1/17/2009
Carol Pass, Mary Gonsior,
Linda Leonard, Earl Sims,
Called to order at 9:57 am
at Welna’s Hardware
Agenda approved by consent
with a committee of the whole.
Board minutes from November
comments:
We passed a more involved
motion about excel at our membership meeting.
The paint booth for all the
light rail trains was stopped because of the bill Karen Clark’s bill stopped
the process.
The bill also stopped
progress on the city’s plan to put in a new hot asphalt plant.
We’ve not had time to pursue
purchase arrangements for the community garden.
17
Mary moved and Linda
seconded the motion to approve the Minutes. Passed
EPIC Finances
Carol and Mary discussed the
format of the financial statement and appropriate labels for the report. They
are going to use “Statement of Activities” changing the title of “donations” to
“restricted grants”, but Carol got different advice from an accountant. There
are some differences in report styles between nonprofits and corporations. Mary
and Carol will continue the discussion and how best to report our figures. We
agreed on a three year depreciation schedule.
-------Earl Simms arrived at
10:20
Report on NRP
Carol went to a Midtown
meeting to talk about the mayor’s new community advisory board. Carol was just
elected to the NRP policy board. NRP still has more than advisory power. It is
a nonprofit that controls millions of dollars for neighborhoods. The new
advisory board is what the mayor wants and it centralizes power downtown. No
one from the 8th or 9th Ward got on the advisory board
even though Carol and Jana Metge applied. The new board has 8 people the mayor
and council chooses and 8 people from neighborhoods. The mayor has chosen all
anglos, non of whom has been involved in neighborhood organizations. NRP is
asking neighborhoods how we want to select the other 8 people. NRP has proposed
a formal resolution for a meeting Feb 21st. 60% of the neighborhoods
have to respond by the end of January.
Motion: To adopt the NRP
resolution; Mary moved/Earl seconded. Passed
Earl would like to meet at
Perkins whenever the first Saturday falls on the 1st and ACE isn’t
available.
We appointed Carol to attend
the Neighborhood and Community Engagement Commission meeting on Feb 21 to
discuss how to select representatives and to frame issues for the citizen’s
advisory committee which will have 8 representatives from the neighborhoods.
It’s the beginning of a discussion.
The NRP elections resulted
in the election of Kari Anderson as a delegate and Carol as an alternate to the
Policy Board.
REPORT ON PARKS
There was a survey from the
park board about residents’ view of programs and facilities but they were
available only at Stewart Park and almost no one goes there. They were due the
15th of Jan.
Karen Clark spoke with Brad
and Carol about state financing of the community center. The design team has
not been meeting, but 3 park commissioners met with Brad and Carol,
As chair of the design team,
Brad sent a letter to Representative Alice Hausman to correct impressions that
Tom Weaver of the Met Council sent, given the documents provided him from the
Park Board staff.
Vreeland, MM Anderson, and
Annie Young as Park Commissioners reviewed the correspondence with Brad and
Carol. They are worried about losing the money to the state and that we need a
one story contract right away. They want to meet Jan 21st to decide
at the Park Board Meeting with a report about where we are in the design,
contract, and money raising process.
Karen Clark sent a letter
and a copy of a law that we have two more years on this report to the park
board.
***EPIC wants a copy of the
Park Staff reports and correspondence relative to the East Phillips Park
Building. We’re going to ask Karen Clark
to get that information by her request.
Karen is on the conference
committee and holds some power over the Park Board at the Legislature.
***Carol and Brad need to
ask Karen to meet with commissioners and the design team and to go to the Park
Board meeting next week.
EXCEL ENERGY
There is a concern about the
effect of above ground high magnetic influence with the high power lines. EPIC
already passed a motion about underground. The community meeting last week
surfaced a lot of information. Abbott might write a letter encouraging Xcel to
bury the wires. Excel published in the papers already that it is going down the
Greenway with criss-cross wires wires. MPCA has no power. Only the public
utilities commission needs to issue a permit.
This would negatively impact high density housing and health issues
along the Greenway. We need a new law
for needs assessment based on population density as well as distance of the
lines.
We want a rate change to
Hennepin County or the entire city to pay the cost of burying the lines. Excel
sometimes runs over the community, sometimes cooperates. Excel is building another substation that
they haven’t told us about and it seems they plan to link these to provide
power elsewhere.
******Look at the cost and
loss to major development along the Greenway for business and housing.
We need to have the city
council to oppose overhead lines. Developers have told us they would refuse
developments near these lines.
Motion: EPIC is adamantly
opposed to overhead high power lines running anywhere in the neighborhood and
want them buried down East 28th .Street.
passed.
REPORTS
Court watch photos
List of foreclosures in
Phillips
We have the community of Phillips
patrol vests and walkie talkies; cops patrol
Meeting adjourned at 11:45 am.
