The following item is an account by Cheryl Luger of the MPRB’s March 4 meeting discussion regarding the SWLRT MOU agenda item.
Park Board Approves SWLRT Agreement with the Met Council
In a long, emotional and a bit ‘challenging’ meeting tonight, the Park Board approved the negotiated Met Council/MPRB SWLRT MOU.
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It wasn’t unanimous
Given the incredible pressures brought by the governor, county, Met Council, unions and corporations …. tonight’s outcome was probably the only one having the political will of being possible after discussion and questions raised by residents and commissioners, sending it back to committee for one cycle might have been a good idea.
Commissioner Tabb brought up a number of troubling issues not addressed in the MOU (broad, undefined, lots of wiggle room for future incursions into park land and sovereignty).
There was an interesting discussion on what would trigger a new round of municipal consent requirements including a short discussion on the history of municipal consent in Minnesota ….county, municipalities included. But an independently elected goverance unit is not (I think that was why the park board had no say around the Bottineau/wirth park project ?).
Probably didn’t help when there seemed to be a two step around the cart before the horse with designing the LRT before the environmental impact study had been completed.
Mitigation, capital project compensation, park board liability were briefly discussed …. but nothing is in the MOU document.
If you watch it on replay, the number of other agenda items as well as the time certain public hearings cut up the discussions….
Graco, ending Hiawatha beach, master plans, renaming park and need for a policy discussion vs. a suspension of the rules to make exceptions.
Usually the city webcast cuts off the park board at 9pm.this evening the broadcast went a few minutes later so the home audience could catch the last arguments and vote.