An architectural drawing of the proposed Fuller Road Station. (Image links to city of Ann Arbor webpage on the Fuller Road Station)

The press release includes a statement from mayor John Hieftje, which reads in part: “After months of fruitful discussions, we received new information from the Federal Rail Administration regarding the eligibility of monies for the local match. This information altered project timing such that we could no longer finalize a proposal under the current Memorandum of Understanding.”

On the university’s side, Jim Kosteva – director of community relations – is quoted in the press release as follows: “We are optimistic the city’s drive to win additional federal and state dollars for Fuller Road Station will be successful …When the time comes, we stand ready to reengage.” [.pdf of press release]

The press release also includes the news that the university will build the parking deck it had planned for the Fuller Road Station site at a different location: “… it is acknowledged that the University will need to move forward with building a parking structure, in a yet to be determined location, near the Medical Campus to address the expected demand as employment and patient activity continues to grow.”

The university was primarily interested in the initial phase of the project, a large parking structure with more than 1,000 spaces planned.

The city of Ann Arbor’s main interest was in the second phase of the project – a multimodal transit center that city officials hope would include a new Amtrak station, bus depot and sufficient parking for those needs. That component of the project appears to be very much still in play, contingent on identifying funding.

The Chronicle has compiled a timeline overview of Fuller Road Station with links to previous coverage. After the jump, we look at: (1) the train/bus station component of the project; (2) what led UM to initially participate in the project; (3) what happened since a memorandum of understanding between the city and the university was ratified; and (4) the timing of the decision to halt the project.

Funding a Rail Station

With the university’s parking requirements no longer a part of the project, some of the controversy surrounding it could be reduced. That specific controversy stemmed from the objection that the construction of a large parking deck would require some kind of lease arrangement with the university over a long enough period to be tantamount to a sale of the land. A sale of city parkland is required by Ann Arbor’s city charter to be put to a voter referendum.

The parcel is zoned as public land (PL). The city council approved a change to the city’s zoning code in July 2010 that explicitly allows for “transportation facilities” on public land.

The city was looking to an investment from the university in Fuller Road Station to count toward matching funds for federal funding that would support construction of a later phase of the project, which would include a rail station. The project would still need to include a parking component – but not anywhere near the scale of the structure UM was planning to build. It’s not certain what funding sources will be available to the city of Ann Arbor as it moves forward with the project without UM’s involvement.

However, federal funds have always been a part of a hoped-for funding strategy. And in the spring of 2011, the city received news that initial federal funding for the project had been awarded – $2.8 million from the Federal Rail Administration, towards a $3.5 million project for environmental assessment and engineering at the site. The difference is required to be paid by a local match. The city and the university have already made expenditures in connection with that project that the city believes will count for most if not all of that local match. It’s typical that federally-funded infrastructure projects require something on the order of a 20% match in local funds.

The rail station component of the project is estimated to cost about $18 million, with necessary modifications and upgrades to tracks totaling an additional $6-7 million. When the FRA funding for the environmental assessment was announced, Ann Arbor transportation program manager Eli Cooper called the award significant because it indicates the FRA’s willingness to be the lead federal agency for the project. Although it’s not guaranteed, the FRA does not typically fund initial phases of a project like the environmental assessment without following through with funds for the project itself.

If the city eventually pursues the project independently of the university’s own parking needs, it would provide a more narrow focus on the amount of parking that’s required just for the rail station component. To meet that need, some amount of parking spaces would be required for short-term and drop-off parking, as well as some long-term parking. The figure corresponding to the city’s allotment of the spots when UM was involved would have worked out to around 200 parking spaces. Those spaces would need to be constructed as a project independently of UM’s parking needs.

The FAQ maintained by the city of Ann Arbor about Fuller Road mentions that Greyhound and Amtrak have indicated an interest in the project. [For a historical look at Amtrak ridership from 1994-2011, see "Transit Ridership Data Roundup: 2011"]

The Fuller Road Station is included in a 30-year vision that has been developed by the Ann Arbor Transportation Authority as part of a transportation master plan for a countywide system. The transition of the AATA to a system of governance that includes a wider geographic area than the city of Ann Arbor is currently being debated by the Ann Arbor city council. That’s a discussion centered on details of a four-party agreement – between the city of Ann Arbor, the city of Ypsilanti, Washtenaw County and the AATA.

Wall Street Controversy Led to Fuller Road Location

The attempted collaboration by UM with the city on Fuller Road Station stemmed from a controversy about UM’s plans to build a parking structure on Wall Street dating back at least four years. Plans by UM to expand in the general area go back to the 1980s. In 2008, the university’s plans to address its parking needs by constructing a parking deck on Wall Street had generated vocal opposition among nearby residents.

Early sketch of Fuller Road transit station from 2008-2009. (Image links to higher resolution image.)

So the alternative proposal to build the parking structure at the Fuller Park location next to the railroad tracks – in conjunction with a transit station that the city hoped to construct – had relieved some of the Wall Street controversy.

The specific pitch by the city to the university to collaborate on a multimodal transit center was publicly given concrete form at a January 2009 meeting of city staff and neighbors held at the Northside Grill, on Broadway in the Wall Street neighborhood. The city had identified the possible site for the proposed Fuller Road Station – a parking lot on land designated as part of the city’s park system – in its “Model for Mobility” long-term transportation planning initiative.

Later that year, on Nov. 5, 2009, the city council ratified a memorandum of understanding with the university for the parking deck component of the project. It called for a 22%-78% city-university proportionate share of the 1,050 parking structure spaces and a corresponding financial responsibility for construction. With an estimated cost of $46.6 million, the city’s share of the parking structure (phase 1) would have been roughly $10 million.

The UM board of regents approved the project at its Jan. 21, 2010 meeting. The memorandum of understanding calls for the parking structure component of the project to be ready for use by June 15, 2012. Construction would have needed to start in 2011 for that target to have been met.

The memorandum of understanding between the city and the university also gave a nod to the university’s interest in the rail station component (phase 2) portion of the project, but placed no obligations on UM: “The City and University shall cooperate and use their best efforts to achieve completion of mutually-beneficial elements of Fuller Road Station not included in Phase One.” Now, however, it’s not clear how UM might be involved on any elements of a rail station that might connect across the tracks to the UM hospital complex. The Feb. 10 press release includes the statement from Kosteva: “When the time comes, we stand ready to reengage.”

After the City-University MOU

Since the ratification of the memorandum of understanding, the project had languished, with little visible progress on the city-university deal. But community conversation about the deal has continued – during public commentary at meetings of the city council, the city’s park advisory commission, the city planning commission and of the UM regents. That’s because the Fuller Road location for the construction of parking for UM included at least as much controversy as the original Wall Street location – due partly to the fact that the parcel (currently a surface parking lot) is located on city-owned land designated as part of the city’s park system.

In May 2010, the city’s park advisory commission (PAC) considered a resolution that called for the city council to abandon the Fuller Road Station project, or at the least to get a better deal from the university in terms of revenues provided to the city for leasing the structure. [Chronicle coverage: "Better Deal Desired for Fuller Road Station"] That caught the attention of Hieftje, an advocate of the project, who attended PAC’s May 18, 2010 meeting and asked commissioners for their support. [Chronicle coverage: "Hieftje Urges Unity on Fuller Road Station"]

Hieftje’s request led commissioners to reconsider their position, dropping a call to stop the project but still urging city council to work for a more open process and to ensure a better financial deal to benefit the parks system. [Chronicle coverage: "PAC Softens Stance on Fuller Road Station"] The Ann Arbor city planning commission voted 7-2 on Sept. 21, 2010 to recommend approval of the Fuller Road Station site plan.

By the next year, with no visible additional movement, in June 2011 Hieftje indicated at a city council meeting that he’d be willing to schedule a work session on the topic of Fuller Road Station. And when a July 11, 2011 work session was added to the council’s calendar, it appeared the topic would be Fuller Road Station. However, at the council’s July 5, 2011 meeting, Hieftje indicated that the upcoming work session would not deal with Fuller Road Station – it dealt instead with possible changes to the city’s approach to garbage collection, as well as a reorganization of the city/county office of community development.

Later in July 2011, Hieftje sent a letter to constituents that reviewed much of the information that was previously known, but appeared to introduce the possibility that the University of Michigan would provide construction costs for the city’s share of the parking structure up front, with the city’s portion of 22% to be repaid later.

Although the final project has not been voted on and formally approved by the city council, aspects of Fuller Road Station, including its design, have moved ahead. A task force for a public art component was formed last year, for example. But at the public art commission’s November 2011 meeting, commissioners on the task force reported that they were told by city staff that the project had been delayed by 6-12 months.

Timing of the Decision to Halt Fuller Road Project

The Feb. 10 announcement about halting the joint university/city project comes after a release on Jan. 31 by the Sierra Club-Huron Valley Group of the city of Ann Arbor’s response to a Freedom of Information Act request seeking information on Fuller Road Station.

The material released under the FOIA request indicated growing frustration on the university’s side dating back at least to late October of last year. In an Oct. 20, 2011 email sent to mayor John Hieftje and city administrator Steve Powers – with the subject line “Action on Fuller Road Station” – UM director of community relations Jim Kosteva wrote:

There is growing anxiousness among university leadership regarding the ongoing delay in getting the commitment from Council and construction started. And revisiting our decision to postpone the structure(s) on Wall Street is becoming a more frequent discussion.

In that email Kosteva points to the imminent opening (since opened) of the new C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital and the increased pressure that the new hospital puts on the university’s parking system. [.pdf of Oct. 20, 2011 Kosteva email]

The decision about halting the Fuller Road Station project was made at least as early as Wednesday, Feb. 1. And in retrospect, there were some signs of that. During that afternoon’s meeting of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority, Hieftje appeared pre-occupied at the board table – he did not cast his vote of principle against the Republic Parking management incentive, as he has consistently done the previous three years.

And Lucy Ann Lance reported on air just after 9 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 3 that a hoped-for guest who could talk about UM’s parking and transportation system – Hank Baier, associate vice president for facilities and operations – would not appear on her Business Insider radio show (1290 AM) that morning.

Joe Grengs, University of Michigan associate professor of urban and regional planning, speaking at a Feb. 9 forum on sustainability in the city of Ann Arbor.

Possibly factoring into a delay in announcing the news were two public events held by the city of Ann Arbor on Wednesday and Thursday this past week (Feb. 8 and 9) – events where the topic of Fuller Road Station might naturally emerge. On Wednesday, the city hosted two sessions of a forum on the city’s non-motorized master plan update. And on Thursday, the city held the second of a four-part series on sustainability forums. The city’s transportation manager and AATA board member, Eli Cooper, was a speaker at both events. Had the news been released before those events, conversation might have centered on Fuller Road Station to the exclusion of other topics.

Even without the news of the project’s suspension, the topic of Fuller Road Station was raised during the sustainability forum, which focused on land use. During a question-and-answer period, Clark Charnetski – a member of the AATA’s local advisory council – voiced support for the proposed location.

Charnetski’s comment prompted a response from Joe Grengs, a panelist and UM associate professor of urban and regional planning. Grengs said he didn’t believe the university needed more parking, and that there are steps that could be taken to reallocate parking within UM’s current infrastructure.

The Fuller Road Station project undermines the city’s stated sustainability goals, Grengs said, because the mode of parking falls into a completely different category than walking, biking and rail transit. All of those latter modes work well in areas of high density, he said. But cars work against that – they are “big, hulking objects” that simply sit all day, he observed. So to have 1,000 cars parked at that location every day, at a place where there should be opportunities for interaction – places for retail or recreation, for example – “to me is a mistake and I’d urge the city to think about that,” he concluded. Grengs’ remarks were met with a smattering of applause from the audience.

Grengs’ commentary included a view that has been expressed by UM graduate student Joel Batterman at more than one public meeting covered by The Chronicle: That the university could meet its parking needs by reallocating and optimizing its current parking resources. Batterman is an urban planning student who is specializing in transportation issues. From his remarks made to UM regents on Jan. 20, 2011: “… continually increasing parking supply may be less environmentally and fiscally sustainable than an alternative strategy of adjusting parking pricing to more efficiently use existing parking supply.”

Fuller Road Station Timeline Overview

The following is a detailed timeline of the Fuller Road Station project, compiled by The Chronicle, with links to previous coverage.

• 1824 Ann Arbor is founded.
• 1837 University of Michigan re-locates from Detroit to Ann Arbor.
• 1993-Jun-26 UM and city make a land swap deal involving the surface parking lot at the site of the proposed Fuller Road Station. Ann Arbor News article states: “Oak trees to be spared from ax – A request from UM officials for a temporary parking lot may be the key to saving condemned burr oak trees.”
• 2006-Jun-15 City of Ann Arbor “Model for Mobility” introduced as a three-point vision, with: (1) north-south commuter rail, (2) east-west commuter rail, and (3) local circulator connector system.
• 2008-Sep-18 University of Michigan regents give initial approval to $48.6 million Wall Street parking structure.
• 2008-Dec-16 UM officials meet with residents who live near the proposed Wall Street parking structure projects.
• 2009-Jan-27 City transportation program manager gives combined multimodal transit center and parking structure concrete form by showing a sketch of the project, indicating its location at the Fuller Park parking lot. The presentation takes place in the context of a neighborhood meeting to respond in part to concerns about the UM proposal to build parking structures on Wall Street.
• 2009-Jun-19 UM regents pause the proposed Wall Street parking structure project.
• 2009-Aug-17 Ann Arbor city council approves $213,984 of city funds for an environmental study and site assessment. Of that amount, $104,742 was appropriated from the economic development fund.
• 2009-Nov-05 Ann Arbor city council approves memorandum of understanding with UM on Fuller Road Station.
• 2009-Nov-05 Ann Arbor city council authorizes additional $111,228 for environmental study and site assessment.
• 2010-Jan-21 UM board of regents approves the Fuller Road Station project.
• 2010-Feb-10 Public forum held for Ann Arbor residents on Fuller Road Station.
• 2010-May-04 Ann Arbor park advisory commission weighs a resolution calling for the city council to abandon the Fuller Road Station project, or at the least to get a better deal from the university.
• 2010-May-04 Ann Arbor city planning commission recommends amending zoning code list of permitted principal uses of public land (including the site of the proposed Fuller Road Station) – specifically, changing a “municipal airports” use to “transportation facilities.”
• 2010-May-18 Ann Arbor mayor John Hieftje attends meeting of park advisory commission urging their support of Fuller Road Station.
• 2010-Jun-01 Ann Arbor park advisory commission modifies resolution draft due in part to the mayor’s visit at their previous meeting.
• 2010-Jul-06 Ann Arbor city council votes to change zoning code to allow transportation facilities as allowable use for public land.
• 2010-Jun-15 Ann Arbor park advisory commission passes resolution on Fuller Road Station calling for transparency.
• 2010-Sep-21 Ann Arbor city planning commission votes 7-2 to recommend approval of the Fuller Road Station site plan.
• 2011-May-17 Ann Arbor park advisory commission gets update on Fuller Road Station, including award of $2.8 million from Federal Rail Administration for environmental study and site analysis. The funds would reimburse some money already expended.
• 2011-Jun-06 Public commentary at a city council meeting prompts city councilmember Sabra Briere (Ward 1) to request that a council work session be scheduled on Fuller Road Station – mayor John Hieftje agrees that one can be scheduled.
• 2011-Jun-20 City council adds a working session to its calendar for July 11, 2011.
• 2011-Jul-05 Mayor John Hieftje indicates during the city council’s meeting that Fuller Road Station is not among the intended topics for the July 11 work session.
• 2011-Jul-27 Mayor John Hieftje sends letter to constituents about Fuller Road Station.
• 2011-Oct-20 Jim Kosteva, UM director of community relations, sends an email to the mayor and city administrator warning of the need for urgency.
• 2012-Jan-31 Press release from Huron Valley Group of the Sierra Club calls for details of Fuller Road Station plans to be made known.
• 2012-Feb-10 Press release from the city of Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan announcing a halt to the project.
• 2012-Jun-15 Date by which Ann Arbor-UM memorandum of understanding anticipates Fuller Road Station parking structure would be ready for use.

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For actual coverage of the announcement that the Fuller Road Station project has been suspended, see: “UM, Ann Arbor Halt Fuller Road Project.”

Before the start of the Jan. 19 board of regents meeting, UM president Mary Sue Coleman scanned an article from The Chronicle – but not this Chronicle. It's a report from The Chronicle of Higher Education. (Photos by the writer.)

