for some tenant space. This will be a small space. It would be about 800 square feet. I'll let the applicant go through that um and provide those options as part of their presentation. So again, looking at the zoning compliance, it's the the canopy, the pump islands, the parking lot itself, um that would require those variances with a formal application. Um so with that we our applications are out our applicant is out of state so they are with us virtually tonight. So I will close there and if we could go to our applicants and they will present in a little more detail.

Thank you Carrie. Got an infinite screen going on. Can anyone hear me? We can. I do have their PowerPoint if if that works. Not sure if he'll be able to present it looking at the screen there. Hello. Hey, can you hear us? Yeah. Hey, Justin. I I can hear you.

All right. You can hear me. Dec. Okay. Oh, here. Okay. Can you hear us now? I can hear. Yep. love technology. We are ready to hear your presentation if you'd like to begin. Oh, all right. Fantastic. Dean, you got

Yep. I will I will take it from here. So, somebody else has got our slides. Um, first off, just a little introduction. we we couldn't hear anything up until this point. So, I'm not sure you know what we've already covered, but you know, Declan Wilkerson here um with with the Ayanna team, an architect and site designer um for us, and I'm here with Justin Nickel um Kimley Horn engineer. They are our design partner for this project. Um so, just you know, launching into our our presentation here. First slide. Um INA is a a joint venture of eight of the largest audio manufacturers. um in the world. Um you can go to the next slide.

Um so like I said, born from eight auto manufacturers um with the with the mission to build a nationwide charging network um that puts the customer in the center. Um our mission is to provide, you know, full network coverage um that drivers need um the reliability that they deserve um all while looking to provide amenities that they crave. Uh, next slide please. Um, next slide. That's just a little bit more about the automakers themselves. Uh, yeah, here we go. So, as you can see in this image, this is a look at what our network looks like today. Um, if you'll click to the next slide, Here's here's a graphic that shows kind of the reach that we have as of as of now. So, as of now, we got about 86 sites live, I think, as of today, um across the country. And these orange dots kind of represent um you know, the major MSAs that we're looking to build in um as well as connecting corridors that um are starting to branch throughout the country. Um and we're very close to being able to provide a coast to coast service. um using the ayana rechargery stations alone. Um you can head to the next slide. Um the iona charging experience and kind of what sets us apart from others. Um we provide 400 kilowatt um dual port charging units. Um so that's CCS plug types and knacks. Um meaning that we can charge um just about any EV out there. Um we like to provide amenities. Um we like to call them pit stops with purpose. Um and provide restrooms um food and vending um access, Wi-Fi, um canopies over our chargers and sometimes

even more. Um and like I was stating earlier, nationwide um network is about about 800 bays um as of today and counting or in 4,000 bays contracted. Um, and we're aiming to to establish 30,000 charging bays by the end of the year 2030. Next slide, please. Um, as I was saying, this is a little bit more about um, kind of who we are and, you know, the charging experience. Like I said, Knack um, and CCS plug types are offered at all Ionish um, charging stations, meaning that, you know, just about any EV can pull up and charge. Um and we accept pretty much all forms of um you know virtual payments. Um next slide please. Um so here's a look at one of our uh rechargeries. This is a a real built site um where you can see kind of the branding um and get a bit more of a feel for you know who we are and what we like to deploy. Um you'll see our charging units there. Um the blue and orange and then that is one of our standard canopies that goes over the top of the chargers. Um what we're planning for this site as of now is 14 fast charging bays. So that that'll be seven chargers. Um each one serving two two parking stalls for a total of 14. Um like I said, those are all going to be the the fast charging 400 kilowatt um chargers. um the branded dispensers as we like to call them um with the canopy and then some trash can window cleaning stations. Um and then we are going to as of now we are planning to retrofit the existing building on the site um and to be kind of a customer lounge experience with uh the potential to work with a local business, bring in a tenant um to to run their business out of out of the remaining portion of the building. Next

slide. This is a look at our mini canopies um which we're thinking about deploying at this site as well. Um we could kind of go either route, you know, depending on the setbacks and site conditions. Um that's just a rendering of what those would look like. Next slide, please. This is another site that we have in the works in Connecticut. Um you can see it's another example of us taking a previously um utilized building. It was a a car service bay and we're going to take it and, you know, retrofit it very similar to how we're proposing we do this site. Um, and there we've got the chargers and the canopies over the top. Next slide, please. And then here, something that you guys have just seen, this is our proposed site plan as of now. Um, and maybe Justin, you'd like to jump in here and speak a little bit more as to as to what we're doing.

Uh, yeah. Um, as as Declan mentioned, uh, so my name is Justin Nickel. I'm with Kimley Horn. We are a consultant and engineering firm on behalf of uh, Ayanna. Um, so yeah, so we're proposing to install seven uh, chargers in 14 bays, charging bays. Um, overhead canopy. Um, again, as Declan mentioned, uh, we'd be willing to kind of work with y'all if if the overhead uh, canopy is not something that y'all are interested in. We can also do mini canopies as well. Um that would work along with the setback situations. Um knowing that we obviously have some variances that we have to go after as well. Um let's see. Um other than that, not much more. I mean, again, retrofitting the existing building structure to allow for um either a a lounge uh for customers um to uh while while their vehicles are charging to sit, relax, um vending machines, bathrooms. Um we kind of are leaving that that option open to y'all to discuss with you guys to what you guys might be interested in doing there. Uh but again um ideally it would be again a uh a location just specifically for the uh the customers that are charging there. Um other than that I don't know [sighs] outside of what you already said I think you kind of covered everything.

Yeah. So you know to pick up where what Justin was saying we uh we could go a couple different ways um with the with the building retrofit. Um, yeah, as these mock-ups show, um, we like to do, you know, a customer lounge experience with vending machines and restrooms, as Justin mentioned. Um, and then we can leave, you know, majority of the building open for a future tenant. Hopefully partner with a with a local business um to, you know, be run out of the the other half of the building. Um, or we could go the route of having a mini uh convenience store. Um we've we've deployed that as well where we have you know a completely autonomous experience um with you know an Amazon just walkout convenience store um where basically you know you walk in you prepay you walk in um bunch of cameras on the ceiling that track your movements um whatever you pick up and walk out with you're then charged for. Um so that's an option that we could go with with you know no staff um 247 autonomous experience. Um, and then another another way we could go, um, would just be having the whole building be kind of, you know, nice comfortable lounge space, plenty of room for for customers who come to charge your car, to, you know, park, charge, uh, wait, go in, grab a snack, you know, stretch their legs, that that sort of thing. Um, and the next slide will show you our our Apex location here in North Carolina, as well as our Garner. So, there the central picture. Um, if you go back. Yep, here we go. Um, you can see we we retrofitted the interior of a of a gas station that was about a hundred years old. Um, retrofitted the interior um to be that customer lounge experience we're talking about. The picture in the top right, that's another look at that lo that location, the vending machines and the bathrooms down the hall. And then the picture in the bottom right, that's a different spot, but again, retrofitted a gas station um to be a nice spacious customer lounge. On the right hand side,

we got, you know, coffee bar and then kind of center, it's it's difficult to see in that image, but you know, right there in the center is that Amazon um just walk out technology for the for the convenience store piece. Um so to kind of bring it all together, you can go to the last slide. Um I believe this is the last slide. Um so how our our vision aligns with the city. Um we're, you know, this will be an investment of about one to two um million dollars or so um when it's all said and done. And you know what we're looking to do there is is provide public infrastructure that aligns with you know the city's goals of livability, sustainability um you know giving giving back to the people um you know with with the evolution of the EV the EV um charging um you know like we were speaking on earlier um we can hire people um you know maintenance contractors to come out and keep the site clean, EV technicians to come out um work on the chargers um and then the sustainability aspect you know um auton autonomous building um EV charging um reducing greenhouse gases bolstering the health of the community um and then you know the press opportunities to highlight this new service in town this would be kind of a a big plus high um site for us you know we don't have too many plus high sites actually built yet but we have a lot in the works Um, and it would be, you know, a really good addition to the city. So, I believe that is the last slide. Um, yep. And there's contact information for Emily building. She's our utility and policy engagement associate. Um, you know, works with the cities, works with the power companies all the time. Um, you know, working to get things done efficiently for us here at Ayanna. So, that pretty much wraps up the conclusion

or the presentation there. All right. Thank you very much. Can you hear us? Yes, we certainly can. Yes, we can. Great, sir. Appreciate it. So, this is a sketch plan. So, I'd open it to the rest of the commission for questions, comments, feedback. Let this is open also to staff too since we kind of merged both of the presentations. And if you maybe want to start with questions and we can consolidate kind of our feedback and recommendations till the end. Maybe let's do that. Who wants to start? Yeah, you got question. I don't have any questions.

Okay. Um I have a few questions. Tell me a little bit about the canopies. If you like to have canopies over every um pump, do you call them? And the general heights of the canopies, heights of like the individual canopies or heights of a overall canopy, do you have standards for those? Yeah. Uh go ahead.

Exactly. I was just going to say the standard height of the canopies typically are about 15 feet tall. Um, and that's for the larger uh canopy that covers over everything. Again, we're we're we're trying to kind of provide a little bit of an a different experience than what's out there currently uh right now with EV charging. um if you if you've seen them and if you have EV chargers, you typically might pull into a location that you know it's they've got the chargers and what whatnot, but Ayanna what they're trying to provide again is that that a little bit more of a luxurious kind of experience I guess in in that providing an overhead uh uh canopy for protection from the elements um and additional lighting on on these sites as well too. So

yeah. Okay. I have a few more questions, but go ahead, Justin, you had additional info or No, not not much else.

Yeah, I was sorry, that was me. I was I was going to jump in and say, yeah, for the mini canopies um that kind of go over each individual uh charger dispenser, we like to call them. Um those are about 10 feet. So, a little less, you know, um obstructive than than the standard canopy. Um they feel a lot lighter. Um, but they still provide, you know, that overhead coverage for our customers who, you know, you know, if it's pouring rain or a really hot day or snowing, whatever it might be, you know, when they get up there to pay at the at the dispenser and plug the car in. Um, definitely definitely is a is a welcome amenity to have, you know, coverage overhead.

Okay. Thank you. And and do you like to have a canopy over each pump, right, to protect the pump? Just a question of these. Okay. Yes, ma'am. Ideally, we would we would like to have dispensers covered. Of course, um you know, with setbacks and easements and variances and the whole nine yards, um but it can be difficult to deploy them, but we always try to go the route of having having coverage over our dispensers for sure. Okay. And tell me a little bit about your thoughts for the sign for signage.

For signage, uh, yes, ma'am. Usually signage, um, as seen in the pictures for the canopy, um, it'll be like a a logo on the fascia of the canopy as well as, um, you know, some wayfinding signage. Um, and then for the building, you know, again, we're still working through with our architects, you know, how that will come together, but there'll be there'll be some branding on the building. Um, but as as far as the canopy, those will probably be the the biggest signs, and we like to do it on the fascia. We've we've, you know, proposed and built in the past having a an Iona logo sign that kind of goes on on top of the canopy. Um, but, you know, if if that's if that's going to be an issue, we can definitely implement it on the fascia instead.

Yeah. I was I was going to add to that, Declan, and that's a good point. I know one of the pictures that we had showed the uh the signage on top of the canopy extending above. Um and most recently, our our our canopy and our signage has been an integrated lit uh fascia um on the actual canopy itself. So, it's not as as it's not extending above, it's not extending outwards. It's actually part of the canopy. Um so, it's not as intrusive.

