The forum was hosted by the Ann Arbor Democratic Party for all city council candidates in contested wards for the Aug. 2 primary election. The event was held in the context of the Democratic Party’s regular monthly meeting at its usual location in the Ann Arbor Community Center on North Main Street.

Ann Arbor's Ward 5 is the yellow highlighted wedge on this city map. The image links to the city of Ann Arbor's My Property page. Type in your address for definitive information about which ward and precinct you live in, along with other information.

The winner of the Ward 5 primary will face Republican Stuart Berry in the general election on Nov. 8. Currently, only Democrats serve on Ann Arbor’s city council.

Republicans have also filed in Ward 4 (Eric Scheie) and Ward 3 (David Parker). In Ward 2, the lack of a Republican challenger means that spot is almost sure to be decided in the Aug. 2 Democratic primary. For the open Ward 1 seat, currently held by Sabra Briere, no partisan challenger filed. Independent candidates have until Aug. 15, 2011 at 5 p.m. to file petitions to run in November.

The last day to register to vote for the Aug. 2, 2011 primary is July 5, 2011.

In this report, we give paraphrased summaries of responses from the Ward 5 candidates. Summarized remarks made by candidates for seats in Ward 2 and Ward 3 are presented in separate articles.

Other Attendees, Logistics

Before getting into the candidate responses, we’ll briefly describe the June 11 gathering. By way of background, the Ann Arbor city council consists of the mayor plus two representatives from each of five wards, who serve for two years each. That means each year, one of the two representative seats for each ward is up for election.

Saturday’s Democratic Party forum was attended by five out of 11 current councilmembers: Mike Anglin (Ward 5), Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) and Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) all participated in the candidate forum. Sabra Briere (Ward 1), whose Democratic primary race this year is uncontested, was invited to make remarks at the end of the forum, which she did. Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) – who is running unopposed in the Democratic primary, but who faces a Republican challenge in the fall – was extended the same invitation as Briere, but could not attend due to a family commitment.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5), who was first elected in November 2008, was re-elected last year. His seat is not up for election again until 2012, but he attended the forum.

Party co-chair Anne Bannister called attendees’ attention to other elected officials in the audience as well. They included county commissioner Yousef Rabhi and state representative for District 53 Jeff Irwin – both Irwin and Rabhi are Ann Arbor residents. As the room was surveyed for other elected officials, attendees got a reminder that the boards of the Ann Arbor District Library and Ann Arbor Public Schools are also elected positions. So Nancy Kaplan (AADL board) and Susan Baskett (AAPS board) were also recognized.

Baskett was recruited to keep time – it was rarely an issue for candidates. Party co-chair Mike Henry moderated.

The Chronicle counted around 50 people in the audience.

Opening Statements

Candidates were given two minutes to make an opening statement. We present candidate responses in the order they were given. First chance to respond rotated down the table of the seven participants in the forum.

Opening Statement: Mike Anglin

Anglin thanked those who organized the forum, and as well as those who are supporting the candidates. Grass roots is fundamental to good government, he said. There are so many people in the room, he said, that it’s indicative of the Democratic umbrella. We’re all here with different ideas, where we discuss things, and the more of that we have, the better off we are as a community, he said. We need this discourse.

He said he would speak to just a single aspect of being an elected official due to the time constraints: Why did he enter politics?

He said he had a masters degree in American history and a masters degree in special education. He’d always had a service component to his life, he said. During college he worked in the D.C. public schools teaching kids to read as a volunteer. Later he worked at Boys’ Village in Cheltenham, Maryland. He began teaching in New York at junior high schools. He finished his career in Montgomery County in a special school for handicapped, emotionally disturbed children.

When Anglin came to Ann Arbor, he got involved in politics because he realized there were issues he wanted to be involved with, like the environment. So he’d started working with the Allen Creek greenway. He’d joined the Kiwanis Club – he schedules Route #9 for Meals on Wheels for that organization. He said he is very heavily involved in the community, and he likes to listen to people, because the first job of government is to provide services to the community.

Opening Statement: Neal Elyakin

Elyakin thanked the Democratic Party for bringing everyone together. These kinds of forums are very important, he said, for the democratic process. Why am I here? he asked rhetorically. First, because of civic responsibility, and also because of the expertise he can bring to the city council.

He noted that he and Anglin had a lot in common. They’re both New Yorkers, both from Brooklyn. He’d grown up there riding the trains and the subway. He said he’d become a special education teacher and had been in teaching administration for many years.

His expertise, he said, is in visioning and futuring and looking at process – making sure we’re looking in the same direction and staying in that direction once a decision has been made. He’s experienced in nonprofits and civic organizations, locally, statewide and nationally, which will help him bring people together who are diverse, to build consensus.

He’s served on Ann Arbor’s human rights commission, and with that work has learned about city government and the importance of building consensus, so that you can make a decision, debate the issues, and move things forward. “I am here to help government, I am here to help you be a part of the government.”

Question: Budget – Public Art

The state and the city face budget challenges and constraints. Many governments are going through a cost-cutting process. How would you prioritize cutting items from the budget? Please speak specifically to the question of whether public art in buildings should be prioritized at times when we are cutting police and firefighters.

Mike Anglin: Budget – Public Art

Mike Anglin said if you look at growth areas of the city budget, in just the general fund, which pays for public safety, it’s based on property taxes. There’s a continual drain on that fund, he said. We need to find a way to push more money in that direction. One area he’d identified that needs to be decreased is the amount of “administration” in the city. Administration seems to be growing, he said, but delivery of services is not. We’re getting a higher, broader, and deeper administration, but fewer services coming into the community, he said. So we see police layoffs, when we should instead look at other staff besides safety services, who should be reduced.

Neal Elyakin: Budget – Public Art

Neal Elyakin said the issue concerns decision-making, and he does have experience looking at the macro issues and looking at the process by which we make decisions. Decisions need to be made based on a “futures orientation” – based on what we want our city to be and to look like for all of its citizens 10-20-30 years from now. We need to “stay on those decisions.”

Whether to make decisions based on art or parks should be built into that vision you have of the city, Elyakin said, and how you’re going to get there. We need to list the priorities clearly and stay on message, and on target. That’s part of the process. “How are we going to fix it right now, this second? I don’t know.” But he said he did know that moving forward, the process by which we make decisions will affect the future of the city.

Question: Budget – Areas to Cut

In his response to the first question about the budget, Anglin identified “administration” as an area that he thought could be reduced. Moderator Mike Henry followed up by asking candidates to name one or two areas that they think are prime for cutting.

Mike Anglin: Budget – Areas to Cut

Anglin said we need to watch the IT (information technology) fund. Though it’s important to have an IT department, as it gets larger, it’s important to keep an eye on it. The other area Anglin would look at would be the city attorney’s office. There are 10 attorneys on staff and he felt that we could take a look at that to see if they are all necessary. [The city attorney's office employs eight attorneys, an office manager and  four legal assistants.]

Neal Elyakin: Budget – Areas to Cut

Elyakin came back to the idea of process: The city needs a process to figure out where and what they should look at with respect to city services. Where are the extra people? He said he did not believe that there were that many “extra” people at the city. He said city employees do a fabulous job to help make the city the best it can be. But there needs to be a regular process, he said, that is followed by the city and by the citizens to help develop those priorities.

Question: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Who is supporting you and why do they have confidence in you? Why do you think you’re a better than those running against you?

Mike Anglin: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Anglin said since he’s been on the city council, he’s tried to listen attentively to the public. They are the ones who are paying the bills and who want to make this town their home. So they are the ones who’ll give direction to the government, he said.

Ward 5 is diverse – there are a lot of different income levels. The people who support him are those he responds to “at the lower level of things” – people who are on a fixed income, people who cannot continue to live in the city if we add more and more burdens to them. The city sometimes pushes things that look small to us but are large to the people they affect, he said – for example, the $45/month garbage cart collection that was added to the set of fees approved by the council this year. All these little expenses add up, he said. As for the people who are supporting him, they’re listed on his website – some are county representatives and people he supported in their elections. He said his support was citywide.

Neal Elyakin: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Elyakin said he is new to the process of running for office. There are a number of people listed on his website as supporting him. He said he’s been knocking on doors of his neighbors and others who live in Ward 5, he’d eventually get to all of the doors in Ward 5.

He said he has friends in the city who’ve told him they believe in him and his ideas and priorities. He’s having conversations with residents of Ward 5, regional leaders, councilmembers, state representatives, county commissioners and others who have leadership roles in the community. He invited people to look at his website and learn who’s supporting him as well as his priorities for the city.

Question: Disagreement

Who would you say you disagree with most often on the city council – please be specific. How would you work to bring yourselves to agreement?

Neal Elyakin: Disagreement

Elyakin said that this may depend on the particular issue. He said he could not be specific about who he might disagree with. As you look at the process of decision-making, you may disagree on a piece of legislation, but on another piece of legislation you might be right on board with that person. The beauty of the process is working together to one end, he said.

Consensus is a way to say, once all the information is gathered, and all the input has been collected, that you make a decision, stick with that decision and live with that decision, Elyakin said. Building a consensus in a political environment is just as important as in the private world, he said.

Pressed by the moderator to talk more about disagreement, Elyakin said he would bring up the Library Lot as an issue. [The city issued an RFP (request for proposals) for development atop the city-owned Library Lot, where an underground parking structure is being built. A conference center/hotel project was initially identified as the preferred proposal, but city council called off the process this spring.] It was a process disagreement, he said, as opposed to a disagreement with a person or a group of people. He said he disagreed that the process followed was an effective process. Moving forward, when making decisions like that, we have to make them more intentionally, with a clearer view of what the future will be, he said.

Mike Anglin: Disagreement

Anglin said the city council agrees on 99% of everything it votes on. Where they disagree are projects that start and still have a life after two or three years. If the city has a good IT department, he said, the city could move towards transparency by posting drafts of documents. If a committee is working on something, the committee should post a draft. It would not be the final resolution, and we wouldn’t hold people’s feet to that draft in February if by October the committee has changed its mind, he said.

