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_________________________________________________________________________________________ City of Arden Hills Planning Commission Meeting for May 3, 2017 P:\Planning\Planning Cases\2017\PC 17-006 - Higher Education Study\Memos_Reports_17-006\PC Memo (05-03- 17)_17-006 Final.docx Page 7 of 8 To begin, staff went through each zoning district to determine which zones within each city higher education uses are a permitted or conditional use in. From there, the specific districts were generalized (commercial, industrial, residential, etc.) to allow for comparison across cities. This evaluation revealed that there really is no pattern in how cities in Minnesota allow for higher education uses. However, several cities separate higher education uses out into two categories: college or university, campus; and college or university, office-based. This is beneficial to these cities because the intensity of use between these two categories can be vastly different. Colleges with campuses often include students living on campuses in residence halls, athletic facilities for sport, theatres for performing arts and cafeterias or other types of food service in addition to their classrooms, laboratories, libraries and other educational spaces. College campuses are often lively places 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. In comparison, traditional colleges are opening office-based colleges that have been dominated by the Globe of Rasmussen Business Colleges in the past. The University of St. Thomas campus in Downtown Minneapolis and the Hamline University facility in the West End of St. Louis Park are two examples of traditional colleges that have office-based campuses away from their main campuses. These office-based campuses are often occupied by graduated students or adults participating in continuing education courses and the activity at them are often limited to weeknights or Saturdays. Should Arden Hills choose to adopt two different college uses, staff would recommend that the office-based definition include language that the office building be used, constructed and operated similar to other office buildings. This is meant to allow classrooms with lab courses such as biology or medical that may draw blood but which would not require special air handling HVAC equipment, the storage of large volumes of chemicals or generating hazardous wastes that can be common with hard science labs for chemistry or physics courses. The final step in evaluating higher education in other communities was to look at specific institutions of higher education and evaluate whether or not they are located in a district where higher education is a permitted or conditional use. Of the 38 institutions evaluated, seven of them were located in a zoning district that does not allow for higher education uses. Of these seven, five are public colleges and universities of either the MNSCU or University of Minnesota system. MNSCU system schools are regulated by the state and the University of Minnesota regulates itself, so they preempt any city zoning requirements. The remaining two non- conforming schools are private and in smaller, greater-Minnesota cities. These schools were in existence prior to current zoning standards. Next Steps Staff has one relating topic to research and discuss within the scope of the Higher Education Study: the amount of land and the total square footage of buildings within each business or industrial zone. With this fifth and final piece of information, staff will be asking the Planning