Thank you. That makes sense. I have one more question. Um, how do h how is the lounge accessed and by extension, how would the little convenience store be accessed?

Yeah, good question. Um, the the lounge can be accessed usually. I think what we do is we have like a QR code um that's that's posted on the door um and a user can can scan the QR code and it'll take them to a portal, you know, where they'll they'll be able to access um you know on their phone. They'll tap a button and the door that they are are trying to open will unlock. Um that could be front door, restroom doors. Um they basically have to, you know, scan that QR code and it'll allow them in. Um, and it's very similar for the convenience store. You know, they'll once they're in the building, they have access to the building. Um, they will not be able to go into the convenience store piece if that's a direction that we decide to go um without prepaying. And then, you know, like I said, the Amazon just walk out technology handles the rest. And then when they walk out, they are they are charged for whatever they walked out with. Um, and the the good thing is that we actually here have the ability to um, you know, if there's any people that, you know, aren't I customers that enter the building and, you know, cause trouble, we do have the ability to blacklist those devices. So, you know, we'll have access to security cameras and any, you know, you know, negative activity that that may go down, we have the ability to, you know, see exactly who it was um and and work to prohibit those people from from entering again.

Um, I'm going to ask a follow-up question just because my question was um kind of the opposite way. Um, you know, there are a lot of kids that live over there that have to get on their bikes and cross a busy road to go get a soda or something. Um, I wanted to know like if a 15-year-old wanted to grab his bike and go get a pop, could he from the convenience store or do they have to be um, customers of the pumps? Yeah, great question. That that would be the case. They they would be able to get in. They would not. They would. would okay if they had a credit if they had a credit card and a phone?

Yeah. Yes, ma'am. If they have a if they have a payment method, then you know, in theory, they would they would be able to access the the convenience store for sure. Y I had a couple for Director T actually. [clears throat]

Do you remember I was just thinking I was listening to you kind of like list off the other proposals that came in front of us and I was just wondering do you remember um for like the dining and the green drop and the pizza and maybe even the memory care and maybe you don't remember but do you remember um were any of those projects talking about or those you know needing a a zoning a reszoning and and if not and just separately were any of them kind of contemplating a comp plan amendment. It would just I think be helpful to remember all the different changes that were proposed and maybe what we thought about those as we considered the Yes.

this one. All three needed a reasonzoning and all three needed a comprehensive plan change. Do you remember what the doesn't need a reszoning? Do you remember what the the proposed comp plan change was for each? Yeah, it was to this neighborhood node. I believe with the um with the green drop, we thought about creating a new district, okay, a new land use category in the comprehensive plan um to just um be more specific to that use. We could do something like that here.

I was just curious. And then the memory care, did we even talk about that needing a comp plan? that that did as well because that well would that have been neighborhood note or would that have been something different? We it would have needed a reasonzoning. Yeah. And the the density wasn't an issue because it was a memory care and so the mech council doesn't consider the number of units in the density calculation. Okay. But they just needed a reasonzoning. Okay.

And then I guess just one question for the applicant. you have you guys thought about who would I don't know use this and who your target customer would be it people from the neighborhood is it people from around the metro I mean what are your thoughts on on who you're thinking would would predominantly use this

uh yes sir I would say you know definitely target targeted towards people um in the larger metro you know just that's where we found um statistically that there's a larger um density of electric vehicles um people who are you know passing through the area. But you know absolutely any anybody who lives in the city um and around the residential area who has you know an electric vehicle and does not have you know the means to charge at their own home um would definitely be included in that in that um target demographic. And on top of that, Declan, right, like if you if you are a uh, you know, a local resident that has a uh has a electric vehicle and you're charging at home, the the fast chargers that we also offer um are going to charge a lot quicker in situations, too. So, if you're if you're headed out of town for a quick meeting or something like that, you know, you've got the opportunity to stop by at the local rechargery to to hit for 20 minutes and boom, your car is charged that much quicker than, you know, anything that maybe maybe you forgot to plug it in at night, right? And you live down the street, you forgot to plug your car in or something like that. It's it's great for that residential area as well.

Um, right. Yeah. And I it's also important to note that um across our network, you know, that's that's nationwide. We find that about um 60% of our customers are repeat customers. Um and we have a very very high percentage of you know that first plug-in um success rate. Um so you know your first time using an Iona rechargery. Um we have a very high percentage of people who report that they you know their experience was flawless. Um and you know they become part of that repeat customer statistic. Right. Thanks.

Other questions or questions? Yeah. Comments? Uh, two questions for Director Teague. First, so just for clarity on process, if hypothetically this project didn't need any variances, would we still have to change a comprehensive plan? or is it is it any permit wouldn't make us do that or is it just because of the variances? I believe we need a comprehensive plan change because we need to we need to bring our zoning in to compliance with what the comprehensive plan says in terms of the use of the property. So it it's more of a city issue because it it is allowed by the zoning, right?

But we need to bring the comp plan into compliance with the zoning or vice versa. But just say in that case, would the applicant have needed to pay and go through this process or I I acknowledge that it would be good for us to do that, but would that be on the applicant or would that be on us? It's more on us. Okay. Okay. And then secondly, are there any constraints in the code on what that third party tenant could or could not do?

Yeah. So if let's say if it was a restaurant, I mean if we're talking small scale here, so I think we'd probably need a different zoning. I think all the uses have to be if we're calling it a gas station or a EV station which falls under the definition of a gas station in our code. Um it would just have to be that's the primary use. It would have to be accessory to that like a convenience store. Okay. So probably not a dry cleaner say, right? But because I think there's some parking issues attached to that. It seems like most of the parking space is charging space. So, you don't want a lot of drive up customers that aren't charging their cars. That's right.

Okay. Thank you. Uh, one question for the applicant. Is there um typically a difference between the amount of light generated by the full-size canopies compared to the mini canopies? Uh, I would I would say yes. I would say that the the full size larger canopy definitely outputs more more light than the smaller mini canopies for sure. Okay, thanks.

Thanks gentlemen for your presentation. Just a couple of quick questions on my part. Um just to clarify um Commissioner Alky, currently um the comp plan and the zoning are in conflict with one another. So um either one or both need need to be changed or or um for whatever ends up there. Um my question specifically to you are all of your stations either currently operating or planned operating 24 hours? Yes ma'am.

And have you given any consideration or is it possible to do anything less than 24 hours? Uh, no ma'am. I don't, you know, that doesn't really align, you know, with the overall ion mission for, you know, some sites to be 24/7 and then others not to be 24/7. That makes sense.

Okay. And with that too, um yeah, uh lighting issues in terms of the the full canopy, um and how that affects um the neighborhood and um I don't know if you've looked into that at all or what kind of issues you have in the places like the Connecticut one that you showed us that looks like it's, you know, uh adjacent to a residential neighborhood. Have you dealt with that at all? [clears throat] has that come up? Oh, you're talking specifically specifically like the canopy with the lighting? Yes.

Um, that's a good question. I I believe that we have um but fortunately, you know, when we go through these these designs with our canopy vendor and our lighting vendor, we we do have the ability to control the output of light. Um, so like I was saying, those mini canopies will definitely output less light than the large, you know, full overhead canopy, but in either scenario, we do have the ability to control, you know, the output.

And is there any internet enhancement that would be required if you've got potentially 14 people um sitting in the um convenience area, you know, all wanting to use internet? Um, I mean, we would provide, you know, enough enough Wi-Fi coverage, um, to make sure that if that was like max capacity that everybody would still be able to, you know, have a have a seamless experience. Um, how long is generally would it take to um, charge? I don't know. Do I have to tell you what kind of vehicle or um, No, ma'am. How long does it take? On average, it'll take about

Yeah, it'll take about 20 minutes, give or take. Oh, that's all. Okay. Fast charging. Yes, ma'am. Um, and in any of these, do you end up having a line? Do you have people waiting or or what's the the usage like? No, ma'am. I mean, we get, you know, a lot of our sites, especially, you know, in these um kind of metro areas, they they get utilized quite often, but we we have not run into issues where, you know, there's queuing and there's cars stacked up around, you know, around the block. It's usually very very seamless experience for drivers to pull up, you know, charge and leave. Um there's not a lot of queuing that happens.

And you anticipate having somebody there 24 hours. Did you say that? an employee? Uh, no ma'am. In fact, the opposite. You know, with the Ayana lounge, um, we we like to do completely autonomous. All of our other sites that we've done a retrofit for are completely autonomous and don't have an Ayanna employee um, running the lounge. If we were to, you know, partner with the local business and have a have a a different tenant in part of the building, then that would be, you know, kind of up to their discretion of, you know, what the business is and what their hours are. like the ionic side autonomous. So my my question really goes to maintenance and clean up and things like that.

Uh yeah, we we will partner with like a a trash or you know waste contractor that will probably come and clean the site, you know, empty the trash cans and whatnot once a week. Um same with the bathrooms, clean the bathrooms once a week or so, maybe a couple more times depending on usage. Um, okay. Thanks very much. Yes, ma'am. All right. Uh, thank you for your presentation tonight. Um, I have a uh a question based on that presentation. The map you showed was a national map showed basically along the freeways and and uh

thorough affairs of of our country. Um [snorts] and Commissioner Bournestine mentioned um you know a little bit about the site as being this site is really local and and what's the use for it?

It would in my mind again it would be more local use. Um but again you're promoting crosscountry travel and things like that with the EV. So I'm just wondering um you do have a site you mentioned [clears throat] like this. Are there are there multiple other sites you're looking at that are similar to this that are in a this is really a uni unique site because it's all residential um right all around it as you know um it is on a major uh thoroughfare but um it's not on a a freeway or anything like that. So, right.

Is that I I obviously know the site. Um, so you're you're anticipating not a whole bunch of travel through the city to get to this site with national, you know, people going across country, per se, and more more local. Is that is that what I'm hearing?

Yes, sir. um you know we have a we have an entire you know site acquisition team that um all day every day they're looking at sites all across the country and they're scoring them based on a an internal algorithm. Um, so when this when this site was, you know, first, you know, being considered, um, it's one of those where we we have other sites in Minnesota that are more, you know, on these, you know, just off these major highways or in a more densely, you know, populated area, um, that are more standard, um, really just kind of charters out there in the parking lot, um, with, you know, a canopy over the top.

Um, but we're also looking to expand our our network of what we call plus high sites. And those plus high sides are where we, you know, take an existing property with an existing building and we look to retrofit it. Um, and those ones, you know, sometimes they're in a bigger metro area and get a lot more usage. Other times they're in a a smaller, more local um network. But, you know, to expand our portfolio of of plus high amenity based sites um you know, like this one, we're we're really looking to be a part of the community and provide you know, um kind of like a neighborhood rechargery experience. Um where it's it's known and it's used and it's, you know, enjoyed by the locals. Um, and you know, anybody else who who's passing through or you know, wants to come check it out, um, is absolutely more than welcome. Um, but this one would be for sure, um, you know, kind of local neighborhood rechargery oriented first and that's exactly what um, our Apex location out here in North Carolina is.

All right. Thank you. Another question would be um, related to the tenant space. You had three different options. you look at a convenience store, a uh um like you mentioned the the Amazon type of ready store, um just a lounge and uh there were three different options, but with the tennis tenant space, the only reason I bring it up, the tenant space seems to be

um you know, very there's a lack of parking on the site. So, I mean, having other people come in and use it to go to that store, there's literally no other parking or or very little other parking on this site. So, that would be a concern. I guess I you know, I would guide you toward doing maybe one of the other sites. I mean, I understand uh Merryweather mentioned the uh uh you know, a kid running up on his bike and whatnot, but um that that wouldn't be an issue. But having people come in to park and go grab something from the sea store would be seems to be a challenge just just for lack of parking alone. Right. Um

so I might guide you that direction, but again it's your you know when you come forward with what you you want to think about that a little bit.

