The first return list item was for the City's Work Session Agenda for a Council meeting Dec. 8, 2009, containing the following notice (click either thumbnail to enlarge and read the item - note, also, the online source did not have referenced attached pages):
I am curious not only how this affects the public interest regarding the "Brookfield" thing, and its neighbors; but also, recall, the routing of sewer-water involved a stopover at the gun club, for development venturing there also; so how will that thing, and its neighbors be impacted? What aspect of public interest attaches to each locale in this changed situation?
And this thing seems to have been kept under a hat by city officials. "Staff and 21st Oakwood have been meeting on these issues at least since May of this year," the item now tardily discloses. Were the neighbors who suffered that development being foisted next-door without a shred of density transition even given a single word of notice during the months-long pendancy of this latest mischief revisionism effort? Or were they like the general Ramsey public treated like mushrooms?
By email I am requesting City officials to provide for review and possible copying public data documents that may exist in city files and records about the described situation which might shed more sunlight on things. By law, the City must reveal documents not privileged per pending or possible litigation-related issues (where the City Attorney might review my request for ongoing disclosure and documents may become available over time in a peicemeal fashion as things presently exempt from disclosure under the Minnesota Public Data Act change status with time). We wait. We see.
Some may recall that sewer-water routing for dense housing at the gun club and then at the cornfield across Nowthen Blvd from the Peterson home and acreage on the east side of the road was a contentious issue. Citizens petitioned against it and attained sufficient charter amendment signatures of Ramsey citizens to qualify for a special election on proposed amendment wording; but then City Administrator James Norman, and/or others, brought in two law firms to opine that the election should be forestalled on ostensible legal grounds; the Council then showing the citizenship and awareness to deny the citizens their due, electing instead, unanimously, to sheepishly follow the procured legal opinions - presumably whether or not their consciences were in accord with what the paid lawyers said.
It was a rancorous thing for those involved in the effort to advance citizen initiative and driving effort, in City of Ramsey.
Well, the pipe got put into the ground as Ms. Steffen was noted as favoring in one set of work session minutes while serving as Met. Council member; and we live with the results, whether good or bad for the community - it was far from the BNSF tracks, but like the Norman Castle and Ramp there, it got railroaded through - absent any referendum or other chance for citizens to have any real say.
I know some residents were heart broken to have that dense "Brookfield" stuff stuck right up against their property lines, with no requirement of density transitioning between the dense housing and the existing large-lot neighboring lands - thus failing to preserve the local neighborhood characteristics so highly valued in that part of town, before "Brookfield." I expect they still are upset that density transition was not then a priority of those in City decision making positions. They were callously treated and I would hope the affected homeowners still keep a sense of history so that less of that nature of ill-restrained "development" will occur in Ramsey's future. Politicians are as they do, and some did a quite poor job of citizen accomodation during those times. The city administrator from then has since removed himself, as has the lead planner, Ward 1 representation continues as it was, and Cook, the more vocal of the at large representatives over repressing the citizen charter initiative effort then, is off council - as is the mayor from those sad days, and as is Ms. Olson.
Hopefully new blood and new market realities and viewpoints will show change in demeanor and considerations. Not that it is much consolation to the neighbors who bore the brunt of the dense housing growth offensive back then.
It was: Done for us? Done to us? That debate is not yet over, with some feeling that the battle to save the character of the town was irretrievably lost with that hop-scotch imposition of dense housing into north Ramsey - north of any prior "MUSA line" which had delineated Alpine Blvd. as the line. Now we have "MUSA areas." This map is illustrative, with the Gun Club MUSA area being shown detached from the southern dense housing "MUSA line" situation:
Those who did it, I hope they now are really proud of themselves. Their legacy. Their judgment. Their motives. From Met. Council to James Norman, may they perform better and less arrogantly and self-certain in the future. May they have an upward sloping learning curve of some kind.
MY BOTTOM LINE IN ALL OF THIS: Peterson and pals could not have done us all in with that sewer-water extension to gun club and all, without the money behind them, facilitating their mischief. Now the lender, the money funding the mischief, wants grace - more time on a contract with it wholly unclear that any consideration for a modification of contract is being offered [no referenced pages present with the online version of the agenda]. I say, never give them an inch. Hold them to the exact term of time to recoup cash. We owe them nothing. They were complicit in a profit-motivated effort to ruin better aspects of Ramsey.
Screw them.
They screwed Ramsey. Or helped others to.
A contract with a fifteen year term has to have contemplated changing circumstances over that long of a time frame. These particular lenders - why cut them one minute of slack? They presumably knew the terms between the borrower and the city, and approved. They put the six million into escrow to allow the fiasco. They were complicit. They facilitated.
I see no reason to allow them one single minute more on the deal. Can they offer any amelioration to the adversely impacted neighbors? Have they? Have they any such sense of complicity and a current willingness to somehow change? I cannot see how they can undo a thing. So, feet to the fire. No extra time. It is the only way people like that will learn a thing.