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W1 <br />GUIRONVIT"11 <br />_ INSfiITUTE <br />Toll Free 866.900.3064 ! Fax 866.924.1928 <br />June 22, 2011 <br />Mayor and City Council <br />City of Pequot Lakes <br />4638 County Road 11 <br />Pequot Lakes, MN 56472 <br />Re: Planning Commission Report <br />Dear Mayor and City Council, <br />The Planning Commission met for their regularly scheduled June meeting at which there <br />was one public hearing. The Planning Commission is forwarding one recommendation <br />at this time. <br />1) Ordinance Amendment regarding Variance Criteria, City of Pequot <br />Lakes, Applicant. Application 11-3834• The attached ordinance <br />amendment is in response to amendments that the MN Legislature recently made <br />to state law regarding the criteria by which variances are to be reviewed. <br />As some of you may know, the MN Supreme Court had come down with two <br />rulings in recent years regarding variances. For counties, the case was <br />Stadsvold v. Otter Tail County and for cities the case was Krummenacher v. City <br />of Minnetonka. These two cases significantly altered how variances were to be <br />reviewed and for cities, the Krummenacher case was widely seen as making it <br />nearly impossible for a city to grant a variance so long as a property owner could <br />make any reasonable use of their property. <br />The MN Legislature has responded by amending state law and creating one <br />common set of standards by which variances were to be reviewed in cities, <br />townships and counties. The most significant aspect of the changes they made <br />was to eliminate the phrase "hardship" from the review standards and replace it <br />with the term "practical difficulties ". <br />The Planning Commission is recommending that the Ordinance <br />Amendment be approved. <br />WWW.COMMUNITYGROWTH.COM WWW.STRONGTOWNS.ORG <br />