Instead, regents dealt with less high-profile matters, approving a range of action items with little discussion. Those included funding for a major expansion of the UM Health System into Wayne County, along the I-275 corridor; renovations that will transform the entrance to Schembechler Hall and make a museum of football memorabilia more accessible to the public; and improvements to the university’s Northwood apartment complex on north campus.

But much of the meeting consisted of reports. Stephen Forrest, UM’s vice president for research, presented a sobering outlook for future research funding, calling the climate for federal funding “worrisome.” After his talk, regent Andrea Fischer Newman pointed out that tuition is helping to support the university’s $1.2 billion research program – about 25% of those research expenditures are covered internally.

Regents also heard from dean Alison Davis-Blake, who described how the business school is countering the caricature of managers that are only focused on short-term profits, and whose management skills consist of the ability to say, “You’re fired!” Graduates of Ross are taught to think more broadly, she said.

An item not on the agenda of the Jan. 19 meeting received considerable attention during public commentary. One student and three professors spoke against an effort to unionize graduate student research assistants (GSRAs).

Also during public commentary, the chair of the Sierra Club’s Huron Valley group raised concerns over the proposed Fuller Road Station, saying that the joint UM/city of Ann Arbor project runs counter to the university’s sustainability efforts. Fuller Road Station’s initial phase is a proposed parking structure, located near the UM medical campus, that could hold over 1,000 vehicles.

President’s Opening Remarks

The board typically meets in the regents boardroom of the Fleming Administration Building, but the January meeting was held in a sixth floor conference room of the Ross Business School. Another event was scheduled in the same room following the regents meeting, so UM president Mary Sue Coleman began her remarks by noting that they needed to move through their agenda “with alacrity.”

Coleman thanked the business school and dean Alison Davis-Blake for hosting the meeting. Construction of the new building had been made possible through philanthropy, she noted. [The school is named for businessman Stephen J. Ross, who donated $100 million – the largest donation ever to UM.]

Coleman said she wanted to revel in the Sugar Bowl one last time. Several regents and UM executive had traveled to New Orleans for the game, she said, and it had been terrific to see the resurgence of the historic American city in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Alumni were enthusiastic, the marching band outdid themselves, and coach Brady Hoke and the football team made the fans proud, she said, though at times nervous. It was a magnificent display of spirit and intercollegiate athletics, Coleman said.

Turning to academic honors, Coleman reported that UM chemistry professor Brian Coppola had received Baylor University’s Robert Foster Cherry Award for Great Teaching. It’s the most financially lucrative teaching award in the country, she said – $250,000 to the winner, plus $25,000 for his home department, to further develop teaching skills there. Coppola is known for his innovative teaching, Coleman said – he won the U.S. Professor of the Year award in 2009, and UM’s Golden Apple teaching award in 1994. She said she’d watched one of his lectures that’s posted on the Baylor website, and she highly recommended that others watch the video too.

Calling it a landmark event, Coleman also highlighted the fact that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has decided to open a satellite location in Detroit – its first office outside of Washington D.C. This region was selected because of its high number of patent applications, from the auto industry as well as university research. Coleman reported that UM, Michigan State and Wayne State had worked hard to convince government officials to open the office here. She said she expects the university law schools will form alliances with the office, too.

Unionization of GSRAs

By way of background, at the board’s May 2011 meeting, regents had passed a resolution of support regarding the rights of graduate student research assistants (GSRAs) to decide whether to organize and be represented by a labor union. The resolution was passed over dissent from the board’s two Republican regents – Andrew Richner and Andrea Fischer Newman. Before the vote, UM president Mary Sue Coleman had spoken in opposition to the action.

On Jan. 19, Newman asked provost Phil Hanlon for an update on a UM graduate student who had spoken at a press conference the previous day. [The event had been organized by the Graduate Employees Organization (GEO), a group that hopes to represent GRSAs if they decide to unionize. The student, Jennifer Dibbern, was a GSRA who alleges that she was fired by professor Rachel Goldman over her support of efforts to unionize the GSRAs.]

Hanlon responded to Newman, saying that a lot of faculty members had inquired about the situation. He said he had personally reviewed the student’s academic record and is convinced that the decision was justified and appropriate, and that the decision was made based on academic grounds. He strongly supported the action.

Unionization of GSRAs: Public Commentary

During public commentary at the end of the meeting, four people spoke against the unionization effort.

Stephen Raiman, founder of Students Against GSRA Unionization, started off the public commentary by noting that he had spoken to regents on the same issue at their November 2011 meeting. Now, he wanted to talk about the negative effects on the faculty. He said he’s talked to many people across campus at various levels, and encountered people who are afraid to speak out. One faculty member said his department chair didn’t want anyone to address this issue for fear of retribution from the board of regents, Raiman said. This feeling is pervasive, he said, and stems from the disagreement between the majority of board members and the university administration. He contended that the overwhelming majority of faculty are against the unionization of GSRAs.

Raiman noted that in order for the unionization effort to move forward, signatures from more than 50% of GSRAs needed to be collected – and this was completed by the Graduate Employees Organization (GEO), he said. But many of the signatures were secured through misinformation or outright deception, he contended. He cited some specific examples of people he’d talked with, who told him that they hadn’t been informed about the $400 in dues they would owe to the GEO if the GSRAs are unionized. One person told him ”I signed their card to get rid of them,” Raiman said. These examples are anecdotal, he acknowledged, but he’s hearing more instances like this.

Victor DiRita, UM professor of microbiology and immunology, spoke during public commentary against the unionization of graduate student research assistants (GSRAs).

On Feb. 1, the Michigan Employment Relations Commission (MERC) will hold an administrative hearing on the legality of the election to unionize GSRAs, Raiman told regents. But his group is barred from attending – that means only one side of the issue will be represented, he said. He asked the board to ensure that the election is fair, if there’s an election. Raiman concluded by saying he was glad to see that there were faculty members brave enough to come and speak during public commentary.

The next three speakers were UM faculty: Victor DiRita, Finn Larsen, and Cagliyan Kurdak.

DiRita, a professor in the department of microbiology and immunology, is also associate dean for graduate and postdoctoral studies at the UM Medical School. He agreed with the sentiments expressed by Raiman. Saying he understood the impulse to offer choices to students, DiRita said that in this case, the choice is based on the flawed premise that students are employees. The faculty views that premise as a serious affront, he said. Faculty take mentoring and academic progress very seriously, and in fact it’s a red flag if someone treats a student like an employee, he said.

Larsen and Kurdak also raised concerns over possible GSRA unionization. Larsen, who’s chair of the physics department’s graduate program, said it’s meaningless to distinguish between thesis research and GSRA-supported research. Doing so will have a negative impact on the education and research missions of the university.

Kurdak, director of the applied physics program, also objected to characterizing GSRAs as employees. The relationship between faculty and students is very personal, he said. When problems arise between the faculty member and student, often times the problems are academic in nature – and union involvement would not be effective. In fact, it might result in escalating the situation so that there are no solutions that benefit the student, he said. Kurdak encouraged regents to recognize the academic nature of GSRA appointments.

Regent Andrea Fischer Newman thanked the faculty for coming to speak to the board on this issue.

Annual Research Report

Stephen Forrest, UM’s vice president for research, began his presentation by noting that this was the 90th annual research report to regents, but that it would be a more sober report than previous reports, because the university is entering sobering times. [.pdf of fiscal 2011 UM research report]

To put the research enterprise in context, Forrest noted its $1.2 billion in expenditures makes research the third-largest segment of the university, behind the health system ($2.4 billion) and education ($1.3 billion). He cautioned that these numbers can be misleading, because the three segments interlink in many ways.

Forrest then cited a 1962 quote from Harlan Hatcher, UM’s 8th president, on the occasion of the 40th annual research report: “The university fulfills three basic, interlocking functions: to educate youth in the widest possible variety of intellectual disciplines; to collect, increase, and disseminate knowledge that bears on these disciplines; and to perform those services for society, both individually and collectively, which, consistent with its education and research functions, it is peculiarly qualified to perform.”

Stephen Forrest, UM's vice president for research.

The statement was true then, Forrest said, “and it’s certainly true today.”

The challenge now, he said, is how to make the research enterprise thrive during a time of flat or declining federal support. Federal funding is the largest source of research dollars at UM, accounting for 66.7% – $824.75 million – of total research expenditures in fiscal 2011. For UM, federal funding has always increased year-to-year, Forrest noted, even when the overall amount of federal dollars available for research nationwide has declined. In fiscal 2011, federal funding for UM research increased 9.8% compared to the previous year.

In fiscal 2012, the university had expected federal funding to drop, but it didn’t, Forrest said. Regardless of the noise coming out of Washington, both political parties agree that innovation is a driver of American economy, he said.

In looking at funding received by UM from specific federal agencies, 46.2% of all UM research expenditures in fiscal 2011 were funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), an increase of 12.6% compared to the fiscal 2010. UM’s medical school is the sixth largest recipient of NIH funding in the country, Forrest noted, and they ?? need to be concerned a little – “or maybe a lot” – about diversification, he said.

The university’s second-largest federal funding source is from the National Science Foundation. NSF funding increased 10.3% to $74.25 million in fiscal 2011. Federal energy funding grew 30.4% to $35.40 million – the largest percentage increase.

Research funding to UM dropped from two federal sources – NASA and transportation funds.

Total non-federal funding also decreased by 1.1%, to $105.63 million. Industry support accounts for $40.84 million of that non-federal total, an increase of 4% for the year. (Other non-federal sources are foundations and state or local government.)

Overall, funding from industry sources makes up only a small percentage of total research expenditures, Forrest noted. But it’s important, he said, because it serves as a catalyst for other funding. In the 1980s, the federal government started emphasizing “use-inspired” basic research – work that can eventually lead to the creation of jobs or that supports an “innovation economy,” Forrest said. Very often, federal grants require some kind of industry partnership.

Looking ahead, Forrest said the growth forecast is worrisome. The global growth domestic product (GDP) is hovering just above recession levels. The GDP dip in 2008 was “terrible,” he said, and subsequent shocks, like the tsunami in Japan or the debt crisis in Europe, have had an impact.

In the future, Forrest expects to see significant budget cuts across all federal agencies, as the nation’s debt catches up with it. The university dodged a bullet in 2012, he said, but shouldn’t get complacent. These trends are likely to persist over the next 5-10 years.

So what should UM do? It’s important to focus on the university’s research strengths that are priorities for the federal government and industry, Forrest said. The university’s “sweet spot” is use-inspired basic research, he said, in areas including health, energy, intelligent vehicle systems, advanced manufacturing and sustainability.

Secondly, UM needs to build on its culture and research environment, Forrest said. The university already has a reputation for strengths across disciplines, and for interdisciplinary cooperation, ties to industry, and international relationships, he said. Forrest also described the North Campus Research Complex (NCRC) as the university’s “secret calling card,” with rapidly developing potential.

Finally, Forrest told regents that UM’s research operations need to streamline the administrative process. One example is the need to mentor young faculty, he said, so that they can more quickly start getting research grants. UM’s research administration needs to improve, he continued, by forging better relationships with the university’s office of technology transfer, business engagement center, and individual academic units.

The administration also needs to reduce barriers to working with industry, he said. Forrest concluded by telling regents that they can look forward to announcements about how the university will make it easier to craft intellectual property agreements, and in general improve its relationship with industry.

Annual Research Report: Regent Commentary

Andrea Fischer Newman said it seems that the university is losing money on its research – is that the case? Forrest replied that internal funding accounts for about 25% of UM’s total research program, paying for things like fellowships, infrastructure, and packages for startups that license university technology. Research returns a great value, he said, but it does cost a lot.

Newman said she wasn’t criticizing it. But she wanted to point out that tuition is used in part to subsidize the university’s research program.

Update from the Business School Dean

Alison Davis-Blake, dean of the UM Ross School of Business since July 2011, gave a brief overview of the school’s mission and approach to business education. Much has been written about the ill effects of business school graduates, she began – people who are narrow-minded, focused on short-term profits, and whose management skills consist of the ability to say, “You’re fired!”

Alison Davis-Blake, dean of the UM Ross School of Business.

That’s a caricature, she noted, yet there’s some truth to it. The future of business requires managers who think broadly and who have subtle management skills – and those are the kinds of managers that the Ross School is training, she said.

The school offers the traditional business disciplines, Davis-Blake said. But it also take an action-based learning approach, she added, focusing on organization sustainability – doing more with fewer financial, human, temporal and environmental resources, while creating positive outcomes for people and organizations. The approach is done in a multi-disciplinary way, she said, and involves not only faculty and students, but also alumni, businesses, nonprofits and government organizations.

Davis-Blake gave three examples to illustrate this approach. An “advanced model factory” at the Tauber Institute will be coming online in September, she said. Located at the North Campus Research Complex, it will be a small-scale replica of a real production environment. Because it will be easy to reconfigure, it will allow students to examine the effectiveness of various production methods. The focus will be on lean manufacturing and “green” techniques, she said, using principles of “factory physics.” In addition to teaching undergraduate and graduate students, workshops will be offered to Michigan businesses as well, she said.

Davis-Blake also cited work done by the school’s Center for Positive Organizational Scholarship. The emphasis is on cultivating positive emotions, positive connections and positive interpretations of events. A “job crafting” tool, for example, helps people change the way they work to make it more positive and productive.

In her final example, Davis-Blake described environmental sustainability work at the Erb Institute, a joint venture of the business school and the School of Natural Resources & Environment. Graduate students complete a thesis that involves a real client, and alumni teams choose projects that are suitable for publication. Three books – printed locally by Thomson-Shore – have been produced so far, she said, on the topics of climate strategies, hybrid organizations, and sustainable hotels.

Davis-Blake concluded by noting that her father had been a business school dean, and photos from his tenure showed an all-male faculty. Ross is not your father’s business school, she said.

Coleman thanked Davis-Blake, and commented that the energy from students in the building’s Winter Garden – the first floor lobby – was palpable.

Health System Expansion

A major expansion into western Wayne County by the University of Michigan Hospitals and Health Centers was on the Jan. 19 agenda for regents to authorize.

The $39 million project entails opening a new clinic along the I-275 corridor, at a site located at Seven Mile and Haggerty Roads in Northville Township – about a half mile away UM’s existing Livonia Center for Specialty Care. Attracting patients from outside the market of Livingston and Washtenaw counties is part of the UM Health System’s strategic plan.

The plan calls for signing a 25-year lease on 100,000 square feet, with base rent of $27.25 per rentable square foot per year, increasing 5% every five years. The base lease covers expenses related to the land, site work, design and management fees, and a part of the building construction. Operating costs would be an additional expense.

Ora Peskovitz, UM's executive vice president for medical affairs.

The location is expected to include primary and specialty care; a musculoskeletal program; eye care for adults and children; radiology services; infusion for cancer and non-cancer treatment; and a medical procedure unit.

The site is expected to be ready by the winter of 2014.

When he introduced the item, UM chief financial officer Tim Slottow noted that there were several reasons why this particular lease required board approval – the lease is longer than 10 years, more than 50,000 square feet, and over $1 million annually. He said the project is something that has been worked on for several years.

Ora Pescovitz, UM’s executive vice president for medical affairs, spoke briefly about the project, saying it was a very important facility and pivotal for the health system’s strategic plans. It’s responding to the burgeoning clinical needs in communities along this stretch of I-275.

Outcome: The board unanimously approved the lease for the Northville Township health system expansion.

Executive Officer Reports

During every meeting, UM’s executive officers have the opportunity to give verbal reports, supplementing any written communications they provide to the regents.

Executive Officer Reports: Health Care Costs

Tim Slottow, UM’s chief financial officer, said that in light of changes to health benefits made at the state level, he wanted to remind people of the successes that the university has seen in its health benefits strategies. Changes that UM has made since 2003 have resulted in about $94 million of savings annually, Slottow said, or about $400 million cumulatively. Of that, greater cost-sharing by employees accounts for about 65% of the savings. Employees pay for 30% of their health care premiums and co-pays.

Other savings were gained from use of generic drugs, instituting a one-year waiting period before new employees get university contributions toward their retirement savings accounts, and reducing administrative costs, he said.

UM president Mary Sue Coleman said the administration recognizes that faculty and staff have been partners in cutting costs. Everyone is aware of the need to do that, she said.

Executive Officer Reports: Development

Jerry May, UM’s vice president of development, reported that there was a strong uptick in donations in December, but fiscal year-to-date giving to the university is only up about 2% – $140.88 million for the first six months of fiscal 2012, compared to $138.05 million for the same period in fiscal 2011. [.pdf of development report]

May noted that in 2009, UM president Mary Sue Coleman had issued a challenge grant, with $5 million in matching funds to provide a $1 match for every $2 in endowment gifts of up to $500,000. That meant that the development office needed to raise $10 million in contributions to the university to fund undergraduate and graduate study abroad.

