PREPARING FOR NEW VICTORIA CHURCH
TO BE CONSTRUCTED ON ROLLING ACRES ROAD

Mount Olivet Rolling Acres Inc. re-ceived approval of a minor subdivision of the property located on the east side of Schutz Lake at 7200 Rolling Acres Road in Victoria.
This subdivision allows the property to be split into two parcels, one approxi-mately 12.09 acres and the other 6.63 acres.  The existing assisted living facility will remain located on the larger parcel to the south.  The smaller parcel to the north will be sold to Mount Olivet Lutheran Church, which has plans to construct a church building on the site.
Stated City Planner Mark Kaltsas, "These are two different financial entities.  This is completely allowed under the sub-division ordinance."  The Planning Com-mission also recommended approval.

KIDTALK BUILDING PERMITTED
PARKING SPACES WILL COME LATER
Tom and Candy Almquist received a conditional use permit that will allow them to proceed with plans to construct an office-retail building at 1772 Stieger Lake Lane in downtown Victoria.  This is the former Sidco-Braunworth site.

The City of Victoria has negotiated the sale of this property to the Almquists.  Candy currently owns and operates Kid Talk on Main Street Victoria next to the Post Office.  Kid Talk is a pediatric thera-py center that will be able to provide ser-vices at a larger scale in its proposed new location.
A conditional use permit was re-quired because no on-site parking will be made available and there will be zero lot line setbacks.  The required parking lot for this proposed 10,500 square feet of lease-able space is otherwise 42 parking spaces.
Stated City Planner Mark Kaltsas, "This request has been before the Plan-ning Commission.  The Almquists will be building this for themselves initially.  The light rail transit is just to the north of the property and the new bridge is just to the west of it.  We've worked with the devel-opers for several months now.  Their architects are KKE, the same as for the Clocktower building." 
Also in attendance at this March 11th council meeting was Jack Shaw of Shaw Construction, the same builder for the Clocktower.
Continued the planner, "Discussion at the Planning Commission level revolved around parking.  The city will be looking at additional downtown parking when the next phase along Quamoclit develops and the new street goes through."
"We can accommodate this building," he said, "but not more at this time.  With some modifications we'll be making this year, and the overall lack of development in the downtown -- these things make this acceptable.  Right now our highest users are a restaurant and a bar, and their peak hours are the opposite of this business."
Mark said this "tight site" offers no parking of its own.  The three-story build-ing includes between 3,000 and 4,000 feet per floor. 
Kid Talk itself generates a need for approximately 7 to 8 parking spaces.  There are enough parallel parking spaces for the new location along Stieger Lake Lane.  There should also be some relief of parking on Main Street when the business moves from the Post Office building.
Stated Councilmember Mary Thun, "I'm okay with this right now, but I'll be concerned about building up like this all along Stieger Lake Lane."  The concerns centered around obstructing views of the lake."
On a related note, Mark reported there had been a substantial amount of petroleum contamination on the site that went beyond 25 feet deep, but the Pollu-tion Control Agency said the city could stop digging and cleaning up because it was physically impossible to keep dig-ging.
"It is costing us a lot of time to get the all-clean status," he said.  "And the petitioners [the Almquists] probably can't get financing until we get that letter.  The PCA keeps coming up with more requests for more information."

THUMBS UP FOR TWO PRECINCTS
AS VICTORIA VOTING NUMBERS INCREASE
Victoria councilmembers gave Coun-ty Auditor Mark Lundgren a thumbs up for two Victoria precincts and two Vic-toria polling places, just in time for the upcoming primary election in September and general election in November.  Long lines for voting Victoria residents have come to be the norm in this growing city of 5,500 population, that still only has one precinct and one polling place at City Hall.

Possibilities for the dividing line for the two Victoria precincts and locations of the two Victoria polling places will be drafted in cooperation with the county auditor and city clerk, then presented for review and approval by the city council-members at another workshop.
At the March 25th workshop Auditor Lundgren stated, "We're here to give you information.  Having grown up in Victoria and having an aunt as an election judge in Victoria for years, I think it's time for you to divide and conquer."
He said that dividing Victoria into two voting stations is a logical move at this time.  "I think your people will be happy with that ... You could have done this two or four years ago."
Statistics show there were 3,022 reg-istered Victoria voters in the 2000 General Election and 3,281 registered voters in the 2002 General Election.  The numbers of actual Victoria voters in the 2002 General Election was 2,462.
"The rule of thumb is 2,000," said Mr. Lundgren.  "That's about the limit of the machine."
Victoria's single precinct is the largest in the area.  Chanhassen has seven voting precincts.  Chaska has five wards and two precincts.  Waconia has two wards.
Mr. Lundgren explained that wards can be divided into precincts, but pre-cincts cannot be divided into wards.  If Victoria would choose to be divided into wards, its various elected councilmembers would have to reside in the respective various wards.  If Victoria chooses to remain in the precinct mode, all of its five councilmembers can remain elected from "at large."
For example, all of Chanhassen coun-cilmembers are elected at large.  Chaska councilmembers, however, are elected from each ward.  In both cases, the mayor is elected at large.
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