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Special City Council Meeting Thursday, February 20,2014 Page 7 Mr. Rancone clarified that his firm owned a small, approximately 6-acre parcel at 2720 Fairview Avenue located in the orange area on the map. Mr. Rancone also noted their firm's unique experience of having been a part of this area for a long time; opining that this appeared to be just the next step in another re-evaluation of what should be done in Twin Lakes. Based on general comments, Mr. Rancone opined that it may be more prudent to first reflect on the process followed over the last twenty years and why this high profile area of land has remained as is for so long without redeveloping. While everyone had their own opinions, Mr. Rancone referenced comments made earlier that the City Council's desire is to reflect the wishes of the community. However, Mr. Rancone opined that often commercial property owners were not treated as part of the community, with residents holding much more weight and commercial property owners looked at as second class citizens, when the contribution of those properties to the City was very significant. Mr. Rancone referenced his experi- ences in the City of West St. Paul as an example of their encouragement to retail businesses to help cushion costs for every resident. Even though a resident may not want more retail, or not desiring another "big box" retailer (e.g. Wal-Mart) or other retailer in the orange map area, Mr. Rancone opined that it is what it is and that's what America wants and that's what Roseville is, not North Oaks, its Rose- ville. In today's newspaper, Mr. Rancone referenced population predictions of 4,000 more in population growth than current; this all in a landlocked suburb hav- ing potential with this property. Mr. Rancone opined that every four years a new City Council came up with a new ideas; and he and the development community were finding it tiring as they'd been down this road so many times before, yet the land was still underperforming. Therefore, Mr. Rancone reiterated his suggestion that the City Council do some self-examination; as many developers were no longer interested in dealing with Roseville, because the public perception isn't worth tackling. Mr. Rancone noted the potential in the past when Costco was looking to locate in Roseville, including a mixed housing unit — everything the Council now is seeking spent and frustration on everyone's part. Mr. Rancone g suggested that tthe economics of how retail benefitted a neighborhood with little impact to adjacent neighbors needed to be clearly understood, and could provide a lot of money for the City and School District. Mr. Rancone opined that residential apartment developers should be wanting to develop around Langton Lake; however, they weren't coming forward; and while he didn't claim to be an expert on what market research may indicate would best fit there today, he didn't' think anyone at the table was an expert either. There- fore, Mr. Rancone suggested that the City seek expert advice on what could locate in this area and how to market it to the community to draw interest, rather than simply saying "no" to this and that; to change the mindset of the community to look at Roseville and creative incentives to get what it wanted.