That goal has been met, May said, and there is now a permanent $15 million endowment that over the years will benefit thousands of students.

UM Athletics: Renovations, Finance

Two action items on the Jan. 19 agenda related to university athletics – for renovations of Schembechler Hall and Yost Ice Arena. In addition, regents were provided with supplemental information related to a financial audit of the athletics department.

UM Athletics: Renovations – Schembechler Hall

Regents were asked to authorize a $9 million renovation to the entrance of Schembechler Hall, which will integrate the Margaret Dow Towsley Sports Museum area. The building at 1200 S. State St. was constructed in 1990 for UM’s football program, and contains locker rooms, meeting rooms, medical treatment rooms, training areas, weight rooms, and administrative offices. The project will add about 7,000 square feet to the building, and renovate an additional 7,000 square feet. Funding will be provided from athletic department resources.

Tim Slottow, UM’s chief financial officer, said the renovations would completely change the look and feel of the entrance. Regent Andrea Fischer Newman asked whether the changes would make the museum more accessible. “Absolutely,” Slottow replied. The museum is significantly underutilized, he said, and this project is rethinking its whole use.

Newman said that if the university is going to spend $9 million on renovations, the public needs better access. Slottow said the changes will result in the museum being far better used.

The museum is a collection of UM football memorabilia, including some of the program’s championship trophies. In a statement released after the regents meeting, athletics director Dave Brandon indicated that more interactive displays will be added to the museum during the renovations. There’s no admission and it’s open to the public, but hours are limited. It’s open Monday-Thursday from 9 a.m.-noon and 1-4 p.m., and Friday from 9 a.m.-1 p.m.

Outcome: Regents unanimously approved the renovations to Schembechler Hall.

UM Athletics: Renovations – Yost Ice Arena

In a separate vote, regents were asked to authorize issuing bids and awarding construction contracts for a $14 million project at Yost Ice Arena. The overall project was initially approved by the board at its June 2011 meeting, with a schematic design subsequently approved in October.

The project includes replacing seating on the east, south and west sides of the rink, improving accessibility and emergency exits, converting the west side media balcony into a series of loge boxes, adding a new level five on the west side for media, and constructing new corner and stair platforms for additional seating. The project will be paid for out of athletic department revenues, and has been designed by Rossetti Architects Inc. of Southfield, Mich.

There’s the potential that a donor might provide additional funding for enhanced window treatments at Yost, Slottow said – UM athletics director Dave Brandon and Jerry May, the university’s vice president of development, are working on that. If the donation comes through, Slottow said he’ll be returning to the regents asking for an approval of an additional $1-2 million for the project.

Outcome: Without comment, regents unanimously approved issuing bids and awarding construction contracts for renovations at Yost.

UM Athletics: Finance – Supplement to Audit

As an item of information, Slottow pointed regents to a supplemental report for the athletics department financial audit covering the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2011. [.pdf of supplemental audit information] Slottow noted that the information is required by the NCAA. The report includes reviews of financial contributions from various booster organizations, financial aid for one student athletic in each of 10 sports, compensation for 12 coaches, and several other items. No exceptions were noted.

Renovation Projects: Kraus, Northwood

Regents were asked to approve renovation projects totaling nearly $10 million for academic and student housing purposes.

Renovation Projects: Kraus

A $1.7 million renovation to the auditorium of the Edward Henry Kraus building was on the Jan. 19 agenda for approval. The Kraus building is used by biology departments and was constructed in 1915. Its auditorium – one of the largest on central campus – was last updated in 1990.

The current project would renovate about 5,100 square feet and include accessibility improvements, new seating, power for laptops and other devices, and other upgrades. The renovation will be funded by the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts and the provost’s office. The work is expected to be complete by the summer of 2012.

Outcome: Regents unanimously approved the Kraus renovations.

Renovation Projects: Northwood

The board was asked to authorize a $7.5 million upgrade to the fire alarm and boiler systems at Northwood I, II and III – a 58-building apartment complex on north campus with 686 units of student housing.

The complex had been mentioned at the regents’ Nov. 17, 2011 meeting in the context of other housing changes on north campus and elsewhere throughout UM’s student housing system. At that meeting, regents approved renovations at two dorms – Baits II on north campus, and East Quad on central campus – and discussed the need for a broader strategic plan for student housing. Royster Harper, the university’s vice president for student affairs, had informed regents that the living/learning communities in the Northwood apartments I and II would be expanded to Northwood III.

The renovations to Northwood will be designed by UM’s department of architecture, engineering and construction, in collaboration with Riverside Integrated Systems Inc. and Structural Design Inc. The project is expected to be completed by the summer of 2013.

Outcome: Regents unanimously approved the Northwood renovation project, without comment.

Michigan Energy Institute

As an item of information, Stephen Forrest – UM’s vice president for research – noted that the Michigan Memorial Phoenix Institute is being renamed. As of Feb. 1, it will be called the University of Michigan Energy Institute.

When the institute launched six years ago, Forrest said, its name was chosen to reflect the legacy of the Michigan Memorial Phoenix Institute, which had been formed in 1948 to focus on peaceful uses for atomic energy. It was a way to honor the more than 500 students and alumni who sacrificed their lives during World War II.

A prominent display about the Phoenix project will be located in the lobby of the building, he said, and the building itself will be named the Michigan Memorial Phoenix Laboratory on North Campus. [The building is located at the North Campus Research Complex (NCRC) on Plymouth Road, site of the former Pfizer research operation.]

The institute’s new name will reflect a more interdisciplinary approach that draws on a range of disciplines, including science, technology, policy, business and other fields, Forrest said. It’s an academic research unit of the office of the vice president for research, with the mission of developing and promoting energy research and education.

Regents had no comments regarding the name change.

Conflict-of-Interest Disclosures

Regents were asked to authorize five items that required disclosure under the state’s Conflict of Interest statute. The law requires that regents vote on potential conflict-of-interest disclosures related to university staff, faculty or students.

The items often involve technology licensing agreements or leases. This month, companies involved are Edington Associates LLC, ArborMetrix, Valley View Farms, FlexDex LLC, and Diapin Therapeutics LLC.

Outcome: In one vote, regents authorized the five conflict-of-interest disclosures, without comment.

Public Commentary

In addition to the four people who spoke during public commentary against the effort to unionize graduate student research assistants, as reported above, a fifth speaker raised concerns over the proposed Fuller Road Station.

Public Commentary: Fuller Road Station

Nancy Shiffler, chair of the Sierra Club’s Huron Valley group, congratulated the university for its Planet Blue sustainability efforts, saying she was impressed by its goal and scope. However, she’s concerned about a project that runs counter to those goals.

Nancy Shiffler, chair of the Sierra Club's Huron Valley group.

The proposed Fuller Road Station would be a parking garage for potentially 1,600 vehicles, and would directly contradict the university’s sustainability goals, she said. The garage would primarily be used by UM employees commuting by car, although eventually it might include a commuter rail station.

Shiffler outlined several concerns. If a train station is eventually built, having a large parking garage there would discourage people from using commuter rail, she said. The structure would increase air pollution and traffic congestion, especially during hospital shift changes. Building on parkland, repurposing the land for non-park uses, violates city zoning. An extended lease or use agreement amounts to a de facto sale of parkland, which by city ordinance would require a vote by residents for approval.

In addition, Shiffler noted that the project’s first phase is expected to be funded by UM and an undetermined source of local funding. For phase 2, the city hopes to secure a federal grant, she said, which would require an environmental assessment and possibly an environmental impact statement. However, construction could begin on phase 1 and negate the results of those environmental reports. The Sierra Club has contacted the Federal Rail Administration about this issue, she said.

Shiffler concluded by saying that UM appears to tout its sustainability program, but ignores the program when it’s convenient to do so. She didn’t think this was the image that UM wanted, and she urged regents to look at the project from the point of view of sustainability.

Regents gave no response to Shiffler’s commentary. Other residents have raised this issue at previous board meetings. For example, in March 2010 Rita Mitchell also spoke to regents about Fuller Road Station, urging them not to proceed with the project. Mitchell attended the regents’ Jan. 19 meeting, but did not address the board during public commentary.

Present: Mary Sue Coleman (ex officio), Julia Darlow, Denise Ilitch, Olivia (Libby) Maynard, Andrea Fischer Newman, Andy Richner, Kathy White.

Absent: Larry Deitch, Martin Taylor.

Next board meeting: Thursday, Feb. 16, 2012 at 3 p.m. at the Fleming administration building on UM’s central campus. [confirm date]

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Occupy UM protesters walking toward the Fleming administration building prior to the Dec. 15 regents meeting, where they protested against the high cost of public education. Flyers taped to The Cube repeated the same theme. (Photos by the writer.)

As UM president Mary Sue Coleman began her opening remarks to start Thursday’s meeting, about two dozen “Occupy UM” protesters, who’d been sitting in the boardroom, stood up and shouted, “Mic check!” For the next five minutes, in a call-and-response delivery, protesters outlined their grievances against the university’s leadership – primarily, that once-affordable public education has been turned into an expensive commodity. [A video of the protest is posted on YouTube.]

When the group finished, they left the boardroom chanting “Instruction, not construction!” Neither the regents nor Coleman responded to them or alluded to the protest during the rest of the meeting.

Another group of students gave a decidedly different performance just minutes later. The a cappella group Amazin’ Blue sang five holiday songs, prompting board chair Denise Ilitch to don a blue Santa’s hat – embroidered with “Michigan” – and sing along.

The meeting included two issues related to the Ann Arbor community and parking. During public commentary, Chip Smith of the Near Westside Neighborhood Association highlighted problems with a UM parking lot that’s surrounded by homes on the Old West Side. And in a staff memo accompanying a resolution to issue bonds for capital projects, Fuller Road Station was on the list in the category of projects that would require final approval by regents prior to being funded with bond proceeds. The regents had approved the controversial project – a joint UM/city of Ann Arbor parking structure, bus depot and possible train station – in January 2010, but a formal agreement between the city and university has not yet been finalized.

Other items on the Dec. 15 agenda included: (1) presentations by three UM faculty who were named MacArthur Fellows this year; (2) approval of the Michigan Investment in New Technology Startups (MINTS) initiative; and (3) approval of several renovation projects, including work on the Law School’s historic Charles T. Munger Residences in the Lawyers’ Club and the John P. Cook Building.

Occupy UM “Mic Check”

Occupy UM is one of several local groups formed since the Occupy Wall Street movement started earlier this year. [Other groups include Occupy Ann Arbor and Occupy For All – described on its website as a "merry band of roving peaceniks based in Ann Arbor."]

This Occupy UM protester read a statement to the regents that was repeated in unison by other protesters in the boardroom.

Before the regents meeting, Occupy UM held a rally at The Cube, located in the plaza next to the Fleming administration building, where the regents meet. After the rally, Occupy UM supporters entered Fleming and took seats throughout the boardroom before the start of the meeting.

The agenda begins with remarks from UM president Mary Sue Coleman, and as soon as she began speaking the protesters stood and shouted “Mic check!” – which launched the start of a technique used by Occupy protesters nationwide to propagate a message to a crowd without the aid of a microphone.

The five-minute call-and-response recitation – shouted by a leader in short phrases, and repeated in unison by the other two dozen or so protesters – sharply criticized the regents and university leaders for a range of actions and inactions that have resulted in a cost of education that’s inaccessible for many. They referred to the meeting’s agenda, saying it reflected the values of funding start-up businesses and construction projects rather than accessible education.

An excerpt:

There was once affordable public education. / Today / there is only an expensive commodity. / You sell this commodity to wealthy students. / To the rest of us you offer / a more ominous exchange: / an education / for a lifetime of student debt.

…

You endeavor to attract the richest and whitest / not the best and brightest. / You support construction not instruction. / We have another vision. / Job security and intellectual freedom / for faculty and staff; / a student body without student debt; / and a community that shatters race and class divisions / instead of reproducing them./

This university claims to be / an institution of inclusion and equality. / Our vision works for the future / when this may be true. / Your vision ensures / a public forever divided. / We reject your vision! [.pdf of full Occupy UM statement]

When they finished, the protesters continued chanting “Instruction, not construction!” as they left the room. Their chants could be heard as Coleman resumed her opening remarks, which highlighted the Dec. 18 winter commencement on Sunday, where New York Times executive editor Jill Abramson would give the keynote speech. Coleman also noted several faculty achievements, and gave well wishes for students during finals and for the UM football team at the Sugar Bowl. The meeting continued without any mention of the protesters by regents or UM executives.

However, the following day – Friday, Dec. 16 – a letter from Coleman to President Barack Obama was released, addressing the same issue of affordable education. The letter was tied to Obama’s recent meeting with university presidents at the White House, which Coleman did not attend. From the letter:

By bringing together higher education leaders to discuss college affordability, you have elevated a thorny issue that demands a national conversation because of its impact on all sectors of society. The cost of attending college is one of the most serious matters facing a country that seeks to strengthen its global competitiveness. How we resolve this dilemma requires collaboration, sacrifice and hard choices.

…

Higher education is a public good currently lacking public support. There is no stronger trigger for rising costs at public universities and colleges than declining state support. The University of Michigan and our state’s 14 other public institutions have been ground zero for funding cuts. The state’s significant disinvestment in higher education has been challenging: a 15 percent cut in the last year alone, and a reduction of more than 30 percent over the last decade.

We have worked extremely hard to mitigate the impact of these cuts on students and families. We must and will do more, but also offer recommendations that may benefit all of higher education.

Recommendations in the letter included: urging states to reinvest in public colleges and universities, asking the business community to lobby for increased government funding of higher education, increasing private support, and cutting costs.

Student, Faculty Awards

Provost Phil Hanlon gave a presentation about the various awards and other honors that UM’s faculty have received, as well as introducing and congratulating Alex Carney, a UM senior who recently was named a Marshall Scholar – one of only 36 students in the U.S. awarded the scholarship to study in Oxford and Cambridge. Carney – a mathematician, violinist and cross-country runner – received a round of applause.

Tiya Miles, chair of UM's department of Afroamerican and African studies and a 2011 MacArthur Fellow.

After cataloguing the range of honors for UM faculty – including Guggenheim Fellowships, the Carnegie Foundation’s U.S. professors of the year, and election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, among others – Hanlon introduced three faculty members who had been named MacArthur Fellows this year: Tiya Miles, Melanie Sanford, and Yukiko Yamashita.

Each of the three professors spoke to the regents, describing their work and the support they’ve received at UM. Miles, chair of UM’s department of Afroamerican and African studies, talked about the interdisciplinary nature of her research, working in the program in American culture, the department of Afroamerican and African studies, the department of history, and the Native American studies program. She recalled a challenge several years ago when she was pregnant with twins and needed to take medical leave. A book she’d been working on wasn’t completed, and she said she could imagine a scenario in which she’d be left to fail. But she had wonderful department chairs, Miles said, and senior women faculty who reached out to her. Thanks to that support, her book was eventually published and received awards, and her daughters are now eight years old.

Sanford, an Arthur F. Thurnau professor of chemistry, described her work as developing new ways to make common chemicals in a more environmentally friendly fashion, with less waste. The research has potential to impact a range of industries, from pharmaceuticals to beauty products. She said she couldn’t do the work without the amazing undergraduate and graduate students that UM attracts. “That is really the strength of this university,” Sanford said. She also praised UM’s efforts to recruit and retain women in traditionally underrepresented fields, like chemistry. There’s tremendous diversity in the chemistry department, she said, making it a dynamic and exciting place to work, with fantastic research being conducted.

After Sanford’s remarks, regent Andy Richner asked how to make a plastic cup out of corn. “That’s easy,” Sanford quipped, and quickly described how to do it. She said her lab is working on ways to do this kind of thing more efficiently, with less energy.

Yamashita spoke next, saying that she’s a stem cell biologist but “that’s not as controversial as it sounds.” That is, her work uses adult – not embryonic – stem cells. The research is very, very basic, Yamashita said, using fruit flies. But it lays the foundation to find cures for degenerative diseases, for example, or cancer. She described basic research as like a baby: You don’t get rid of a baby because it can’t yet walk or talk. The university is very supportive of her work, Yamashita said. There are great mentors, she said, who know just the right amount of leash to use on junior faculty – not too much, nor too little.

