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North St. Paul begins comprehensive-plan update; staff eyes Met Council grant, community pop-ups and consultant work
Summary
Commissioners began the 10-year comprehensive plan update conversation, discussed keeping much of the current vision language, and reviewed a proposed engagement strategy that leans on a $40,000 Met Council grant and an estimated $110,000 consultant budget.
The Planning Commission began a multi-year discussion June 4 on updating North St. Paul’s comprehensive plan, which must be refreshed in the coming years to meet Met Council requirements.
Community development director Roberts said the current plan — adopted about 10 years ago — contains a vision statement that begins, “North St. Paul is your favorite small town,” and that the commission should consider modest wording changes rather than a wholesale rewrite. Roberts asked commissioners whether the vision statements and goals in chapter two remain relevant and suggested tweaking ambiguous phrases such as “creative placemaking.”
Roberts told the commission that the city is eligible for a Met Council grant of $40,000 but estimated a consultant-driven update would cost about $110,000, leaving roughly $70,000 to be covered by the city if a consultant is hired. He proposed engaging WSB for technical work (sewer, water, stormwater and planning) and asked whether the commission wanted two or three community-engagement sessions plus online engagement. Commissioners favored community pop-ups (examples cited included a Casey Lake Park popup or outreach at a car show), at least two in-person engagements, and online input for a month.
Commissioners also discussed options to involve universities, to tailor consultant scopes so the city avoids stock plans, and to ensure staff have final editing authority on deliverables. Roberts said staff plans to include public-engagement approaches in a proposal to WSB and expects to pursue grant funding and budget approvals in the next budget cycle.