Yes sir. For sure. Like I said those are you know we're still working out what we can and can't do with our architects. Um we just wanted to make sure that um you know you guys were aware of the different directions we could go. I I agree with you on this one that um parking would be tight um and you know some of these plus high sites you know we like to partner with local businesses. It's always something that we're looking to do and kind of really be a part of the community but you know some sites we we totally recognize that you know just due to space constraints it's not possible and we might have to go the route of the convenience store the full lounge. Um, but you know, either way, that wouldn't be a problem for us. We'll we'll design with that in mind for sure.

And also, the the lighting's brought been brought up a few different times. Again, with it being a a fully residential neighborhood, I I would uh, you know, guide you toward, you know, being conservative on the lighting and and making sure either it goes off and when there's no cars there or a minimal amount of lighting being being pushed across the uh beyond the site. Anyway, um and then the other the other point is I I add is you know people usually takes

somebody stops at a gas station traditional filling station would would take maybe 5 10 minutes uh either to run in gas up run in and grab what they want and leave. Uh you mentioned 20 minutes in and that's you know it's maybe double the the length of time maybe three to four times the the amount of time somebody traditionally would stop. Um so they might have time to to stop at the the the facility you're you're at or or go you know take a walk around the the area. There's a park nearby.

Um I just just things like that. I'm wondering about again with the park, lack of parking for other folks. I'm wondering about the fencing security around the site. Is the only access going to be off of Vernon? And is that um would there be fencing to not allow basically pe you you could walk obviously around the fence, but would you only be allowed on that one off of that one street is is the main question. What I'm getting at is there's there's in Prairie Road is is right on that on the back side of this lot on the north side of this lot. I don't think the neighbors would like a lot of parking there and have people running in and grabbing, you know, things from the convenience store. And it's just a just a thought I had.

Yeah, understood. You make a good point. Uh usually, you know, especially in a situation like this where that definitely could be something that happens, uh we'd probably take a look at adding, you know, some sort of vegetation or um even like a trex fencing um across like the back side of the site just to kind of, you know, deter people from parking and and walking across the street. Um but you know still still in the early phases of this one and um you know working those things out but definitely definitely something we'll take note of and make sure we we address.

And then lastly and real quickly the the no one on site uh situation. How is the safety of the site and other the the users um obviously have cameras? Are those monitored 247? And I I just weren't wondering about the safety of and and security of the site and the users.

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Um you know that that's kind of where the the lighting comes into play. you know, if somebody pulls up um you know, almost on empty and they need to charge their car, you know, two in the morning, 3 in the morning. Um that's where we want the lighting to come in to make sure that you know the site's well lit and they feel safe to you know, park and charge their car. Um, you know, with the building, like I was saying, security cameras, um, you know, we have the ability to monitor those closely and, you know, block anybody, blacklist anybody who, you know, comes to the site to do something other than charge their car and grab a snack. And we also have a 247 call center, um, you know, for troubleshooting and for, you know, any security or things that, you know, people take note of that might not be right. Um we have a 247 call center um that people can people can contact and let them know.

Okay. Thank you. Yes sir.

Hi. Thank you again for the presentation. Um I have a couple questions here and hopefully I'll be coherent. A lot of great questions were asked earlier. I'll see if I could flush out more of the operation just so we understand what that looks like and then um just be sensitive to the impact that it might have. So just a couple questions um uh so I could understand. I think you mentioned that it takes about 20 minutes roughly to charge a vehicle fully, but that's just the charging. How long does someone typically linger or hang around after their vehicle is fully charged? Is it just a normal practice to go in, sit down, relax for a few minutes, come back? like how long does one vehicle stay at a site when they when they when they visit,

right? Uh yeah, I would say it's it's pretty much aligned with however long it takes your car to charge. You know, these these new age EVs, you know, they basically have an app for everything. They're connected to your phone. You get, you know, live updates on the charge status of your car. So, you know, people come in on empty, and they they plug their car in, you know, they walk to the store, they're chilling in the lounge, using the restroom, grabbing a snack. You know, they're likely getting, you know, live updates on on when their car is ready to go. Um, and when they get that notification saying, "Hey, your your car is ready, you know, they're they're pretty much out of there. So, I'd say 20 20 30 minutes or so on average."

Okay. And you know given some of these statistics when you guys did the modeling in let's just say uh Monday through Friday per day um how many units or or or vehicles would be coming through in a given week in you know 100 cars for this location you would calculate per day or or what's the volume uh range look like?

Uh that's a good question. you know, it really it really varies on location, but I would say um you know, we got we got 14 bays total and currently we track, you know, across our network about one one maybe two uses per bay, you know, per site. So, if we got 14 14 bays, probably 14 cars um you know, maybe maybe 20 cars a day cycling in and out. So for a long period of time they just be empty bays sitting there, right?

Uh yes sir, you know you make a good point. Um but as the as the Iona network and brand grows, we we really believe that that that number will change. Um, you know, it it will never be as much as like a gas station where there's, you know, you know, pumps and you might drive up and like never have a pump, but we definitely believe that, you know, here in the next three, four, five years, um, utilization will will absolutely go up for sure. So, it might start low and increase over time as it gets more um more recognized as people learn about it.

Yes, sir. And as more people, you know, begin driving EVs, we're already seeing those numbers start to start to skyrocket. So, is it like a minimum volume that would keep you guys profitable to to operate there or or how how do you think about um you know viability for the site,

right? Um we we we do have internal targets here um for utilization rates. It it varies sight to sight. Um, but usually when we do, you know, these these ground leases, um, we, you know, they're they're usually 10 to 15 year leases. And, um, when we build something, you know, we're looking to be there to stay. Um, and, you know, our internal targets will will increase as the as the years go on, kind of like we were just talking about. Um, in terms of how many uses per day do we need to stay profitable, I I I would say it's a little too soon for this site specifically. Um, to kind of make make an accurate um, estimate there.

Gotcha. Um, a question came up earlier about queuing and and the risk of that. do and I don't have an EV vehicle, but I'm guessing if I were driving one, maybe you could see on a dash the different sites that are located around the country. Does it does it indicate if there are free bays that you could use like through an app or something like that? Like how would you know that it's not full? Yeah.

Yeah. That um that is all, you know, coming soon. you know, I we're developing an app and, you know, integration with, like I said, founded by these these eight auto manufacturers, all of whom are, you know, producing and um scaling their EV production rates. Um, and we're going to have, you know, just like, you know, you get in a Tesla and you're low on charge. You know, your your Tesla will take you to a Tesla um charging station. That is what we are working towards with the eight auto manufacturers that uh that we are are funded by. So, it's not there yet, but something in the future that's coming where you could be notified. Yes, sir. No. Okay. Yes, sir. That's right.

And there and Declan, there is there is plug share, right? Like I mean, it's not specific right now, but plug share is a uh it's an online or an app or a online u database that identifies locations for for EV charging. I I myself do not have an EV as well. Um but uh you know it it's got the ability to identify locations in in the area that you're targeting uh so that you're in charge of.

That's absolutely right. Plug share for sure is our our biggest you know that's that's how people who drive EVs are are finding us currently. You know just googling um you know we're kind of making waves in the EV scene. You know people are excited about the Iona brand. Um you know googling and and looking for where there's a recharger near them. Um, and if you you own an EV, then you definitely use the Plug Share app. Um, you know, and it'll it'll notify you of sites around you and, you know, which ones are open, which ones aren't. Um, so that's that's kind of what we rely off of right now until until our OEM integration is is fully there. Gotcha. Couple more questions here.

Um, does the rates defer by time of day? I know some folks who charge at home usually set a timer when the rates are lowest at night versus when it's heavy load on the electrical grid in the daytime. Would the rates be different depending on when folks show up to charge?

Uh right now, you know, rates are pretty fixed. Um you know as as the network grows as we get more data as um you know the company expands um it's definitely something that you know we we thinking about and we have you know people who internally are devoted to that kind of research um you know time variable pricing or things like that but for now it's pretty fixed um and we just we just kind of monitor the market and see see how things are shaping up.

Yeah. Okay. The reason why I asked that is um you know you might have low volume in the daytime but higher volume at night if if if folks be the uh rates would be lower um in the absolutely in the night time. Um

I would say yeah I would say I would say time of day. Um again kind of just depends but you know I would personally I would guess that you know nighttime is just going to be lower volume. Um, just because a lot of people, especially in a residential heavy area, a lot of these people will probably have like, you know, an a method of charging their vehicle at home. Um, but, you know, that's not to say, you know, people aren't passing through the area and like really need to charge. Um, it's just kind of one of those time will tell. Um, and it varies sight to sight. Just to jump on that, Quincy, uh um I presume like a lot of your competitors, you guys have an idling fee.

That is a good question. Um we actually at most places when your vehicle is done charged, you get continued to get build after like, you know, they give you a grace period, but it's so that you don't park overnight and make it your personal garage spot. Um, so there are penalties then for people who are there longer than their car needs them to be there.

Yes, ma'am. That that's a that's a great point. Um, we we currently don't have that and we really haven't experienced anybody doing that, but we we absolutely have the ability to put that in place if if we notice that, hey, like people are just coming to to park and hang out, you know, all through the night like something's going on here. We we definitely do have the ability to to make adjustments as needed. Gotcha. You know, when I when I think about um the other charging locations nearby, I know Target has [clears throat] a charging bay that we reviewed and approved some time ago. And Target also has, you know, coffee shops and stuff on the on inside, right? So, right,

you know, when you look at the variety of options that a person would have either at your site or at Target, they'll probably go to Target. um and the target bays aren't always full, right? So, it shouldn't be an issue. I guess I'm just trying to work through here just the business model and if this is going to be something that would be sustainable, right, compared to the other options that a driver would have um right in the city of Edina, I would assume that folks would uh with electric vehicles would probably have some type of charging system at their homes. And so the clients that might be coming through here would most likely be folks passing through.

And you know, when I looked at your map, this might be your most northern site uh on the map compared to where you have u your other businesses located. Um east west I could see north south in California, but in the Midwest this might be the most northern site. So I'm thinking someone who has to go to Duth and back would probably be coming through here. Um so that's probably who your target market might be. Um

some questions came up about lighting which I thought was a really good point. Um we uh as a city uh on France Avenue just installed um the Eline and those uh bus stops which are really nice are like 12 to 15 ft tall.

And what that triggered essentially was neighbors who live right adjacent to that having to get a variance to build a fence up to 10 ft tall to you know not be um for the lighting not to encroach into their property. We're pushing this property so close to the property line where there's almost zero variance from the property line. I'm guessing that the lighting would impact neighbors and it might trigger another action to say, "Hey, could I get a variance to build a higher fence?" Right. So, just the lighting piece, I think, is something that you have to really think about.

Mhm. And then um with the 24 hours, right? Like I don't know if it's like a car club, a group, you know, people coming together, but how do you prevent folks from blasting music late at night, you know, hanging out in a lot like, you know, car culture? I think people sometimes would go into the convenience store, but sometimes just hang out in their cars and hang out. So what's your customer behavior style like? Is are are they folks that you know you know tailgate essentially or do you see your customer base as those who would go in the lounge actually and and spend time in there? Just think about the impact to the neighborhood with late night charging. Yeah.