An intelligent man changes his mind, but a fool does not, Anglin said. He thanked Stephen Rapundalo – a Ward 2 councilmember – for his cooperation on the budget votes. He noted that he and Rapundalo agreed on many things – they worked together on the liquor license review committee. On the budget this year, there was a $90,000 amendment in support of the parks budget. The amendment needed Rapundalo’s vote and he gave it, so he was very appreciative of that, Anglin concluded.

Question: Library Lot

What would you like to see on the Library Lot? [The Ann Arbor DDA is moving forward with a process that would essentially restart a look at alternate uses of several downtown city-owned lots, including the Library Lot on South Fifth Avenue, where a 640-space underground parking structure is being built. See Chronicle coverage: "Ann Arbor DDA Continues Planning Prep." An RFP process for development atop the Library Lot site was terminated this spring, after a conference center/hotel project was initially identified as the preferred alternative among the six proposals submitted.]

Mike Anglin: Library Lot

Anglin said he would like to see the number of stakeholders increase and wanted to see that the public occupied at least “40% of the voting seats.” A community commons and the library could exist together, he said. People volunteer in massive numbers in the community, he said, giving the Water Hill Music Fest as an example.

Any time there’s an event, people will be drawn to it and that will develop economic strength, Anglin said. They’ll love the downtown and want to come downtown. Don’t put up a big building that will isolate people, he cautioned. We need to get the library to buy in – they’re part of the public. [The Ann Arbor District Library's downtown building is located adjacent to the city-owned Library Lot, immediately south of that South Fifth Avenue site.] The library board needs to weigh in. Individuals from the library have spoken, but the board has not, he contended. It’s important to understand who is speaking for whom. The University of Michigan has no interest in a hotel or conference center on the Library Lot, Anglin said.

Neal Elyakin: Library Lot

Elyakin said it goes back to a process issue. When you think about the process by which we got to where we are today, it was a flawed process, he said. His reading of this over a period of time in the media was that it was a flawed process. We didn’t take into account all the necessary stakeholders in thinking about how we could use that property and the property around it. Entering in partnerships to create an event around what is now a “big hole” – that’s the beauty and power of visioning. You come up with something that the entire community can get behind.

Question: Conference Center

Do you think Ann Arbor needs a conference center anywhere? If so, should public dollars be used to support it?

Mike Anglin: Conference Center

Anglin said he didn’t see the need for a conference center. While the community discussion about the Library Lot was going on, he said, he’d met with the owners of some of the local hotels. Weber’s Inn and the Four Points Sheraton are both offering conference facilities, he said. Between them they had $13 million invested, so the city needed to be very careful in how it invested public money.

For the project at the First and Washington site, he said, the city had started in 2005 working to get the site developed, but if you go by the site, it’s still just a place to park a car. There would be a huge discussion on that site as well, he said, because it’s an environmental issue. [The planned development by Village Green on that city-owned site has already received approval by city council. Called City Apartments, the project is a 156-unit residential planned unit development with a 244-space parking deck as the first two stories of a 9-story, 99-foot-tall building. At its most recent meeting, on June 6, the city council unanimously approved a reduction in the purchase price from $3.3 million to $3.2 million, for the deal that is supposed to finally go through sometime in August.]

Neal Elyakin: Conference Center

Elyakin said whether public money gets used is a decision that comes out of the process of determining what our vision is for what we want our community to look like. Looking at partnerships and how we develop partnerships, there could be validity in coming up with a public-private partnership, but it needs to be wrapped around a vision and the potential for revenue back to the city.

Question: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

How would you characterize the relationship between the city and the University of Michigan? How would you characterize the relationship between the city and Washtenaw County?

Mike Anglin: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

Anglin led off his response with an apparent allusion to the Ann Arbor Transportation Authority’s current effort to expand its transit service countywide. He said as services are needed by surrounding municipalities, and as gasoline is getting more expensive, the AATA is expanding into the county because people in the rest of the county also want the AATA’s services. Cooperation is also happening in Ypsilanti with Ann Arbor SPARK, he said, referring to the area’s economic development agency.

All this would ultimately lead to an income tax, Anglin contended, which he would not support, because it would not help the community. But what the county could do is pass a millage on their residents and then they would have that money to pay for services that originate in Ann Arbor. Anglin criticized the fact that water rates charged by the city of Ann Arbor for some of the townships is only 3% more than the cost charged within the city of Ann Arbor.

We need more cooperation, but we’ll get it only if people see a need for it, he said. For the university, he said, a PILOT [payment in lieu of taxes] program should be in place. He felt that the city would probably finally get to that point. He said he was disappointed that the university didn’t help with the East Stadium bridges replacement. It really helps the university to have that bridge there in the middle of the campus, he said. The university should have simply stepped forward, but the city didn’t push very much, he concluded.

Neal Elyakin: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

Relationship building is a skill he could bring to the city council, Elyakin said. His conversations with city leaders and state-level leaders showed him that building bridges between entities on the city level and the state level and the regional level will help our city revenue streams. It will help eliminate redundancies, and these things are all mutually beneficial. Part of regional leadership is that this city can become a regional leader in working collaboratively with communities around us, he said.

Question: Economic Development

Describe the Ann Arbor that you would help to create if you’re elected. What are your priorities for economic development?

Mike Anglin: Economic Development

Anglin asked how Ann Arbor is different from other towns – other towns also have small shops and coffee shops, too. What we have that makes us different, he said, is the values of the community that are expressed in the priorities that we’re willing to spend money on. To date, we’ve done a good job, but we’re starting to lose some traction on that. We can bring it back, he said. We have a can-do attitude about this, he said.

Anglin said he agreed that service delivery is very important. You like to live in a town because you like the way you were treated the one time you called city hall. When you call city hall and all you get is transfered around, people hear about that – one bad thing goes around 100 times. When that happens, you have a festering and a discontent in the town. He said he felt like we’re now on a better track.

Neal Elyakin: Economic Development

Elyakin said he felt like he probably sounded like a broken record, but visioning for the city is very important. A multi-year budget process is something we could engage in with citizens in a real sense. We could get more direct input from citizens not just to the city council, he said, but to other city leaders. He’d like to see more permanent solutions – dumping loose asphalt into a hole doesn’t necessarily create a permanent solution, he said. He said he loved the idea of more green development and converting city buildings to be more green. He wanted more accountability in our governance as well.

Closing Statements

Each candidate was given two minutes for a closing statement.

Mike Anglin: Closing Statement

Anglin said he didn’t think the council went for consensus. That a misconception, he said. A consensus is one opinion. And one opinion wouldn’t go very far. We all have something to bring to democracy and the more voices we have, the better the solution will be. He’s a hard worker, he said, and tries to build relationships.

Over the course of four years of service he’s established valuable relationships, Anglin said. Some of those are not in his own ward but apply to the whole city. Working to save Huron Hills golf course, he said one of the most important things that was said was by a little man who never even played golf, but who said that one of the most tranquil times of the day is driving past the course in the morning and at night. We all get something different from this town, Anglin continued. Have your voice heard, because that’s what it’s all about. An example of that was preserving Argo Dam for the rowers. He said he’s always on board to vote for infrastructure.

He likes the idea of a community commons [on the Library Lot site] because it will promote democracy. If you see someone sitting there you could go up and talk to them and find out that they have very different views. That avoids a situation where the same discourse goes around and around like a washing machine. We don’t have a community commons that is the center of the city. With three minutes during public commentary at the city council, you don’t feel you’ve been heard, Anglin said.

Neal Elyakin: Closing Statement

Elyakin said he grew up in New York in a big family and learned early the importance of democratic values living with his relatives. He understood the value of how a city can take care of its less able folks. His family was not wealthy by any means, he said, and they relied on public assistance to make ends meet. So he understood clearly the democracy of the country we live in. It’s there to help all the citizens, no matter what they are or who they are or how they behave or what their needs are.

That came with him to Ann Arbor, he said, after living overseas and learning that some democracies are different from U.S. democracy. He learned the importance of listening to everyone and to what people say. He does believe that consensus can work, because it’s a way of building relationships with people so that we can all move forward in a comfortable way. He’s learned that through his work with nonprofits, through his work as an administrator with the Washtenaw intermediate school district (WISD), with civic organizations in the city, at the state and with international nonprofits.

In his job, he works enormously hard building consensus with families and school districts, employers and neighborhoods, Elyakin said, to move forward with a vision for a particular young man or woman with a developmental disability so that they can be all they can be in their community. He feels he can bring that skill to city council that is good for all the citizens.

Elyakin concluded by thanking the audience for their time and the Ann Arbor Democratic Party for creating the forum. He invited the audience to learn more about all of the candidates before making a decision on Aug. 2.

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The event was a combined forum for all Ann Arbor city council candidates in contested wards for the Aug. 2 primary election. The forum was held in the context of the Democratic Party’s regular monthly meeting at its usual location in the Ann Arbor Community Center on North Main Street.

Ann Arbor Ward 2 is the highlighted magenta wedge. The image links to the city of Ann Arbor's My Property page. Type in your address for definitive information about which ward and precinct you live in, along with scads of other information.

The winner of the Ward 2 Democratic primary will almost certainly be the winner of the general election on Nov. 8. No Republican filed nominating petitions, and no independent candidate has yet filed. Independent candidates have until Aug. 15, 2011 at 5 p.m. to file petitions to run in November.

Currently, only Democrats serve on Ann Arbor’s city council. Republicans have filed in Ward 3 (David Parker), Ward 4 (Eric Scheie) and Ward 5 (Stuart Berry). For the open Ward 1 seat, currently held by Sabra Briere, no partisan challenger filed.

The last day to register to vote for the Aug. 2, 2011 primary is July 5, 2011.

