06-09-2014 Council Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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MINUTES OF THE ORONO CITY COUNCIL MEETING Monday, June 9, 2014 7:00 o’clock p.m. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Page 3 of 22 (5. TOUR DE TONKA, Continued) Litfin stated the Tour de Tonka helps raise money for the ICA Food Shelf and that they also have a kid ride every year, which has been fairly popular. Litfin thanked the various local police departments for their help in making the event a success. Litfin displayed a map of the different communities the riders go through. The rest stop for this area in 2014 will be at the Trinity Lutheran Church in Long Lake. Litfin noted the Tour de Tonka also has a number of great sponsors which contributes to the success of the event. Litfin displayed pictures from last year’s ride, noting that KARE 11 also covered the event last year. Lifton presented a short video covering highlights from the 2013 ride. Litfin thanked the City of Orono for being a part of the Tour de Tonka. Printup stated it is very impressive to see that the number of participants has continued to climb through the years. Printup thanked Litfin for his efforts at coordinating this event. LMCD REPORT – ANDREW MCDERMOTT, REPRESENTATIVE Andrew McDermott reported the LMCD has recently changed its marina ordinance. The process was started in September following a request by the marina owners. At the April 23 meeting, the new ordinance was adopted by the LMCD and there is now a code of qualified commercial marinas, which are essentially marinas that lease space to individuals and are not city docks or yacht clubs. The LMCD will be looking at those two items in the near future. McDermott stated marinas originally were only allowed to go out to 100 feet but are now legally allowed to go out to 200 feet. McDermott stated there were probably only a third that were at 100 feet, a third at 150 feet, and a third at 200 feet. The docks originally were at 300 feet but have gradually been pulled back over the years in an effort to get them at 100 feet. McDermott stated time has demonstrated that 100 feet was really not workable, which was one of the reasons for the change. McDermott stated the new ordinance also drops the amenity requirements, such as parking spaces, a meeting room, or a pay phone. The change in parking spaces will allow the marinas to increase their density slightly. McDermott stated most of the regulations were outdated and needed to be updated. McDermott noted the new ordinance does not mean that the docks can be extended immediately out to 200 feet and that the marinas will need to submit an application and comply with the setbacks and other requirements. If they currently have a setback variance, they will need to meet the new setbacks. If the docks are extended to 200 feet, the marinas would not be able to increase the number of boats but the slips could be made smaller or larger unless the amount of shoreline would allow the increase in the number of boats. McDermott noted the number of boats at the majority of the marinas would not change. In addition, very few marinas will qualify for an increase in boat storage.