Legalectric

The new editor/publisher, Louie Seesz, is off to an inauspicious start. First the Guest Column change. Now this… The article printed in the November 19, 2005, Northfield News had a PATENTLY FALSE STATEMENT, as well as some incorrect quotes and conflations. The biggest problem is in the secondary headline, where the News FALSELY stated:

Judge deems suit against county as “frivolous.”

Here’s a link to the article. Nope, can’t link to it because it’s not all there in the online version.

Here’s a link to the Order: Download file

It’s clear — this Order is dismissing the suit on “jurisdictional” issues, it was not dismissed as frivolous, and it was not dismissed with prejudice. This case has not been decided on the merits.

The reporter I spoke with said he had the Order — if so, what yahoo wrote this headline?

And for the record, I did not say that it was dismissed because a reply was not filed! I said that the judge had stated in the Order that the Reply had not been filed until the morning of the hearing, that the statement in the Order was not true, and I have the fax receipt and a cancelled check to prove it!

I don’t understand why Reuvers would be saying on Tuesday that RCLUA “planned” to refile when it very clearly had been served, filed, served on the AG’s Office, MPCA and published in the paper the week prior. He got a copy of the Summons and Complaint, and I sent him an affidavit of Service on the AG’s office and MPCA (Affidavit from Faribault Daily News hasn’t been received yet). It’s old news, nothing “planned” about it, it’s real. But he can say whatever he wants. The article states “He says it is a little tiring to have to deal with the same issue twice.” This hasn’t been addressed on the merits once, so we have yet to see how they deal with it on the merits!

Here’s what Reuver’s has sent — Download file

My legal opinion? Here’s my response: Download file

That’s legalese for “WHAT A LOAD!”

And then, back to the article, there’s Gordon Kelly, the guy who loves to slam members of the public for participating in public hearings and asking questions, who joins in the after hearing Planning Commission discussion in favor of calling the sheriff on me for passing out blank forms for public comment on the AUAR, it’s just to funny to hear him talk of this suit damaging the county’s reputation! Damaging the county’s reputation? After the actions of the Planning Commission and County Board, how could the county’s reputation on these issues get any worse — but what else can they say when confronted with the truth of their multiple violations of environmental rules? Violation of environmental rules is not an isolated thing, but a pattern of behavior, and one that must be corrected. How to correct it? How to hold them accountable? Seems to me the best way is to require they get environmental training so they can’t claim not to know the state’s Rules — and that’s what we’re asking for in this suit. Gordon Kelly states that “It was pointed out to us that Rice County is following the environmental rules.” Earth to Mars, reread that Order, the part quoted in the paragraph below your statement in the Northfield News article, which says:

Although this lawsuit is dismissed, the Court notes that the lawsuit does provide Rice County with an opportunity to fully review whether its environmental review practices are fully in compliance with environmental rules and regulations.

We’re asking for education and training regarding environmental review and rules. Will somebody please explain why the County finds the education and training regarding environmental review and rules so onerous?

This case has not been addressed on its merits, and it will be. It’s been refiled, the “jurisdictional” issues are remedied, and we’re going forward.

Hopefully the Northfield News will have a greater understanding and command of the English langage and will exercise their word processor and printing press with more accuracy.

The editorial page in today’s Northfield News says it all:

Good ideas and consequences

To the editor:

Here are some good ideas:

* Rice County commissioners rezoned 1,180 acres of prime farmland and wetlands along Interstate 35 to a highway commercial zoning designation. This can bring more money to the county.

* Farmers wanting to quit farming on the land can make a lot of money, to which they are entitled.

* Developers and businesses who want to take over the land can make a lot of money.

* New businesses can bring new jobs to the county.

* The county has a plan for responsible development.

* Input from the residents of the county is invited on the development plan.

Here are the problems:

* The Rice County commissioners have said development will bring in money for the county, but they have never said how to pay for it. Estimates to get started range from $20 million to $40 million.

* Over 50 percent of the soil in the development area will not handle development and must be replaced.