After the break, we report in paraphrase form what the Ward 2 candidates had to say. Summaries of remarks made by candidates for seats in Ward 3 and Ward 5 are presented in separate articles.

Other Attendees, Logistics

We’ll start with this report with a partial picture of what the June 11 gathering was like. By way of brief background, the Ann Arbor city council consists of the mayor plus two representatives from each of five wards, who serve for two years each. That means each year, one of the two representative seats for each ward is up for election.

Saturday’s Democratic Party forum was attended by five out of 11 current councilmembers: Mike Anglin (Ward 5), Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) and Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) all participated in the candidate forum. Sabra Briere (Ward 1), whose Democratic primary race this year is uncontested, was invited to make remarks at the end of the forum, which she did. Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) – who is running unopposed in the Democratic primary, but who faces a Republican challenge in the fall – was extended the same invitation as Briere, but could not attend due to a family commitment.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5), who was first elected in November 2008, was re-elected last year. His seat is not up for election again until 2012, but he attended the forum.

Party co-chair Anne Bannister called attendees’ attention to other elected officials in the audience as well. They included county commissioner Yousef Rabhi and state representative for District 53 Jeff Irwin – both Irwin and Rabhi are Ann Arbor residents. As the room was surveyed for other elected officials, attendees got a reminder that the boards of the Ann Arbor District Library and Ann Arbor Public Schools are also elected positions. So Nancy Kaplan (AADL board) and Susan Baskett (AAPS board) were also recognized.

Baskett was recruited to keep time – it was rarely an issue for candidates. Party co-chair Mike Henry moderated.

The Chronicle counted around 50 people in the audience.

Opening Statements

Candidates were given two minutes to make an opening statement. We present candidate responses in the order they were given. First chance to respond rotated down the table of the seven participants in the forum.

Opening Statement: Stephen Rapundalo

Rapundalo opened by noting that he’d represented Ward 2 since 2005. He is seeking his fourth term on the city council for two reasons. First, he said, the ward needs continued strong, pragmatic representation. He offered his service on key council committees in support of his candidacy. [Rapundalo serves on the budget committee, the administration and labor committee, and the liquor license review committee. He is also the city council representative to the board of the local district finance authority (LDFA)]. Rapundalo said, “I am the clear choice of the two of us.” There is also some unfinished business left to do, Rapundalo continued.

Like many other communities, Ann Arbor has tried to grapple with financial challenges. As much as the city has tried to trim away the meat, he said, the fact of the matter is that it hasn’t solved the entire problem. That means the city needs to look for other solutions.

Labor concessions are important, he said, and as chair of the labor committee that’s been a goal of his. Also, the city hasn’t really begun to talk about restructuring revenue. [Presumably Rapundalo was referring to the idea of imposing a city income tax on employees who work in Ann Arbor.] He also said he thought the city is losing its touch on customer service and levels of customer service. Lastly, Rapundalo said, we need to focus on revenue and for that reason the city needs to focus on economic development.

Opening Statement: Tim Hull

Hull thanked the Ann Arbor Democratic Party for hosting the event. Ann Arbor is a great place to live, he began. Since his time here as a student at the University of Michigan, he’s appreciated the unique sense of community he’s had here.

But Hull said that Ann Arbor can’t rest on its laurels if it’s going to remain the great city it currently is. We need to provide the level of services that residents need. In difficult economic circumstances, when difficult decisions must be made, fire and police services should be the last to be cut, he said. If elected, he would make sure that the city is fiscally responsible and sets budget priorities based on community needs. It’s vital to preserve the unique character of Ann Arbor – neighborhoods, parks, natural beauty and a sense of community. As a member of the council, he would work to preserve these parks and neighborhoods, pursuing responsible development that respects the wishes of the community.

It’s important to hear residents’ voices, Hull said. Sometimes it seems like the city council is too caught up in politics to respond to community issues. He promised to be responsive to residents’ concerns, and  said he would make addressing their needs his top priority.

Question: Budget – Public Art

The state and the city face budget challenges and constraints. Many communities are going through a cost-cutting process. How would you prioritize cutting items from the budget? Please speak specifically to the question of whether public art in buildings should be prioritized at times when we are cutting police and firefighters.

Tim Hull: Budget – Public Art

Hull acknowledged that Michigan and Ann Arbor are facing a difficult budget situation. When cuts have to be made, the community’s needs should be the focus, he said. We should ask what do we need and what don’t we need, then go from there. Police and fire services need to be protected. It’s important to protect parks, because they make Ann Arbor an attractive place, he said. He said he understands the importance of public art, but feels like it’s more important to keep sufficient funds in our utilities budgets, instead of reserving a certain percent for public art.

Stephen Rapundalo: Budget – Public Art

Rapundalo said that everything should be on the table, and everything should be on the table at all times – it’s an iterative process. But the biggest cost is personnel and that’s mostly in public safety. He did not want to see public safety numbers diminish, or safety and security compromised, but the fact is that the health care and pension plans for public safety employees are totally out of synch with the rest of the public sector and the private sector, he said. Those costs need to be reined in, and the city is on a path to do that, he said.

Rapundalo also said that “revenue restructuring” had not been looked at, and the community needs to have an open debate about that. With respect to public art and parks, those are quality of life issues, but we certainly need to look at putting everything on the table.

Question: Budget – Areas to Cut

In his response to the first question about the budget, Mike Anglin (Ward 5) identified “administration” as an area that he thought could be reduced. Moderator Mike Henry followed up by asking candidates to name one or two areas that they think are prime for cutting.

Tim Hull: Budget – Areas to Cut

Hull said we need to engage constituents in the process in looking at what we really need and where cuts could be made. Some areas that might be good to look at would be various administrative roles, including the city attorney. It would also be worth looking at how the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority fits into the picture.

Stephen Rapundalo: Budget – Areas to Cut

Rapundalo said it’s easy to pinpoint things, but we need to take a more “macro look” and examine return on investment in functional areas. In the areas that Mike Anglin had highlighted – IT (information technology) and the city attorney’s office – the city is getting a good return on those investments, Rapundalo said. IT also helps move the city as a whole in a direction of efficiency. We have to be careful as we look at everything, he concluded.

Question: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Who is supporting you and why do they have confidence in you? Why do you think you’re a better than those running against you?

Tim Hull: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Hull said he was new to the process, but he is going door-to-door in Ward 2. He’s been talking with people of different orientations – students, young and old. Basically his goal is to talk to as many people in the community as possible, he said. He’s talked to people who are currently in office and wants to build a good constituency around his campaign.

Stephen Rapundalo: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Rapundalo said his support is broad – from elected officials past and present, across multiple jurisdictions. A lot of his support comes from people in the neighborhoods – people he’s helped with their end-of-the-driveway type of issues. As for why he’s a better choice of the two candidates, it boils down to two things, he said: leadership and breadth of experience.

Question: Disagreement

Who would you say you disagree with most often on the city council – please be specific. How would you work to bring yourselves to agreement?

Tim Hull: Disagreement

Hull said it really depends on the issue. He said he could agree with councilmembers on some issues, but disagree on others. It depends on what they’re considering. As an example, for public art he might disagree with some members, but agree with the same people on the DDA parking contract. With respect to the DDA contract, he was concerned about giving too much power to a non-elected body. [The contract recently ratified unanimously by the city council and the DDA board assigns full responsibility for setting public parking rates to the DDA.]

Pressed by the moderator to talk about how he would bring himself closer to agreement – in terms of techniques and strategies – Hull said they could have a discussion and come up with compromise ideas.

Stephen Rapundalo: Disagreement

Rapundalo said there’s not any one person he can pinpoint as someone he disagrees with most. Sometimes you’ll have agreement and sometimes you’ll have differences, he said. At the end of the day, there’s always some measure of compromise. There’s always common interest and common goals. The DDA is one area where he’s taken issue with other councilmembers, he said.

Question: Library Lot

What would you like to see on the Library Lot? [The Ann Arbor DDA is moving forward with a process that would essentially restart a look at alternate uses of several downtown city-owned lots, including the Library Lot on South Fifth Avenue, where a 640-space underground parking structure is being built. See Chronicle coverage: "Ann Arbor DDA Continues Planning Prep." An RFP process for development atop the Library Lot site was terminated this spring, after a conference center/hotel project was initially identified as the preferred alternative among the six proposals submitted.]

Tim Hull: Library Lot

Hull said it’s not what he wants to see there, but rather what the community wants to see there. We need to have a process where the community is engaged in deciding what it wants there, whether that is a park or a conference center, or something else altogether. The previously terminated RFP process was far from ideal, he said. He felt that the public was not as engaged as it should have been. That could be seen from the objections that were voiced up to the time that the council terminated the process, he said.

Stephen Rapundalo: Library Lot

Rapundalo noted that he was intimately involved in that particular issue. [Rapundalo chaired the RFP review committee for the Library Lot proposals.] For at least four years now, the community has been clear that we want to see dense development on that property, he said.

It’s a very valuable piece of property and needs to be developed so that the tax revenues can be realized, Rapundalo stated. What that development should be, he said, he did not know. The RFP put out by the city was completely wide open and did not have preconceived notions. Rapundalo concluded by saying he was quite dissatisfied that the process was prematurely terminated.

Question: Conference Center

Do you think Ann Arbor needs a conference center anywhere? If so, should public dollars be used to support it?

Tim Hull: Conference Center

Hull said the city shouldn’t be picking winners or losers and that whether we need a conference center is up to the private sector. The city shouldn’t be subsidizing it with public money, given that we’re cash-strapped as it is, he said.

Stephen Rapundalo: Conference Center

Rapundalo said the very essence in a public-private partnership is that there’s some contribution from the public sector into it. What that should be depends on the specifics of whatever project is presented. However, the city should always minimize risk going into a project. He said he had some qualification to assess the need, and that there is some unmet need. People want to be able to step outside their meeting door and enjoy the downtown. [In contending he had some qualification to assess conference center need, Rapundalo was alluding to his capacity as executive director of MichBio, a biosciences industry trade association.]