Start-Up Tech Investment

A new initiative – the Michigan Investment in New Technology Startups (MINTS) was on the agenda for approval by regents at the Dec. 15 meeting. Plans for the initiative had been announced in early October by UM president Mary Sue Coleman in her annual address to campus.

Managed by UM’s investment office as well as the technology transfer office, the program involves investing in start-up companies formed using UM technology. It’s estimated that over 10 years, the program will invest about $25 million from the university’s long-term portfolio. According to a staff memo, the investments would be part of the portfolio’s venture capital sub-portfolio. A limit of up to $500,000 would be made in any single round of financing.

In addition to approval for the overall program, regents also were asked to approve guidelines for MINTS. [.pdf of MINTS guidelines]

Tim Slottow, UM’s chief financial officer, praised Erik Lundberg, the university’s chief investment officer, and Ken Nisbet, executive director of UM’s tech transfer office, for their work in putting together this program. Slottow described it as a breakthrough type of funding that doesn’t exist at any other university. With regental approval, the university will begin investing “as soon as we can,” Slottow said.

Outcome: Regents unanimously approved the MINTS initiative and guidelines.

Building & Renovation Projects

Regents were asked to approve several items related to building and renovation projects on the Ann Arbor campus, including renovations of the law school residences, an overhaul of the University Hospital’s Trauma Burn Unit, and issuance of bids for an addition to the G.G. Brown building on north campus.

Building & Renovation Projects: Law School Residences

Regents were asked to approve the schematic design for a renovation of the Law School’s historic Charles T. Munger Residences in the Lawyers’ Club and the John P. Cook Building. The residences house about 260 students and were built in the early 1920s.

Lee Becker of Hartman-Cox Architects describes the schematic design for the UM Law School residences.

Regents had previously authorized the overall project at their March 2011 meeting. That meeting had included  a unanimous vote to name The Lawyers Club dormitory in honor of Charles T. Munger, who gave the university $20 million toward renovations of the building. The March 2011 meeting also included a vote to approve a $39 million renovation of The Lawyers Club and the John P. Cook buildings – part of a larger expansion and renovation effort at UM’s law school.

Washington, D.C.-based Hartman-Cox Architects, working with SmithGroup, is handling the project’s design. Lee Becker of Hartman-Cox attended the Dec. 15 meeting and showed regents examples of the renovation work they’ve planned. Most of the work will be interior changes to the residences – such as opening up connections between the townhouse-style dorms so that hallways will run through all the units. One of the main goals is to build better community among the law school students, he said.

Becker noted that the renovations will allow the university to skip roughly $30 million in maintenance it would otherwise need to perform in the dorms. Other work will include removing the fireplaces, adding air conditioning, installing elevators, replacing the roof, restoring masonry and refurbishing leaded glass windows.

Tim Slottow, UM’s chief financial officer, mentioned that the renovations would bring the buildings up to the same energy efficiency standards as other UM facilities. Examples of specific changes addressing energy efficiency include low-flow fixtures to conserve water, insulation, energy-efficient light fixtures and thermostat setback controls in each room.

Regent Libby Maynard asked where the students will live during the renovations, which will take about 18 months and be finished in mid-2013. Hank Baier, UM’s associate vice president for facilities and operations, reported that the university is leasing space in several apartment complexes that are close to central campus.

Regent Andy Richner noted that he had lived there when he went to law school, and he supported the project. Mary Sue Coleman said she couldn’t be more pleased with the new design, calling it one of the most precious buildings in the country.

 Outcome: Regents voted to approved the renovations at the Law School dorms.

Building & Renovation Projects: Trauma Burn Unit

A $3.33 million renovation for the University Hospital’s Trauma Burn Unit was on the agenda for approval. Renovations of the roughly 6,600-square-foot facility include improved lighting for care within the patient rooms, improved treatment rooms, creation of a dedicated physical therapy and occupational therapy room, and creation of a faculty on-call room.

Project and Design Management LLC, an architectural firm based in Ferndale, will design the project. According to a staff memo, a phased construction schedule is planned to minimize disruption to operations and patient care, with construction to be completed in the fall of 2012.

Outcome: Regents approved the trauma burn unit renovations.

Building & Renovation Projects: G.G. Brown

On the agenda was an item that would authorize university staff to issue bids and award construction contracts for a $46 million addition to the  G.G. Brown Memorial Laboratories Mechanical Engineering building on UM’s north campus.

A schematic design for the 62,500-square-foot addition was approved by regents a year ago, at the board’s Dec. 17, 2010 meeting. Construction is expected to be complete by mid-2014. The addition will house research labs, and faculty and graduate student offices for emerging research areas, including bio-systems, energy systems, and nano-systems.

Outcome: The board voted to authorize the issuance of bids and the awarding of construction contracts for the G.G. Brown addition.

In addition, as an item of information, regents were presented with UM’s annual capital outlay request to the state for fiscal 2013. For the Ann Arbor campus, that request included funding for renovations of the existing G.G. Brown building – a separate project from the planned addition. At previous meetings, Tim Slottow – UM’s chief financial officer – has said that UM expects to receive $30 million in funding for the renovation as part of the state capital outlay bill. At the Dec. 15 meeting, he didn’t specify any anticipated dollar amount, but said he hopes the state will help with this project and two others at UM’s Flint and Dearborn campuses.

Long-Term Bonds

Regents were asked to authorize the issuance of up to $280 million in general revenue bonds to fund a variety of capital projects. Tim Slottow, UM’s chief financial officer, briefly introduced the item, saying that UM needs to refinance some of its existing $200 million in commercial paper and provide longer-term financing for authorized capital projects.

A staff memo included a list of projects that require financing:

• Alice Crocker Lloyd Hall renovation
• Crisler Arena expansion and renovation
• C.S. Mott Children’s and Von Voigtlander Women’s Hospitals, and related projects
• Institute for Social Research addition
• Vera B. Baits Houses II renewal
• Seven projects for the UM Hospitals and Health Centers: (1) Simpson Circle parking structure improvements; (2) University Hospital accelerator replacement; (3) University Hospital computed tomography angiography; (4) University Hospital kitchen renovations for room service protocol; (5) University Hospital medical procedure unit expansion; (6) University Hospital radiation oncology simulator replacement; and (7) University Hospital Trauma Burn Unit renovations.

In a separate category, three projects were listed as requiring final approval by regents prior to being funded with bond proceeds:

• Fuller Road Station
• UM  Hospitals and Health Centers – A. Alfred Taubman Health Care Center internal medicine renovations
• UM Hospitals and Health Centers – A. Alfred Taubman Health Care Center Levels 1 and 2 backfill renovations

Regents had approved the Fuller Road Station project at their January 2010 meeting, when they had also authorized appointing an architect. From the staff memo provided to the regents at that 2010 meeting:

The first phase of the development of this major intermodal transportation complex is the Fuller Road Station project which includes site preparation and construction of an intermodal facility that includes: four covered bus loading/unloading zones and waiting areas; a covered area for bike hoops and lockers; parking for 1,000 vehicles (78 percent for university and 22 percent for city use); improvements to Fuller Road immediately adjacent to the site for vehicle access; and upgrades to the multi-use path along Fuller Road.

The university will manage the construction of the Fuller Road Station project. That includes building the facility on city property, following city code review and inspection, and collaborating with the city for their approval of design. This project is unique since we would be constructing the facility on city-owned property and following city building codes. We will also need approval for the lease on city-owned land since it would be for a period of greater than ten years. We will seek approval of the lease at a later date, but prior to seeking bids or awarding construction contracts for the project. A parking structure operation and maintenance agreement will be developed concurrently with design of the project. The City of Ann Arbor will manage the site preparation at an estimated cost of $3,000,000. In addition, at the City’s expense, they will undertake an environmental assessment of the property. Although there will be a temporary loss of some leased parking spaces during construction, there will be an increase of approximately 780 university parking spaces as a result of this project.

The estimated cost of the project is $46,550,000. Costs will be shared between the University of Michigan and the City of Ann Arbor in proportion to the number of parking spaces available to each (78 percent and 22 percent respectively). Total university funding, not to exceed $36,309,000 (78 percent), will be provided from Parking resources. The construction cash flow may be provided, all or in part, by increasing the commercial paper issuance under the commercial paper program, secured by a pledge of General Revenues, and authorized by the Board of Regents. The parking structure consulting firm of Walker Parking Consultants will design the project. Design is scheduled to begin immediately, and we will return with a construction schedule when we seek approval of schematic design.

At that January 2010 meeting, James D’Amour – a member of the executive committee for the Huron Valley Group of the Sierra Club – spoke out against the project, objecting to it being built on city-owned property that had been designated as parkland. He and other community members have been vocal in their objections to the structure, primarily at public meetings of the Ann Arbor city council and the Ann Arbor park advisory commission – most recently at PAC’s November 2011 meeting. [See Chronicle coverage: "More Concerns Aired on Fuller Road Station"] Regents have not discussed the project at their board meetings since the January 2010 vote.

Outcome: Without discussion, regents authorized the issuance of general revenue bonds. 

Annual Lease Report

As an item of information, regents were provided with an annual report on leases held by the university that exceed 50,000 square feet. Tim Slottow, UM’s chief financial officer, noted that there was very little change from the 2010 report, made at the regents’ Dec. 17, 2010 meeting.

There are currently five leases for space over 50,000 square feet:

• 222,775 square feet at the Domino’s Farms complex, used by various UM Health System departments.
• 125,815 square feet at the KMS Building on South State Street, used by UMHS and leased from Kosmos Associates.
• 65,693 square feet at 325 East Eisenhower Parkway leased from Burlington Property LLC for use by Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Spine Rehabilitation and the Dental School.
• 63,920 square feet at 2301 Commonwealth Boulevard, for use by UMHS and leased from First Properties Associates.
• 51,534 square feet at 1051 North Canton Center Road in Canton, leased from Saltz Center for the UMHS Canton Health Center.

Appointment of UMHS Development Officer

As a supplemental agenda item, regents were asked to approve the appointment of Brian Lally to a newly created position: associate vice president for medical development and alumni relations for the UM Health System. Jerry May, UM’s vice president for development, told the regents that the university had been doing a search to fill this new position for more than a year, with the goal of dramatically increasing fundraising for UMHS. Lally will report jointly to May and Ora Pescovitz, UM’s executive vice president for medical affairs.

Lally most recently has served as vice president of development and alumni relations for Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center and Dartmouth Medical School.

Outcome: Regents unanimously approved Lally’s appointment.

Conflict-of-Interest Items

At each monthly meeting, regents are asked to authorize items that require disclosure under the state’s Conflict of Interest statute. The law requires that regents vote on potential conflict-of-interest disclosures related to university staff, faculty or students.

The items often involve technology licensing agreements or leases. This month, the eight separate items included four research agreements, one subcontract agreement, one licensing agreement, one licensing option agreement, and one business transaction. Companies involved are: ONL Therapeutics; Emerging Micro Systems Inc.; CytoPherx Inc.; CSquared Innovations; Arbor Ultrasound Technologies; ISSYS Inc.; and Red Poppy Floral Design.

Outcome: Without comment, regents unanimously authorized the conflict-of-interest disclosures.

Student Government Report

In his regular report to the board, DeAndree Watson – president of the Michigan Student Assembly – explained the reasoning behind the organization’s upcoming name change. As of Jan. 1, the MSA will be called the Central Student Government. In 2010, students had voted to change the constitution of their student government, creating three separate branches that mirrored the federal system: executive, legislative and judicial. The legislative branch is known as the Assembly, and the overall government name was changed to distinguish itself from that branch. The name will also serve to distinguish the central student government, which represents students campuswide, with the various student governments for each school or college within UM.

Regent Andrea Fischer Newman asked Watson if he’d considered possible confusion with Central Michigan University. Watson replied that he had been part of the group that had rewritten the constitution, and that had settled on the new name. The word “Central” had been meant to signify a “central voice” for all students, he said. The only concern they’d heard about it was from one student who felt it might disenfranchise students on UM’s north campus. The official name will be the University of Michigan Central Student Government, he said.

Misc. Communications

Stephen Forrest, UM’s vice president for research, told regents that the university’s formal policies and procedures had been completed for the return of Native American human remains and associated materials in UM’s collections under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). Responding to a follow-up query from The Chronicle, David Lampe – executive director of research communications – reported that the 75-page document formally specifies details of all of the policies and procedures that UM has adopted to handle the requirements of the act. It has been submitted to UM’s Office of the General Counsel for final approval – it will eventually be posted online.

Public Commentary

During public commentary at the end of the meeting, Chip Smith introduced himself as a UM alum and donor, and a representative of the Near Westside Neighborhood Association. The association consists of 24 historic homes – all built in 1930 or earlier – that border a UM parking lot off of Krause Street, known as Lot W11, between West Washington and West Liberty. [.jpg of map showing location of the NWNA and the lot] The neighborhood group was recently formed in response to construction at the lot, which has caused issues related to noise, lighting and stormwater runoff, among other things.

Chip Smith spoke to regents about problems in a UM parking lot off of Krause Street affecting neighboring homes. He represents the recently formed Near Westside Neighborhood Association.

Smith thanked Jim Kosteva – UM’s community  relations director – for his help, and provided a handout to regents that included a Nov. 23 letter that the association had sent Kosteva about Lot W11 issues.

A packet of materials distributed to regents by Smith listed several issues related to the parking lot, including the impact of construction activities, traffic, vandalism, and a lack of communication with neighbors. One of the handouts stated that “UM Lot W11 has been a bad neighbor for 20+ years.”

During his remarks, Smith focused on two main concerns: (1) implementing best management practices for stormwater control, and (2) lighting at the lot, which is outdated and intrusive for surrounding homes.

He praised UM’s sustainability initiative, and asked regents and the administration to hold the project group’s feet to the fire in terms of implementing stormwater best management practices that the university has adopted. [Among the sustainability goals outlined by Coleman in September was this one related to stormwater: "Protect the Huron River through best-in-class stormwater control strategies and by applying 40 percent fewer chemicals to campus landscapes, and ensure that at least 30 percent of stormwater runoff does not flow into the Huron River."]

Referring to construction on the lot that’s planned in 2012, Smith said the main issue is lighting. It’s unclear whether the current lights – which Smith said are extremely bright – will be replaced, but he asked that UM staff work with representatives of the neighborhood to find an acceptable solution.

In addition to these specific issues, the problem is the way in which the residents are treated, Smith said. Of the 24 houses surrounding the lot, 21 are owner-occupied. “This is our neighborhood,” he said, adding that he looked forward to working with UM to minimize the impact of future construction. He thanked regents for the opportunity to address the board.

After Smith’s remarks, regent Larry Deitch called the presentation “refreshing” – presumably because the tone had not been combative, as is often the case with remarks made during public commentary. Regent Andrea Fischer Newman said it would be helpful if Smith could bring a map. [A map of the lot, as well as photos of that location and other UM parking lots, were part of a packet of materials distributed to regents at the start of Smith's remarks.]

Present: Mary Sue Coleman (ex officio), Julia Darlow, Larry Deitch, Denise Ilitch, Olivia (Libby) Maynard, Andrea Fischer Newman, Andy Richner, Kathy White.

Absent: Martin Taylor.

Next board meeting: Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012 at 3 p.m. at the Fleming administration building on UM’s central campus. [confirm date]

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A Santa sock worn by regent Libby Maynard at the final board meeting of 2011 was a subtle reflection of the holiday season.

Students from the Amazin' Blue a cappella group sang Christmas carols at the Dec. 15 regents meeting.

Board chair Denise Ilitch wore a UM Santa's hat during the performance by Amazin' Blue. The front of the hat was embroidered with "Michigan."

At left: Lynn Bowen, an administrative assistant with the city who provides staff support for the park advisory commission, is retiring and was honored at PAC's November meeting. She has worked at the city for 26 years, including the last six years with parks and recreation. To the right are PAC chair Julie Grand and Colin Smith, the city's parks and recreation manager. (Photos by the writer.)

Commissioners were briefed by city staff about annual finances related to the land acquisition for parks and greenbelt programs, which are funded by a 30-year millage. They also got an update on the city’s marketing efforts for parks and recreation, and heard a report on the status of a sustainability project – several PAC commissioners had attended a September joint work session to help prioritize city goals related to environmental quality, economic vitality, and social equity.

Updates were also given about a sediment removal project in the Ruthven Nature Area, and about two parking-related projects at Riverside Park and Veterans Memorial Park.

