urbanMSP

The Governor's "Blue Ribbon Committee" on reviewing the Met Council (effectiveness, elected vs. appointed, etc.) appears to have met for the final time and put together a report of their recommendations. I never had high hopes for this group once I saw it was chaired by Dakota County Commissioner Mary Liz Holberg.

Home Page for Blue Ribbon Committee: https://metrocouncil.org/Council-Meetin ... ittee.aspx

Final Report: https://metrocouncil.org/Council-Meetin ... eport.aspx

Their recommendations are ultimately disappointing and don't go further than "keep everything the same except implement staggered 4-year terms". That's been discussed for years and AFAIK, has no known opposition. If a Republican should win the governorship in the future, that would prevent them from instantly replacing the entire Met Council, though presumably they'd be able to replace half, plus the chair, giving them a 9/17 majority right off the bat, and the ability to replace the rest 2 years into their first term. Staggering terms is a good move, but won't do shit to prevent a future Republican governor from stacking it with people who hold beliefs counter to the Council's mission. The principal unspoken priority of this blue ribbon committee should have been "what can we do to ensure that a future Republican governor doesn't completely decimate the Met Council?" and they clearly failed at that. I sympathize that they don't want to have the entire Council elected, creating a "mini-legislature" and/or another body that would supersede County Commissioners' authority on transit matters, but I'm surprised they didn't at minimum recommend that the Chairperson be elected metro-wide or something.

It would be a major upheaval, but it still seems like the "perfect world" solution is to abolish the 7 metro counties and elect the Met Council instead, having that newly elected "Metro County" take over the role of the 7 counties. Increase the number of seats from the current 16 to at least 25-30 to reduce the size of the districts, with the chairperson either elected metro-wide, or perhaps appointed by the Governor. In this grand consolidation scenario, I'd allow the outlying, truly rural/agricultural parts of Scott and Carver Counties the opportunity to escape "Metro County" and join the adjacent county, if that keeps the suburbanized parts in. Alternatively, short of a full consolidation of the 7 metro counties and all their powers, I'd be interested in seeing the Met Council absorb the counties' transportation responsibilities (basically absorbing the 7 Regional Rail Authorities, Public Works Departments, and half-cent sales tax & wheelage tax revenues). The 7 counties would continue to exist for Health & Human Services, Libraries, and all the other things they do, but transportation would no longer be on their plate in any way.

The good?/bad? news is that the Minnesota GOP's hostility to the Met Council is inseparable from their hostility to the metro region, and they need at least respectable results there to win statewide. That doesn't eliminate the risk, but I do think that the next Republican to win statewide is more likely to be a Met Council dove than a hawk.

How does the MyPillow guy feel about the Met Council?

Depends on which gov appointed them.

I have a feeling this is flying under the radar and probably not going to go anywhere, but this is an interesting idea that was floated around last weekend: Metropolitan Transportation Planning Board creation as part of the Department of Transportation establishment; Metropolitan Council authority over transportation, transit planning, and construction elimination; appropriating money
https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bills/bill.p ... n=0&y=2021

I skimmed it and didn't find anything extremely offensive, but I'm certainly suspicious of its motives. It's extremely focused on light rail. What problem is this trying to solve?

I skimmed it and didn't find anything extremely offensive, but I'm certainly suspicious of its motives. It's extremely focused on light rail. What problem is this trying to solve?

One of the authors, DFLer Karla Bigham, was a county commissioner in Washington County and frequently complains about Met Council mandates.

This is openly hostile to the Met Council, and probably is intended to be the first step in dissolving the Council (or at least greatly reducing its power) by slowly stripping it of its responsibilities. Of course, this has been a long-term goal for state Republicans, but it's disheartening to see a DFLer pick up on it.

TBF, this may be an honest attempt to better regulate regional transit, but I have little faith in that given who the sponsors are.

I wouldn't be surprised if politicians in Washington County are still bitter about the Lake Elmo decision.