Question: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

How would you characterize the relationship between the city and the University of Michigan? How would you characterize the relationship between the city and Washtenaw County?

Tim Hull: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

Hull said collaboration between the city, county and the university is important because they’re all interconnected. Obviously the county and the city coexist with each other, and the university is located in the city, he said. Many Ann Arbor residents have a stake in the university. He himself is a university employee, he said. We should cooperate to reach common goals, but keep in mind our separate interests. We need to open more dialogue. The city should engage the university more in city affairs, in particular students, who feel alienated from the political process. Sometimes the main contact a student has with the city is getting an MIP [minor in possession of alcohol] citation, which shouldn’t be the case, he said.

Stephen Rapundalo: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

Rapundalo had to depart shortly before the forum concluded in order to attend high school graduation ceremonies for two of his daughters. He was not present for this question.

Question: Economic Development

Describe the Ann Arbor that you would help to create if you’re elected. What are your priorities for economic development?

Tim Hull: Economic Development

Hull said that what makes Ann Arbor really unique is its neighborhoods and its sense of community, its parks and its services. He wondered who would want to invest in a community with potholes all over their roads. It might not be glamourous, but making sure fundamentals are in order is something we should prioritize. We need to make sure that developers know what the community wants, and we need to work together to build something that’s equitable to all parties, he concluded.

Stephen Rapundalo: Economic Development

Rapundalo had to depart shortly before the forum concluded in order to attend high school graduation ceremonies for two of his daughters. He was not present for this question.

Closing Statements

Each candidate was given two minutes for a closing statement. Because Rapundalo had to leave the forum early, he did not give a closing statement.

Tim Hull: Closing Statement

Hull thanked the Ann Arbor Democratic Party again for putting on the forum. He appreciated what all the candidates said.

Times may be tough, given the state of the economy, but we’ll weather the storm together, he said. We might have to make difficult decisions at budget time, but it will be less painful if we prioritize based on what’s best for the community. As a councilmember, he’ll work diligently to represent citizens interests.

He’ll fight to protect those things that make Ann Arbor unique, Hull said. He specifically wants to see Huron Hills golf course protected. He allowed that he might be young, but he has the resolve and dedication to fight for the issues that matter to voters.

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City of Ann Arbor Ward 3 is the highlighted blue wedge. Image links to the city of Ann Arbor's My Property page. Type in your address for definitive information about which ward and precinct you live in, along with scads of other information.

Candidates for Ward 3 could not exactly square off – there are three of them. Plus, the linear seating configuration (determined by drawing playing cards) separated Ward 3 incumbent Stephen Kunselman from challengers Ingrid Ault and Marwan Issa with a buffer zone consisting of the two Ward 5 candidates.

The winner of the Ward 3 primary will face Republican David Parker on Nov. 8 in the general election. Currently, only Democrats serve on Ann Arbor’s city council. Republicans have also filed in Ward 4 (Eric Scheie) and Ward 5 (Stuart Berry). But in Ward 2, the lack of a Republican challenger means that spot is almost sure to be decided in the Aug. 2 Democratic primary. For the open Ward 1 seat, currently held by Sabra Briere, no partisan challenger filed. Independent candidates have until Aug. 15, 2011 at 5 p.m. to file petitions to run in November. The last day to register to vote for the Aug. 2, 2011 primary is July 5, 2011.

After the break, we lay out in paraphrase form what the Ward 3 candidates had to say. Summaries of remarks made by candidates for seats in Ward 2 and Ward 5 are presented in separate articles.

Other Attendees, Logistics

Before diving into candidate responses, we’ll sketch a partial picture of what the June 11 gathering was like. By way of brief background, the Ann Arbor city council consists of the mayor plus two representatives from each of five wards, who serve for two years each. That means each year, one of the two representative seats for each ward is up for election.

Saturday’s Democratic Party forum was attended by five out of 11 current councilmembers: Mike Anglin (Ward 5), Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) and Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) all participated in the candidate forum. Sabra Briere (Ward 1), whose Democratic primary race this year is uncontested, was invited to make remarks at the end of the forum, which she did. Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) – who is running unopposed in the Democratic primary, but who faces a Republican challenge in the fall – was extended the same invitation as Briere, but could not attend due to a family commitment.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5), who was first elected in November 2008, was re-elected last year. His seat is not up for election again until 2012, but he attended the forum.

Party co-chair Anne Bannister called attendees’ attention to other elected officials in the audience as well. They included county commissioner Yousef Rabhi and state representative for District 53 Jeff Irwin – both Irwin and Rabhi are Ann Arbor residents. As the room was surveyed for other elected officials, attendees got a reminder that the boards of the Ann Arbor District Library and Ann Arbor Public Schools are also elected positions. So Nancy Kaplan (AADL board) and Susan Baskett (AAPS board) were also recognized.

Baskett was recruited to keep time – it was rarely an issue for candidates. Party co-chair Mike Henry moderated.

The Chronicle counted around 50 people in the audience.

Opening Statements

Candidates were given two minutes to make an opening statement. We present candidate responses in the order they were given. First chance to respond rotated down the table of the seven participants in the forum.

Opening Statement: Stephen Kunselman

Kunselman began by saying that he was serving the second of two terms to which he’d been elected, with a year off between terms.

[When he was first elected to the council in 2006, Kunselman won a three-way Democratic primary among Jeff Meyers, Alice Ralph and himself  – the seat had been empty due to Jean Carlberg's retirement from the council. In his reelection bid in 2008, he was defeated by Christopher Taylor in the Democratic primary. Then in 2009, Kunselman returned to defeat incumbent Leigh Greden and LuAnne Bullington in the Democratic primary. The general election was uncontested in Ward 3 for all those years.]

Kunselman said he was looking for a third term to represent Ward 3, because there’s a lot of work still to be done. He thanked his challengers for making it a race. There’s a lot for residents of Ann Arbor to be concerned about, he said. He’d recently been focused on the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority and its finances, he said. Why is there so much debt associated with the DDA? This is debt that the city owns, he said. The annual report of the DDA – which he said the city council had yet to receive from the DDA, despite its publication in the newspaper in March – shows $140 million worth of debt (when principle and interest is added together).

Kunselman said he wanted to focus on general governmental accountability: Why is the city staff not preparing reports with good information that would allow the council to make good decisions? With respect to the planned Fuller Road Station, he said, the council has been told that the city will be contributing $10 million to the project. And the council has been assured it would not come from the city’s general fund, but no other fund had been identified. If it’s not the general fund, that left only one other avenue, Kunselman said – utilities. He stated that he did not think that the city should be paying for Fuller Road Station out of utility funds.

Kunselman said he’d campaigned last time on the idea of representing a strong voice, a bold vision, an honest ethic and a new direction, and said he felt that he’d lived up to that. He would continue to hold to that.

Opening Statement: Ingrid Ault

Ault introduced herself as a lifelong resident of Ann Arbor – she’s lived in Ward 3 for about 30 years. She grew up in this community – almost all of it in Ward 3 – and she knows it well, she said. She has a long record of civic activity, she said. The reason she decided to take on this challenge, is that there are some areas where the community is not as well represented as it should be.

Ault is the executive director of Think Local First, a nonprofit that supports locally-owned independent businesses. One thing she does every day, she said, is talk to people. She hears their stories and hears what’s working and what’s not working so well. She catalogs that and looks at ways to build partnerships with small businesses. Communication is key. She said that if you talk to members of Think Local First, they will say she’s reactive and proactive. It’s important to support small businesses, she said – it’s one way we can raise revenue in the community. It’s important that we don’t continue to see the erosion of our city services and in particular our safety services.

She said she also brings experience in government, though she’s never run for office. She did work for the Ypsilanti Downtown Development Authority and said she took on some major projects during the time she served as the DDA’s executive director.

Opening Statement: Marwan Issa

Issa said he’d lived in Ann Arbor all his life. He attended the University of Michigan, and just finished his PhD at Eastern Michigan University. He said he’s not planning to go anywhere else – he’s planning to stay and work in Ann Arbor. His grandfather came to the U.S. in 1970, Issa said, so he’s the first generation in this country.

Issa would like to see a fresh perspective on the city council, a way to look at things from a different view. Those views come partly from his work experience, he said. He’s worked in an educational startup, so he understands how important education and economic development are to the city.

Question: Budget – Public Art

The state and the city face budget challenges and constraints. Many governments are going through a cost-cutting process. How would you prioritize cutting items from the budget? Please speak specifically to the question of whether public art in buildings should be prioritized at times when we are cutting police and firefighters.

Stephen Kunselman: Budget – Public Art

Kunselman said fiscal challenges can’t be handled very well in sound bites. But he felt that the public art program is taking too much money from utility funds, when the city’s infrastructure needs are great. There was an attempt at the council’s budget meeting [on May 31, 2011] to decrease the amount of public art and put that money back into the funds they were taken from. [Kunselman had supported that resolution, but it failed.]

Taking care of infrastructure is a budget priority, Kunselman said. There have been four water main breaks on his street in the last year, he said. One of the repaired mains has broken again – that makes five. But he concluded that the budget process is a cooperative effort among all councilmembers, so no one councilmember would be able to say what’s going to happen.

Ingrid Ault: Budget – Public Art

With respect to budget cuts, Ault said, everything needs to be on the table. Nothing is exempt. Everybody needs to give and take. If it’s not a community effort, it’s not going to work. We need to talk to the unions about making concessions on health care, she said. Ault added that she’s not anti-union, but everybody needs to participate in the process.

Ault said she’s a proponent of public art. There are 3,000 people in Washtenaw County that define themselves as working artists, she said. It’s unfortunate that the first project to be funded through the public art program was not a local artist, she said. [Herbert Dreiseitl, a German artist, was commissioned to design a fountain for the city's new municipal center.] She said that one of the points she talks about all the time is the importance of spending money in the community – it can “reverberate” in the community as much as seven times over. She added that there are 168 parks in the community and we need to continue to support them.

