Over the past 10 years, the city of Burnsville has received more than $4.6 million from the Met Council for municipal projects under the agency's Livable Communities program.

Since the program began in 1995, the Met Council has awarded about $200 million in grants to the more than 100 communities that participate. The program is designed to help the agency meet its goals on affordable housing.

Yet, the Burnsville City Council last week seemed less than thrilled about signing up for another 10-year commitment to the program, even though it could mean access to perhaps millions more dollars in future Met Council grants.

"There was some hesitancy," Craig Ebeling, Burnsville's city manager, acknowledged after the meeting where the City Council ultimately agreed to re-up.

According to City Council members, the reluctance comes from ongoing friction between municipalities and the Met Council over what role the agency should play and how much influence it has, given that it is not an elected body.

"We are elected. They're an appointed body," Burnsville Mayor Elizabeth Kautz said. "We are held accountable as elected officials and they are not. And then they try to tell us what do. That's my rub."

The Met Council notes that the Livable Communities Program, which has 105 participants, is voluntary, as are the housing goals to which the council and the cities agree.

"The Livable Communities Act program is a voluntary, incentive-based approach to address ... affordable and life-cycle housing needs while providing funds to communities to assist them in carrying out their development plans," Bonnie Kollodge, a Met Council spokeswoman, said in an e-mail. "Communities decide for themselves whether to participate."

"Control creep?"

Kautz, in office almost since the Livable Communities Program was enacted, cited the Met Council's "creeping control" as one reason to pause before entering into a relationship with the agency.

Burnsville officials take issue with the Met Council dictating to them how many units of affordable housing there should be in the community.

"We are in charge of land use," Kautz said. "But, like with everything else, there is control creep, mission creep."

Burnsville Council Member Dan Kealey takes an even stronger view, accusing the Met Council of holding cities "hostage" by withholding grant money if communities do not participate in the program.

Specifically, he said, Burnsville and other communities send tens of millions of tax dollars to St. Paul each year, but they receive only a fraction of that back through the Met Council and its programs.

"They're holding us hostage [with] the grant money that we send to the Capitol," Kealey said. "We send millions of dollars and get nothing back, or little back."

The friction in the south metro has been exacerbated by ongoing differences with the Met Council over transit issues, specifically who should run and operate bus lines in and out of Dakota County.

Some local elected officials, such as Kautz and Kealey, believe the Met Council wants to take over and do away with the Minnesota Valley Transit Authority, the bus service of which Burnsville is a part.

"There is friction," said Tom Lawell, city administrator of Apple Valley, which also must decide whether to renew its participation in the Livable Communities Program. "There certainly is a lot of tension right now with the transit situation."

"State within the state"

Burnsville is certainly not the first community to raise these concerns. As the Met Council has grown, more and more local elected officials have chafed under its yoke.

Earlier this summer, Wright County commissioners refused to participate in a Met Council transit study -- even though a majority of the cities in the county wanted to join in -- because they feared what the council might do with the information in the future.

"The bottom line with the Met Council for me is that they are a layer of government that seems to be getting bigger and bigger, a kind of state within the state," Kealey said. "This mission creep ... is that they've gotten too big, they've gotten too much authority, and now are flexing their muscles."

Despite any tensions that might exist, Lawell said, his city's experience with the program has been "cooperative and productive."

According to Met Council records, Apple Valley has been awarded eight grants totaling more than $4.2 million. Lawell said the city currently is pursuing two grants totaling about $110,000.

"We've had good success with many of their programs," Lawell said. "We've been frequent applicants. As long as the program is out there, we will be interested."

Burnsville officials acknowledge that, despite their issues with the Met Council, the city cannot afford to ignore the Livable Communities program.

"I would have been willing to say no, but it would have been cutting off your nose to spite your face," Kealey said. "We say no and ... our grant money is held hostage."

Heron Marquez Estrada • 612-673-4280