Stories indexed with the term ‘Bryant neighborhood’

Ann Arbor park advisory commission meeting (May 21, 2013): The meeting featured a briefing on a project to install rain gardens at Arbor Oaks Park, part of a broader effort to address drainage and flooding problems in the Bryant neighborhood in southeast Ann Arbor.

Jerry Hancock, the city’s stormwater and floodplain programs coordinator, described the project, which is being paid for out of the city’s stormwater utility fund – not the parks and recreation budget. It will involve regrading the perimeter of the park in the fall, then putting in native plants next spring. Soil excavated to create the rain gardens will be used to elevate the park’s central lawn area, which often has standing water following heavy rains. The work will be done prior to improvements planned for the park’s playground next year.

Later in the meeting, commissioners voted to recommend awarding a contract for roof replacement at the Mack indoor pool, located within the Ann Arbor Open school near the corner of Miller and Brooks. The recommendation is to select Pranam GlobalTech Inc., which put in the low bid of $193,000. A 10% construction contingency brings the project’s budget to $212,300, with a portion of that amount to be paid for by the public schools.

Also recommended was using $8,280 from the public market fund to upgrade a surface parking lot – known as the “sand lot” – on the Fourth Avenue side of the farmers market. The paving is viewed as a short-term solution, pending longer-term improvements expected at the market in a few years.

Commissioners also elected Bob Galardi as chair of PAC’s budget & finance committee. He replaces Tim Doyle as committee chair, following the end of Doyle’s term on PAC earlier this month. Jen Geer – Doyle’s replacement on PAC – was confirmed by the city council the previous evening but did not attend PAC’s May 21 meeting. Geer has worked with Galardi and councilmember Christopher Taylor – an ex-officio member of PAC – in another capacity, in the performing arts. Most recently, she was executive producer for the Ann Arbor in Concert production of Ragtime, performed at Michigan Theater on May 18. Both Taylor and Galardi were lead performers in that show.

Updates during PAC’s May 21 meeting covered a range of topics, including news that bids for construction of the new skatepark came in a little higher than anticipated. Parks staff and skatepark designer Wally Hollyday will be reviewing the bids to see what options are available. Parks and recreation manager Colin Smith reported that at PAC’s June 18 meeting, commissioners will be presented with a resolution to award a construction contract, as well as an agreement between the city and the Friends of the Ann Arbor Skatepark related to operating the skatepark.

Other updates from Smith included the fact that parks staff is gearing up for Memorial Day weekend, with the opening of the city’s outdoor pools. He also highlighted the completed renovations of ball fields at Veterans Memorial Park, West Park and Southeast Area Park, and improvements made at Liberty Plaza. In addition to removing some bushes there, he said, “we also removed all sorts of things that were in the bushes, which are no longer there – and I’m glad they’re not.”

Other brief reports were given regarding work of PAC’s dog park and downtown park subcommittees, and public forums for the North Main-Huron River task force. Public commentary focused on input from the Library Green Conservancy, which is advocating for a park or public space atop the city’s Library Lane parking structure. [Full Story]

Ann Arbor planning commission meeting (June 5, 2012): Planning commissioners acted on two items at their recent meeting that have implications for the city’s future energy use: A proposal for a new DTE Energy substation, and recommendations for a set of sustainability goals.

The estimated $10 million project by DTE to build a new electrical substation was met with caution by commissioner Erica Briggs, who urged her colleagues to postpone the proposal. DTE is building the substation to meet increased energy demands in the city.

The project – called the Buckler substation – had previously been discussed at the commission’s May 15, 2012 meeting, which Briggs did not attend. When the item came up again at the June 5 meeting, she argued that a broader conversation about the community’s energy needs is needed. It’s a rare opportunity for that, she noted, given that projects like this don’t occur frequently – the last Ann Arbor substation was built in the 1960s. She used an analogy to transportation: If a proposal came in to widen all the roads in the community, that idea wouldn’t automatically move forward – because people would stop to discuss whether this is what they want for the city. The DTE project will essentially widen the energy capacity for the city, she said, at a time when the community is talking about the need to reduce its energy use.

As examples, Briggs noted that the city is moving forward with sustainability goals, as well as with a climate action plan. Later in the meeting, the commission unanimously recommended approval of 16 sustainability goals, including three that relate to climate and energy. One of the goals calls for the city to “reduce energy consumption and eliminate net greenhouse gas emissions in our community.”