Marwan Issa: Budget – Public Art

Issa said the city needs to be fiscally responsible. When you look at the police and fire departments, he said, it’s hard to cut them. People move to Ann Arbor because of its safety and security. After the cuts, he said, Ann Arbor will have only 0.72 firefighters per 1,000 residents. That’s well under the national average, he said, and that’s not fair to the citizens. Police and fire should be the last things to go. He said he appreciates parks and recreation, but would prefer to save a police officer or a firefighter job.

Question: Budget – Areas to Cut

In his response to the first question about the budget, Mike Anglin (Ward 5) identified “administration” as an area that he thought could be reduced. Moderator Mike Henry followed up by asking candidates to name one or two areas that they think are prime for cutting.

Ingrid Ault: Budget – Areas to Cut

Ault said that rather than talk about cutting jobs, what we need to look at is where duplicate work is being done. Washtenaw County is already doing this, she said, by consolidating the office of community development with the office of economic development. [The proposed consolidation also includes the employment training and community services (ETCS) department.] Thinking about how to be more efficient through collaboration is a better solution than thinking about who we are going to cut, she said.

Marwan Issa: Budget – Areas to Cut

Issa said that before cutting, we need to make sure the city is efficient and effective. Once we’ve done that, then we can look at what to cut. As an example, he gave people with desk jobs who get a gas mileage reimbursement.

Stephen Kunselman: Budget – Areas to Cut

Alluding to Ault’s call for eliminating duplicate work, Kunselman said there’s a lot of duplication at the DDA. The DDA has an attorney; the city has an attorney. The DDA has an accountant; the city has an accountant. The DDA has a planner; the city has a whole planning department. The DDA pays $50,000 for luxury office suites, Kunselman said; the mayor had asked the DDA to move to city hall, but they’d refused. That’s a lot of money that could be saved. Half of the $750,000 bureaucracy at the DDA is paid for by general fund parking revenues, Kunselman said, and it’s time to bring that money home.

Question: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Who is supporting you and why do they have confidence in you? Why do you think you’re a better than those running against you?

Ingrid Ault: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Ault named former city councilmember and current planning commissioner Jean Carlberg as an early supporter. She said she walks her dogs past Carlberg’s house, and would chat with her about things. Carlberg is one of the reasons that she decided to run. She also named Leah Gunn and Barbara Levin Bergman as supporters – both Gunn and Bergman serve on the Washtenaw County board of commissioners.

Ault said she’d also found that people whose doors she knocked on were very interested in what she had to say, and she was interested in what they had to say. She said she was excited to meet those she hasn’t met yet.

Marwan Issa: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Issa said he was new to the process. In talking to people in the ward, he said that many people had encouraged him to run for office. A lot of the support would come as time goes by, he said.

Stephen Kunselman: Campaign Support, Candidate Comparison

Kunselman said he’d not done endorsements in previous campaigns, but would drop a couple of names that day. One was county commissioner Yousef Rabhi – he’d know Rabhi since he was a little kid. And state representative Jeff Irwin was also supporting him, Kunselman said. He also counted Gwen Nysteun, who serves on the city’s park advisory commission, as a supporter.

Kunselman said he had a good strong constituency that represents all the Ward 3 neighborhoods: North Burns Park, Burns Park, Pittsfield Village, Forestbrooke, Turnberry, and even his own neighborhood. [Kunselman lives on Butternut Street, near Packard and Platt.] He noted that he’d served on the planning commission with Jean Carlberg and had run years ago with her tacit support. He said he was looking forward to getting out and talking to people about city services.

Question: Disagreement

Who would you say you disagree with most often on the city council – please be specific. How would you work to bring yourselves to agreement?

Ingrid Ault: Disagreement

Ault said she didn’t really pay attention to how she’s different from others. Rather, she looks for people who can be an ally for certain projects. She said that she and Kunselman had very different ideas about DDAs. Having worked on a DDA [in Ypsilanti] at a time when there was discussion about merging finances with the city, she said she’d done extensive research about what that would really mean. And what that would mean, she said, is you’d get fewer services.

The Ann Arbor DDA had four staff who did a great job managing the parking system, Ault said. We should rely on the DDA to make decisions about the parking system, she said, and the council should not make specific individual decisions about something that’s a user-based fee program.

Marwan Issa: Disagreement

Issa said he would not name specific names. He said he disagreed with the idea of reducing firefighters and police officers. With respect to the DDA, he suggested that the DDA board become an elected body. The DDA was becoming an entity that could do whatever it wanted, he said – it would be nice to reign it in, to make sure the DDA stays on focus.

Stephen Kunselman: Disagreement

Kunselman said he was not in a position to pick on other councilmembers, because they have to work together. But he joked that he would pick on Stephen Rapundalo a little bit, noting that he and Rapundalo were often on different sides. [Rapundalo was seated immediately to Kunselman's right at the candidate forum.]

On basic philosophy, Kunselman said, he had a different view of economic development. He did not think the city council’s focus should be on how to raise revenue through economic development. Instead, he said, the council’s priorities should be on health, safety and welfare. The city cannot do it all, he said. The DDA is set up to promote economic development and that’s what they should do. The DDA has a $3.5 million TIF (tax increment finance) fund they should be spending on economic development efforts. But taking $16 million in parking revenue and performing the same functions as the city, that’s an issue we need to discuss, he said. So he had a difference of opinion with some other councilmembers about the role of the DDA, Kunselman said.

Question: Library Lot

What would you like to see on the Library Lot? [The Ann Arbor DDA is moving forward with a process that would essentially restart a look at alternate uses of several downtown city-owned lots, including the Library Lot on South Fifth Avenue, where a 640-space underground parking structure is being built. See Chronicle coverage: "Ann Arbor DDA Continues Planning Prep." An RFP process for development atop the Library Lot site was terminated this spring, after a conference center/hotel project was initially identified as the preferred alternative among the six proposals submitted.]

Ingrid Ault: Library Lot

Ault said it’s an interesting piece of land, arguably the most valuable piece of land in Washtenaw County. Developing it in the best possible way makes sense. The ground floor should be mixed use, but she did not care what goes above it. You need to put greenspace in there, she added, but it doesn’t need to be a park. If we want a park, then we could simply reinvest in Liberty Plaza, she said. [Liberty Plaza is an urban park at the southwest corner of Liberty and Division.]

Now that the design review board has been established, Ault said, if we put together a good RFP, and are clear about our wants and needs, the city could receive responses to that RFP that include some great projects.

Marwan Issa: Library Lot

Issa said it would be good for a start-up hub. It could be used as office space for start-up companies – if the city provides a new start-up company with a facility to use, we will have more companies come to Ann Arbor and increase the economic development of the city.

Stephen Kunselman: Library Lot

Kunselman stressed that anything that’s developed on the lot should not have a public subsidy – that’s why he was against the hotel/conference center proposal that had made it to the end of the RFP process. His vision of that block is based on the idea that there is too much public land in the area. He would like to see the Ann Arbor District Library sell its land to a private party, and then build a new library building on top of the underground parking structure on the Library Lot. [The AADL's downtown building is at the northeast corner of Fifth and William, immediately south of the city-owned Library Lot.]

The city should sell the old Y Lot – that needs to get onto the tax rolls, Kunselman said. [The site is a surface parking lot, on the north side of William between Fifth and Fourth.] The idea of mixed-use retail in the middle of the block at the Library Lot he described as a “pipe dream.” The city council should not try to pick winners and losers in the private sector, he said. The community should help design it. Then the city should translate that design into deed restrictions, and sell the land with those restrictions in place, he said.

Question: Conference Center

Do you think Ann Arbor needs a conference center anywhere? If so, should public dollars be used to support it?

Stephen Kunselman: Conference Center

On the subject of public subsidies, Kunselman said that’s simple: No! The city should not be involved in public subsidies for private development. The city has not been successful to date on those efforts. That’s why when he campaigned two years ago, it was based on a new direction. There’s ways of accomplishing things besides going out and fishing with an RFP, he concluded.

He said he’s not qualified to determine the need for a conference center. The private sector can handle that, if there is a need.

Ingrid Ault: Conference Center

Ault said she thought the conference center was an interesting topic from the standpoint that there’s a need for conference space in the downtown – people don’t want to go out to Weber’s Inn. But she rejected the idea of funding it with city dollars. If a project is not viable on its own, then it shouldn’t go forward.

Marwan Issa: Conference Center

Issa said he thought that a conference center is a horrible plan. The University Michigan has a lot of places where people can hold conferences. As far as public funding goes, he said if there were a start-up company and it was a company that’s going to stay here, that’s where public funding could be useful.

Question: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

How would you characterize the relationship between the city and the University of Michigan? How would you characterize the relationship between the city and Washtenaw County?

Ingrid Ault: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

Ault said one of the things she does as executive director of Think Local First is look for partnerships. There’s a study that indicates if you shifted 10% of your budget to local businesses, it would create 1,600 jobs and $53 million in wages. She said she’s been talking to city and county officials about supporting local businesses.

Ault said she could give many examples where the city is making short-sighted decisions and hundreds of thousands of dollars have left the community, because of maybe a $300 difference in a bid. The county is a good example of collaboration – it’s built partnerships with other entities, figuring out how to do more with less. We have a long way to go with the university, she added.

Marwan Issa: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

Issa said that when you look at the relationships between the University of Michigan and the city of Ann Arbor, “it’s not there,” and needs to get better. It seems like it’s an us-versus-them attitude with the university. When we look at firefighters, the university owns a lot of land, he said, so why can’t we get them to help support the fire department, by funding some of the firefighters?

