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Newspaper Clipping - Newspaper Clipping Scan - People move to Eagan despite growing pains - 8/1/1985Community Dakota /Scott 7nne nanAS insith Minneapolis Star and Tribune Thursday August 1/ 1985 iv People keep moving to Eagan despite its growing pains By Diana Ettel Gonzalez Staff Writer Eagan officials like to point out how growth has brought an expanding tax base, a thriving economic climate, a booming housing industry and some impressive corporate headquarters to their city. But they acknowledge a flip side to living in the fastest - growing city in the metropolitan area. Schools are bulging. Residents will face a longer wait next winter to get their streets plowed. Neighborhood parks sometimes come into a neigh- borhood years after the area is de- veloped. The city's crime- prevention program lags because the Police Department doesn't have enough people to devote a full -time officer to the program. The Fire Department says that unless a new station is built soon, response time to fires in some parts of the city may be unaccept- ably long. In 1980 Eagan had 20,700 residents. The Metropolitan Council expects the population to reach 35,000 by 1990; city staff members expect it to reach 41,800 by that year. It's the price of growth, but people apparently feel that it's a price worth paying, because they keep moving into the city at an astounding rate. "We talk to a number of residents who find it's a good place to invest in housing because we're equidistant to both downtowns," said City Adminis- trator Tom Hedges. "Eagan has been a silent sleeping giant for a long time; it's waking up." Unlike many suburbs that are main- ly bedroom communities, Eagan is a place where people can live and work. In 1980 there were 11,300 jobs within the city, many of them in high -tech fields, Hedges said. Those jobs are expected to increase to 18,400 in 1990, according to staff estimates. Young families have been moving in in droves. Between 1980 and 1984 Eagan had the highest increase in the number of households in the metropolitan area, according to the Metropolitan Council. (The city ac- quired 2,660 households, compared Staff Photo by Charles Bjorgen Scott Eppen and Don Buecksler, Eagan Parks Department employees, set posts for the perimeter of a hockey rink In Ridge Cliff Park. with 2,496 in Plymouth, 2,192 in Brooklyn Park, 2,157 in Eden Prairie and 2,115 in Coon Rapids.) Hedges said the council is doing all it can to keep up with personnel and equipment demands. "We've been adding seven or eight people a year for the last six years. But even if the council took the pos- ture, 'Let's add 15 new people,' we couldn't levy that much taxes," he said. In 1980 Eagan had 22 police officers for its population of 20,700 — more than the one per 1,000 residents rec- ommended by most police officials. This year it has 27 officers. Whether the department has enough officers for its population depends on the estimates used. Eagan staff mem- bers have estimated that last year the city had 32,243 residents. The Metropolitan Council estimated that the population was closer to 26,470. Police officials say the department continues to answer emergency calls within three to five minutes, but police are likely to take longer to answer calls where a crime has oc- curred, people are no longer in dan- ger and the criminal is nowhere in sight. No exact figures were readily available because records of calls aren't computerized, according to Capt. Pat Geagan. "We try and ascertain if there is any immediate danger to life or proper- ty," he said. "If the crime has been committed and the perpetrators are gone, we answer the others first. We used to do that before. but not as often as we do now." Police officials say they worry about the possibility of not having enough officers to give adequate backup in dangerous situations. "If we have several domestics at the same time, we have to use all our officers, then we have to call neigh- boring communities to back us up. We get rather thin at times," Geagan said. He said he can't recall a situation when officers have had inadequate backup. The number of serious crimes such as burglaries, rapes and assaults has not risen between 1980 and 1984, but the crime - solution rate has changed slightly. Of 841 serious crimes in 1980, 25 percent were solved; of 841 in 1984, police solved 22 percent. The last fire station in Eagan was built six years ago. The city has kept response time to fires between five and seven minutes, said Fire Mar- shal Doug Reid. As with the police, exact figures aren't available be- cause records are not computerized, Reid said. He said fire officials be- lieve that response time should be seven minutes at the most. The city is studying fire services to see what might lie ahead. Parks Director Ken Vraa is used to getting calls from people that they can't find tot lots or tennis courts in their neighborhood. "Eagan is such a new community: you see all these people comics In with high levels of expectations," Vraa said. "Their expectations are not unrea- sonable." he said. "It's not unreason- able to expect that you can take your son or daughter and walk to your neighborhood park where you have some play equipment." Vraa said he is not surprised by the demand. Voters approved a bond is- sue last year that allowed the city to buy about 400 acres of parkland. The amount of developed parkland has remained at 126 acres for four years, but Vraa said the city is developing 95 more park acres. Park develop- ment should be completed in 1988, he said. "Unfortunately," he said, "we can't build them as fast as people would like them. "When we completed putting play- ground equipment at Ridge Cliff Park we went out there one hot day and there were something like 28 kids crawling on the playground equipment. This was in the heat of the day, with summer school still in session," Vraa said. "When you see that type of things, you think, we really need to get that playground equipment for the kids (at other parks)." The demand for adult facilities is also strong, he said. "If you wanted to play softball next year, and you're a new resident with a new team, the odds of your getting in are about one in six," he said. "One of our real strong policies is that we don't put adult teams on neighborhood parks. Those are for the kids' teams and their practices and their games. Tuesday night is full for next year; Monday night I think we could take in two teams. It means that there are a lot of discour- aged people out there." Eagan is doing well in some areas, however. Although it had to ban sprinkling to protect its water supply last year, there have been no such problems this year, despite the dry summer, because the city hay completed a 12- mil "_.. "sd11on per day water +- °atment plant, said Tom Colh°ri• director of public works. "We've caught up, and now we want to try and get one step ahead, by installing two new water wells be- fore the summer of '86," he said. But snowplowing is expected to take longer this year, he said. "We've been able to plow our streets within 12 to 14 hours. The winter of '85 -'86 we'll probably fall behind to 14 to 16 hours because of the in- crease in street mileage," he said.