Conflict slows plans to redo Lake Harriet // Neighbors voice opposition

Steve Brandt; Staff Writer

Publication Date: May 30, 1996 Page: 01B Section: NEWS Edition: METRO

When more than a hundred Lake Harriet area residents gathered

last week to plow through decisions about traffic at the lake,
months of frustration erupted.
They seized control of the agenda. They took over the
microphone.

Then they took a preemptive vote against making any changes to

the lake's parkways.

It's a decision that has left some people questioning the

virtues of citizen participation.

Those who are leading the lengthy but important process of

planning changes at the city's Chain of Lakes also are asking
whether those showing up at lake meetings represent the broad mix of
people using the lakes - or are merely neighbors trying to treat it
as their own back yard.

Homeowners within a few blocks of the lake - first on its east

side and later on its northwest corner - have been best organized

and most vocal.

East side residents have raised at least $1,250, circulated

leaflets door to door and through their community paper and turned
out large numbers for public meetings to stop roadway changes.

"They want all of the benefits. They don't want to pay the
price," said Jon Gurban, who lives on W. Lake Harriet Pkwy. and said
some residents have a raise-the-drawbridge mentality. He is
executive director of the Minnesota Recreation and Park
Association.

One price of living by the lake is that traffic can be thick on

some summer weekends and weeknights, although some residents say
it's really only a two-month issue. Some are concerned about crime;
some worried last week over teens hanging out at the lakes. One of
the meeting's memorable comments was by a man who decried "suburban
boys who come in to hustle our urban girls."
Behind schedule

The planning of specific changes at Harriet, for which state

and regional authorities have granted $2.1 million, and setting a
more general 20-year master plan for all the lakes is now seriously
behind schedule. Both originally were supposed to get done in
April.

A revised schedule calls for the Minneapolis Park and

Recreation Board to get recommendations July 10. That limits the
amount of work that will get done this year and increases the amount
that will spill over into the early summer high-use period next
year.

Other problems loom. Metropolitan park officials are impatient

that money earmarked in 1994 still hasn't been spent, saying that
makes lobbying for regional park funds harder at the State Capitol.
They fault the Park Board for not involving citizens in planning
lake changes before requesting the money.

"Other agencies do that," said Ed Gale, chairman of the

Metropolitan Parks and Open Space Commission.

Moreover, the lengthy process of planning changes at Harriet

has left a residue of bitterness. Those closest to the eastern
shore spoke loudest against closing a lower road that would send
traffic on an upper road nearer their homes, and they clearly
distrust park staff members.

They're also frustrated by the number of nights consumed by

Harriet meetings since December, although park staff say the process
has been dragged out by demands from the public for more
information.

"It's called death by meeting. People are so exasperated by

all these meetings that they get burned out," said east side
resident David Cowley.

The exasperation over meetings was heightened by a requirement

that only people who had attended two-thirds of public meetings on
Harriet could vote. That was intended to encourage informed
decisions, rather than a one-night turnout. But park staff members
so far haven't enforced the rule, saying that unforeseen consultant
proposals affected people who showed up at meetings too late to meet
the two-thirds rule.
Tax issues

There's also something of a property tax revolt from owners of

expensive lakeside homes. So far it has prevented some of the more
ambitious ideas advanced by landscape architect Michael Van
Valkenburgh from moving forward.

Cowley, for example, has complained in public meetings that

taxes on his home have tripled in 10 years. Park taxes make up
about 5 percent of his bill. (Although the tax rate has risen, the
major factors in Cowley's increase include his decision to buy the
house for more than $300,000 above its assessed value and making at
least $120,000 in improvements.)
East side residents have been arguing against making changes that
go beyond the money already earmarked for Harriet improvements.

"I heard a loud-and-clear voice saying we want to be

fiscally responsible," said Carol Berg O'Toole, one of the most
vocal Harriet-area residents.

There also are complaints that park commissioners haven't shown

up at many meetings to hear Harriet-area sentiments. Park Board
President Patricia Baker said commissioners shouldn't try to
influence recommendations that are advisory to the board.

But the vociferous reaction to consultant proposals has left

some leaders in the process concerned.

"That was the weirdest meeting I have ever attended. . . . I

had no idea that it was going to get so ugly," Catherine Shreve, a
Harriet-area resident who heads the all-lakes Framework Committee,
said after last week's meeting.

Jan Del Calzo, who has chaired the series of Harriet meetings,
said she thinks an open-ended series of meetings has limited
value.

"I don't think you can have a rational discussion with a

group of 150 people," she said.

Del Calzo also served on a more formally defined advisory

committee of a couple dozen people 20 years ago that produced the

then-controversial plan for one-way parkways - which Harriet
residents now demand be kept.

Niel Ritchie, past president of the neighborhood board for much

of east Harriet, said those who oppose traffic changes have been
able to stymie the open-ended Harriet process. "I was personally
ashamed of the conduct of the group," he said of last week's
meeting.

The park staff's most immediate reaction to the meeting was to

cancel the next one. It also called in a facilitator to run
meetings of the Framework Committee and future Harriet meetings.

Monday night, although the facilitator ran the all-lakes

committee meeting at a brisk pace, not even half of the agenda was
completed. But key decisions included exploring traffic-calming
techniques on parkways and backing one-way parkways with five feet
of the roadway converted to lanes for fast bikes.
More information:

Meeting schedule

The Minneapolis Chain of Lakes planning process consists of an

appointed Framework Committee that is supposed to produce
recommendations for changes at all the lakes, and task forces

focusing on individual lakes with open membership.

Here are the scheduled meetings that Park Board staff members
hope will produce recommendations to the board July 10. All
meetings are open to the public and begin at 7 p.m.:
June 4: Lake Calhoun, Linden Hills Neighborhood Center, 3100
W. 43rd St.

June 5: Framework Committee, Pershing Neighborhood Center,

3523 W. 48th St.

June 11: Framework Committee, Kenwood Neighborhood Center,

2101 W. Franklin Av.

June 17: Lake Harriet, location to be announced.

June 18: Calhoun, Isles and Cedar, Linden Hills.

June 25: Framework Committee, location to be announced.

July 1: Lake Harriet, location to be announced.

July 2: Calhoun, Isles and Cedar, Martin Luther King

Neighborhood Center, 41st St. and Nicollet Av. S.

July 9: Framework Committee, King.