[Issa's point about university land is related to the fact that UM facilities built on university land receive fire protection from the city. The state of Michigan has deemed that it's not a university responsibility and has used a strategy for funding the university's fire protection through a state grant. But the city of Ann Arbor has long contended that the level of that grant funding is not adequate to cover the cost of the additional protection. UM contributes to the city's fire protection through the location of fire station Number 5 on university property.]

There are a lot of redundant jobs in the city and the county where there could be cost savings, Issa said, but the relationships aren’t there.

Stephen Kunselman: University of Michigan, Washtenaw County

Kunselman said it’s a tough issue, but he felt that the partnerships between the city and the university, and between the city and the county, are going as well as they can go, given the governmental autonomy that each entity has.

We can talk about cooperation and collaboration until we’re blue in the face, he said, but the fact is that UM is not going to contribute to the city’s basic services. The university works under the constraints of the state constitution and the state legislature, he said, and the moment the university starts doling money out to the city for whatever reason – for signals and signs for football games, for which the university has been billed but has not paid – the state legislature will send them a clear message. That message is that the university’s funding would be dialed back. So the university has a hammer over its head. We can’t just sit here and envision a great and wonderful cooperation with the university, he said. [Kunselman is a UM employee, working as an energy conservation liaison. Other councilmembers affiliated with UM include Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), who works as an administrative assistant, and mayor John Hieftje and councilmember Tony Derezinski (Ward 2), who both have served as lecturers.]

The situation with the county is different, he said. There are representatives to the county board of commissioners who live in the city. But for the townships there’s an inequality with respect to the tax base between the city and the townships. When we talk about mutual aid, he said, we look at who has more money in the game – typically it’s the city. So not all partnerships would be in the city’s best interest. It all sounds good, Kunselman concluded, but at the end of the day, we’re beholden to voters who expect us to watch their tax dollars.

Question: Economic Development

Describe the Ann Arbor that you would help to create if you’re elected. What are your priorities for economic development?

Marwan Isssa: Economic Development

Issa said the Ann Arbor he envisions is one where we don’t have to constantly discuss how we’re going to pay for services and what we are going to cut. He said he and his family had been in Ann Arbor for over 30 years and had started local businesses. They understood how that works and how economic development is important to the city. Another component is the University of Michigan, he said, which spends spending billions of dollars on scientific research. The city needs to work with the university, not in terms of asking the university to give the city money, but in terms of how to be a partner. He suggested an ambassador or a liaison to show companies what Ann Arbor has to offer.

Stephen Kunselman: Economic Development

Kunselman said the Ann Arbor he hopes to achieve is the one he grew up in – where everyone is treated equally, we have good roads, clean water, safe neighborhoods, maintained parks. If you have all that, then you get economic development, he said, because you get businesses that are interested in moving to your community. Those are businesses that want to invest because they can see where their money is going. They see the money going into roads to be fixed, they see water mains being repaired, they see police and firefighters present, then they feel like they’re getting a good return on their invested dollar.

Kunselman said he didn’t understand why anybody would want to relocate to Ann Arbor if they drive Packard, Jackson, Dexter, or Miller and have to handle those roads. He said he couldn’t understand – if we put all our money downtown instead of in neighborhoods – why employees would want to live here, where water mains are breaking and street trees aren’t being cared for. Public safety, health and welfare breeds economic development, he concluded.

Ingrid Ault: Economic Development

Ault said we need to remember that Ann Arbor is a living organism and we all need to work together. She said that what she does every day is economic development – she looks for ways to support businesses and to create new businesses. She supports nonprofits, she said, because they’re important to the fabric of the community.

Closing Statements

Each candidate was given two minutes for a closing statement.

Stephen Kunselman: Closing Statement

Kunselman thanked the hosts, the audience and the other candidates. He said he looked for their support on Aug. 2.

He’s a lifelong Ann Arborite. He pointed out that he and Ault had both graduated from Pioneer High School in 1981. His grandparents were founding members of St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church on Stadium Boulevard. His grandmother was a police dispatcher in the late 1950s for the East Ann Arbor police department. He lives near Packard and Platt, the “heart of Ward 3.”

Kunselman noted that he served as a planning commissioner from 2004-06 and served as a city councilmember from 2006-08 – he wanted to serve another term, from 2011-13. He ventured that perhaps people had read about him in the news, and he allowed that he did have a strong voice. He has a strong passion for his beliefs about what Ann Arbor is and what it should be, he said.

Kunselman didn’t want to say that his voice is the best, but he does think he’s made a difference. He said he helped defeat the conference center. He said he’d shown how the DDA had failed to be open and transparent with their budget. He’s been there for the city’s police and firefighters since day one and did not feel comfortable laying them off, even while the city allocates funds to public art and the Fuller Road parking structure. All of those things boil down to needing some independence on the city council, he said, which is what he offers.

Ingrid Ault: Closing Statement

Ault said she appreciated the opportunity to be heard – that’s all she wanted. She wanted the process to be clear and open to see where they are the same and different.

Ault wanted to emphasize that she is a very strong voice for this community – she’s immersed in every facet of it. She knows what is going on in the downtown, because she’s worked the majority of her life in the downtown and understands what challenges small business are facing. Her service record for nonprofits ranges from Meals on Wheels, to the Humane Society and 826 Michigan – she’s been there and done it, she said. She’s curious, she said, and she wants to know why people support who they support. A lot of time the people who have the biggest pocketbooks or the most time on their hands have more of an impact on the community, she cautioned. She wants to make sure that everyone has a voice.

Marwan Issa: Closing Statement

Issa thanked the hosts of the debate – it was his first debate, and the first time running for an elected position.

Ann Arbor is a gem, he said. We’re lucky and fortunate. In Ann Arbor, you can come as you are and you will be accepted. Electing him will help the community out, he said.

He’s from the area. He had a father who helped him go through with his education. With the opportunities he had, now he wants to be able to give back to the community. His optimism and experience will give him the ability to take on the many challenges the city has.

The city’s main important voice is that of the residents, Issa said. If they start to feel the city council is inadequate, or is not doing right by the people, we need to make sure people are happy with what’s going on with the city council. He said he’d been researching the city council, and they work hard. But the council’s hands are tied. There’s a reason why we can’t take public art money and pay for cops, he concluded.

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In Ward 1, incumbent Democrat Sabra Briere submitted 106 valid signatures, and will not face a challenger in the Democratic primary. No Republican filed in Ward 1.

In Ward 2, the Democratic primary will feature incumbent Democrat Stephen Rapundalo (107 signatures) and Tim Hull (120 signatures).

In Ward 3, incumbent Democrat Stephen Kunselman (108 signatures) will contest the Democratic primary with Ingrid Ault (110 signatures) and possibly Marwan Issa. As of 4 p.m. Issa had submitted 94 signatures determined to be valid. However, the city clerk’s staff had disallowed a petition sheet with 20 signatures, based on a statement made by the petition circulator.

City clerk staff say the circulator for Issa told them he’d left the petition sheet at a house where several family members of Issa live so that they could sign it. Staff had disallowed the sheet of signatures, because it’s required that a petition circulator witness the signature of people signing the petition. A family member of Issa at the clerk’s office window on Tuesday afternoon felt that the circulator may have misunderstood the question asked of him by the clerk’s staff, saying that the sheet had been properly circulated.

City clerk staff say that Issa can take up the issue of the disallowed petition sheet as well as other disallowed signatures with city clerk Jackie Beaudry, when she returns to work in the clerk’s office on Thursday, May 11. Today and Wednesday, Beaudry is working in Lansing looking at new election equipment.

The winner of the Ward 3 Democratic primary will face Republican David Parker (100 signatures) in the fall.

In Ward 4, incumbent Democrat Marcia Higgins (102 signatures) will not face a contested primary. In November she’ll face Eric Scheie (107 signatures), who filed petitions as a Republican.

In Ward 5, incumbent Democrat Mike Anglin (109 signatures) will face Neal Elyakin (107 signatures) in the Democratic primary. Republican Stuart Berry submitted only 97 valid signatures to run in Ward 5, falling three short of qualifying. [Update: Later in the evening after double-checking signatures, clerk staff were able to verify some of the 120 signatures submitted by Berry that had previously been questioned as not valid, bringing his total to 102, qualifying him as a candidate.]

Each of the city’s five wards is represented with two seats on the council. Councilmembers serve two-year terms, with one seat per ward contested each year. The mayor is also a member of the council, but this year is not a mayoral election year.

• the countywide school millage was soundly defeated, though supported by a majority of Ann Arbor voters; [detail on WISD millage results]
• in the two contested Ann Arbor city council races, incumbent Democrats Sabra Briere in Ward 1 and Marcia Higgins in Ward 4 were re-elected by wide margins; [detail on Ward 1 council results; detail on Ward 4 council results]
• both Ann Arbor city charter amendments were approved by voters, changing publication requirements for the city’s ordinances. [detail on Proposal A results; detail on Proposal B results]

Complete election results from across the county are available on the Washtenaw County elections website. Later today we’ll have a behind-the-scenes report on election night at the county clerk’s office.

Marcia Higgins and Hatim Elhady settled in to answer questions from Ward 4 residents on Friday night at Dicken Elementary School. (Photo by the writer.)

For one hour on Friday evening at Dicken Elementary School, candidates for the Ward 4 city council seat – Marcia Higgins and Hatim Elhady – answered questions read aloud by Ann Arbor resident Jack Eaton. Higgins is seeking re-election on Nov. 3 as the Democratic nominee, while Elhady is challenging her, and is unaffiliated with any party.

The Chronicle arrived just after the ground rules were explained – questions read by Eaton were submitted to him by attendees of the event. There would be opening statements from each candidate, announced Eaton. At that, Higgins suggested that they dispense with the opening statements and dive right into the questions – the event was about letting Ward 4 residents get their questions asked and answered, she said. Elhady quipped that he’d had his “heart set on an opening statement,” but agreed to Higgins’ suggestion.