In his manager’s report, Colin Smith noted that he’d taken a canoe run through the under-construction Argo Dam bypass pools – the new channel was a ”bit sportier” than he had expected, and is still being tweaked. He also told commissioners he’d received word that two state grant applications made by the city of Ann Arbor – $300,000 for the proposed Ann Arbor skatepark at Veterans Memorial Park, and $300,000 for improvements at the Gallup Park canoe livery – had ranked in the top 12 out of 100 applications statewide for funding from the Michigan Natural Resources Trust Fund. That bodes well for the possibility that the grants will be awarded – a decision from the state is expected in December.

During the meeting commissioners also honored two volunteers with the city’s natural area preservation program – Sarah Newman and Drew Lathin – and said farewell to Lynn Bowen, the administrative assistant who works with PAC. The meeting was her last before retiring from the city.

An item not on the agenda – the proposed Fuller Road Station – drew focus from public commentary as well as some questions from commissioners later in the meeting. 

Fuller Road Station

The issue of Fuller Road Station has raised concerns for several members of PAC dating back nearly two years. The large parking structure, bus depot and possible rail station is proposed near the intersection of Fuller Road and Maiden Lane, near the University of Michigan medical campus on city-owned land. The land has been used as a surface parking lot since 1993, leased to the university, but is on property designated as parkland. It’s a joint project of the city of Ann Arbor and UM, but a formal agreement regarding its construction and operation hasn’t yet been finalized.

In June 2010, the commission passed a resolution that asked the city council to make available a complete plan of Fuller Road Station – including any significant proposed agreements, such as what the university will pay the city for use of the structure – allowing sufficient time for a presentation at a televised PAC meeting before the council votes on the project. The resolution also asked that staff and the council ensure the project results in a net revenue gain for the parks system. PAC most recently got a detailed update on the project at its May 2011 meeting. The commission has not formally received word about whether the city council will agree to the requests made in the 2010 resolution.

There was no agenda item for the proposed Fuller Road Station, but the issue came up during public commentary as well as at the end of the meeting, with questions from commissioners.

Fuller Road Station: Public Commentary

Nancy Kaplan told commissioners that she was there to speak about transforming Fuller Park into a Fuller Road parking garage, saying it set many negative, troubling precedents. One precedent is that it’s OK to change a part-time surface parking lot into a parking garage. The fact that it’s a surface lot to accommodate parking for the University of Michigan is being used to justify building a parking garage with up to 1,600 spaces, with an expected structural life of 75 years, she said. This decreases the chances of reclaiming the Huron Valley as a beautiful amenity. Another negative precedent, Kaplan said, is circumventing the expectations of a 2008 ballot initiative passed by Ann Arbor voters, which requires a referendum in order to sell city parkland. This circumvention breaks with the trust of voters, who had a common understanding of what it meant to sell parkland, she said, and although this situation isn’t technically a sale, the result is the same.

A third negative precedent is accepting that the project will move forward without a due process hearing. Aside from the memorandum of understanding, no city council vote on the overall project has been taken. Yet at the Nov. 14 council work session, Kaplan noted, it was stated that a groundbreaking is expected this spring, and that public art is already being planned. Finally, she said the university has embarked on a sustainability initiative, but bringing up to 1,600 cars into the parking garage is counter to sustainability. She pointed out that Stanford University in California doesn’t subsidize employee parking, as UM does. Instead, as part of its reward system, Stanford pays employees not to park, and offers bus passes and free shuttles. The side benefit is that Stanford doesn’t have to build a lot of parking garages. Kaplan said that hopefully these negative precedents, plus the model of Stanford, are issues to be considered seriously.

Rita Mitchell continued the topic of Fuller Road Station. She began by noting that she’s a steward for the city’s natural area preservation (NAP) program, and takes great interest in parks. She said she appreciated PAC’s work. She asked that commissioners discuss and forward a series of questions to city council, to be reviewed in public, regarding plans to build a parking structure in Fuller Park. She gave a brief history of the property, noting that it was acquired by the city in the 1920s for use as parkland, and was the city’s first golf course. Starting in 1993, it was temporarily leased to UM for parking, and many problems have stemmed from that use. It’s already an area of great traffic congestion, and adding up to 1,600 more cars will create a range of problems, including air pollution, more polluted runoff, and conflicts with pedestrians, buses and bicyclists. Air pollution and health risks will increase in the summer for people, including children, who use Fuller Pool, located across the street, Mitchell said.

The city has spent significant money already, without discussing with the public whether parkland should be repurposed in this way, Mitchell said. She asked that PAC advise the city council to hold a public hearing on the issue, at a time that’s not influenced heavily by upcoming holiday schedules, so that the community can express their concerns. She noted that the council’s Nov. 14 work session had included discussion of art for the structure, and called it “outrageous” that this discussion would happen for a project that hasn’t yet been approved. The university is the primary beneficiary for this project, but the public doesn’t know who is negotiating with the university on this project. “Do you, as commissioners?” she asked. PAC should ask council to be provided with the names of those negotiating, and the specifications of the negotiations. Repurposing parkland subverts the letter and intent of the 2008 ballot initiative that requires a voter referendum on the sale of parkland, she said. The structure would have a 75-year lifespan, and 75 years for use of land is in effect a sale. But there’s been no discussion of a fair market value, or compensation to the citizens or parks system for the use of the land.

Mitchell also said she’s heard about the possible transfer of the Amtrak station to that site. While rail travel is a great idea, she said, there are also a range of concerns. Is it in the best interests of the city to build and run a train station? Should it be placed on parkland? If Ann Arbor is just one commuter stop, why do we need a 1,600-space parking structure? There hasn’t been adequate public discussion on this issue, Mitchell said. In addition, this summer a major water and sewer line were moved in Fuller Park – had that been discussed with PAC? Is the sign that’s now missing from the south end of Fuller Park a silent indication that the land is no longer part of the park system? Park commissioners are stewards of all city parks, Mitchell said. She urged them to start asking pointed questions and advocate for greater public participation in decisions that relate to parkland.

Fuller Road Station: Commissioner Questions

Later in the meeting, Gwen Nystuen asked city staff a series of questions about the Fuller Road Station project. She wondered about the legal status of the city’s parks, and how that relates to the project. She asked about the site plan for Fuller Road Station – if council approves the project, would it constitute a change of land use, and no longer be part of the parks system? These are issues that have never been discussed by city council, she noted. The land is part of the central Huron River valley, an area that has some of the least parkland per capita in the city, she said. This project would reduce it even more, she said, so it’s of concern to PAC. She also wondered about the status of the soccer field that had been in that area.

Colin Smith, the city’s parks and recreation manager, said these are legitimate questions. He asked Nystuen and other commissioners to send him whatever questions they had, and he would forward the questions to the city attorney or other relevant staff. He said the soccer field will be put in place again after utility work is finished on the south side of Fuller Road.

Tim Berla suggested asking representatives from the city attorney’s office, systems planning unit and Eli Cooper, the city’s transportation program manager, to attend a future PAC meeting to discuss the Fuller Road Station project. He noted that sometimes their answers are a bit opaque, and that it’s better to have the chance to ask follow-up questions in person, rather than to just get their answers in writing.

Open Space Millage Update

Ginny Trocchio of The Conservation Fund briefed commissioners on the annual financial report related to the land acquisition for parks and greenbelt programs. [A similar update was given to the greenbelt advisory commission by Kelli Martin, financial manager for the city’s community services unit, at GAC's Sept. 14 meeting.] [.pdf of land preservation annual report]

Under contract with the city, Trocchio is a Conservation Fund staff member who helps administer the city’s greenbelt program and land acquisition program for parks, which are both funded by the 30-year open space and parkland preservation millage. The 0.5 mill tax was approved by voters in 2003. Two-thirds of the millage proceeds are used for the greenbelt program, and one-third is allotted to parkland acquisition. PAC oversees the portion related to parkland acquisition.

Revenues from the millage were $2.164 million in fiscal 2011, down slightly from $2.262 million the previous year. In addition, the greenbelt program brought in nearly $2.8 million in federal grants during the year – the highest amount it has ever received. Those grants are from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Farm and Ranchland Protection Program, or FRPP. Investment income was $233,614 for the year, down from $492,576 in FY 2010. In total, $5.185 million in revenues came in for the combined greenbelt and parks acquisitions programs in FY 2011.

On the expense side, items included $1.2 million in debt service on the $20 million bond that the city issued in FY 2006. The greenbelt program spent $8.3 million during the year, related to land preservation projects. Parks spent $985,900 during the year, including two major purchases: (1) $592,503 for property off of South Pond owned by Wes Vivian and Elizabeth Kauffman, and (2) $369,160 for property next to the Bluffs Nature Area, owned by the Elks.

In FY 2011, $120,338 was paid to The Conservation Fund, which manages the greenbelt and park acquisition programs. Total administrative costs – including items like information technology (IT) and bond insurance – were $161,195. Administrative expenses accounted for 1.5% of the $10.672 million in total expenditures.

The fund balance stands at $10.3 million, down from $15.79 million a year ago. Of that, the portion for land acquisition for parks is $4.24 million.

Commissioners had no questions for Trocchio about the report.

Promoting Parks and Recreation

Kimberly Mortson, communications liaison for the city of Ann Arbor, gave a presentation on communications, marketing and social media for the parks and recreation system. She said that although she also does some work for other parts of the city’s community services area, 95% of her efforts are for parks and recreation.

Mortson noted that she started using Facebook and Twitter to promote city programs and events about two years ago. One of the advantages is that she can post a message one time, but there are an infinite number of people who’ll see it – and it doesn’t impact her budget, because Facebook and Twitter are free services. There’s a general Facebook page for parks and recreation, and other pages for specific units of parks and recreation, like the Ann Arbor farmers market, Cobblestone Farm and canoe liveries, among others

Twitter page for Ann Arbor parks. (Links to Twitter)

On Twitter, the @a2parks account has over 1,800 followers, Mortson reported. Over the past year, staff has tweeted from events, like the re-opening of West Park after its renovations, or the Heisman Trophy appearance at Hanover Park. They also use the account to promote other activities and programs.

Parks and recreation has also started using FourSquare, a social networking website that allows users to “check in” from their smart phones or other mobile devices, when they arrive at their destination. Mortson said she’s uploaded all the city’s parks and recreation locations to FourSquare – it’s another free marketing tool, she said.

Turning to the city’s website, Mortson told commissioners that the parks and recreation page is one of the most visited pages on the a2gov.org site. There will be changes to the page in the coming weeks and months, she said, to help people use the site more easily. Staff is also working with the state of Michigan on a new mobile application – the MI Camping and Recreation Locator. Now, people can use the application to search for information about state parks, she said. Ann Arbor will be the first city in the state to have its information loaded on that application, so that people can search for Ann Arbor parks information, too.

Some marketing materials for parks and recreation include QR codes, Mortson said – a marking similar to a bar code, which can be read by smart phones. The code is used to direct people to different websites for parks and recreation.

In addition to cost savings, social media and other online marketing is green, Mortson said – it saves paper.

Mortson said the city also advertises parks and recreation events and programs in traditional media, and showed several examples of ads that have run in the Ann Arbor Observer, Ann Arbor Chronicle, AnnArbor.com and other publications. Other venues for promoting parks and recreation include ads on buses and posters within city facilities.

Following Mortson’s presentation, Gwen Nystuen praised her efforts, saying the information showed that her marketing work is succeeding. Colin Smith, the city’s parks and recreation manager, noted that the programs are being well-run, and are being promoted exceedingly well. He gave the example of this summer’s day camps. In an extremely competitive area, two of the city’s four day camps were filled. Smith credited Mortson’s marketing efforts for helping achieve that level of participation.

Sustainability Project

Jamie Kidwell is working for the city on a sustainability project funded by a $95,000 grant the city received from the Home Depot Foundation. At the Nov. 15 meeting, she briefed commissioners on a Sept. 27, 2011 joint working session that involved four city commissions: park, planning, energy and environmental. The session focused on prioritizing existing goals for the city that touch on sustainability issues.

A Sept. 27, 2011 sustainability work session at Cobblestone Farm involved four city commissions: park, planning, energy and environmental.

By way of background, the concept of sustainability focuses on what’s called the triple bottom line: environmental quality, economic vitality, and social equity. The goal of the sustainability project for Ann Arbor is to review the city’s existing plans and organize them into a framework of goals, objectives and indicators that can guide future planning and policy. Other project goals include improving access to the city’s plans and to the sustainability components of each plan, and to incorporate the concept of sustainability into city planning and future city plans.

There’s an 18-month timeline for the project, which started earlier this year. For the first phase, Kidwell reviewed existing city plans – such as the downtown plan, the non-motorized transportation plan, the natural features master plan and others – and interviewed key city staff to determine which plans they use to guide their decision-making. Included in this project are 26 plans, and the second phase has involved organizing the goals for each plan. [.pdf of the list of 26 plans]

Kidwell and other city staff started to develop a framework for these plans, and to identify gaps that exist – goals that the city might want to pursue, but that aren’t laid out in existing plans.

At November’s regular PAC meeting, Kidwell characterized PAC as well-represented among the 26 commissioners at the three-hour sustainability session on Sept. 27. [Among the PAC members attending were Julie Grand, Tim Berla, Tim Doyle, Gwen Nystuen, Sam Offen, and John Lawter.]

Kidwell explained that the staff had identified four planning areas – climate & energy, community, land use & access, and natural systems. During the work session, commissioners met in breakout groups and started to prioritize the 226 goals that staff had pulled out from the city’s 26 planning documents and sorted into the four planning areas.

Kidwell provided a handout that listed the top goals identified at the work session in each planning area:

Climate & Energy

(1) Reduce community-wide greenhouse gas emissions 8% from 2000 levels by 2015.

(2) Commit to energy conservation measures and methods.

(3) Reduce greenhouse gas emissions in municipal operations 50% from 200 levels by 2015.

(4) Use 5% renewable energy community-wide by 2015.

Community

(1) To encourage cooperation between the City educational institutions and between the City and Townships that surround Ann Arbor (Ann Arbor, Pittsfield and Scio) on development issues that affect each other.

(2) Provide job opportunities, raise the standard of living of county residents, promote a sense of place and realize a tax base sufficient to provide public services through a comprehensive set of public and private strategies to foster and attract emerging industries.

Land Use & Access

(1) Encourage dense land use and development patterns which draw people downtown and foster an active street life, contribute to its function as an urban residential neighborhood and support a sustainable transportation system

(2) Establish a network of greenways throughout the City that provide non-motorized connections between various land uses, such as neighborhoods, commercial and employment centers, downtown and the University of Michigan, and that help retain the shape and continuity of natural features, especially along stream corridors, between parks and through new neighborhoods. The network also should extend to greenways located on adjacent township and County properties.

Natural Systems

(1) To protect and restore woodlands, landmark trees, steep slopes, endangered species habitats, prairies and savannahs, the Huron River, creeks and native flora and fauna from the impacts of development.

(2) To improve air quality to protect the health and welfare of the public

(3) Develop, complete and regularly update watershed plans for the City’s tributary waterways to improve water quality and to restore and preserve, waterways, banks, wetlands, floodplains, wildlife habits, native species and natural areas. Plans should include techniques to dramatically reduce the volume and speed of storm water runoff, increase water directed to infiltrate soil, and reduce the volume of toxics and pollutants reaching waterways.

(4) To protect, preserve and restore the natural resources of Washtenaw County through a comprehensive approach to water management and preservation of our natural features.

The 226 goals had been an exhaustive list, Kidwell said, with overlapping goals on a range of topics. The priority goals identified at the working session are a starting point, she said, providing feedback as the staff continues to refine what goals will fit into a sustainability framework.

Among the next steps, Kidwell said, will be to form a joint committee with representatives from each of the four commissions, to continue work on this project. There will also be a lecture series starting in January featuring issues in the four planning areas. Those lectures will be free and open to the public. At the same time, work will continue on developing a sustainability action plan, tying goals to measurable targets, Kidwell said.

Julie Grand, PAC’s chair, reported that she and Karen Levin will serve on the joint committee, representing PAC.

Parking Lot Improvements

Park planner Amy Kuras and Liz Rolla, a city engineer who primarily works on road resurfacing and reconstruction projects, talked about two parking lot improvement projects – at Riverside Park and Veterans Memorial Park.

Kuras said the projects represent a collaboration between the parks and public services units. At Riverside, the current parking lot is frequently under water, so Kuras was planning to address that issue as well as make other changes at the park. [For details, see Chronicle coverage: "Work Planned at Ann Arbor's Riverside Park"]

Sketch of proposed changes to Riverside Park. (Links to larger image)

Canal Street, a city street runs next to the park, also needs repair, so Kuras approached the public services staff to coordinate their work. The parking lot will be moved to a different part of the park – out of the floodplain – and Canal Street will be repaved.