If that could ever be an issue.

No, absolutely. Um yeah, our our customer base um thus far has proved to be you know people who will um you know park their car and sit in it the entire time and charge or you know if we do offer an amenities building. They will park um you know charge their car and you know go into the lounge until their car finishes charging. you know, we we we really have not had any instances where, you know, people come and hang out at our sites and don't do anything other than, you know, cause problems. And then the people who do use our sites are, you know, very very respectful thus far and they, you know, they respect the site, they respect the um the building and they don't they don't cause problems.

Yeah. Okay. I think that's close to the end here for me on on on questions. I certainly have some uh thoughts there, but you know, with no nobody being on site to monitor, it's it's all remote monitoring, right? Um no security guard to say, "Hey guys, turn it down." You know, there's none of that. So, it's really on the goodwill of the folks that come there is is is what, you know, what we're what we have to weigh and the impact to the community. So, just things to think about um as you look at your uh business model and your and your customer model,

right? Yeah. Absolutely. Um fair point and you know kind of going back to what I was saying Ayanna you know as a company any anywhere that we deploy a site um especially one that you know is more amenities based and has a building and we're trying to you know kind of draw people in um we we are willing and able to work with the city. So in an event that you know we noticed that you know kind of repeat offenders kept coming back and causing problems you know tailgating like you're speaking about or you know utilizing the the lounge for something that it's not supposed to be. We can we can absolutely pivot and deploy um some sort of security if needed. Absolutely. We will work with you guys on that.

I have just a couple more just real quick ones hopefully. Um, just thinking more for the folks listening in or or potentially watching this later. Um, I'm not I don't have an EV. I'm not that familiar with what it takes and everything. I'm just wondering is are there any radiation concerns of these of the charging stations having so many close together or is there noise or anything produced from the are there fans on these to keep them cool or [clears throat] just wondering if there's any noise

from that. Yeah, I I would say, you know, ab like absolutely not. I mean, these these things are efficient. They're welldesigned. Um top-of-the-line chargers. Um you know, they get the job done. They charge your car fast and they you know, you wouldn't you wouldn't even know they were there. Um they they're quiet. Um they're safe. Um and you know when we when we design these sites we ensure that you know construction-wise everything is you know absolutely done correctly um and safely and that anybody can pull up and the interface is easy to use. Um at our headquarters building here in uh Durham, North Carolina, we actually have u seven you know kind of test units that are set up um in our laboratory space and we have you know a whole tech team and engineering team that work out there in the lab. um with these things all day long and you know there's there's no complaints about noise or heat or anything of the sort. So

Okay. Well, that was my I assume that but I wanted to hear it and and have it out there. The only other thing I had as far as this particular site is um would you or have you considered in the past coming in with say 8 to 10 locations just due to the the size of this and then perhaps expanding um you know putting two or three more um units in later.

Yeah, for sure. Um, I mean, we we like to plan, like I said, I touched on earlier, our our real estate and site acquisition team. You know, they they score these sites based on an internal algorithm, and it'll kind of, you know, spit out a number or like a range. You know, you should have 10 to 14 charging bays. Um, and then, you know, we as designers, we we obviously try to um we obviously try to to maximize the site. you know, if we're gonna if we're going to spend the money to buy or lease the site, you know, we want to maximize it and try to get our return. But, you know, in the event that, you know, 14, so seven chargers was too much. I mean, we we absolutely could, you know, work with you guys to drop it down. Um, you know, future proof the site so, you know, future development is possible. Um, but we really like to to kind of, you know, deploy our sites, um, you know, with with the maximum capacity in mind. Okay. Thank you.

Yes, sir. Absolutely. Thank you for the presentation. I got a couple questions, one for staff, perhaps one for you that has not been answered. But in terms of the zoning, Carrie, I mean, it's specific where it says gas stations and then it says motor fuels. You had it underlined and bolded. Does this qualify legally? Yes, we ran that by the city attorney and he agrees that it's a permitted use. Okay, just wanted to clarify that you had it bolded and underlined, I assume, for some reason.

Okay, so electricity is motor fuel essentially and a gas station is it doesn't have to have gas apparently. Not by our definition.

Okay, just wanted to clarify that. It seemed it seemed a bit odd. So, and then in in terms of I think I think most questions have been answered pretty thoroughly for me to feel good about not having any more questions as such. But, um, in terms of just in the site in general, have some of these questions maybe touched on some maybe recommended site improvements. Um, have you guys explored what those might look like or do you just have or are you open to whatever? [clears throat]

Um, I would say for the most part we're kind of open to whatever. Obviously, you know, we have um, you know, internal design standards that we like to adhere to and you know, obviously we want to build things um, cost-effectively. Um, but you know, if there was if there was improvements that, you know, you guys at the city would would really like us, you know, to see and, you know, we would absolutely be open to, you know, working with you guys and seeing if it's something that we could accommodate. For sure. Okay. Thank you. I guess I'll just open it to the rest of the group if you have now more like the feedback and recommendations. We can just kind of go down the line one by one.

Chair, I had one more question if you don't mind. You got it. Uh, Director Teague, I know our wheelhorse wheelhouse is zoning and land use, but the regulations do say no automobile service station on a lot adjoining a lot in a residential district shall be operated between the hours of 11:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. So, that seems to apply here. Where in this whole process does that come into play? That is for a automobile service station where they're repairing cars. says automobile service centers and gas station standards. Am I misunderstanding that? So we can regulate that looks like it.

That specific regulation just refers to a service station. Oh, okay. So there's a difference. So that's when there's no gas but just service. Correct. Good. Thank you. Yeah, let's proceed.

Hi. Um, thank you for your presentation and um, all of this feedback. Um, I didn't necessarily have questions, but um, as an EV driver who doesn't have a fast charger at home. Um, I'm excited that there is more and that there's interest from companies to get more opportunities. Um just going to in no particular order run through my notes and and the thoughts um that I jotted down while my commissioner fellow commissioners were speaking. Um I uh appreciated all of the concern about light pollution. Um I know some gas stations and other places of business that are open late have um lights on, but they functionally dim down until they sense more motion. Um, and I would encourage uh the applicant to look into um ways of having so that light pollution be reduced when the the stations are not in use. Um, if you know the retro vibe that was shown with the larger canopy seemed very in the spirit of the Kevin Keys yellow building and and I I kind of liked and get that. if we were going to do a larger roof, I wondered if you had explored things like solar panels or something to continue to be part of that um environmental message of the organization. Um I have

Okay.

I have some concerns about once a week or even once a day uh maintenance and cleanliness. Um want to make sure that you guys know how to run your business, but wanting to note that um that's a concern for everyone. Um, and I actually disagree with um my fellow commissioner um, Commissioner Nelson. I hope there isn't a fence. I hope that if people are taking 20 minutes to fill up and it's a nice day, they want to get out and stretch their legs. Um, I I think that would be a great use of space. I would continue to encourage um you guys to think about how to make the sea store more accessible and more available to local kids or local neighbors if they want to walk down the street and grab a milk. Um it's a big building that I appreciate you guys are trying to reuse, but uh to be a neighborhood node, you want to serve the neighborhood and I think that um continues to really reinforce that that connection and make it a desirable place to be. Um I go to the Target Chargers a lot. They're um slightly slower than what you guys are proposing, but I can fill up my car from, you know, having 20 miles of of of gas in the tank left all the way up to basically a full charge in 20 minutes. If these are going to go even faster, um just from a usability perspective, I would imagine you got you want something to draw me in. I can walk down the aisle to Target and go shopping, but what's going to make me come in and spend those extra dollars in the convenience store?

Um Um, I already mentioned lighting. Yeah, I would encourage you to build out the con convenience store, make it continue to be something that people in the community want to engage with. Um, I think my biggest concern might actually be um that you mentioned that there was a ground lease. Um, this site has been uh troubled and has struggled to find its purpose. I don't know if 14 pumps is the right number. Target has six and there's almost always one free, but you guys have the numbers. But I do want to make sure that whatever we're investing in this newaged gas station and new age concept isn't just something that we're going to have to be revisiting in 5 10 years. I really want to make sure that it is part of that neighborhood node because you you only get that node feeling when you have continuity and history and decades of interaction with the space. So, um, I just want to bring that to to the forefront and say I I want this place, if it is a neighborhood node, to be a part of the community and to serve the community, not just for some people who have an electric car who want to charge quick.

Gotcha. Okay.

Thank you. Um, I agree with Commissioner Honaman on her statements and want to add if um if you decide to proceed with this, I would suggest um a full canopy on one side only and maybe a mini canopy on the other. And in fact, I'm wondering if you um eliminate the stations on the south and pull the um north side away from the property line. So, you can put some vegetation like a living fence or arbor vite or something that would um help to block the light because a sixoot fence isn't going to cover a 15t canopy. So, I'd rather see

some dense greenery between the residences and um the residential street and and this um we also or at a minimum um turn the south access have the cars face east west rather than north south so you can pull that um northern canopy away from the property line. Um, we also have a signage requirement that says no lights on signs between 1000 p.m. and 7 a.m., I believe. So, um, as So, I want to add that to Commissioner Honaman's statements about

uh, dimming the lighting at night and and I'd rather not have the lights go up and down. I'd rather have them go down at night and no lit sign. I mean, when you go to gas stations across the country, they're dimmer at night than they are during the day. Um, and I definitely agree, especially the site. If there's trash cans, um, you had mentioned pet waste. Um, in the summer, it gets hot and humid here. I'd want to make sure that that was attended to on a daily basis. Okay, those are my thoughts. Thank you.

I guess I don't have that many thoughts. It I guess I just maybe have more of a question and I'd be interested in the other commissioner's thoughts is um you know if if a comp plan amendment is needed is neighborhood node the right category? Um, it's just seems it's just such an awkward spot for there to be a singular land use category for essentially one parcel that's this small. It's not really what a neighborhood node

is really anywhere else. I'm not trying to make it complicated, but maybe we should just think about whether that's the right land use category or, you know, if the plan should be amended um in some other way maybe more broadly. For example, if this is a place where a neighborhood note is going to be, should more than just this site be should be guided that way? Um, it just seems strange to have like such a small parcel within an otherwise residential area be neighborhood node when like that like the words that are used to describe what a neighborhood node is. Kind of an active use serving predominantly the adjacent neighborhood isn't likely to be totally accomplished with this use just because it's kind of a a little bit of an inactive use. um focus more on I think people passing through which is fine. Um but you know is there a different land use category that that would be better? Is there a mixeduse category that should be applied more broadly? This is more just like a like a planning related discussion about what this area should look like um just like in the event that um you [snorts] know a different use maybe comes in in the future. So, I haven't totally formulated an opinion on that, but but I guess I'm thinking about it predominantly from that perspective.

Um, I just wanted to say my neighbors like who are like in elementary school and they don't have phones, but I know in the summer they walk to the gas station like weekly. So, if there was like any way to be able to get into the gas station or um convenience store without a phone because a lot of people don't have phones that would maybe want to go.

Yeah, that's a good point. Um we could we could definitely look into something like that. Maybe, you know, during normal business hours, um you know, doors unlocked, nobody could go in. Um, and then you know when you know after hours like later at night that's when that's when it locks and you need to have you know be able to scan the code and and get in there.

