Environment Committee
The Environment Committee, led by Betty Wheeler, kicked off an air-quality monitoring study through handheld devices provided by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. The program will last through the middle of August and will be posted on an online map.
Amanda Yang will soon present her Environmental GIS mapping system to the community. For more than a year, Yang has been scouring public records to find the local history of environmental degradation and clean up in District 12.
Yang has a background in GIS, holds a master’s degree in urban planning and a bachelor’s degree in architecture. Her project has been a collaboration with the University of Minnesota’s Center for Urban and Regional Affairs (CURA) and the Southeast Como Improvement Association (SECIA) in Minneapolis.
The project tracks the history of the neighborhood by parcel back to the 1800s.
Equity Committee
The Equity Committee has surveyed the neighborhood on the proposed tennis courts resurfacing project at Joy of the People at 890 Cromwell Ave. in South St. Anthony. With more than 170 responses, this was a hugely successful engagement process. CURA and Humphrey School of Public Affairs graduate intern Bettsy Hjelseth is midway through her summer work on bridging the food gap in south St. Anthony Park. She will be surveying low-income residents in the area on their food needs in the coming weeks.
Land Use Committee
The Land Use Committee will work closely with Dominium, a Minneapolis-based developer planning to develop two sites in the neighborhood. Dominium plans to build 600 to 700 market-rate and income-restricted apartments on a 13.3-acre industrial site next to 808 Berry Place, a rental property that Dominium built in 2004. The site was formerly a Weyerhauser lumberyard.
Dominium has also proposed building a 216-unit building at Hampden and Territorial avenues. The proposed project would serve a population that meets 60 percent of the Area Median Income (AMI) or less. Dominium plans to have 1.25 parking stalls per unit as well as an inner courtyard with a pool and social areas. The group is planning a townhouse-style building with patio access for every unit.
The group presented its proposal to the Land Use Committee in July, and the committee voted to support a change in zoning at the site from industrial to T3 residential. Dominium will return to seek support on a conditional-use variance to increase the height of the building past the 45 feet allowed at a T3 zoning.
Transportation Committee
Transportation intern Jeff Cornell has completed his transportation-usage project and presented it to the Transportation Committee in July. The project surveyed the needs and gaps in transportation in the neighborhood. The Transportation Committee is working with City of St. Paul staff on the Raymond Avenue reconstruction project, scheduled to start after Labor Day.
The project will include the portion of the avenue between Energy Park Drive and Como Avenue. The project will be broken into two parts so that the road will be open through the winter. It is scheduled to be completed next summer.
