The District 10 Como Community Council will vote on bylaw changes that will reflect an adjustment in service boundaries between St. Paul Districts 6 and 10 and increase the size of the council at its Nov. 19 meeting, which will be held at the Historic Streetcar Station, 1224 N. Lexington Parkway, at 7 p.m.
Since April 2013, a group of volunteers from District 10 and the South Como neighborhood have been working to revise the district’s bylaws to allow the move of more than 3,500 South Como residents from District 6 into District 10.
The change will take effect on Jan. 1, 2014.
The committee presented its final recommendations for changes to the District 10 bylaws at a community meeting on Sept. 25 and to the District 10 Community Council on Oct. 15.
The committee had hoped to receive comments and responses in October to the changes, but at the District 10 meeting, Pete Bolstad, who co-chaired the boundary-change committee, said no comments had been received.
One of the larger issues of the boundary change was to create new subdistrict boundaries. Currently, the district is divided into three subdistricts. The 15-member community council includes two members from each subdistrict.
The boundary change committee has recommended that a fourth subdistrict be added with changes to all subdistrict boundaries. Council members currently representing the original three subdistricts will continue to represent their respective subdistrict within the adjusted boundaries and all officers of the board will stay in office until the April regular election. If the bylaw changes are approved in November, a special election will be held in December to vote for two representatives from the new Subdistrict 4.
Subdistrict 4 will include all areas south of the railroad tracks, including most of the South Como and Energy Park areas.
South Como areas north of the railroad tracks will be moved to Subdistricts 2 and 3.
Each of the four subdistricts will have a nearly equal number of residents, committee co-chair David Arbeit explained at the September meeting.
The boundary change between the two districts was initiated in January at a public meeting spearheaded by City Council member Amy Brendmoen, a South Como resident. Brendmoen, who was elected in 2011, said that during her campaign she heard many South Como residents’ concerns about wanting to be represented in a district closer to home. Much of South Como borders on the south and east borders of Como Regional Park, which is part of District 10.
Park issues were not the only concerns of South Como residents. Brendmoen’s campaign literature addressed a 2011 change in the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) used by realtors that moved South Como homes out of Como and into the North End designation.
District 6 currently serves both South Como and North End, which extends east to Highway 35E.