* No plan has been presented to cover the cost of necessary infrastructure.

* Farmers who want to continue to farm this land and homeowners who want to stay will be forced off their land by development pressures and unwelcome commercial neighbors. Many will lose a lot of money if the county says their pieces of the land will not be used for development, only related infrastructure, etc.

* Developers and businesses will ask for tax breaks.

* The cheapest development involves truck transfer facilities and large storage or display areas. Some of these will employ less than a dozen local people. The number of jobs per acre for these businesses will be small.

* The commissioners’ highway commercial zoning designation was not based on the county’s long-term development plan. When they realized what they had done, they quietly rewrote the plan. This is one of several instances where they violated their own laws. However, to date they have never held themselves accountable.

* City mayors and township board members, representing the majority of the citizens of the county, have objected to the many negative consequences of this plan. To date hundreds of questions and problems have been raised. Almost none have been answered, and few improvements have been made to the highway commercial plan. Local governments and citizens are being ignored.

* Numerous additional technical and legal problems with the highway commercial plan are now being raised, in writing, by concerned citizens committed to responsible and accountable government. More comments are encouraged, and must be submitted by Oct. 26 to the director of planning and zoning.

* More such development plans, that ignore the consequences to the citizens of the county, are starting to emerge. Whether residents of the county live near or distant from these development, in one way or another, all will pay for the benefit of a few.

Charles Skinner
Northfield

A rezoning nightmare

To the editor:
As most people know, Rice County Commissioner Jim Brown made his move last November to rezone 1,100 acres of ag land along a three-mile strip of Interstate 35 — Minnesota Highway 19 on the north to Rice County Road 1 on the south — to highway commercial. Faribault, Dundas and Northfield, Bridgewater and Forest townships along with farmers and rural residents strongly objected. At one of the hearings, former Faribault City Councilor Fran Minnick called on the board to open up a smaller area to start out. Sounded like common sense to me.

The new county board approved a committee chaired by Gordon Kelley, under the guidance of RLK Kuusisto Consulting, to come up with a master plan by Dec. 31, when developers will begin rushing in. Plans now include shopping centers along with business and industrial parks and warehouses — a true hodge-podge.

RLK put together an Alternative Urban Areawide Review (AUAR), available for public comment through Oct. 26. It is a set of 31 questions, designed to give information about the project that may have the potential for “significant environmental effects.” The document is available at Faribault, Northfield and Rochester public libraries, Rice County Zoning Office or the county Web site. Anyone who finds answers to the questions to be incorrect or incomplete should put it in writing to Rice County Director of Planning and Zoning Arlyn Grussing.

Questions will be answered and, one assumes, adjustments made or an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) ordered if citizens call for it.

It is a daunting task for an ordinary person to review a document of 54 pages plus maps and exhibits. I suggest each person look at the table of contents and find one or two questions to look at. For me, it is No. 18: Wastewaters. A continuous discharge wastewater treatment plant on Heath Creek (or Wolf Creek as an alternative) is a very offensive idea. Fortunately, discharging to already impaired waters (in this case Lake Byllesby) is not allowed, so other alternatives were listed. It looks like warehouses and other businesses will go in on their own septics to start out. That doesn’t sound great, either.

I am just starting on the traffic section. Planned level of service (LOS) at several intersections are rated very low. At full buildout, 103,325 traffic trips per day are projected for the area. The intersection of Highway 19 and Rice County Road 46 is rated “D.” On a scale of A to F for failing, that is not good. And, as one of a dozen residents who spoke at the planning commission public hearing regarding the AUAR said last Thursday night, what about air emissions?

I empathize more with farmers and residents who will be negatively impacted by this massive development and less with those few who are standing in line to sell for big money. I guess we know which group Commissioner Brown is listening to.

Stephanie Henriksen
Dundas

Concerning French Lake

To the editor:
It appears another taxpayer fiasco is on the drawing board for Rice County, as if the ill-conceived hyper-squalor producing Interstate 35/Minnesota Highway 19 corridor isn’t enough to impair more surface waters, disfigure more landscape and threaten to raise county taxes to the realm of the metro area. Now comes the bold new plan for a 350-unit “Gated Community” on French Lake that will disrupt and destroy the very countryside that it uses to sell these McMansions in the first place!