Yeah, thank you for taking all the questions here and and going through it. I think for me, um, Commissioner Haniman kind of touched on a couple things that I I I definitely agree with, which is, um, you know, once something goes here, we hope that it lasts a long time to really be part of the community. The business model for this just seems a little bit tough. you know, with low volume of vehicles, multiple bays, competitors like Target and other charging stations around, I'm just not super convinced that the long-term viability is there, even though the market would have more EVs coming through. Um, the clientele would seem to me based on just the discussion to be folks that are not really local. It might be folks passing through is kind of how I I feel about it. Um, and so for it to really be viable, I feel like there's a lot of things that would need to change. Of course, the impact to the community is really important, right? And we certainly want opportunities that that that are in sync and in rhythm with the with the with the residential neighborhoods that are around, meaning it wakes up and it goes to bed around the same time like everybody else. And so it being 24 hours at night um just you know there's a conflict there to some degree unless you could figure out how to ensure you know for a non with no one there physically but being monitored virtually how do you ensure that the folks who pull up to charge is not going to create some disruption right and and and that's going to be a huge question

um the ability for folks in the community to come through and use it. You know, the expectation is that if if there's a convenience store, I you know, I run out of sugar and I'm in the middle of trying to bake something or make batter, I want to run out and get it quickly, right? And um I want to be able to do that and I don't need to have a an EV to do that, right? Um, and so just being open to the community to to to access it and and you know, as the student commissioner was just talking about, young kids are want to going to go there and they may not have a phone or they may not have certain things and they want to go in and pick up some candy bars or something, right? So, it has to be flexible to allow that to happen. And the business model just seems really not doesn't lend itself positively in that direction. It's more geared towards members of Iona and and and EV drivers, right? There's also the challenge of, you know, I'm driving through and I want to make a quick pit stop. I'm the only spot I could park in is an EV charging spot, right? And so gas drivers might go into that location, too. And we just got to be sensitive to that. And there's no way to prevent that from happening. Um, so these are just some of the challenges I think honestly uh with with with this the positive thing I see of course is is is the is the forward thinking with with with this kind of technology. The convenience store component is always good. Um and and having a food type spot in that location is what I think residents have been talking about. But folks also want calm

um you know simple operation that that that that wakes up and goes to bed uh at a similar time as uh they do to commissioner um you know born scene's question about uh neighborhood node I think that's a good question right I was the first thing I thought about was is Pluto a planet or or is it something from the or cloud right like I'm cool with calling it a neighborhood node even if it's a little bit smaller, you know, [laughter] and so uh not to make things too complicated, right? So that's kind of my take on that. I'm okay with that designation. Um but yeah, these are just some of my comments on feedback. So if you could package that into a proposal that that gets close to that, you know, that would be good, but I just that could be really challenging given given the model that you guys have. So that's my comments on that.

Understood. Thank you.

Um I have um some concerns about um you know being an absent absentee landlord or you know running this from from someplace else. And you know, as others have said, um you know, cleaning the bathrooms once a week is, you know, doesn't sound acceptable, um to be perfectly blunt. So, I'd like to see um um you up up the maintenance and the cleanliness aspect of it. and and then to that kind of as a is a tangential concern um that this needs to be part of the community. So I don't know that um uh Commissioner Smith's going to be able to get his sugar there. He might have to go to Quick Trip, which is a gas station to go to get his sugar to bake. But um I do think um the convenience store of the three that you laid out probably you know the the my strongest recommendation is that um you go with the sea store um option. Um, I think having a tenant in there is going to cause all kinds of complications, whether it be parking or zoning or or um I think that's going to be you're letting yourself in for um a lot of complications for probably um minimal benefit. um I would guess. Um so again, and that also has to do with um becoming uh more integrated into the community. Um I spent a lot of time in Southern California. In Southern California, there is weight. You have to wait to get to a charging station often. So I'd like to see some signage to make sure that there's no waiting. Um which hopefully is that more people drive these cars and you get more business.

you know, that's kind of a, you know, might be a problem in the future. Um, um, we haven't talked about this at all, but, um, I'm assuming that there's, um, there's two curb cuts, um, right? And that there's going the traffic is going to go one way in, only one way in and one way out. um or that's something that needs to be looked at or or that's something I'm suggesting that um all the traffic go in one direction um but we haven't talked about it. And lastly, which I don't know whether or not you care about this, but just for um Commissioner Borenstein, I have said since the day I came on this commission, one business does not a neighborhood node make. Um I don't think just because there's one thing there, it's a neighborhood node. So, I'm completely in agreement with you on that and I think we would have to it's my feeling that we would have to um call it something else. That's my comments.

I just to build on that a little bit. The I agree with the comments that have been made about it not feeling like a neighborhood node. So, I looked at the other potential things you could call it that are already in the comprehensive plan. I looked at uh mixeduse center. I looked at community activity center and none of them really feel any better because at the end of the day I feel like the problem is not what it's called but that it's only one parcel. So the only way you could make it fit would be to have it be the same as the parcels around it. So for me that's a at this point an unsolvable problem and I think we're just going to have to get used to calling it something that feels a little silly. Um I'd much rather have it be medium density residential but that doesn't seem to be in the cards either. So, at some point, I guess we have to move on. And um and so I'm in favor of a of a comprehensive plan comprehensive plan amendment to make a neighborhood node for the lack of a better thing to call it. The for the applicants, um I want to uh foot stomp the comments that have already been made about doing what you can to make this a community resource. Um I'm very concerned about light. So, if the mini canopies can serve the customer well and also create less light, I'd be I would I would encourage that. And also, the fact that it's a very small lot probably would make one lean in that direction anyway, but that's not um an area of expertise for me. So, just something to think about. Also very concerned about the 24-hour nature of it. The lighting and the 24-hour nature of it are allowed. So, it's not that That's what gas stations are. So, that's the way it's going to be. But, I'd look for um I'd encourage you to find ways to minimize concerns of neighbors overnight

from all kinds of things, whether it's noise or I don't know what what what kinds of things they would be concerned about or you you would probably in a better position to anticipate that than uh than we would. That's it. Right. I've already understood it. Thanks.

I've already spoken quite a bit on this topic and and I'm not going to rehash the the concerns I had, but I I again uh I don't think there's a better use that we've seen so far. I mean, this is obviously almost a like forlike use. And um I in my mind it makes the most sense of anything we've seen. I encouraged by what you're you're showing here. And I think it it would work. I think we just need to be cognizant of some of the things that we've we've discussed here tonight and and be uh um obviously super um you know listen to the the community as much as you can because there's a lot of uh a lot of neighbors right there and uh but but being you know Kevin Keys did have a gas gas pumps there a number of years ago uh they've been removed quite a while back but uh going from a gas pump to a electric pump seems uh seems like it makes sense to me. I don't really have a comment on the neighborhood node concept, but it seems like that's probably the way we end up going on that. That's all I have. Thank you.

All right. Thank you. So, I'll keep it short and maybe I'll depart quite a bit. Um, just currently I I feel like maybe no matter what you could provide on this, I don't know if it'll get my support. I just find myself asking like it needs this, it needs that, it needs this exception, it needs this concession to like really win my support, especially compared to what has been proposed here previously. And again, this is a comprehensive plan amendment. So the reminder to all of us and the community is like this has our utmost discretion to either make something work or make it if it doesn't make sense to you for a variety of reasons. I just feel like our comprehensive plans bringing us a different way in the future and at least in terms of what we're trying to solve with small area plans is providing say neighborhood nodes places for people to gather and come together. And a lot of what was presented previously did win majority support, but again, this will require a supermajority vote for the council to approve. So 4 to one. And I I just for me like it's it's the chance to have a community gathering place here even in the slightest and this doesn't quite provide enough of that even in even with the sea store option. Um, I think just kind of like Commissioner Smith mentioned, I mean, regardless if this is deemed a neighborhood node, it is a singular small site. So, it seems like it it ought to at least in line with that serve the adjacent neighborhood like is prescribed. This is a type of use that does not seem that it's serving primarily the adjacent neighborhood. I think most people there are charging at their homes or they go

elsewhere like when they're shopping and I think this is creating a national chain to build something to bring regional traffic through there and I I just don't see the business making sense otherwise. But if this does get supported uh there a variety of recommendations I have for the business and the site some of which were echoed. If it were one of the three options, it'd be the sea store option. I'd support um limiting the hours instead of 247. Um opening it during the day to anyone and then even figuring out like if a kid walks in. I mean, I guess they'd have to have a credit card, too, and walk in to get something. Something to make it more accessible for people in the neighborhood to go and use it. Um, in terms of the site, the navigation, uh, previous proposals kind of heeded our advice and did what Commissioner Padilla mentioned. It was a one-way traffic starting on the west side to enter. So, if for some reason you're re-entering the site, you're coming out and turning right without crossing traffic. Recommend that. recommend um like other have proposed an outdoor seating area um losing some of the backup for the hidden trash um but creating some sort of patio or outdoor seating space for people to enjoy a nice summer day versus sitting inside. Uh this is the one block of Vernon that does not have a sidewalk on the north side. Every proposal previously has also provided a sidewalk. I don't see that at least drawn up. So I would fully expect others to um you know to kind of demand a sidewalk so that the rest of the the block is

connected. Right now there's no sidewalk there. So how do you get to the site if by foot? So we need to build that. um other landscaping things that have come up on previous proposals that were very important uh during sketch plan and the final approvals or denials I should say uh was like plenty of landscaping and buffer to that north side. So whether that is a fence or it's a fence with landscaping or both, however you can change the site um to accommodate that would be important. And that is all from me. And I guess I'd support the the mini canopies too, just to minimize the the effect to the neighbors. Anything else anyone has? Well, thank you very much for your presentation, your interest in Edina, and good luck to you. uh I guess harnessing our feedback and as well as the city councils and if you're back to propose uh official um application look forward to seeing you then.

All right. All right. Thanks everybody for taking the time. Look forward to working with you guys soon. Thanks. Thank you very much. Thank you. Bye-bye. Bye. All right. Next we have sketch plan review again number two for 420076th Street West. It's a retail warehouse drop offs for Salvation Army. Before we begin, I know one of the commissioners is likely going to bow. I just allow Commissioner Nelson to just

Yeah, I need to step out for this one. I'm uh just full disclosure I'm on the advisory board for the Salvation Army of the Twin Cities and uh have become aware of this project over the last uh 6 months and and and longer. So I'm just going to go sit in the audience at this point. Thank you. Thank you very much. All right, Commissioner or Planner Teague, take it away. [clears throat]

All right. Thank you, chair, members of the commission. So, [snorts] this site's located in the Greater South Dale District. It's on 76th Street west of France Avenue. It's right across the street from the new fire station. Uh the proposal here is to remodel the existing office building there for an 18,000 foot retail store and a 9,000 square foot warehouse for the Salvation Army. This project is unique really unlike anyone that we've had before us uh before in that the the proposed use a secondhand store that's larger than 2500 square feet is not allowed in any zoning district in the city. You could have a secondhand store but it has to be smaller than 2500 square feet. Not sure the reasoning that went into that but nonetheless that's the ordinance that's on the books. Additionally, retail sales as a primary use is not allowed in the industrial district. We do allow uh retail sales, but it's limited to um no more than 10% of the square footage of a building amongst other regulations. So this site again it the current zoning of the site is P planned industrial district which allows light industrial and office uses. It's before I move off this slide. So the speckled area is multif family residential to the north. This purple site here that's the AON apartment building that was recently built. And then again to the south is the new fire station. It's guided in our comprehensive plan for office and residential use. So primary uses within that land use category are offices, attached or multif family housing. Secondary uses include

limited retail and service uses, not big box retail. This wouldn't be considered a big box retail. It's typically in the 20 to 50,000 square foot range. I wouldn't classify that as a big box. So the existing building as shown on the screen here that would just be remodeled. So the front of the building would be the 18,000 square foot retail with the warehouse at the back. You can see the circulation pattern for people that wanted to drop things off could move through the building this way. looking at our zoning ordinance compliance table for the PID district. Putting aside the use issue, it would be compliant with uh all of our regulations there exly existing conditions. So, there's a lot of options for a formal application to discuss here. a resoning um an ordinance amendment and and a comprehensive plan amendment. A reszoning of the site from PI to possibly a commercial zoning district with a zoning ordinance amendment that would allow secondhand stores to exceed 2500 square feet in size. could be a comprehensive plan amendment to allow um to allow retail sales as a primary use uh in that o uh category in the comprehensive plan. So some of the things to consider and we can leave this up as as you're discussing uh consider by the planning commission. Should retail sales um secondhand stores be allowed in the industrial zoning district as a primary use? Is the site appropriate for commercial and retail zoning? Should the comprehensive plan be amended to allow retail as a primary use in the O district in that O land use category? And should the comprehensive plan be amended to reguide the site for commercial land use? So, there's a lot

there. I could stop and answer any questions you might have. Otherwise, uh the applicant has a presentation as well. Any quick questions for Carrie in regards to play by play to get there? Okay, we'll move on. Thank you all for coming. And [clears throat] I guess just to the applicant team, if you can come up, introduce yourselves and introduce the project. Happy to have you.