Briggs made a motion to postpone the substation proposal, but it died for lack of a second as none of the other commissioners at the meeting were supportive of another postponement. A possible ally on the issue – commissioner Bonnie Bona, who works for the nonprofit Clean Energy Coalition – did not attend the June 5 meeting. The project was approved on a 5-1 vote, with Briggs dissenting and three commissioners absent. It does not require further approval by city council.

Another proposal that had been postponed from an earlier meeting in May – Maple Cove Apartments & Village development – was taken up again on June 5. The two apartment buildings and seven single-family homes are proposed at 1649 N. Maple, north of Miller Road between North Maple and Calvin Street on the city’s west side. Safety concerns over two planned entrances off of North Maple had caused the previous postponement, but planning staff reported that the entrances conform to city code.

Two residents of Calvin Street spoke during a public hearing, both of them objecting to the project. Several commissioners also expressed disappointment in the project, as they had at earlier meetings. But they noted that because it conforms to the city’s ordinances, they had no choice but to approve it. Briggs said it pointed to the need to reexamine some problems in the city code that led to this situation. The commission’s unanimous recommendation of approval will be forwarded to city council for consideration.

The vote on a project located near Maple Cove – a proposed Speedway gas station at the northeast corner of Maple and Miller – was postponed by commissioners. City planning staff had recommended postponement, to allow the owner to make requested revisions in a landscaping plan and traffic impact statement.

Two other requests were approved, both related to rezoning of land acquired by the city: (1) two parcels for an expansion of the Bluffs Nature Area, and (2) a site adjacent to the Bryant Community Center. In both cases, commissioners recommended that city council rezone the sites to PL (public land). [Full Story]

The Ann Arbor planning commission has unanimously recommended rezoning a 0.2-acre site at 5 W. Eden Court from R1C (single-family dwelling) to PL (public land). The vote came at the commission’s June 5, 2012 meeting.

This land was recently purchased for $82,500 using funds from the city’s open space and parkland preservation millage – a purchase approved by the Ann Arbor city council at its Sept. 6, 2011 meeting. It’s located next to the city’s Bryant Community Center.

The recommendation will be forwarded to the city council for its consideration.

This brief was filed from the second-floor council chambers of city hall at 301 E. Huron, where planning commission meetings are held. A more detailed report will follow: [link]

Ann Arbor city council meeting (Sept. 6, 2011): Ordinarily the slot on the council’s agenda for nominations and appointments to various boards and commissions generates little conversation during the meeting – by the public or by the council.

However, considerable public commentary at the council’s Tuesday meeting – held a day later than usual due to the Labor Day holiday – was connected to appointments to the city’s medical marijuana licensing board. Advocates for access to medical marijuana tied their remarks to that agenda item, though none of the speakers had any apparent issue with the proposed constitution of the board. Instead, they expressed concerned that a recent court of appeals ruling makes the legality of certain dispensary operations uncertain.

On the council’s side, the unusual focus on appointments came during the usually perfunctory vote on the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority appointments. That vote was drawn out by a request from Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) to separate out the three appointments for separate roll-call votes. The votes on the reappointment of John Mouat and the new appointment of Nader Nassiff were unanimous. But Kunselman wanted to cast a lone vote of opposition against the reappointment of Joan Lowenstein to the board.

The other non-unanimous vote of the evening came on the reconstruction of a pedestrian bridge over Malletts Creek in the Lansdowne neighborhood. Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) asked his colleagues to indulge him in a two-week postponement on that project, so that he could achieve a clearer understanding of the public-private character of the project and its potential legal liabilities. His colleagues, who indicated they were already familiar with the longstanding issue of the bridge, were disinclined to grant the postponement. So Derezinski voted against the $120,000 project, which will be paid out of the city’s major street fund.

In other street fund expenditures, the city council approved a roughly $550,000 increase in the amount of its contract with Barrett Paving Materials Inc. to undertake additional street repair projects in the 2011 construction season. Progress on the scheduled projects had been sufficiently rapid that it was possible to add the additional work.

