09-19-06 PTRC Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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PARKS, TRAILS AND RECREATION COMMITTEE MEETING SEPTEMBER 19, 2006 Page 7 of 8 way might be to take the information and put it in chart format and look at some options like bonding, local grant program,regional grant program,and maybe see if we can find some areas of overlay. Committee Member Williams stated that the city also has to be in a position to have enough financial strength to pay its own way. You can't expect everyone else to spend 100 percent on projects and have the city take a free ride. Arden Hills has been known for that for a long time by other communities. It seems if we go for grants, whether it is 50 percent or matching of any proportion, that the City should have some of its own funds available. The city could go to Met Council or Ramsey County and say we have X amount of dollars to put towards a project and the total cost is X amount, so we are looking for the gap. Committee Member McClung stated he thinks it is an easier discussion and easier sell if we are able to show we are serious about a project by being able to come up with a portion of the funding. Committee member Williams stated that the first time this was presented to the Council,their response was to go out and get the money or the people who are willing to fund the projects and we'll do it. Well, it is much easier to go looking for money if you are able to say the City has this much and we are looking for the gap. But if we don't have that amount, why should anyone help Arden Hills. Why should they front a project when there are all kinds of projects to be fronted? The City has to come to some grips about how parks, trails and recreation are important components of what the City is responsible for providing to its residents. The City must be willing to dedicate money to help accomplish that. Committee Member McClung stated he agrees that the City should not ask anyone to front 50 percent of the cost and we come in after. We should identify what types of funding sources are available that we can combine with, get leadership to committee the money and then get the 50% or whatever we can to proceed with the project. Committee member Williams stated that we know what most of the funding sources are. There may be some lurking out there in the weeds that we are not aware of,but I think most of the programs are known to somebody. We need the City Council to help us understand what is possible and what isn't regarding the City, when we have that discussion. Council Liaison Larson stated that having the leverage of funds of your own to match funds from other funding sources is a good idea, but he also thinks the City has to be willing to do some improvements on its own. Otherwise,you are at the mercy of the grant cycle. Ms. Olson stated that when it comes to the park fund, we do have some regulations that have been revised. We did find out that the statues state that the money from that fund cannot be utilized for ongoing maintenance. That is significant information because you are not able to resurface a tennis court or trail with that fund. Committee member McClung stated that it focuses our discussion of what we can use our special assessment park fund for. Committee Member Wheeler has done some work on identifying funding sources along with our strategies. She stated that there are sources that we are eligible for. She added that formatting sources and strategies into a chart would help us identify what projects would be eligible for what funding program, such as local, regional and there may be some that don't meet the criteria for any. We talked about bonding proposals. Maybe now we look at bonding to make up the difference. Committee Member McClung stated that some of the advantages of the discussion regarding TCAAP is what the Council is going to do in terms of updating the interim agreement. They will need to revisit and start to educate themselves a little more on the pluses and minuses of each of the various tools of public financing. That might break down some of the reluctance of bonding and levying. He thinks there are • some misunderstandings in terms of what a lot of those tools are and what they might mean to the City. He doesn't think the Council realizes there are some serious pluses going in that direction. Some of those