Agenda Packets - 2007/02/12 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Item No: 7D Meeting Date: 02/12/07 Type of Business: CB City of Mounds View Staff Report To: Honorable Mayor and City Council From: Kurt Ulrich, City Administrator Item Title/Subject: Resolution 7018 Approving the Sufficiency of Petition in Opposition to the 2007-08 Street Improvement Project. Background: On Friday, February 9, 2007, staff proceeded with determining the validity of the petition against the 2007-08 Street Improvement Project submitted by Mary Lou, Anna, and Ella Schovanec. The petition contains the signatures of 169 households within the designated street improvement area. The project area contains a total of 328 units (properties) that were to be included in the project and assessed for the improvements. Based upon a number more than 50%, 165 properties would need to sign the petition for it to be sufficient. In order to validate the petition, staff printed the owner information for all of the parcels within the street improvement project area from the Ramsey County property records. Based on this list, staff was able to verify that 169 of the 212 signatures on the petition represented individual property owners. Two property owners have subsequently withdrawn their names (in writing) to bring the total to 167 signatures. Staff was unable to verify three additional signatures as the current property owners, based on County records that were current as of 1/17/07. It is probable that the people who signed the petition are in fact the property owners, but due to a recent purchase of the property have not yet been recorded in the public property records. One objection to the street improvement project (sent separately via fax) was rejected because it was not in the petition format and did not specifically reference the street improvement project number. Discussion: If time allowed, follow-up on verification of the three property owners that have a discrepancy with County records could be done by requesting a copy of the current property deed from these petitioners. However, the short time period has not allowed for this detail of verification. If these signatures end up determining the sufficiency of the petition (based on withdrawals), it is recommended that a determination of sufficiency be delayed until complete verification of these parcels can be made. The 167 signatures verified represent 51% of the 328 households that are included in the project area. Based on this information, the petition is sufficient, as it contains more than 50% of the affected households within the 2007-08 Street Improvement Project area.