Tim Berla noted that the path at Riverside, running next to the Huron River, is also frequently under water. Will the project address that too? Short of creating an elevated boardwalk, Kuras said, there’s nothing they could do to prevent flooding, given the path’s proximity to the river.

The second project involves the repaving of Dexter Avenue, which runs past Veterans Memorial Park. The road repaving needs to address stormwater issues, while the parks staff is concerned about the park’s path and parking lot, which are falling apart, Kuras said.

Rolla said the road will be reconstructed from Maple to Jackson. Typically, the requirement to capture stormwater runoff is handled through underground oversized pipes and swirl concentrators. But since the road runs past the park, the staff is looking at handling runoff with a bioswale in the park, which would include native plantings. There are federal dollars to pay for stormwater improvements, which will cover about 80% of the project’s cost, Rolla said.

Kuras said benefits include rebuilding the path that runs along Dexter Avenue, and reducing the parking lot’s footprint, though the number of parking spaces will remain unchanged. It’s a better environmental solution, she said, because of the bioswale.

Colin Smith, the city’s parks and recreation manager, said it’s good timing, since the city plans to renovate the softball fields there in 2012. The field renovation will likely start in mid-August, after the softball leagues finish their season.

Gwen Nystuen asked whether the parking lot would be paved with a pervious surface. No, Rolla replied. It’s too wet in that area for pervious pavement. Instead, the lot will be graded so that runoff will drain into the bioswale.

Karen Levin asked whether the park would be closed during this project. The section off of Dexter Avenue will probably be closed for some period, Kuras said, but the ice rink and pool – with an entrance off of Jackson Road – won’t be affected. Rolla added that the Dexter Avenue project will likely run from April through November, but they’ll leave it up to the contractor to decide when to do the parking lot and bioswale part of the project.

Aerial view of the site for the proposed bioswale at Veterans Memorial Park. The road at the top is Dexter Avenue. (Image links to larger file.)

John Lawter asked whether the bioswale will have standing water. There might be some minimal amount of standing water as the plants take hold, Rolla said, but the bioswale will be designed so that water will infiltrate. It’s similar to the bioswale at Buhr Park, she said. There will also be outlets leading to the city’s conventional storm sewer system, she added, in the event of a major rain.

Tim Doyle asked how much maintenance will be required in the bioswale. Rolla replied that the city will have an agreement with the contractor, who will provide maintenance in the area for three years. After that, the plantings should be established and it will be treated as a wet meadow by the city’s natural area preservation program. Smith noted that currently, the area proposed for a bioswale is included in the park’s mowing cycles. That maintenance would eventually be eliminated.

Julie Grand wondered what will happen if balls get hit into the bioswale – how are they retrieved? Smith said it’s a rare day when any balls are hit into the area proposed for the bioswale. Nor is it an area that’s typically used for team warm-ups. “It is really pretty much a dead space,” he said.

Grand also noted that the new parking lot will be closer to the playing fields. Is there more potential for balls to hit the cars? Rolla said it’s proposed to be moved only slightly closer to the fields. Kuras added that the location was discussed at length, and indicated that there’s little concern about the change.

Ruthven Nature Area

Lara Treemore Spears of the city’s natural area preservation (NAP) program updated commissioners on a wetland mitigation sediment removal project at the Ruthven Nature Area. The project involves removing sediment from Millers Creek, which flows through Ruthven, and repairing stream bank erosion that occurred when the creek bypassed its channel because of a sediment dam.

Like many streams in urban areas, Spears said, Millers Creek is surrounded by impervious surfaces. That creates runoff and sediment flowing into the creek, and over the years, has caused the creek to completely change its course.

The city risks losing some of its infrastructure along Huron River Drive and Geddes Road, Spears said – specifically, there’s the risk of damage to an undersized 24‐inch culvert under Geddes, which was not designed to receive the full volume of Millers Creek and could result in road flooding. Removing the sediment would redirect stormwater flow to a former open channel running through the wetlands at Ruthven, and into a larger 60-inch culvert under Geddes. It’s not an area that’s designated as a county drain, she noted, so it doesn’t fall under the purview of the county water resources commissioner’s office.

It’s best to remove the sediment when the ground is frozen, Spears said, so the work will likely begin in January. It will require some clearing, she said, but not nearly as much as has been done along Washtenaw Avenue for the county’s Mallets Creek drain project. The stream bank will be shored up with rock and restored with topsoil, mulch blanket, and native plant seed.

The city has submitted an application for a permit from the Michigan Dept. of Environmental Quality to do the work, and is awaiting review.

The ultimate goal, Spears said, is to reduce erosion. The city’s capital improvements plan (CIP) includes a sediment study of Millers Creek, to see if better long-term solutions can be found for preventing erosion.

Gwen Nystuen noted that there are a lot of  invasive species in Ruthven. She also wondered if the city had any plans to put in more trails through the nature area. There’s a trail with an entrance off of Geddes Road. But Spears noted that for a path off of Huron Parkway, after the first 325 feet it gets quite wet. There is one high quality area – a glacial kame, a hill created by glacial deposits. But most of the runoff flows straight south through a buckthorn thicket, she said – buckthorn is considered an invasive.

Tim Berla asked for Spears to give her best guess as to how long it would be before they’d have to repeat this work. Spears acknowledged that the problem comes from upstream, in an area that the city doesn’t control, and that erosion is aggravated by the surrounding impervious surfaces of roads and other development. Berla asked if there are any additional measures that can be taken, like adding underground swirl concentrators – devices designed to remove suspended solids from stormwater prior to reintroducing it into the city’s stormwater system. Spears said a long-term sediment study of the creek would look at those kinds of potential solutions.

Manager’s Report

Colin Smith, the city’s parks and recreation manager, updated commissioners on a range of items, starting with plans to renovate the city’s softball fields at Veterans Memorial Park, West Park, Southeast Area Park and Allmendinger Park. It’s analogous to the work already done at the soccer fields, he said. The idea is to bring the fields up to an acceptable level of play. Staff will be presenting a budget for the project to PAC at its December meeting. Smith and other staff had held a public meeting on the project earlier this month, which was attended primarily by managers of various leagues that use the fields. Smith reported that they seemed happy to see the project get underway.

Manager’s Report: Argo Bypass

Smith also noted that earlier in the month he had gone canoeing to test the new Argo Dam bypass, even though it had been snowing at the time. The design team is still tweaking the series of pools that make up the channel, and Smith described the stretch as a “bit sportier” than he had expected. It’s exciting to see that project come together, he said. Smith reported that the city council would be voting on a proposed change of scope to the project, which PAC had recommended at its August meeting.

View facing west of the first two pools in the Argo Dam bypass. The concrete pass-through at the far end will be replaced by a new, larger entrance.

The change will add a new entrance to the waterway from Argo Pond to the Huron River. The modification to the project is linked to an offer from DTE to pay for a whitewater section that’s part of the overall project, which freed up city funds for a new entrance from Argo Pond into the bypass. DTE is being required by the state to complete environmental remediation on its nearby property, which prompted its request that the city hold off on the part of the project that runs along the river.

Smith said the city’s agreement with DTE stipulates that the energy firm will hire the same consultant who designed the bypass – Gary Lacy – to design the whitewater features. TSP Environmental, which is building the bypass, will build the new entrance. [The city council subsequently voted to approve the change of scope at its Nov. 21 meeting.]

Tim Doyle wondered whether the change of scope will delay other aspects of the project. Only the whitewater features, which will be located in the river, will be delayed, Smith said. The bypass and new entry will move forward. It will likely be at least another year before the whitewater features are added, he said.

Manager’s Report: Update on Skatepark, Gallup Livery Grants

Smith reported that two state grant applications made by the city of Ann Arbor – $300,000 for the proposed Ann Arbor skatepark at Veterans Memorial Park, and $300,000 for improvements at the Gallup Park canoe livery – ranked in the top 12 out of 100 applications statewide for funding from the Michigan Natural Resources Trust Fund. Smith told PAC members that he received the application scores in the mail earlier in the day.

The skatepark application ranked 12th out of the 100 applications, based on a scoring system used to evaluate the grants. The Gallup Park application ranked 2nd. Smith also reported that a $300,000 grant application for Rutherford Pool in Ypsilanti had ranked 11th in the scoring system. The scoring is an indication of the likelihood that these grants will be awarded, but that announcement won’t be made until Dec. 7, Smith said. It’s also unknown how much money will be awarded this year from the trust fund. He told commissioners that the top 12 grant applications total $2.7 million. There’s a cap of $300,000 per project.

At its March 15, 2011 meeting, PAC had voted to recommend supporting the grant applications. The city council made a similar vote of support on March 21. The council’s resolution of support prioritized the skatepark project over the Gallup renovations – based on the opportunity to leverage $400,000 of matching funds from the Washtenaw County parks and recreation commission.

NAP Volunteers Honored

Toward the beginning of the Nov. 15 meeting, Dave Borneman, manager of the city’s natural area preservation program, introduced two volunteers – Sarah Newman and Drew Lathin – who had been honored in October by the city council as NAP Volunteers of the Year. Newman was recognized for work in the Miller Nature Area and Furstenberg Nature Area. Lathin was honored for work in the Miller Nature Area, as well as for volunteering for NAP’s burn crew and its frog and toad surveys. Borneman read the proclamations that had been given to the two volunteers at the Oct. 26 council meeting, and PAC gave them a round of applause.

Newman thanked commissioners, as well as the staff of NAP, for all their work. She described Furstenberg and Miller as areas that are at the opposite ends of the spectrum. Furstenberg is a gem in the parks system, located along the Huron River and constantly maintained by NAP. Miller, on the other hand, is a large but relatively unknown neighborhood park on the west side that’s full of invasive species.

Her time most recently has been spent at Miller, and her role has been to encourage neighbors to get involved, she said, including work with kids in Peace Neighborhood Center‘s summer day camp, helping them to learn about what a nature area is and to help preserve the trails. “It’s a privilege and pleasure to work with the dedicated, intelligent and super hard-working group that Dave heads,” Newman said.

Dave Borneman, center, head of the city's natural area preservation program, introduced two NAP Volunteers of the year: Drew Lathin and Sarah Newman.

Lathin said it was an honor to be honored, but that he and Newman wouldn’t have gotten much done in Miller Nature Area without the hundreds of hours that other volunteers worked. They’ve had close to 1,000 volunteer hours there since they started working on about a one-acre section of the park.

He said his work at Miller started one winter day when he was walking through and saw all the invasive honeysuckle and buckthorn there. In a moment of insanity, he said, he decided to do something about it. Borneman directed him to Jason Frenzel, who was NAP’s volunteer coordinator at the time. Lathin said he’s happy he has mental health benefits as part of his insurance, because he thinks they’re called for. He praised NAP staff under Borneman’s leadership, saying they aren’t typical government employees – they’re very committed to what they’re doing, and they do great work. Lathin said he’s just the tip of the iceberg, in terms of the volunteers who work for NAP.

Present: Tim Berla, Doug Chapman, Tim Doyle, Julie Grand, Karen Levin, Gwen Nystuen, John Lawter, councilmember Mike Anglin (ex-officio). Also Colin Smith, city parks manager.

Absent: David Barrett, Sam Offen, councilmember Christopher Taylor (ex-officio).

Next meeting: PAC’s meeting on Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011 begins at 4 p.m. in the city hall second-floor council chambers, 301 E. Huron St., Ann Arbor. [confirm date]

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The view looking east down the dewatered Argo headrace, with the embankment on the right. The trail along the embankment to Broadway is closed, as the city prepares for major reconstruction of the headrace. (Photos by the writer.)

Commissioners approved a resolution recommending a change to the scope of work at the Argo headrace – a change that will add a new entrance to the soon-to-be-reconstructed waterway from Argo Pond to the Huron River. The modification to the project was linked to an offer from DTE to pay for a whitewater section that’s part of the overall project, which freed up city funds for the new entrance. A state permit needed to start the reconstruction is expected to be received by Aug. 23.

A second resolution introduced at Tuesday’s meeting urged the city council to incorporate design of a trail system – including the county’s Border to Border (B2B) trail – into the Fuller Road area in advance of building the proposed Fuller Road Station. Two members of the Washtenaw Bicycling & Walking Coalition were on hand with suggestions for where trails might be located to bypass the busy intersection of Fuller Road, Maiden Lane and East Medical Center Drive.

The topic of trails also emerged tangentially during a presentation by PAC vice chair John Lawter on dog parks. Some people walk their dogs off leash on park trails and in other park areas, violating Ann Arbor’s ordinance requiring dogs to be leashed. The exception is in the city’s two dog parks, on the north and south edges of town.

Lawter suggested that Ann Arbor might find other ways to let dogs off leash, either by creating another traditional dog park that’s more centrally located, or designating certain hours for dogs to be off leash in specific parks. PAC might form a subcommittee to explore options for a new dog park, and for how to increase enforcement of existing dog-control ordinances. Such an effort might uncover more data points like those Lawter provided in his presentation, which included the pounds of poo collected annually at Swift Run dog park.

Data collection has also been part of developing the city’s first urban forest management plan. Oliver Kiley of JJR, the consultant leading this project, updated the commission on the effort. Possible outcomes include a recommended maintenance plan, protections for mature trees, targets for new tree plantings, and proposals for relevant ordinances and zoning. The discussion among commissioners led to concerns over whether the city is prepared for something similar to the emerald ash borer – which decimated thousands of trees in the city over the past decade and chewed up the city’s forestry budget for several years.

The urban forest management plan will be among the 26 city plans in a sustainability framework being developed, focused on “triple-bottom line” goals of economic vitality, environmental quality and social equity. The commission was briefed on this project in preparation for a Sept. 27 joint meeting of the park, planning, energy and environmental commissions. The goal of that meeting is to start prioritizing goals from these existing city plans.

Argo Dam Update

Brian Steglitz gave an update on the city’s reconstruction project at the Argo dam headrace, as commissioners were asked to recommend amending the project scope with TSP Environmental. Steglitz is the city’s project manager for the Argo reconstruction. [.pdf of staff memo and resolution]

TSP, a Livonia firm, had been hired last year to build a dam bypass channel in the headrace for $988,170 and to add whitewater features for an additional $180,000. However, DTE is now offering to pay for the whitewater feature of the project, if the city agrees to hold off on construction of that piece until after DTE completes environmental remediation on its nearby property, as required by the state.

By having DTE pay for the work, the city is expected to save $163,636. The resolution at Tuesday’s PAC meeting recommended using some of these funds to improve the entrance to the headrace. That work had not previously been part of the project’s scope.

Steglitz told commissioners that the additional work would include modifying the entry into the headrace by removing the top of the concrete culvert, adding grouted limestone to widen the approach, building new concrete abutments, and installing an arched prefabricated steel clear span bridge with a concrete deck. The work is expected to cost about $85,000.

A July 25 memo from city staff reported that the city had been notified by DTE officials of upcoming remediation work that DTE plans to do in 2012, adjacent to DTE’s property on the south side of the Huron River, between Allen Creek Drain and the Broadway Bridge. The remediation is being required by the Michigan Dept. of Environmental Quality. The city is currently in negotiations with DTE about the details of the work it will do related to the headrace and whitewater features, Steglitz said.

Brian Steglitz gives a presentation on the Argo headrace project to the city's park advisory commission.

The overall Argo dam project, as previously approved, calls for removing the canoe portage and replacing it with a series of “drop pools” so that no portage is required. Originally, five pools were proposed, but that has increased to eight pools, Steglitz said. Grade changes on the drops between pools will be less steep, to accommodate fish movement through the headrace. The change will also make it easier for novice canoers and kayakers to navigate, he said. [.pdf of Argo headrace design and bridge info]

Other work includes improving the accessibility of the path – which is part of the county’s Border-to-Border trail – and addressing problems in the headrace embankment.

The work is tied to a consent agreement that the city reached with the state in May 2010, laying out steps that the city must take to deal with some of long-outstanding structural issues with the earthen embankment. TSP Environmental had been selected by the city council at its Nov. 15, 2010 meeting, following a recommendation by PAC in October 2010.

Steglitz told PAC that the city hasn’t yet received the necessary state permit to begin major work on the project. The city applied for the permit in April, and since then has been responding to comments and additional requests for information from the state. City staff expect to receive the permit by Aug. 23, after which work will begin immediately. There’s a Nov. 15 deadline from the state related to the consent agreement, Steglitz said, which had originally been set based on receiving a permit in May. Meeting that deadline now will be aggressive, he noted, but for the most part doable – and the state will likely be flexible, if necessary, given that work couldn’t begin when planned.