The event was organized by Elhady’s campaign. Eaton, who is pictured on Elhady’s campaign website and has contributed to the Elhady campaign, administered the questions and kept time in a way that could fairly be characterized as impartial. When Elhady concluded one of his responses, Eaton self-reported that he had not timed Elhady and would thus not time Higgins, either. In general, adherence to the two-minute time limit was not a problem for the candidates, good pace was maintained between questions, and they covered a lot of ground in the hour.

Below we give the questions and answers in summary form – no attempt has been made to render a verbatim account. Higgins and Elhady took turns taking first crack at the questions. So in every case, the candidates’ responses are summarized in the order they were given. The order of the questions is also presented in the order they were asked.

Question: If elected, what are your top three priorities in the coming year?

Higgins: She said that the budget was absolutely one of her top priorities. She said that the cuts in state revenue sharing meant that there would be choices to make. Vital city services needed to be maintained – police, fire, garbage. But she cautioned that there would need to be a community discussion about what things needed to be let go for right now and deferred, perhaps to some later time.

The second major priority she named was zoning, saying that it was a huge issue. She pointed out that she had sponsored the resolution that would overhaul all of the city’s zoning code and consolidate all of its master plans. Currently, she said, there were places in the city code where in one section the directives completely contradicted those in another section. Previous efforts, she said, had been piecemeal, but this one was meant to be completely comprehensive.

Elhady: He named fiscal responsibility as his top priority, saying that it was important to distinguish between luxuries and necessities. As examples of necessities he gave: infrastructure, road repair, street lights, emergency services. Luxuries are those things that we would like to have when we have a lot of money. Right now, however, we don’t have a lot of money, he cautioned, so we need to be more careful. The police-courts building [known also as the municipal center], he characterized as a luxury. We could use that money, he contended, to fund road repair. He referenced a study that put Ann Arbor roads as second-worst in the state and noted that the Stadium bridges were on the verge of collapse. He referenced a resolution passed in 2004 on the Stadium bridges, saying that this showed that it was not an unknown problem.

Hatim Elhady, independent candidate for Ward 4 city council. (Photo by the writer.)

He contrasted Higgins’ choice of zoning as her second priority with his own priority of public inclusion. He allowed that zoning was a big issue, but sketched out how public inclusion cut across a wider range of issues, including zoning and Argo Dam. He described how his planned weekly office hours and a monthly newsletter would facilitate public inclusion.

Elhady gave a third priority: Finding a commonality between homeowners and students, comparing it to the Prisoner’s Dilemma. [This is a standard puzzle in economics, in the specific field of game theory.] The point of Elhady’s comparison to the academic puzzle was to emphasize that homeowners and students could accomplish more by cooperating than by opposing each other. That kind of cooperation was a goal he’d set for himself and he was willing to work hard in service of that goal, he said.

Question: Where will the money come from to improve the roads and bridges?

Elhady: He characterized as the first option that council has thought of to address the funding issue – to raise taxes – as “milking” constituents by proposing a city income tax. He said that the answer was not in raising revenue, but rather in efficiently allocating the dollars we do have. He said we could get “more bang for the buck.”

He said that instead of taking general obligation bonds to build unnecessary buildings [e.g., the police-courts building] the money could be used for roads. He pointed out that the city had lost the opportunity to obtain federal stimulus funds to repair the bridge. He alluded to a memo from [city engineer and project manager] Michael Nearing, in which Nearing cited the failure of Ward 4 city council representatives Higgins and Teall to appoint a citizen advisory committee as the reason a shovel-ready bridge design was not ready when federal stimulus money became available. We lost “free money,” Elhady said. He assured the audience that they could rely on him in the future to obtain such grants when they became available. The current city council, on the other hand, had proven they could not get such grants, he concluded.

Higgins: She began by saying that every few years, the citizens of Ann Arbor had approved a street millage and that’s where the money to repair local road infrastructure came from. She also pointed out that this millage money was used to “leverage” state and federal grant support to get the best use out of our local dollars. In the last 10 years, she pointed out, the city had replace two bridges that had been falling down: (i) the Broadway bridges, which was a project brought in on time and on budget, and (ii) the Huron Parkway bridges.

The problem was not, Higgins contended, that city hadn’t been actively looking at these infrastructure issues. With the extreme winter weather we’d experienced in the last few years, Ann Arbor had had more local roads needing repaving than they’d had money for.

She said she’d been following the Stadium bridges for several years. When the bridge in Minneapolis collapsed, Higgins said she emailed Sue McCormick [director of public services for the city of Ann Arbor] the same day and had learned that the rating of the Stadium bridges was the same rating of the Minneapolis bridge. She rejected the contention that it was this council that had held up the repair of the Stadium bridges. She traced the work by council on the issue back to 2005-06, when a public process was begun on the question of upgrading Stadium Boulevard from the M-14 interchange down to South Industrial.

At the same time, they had focused on the area between Main Street and South Industrial and were looking to integrate the area into the city’s non-motorized transportation plan. In the midst of that planning, she said, the University of Michigan announced that they were preparing renovations to the football stadium. It became clear that shutting down South Main to South Industrial would not be feasible.

Addressing the specific memo from Nearing, Higgins contended that at a meeting held at a higher level than Nearing, she and Teall had decided not to appoint the citizen advisory committee when it became apparent that the work could not be completed on the originally planned schedule. She pointed out that if there’s a public process and then four years elapse before implementation of the results of that process, then the reaction would be, “When did that happen??” Public process needed to happen closer to the time frame when the actual work would be done, she explained. To say that the council had not done anything was not accurate, she concluded. She pointed out that when Obama announced the stimulus package, no one knew he was planning to do that.

Marcia Higgins, Democratic Party nominee for Ward 4 city council. (Photo by the writer.)

In January 2009, the city had made a conscious decision to separate out the bridge from the broader range of construction, because they knew they needed to focus on the bridge. The decision was also driven by the lack of enthusiasm for pursuing an eminent domain action with the Ann Arbor Golf and Outing Club, which would have been necessary for some of proposed non-motorized amenities.

At the same time that the city looked at spending $500,000 to repair the south side of the bridge, they learned that the weight of the equipment that would effect that repair posed the risk of causing the bridge to collapse, and that plan could not be implemented. So the city opted to just get the bridge designed and go after funding. Discussions on the budget and labor committee and the bridge committee, she said, had considered the possibility that no funding could be obtained from external sources [such as the state local bridge fund, earmarked federal transportation bill, and a TIGER (Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery) grant].

In that event, she said, there was the possibility of leveraging street millage money for the next five to six years and fund the bridge ourselves. The consequence of that strategy, she cautioned, was that we could not use that money to repair local roads. “Are we willing to forgo local street repair in order to build the bridge?” she asked. That was why the city was identifying “pots of money” that could be targeted. She mentioned a meeting in Lansing [Nov. 5] of the state’s local bridge fund authority, where the city will be making a presentation, asking for funding.

Question: State your position on the Argo Dam/Pond question and state why you hold that position.

Higgins: She said she supported leaving the dam in. All of the information on the [concrete and steel] dam itself pointed to the conclusion that it was structurally sound. The issue was with the toe drains in the earthen embankment, she said. The piezometers that had been installed were trying to help answer the question of whether the toe drains were functioning properly, she explained. She summarized part of the dispute between the city and the MDEQ as this question of whether the toe drains were working. Into the mix, she said, had come the identification of an endangered species of plant life [the purple turtlehead] on the embankment. The city found itself pitted between two government agencies [Michigan Department of Environmental Quality and the Department of Natural Resources] with respect to the toe drains in the earthen embankment and the preservation of the wildlife.

Any alternate designs for reconstruction of the embankment [to eliminate the need for a canoe portage, for example] should first go to the city’s park advisory commission, because that was in their domain as recreation. She was definitely in favor of keeping the dam, she concluded.

Elhady: He said he was a big supporter of Argo Dam. He’s dam-in. He said that while going door-to-door in Ward 4, he’d met people on both sides of the issue, and what he’d tried to stress was that whether or not they were in agreement with him on an issue or not, he would listen to them, because he believed in public inclusion. He contended that Higgins had not practiced public inclusion, giving as an example the resolution that was recently brought to the council to keep the dam, but was tabled, partly because there had been no formal public hearing.

Question: Do you support or oppose extending the airport runway?

Elhady: He said he was opposed to extending the runway, that he’d opposed it from the beginning, and that his mind would not change unless he saw real evidence of a safety issue. Also, he said that he needed clear evidence from the Michigan Department of Transportation and the Federal Aviation Administration that there would be an economic benefit from the runway extension. Elhady warned that if there were an extension of the runway, it would bring more and heavier aircraft in. That would increase the noise level, he explained. Further, it would expand the time of the increased noise levels because there would be a need to extend the hours of operation to accommodate the greater number of aircraft.

He contended that Higgins’ current opposition to extending the runway stood in contradiction to the Jan. 22, 2007 resolution she had sponsored approving the new layout plan.

Higgins: She noted that the new plan to which Elhady referred had been approved and accepted by the city council on the recommendation of the airport advisory board, and reflected a required update in the plan. No action on changing the layout had been taken, she stressed. Among the items where action had been taken were the updating of new hangers to replace rusted-out structures, and the construction of a new storage shed for snow removal equipment. As far as a specific proposal to extend the runway, she did not see any movement to bring forward such a proposal and said she would oppose it if it were to be brought forward. She mentioned that the other action that had been taken was an environmental assessment for the property – there are wells that sit on the airport property that feed into the water supply and are used heavily in the wintertime.

What do you think about the Library Lot project and the Blake Transit Center?

Higgins: She began by saying that she wished the city could have included the Blake Transit Center when they had looked at redeveloping the old YMCA site. She then asked for clarification on whether the “Library Lot project” meant the underground parking deck or the project to be built on top. As the question itself did not provide guidance, she said she was happy to see parking go underground, and then devoted most of her answer to the question of what goes on top. She said that the motivation for the resolution she’d brought to issue a request for proposals (RFP) that was not specific was to expand the range of possibilities. What could go there could range from a park to a building, she said.

