Possible Lakeville Malt-O-Meal Expansion Plans Move Forward

The Lakeville City Planning Commission paved the way on Thursday, for Malt-O-Meal to continue working on . The commissioners sidestepped a conservation easement hurdle that has been the focus of development plans and nearby residents, with careful language and scrutinized the issue closely during a marathon session that lasted more than five hours.

At issue was a 155-foot conservation easement on a 4.5 acre parcel of land purchased by Malt-O-Meal from New Morning Windows in 2009 as part of their plans to relocate administrative and technological research employees from their headquarters in Northfield. Malt-O-Meal was petitioning the board to vacate the easement.

Historically, conservation easements are considered permanent restrictive land use amendments to preserve natural areas and vacating the easement would more than likely have triggered a state judicial review process.

The conservation easement was put in place in by the city council in 1995, though no records of the reasons for the easement could be found in city records. Prior to 1995, the land was used intermittently for farming purposes. According to a city staff report, the land underwent extensive grading during 1995 New Morning Windows project and was subsequently planted with a variety of prairie grasses as part of the construction agreement at that time.

Language in the easement stated that any alterations to the land were “prohibited in perpetuity and the subject property without the written consent of the City.”

Ultimately, through a series of votes, commissioners did some linguistic gymnastics to proceed with the latter wording while still voting to deny vacating the easement. Essentially, they are keeping perpetuity of the easement in place while recommending that the city council provide written consent to develop on the land.

A number of residents of nearby Jutland Place whose back yards abut the property plead their arguments for non-development perpetuity.

“I have concerns that the issues are not being addressed,” said Jutland Place resident Richard Henderson. “I feel this will have a negative impact on quality of life as well as impact our home values.”

Henderson urged the board to take more time to review the economic impacts and explore other development options such as below-grade parking to preserve the conservation easement. “We all purchased our homes with the understanding that this property contained the conservation easement and that conservation easements cannot be vacated.”

Bart Gernander, an attorney representing Jim Reitter, who also owns a home on Jutland Place, said “Malt-O-Meal purchased the property knowing the easement was in place, just as Jutland residents did.” Gernander contended that the neighborhood was zoned as an R2 environmentally sensitive area and that allowing the easement to be vacated would “be ignoring the reason the easement was put there in the first place.”

Reitter himself stated that choosing to vacate the easement would “probably be setting a bad precedent.”

“I looked at this when I bought my house,” he said, “I never would have built it had I been able to see something like this coming down the road.”

Malt-O-Meal’s plans, as presented during the meeting and to residents during two previous neighborhood meetings, don’t offer specifics and company representatives stated that they have no definite development plans in the works, only that they were seeking the vacation of the easement to allow for more options “if and when” they had a need to expand. The plans did contain a two-story “concept building” and additional parking. Any future development would have to be routed back through the planning commission for further approval.

“There’s nothing final,” said Linda Fisher, Malt-O-Meal’s Manager of Consumer Marketing. “We have no plans to move forward with anything. We’re simply trying to make it easier for us to make considerations as to how we can best utilize that land that will benefit the city of Lakeville.”

“We want to be good long-term neighbors,” she added. “We really want to acknowledge the careful thought and consideration of the planning commission to find a working solution. Being good neighbors is all about compromise and I think that this was the right way to move.”

Commissioners initially leaned toward tabling taking any action, but after lengthy discussions, decided they were comfortable enough with Malt-O-Meal’s stated intentions to proceed with their recommendations.

Commission members surmised that the easement was put in place as a planning tool to buffer the Jutland residential area from manufacturing activity by the window company development at that time.

“There’s a fixation an easement that never should have been there in the first place,” said Commissioner Karl Dratning. “The planning commission didn’t recommend that easement. It just kind of magically appeared.”

“We want to do our best for the city,” said Commission Chair Bart Davis. “When I say city, I mean what’s best for all of our citizens - our corporate citizens and our neighborhoods.”

Commissioner Gerald Grenz was the lone dissenting vote in passing the recommendations. “I don’t think everybody is in acceptance of this solution,” he said.

The solution as recommended to the city council calls for a 50-foot setback along the Jutland Place properties from any development. Malt-O-Meal has agreed to move forward with landscaping along that 50-foot area that would include a minimum of 25 20-foot white pines to be strategically planted for screening purposes along with additional shrubbery. The white pines are well above the required six-to-eight foot height required by city code and would be intended to enhance the screening provided by mature trees already in place.

Other conditions of the recommendation to approve development include limiting any building to two stories, directing any exterior lighting away from residential areas and limiting future buildings to research and development or general office use.

Any future action on the part of Malt-O-Meal would require detailed plans as well as additional public hearings and city approval.

The issue is tentatively scheduled to come before the city council at its March 7 meeting for approval.