03/27/1995 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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The geographic implications of this flexibility is also limited. The City only has 52.2 acres of commercial zoned land within the designated shoreland areas (see Table E). This represents only 1.2 percent of the City's total Shoreland Overlay District. The City has 86.70 acres or 1.9 percent of the Shoreland Overlay District zoned industrial. The industrial zoned land is not directly abutting any lake surface. CITY CHARTER Lino Lakes is a charter city. The City Charter allows residents to refuse assessments for infrastructure improvements until such time as they made connection to the utility. This unique charter provision limits the City in its future utility planning and places the burden of costs for utility extension on the potential developments. The implications of reducing densities, as suggested by the State shoreland regulations, would reduce the critical mass of a developments falling within 1,000 feet of any protected lake or wetland necessary to make development projects financially feasible. Thus, the imposition of lower residential development densities in the City's shoreland areas compounds a pre-existing development obstacle. The fact that developers must bear both the cost of infrastructure improvements and comply with reduced development densities discounts the marketability of the City's developable shoreland areas. Obviously, this lies contrary to the City's development objectives of escalating the City's tax base and promoting infill orderly development. CONCLUSION The City agrees with the purpose and intent of the Shoreland Regulations and is willing to incorporate most of the State Shoreland Regulations into its local ordinance to protect and preserve its lake sources. However, the City is requesting flexibility in select areas of the Shoreland Regulations to accommodate sustained growth. We believe that the aforementioned physical and regulating constraints faced by the City are unique to Lino Lakes and warrant consideration of flexibility. The geographic application of the proposed flexibility will be limited to only 4.9 percent of the City Shoreland Overlay District. Additionally, Lino Lakes' current development regulations, the Local Water Management Plan and proposed adoption of the new shoreland performance standards reflect the City's commitment to the protection of the local lake resources by alternative performance standards. 10