Good evening. Um, for the record, my name is Joe Becker with Carlson Partners, 6550 York Avenue, Dina. Um, we're here along with uh Salvation Army, um, to present this project. Um, and just to thank you guys all for being here this late. Um, I know it's gotten gotten quite up there now. Um but uh at the end of the day um at its core, this request is about redeveloping an underutilized and vacant building um to evolve uh to better serve uh the present- day community needs. Um from a community perspective, the surrounding area includes higher concentrations of residents who experience economic and transportation hardships um compared to Edina City proper. Um so essentially what we're trying to do uh is reinvest in the existing structure um that supports sustainable development practices um and ultimately is advancing a donationbased model. Um, the Salvation Army, uh, Sal, excuse me, the proposed family store contributes to the vitality of the France Avenue corridor, um, by activating the existing building, creating both full-time and part-time opportunities, um, and expanding affordability. Um, I think right now it would make most sense though for Tom Campfield to come up and just share a little bit more about the Salvation Army's organization, um, and the store's model itself. Good evening everyone. Thanks for allowing us to be here. My name is Tom Canfield and I'm with the Salvation Army Adult Rehabilitation Center and we're located in downtown Minneapolis in the North Loop. And the reason why I tell you that is because really what this is about is the rehabilitation center. We offer long-term rehabilitation, residential rehabilitation for people who struggle with drug and alcohol

addictions, substance abuse, and all disaffiliation from society. And it's a free program. Anyone can come like someone could come there today and we would intake them into our program at no cost. There would be no insurance, no government funds. We fully self-fund the program. And how we fund this program is through the generous donations of people who give us clothes and household items and furniture and we sell them in our thrift stores. We have had approximately tens of thousands of people donate from Edina into other locations or we have you know uh driven our trucks to pick up donations from people in Edina. Edina is generous to the Salvation Army and that's why we're here today is because we would like to put a uh production and retail operation to serve the community of Edina not only in a sustainable way but also to help people who suffer from addiction. If you have any questions for me I'm able to answer them.

Thank you very much. Any questions? Thanks for coming tonight. Just was curious the uh I think Value Village is an ARC facility at Penn and 66 or is that not related to you? That's not related to us. Okay. That's another great organization that does does the same industry though. Thanks. Thank you. Thank you. I guess is that is that all for the presentation just to be clear?

Yeah, I think for us we're really trying to just open a conversation and a dialogue with all of you guys here today um to kind of just see how we can get a Salvation Army family store within the city of Edina. Um particularly this site is of great interest to us um given a lot of the uh economic factors around it. Uh before open it up to questions, could you just speak to kind of the history of this site and again maybe in terms like reiterating why this site is the best site for this?

Yeah. Um from a from a history perspective on the building itself, um it was formerly occupied by LVC, which is a fire protection uh company. Um LVC has since vacated um over a year ago and since then the site has sat vacant. Um for us as the Salvation Army uh we've been targeting the uh city of Edina for quite some time now. Um, and as we look at the city of Edina as a whole, there's a lot of higher cost retail centers that are out there, and we would love to go into those, but oftent times there's the cost barrier as well as a second zoning kind of restriction that's not actually zoning, but landlord use restrictions tied to the use itself. Um, so as we're trying to navigate both that and zoning ordinances, um, this has been a site that has kind of come up as greatly of interest to us. I don't know if that answered your question.

Yeah. No, thanks. I think it just teased it up. Also, really appreciate the presentation and your interest. I'll just open it to fellow commissioners for questions, comments, feedback for staff and for you. Just maybe we'll save the feedback for the end. Kind of like the last one. just stick to questions and general comments right now. Okay,

thank you for the uh presentation. Um my question is just more around the operation and you know what to expect in this location. There was a great map that was up before that shows the traffic pattern. I don't know if director T or someone could could share that particular slide. Here we go. Yeah. So, if I'm looking at this carefully here, um there is some crossover at the be at the at the opening of that site there. you see where the red and the green lines kind of cross over, but that you know hopefully um I'm assuming that's not going to be too much of an issue, but what's the volume you guys would project here? Um the amount of cars that would be coming through and I asked that because the fire station is right across the street, right? And that road could get quite busy sometimes. And if we have um more moving through tra, you know, traffic, uh it it could create uh just more volume on that street, it could might create some potential con congestion. Um so just what are your thoughts on the amount of vehicles you would expect to come through on a daily basis during your uh working hours? Yeah, I would defer to the Salvation Army from an actual vehicles per day, but from the actual stacking plan that we are projecting here, we actually kind of came in with a more conservative approach and added more cars than we projected to ever be within the stacking plan to potentially alleviate any sort of concern around blocking in the road for the fire station. The donation center would operate from

9:00 in the morning until 9:00 in the evening. And we would expect approximately on average 50 cars per day. We also um our main location in downtown Minneapolis is adjacent and next door to a fire station right now. We have no issues working uh with them. They're some of our best customers to be honest with you. And um but we have great communication with them. We see we've seen no uh uh issues with our traffic impeding on what they need to do.

Gotcha. And um I'm comparing this to the Goodwill site in St. Louis Park. I don't know if you guys are familiar with that site. Um but some sometimes it it it takes so long to drop something off and and get through there. Um, but is this going to operate very similar where someone has items to donate, they drive through, the doors open, they remove it, and they may get like a card to say, "I've donated," and then they and then they leave. So that cycle time is usually like what in your estimation would would that be? How long would someone sit to donate something and then exit the site? Currently, our busiest donation center receives about 500 donors per week. So, that's under a 100 cars per day. We've seen uh in in that location, it has two doors to drive through. Um so, uh wait times can be three to four cars stacked at one at one point, maybe five minutes to wait. We would uh stack all cars in the parking lot of the building, not on the street, not in trafficways, and we don't anticipate that there would be any congestion on 76.

Thank you. Just one more question. The retail space, um what's the range you would say of products being sold? I'm guessing it's not just clothing, but it might be housewares. It might be, you know, very similar to like a Goodwill site, right? So, anything that is in there, not food usually. No food. Okay. So, that's regular retail. Similar to our Goodwill type retail facility.

We try to operate at 60% of our income, 50 to 60% being wearables or clothing. We would offer all array of household items from pots and pans to dishes, electronic kitchen items, things like that. uh shoes, uh domestics, linen, bedspreads, things like that, furniture, and um accessories, uh shirts and ties, you know, hats and purses, bags, things like that. Thank you. You're welcome.

Sorry, I might have you come back up. Um, can you tell me about the relative size of this one versus the one down at the gas station or some of your others? And if this size um would um affect how like could you have more household goods or furniture here versus clothing? I mean, that's what I want to get a feel for, like how you would use this one versus some of the other ones. The size of the building is exactly what we're looking for. We like between 25 and 27,000 square feet. Uh reason being is we need to have an area of production. So when items come in, they get separated by department. We have multiple people processing um in those locations. Uh, this sits at not our would not be our largest store. Um, but it would be in the top onethird of of large stores. Our closest store in Bloomington is 18,000 square feet total has 13,000 square feet on a show floor. So, this would significantly increase the amount of items that we could offer.

Okay. and our background studies of where our donors come from. And there's so many people donating from Adina that we would expect um that we just offer more product simply. Okay. Thank you. Before you sit down, can I ask another question? I didn't want you to have to do like gymnastics here. [snorts]

Um, operationally, can you tell me a little bit about how you call your inventory as it ages? Um, and how um you keep the uh quality of the products attractive enough so that you are still getting the clientele um to come and shop the way you'd like.

It's a a broader multi-store business scheme. Okay. So, when donations come in and they're processed and they're put on the floor, processing simply means that um it's sellable, it's usable for someone, and then we place a color tag on that item. And we operate in five different colors. So, that um for four, I'm sorry, four different colors on the floor at one time. So, for three weeks, it's offered at full price, then it goes to half off and we hope to sell it in that location. If it does not sell, it's pulled off the sales floor. It's moved to a location downtown that sells by weight to the public at a $169 or $189 a pound. And um if it doesn't sell there, it may get moved to another thrift store. Our whole objective is to place these items at a good cost into people's hands who need them or would use them because um really the uh antithesis to thrift is doing what the donor didn't do would be throwing it away. Our biggest competitor really isn't Goodwill or Ark Value Village. Our biggest competitor is the landfill. more people are throwing shoes and clothes into landfills and we happen to be able to keep, you know, millions of pounds of that out of the landfill every year. So, it's a rotation of product. We're very diligent about the rotation. Thousands of items come to a show onto the show floor every day in one location. At minimum in this location would be 3,000 new items every day. I hope that answers your question. No gymnastics, please. [laughter] So, just a follow-up question there. Um,

I love how uh Commissioner Hanaman touched on that. Uh, just to share a little bit more on the percentages, right? So, not everything that gets there is going to get um sold right away. So, you might be getting more inventory than you have exiting the site being sold, right? Um, and I'm guessing that excess inventory either has to get shipped to another location or frankly moved away in a garbage truck, right? Um, what is what is the the flow of or storage of of of things that you want to throw away and how does how is how does that get managed? like how many times would a truck or a garbage truck or a service vehicle pass through the site to remove things that that wouldn't sit at this location.

The way we operate the business right now, we don't uh have any garbage trucks who come to any of our stores. Most of what we get donated ends up in a retail setting or in a by the pound setting or an e-commerce setting. Now, with that being said, there are items that come that are broken that we cannot use. They get loaded onto one of our trucks and get taken into uh downtown Minneapolis where we have a much more efficient uh system to handle garbage. [clears throat] Thank you. You're welcome.

A question. Yeah, I had just a couple. So, um, how come the model is to to have the warehouse attached to a retail or like not attached to but like a warehouse and a retail operation in one structure? I mean, if stuff's especially if products getting rotated all around different locations. I'm just curious because it seems like that that creates some issues with like the zoning code and the comp plan and everything like that that we're bumping into. Why why is it that that's that's the model as opposed to like, you know, there's a drop off center one place and then there's a retail location somewhere else. I'm just curious.

Simply transportation costs. Okay.