The 1994 combination of transit, parks, sewers, and public housing into the Met Council allowed regional investments to be tied with regional planning policy. Even before 1994, the Met Council had a lot of control over the power of municipalities in planning decisions. Rolling back the tangible duties of the council reduces the power, which then might allow for the planning powers to be rolled back.

The thing that annoys me about it is that the Met Council isn't even that egregious with planning policy. The development standards are really low (3 units per acre for sewer service), and really just serve to prevent leapfrog sprawl. This ultimately saves money for the municipalities. On the other hand, Lake Elmo was different in that the city wanted to remain "rural" and not take on it's allocation of regional growth.

Nah this has nothing to do with Lake Elmo. Likely has to do with how County Commissioners view the Met Council in the post-CTIB era. There are some legitmate issues with the Met Council structure, particularly its dual function as a regional transit/transportation planning body & the region's federally-designated MPO (technically I think the Met Council's TAB is the MPO), while also being the transit operator (pretty rare throughout the US), .

Other structural issues include the way that transit sales tax funds are controlled by each county board, separately, so Met Council defers to the counties on initial planning of transitways. This is not a good strategy for a regional transit system. I'd go in the opposite direction of Senator Bigham though, and just give them total control of the transit sales tax monies. Cut the county boards out of regional transit planning entirely. The CWADS (suburban counties) would pitch a fit though.

Senator Bigham's proposal would actually take things back in the direction of having a separate agency (Metro Transit) operate the transit from the agency that does the long-range planning, as the TAB/MPO function would move over to this new division under MnDOT. This move would kind of leave Metro Transit as an usual appendage under what remains of the Met Council, after being stripped of all authority over transit planning. The Met Council would then be regional sewers, regional land use planning...and a transit operator. At that point it wouldn't make a ton of sense for Met Council to be the parent agency of Metro Transit (likely necessitating even further legislation).

This all gets back to my posts upthread about the "Governor's Blue Ribbon Committee on Met Council governance" being a huge failure and waste of time. They literally discussed all of the issues with the current structure and decided to recommend zero reforms, aside from staggered terms for Met Council members, which is totally uncontroversial and would get bipartisan support any time.

Ah, ok that makes a lot of sense. I guess I assumed the counties would be happier once CTIB was dissolved, but I guess it goes further than that.

It seems that moving the MPO out of Met Council and then attempting to remove transit operations out of the Council as well would overall be pretty disastrous for moving regional growth in the right direction. I think that even if the counties control the planning of corridors, the Council should attempt to identify which corridors have more merit with the goal of directing the counties the right way. I don't believe there has been a holistic view of transitway network planning since the Transit Master Study in 2008 (https://metrocouncil.org/Transportation ... y-pdf.aspx).

I missed this story from a month back, related to what kellonathan posted upthread about the MN Senate pushing a bill to make metro counties pay for more transitway operating costs.

Facing a severe budget shortfall, Metro Transit needs Hennepin and Ramsey counties to make up 31 percent of the Green Line’s $44.7 million budget. Both counties tabled the request, unhappy at being cut out of the conversation before being handed a bill.

https://www.twincities.com/2021/04/27/r ... lion-bill/

Considering the likelihood that the met council of the future will be extremely different then the one today. Maybe it might make sense to get in front of it and transfer some of the transportation powers of the met council to a smaller region consisting of the cities and first and some second ring suburbs.

We would sacrifice some of the taxable land and population but I think that it would be easier to make the argument for a higher tax to support core transit, bicycling, road diets. And other things that aren't as politically popular with the met council.

It could be used for things like Greenway rail, BRT lines, and downtown tunnels.

I'd like to see spending on a per capita basis. The more people an area has the more roads or transit or bike paths or whatever infrastructure they choose to spend the money on. I'd imagine the fiscal conservatives would like the idea of not redistributing the wealth so maybe it could get bipartisan support?

I'd imagine the Blue and Green line extensions would be a bit shorter (and run under Hennepen) but I bet the midtown greenway would have LRT in it.