Steglitz also said that some work almost certainly won’t be completed by Nov. 15, such as paving the path and putting in plantings. That work will be finished up next spring.

Meanwhile, some work that didn’t require the permit has been done, including tree removal and dewatering of the headrace, which Steglitz said has been a battle. The trail along the embankment has been closed, and detour signs are up.

Argo Dam: Commissioner Discussion

Colin Smith, the city’s manager of parks and recreation, urged commissioners to visit the Argo site, saying it was exciting to see that some work has begun. He also noted that Gary Lacy, the Colorado consultant who’s designing the project, had previously talked about the benefits of improving the entryway to the headrace, if possible. City councilmembers had also expressed interest in that when they initially approved the project, he said.

David Barrett asked whether TSP Environmental will still build the whitewater feature, now that DTE is paying for it. Steglitz replied that it might not be TSP, because DTE will probably want to use its own contractor. The city still needs to negotiate with DTE about the role that city staff and Lacy will play. City staff might be indifferent to who builds it, he said, as long as the design remains acceptable.

Facing west, looking at the entry to the dewatered Argo headrace. Argo Pond is on the other side of the berm. If approved by city council, a proposed change in the project's scope of work will entail rebuilding the entry with a Trailblazer bridge to provide more headroom to travel from Argo Pond into the headrace.

Smith said DTE staff have been very helpful in working with the city. In response to a query from Sam Offen, Smith said it wasn’t yet clear what type of remediation needs to take place on the DTE site, but he promised to forward that information to PAC as soon as it’s available. Barrett noted that if the remediation is extensive, it might push back the timeframe for building the whitewater features. Tim Berla clarified that even if that occurs, the new headrace would still be open.

Berla asked whether the deal with DTE had been finalized – was it certain that they’ll pay? Smith said that DTE reviewed the memo about the project that was provided to PAC and the city council, so everyone is on the same page. Everything has been laid out, he said, though the agreement hasn’t been finalized. Smith felt it was solid. Offen later asked Smith to seek the city’s attorney’s opinion on the agreement, before PAC’s recommendation goes to city council.

In response to a question from Tim Doyle, Smith said the new bridge would be similar to one installed in Bandemer Park.

John Lawter confirmed that the city would still have the ability to close the headrace, following reconstruction. Steglitz said a stop log could still be used, which would allow staff to block water flowing into the headrace, if necessary.

Outcome: Commissioners unanimously approved recommending an amendment to the scope of work for the Argo dam headrace project. The recommendation will be forwarded to city council for final approval.

Trails and Fuller Road Station

Over the past two years or so, several PAC members have raised concerns about various aspects of the proposed Fuller Road Station, a large parking structure, bus depot and possible rail station to be located near the intersection of Fuller Road, Maiden Lane and East Medical Center Drive, near the University of Michigan medical campus on city-owned land. The land has been used as a surface parking lot since 1993, leased to the university, but is on property designated as parkland. It’s a joint project of the city of Ann Arbor and UM, though a formal agreement regarding its construction and operation hasn’t yet been finalized.

In June 2010, the commission passed a resolution that asked the city council to make available a complete plan of Fuller Road Station – including any significant proposed agreements, such as what the university will pay the city for use of the structure – allowing sufficient time for a presentation at a televised PAC meeting before the council votes on the project. The resolution also asked that staff and the council ensure the project results in a net revenue gain for the parks system. Revenues from the lease of the surface parking lot support the parks system.

PAC most recently got a detailed update on the project at its May 2011 meeting. At that meeting, there was a discussion about the status of trails – including the county’s Border-to-Border (B2B) trail – as it runs through that area. As a follow-up to that discussion, at Tuesday’s PAC meeting, commissioners Gwen Nystuen and Tim Berla presented a resolution recommending that planning for a trail system be incorporated into plans for the proposed Fuller Road Station.

Trails and Fuller Road Station: Public Commentary

Eric Boyd of Ann Arbor said he strongly supported including non-motorized trails in the Phase 1 design of Fuller Road Station. The overall Fuller Road Station project is worthwhile to improve transit services in Ann Arbor, he said. But he said it will poorly serve cyclists if improvements aren’t made to non-motorized trails in the area – either first or at the same time. Specifically, one of the city’s best non-motorized assets is the trail connecting Bandemer Park to Parker Mill – a key link in the Border-to-Border trail, he said.

Right now, Boyd said, there are three obstacles preventing this from being a truly great ride, especially for families with young children: (1) access to Bandemer Park from the west is a mess, he said, (2) the dirt track along the headrace is difficult to navigate – he noted that the city is thankfully working on that now, and (3) the intersection at Fuller Road and Maiden Lane is an unwelcome obstacle and time-consuming to navigate safely. Boyd urged PAC to take a strong advocacy role in supporting non-motorized improvements – as called for in the Parks, Recreation and Open Space (PROS) plan – in the vicinity of Fuller Park, before or during construction of the Fuller Road Station.

John Satarino, a former PAC member, encouraged commissioners to look at a study that was done several years ago regarding the Border-to-Border trail, especially as it related to the Bandemer/Argo area. The rest of his comments related to Fuller Road Station, and a recent letter that mayor John Hieftje sent out to the community with comments about the project. Satarino asked who would pay the $15 million annual operating and maintenance costs for the facility – no one talks about that, he said, though it’s included in a consultant’s report on the project. Also, nothing was said about WALLY, the north/south commuter rail project. That will cost about $36 million to get up and running, Satarino said, plus $6 million to $8 million in annual operating costs.

The mayor minimized the issue of when the Fuller Road Station site became parkland, Satarino said – that was in 1932, when the city acquired the property. At that time, there had been provisions that the land remain parkland, but over the years “I guess the lawyers might have taken care of that,” he said. Satarino also wanted to remind people that there’s a paved parking lot on the land now because the University of Michigan bullied the city into building it – creating a “hostage situation” in order to save some old oak trees near the Veterans Administration hospital.

Trails and Fuller Road Station: Presentation

In starting the discussion, PAC chair Julie Grand suggested commissioners limit their focus to the issue of trails in the area of Fuller Road Station, and not discuss the facility itself at this point.

Tim Berla agreed, saying the resolution was a way to address having biking and pedestrian paths that would provide a safer way to navigate through an area where thousands of vehicles pass every day. He then introduced two members of the Washtenaw Bicycling & Walking Coalition (WBWC): Larry Deck and Joel Batterman.

Larry Deck of the Washtenaw Bicycling & Walking Coalition.

Deck and Batterman covered much of the information contained in a statement issued by WBWC in June. [.pdf of WBWC statement and map showing recommended trails] They showed a series of maps with options for trails – including maps from the city’s PROS plan and the 2006 non-motorized transportation plan.

The WBWC is suggesting three actions, Deck said:

1. Complete the trail system before construction of the Fuller Road Station parking structure.
2. Complete the trail system before the proposed bike center within Fuller Road Station is completed.
3. Have the university share in the costs of the trails and a bridge.

Batterman described several conflicts that pedestrians and bicyclists face with vehicles in the Fuller Road area, at intersections and at entrances to places like Fuller Park. A demand for improvements exists there, he said. A 12-hour traffic count in 2006 showed more than 4,000 pedestrians and 700 bicyclists used that area.

Batterman noted that in the early 1980s, when bridges on Fuller Road and East Medical Center Drive were built over the railroad and when the bridge was built over the Huron River on Maiden Lane, the design included room for future trails to go under the bridges. However, those trails haven’t yet been built, and there’s no continuity in that area for the B2B trail. Both the PROS plan and the non-motorized plan recommend completing these trails, he said. The non-motorized plan also calls for a bridge to be constructed over the Huron River, linking the trails on the south of the river to the trail that continues on the north side of the river through Riverside Park.

It seems reasonable to request funding for trail improvements that have been envisioned for roughly 30 years, Batterman said. The lack of trails is one of the last major gaps in the Huron River greenway system in the city’s center, he noted, and is a keystone in the corridor between UM’s central and north campuses.

Trails and Fuller Road Station: Commissioner Discussion

Berla began by noting that the traffic study mentioned by Batterman is five years old – given the university’s growth, those figures are likely higher today, he said. Berla referred to the text of the resolution, but did not read it – the resolution and memo had been distributed to commissioners via email before the meeting. [.pdf of memo and resolution]

Among other things, the resolution states that detailed plans for the design and funding of the trail system, including the B2B trail through Fuller Park and the connecting links on all sides, should be approved by PAC and the city council prior to action on the Fuller Road Station project. The resolution calls for trail improvements to be completed prior to or concurrently with changes planned along Fuller Road or construction of the Fuller Road Station, and recommends that any future transit improvements – including the “Signature Route” of the future University of Michigan rapid transit connector along Fuller Road – should preserve the integrity of the trail system.

Further, the resolution states that improvement of the trail system should be given priority over planned bicycle amenities within Fuller Road Station, and that costs of a complete non-motorized trail system and a source of funding should be established jointly by the city of Ann Arbor, the University of Michigan, and the Washtenaw County Parks & Recreation Commission.

PAC member Tim Berla.

Julie Grand clarified with Larry Deck that the WBWC was proposing trails underneath the bridges in that area.

Parks planner Amy Kuras was asked for her opinion about the WBWC proposal. She said she agreed that the intersection at Maiden Lane and Fuller Road was one of the most dangerous in the city for pedestrians and bicyclists. Trail connections under the bridges are probably the safest alternative.

Berla noted that the resolution prioritizes trails over the bike amenities planned inside Fuller Road Station. But he wondered whether it would be useful to be even more specific in the resolution. He directed his question to Christopher Taylor, an ex-officio PAC member who also represents Ward 3 on city council.

Taylor replied that in general, articulating priorities isn’t a bad thing. He wondered what the current plans are for trails at Fuller Road Station. Berla said it was difficult to know, since he hadn’t actually seen the plans. But the last time Berla had asked that question of Eli Cooper, the city’s transportation program manager, Cooper had indicated that the design entailed widening an existing path through the site to 10 feet, but that no other trail linkages would be part of the project’s first phase.

Tim Doyle asked how expensive it would be to build a non-motorized bridge over the Huron River. Deck indicated it could cost as much as $500,000.

Sam Offen had questions about two of the resolved clauses:

5) That improvement of the trail system, including the B2B Trail, be given priority over the bicycle elements of Phase I of FRS since there is use of and demand for trail continuity now, and

6) That the costs of a complete non-motorized trail system and source of funding be established jointly by the City of Ann Arbor, the University of Michigan, and the Washtenaw County Parks & Recreation Commission.

Regarding the #5 resolved clause, Berla clarified that while he’d like both the trails and the proposed amenities within the facility – bike lockers within the station, for example – priorities should be given to completing the trails first. Taylor observed that it seemed the clause oversteps the point of the resolution, which is to make sure the facility fits with the non-motorized infrastructure that feeds into it.

Offen was curious to know how Washtenaw County parks & rec was involved. Berla and Nystuen both emphasized that the county is a major funder of the B2B trail.

With no further questions, Grand called for a vote.

Outcome: Commissioners unanimously approved the resolution recommending action related to non-motorized trails in the Fuller Road Station area. The resolution will be forwarded to city council.

Dog Parks: More Needed?

John Lawter, PAC’s vice chair, has on several occasions raised the question of whether the city has a sufficient number of dog parks, and at Tuesday’s meeting he gave a formal presentation on the issue. He began broadly – by noting that dogs are believed to be the first domesticated animal, dating back more than 32,000 years. Dogs were hunting companions and guarded humans against danger, so in many ways, Lawter said, the evolution of humans is closely linked to the evolution of dogs.

The number of dogs is growing, both nationally and locally, Lawter said, including an estimated 75,000 dogs in Washtenaw County. And while there’s a leash law in Ann Arbor, there’s also a need for off-leash socialization and exercise. Leashes can cause dogs to be territorial, Lawter noted.

An off-leash dog area is fenced off from the rest of Olson Park, on the city's north side.

At the same time, complaints about off-leash incidents are on the rise, and enforcement is handled by police, who understandably don’t give it a high priority, Lawter said. But the challenge is that off-leash options in Ann Arbor are limited, he said – there are only two legal off-leash dog parks in Ann Arbor, at Ols0n Park and Swift Run. That’s led to informal off-leash gatherings, which Lawter characterized as common. In an “undisclosed” location in his neighborhood, Lawter said on Saturdays 50 or more people gather to run their dogs off leash. He knows of at least two other locations where this happens within a one-mile radius of the city’s center.

Possible solutions include increased enforcement and additional dog parks. The benefit of a dog park, Lawter said, is that it promotes responsible pet ownership and the enforcement of dog-control laws, while giving dogs a safe place to exercise. Dog parks provide seniors and the disabled with an accessible place to exercise their dogs, as well as a place for socializing for all people and dogs who visit the park – it’s a way to build community, he said.

On the flip side, concerns over dog parks include safety, sanitation, noise, traffic, effects on wildlife and natural areas, and the costs of construction and maintenance. Locations are often hard to find, he said, especially in areas adjacent to residential neighborhoods.

The two existing dog parks are located on the city’s edges – one in Olson Park, a fenced half-acre on the north side of town, and another 10 acres of fenced area at Swift Run in the south, which includes a separate section for small dogs. To reach these parks, most people need to drive there, Lawter said. Dogs aren’t permitted on AATA buses, and these aren’t walkable locations for most city residents.

Lawter also noted that while the number of permits to use these parks has dropped – from about 800 in 2008 to just over 400 in 2010 – the “pounds of poo” have increased, indicating that usage of the dog parks is increasing. About 12,000 pounds were collected by park staff in 2008, compared to over 14,000 pounds in 2010.

Traditional fenced-in dog parks cost about $40,000 to build, not including parking, Lawter said. Olson was cheaper – about $21,000. Maintenance costs are also a factor. Swift Run maintenance costs about $20,000 annually, he said.

In addition to traditional fenced-in areas, Lawter laid out several different options for dog parks. “Instant” dog parks can be created by putting up temporary fencing in areas that aren’t being used for other purposes, for example. Or unfenced dog parks can be designated in larger parks, he said, perhaps by setting restricted hours of use. Other ideas include having amenities like water areas for dogs to play in, benches that can be paid for by donors, and sponsorship opportunities – raising money by selling customized engraved bricks for paths, for instance. The goal is to “focus on the loot, not the poop,” Lawter quipped. He reported that a park planner in Indianapolis said permits for dog parks are “recession-proof” for that city, and that the dog parks could be money-makers, if managed well.

Lawter laid out a process the city could pursue, first by forming public/private partnerships to create additional options for dog parks, possibly by partnering with dog owner organizations. The city would need to identify an appropriate site – at least a quarter-acre minimum, and factoring in a capacity of 25 dogs per acre. Rules, regulations and enforcement issues would need to be developed, he said, followed by design of the park and eventual construction.

In conclusion, Lawter said there’s a need for another off-leash area in the central part of the city. He recommended incorporating this goal into the city’s park planning efforts, adding it as a consideration when looking at land acquisitions, and asking that parks staff actively look for potential sites.

Dog Parks: Commissioner Discussion

Julie Grand asked whether Lawter had suggestions for possible dog park locations. He did not identify any specific locations but said there are potential spots, depending on whether the dog park would be a small fenced-in area or a larger open space. However, the biggest issue is convincing neighbors to allow it, he said. It takes campaigning and advocating, which isn’t the role of the city staff, he said – that’s up to advocates for the dog parks.

Gwen Nystuen suggested setting up a PAC subcommittee to explore Lawter’s recommendations, and said she’d be willing to serve on it.

David Barrett jokingly described the informal off-leash gatherings as “spontaneous doggie flash mobs,” and asked whether there were a lot in the city. Lawter said he knew of at least three in his neighborhood alone, and he agreed with Barrett’s characterization that there was a kind of “doggie underground.”

Barrett also asked about the data regarding poo poundage. That’s collected by county employees at Swift Run, Lawter said – the dog park there is a joint city/county operation. Colin Smith, the city’s parks and recreation manager, reported that it’s one of the stranger data points he’s regularly received from the county over the past three years, but that Lawter had found it useful – “so you never know,” Smith said.

From left: Park advisory commissioners Sam Offen and Tim Doyle.

Sam Offen said he supported another dog park, if it’s in the right park with the right amenities. But it’s important that an increased effort to find a location for another dog park in the city’s center be accompanied by increased enforcement, he said. Bird Hills seems to be the easiest place to find people walking their dogs off-leash, Offen said – and when it’s politely pointed out to them that they’re violating a city ordinance, they often don’t care. However, it’s not cost effective to have police patrol the parks, he added, saying he didn’t know what the solution is.