What will the outcome of adding 300-plus houses be to a rural place where they don’t belong? How about for starters at least 700 more cars on rural roads and tens of thousands of more car trips per year adding congestion and deteriorating roadways even faster. Water quality will suffer for all because of the excavations as well as the usual years of massive noise that is never even considered by these metro speculators.

And all for what? So a developer can make a huge profit at the expense of taxpayers and Rice County’s quality of life. If these projects are allowed, Rice County will know that their planning and zoning department and elected officials are corrupt to the core and that it is only a charade to give the appearance of democracy.

Besides setting an apocalyptic precedent for years to come, this is urban sprawl at its worst, with no accounting of true costs.

Lawrence Morgan
Montgomery

Wouldn’t ya think that this District has learned something about massive boondoggle development, corporations at the public trough, and taxpayer and public coffers sucked dry?

As my EXhusband would say, “Goes to show you don’t think!”

Today is the hearing for the multiple Motions in the RCLUA v. Rice County lawsuit — a suit to hold Rice County accountable for compliance, in this case for its NONcompliance, with the state’s environmental rules.

The hearing’s at the Rice County Courthouse, at 10:30 a.m.

Here’s Rice County’s Motion to Dismiss Download file

Here’s the RCLUA Reply to that Motion Download file

Here’s Rice County’s Reply to RCLUA’s Reply to the County’s Motion to Dismiss Download file

============================
Here’s the Rice County “answers” to RCLUA Discovery Download file

Here’s the RCLUA Motion to Compel Discovery Download file
============================
Here we go!

But what about the people who are already here? A relevant question from today’s STrib’s editorial page:

Letters from readers
September 23, 2005 ELET0923A

All I have been hearing about is how excited the Anoka County and Blaine city officials are about possibly getting the Vikings in Blaine.

Fine. Most of them live on the other side of the city. My house is just across Interstate Hwy. 35W from the proposed site, and I have yet to be asked about it.

A stadium in what is generally a quiet residential area will totally transform our neighborhood. I can’t help but notice that while the renderings of the stadium look wonderful, our homes don’t seem to be anywhere in sight. Officials expect the area to become mostly commercial and they expect it to become commercial fast. They are practically drooling over the amount of new revenue that a stadium could draw.

But what about the people who are already here? Many of us bought our homes here because we liked the small-town feel. We don’t want downtown in our back yards; if we did, we wouldn’t live in the suburbs. I understand the financial benefits of having a stadium in the county, but do they understand the downside of living by one?

Andrea Tholkes, Circle Pines.

Rice County — once again they’ve got me asking “WHATEVER ARE THEY THINKING?!?!?!” This week, I received their “answers” to the Discovery Requests of Rice County Land Use Accountability in our suit against the County for repeated violation of environmental law. Their responses were the legal Discovery equivalent of a G.W. response:

(thanks to Matt Johnson for finding this and putting it on the office wall)

Here are the scanned Rice County responses to our very specific questions — see for yourself! Download file

Over and over, the Rice County mantra:

Answer: Objection, overly broad and burdensome, irrelevant and not calculated to lead to discoverable information.

Not one word of substance, and no documents produced whatsoever, no invitation to show up, dig through files, and do some copying.

OK, fine, “Bring it on!!!!” …now where did I put those weapons of mass destruction??? Guess I’ll have to try a Motion to Compel instead.

(“some people” were tiring of the horses’ asses, so this one’s for you!)

It’s hard for me to understand people’s difficulty with “sustainability.” Isn’t it apparent that we have to consider the impacts of our actions on our surroundings? That our very lives are dependent on it?