Land purchase and lease was the topic of three items on the agenda. In one, the city authorized a $100/month month-to-month lease of part of the city-owned 415 W. Washington building to the Kiwanis Club for storage for the club’s warehouse sale. The council also approved the use of $82,500 from the city’s open space and parkland preservation millage to purchase an Eden Court parcel located next to the Bryant Community Center. And the council held a closed session under the exemption in the Open Meetings Act that allows for such a session for the purpose of land acquisition.

In other business, councilmembers gave initial approval to a change in the city’s pension ordinance, approved the allocation of some money already budgeted for human services, and OK’d the allocation of community events funding.

In his communications time, Kunselman foreshadowed an upcoming issue for the council – the relationship between the street millage and the public art program. First Kunselman offered to fill the slot as council liaison to the Ann Arbor Housing Commission. Derezinski had stepped out of that role in order to serve on the city’s public art commission. At Tuesday’s meeting, Kunselman also reiterated his position that the city’s public art program takes money from dedicated millages in a way that is not legal. In response to his comments, Sabra Briere (Ward 1) encouraged Kunselman to take the action he felt was appropriate to rectify that situation.

Among the proclamations made at the start of the meeting was one honoring Jonathan Bulkley for his service to the University of Michigan, the state of Michigan and the nation. Bulkley had addressed the council at its Aug. 4, 2011 meeting in support of the council’s resolution on the greenway – he’s a board member of the Allen Creek Greenway Conservancy. [Full Story]

At its Sept. 6, 2011 meeting, the Ann Arbor city council voted to appropriate $82,500 from its open space and parkland preservation millage to acquire the property at 5 W. Eden Court. The Eden Court property is immediately adjacent to the Bryant Community Center.

The 2011 taxes on the property were estimated at $1,400, which would be eliminated from the city’s tax base, once the property becomes public land. The parcel could be used to expand the community center’s programming services. It could also be used in other ways in support of the city’s park and recreation system.

This brief was filed from the city council’s chambers on the second floor of city hall, located at 301 E. Huron. A more detailed report will follow: [link] [Full Story]

A major project to replace water mains and resurface roads in the Bryant neighborhood will get under way this spring, part of a broader plan to address the area’s chronic drainage problems and other issues.

At a Jan. 14 neighborhood meeting, Ann Arbor city staff gave an overview of the project, which included an historical look at the subdivision off  Stone School Road, just south of I-94.

The meeting at the Bryant Community Center – organized by the nonprofit Community Action Network and attended by residents, city and county elected officials and staff, among others – is the latest in a series of efforts to deal with a wide range of challenges to one of the city’s predominantly low-income neighborhoods.

At the end of Thursday’s two-hour session, a question raised by one of the residents – “Is there a happy ending to all of this?” – might best be summarized by the answer, “It depends.” [Full Story]

On The Chronicle’s first trip to the Bryant Community Center in December 2008, elected officials, the heads of local nonprofits, city and county staff outnumbered residents at a meeting for the southeast Ann Arbor neighborhood. The reverse was true last Thursday evening, when a room full of neighbors filled every seat, gathering to discuss the challenges they share.

Bryant is one of the few clusters of affordable housing in Ann Arbor. It’s also been hit hard by the mortgage crisis – a foreclosed property in the neighborhood at 2 Faust Court, vacant and boarded up, has been targeted as one of the first acquisitions for the county’s new land bank.

The land bank actually dovetails with a widespread problem that affects nearly all residents, which was the focus of Thursday’s meeting: Inadequate drainage and the chronic pooling of water in crawl spaces, basements, yards and streets. Joan Nassauer, a University of Michigan professor of landscape architecture, has remediated sites with similar problems in Flint, Chicago, St. Paul and other areas. She was on hand Thursday to talk about what Bryant residents might do to address their drainage issues. [Full Story]

If you made a list of people who can get things done, you’d end up with one that looked a lot like the actual people attending a recent meeting at the Bryant Community Center. Two current city councilmembers and a former one. The county treasurer and chief deputy clerk. A school board member. A cop. Nonprofit leaders, city staff and residents.

They gathered on Thursday to talk about ways to improve this neighborhood on Ann Arbor’s southeast side, north of Ellsworth and east of Stone School Road. The effort is being led by the Community Action Network, a nonprofit group that provides support services to people in low-income neighborhoods. CAN was hired earlier this year to manage Bryant and Northside community centers, and also works with Hikone and Green Baxter Court neighborhoods. [Full Story]