Item Description:
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Set Shingle Creek Watershed Mgmt Commission 2024 maximum levy at $986,265 and West Mississippi Watershed Mgmt Commission 2024 maximum levy at $159,075 for projects to improve water quality
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Resolution:
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BE IT RESOLVED, that the 2024 maximum levy for the Shingle Creek Watershed Management Commission be set at $986,265; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the 2024 maximum levy for the West Mississippi Watershed Management Commission be set at $159,075; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the levies for both commissions be certified to the county auditor and be placed on all taxable property under the jurisdictions of the Shingle Creek Watershed Management Commission or the West Mississippi Watershed Management Commission.
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Background:
The Shingle Creek Watershed Management Commission requests a levy of $986,265 to fund five priorities in the commission’s watershed management plan - two water quality cost share programs, a maintenance fund, and two water quality projects. The projects will support the commission’s goals to improve water quality throughout the Shingle Creek Watershed and downstream resources including the Mississippi River.
Descriptions of the programs, funds, and projects to be paid in part by the levy funds are:
• The Maintenance Fund - This project will fund activities that are necessary in order to ensure the success of past capital projects such as ongoing long-term efforts to manage invasive carp or curly-leaf pondweed, maintenance of fish barriers, or water quality projects installed as research projects. These activities will occur at various locations throughout the Shingle Creek watershed. The commission requests a 2024 levy of $53,025 for its maintenance fund.
• The Pike Creek Stabilization Project (Plymouth and Maple Grove) - This project will stabilize 1,000 linear feet of streambank along Pike Creek near its discharge point into Pike Lake, upstream of Hemlock Lane. The project will stabilize banks, reduce sedimentation carried downstream, and help regulate and slow water coming into Pike Lake through Pike Creek, reducing phosphorus loading by 20 pounds and sediment by 23.5 tons annually. The total cost of this project is $395,000 and the commission requests a 2024 levy of $111,350. The remainder of project costs will be paid by the cities of Plymouth and Maple Grove.
• The Brookdale Park Natural Channel Phase 1 Project (Brooklyn Park) - This project will remeander and stabilize the bank to about 5,000 linear feet of Shingle Creek between Brookdale Park and Xerxes Avenue. This project will improve water quality, enhance wildlife habitat, and reconnect the creek to its historic alignment and floodplain, and help store water to mitigate downstream flooding. The total cost of this project is $1,250,000 and the commission will fund the full amount. The commission requests a 2024 levy of $662,815. The remainder of the commission’s contribution will be included in future levy requests.
The levy also includes one project for publicly owned areas and another for privately owned areas to provide cost share for projects that provide additional infiltration and water quality treatment by retrofitting best management practices into already developed areas throughout the Shingle Creek Watershed. The Watershed Management Plan established a process to identify small, best management practices such as iron-enhanced pond filter benches, bioinfiltration basins, plant buffers, and erosion stabilization that qualify; and established a capital levy each year to share in the cost of identified projects.
The commission requests a 2024 levy for the following amounts for these projects:
• City Cost Share Best Management Practices Project - $106,050
• Partnership (Private) Cost Share Best Management Practices Project - $53,025
The West Mississippi Watershed Management Commission requests a levy of $159,075 to fund two priorities in the commission’s watershed management plan - two water quality cost share programs. These programs provide cost share for projects that provide additional infiltration and water quality treatment by retrofitting best management practices into already developed areas throughout the West Mississippi Watershed - one project for publicly owned areas and another for privately owned areas. The Watershed Management Plan established a process to identify small, best management practices such as iron-enhanced pond filter benches, bioinfiltration basins, plant buffers, and erosion stabilization that qualify; and established a capital levy each year to share in the cost of identified projects. The projects will support the commission’s goals to improve water quality throughout the West Mississippi Watershed and downstream resources including the Mississippi River.
The commission requests a 2024 levy for the following amounts for these projects:
• City Cost Share Best Management Practices Project - $53,025
• Partnership (Private) Cost Share Best Management Practices Project - $106,050
Levies authorized pursuant to Minnesota Statutes §103B.251 are exempt from any statutory limitation on taxes. A county levying a tax under Minnesota Statutes §103B.251 shall not include that tax in the county’s general levy but shall separately certify that amount to the county auditor. The county auditor shall extend that levy as a special taxing district. The commissions must certify their final levies to the county auditor prior to October 1, 2023.
Current Request: This request is to set the Shingle Creek Watershed Management Commission 2024 maximum levy at $986,265 and the West Mississippi Watershed Management Commission 2024 maximum levy at $159,075 for projects that will improve water quality. This request also establishes that the levies for both commissions be certified to the county auditor and be placed on all taxable property under the jurisdictions of the Shingle Creek Watershed Management Commission or the West Mississippi Watershed Management Commission.
Impact/Outcomes: Projects in this request will reduce pollutants from throughout watersheds by making cost-share funding available to private landowners and cities, and make targeted improvements to Shingle Creek, Pike Creek, and Pike Lake. This request also adds to a maintenance fund that covers routine activities necessary to ensure the continuing efficacy of past projects and investments by the Shingle Creek Watershed Management Commission.
Both watersheds contain significant areas within their boundaries that are defined by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency as areas of concern for environmental justice. The Brookdale Natural Channel Phase 1 project will occur in one of these areas, and some of the watershed-wide cost-share projects are likely to occur within these areas of concern.
These projects will also contribute to making Hennepin County more resilient to climate change by creating streambanks that are better able to withstand high flows associated with increasing precipitation patterns, by managing more stormwater, and by improving water quality in advance of wetter and warmer mid-century conditions.
This action supports the county’s disparity reduction efforts by enhancing stormwater management systems and mitigating the flooding risks that climate change poses to our infrastructure and vulnerable populations.
Approval of this request will also allow certification of the maximum levy to the county auditor for inclusion in Truth in Taxation statement.
recommendation
Recommendation from County Administrator: Recommend Approval