From the way Rice County is pushing the 11.5 million square feet of commercial and industrial development, what Lief Knecht realistically described at a Committee 1 meeting as “a new city,” it’s hard not to conclude they just don’t give a proverbial rodent’s rump, and as Gordon Kelly’s circular reasoning goes, “we’ve got to get off the dime because we’ve got to get off the dime.” The only logical reasons that come to mind are grossly misplaced trust, greed, special interest influence, delusion, inflated sense of self-importance, shortsightedness? Others it could be? Please let me know, as it makes no sense to me… Bruce Morlan’s asking “Who’s in charge here?” A logical question!

Now they’re all forced to care — Minnesota’s Appellate Court has done what the ineffective MPCA, agency of Gov. Pawlenty, has refused to do — enforce the Clean Water Act. It’s an issue for the I-35 development because they cannot add to the pollution of Lake Byllesby, and the Cannon River is grossly impaired, pollution is an issue long before we get even close to Lake Pepin. The Impaired Waters List is no secret! Why is the consultant expressing concern about Lake Byllesby as the limiting factor when the Cannon River is on the Impaired List? Cannon River Watershed Partnership, where are you in this I-35 discussion? Rice County had better pay attention to this case’s implications for the county plans.

Here’s the actual decision — do take the time to read it:

And let’s hear it for Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy for pursuing this case (I’m not a fan of their concept of energy policy, but this is a good thing). FYI – MCEA is looking for a Legislative Director.

And while you’re at it, check out the Northstar Sierra Club’s report Restoring Water Quality Certification in Minnesota.

There’s a STrib editorial about this today, and remember that the 2012 and 2009 dates are for PLANS, not removing the bodies of water from the Impaired Water List, which will take a lot longer:

Annandale’s water fix was inevitable

Whether the Clean Water Act should permit more flexibility is a matter for Congress; for now, the law is the law, and the only way for Annandale and Maple Grove to get their permit is for the MPCA to come up with plans for getting Lake Pepin and the North Fork of the Crow River off the impaired waters list.

That the agency’s current timetable calls for these to be completed in 2012 and 2009, respectively, suggests the magnitude of difficulty that cities and businesses all over Minnesota may be facing as they try to grow within the limits of the law. If MPCA can’t pick up the pace, and the Legislature provide the resources for doing so, Annandale and Maple Grove will have lots of company in their plight.

Waseca County is updating its Comprehensive Plan, long overdue, but the way they’re doing it, it’s better termed the “Incomprehensible Plan.” My client, Nancy Prehn, and her friend and neighbor Jean Hansen, held a meeting at the Waseca County Annex a couple weeks ago for citizens to discuss the proposed plan changes.

That’s Jean at the blackboard, Nancy in front at the table on left.

Jean’s husband Scott, and Jeremy Ellers (for Senate District 26). Sen. Dick Day and Rep. Connie Ruth were no shows.

Despite all the inconsistencies between the Comp Plan and other county plans and state laws, and despite the County’s lack of acknowledgement of its Water Plan and specific information and policy needs detailed in it back in 1997 that have yet to be addressed, total ignorance of impaired waters in Waseca County, the County’s Planning Commission went ahead and recommended adoption — after an amendment is made to acknowledge a little fact that the consultant did not know about — the presence of 7 billion cubic feet of underground natural gas storage!!! The County Commissioners will probably approve it soon. One of the more onerous provisions is that the Comprehensive Plan will be changed to allow residential development along every body of water in the county, from lakes to rivers to tiny creeks — all the water is ringed in blue. Is this sustainable development?

Development fever in the face of economic and environmental scenarios where it is not sustainable — it feels like it’s 1926 and we’re headed for a train wreck. Today’s New York Times had this reality check (thanks to Barbara Miller for passing it on):

Do try this at home: Assessing your area’s real estate bubble

Indicators to look at are market activity, inventory, prices, failed to sell, price-to-rent ratio, loan quality, risk and popular sentiment. The article does report some good news about the idiocy of “interest only” mortgages:

I am SO grateful for my $32,000 mortgage balance! That low mortgage payment is the most important factor that lets me more or less do the work I love — as Jerry says, “to pursue that goal and feed the dog at the same time…” Mortgage payments are inversely proportional to independence!