Um we had that model uh years ago in the 70s, a little bit before my time, and uh everything was processed in downtown Minneapolis. And unfortunately uh thrift well fortunately thrift has evolved so much since then and people demand a higher quality product. They demand um a wider variety of product and certain cities and certain customers who visit our stores like certain things. Um, to give you an example, um, you know, hunting gear sells really good in Elk River. It's not so much in downtown Minneapolis. So, the community gives up what the community wants. We avoid transportation costs and we get to control the quality much better when it comes out onto the floor. We have local people from that community who work in the store. They understand what the community wants. they can respond to the community needs better. To the zoning point, it is only Dina that we're struggling with the zoning. Everywhere else we've opened a store, um, everywhere we've tried to open a store, there's been not the use restrictions that we're seeing here and that's why we're here tonight.

Got it. And then what are some of those landlord use restrictions that you said? Sure. just that you bump into some when you try to go into other spots. Yeah. Um all around Southdale everywhere and built into their leases there's a clause that says um in this building no resale. And typically that's because they're selling the same brands brand new and we're selling them used at a much discounted price. We don't want the competition. Got it. Okay. Thanks.

Great questions. Any other questions either for staff or the applicant? All right. I guess we'll just maybe go down one at a time just general feedback if you have any. We'll start this way.

All right. I'll start. Got it. Uh first, thanks for coming tonight and thanks for all that you do for people. It's really important and I appreciate that a lot. This was a really interesting one and um get a a surprising amount of use diversity in the area around this uh area around this parcel. I've driven through it a thousand times and it never even struck me until you look at some of the materials that were provided in the package and say, "Wow, that's really different." And it's an industrial district. But, uh, and there's some things that don't seem very industrial really. But then when you dig into our code, you find that, uh, planned industrial district includes allows anything that's allowed in a planned office district. And that's how some of those things come about. And that's why it's so diverse. But the important thing that I learned was that all of it that we see around this parcel today is allowed under our current zoning. Uh they're not anomalies. They're just the way we've chosen to develop that area. I think a person might have a different opinion about like if you really wanted to preserve industrial, which I think we do as a city, you might have a different zoning code than we do right now because we're allowing a lot of things to seep seep into industrial districts. But that's the way that's the way we've set it up. Uh so as much as I admire the work of this organization, I just don't see a rationale or a benefit to the city um to reszone or change a comprehensive plan for this one parcel. I just can't find a way to do it. As much as I admire the work that you do, thanks

Um, I think this is an example of, you know, a round peg in a square hole kind of a thing. This is this is a a one-off project compared to what we usually do. Um, I I support it, however, because I think that it um because it is a one-off and it just it kind of doesn't fit. I think it's good use of this particular property. Um I think the driving pattern um what you've delineated here is kind of the best that it can be. Um there's so many adjacent properties in this in this is a changing neighborhood which is has all kinds of different zoning to begin with in a quarter of a mile radius. Number one. Number two that we've got a lot of buildings in there that are what 60 years old you know 70 years old that you know as much as we keep the zoning in mind and that's where we are starting our thoughts from we need to also be thinking about what's happening with this neighborhood what's happening with these properties um so I think this is um a good use of the property and you've got a great start here last thing I do I I think we need to just make sure that it's not uh spot zoning and that that isn't any kind of an issue. So, um I don't know if we need to just look at that more and I don't know if there's anything we can do and I'm kind of gunshy on the spot zoning thing because of what's gone on, but um I think we need to be comfortable around the spot zoning issue.

Yeah, thank you for the presentation and answering all of our questions. This is a tough one because on the one hand, I do think the model works for this location, the the uh economics, the location, the site, it makes sense. And I don't think there is a thrift store donation setup close by in the diner. I think the closest one for me at least, I go to St. Louis Park. Um, and I'm there all the time. In fact, I might be going there tomorrow because it's in my car today. um a lot of shirts and everything.

Um so I think that it it makes sense. I think too the location makes sense. Um the one thing I'm not clear about is the reason why we have industrial zone and the rest of the city is that the business cycle is a little bit different in an industrial type location than a regular retail location. And when the market kind of goes down in one area, you want to have your industrial zone production keep afloat. So it could help balance out any kind of shifts in the market. Right? This was a manufacturing site from what I could tell before. And so that kind of made sense for this location, right? But now that they've left, we have no revenue generation coming out of this site, right? So that's kind of a huge gap and it could be put to good use. This actually makes sense for this location. um the use case, the business case and frankly residents of of of a dinina would be really good clientele because of the quality and that's why Green Drop was was even looking at that same site we were talking about earlier, right? Is because the quality of the material that they get to resale is of a high value and so the return on investment is pretty good. The challenge of course now for us is to think through what is the impact of allowing this here and the rest of this region right if we allow commercial uh in this area and we don't want spot zoning but I don't see how else we could make this work if we don't do some kind of spot zoning type of a situation unless we open up the entire region then that could create more questions right some folks who, you know, unless you're buying chocolate, right? Other sites would start doing retail in that area, which might cause some kind of imbalance

over time. And so, I like the business. I like the model. I'm trying to think about how could I make this work given the current zoning. I'm leaning towards something that could make exploring more how the zoning could work for this site. and and um I don't know the technical details of how to do that in the right way, but I'm really positive on what you guys are trying to do in this location. And so that's kind of what I have at this time. [snorts] Yeah, kind of similar initial [clears throat] reactions as everybody else. Really worthy business. Super interesting, actually. Thanks for describing how it worked. I learned a lot about something I didn't know anything about before you came here. Um, I think just I don't know exactly how I feel about all the different options you laid out yet, Gary. There I think there were four of them. They're all different. Um, each one involved some Yeah. kind of complex maybe planning changes in in general. I think the tough thing about these types of proposals is it puts us in a I I don't I just And with the other one too, I I just don't love the idea of like PLA planning being reacting to single proposals from businesses that we think are like the most worthy ones out there. and then doing these sort of like oneoff planning cartwheels to either change the comp plan on one site or change the zoning or give to just to make it work because we love the business and we think it would be good for the city to have. That's just where I'm struggling. I think it would be better for I mean it seems like maybe this area needs a second [laughter] look. Um, is there a way to simplify either the code or is, you know, does the comp plan need to be changed in a way more broadly to make it easier for people to kind of just come

in there? Um, generally, so I don't I don't have an opinion yet about which one of the paths um, you know, you laid out might work or whether support that or not. Just in general, prefer to not do planning by reacting to single proposals. Um, and then just like changing the trying to change the zoning or the comp plan on a one-off basis. Um, interesting to hear that you're not bumping into other planning restrictions though elsewhere. That's that's interesting and I think worth giving some additional thought to as to why you're bumping into those in Dina. Also, the structure is like super industrial looking to me. Um, it doesn't it's like off the street. there's this like uh there's like this moonscape of a parking lot that kind of wraps around it. Um it's kind of an ugly building. It doesn't have great windows. It doesn't have a awesome street presence. And in some ways, like it's not the best structure for a retail operation. Um and it makes sense that it's not because it it wasn't designed to be that in the first place. So, so I don't have I don't have a fully formed view that I think considering something proposed by you guys is going to require a lot more planning thought, but kind of torn between super worthy business would be great to have. It's annoying to have to sit in that line by the LA Fitness. I mean, that is awful every time. That thing's the worst. Um, and when it when it's icy, it's even worse. You should have seen how many people just crashed into each other at that spot um about two weeks ago. And it would be great to have something like this in Adina. We just have to be I think a little bit more thoughtful about changes that we make to to the zoning or the comp plan um to to maybe do it in a more compreh like comprehensive way that that makes it easier for people to come in instead of just being being reactive. So

initial reaction um I think before you come back the next time I'll give more thought to the specific options and have a view about which one might be best if there's one that would work.

I also think you're a very worthy business and appreciate everything you do. Um, I've always wondered why Adina doesn't have a thrift store. Um, I've been thrifting for like 50 years and I think a lot more people are as well and a lot more people are interested in that closed loop cycle system. um and not just for um and not just for thrift but but as a way of life. So I don't so I don't understand why Dina isn't a part of that too and why we can't find a way to kind of make that happen here. I was just um in a place um with my daughter over the holidays where we were walking down streets and there was uh bye-bye the bag right next to a cafe right next to uh magic store right next to I mean it was there's no difference. I don't I don't see now why there's a difference between retail and secondhand. I I think society has changed so much that in the past 50 years that there's no um difference between the two. So I so I think it's it's how do we get retail into an industrial area? We do have an industrial area that we want to keep which is Kill. This one has changed a lot. The Fred is there. There's a lot of apartments building there. There are a lot of young kids living in these apartment buildings and and um you know it's not just the affordable housing. There are a lot of people that are struggling to make ends meet and would rather spend you know 10 or 20 or $25 on a sweater than $200 on a sweater. Um so I I would love to figure out some way to

make this happen here because I don't see why it isn't. And you know, like right across the street there's an LA Fitness just like there is here and just used for a gym and this could just be used for retail and I don't know. I would love to find some way to make this happen. So I support it. Carrie, did you want to elaborate on the comment earlier about commercial districts?

Well, I I think the comment was they're having trouble finding a commercial property in Edina. most I haven't did any research but from my experience it seems most Goodwills Salvation Armies are located in commercial commercially zoned districts not industrial so I think that's the that's the issue there

well I I did do a lot of a little bit not a lot of a little bit of research because when I read that a secondhand retailer can't exist anywhere in our city if it's over 2500 ft um square feet. I bristled at that that that seemed very privileged in a biased way that I I didn't like. Um one of the things that we don't do currently that I think some of our neighboring cities do do is we don't allow less intense uses in um in zone districts. So we don't allow certain kinds of commercial in industrial. We don't allow residential and commercial. And I I I had a couple of questions for for Carrie really. Is is a PUD an option here or can we just say secondhand as a category is allowed in industrial without opening the can of worms of office commercial?

Yeah. To [clears throat] me it it does open a can of worms. Say we were to um amend the ordinance to allow secondhand stores in the industrial district. Well, it's a as on the screen here, it's a 18,000 square foot retail store. If another retailer that doesn't sell secondhand goods wants to go into that into the industrial district, is there a real distinction between a the operation is the same whether they're selling new clothes or new items or secondhand?

Does the warehouse or the uh job creation training program give us a different angle than I don't know if GAP wanted to go in there? Well, that that that could be the challenge. Say a gap wants to go in there. City, you allow secondhand stores. It's a retail business. How is that really any different?

I mean, because they can go in commercial, right? And right now, this can't go anywhere.

Correct. As I said in the staff memo, staff would support amending the ordinance to allow secondhand stores of any size in a commercial district that this might be, you know, we've had a lot of discussion about this whole O area. Um, this would be a great area for us to look at when we start the comprehensive plan likely next year. Um maybe this whole area gets labeled something dis different where this type of uh retail uses might be appropriate in this area because it is it is different from the industrial park over in Cahill.

So how are the other office uses or commercial uses in LA? I'm just looking at one of the slides. you know, the LA Fitness or Pristine Detail, there's a eyelash place. How do those work in industrial functionally differently?

Yeah, because they are listed as a permitted use fitness facility. Um, those are permitted uses in the office district, which translates to the industrial district. And so across the parking lot there's a med spa uh and that's allowed because it's uh medical. It's medical. I don't know the exact uses that are going on there, but um it seemed to be more when you went on the website more of a salon.

I I I don't know that business. Okay. how they how they got in there.