Elhady: He characterized the concept of an RFP as “wonderful” because it provided a chance for the public to choose from the ideas that were submitted. But that was not, he warned, what actually had happened. He contended that there were clauses in the resolution that required the project that went on top to bring in more revenue. That, he said, automatically negated the idea of a public park. He contended that there were no public parks anywhere within the Downtown Development Authority area, and that this could be the first. So there were restrictions in the resolution on what the public could choose – the choices had been narrowed down for the public in advance, he said.

Elhady came back to the issue of the cost of construction for the underground parking structure and suggested the money might be better spent on road repair.

Question: I live near Hill Street, which was the detour for the double-tandem trucks for the football stadium construction. There are now 200 potholes in a two-block area. Can we get help?

Elhady: He began by declaring: “Whoever you are, I really do want to help you. Period.” He said he would have the city cover the potholes, but they needed to find the money. That was a question he said was best asked of Higgins, the incumbent. “That’s her responsibility,” he said. If we choose to repair the Stadium bridges with the street millage money, then there would not be money to fix potholes. “It was not my mistake,” he continued, to build the police-courts building, construct the underground parking structure, or forgo stimulus money – “That was not my fault.” He stressed that if he were elected to the council, it would not be an issue – if he had been on council, he contended, the Stadium bridges would not be an issue, and the city would not have to be looking for a grant to magically appear.

Elhady reported that he went past Hill Street all the time and that he had to buy new struts for his car as a result.

Higgins: She began by saying simply, “Yes, you can.” She described how a common process, which was used all the time, was to receive an email from people which would then be forwarded to city staff. Each year, she said, 26-27 miles of roads were repaved and that was done on a priority based on road ratings. The 26-27 miles of the worst roads were targeted for repair. Complaints from residents were directed to staff – it was as simple as that, she said.

She stressed that using the street millage to repair the Stadium bridges was a “worst case scenario” and that to implement that solution would still require dialogue with the community about whether that was really the route they wanted to pursue.

Question: What is your plan for the recently-closed Georgetown mall? What happened to Kroger? What do you plan to do to re-vitalize that area?

Higgins: She reported that she and her Ward 4 council colleague, Margie Teall, had just introduced a resolution to appoint a committee to look at the Georgetown area. She noted that the neighborhood had a very engaged group of people, who would like to work with a developer. A real concern, she said, was that the area would be fenced off in a way that would make it look like it was abandoned. The committee was going to look at foreclosure, and work with the nuisance committee. What they could focus on during the immediate future was how the property would look. As far as revitalization was concerned, Higgins contended, it was an issue across the state, and that as an individual councilmember there’s not a lot anyone could do.

Elhady: He reported that he’d received a lot of emails about the Georgetown area. He said he’d met with Larry and Jeanne Horvath – you don’t have to be a neighborhood association to get attention, he said. He said that residents seemed fine with the way the mall used to be – they wanted stores there, they wanted Kroger back. The main issue was the maintenance of the landscaping on the lot. He reported that he’d spoken with the treasurer’s offices at the county and the city and that if the city did the landscaping work that needed to be done (pulling weeds), the tab could be given to the county.

Elhady said he was glad to have the endorsement of Larry Horvath.

Question: Do you believe that all of the past city council emails should be publicly released, as suggested by Mike Anglin?

Elhady: He began by saying, “Yes.” He mentioned that there is a photo in The Ann Arbor Chronicle where he is holding a yellow sign in support of the email resolution. He allowed that as he was going door-to-door he was confronted by some people who saw a contradiction between his stress on fiscal responsibility and spending thousands of dollars to make past emails public. Email communication between councilmembers, he said, was the foundation of our understanding of how they interact on issues. On that basis, he said, it was possible – if necessary – to weed out councilmembers at the next election. It should be a fiscal priority, he said, to see who is governing our city. He characterized it as an umbrella issue.

Higgins: She indicated that she did not support Anglin’s email resolution. She did, however, support the amendments. She noted that as far as the emails in question, they were currently being requested by citizens under the Freedom of Information Act. As chair of the council rules committee, she said, they’d changed the rules to not allow emails during council meetings except for those to staff or to other councilmembers that related to resolution or amendment language, which would then be read aloud. The procedure by which emails sent during meetings would be captured and appended to the council minutes had been already implemented, she explained. She said that most of the feedback she’d heard was that lessons had been learned and that it was time to move forward based on the changes in process that had been put in place.

Question: The current council has approved two different six-bedrooms-in-one-apartment type projects in our neighborhood. Both are about half-empty. Both were “by right” developments. The council has members who are not willing to litigate the public health, safety and welfare issue. What will your position on council be with technical and non-technical compliance?

Higgins: She began by saying that she recognized the projects as being in the South Main area: 828 Greene and the other on Hill Street. Both had been approved in the last couple of years, she said. She contrasted the situation with a planned unit development (PUD) and a “by right” proposal. With a PUD, she said, there was much more leeway to take into account neighborhood consideration. On the other hand, if a project met the requirements of the law, she had taken an oath to uphold the law. She did not have the latitude to deprive someone of their rights under the law.

Elhady: He said he’d like to highlight two words: “public welfare.” He said that it was not a matter of breaking the law – it was a matter of defining the law. We needed to define what “public welfare” actually is, he explained. Recalling the controversial 42 North development, he said that the Friends of Dicken Woods had pointed out that in other states, the developer had pursued similar projects that had increased crime and shown how it would increase storm water management problems.

Higgins: Eaton accommodated Higgins’ request that she be allowed to clarify for the audience that it had not actually been the Friends of Dicken Woods [Eaton is president of that group] that had advocated against 42 North, but rather the South Maple neighborhood group. She pointed out that the Friends’ nonprofit status prevented it from taking political stances.

Question: Are you really unaware that we had a very lengthy pro-and-con hearing on Argo Dam? [The question was written to be addressed to Elhady, but both candidates responded.]

Elhady: Elhady stressed that a public hearing should be adequately publicized. “If I am unaware, how many others are unaware?” he asked. Going door-to-door, he said he’d found that a lot of residents had not known about the public hearing. He suggested that part of the publicity challenge could be met by weekly office hours and a monthly newsletter.

Higgins: She said that, yes, she’d been aware of the event, she was there, but characterized it as a “town hall meeting,” and on that occasion they’d received the report from the Huron River and Impoundment Management Plan (HRIMP) committee. There’d been 200 people in the audience, she reported. Several organizations had received notices, people had received emails, they’d come to the meeting and they’d spoken. She characterized it as one of the longest town hall meetings they’d had in a long time. Two months later, the staff had presented their report and heard it presented at a work session, which had also been well-attended. So to say that it was an issue that the community was unaware of wasn’t accurate, she said. People were aware and were in attendance making themselves hear, she concluded.

Question: The Veterans Administration hospital is currently studying hydroelectric power at Argo and Geddes dams. Would you support this on our dams?

Higgins: She noted that Argo Dam previously had electric power-generating capacity. She said that she did not have enough information, to have a view on restoring that capability, because the VA feasibility study was not complete. However, she did say that hydroelectric power was something they should be looking at, because the city should be looking at all alternative forms of energy.

Elhady: He said that he’d made it clear on his website that one of the reasons he had a dam-in position was because of the potential for hydroelectric power. He said that he supported the VA feasibility study and said that if the recommendation was for adding hydroelectric capability, then he’d definitely support that. He said that he saw the revenue from hydroelectric as potentially offsetting the maintenance costs of the dam. Putting hydroelectric power in at Argo Dam was also environmentally friendly, he said, and he was pro-environment.

Question: We have a “street-breaking ordinance.” You’re required to (a) have a permit, (b) mark your work, and (c) repair the street to city standards. If a private contractor doesn’t do (a), (b) and (c), why should the street millage pay to clean up their mess? Hill Street is an enforcement issue, not a millage issue.

Elhady: He said he supported everyone cleaning up their mess and following the ordinance. He allowed that he did not have 100% knowledge of the issue with the street breaking ordinance, but gave his assurance that if someone had failed to complete steps (a), (b), and (c), then they should take responsibility for it. He said that should not be taken from the streets millage but rather from the contractor’s profit.

He challenged Higgins, as the incumbent, to explain what this enforcement issue had arisen. He called for accountability by those who were breaking the street.

Higgins: Higgins said that she was not sure that Hill Street was the example that the question was targeting. The ordinance, she said, involved people who cut into the street to take care of water lines, sewer lines and such. They’re responsible, she said, for repairing the street back to the grade it was originally. She noted that often in late fall and early spring, those repairs start to sag. She said the city knows who pulled the permits, so it’s something that the contractor has to come back and address. If it’s not taken care of within a certain amount of time, and the city has to repair, the contractor is sent a bill and they’re not allowed to pull another permit.

She said that she thought the Hill Street issue was a function of the amount of traffic, which was a road millage issue.

Conclusion

With that, Higgins noted the time was 7:30 p.m. – and excused herself, explaining that for those who did not know, her daughter was gravely ill, and that she was happy to come out and talk that night. She thanked those who came and those who organized the event.

In closing, Elhady also thanked everyone all around, singling out his brother. He also said that he had nothing but respect for Higgin’s 10 years of experience on the city council. But the election on Nov. 3 is for students, homeowners, renters, and families to make a choice. He ticked through his experience with the U.S. consulate in Germany and as a volunteer at the VA medical center. He stressed his readiness to listen and expressed what a pleasure it would be to serve as the ward’s councilmember. Ward 4 deserved to be represented by a councilmember who listens, responds, and is accessible. “I am that candidate, and I’m asking for your vote on Nov. 3,” he concluded.

• Marcia Higgins campaign website
• Hatim Elhady campaign website
• City elections page, with information on candidates, ballot issues and polling locations