I'd imagine the fiscal conservatives would like the idea of not redistributing the wealth so maybe it could get bipartisan support?

There aren't any true fiscal conservatives left. Just ones that want to spend on whatever their base likes and punish anyone who doesn't vote for them. So no, I don't expect them to support a plan that lets the cities do what they like without state oversight. An MSP that can act in its own best interests without a veto from Lino Lakes or Cambridge is a nonstarter.

I'd imagine the fiscal conservatives would like the idea of not redistributing the wealth so maybe it could get bipartisan support?

There aren't any true fiscal conservatives left. Just ones that want to spend on whatever their base likes and punish anyone who doesn't vote for them. So no, I don't expect them to support a plan that lets the cities do what they like without state oversight. An MSP that can act in its own best interests without a veto from Lino Lakes or Cambridge is a nonstarter.

But if Lino Lakes and Cambridge has less oversight from MSP. Then wouldn't that be worth it?

I'd imagine the fiscal conservatives would like the idea of not redistributing the wealth so maybe it could get bipartisan support?

There aren't any true fiscal conservatives left. Just ones that want to spend on whatever their base likes and punish anyone who doesn't vote for them. So no, I don't expect them to support a plan that lets the cities do what they like without state oversight. An MSP that can act in its own best interests without a veto from Lino Lakes or Cambridge is a nonstarter.

But if Lino Lakes and Cambridge has less oversight from MSP. Then wouldn't that be worth it?

If we plan to doing anything to combat sprawl and greenhouse gas emissions I really like the idea of investing in the areas that are already dense. More investment would make the area more attractive for new residents which would allow more investment. Places like Lino Lakes and Cambridge could also benefit by investing in the downtown areas instead of building outward (not sure if Lino Lakes has a downtown but maybe they could make one).

Maybe the conservatives wouldn't like it but what are they going to do if they are beaten over the head with their own talking points?

I'd suggest that the people that are moving to Cambridge and Lino Lakes aren't doing so because they want to live crammed into a tiny condo above a coffee shop; they want a detached house on a huge lot; maybe even a hobby farm so they can have ATVs and horses.

If that's why they're there, great. But they keep electing representatives that want to meddle with the metro.

That's the main point I was making - even if there was a bipartisan deal to be struck on letting each take care of their own, giving the cities more power to operate their own affairs would be a tough sell, as it has been throughout most of MN history.

It's not enough that they don't have to pay for the transit, they just don't want the city to have it period.

I'm sure there are people who would enjoy living in a small apartment above a coffee shop in Cambridge. And I'm sure plenty of people want a detached house on a huge lot. I just wish those properties with huge lots would pay for the infrastructure these lots require. Perhaps we should base property taxes on lots instead of buildings.

And it would be nice if the people with the huge lots would quit complaining about how the people who subsidize their infrastructure want to improve their own.

I don't know how long this link will be good for, but it contains a number of Met Council / TAB related items: https://www.metrocitiesmn.org/index.php ... sideration

Most interesting of those links is at the bottom, regarding a policy change to the "Transitway Advancement Process" by which major transitway projects advance from the counties control to Met Council control. As evidenced by Southwest, Bottineau, and now Purple/Rush Line, clearly there are flaws in the current process of having the counties perform the Alternatives Analysis, pick a route at like 10% engineering and hand it over to the Met Council right before it blows up in their faces. The County RRAs walk away unscathed and Met Council takes all the blame and political hits for something that wasn't their decision to begin with.

The proposed policy would require the Council and local project sponsors to develop a risk register and establish roles and responsibilities that address project risks. The Council would then include these elements in agreements with partners for each phase of a transitway project (project development, engineering, construction, and operation).

A major goal of the policy, as described by staff, is to strengthen the transitway advancement process by assessing risks for all subsequent phases of the project earlier in the process. The pressure to keep a given project on track means that important questions are often pushed to a later date and deferring of such questions can have cumulatively significant impacts on a project’s cost or completion date.