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• • Gordon Heitke January 28, 2008 Page 7 of 13 Council shall direct staff to do a feasibility study "once the public improvements have been initiated" under Section 8.04. However, under Section 8.04 the Council will have already ordered the feasibility study. Section 8.05 suggests that the council must take a second action to order the feasibility study. Moreover, the reference to staff is inappropriate (or requires a definition), as feasibility studies may be undertaken by consultants instead of (or in cooperation with) staff. The practical problem is that the list of items to be included in the feasibility study may not be available at this early stage in the process -- especially clause 2 (changes in appearance) and clause 5 (the assessment per lot). Chapter 429 now requires that the methodology of spreading assessments must be available at the improvement hearing, but the actual dollar amount per lot may depend on many factors that are unknown at the feasibility stage. Subdivision 2. This subdivision calls for the feasibility study to address various alternatives in any case where more than a "single public improvement" is proposed. As in other portions of the Commission Amendment, the major difficulty with this approach is that compliance will be difficult (if not impossible) to determine with certainty. There is no guidance as to what constitutes a "single public improvement," and what combinations or alternatives must be considered. This provision would invite claims that the feasibility study did not describe all possible alternatives or all possible combinations, or that a "single public improvement" was not really single and therefore the alternative scenarios should have been triggered. If the proposal calls for multiple improvements, and every possible combination must be addressed, the total number of combinations increases almost exponentially —it is possible that literally dozens of options must be addressed, each with a full scale feasibility analysis. A further problem is a mixture of practical and legal concerns. Some alternatives may be literally impossible, financially infeasible or not cost - effective. Examples might include a street -only project where utilities must be replaced, or a utilities -only project that would only be financially prudent as part of a street project. Assuming the provisions of Chapter 429 govern except as otherwise specified in the Charter (See Section 8.02 of the Commission Amendment), the engineer is required to advise whether the proposed improvement is necessary, cost - effective and feasible. The engineer may not be able to make such a certification for all alternatives, leaving a question whether an alternative not so certified should be submitted to the preference process under Section 8.07. Section 8.06. Public Hearing. This subdivision describes the public hearing process after completion of the feasibility study. There are two technical concerns. First, the language mixes specific charter provisions and state law, creating uncertainty as to what rules apply. The language calls for the hearing to be "at least two weeks away," and references a mailed notice, but does not specify a time period for the notice or reference a published notice. Under Minnesota Statutes, Section 429.031, subdivision 1, the notice must be published twice a week a part, and the hearing must be at least three days after the second publication. The mailed notice must be sent at least 10 days before the hearing. To avoid confusion, the notice provisions should explicitly reference this statute 327632v3 SJB LN140 -86