Yeah, I guess I think we all sort of agree that this seems like a good use of the space. Within that one block, you've got POD1, POD2, PUD, and P and a bunch of different uses. It feels like maybe this is a um crafting of allowed uses dilemma versus a zone. I mean, I guess I to the spot zoning comment earlier. I don't understand why it can't stay industrial and preserve that as the underlying zoning and have a warehouse and the manufacturing of products from the trash can that they got or the garbage bag that they got brought in into onto this to the

that's one of the options that they could pursue. That's all I have.

Thank you. really appreciate all of you being here tonight. This is something definitely the community is lacking and likely desires. Um could you bring up the slide with the map that Commissioner Hanaman was mentioning that had shows all the the variety of the uses around the site? Yeah, they're right there.

Yeah, if you if you look at this at Well, keep this one up. This is the one I want.

If you look at this as well as the zoning map, there is quite a mixture of zoning right around this area. Um yet it seems pretty common that mo like most of these things highlighted are like retailer service in some way where you're going there and using a service um where like the use that's proposed in the nature it's proposed seems to fit right in line with all of this stuff. Um, I think just in general caution against spot zoning that that would be like if that Kevin Keys site were residential and we want to turn it into a restaurant or a gas station, like something by itself out of the blue, nothing else around it relative to it. Here, here we have a variety of different zoning and uses that all kind of match the guidance, at least as far as I'm concerned, with the comprehensive plan and how we want this area to unfold. It's breathing new life into older buildings. And [clears throat] so, I'd support it that way. And then I guess in response to kind of, you know, the unfortunate nature of like us reacting to this, I think this is actually like a perfect reason why we exist. I mean, our zoning has these weird anomalies within it. And unless you're super proactive and might know that, hey, we need some more secondhand stores in this city of a certain size, I don't think anyone's really thinking ahead of that until someone's trying to propose it and is come is coming up against a wall. I guess in terms of that RA, I I don't we don't know the history of the rationale, but 2500 ft is similar to like the size of this room that we're sitting in. So it's a pretty pretty small pretty small

space. So whatever that was geared for, it doesn't seem at least to anyone of us that would have discretion to make these changes like relevant anymore. Maybe someone could find a rationale behind it. But I think whatever you would have to do most I guess easily from like a a planning perspective like what makes us the cleanest will be something I support. And I guess one thing to think about is anytime we make these changes to a particular zone is it applies indefinitely and like basically applies over all the existing zones that has that too. So we just have to be aware like whatever we change it isn't just for this site, it's for all future and current sites too. So, I I don't see an issue with expanding the the retail store sizing over 2500 square feet and just not having a limit. But you have a bunch of different options like what what does staff really feel like is the best one. So, we can kind of leave on a note of a little more unity than

Yeah, this is a difficult one because I'm not sure staff would support any of those options. Um, you know, we'd have to look into it in a little more detail to address the the spot zoning issue. You know, one of the criteria is creating a land use that dramatically reduces the values of properties around it. This would dramatically increase

if you're going to allow retail in that district. Um, so we might be able to get around that spot zoning issue if we were to reszone that to a commercial use. It's possible. And then I guess we would just want to be prepared with what type of, you know, relevant changes might be accommodated with that elsewhere. Like what is that opening the door for that we just need to be prepared for? Yeah, it would be more for this district and for the comp plan, we could amend that to allow retail as a primary use. Um, [clears throat] it doesn't in making that change, it doesn't obligate the city to reszone a parcel to commercial if you don't think it's a good fit. So, that might be the that might be the cleanest path. I don't want to guarantee that that's would be the staff recommendation, but might be a path would [clears throat] be to amend the code to allow the um secondhand stores at any size not have that limit. Reszone the site to some type of commercial. um assuming we're not creating a spot zoning issue. And then amend the comprehensive plan to allow retail uses as a primary use in the office residential land use category in the comprehensive plan.

That's the part where you confuse me. Why why do we have to do that in the comp plan if it's commercial? Why do we have to amend the office residential? Because right now retail as a primary use is not allowed in the office residential land use category in the comp plan. Could because this is in the South Dell district. Could we do that just for the South Dell district and not others?

Yeah. So the office residential um there is also landg guided office residential in other Lincoln London area is an area where it's office residential so it would have impacts there that's why we need to really think this through certainly and and just I mean logically to any resident who might be looking at this area like if that was Salvation Army right now and you look at all all the uses around it. It it it just doesn't stand out as something that why is this here? I just I just I don't see it. And and some of that is like rectifying the code. Like some of this is complicated because of the provision of not a secondhand store over a certain size, not retail is a primary use. So, I mean, it's the nature of their business and like it gets back to the comprehensive plan of like what we're trying to accommodate in the city is, you know, more mixed use. I mean, when you think of what this is, it's it's like a production facility and a retail facility. That's kind of like what we're trying to accommodate in our city. And we don't necessarily have the best zoning to reflect something like this cleanly. So, it's going to be messy no matter what. Yeah,

you know, just to add to that, right? Like if we think down the road, um, and this turns out to a commercial and we allow commercial as a primary use, you know, let's just say LA Fitness doesn't do so well and GAP wants to come into that location, then they would be allowed to do that, right? To create com complete commercial in a much larger site um than what's there. So from an impact perspective, right, we just got to think about what if scenarios, right? What if this happens with these current businesses and new things coming here that's now purely commercial? How does that change the nature of that region?

I guess that's why I'm still like in my brain struggling that this that a secondhand store feels akin to sort of a brewery that sells um sells their product as well, right? They're sort of taking something and really repackaging it for consumption in a in a different way than than a GAP would where right I I guess to me the warehouse component and the sorting and the that there's something there that feels different than Southdale commercial or 50th in France commercial just the retail is larger than right the bottling or packaging you know a lot of retail does well when it has a lot of foot traffic.

Mhm. You know, if you're looking for a red sweater, you're going to go to the mall.

Yeah. To five different stores until you find the right red sweater. Um, people that do thrift here in the US versus other countries like have to go to the place. And for me, having the thrift store next to South Dell is just the best ever because it's closing the loop for everybody that shops there. Having that and um having that having that stuff be able to re recycle somewhere within the community close by. I don't know. For me, it's a good fit.

Yes. One quick question, Carrie. As we've we're going through the comprehensive plan update coming soon, as well as like zoning cleanup or just the code, I mean, has there been some some different type of zoning designation that's like one version of that that one of these consultants have seen that kind of speaks to this kind of multi-use where it's like PCD 5 and it has this specific thing? I I'm just asking because this seems like a common thing you would see elsewhere and what is limiting this in our city is purely the size of the secondhand store.

It it is the initial part of it as well as those private covenants that seem to be out there. Yeah. Yeah. As I mentioned, staff would definitely support the doing away with the MA with the 2500 square foot rule.

Okay. Any Yeah, Commissioner Aler just feel the need to clarify something really quickly. The My concern was not about the 2500 feet thing. I totally agree that that's something that we should change. It doesn't make sense to distinguish between that and other forms of retail. My concern was about zoning this parcel commercially different than everything that's around it.

So can you that's staff's concern as well. [laughter] Um can you speak a little bit about Mr. Honan's idea of allowing lesser uses in an industrial allowing retail uses less intense uses in a industrial like industrial that's another possibility but it opens it up for other retail use

a clarifying question like in some ways this map shows less intense uses in an industrial zone because office I mean that's probably why office is allowed about an industrial because it's typically a less intense use. So what other I mean retail can be less intense. It could also be much more intense. So I I'm not I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm just asking for clarification. Yeah. No, I guess uh the retail is is is the the lynchpin word. If you lump this kind of business model in with all other retail business models,

the concern staff has is industrial property, office property is generally not as expensive as commercial properties. If we open it up for retail uses in those districts, the retailers will come because we get a lot of calls about, you know, can this type of business open up in the industrial district or the office district. We get a lot of those calls. So can I ask because a part of this business is um the taking of goods and separating them and sorting them and preparing them for retail. The warehouse part of this

they could go in there today without the retail. Okay. But that part of it is different than other retail stores. Yeah. Where's the definition of retat? I would have to look that up. I don't know off the top of my head. I I think we've had a lot of discussion about this and I don't know if we're we've given a lot of ideas. Well, it seems like it's maybe nothing that has to do with the applicant team. Correct. No, it's about what the other what would the other what's the cleanest way to

fix the problem that you know this type of applicants having a hard time finding a place to be in our city and then also what would be all the other consequences intended or not of the type of cartwheels we might need to you know do to to change things around if you're talking about changing zoning changing the comp plan and amending ordinances you know just to make so what how does that what does the blast radius look like across this area of the city, but and I just don't think we know the answer yet. So, that analysis could probably be done on like what the one or two cleanest options would be and that would maybe inform the discussion a little bit, but the cleanest way to do it is through the comprehensive plan and looking at the entire district and looking at the ordinance. This this oneoff trying to make this fit is difficult. Another area, another area of the city that deserves another look from a comp plan perspectives been identified. It sounds like Yeah. Any other questions or comments? I guess I'd just encourage staff to keep looking at it, especially in in preparation for city council to look at this. Maybe if there is something cleaner, they might have some other feedback or something we haven't thought about. Anything else? Anyone? No. Thank you. Good luck. Hope it works out. Hope to see you again soon. All right, that is it for our two reports and recommendations. Then on to chair and member comments. Commissioner, you can join us.

Any other any comments by Yeah. Commissioner Felt? I just wanted to mention a few months ago I was at dinner at the Galleria and then I drove around the north side of the our house which um with the remodel we did that um setback variances for the our house. But um I drove around at night. Um we put that additional road in between the underground parking and the parking lot outside of Big Bull. If Big Bull is still there. No, it's is it Big Bull? I don't know.

Pittsburgh. No, on the north side. Um but it really opened up all of the glass really opened up makes it for a very friendly facade and it was very easy to navigate around the north side and I thought that turned out really well. So, I'm glad that that happened. Thanks for sharing. It's always good to revisit, you know, changes whether they're fully supported or not. It's good to see good change happen. Any other comments? Commissioner Smith?

Yeah, just a quick comment based on the last meeting, last review we we just did as we go into this comp plan review process. Um, we going to have to talk about a lot of what if scenarios and I'm not sure if the city has resources or or anything that can help with modeling modeling what the future would look like if we take certain paths. That would be really super valuable to say if if we if we if we make this decision this way, here's what our future city would look like in this path because it's just going to be what we think at the time, right? I'm just thinking about how could we model what the future would look like based on decisions today. And I know that's really hard to say and to think about, but I can't think really clearly about if we make a decision today, what is that going to look like tomorrow? Right? Retail for example, if we change the whole area, what's that look like tomorrow without some kind of model?

Thank you. Any other comments? All right, staff. Uh, just quickly the update from council. So, the daycare that you considered at your last meeting, um, it has not gone to council yet. That goes next week. So, they'll hold the public hearing and then they'll make a decision February 3rd. The last announcement is Liz Olsen, our administrative specialist. Today was her last day. She's gone back to her former employer, so we wish her the best in her position. She's going to be tough to replace. Certainly.

Um, any update on Macy's property? They pulled permits yet. Have they closed? They've not closed on the property yet.

Motion to adjurnn. Second. All those in favor? I so move meeting has been adjourned. Thank you.

That was a long What you Okay. Yeah. I just realized we didn't even acknowledge everything. I know. I know. Two more people shot today like while during our meeting here in Minneapolis. Mhm. Yep. Not non fatal. here in the Twin Cities, Minneapolis.

Yeah. Went faster than I thought it was. We started at like what we started at like quarter to nine. I was like, "Oh my god, I can't do this." No, cuz I drove this morning. All right. Hopefully