Lawter agreed that more enforcement is needed. A lack of enforcement only encourages more people to break the rules, he said.

Grand supported the idea of designating limited hours to allow off-leash dogs in an area in an existing park. She suggested exploring that idea since it meant not having to build another dog park. Lawter said that in other cities where this is done, the hours are set to coincide with times that the parks aren’t used by children – early in the morning, or later at night.

Tim Doyle asked whether any section of Bird Hills might be used for this purpose – would there be public outcry at that? Yes, Smith said, there’d be outcry. Bird Hills is one of the higher-quality nature areas in the city, and there’s no area where dogs could run without damaging the plant life, he said.

Barrett asked if Lawter had ideas about how the dog parks could make money, as the park planner in Indianapolis had indicated. There are many ways, Lawter said. Some dog parks have gates requiring keys that must be purchased. Another option is to periodically go to the dog parks and check to see if people have permits – probably only a third of people who currently use Ann Arbor’s dog parks have permits, he said. Or occasionally a booth could be set up at the dog park to accept permit applications, and educate people about why permits are needed.

Offen noted that currently, permits must be purchased at city hall – it’s not possible to get one online or at other locations, so it’s not convenient to do. Lawter said that one possibility would be to have permit applications available at other park sites where staff are present. Smith said that for people who’ve already gotten a permit, the city mails reminders at the end of the year, urging them to renew. [.pdf of dog permit application]

There are other reasons why permits are important, beyond the revenue, Lawter said. It’s also a way to verify that the dogs are vaccinated – that’s important for public safety. Doyle suggested making permits available at local veterinarian offices.

Smith noted that a few years ago, when the two dog parks were created, the city did significant public outreach on the issue. It’s possible to draw on that information again, he said.

Urban Forest Management Plan

Commissioners received a presentation about development of the city’s urban forest management plan from Oliver Kiley, a landscape architect with the firm JJR, which has been hired by the city as a consultant for the project. [Cheryl Zuellig of JJR is working as a consultant on the project as well. She also serves on the city's public art commission.]

This is the city’s first urban forest management plan, Kiley told commissioners. The intent is to develop a long-term vision for how to manage this major community asset. Public engagement has been a big part of the process, he said, in working to establish a range of goals, objectives and an action plan. Possible outcomes include a recommended maintenance plan, protections for mature trees, targets for new tree plantings, and proposals for relevant ordinances and zoning.

The process started over a year ago, when a working group was set up of the consultants and city staff. An advisory committee of community members was also formed to give input. Beyond that, Kiley said, there’s been outreach to stakeholders and focus groups, as well as two citywide public meetings last year. Two more meetings will be held later this year and in early 2012. In addition, an online survey posted last year yielded about 400 responses, he said.

The draft plan is divided into three components: (1) tree resources, (2) resource management, such as policies, funding and staff, and (3) community engagement. Goals have been set for each component, and a draft of over 50 possible objectives has been developed, Kiley said. [.pdf of draft objectives] The timetable calls for a draft plan to be circulated in April and May of 2012, with city council reviewing and adopting it later that year.

Kiley pointed commissioners to the project’s website at www.a2gov.org/urbanforestry for more information. He noted that Connie Pulcipher of the city’s systems planning unit is the point person for this project, during the time when the city’s forester, Kerry Gray, is on maternity leave.

Urban Forest: Commission Discussion

Gwen Nystuen referred to stormwater management as a major issue for the city, and an important aspect of the urban forest. Will the urban forest management plan attempt to measure or quantify this impact? Kiley noted that the consultant Davey Resource Group did a tree inventory and benefits analysis in 2009 that addressed this issue. [.pdf of full report]

Sam Offen asked who serves on the advisory committee. Members include:

• Harry Sheehan: Office of the Washtenaw County Water Resource Commissioner
• Joel Dalton: Huron Valley Group of the Sierra Club
• Ann Lund: Broadway neighborhood
• Kathy Stroud: Traver Association
• Allison Stupka: Old Westside
• Lynn Borset: Ann Arbor Tree Conservancy
• Jeff Plakke: UM Botanical Gardens & Arboretum
• Neal Foster: Orchard‐Hills Maplewood Homeowners Association & Millers Creek Action Team
• Rita Mitchell: Neighborhood Alliance
• Jim Rogers: Friends of Greenview and Pioneer Nature Areas
• Peggy Sorvala: DTE
• Mike Martin: First Martin (representing business/property managers)
• Paul Bairley: Former city forester
• Kris Olsson: Huron River Watershed Council
• Matt Naud: Environmental Commission (city staff, sitting in for reporting purposes)
• John Lawter: Park Advisory Commission and UM Grounds
• Joan Doughty: Community Action Network

Offen noted that the city had been hit by the emerald ash borer several years ago, which decimated most of the emerald ash trees. He wondered if the city would have responded to the crisis differently, if an urban forest management plan had been in place at that time. Kiley replied that one of the plan’s goals is to be flexible and responsive to changing conditions. It’s important always to keep an eye on what the next disease or insect attack might be, he said, but it’s not clear how the city could have anticipated the emerald ash borer. The city was caught off guard, he said, and for several years the crisis consumed all of the city’s forestry budget and man-hours. That meant that other routine maintenance was deferred – the city just didn’t have the capacity to handle it.

Kiley noted that diversity of trees in the city is important, to prevent decimation of the urban forest by a single bug or disease.

David Barrett asked if the emerald ash borer crisis was over. The borer doesn’t attack trees under a certain size, Kiley said, so for the most part, those smaller ashes are all that remain in the city. Over the longer term, the question is whether the insect has moved out of the area so that the ash trees can grow.

Lawter noted that the plan will address many areas that relate to parks, including setting goals for tree canopy coverage, funding sources, and possible ordinances related to when trees can be removed. He said PAC will at some point receive a draft copy to review for input.

Julie Grand asked whether the interviews with stakeholders or focus groups yielded any surprises or common themes. Riley pointed her to a document on the urban forest website that lists common themes pulled from those interviews. [.pdf of common themes] A sampling includes: (1) the importance of communication and transparency of forestry activities, (2) the need for tree diversity, (3) the importance of tree maintenance and young tree care, and (4) the suggestion of incentives for tree plantings on private property.

Mike Anglin, an ex-officio PAC member who also represents Ward 5 on city council, wrapped up the discussion by thanking Kiley for the work he’s doing.

Sustainability Update

Jamie Kidwell, who’s working for the city on a sustainability project funded by a $95,000 grant the city received from the Home Depot Foundation, gave an update to PAC about those efforts. She had given a similar presentation at a city planning commission working session earlier this month.

The concept of sustainability focuses on what’s called the triple bottom line: environmental quality, economic vitality, and social equity. Kidwell told commissioners that the goal of the project isn’t to develop a new plan. Rather, it’s to review the city’s existing plans and organize them into a framework of goals, objectives and indicators that can guide future planning and policy. Other project goals include improving access to the city’s plans and to the sustainability components of each plan, and to institutionalize the concept of sustainability into city planning and future city plans.

There’s an 18-month timeline for the project, which started earlier this year. For the first phase, Kidwell reviewed existing city plans – such as the downtown plan, the non-motorized transportation plan, the natural features master plan and others – and interviewed key city staff to determine which plans they use to guide their decision-making. There are 26 plans that are included in this project, and the second phase has involved organizing the goals for each plan. [.pdf of the list of 26 plans]

Kidwell said she and other city staff are starting to develop a framework for these plans, and to identify gaps that exist – goals that the city might want to pursue, but that aren’t laid out in existing plans.

The final six months of the project will be focused on developing an action plan, Kidwell said. That will include prioritizing goals within the framework, and tying those goals to the city’s two-year budget plan.

Efforts in other parts of the country – Philadelphia, Miami-Dade, Santa Monica, Calif. and Asheville, N.C. – have provided some guidance in developing a framework for Ann Arbor, Kidwell said. Philadelphia’s model was particularly appealing for its simplicity, she said, using broad themes like energy and the environment.

The draft for Ann Arbor’s framework is centered around four themes: (1) climate and energy, (2) natural systems, (3) community, and (4) land use and access. Goals from each of the city’s 26 plans in the framework are being sorted to see how many of those goals fit into these four themes, Kidwell said.

Also in draft form is a document with summaries for each of the 26 plans, including the top 10 goals from each plan. It’s intended to be a reference resource, Kidwell said. [.pdf of draft sustainability summaries]

At the end of the project, Kidwell said, there will be two concrete products: a relative brief document that will be distributed with a summary of the city’s sustainability framework, and an interactive website – a centralized place where people can access all of the city’s plans, and can sort information based on different goals and themes.

Kidwell concluded by highlighting some upcoming events tied to the sustainability project:

• Tuesday, Sept. 13 at 7 p.m.: Lecture on sustainability by Dick Norton, chair of the University of Michigan’s urban and regional planning program. The venue has not yet been finalized.
• Tuesday, Sept. 27 at 6 p.m.: A joint meeting of the planning, park, environmental and energy commissions, to set sustainability priorities. The meeting will be held at Cobblestone Farm, 2781 Packard Road.
• Second Thursday of each month, January-April 2012: A lecture series on sustainability issues.

The events will be open to the public.

Sustainability Update: Commissioner Discussion

David Barrett asked whether there had been any outreach to the business community, given that one of the three sustainability goals is economic vitality. Not yet, Kidwell said. This initial phase has involved organizing what the city has already adopted. In later phases, the effort will involve community outreach, and the business community will be part of that.

Sam Offen described it as a tremendous project, and asked what outcomes Kidwell anticipates, in terms of recommendations and priorities. Kidwell replied that she hopes some priorities will be set at the Sept. 27 joint meeting of the four city commissions, perhaps identifying one priority from each theme that could be moved head in the coming year. That would provide direction for staff to focus. There are hundreds of goals within the 26 plans, she noted, and not all of them can be acted on at the same time. The hope is that an action plan will prioritize some of the goals so that staff can better track progress toward reaching those goals.

Colin Smith, parks and recreation manager, added that the priorities can be linked to the city’s capital improvements plan (CIP), which is used to prioritize projects for budgeting purposes.

Offen noted that if this kind of framework had been in place, then perhaps projects like the Fuller Road Station would have evolved from it by identifying transportation and environmental needs, rather than just appearing suddenly on someone’s To Do list. Fuller Road Station would have been more understandable if it had been part of a process, rather than just being “birthed,” he said.

Tim Doyle asked whether Kidwell had run across any inconsistencies or conflicts between goals in the different city plans. Not as much as anticipated, she said. There are some conflicts – between goals in the solar and urban forest plans, for example – but those will just have to be addressed whenever they’re encountered, she said. Conflicting goals will be highlighted in the database she’s compiling, Kidwell added.

Offen wondered why there weren’t any plans related to public safety. Kidwell said she wasn’t aware of any such plan, but that there was still time to incorporate suggestions for other plans to include.

Barrett observed that there also weren’t any plans specifically related to economic vitality. Kidwell said that no city plan focuses specifically on that issue, but that goals in many of the 26 plans used in the framework do address economic vitality. In response to a question from Offen, she said that no plans from the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority are being incorporated into the framework, though similar goals are in some of the city’s master plans.

Barrett then asked what’s meant by “social equity.” That’s a big question, Kidwell said, and one that the community needs to answer. Generally, it means ensuring that public health and affordable housing goals, for example, are part of the city’s planning. But part of the process to develop a sustainability framework is to define these terms, she said.

Julie Grand noted that several of the city plans address issues related to the Huron River and non-motorized transportation. She observed that PAC’s agenda that evening included an item related to that too – trails in the Fuller Road Station area.

Kidwell wrapped up the discussion by mentioning that she’s keeping a blog on the Sustainable Cities Institute website, giving updates on the Ann Arbor project.

Misc. Communications

At the end of Tuesday’s three-hour meeting, parks and recreation manager Colin Smith gave several brief updates.

Colin Smith, Ann Arbor's manager of parks and recreation.

He noted that stakes with white flags had been placed in the West Park detention pond in an attempt to “politely dissuade” water fowl from eating the plants there. He acknowledged that it would be helpful to put up signs explaining the purpose of those flags. He also noted that a memo had been sent to city council earlier this month, providing an update on West Park construction.

Earlier in the day, Smith said, an event to launch the RiverUp! project had been held at Island Park. [At its July 2011 meeting, PAC had been briefed on the project, which is spearheaded by a conservancy group called the Wolfpack, and involves several other partners, including the Huron River Watershed Council, the National Wildlife Federation, the Michigan League of Conservation Voters, and the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan.] The event had been well attended, he said, but it was also a chance to reflect on how much the city has done over the past decade or so to improve conditions along the river and provide exposure to the river as a recreational resource. It was good to know that the city has taken a lead on that, he said.

Smith also reported that Matt Warba has been promoted to assistant manager of field operations for the city, taking on broader responsibility for operations outside of the parks. Warba was on hand to give a very brief report, focusing on efforts at Plymouth Park. The city continues to battle stormwater runoff from the railroad embankment in that area along Plymouth Road, he said. Engineering work is underway for a longer-term solution, he said, with construction to start in the fall.

Present: David Barrett, Tim Berla, Doug Chapman, Tim Doyle, Julie Grand, Sam Offen, Gwen Nystuen, John Lawter, councilmember Mike Anglin (ex-officio), councilmember Christopher Taylor (ex-officio). Also Colin Smith, city parks manager.

Absent: Karen Levin

Next meeting: PAC’s meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2011 begins at 4 p.m. in the city hall second-floor council chambers, 301 E. Huron St., Ann Arbor. [confirm date]

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Among other things, the resolution states that detailed plans for the design and funding of the trail system, including the B2B Trail through Fuller Park and the connecting links on all sides, should be approved by PAC and city council prior to action on the Fuller Road Station project. The resolution calls for trail improvements to be completed prior to or concurrently with changes planned along Fuller Road or construction of the Fuller Road Station, and recommends that any future transit improvements – including the “Signature Route” of the future University of Michigan rapid transit connector along Fuller Road – should preserve the integrity of the trail system.

Further, the resolution states that improvement of the trail system should be given priority over planned bicycle amenities within Fuller Road Station, and that costs of a complete non-motorized trail system and a source of funding should be established jointly by the city of Ann Arbor, the University of Michigan, and the Washtenaw County Parks & Recreation Commission.

Fuller Road Station is a large parking structure, bus depot and possible rail station proposed near the intersection of Fuller Road and Maiden Lane, near the UM medical campus on city-owned land. The land has been used as a surface parking lot since 1993, leased to the university, but is on property designated as parkland. It’s a joint project of the city of Ann Arbor and UM, but a formal agreement regarding its construction and operation hasn’t yet been finalized.

The project has been a topic of concern for PAC commissioners for nearly two years. In June 2010, the commission passed a resolution that asked the city council to make available a complete plan of Fuller Road Station – including any significant proposed agreements, such as what the university will pay the city for use of the structure – allowing sufficient time for a presentation at a televised PAC meeting before the council votes on the project. The resolution also asked that staff and the council ensure the project results in a net revenue gain for the parks system. PAC most recently got a detailed update on the project at its May 2011 meeting.

This report was filed soon after the PAC meeting at the second-floor council chambers of city hall, 301 E. Huron. A more detailed report will follow: [link]

Greek Revival shelter at Ann Arbor's Island Park, where an event to launch the RiverUp! project will be held on Aug. 16. (Photos by the writer)

Elizabeth Riggs of the Huron River Watershed Council, which is coordinating the project, told PAC members that RiverUp! is spearheaded by a conservancy group called the Wolfpack. Co-founded by attorney and former Clinton advisor Paul Dimond and retired Ford executive Ray Pittman, Wolfpack members – mostly from the Ann Arbor area – have been previously focused on state issues. Now, Riggs said, they are turning their attention to a 104-mile stretch of the Huron River, starting from the north at Milford through Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti, and downstream to Flat Rock.

Also at their July meeting, commissioners got an update about efforts to build an Ann Arbor skatepark. They also reviewed tentative FY 2011 budget results for the parks system – finals numbers will be presented to the commission in August.

Several other topics were discussed or mentioned during the meeting, in the form of communications from staff or commissioners: (1) an update on work at Argo dam; (2) concerns over the proposed Fuller Road Station and the site design’s consideration of the Border-to-Border Trail; (3) a roughly $100,000 donation from the Henrietta Feldman trust; (4) news of the resignation of Greta Brunschwyler, executive director of the Leslie Science & Nature Center; and (5) a preview of an August agenda item regarding dog parks.

Other news regarding the Argo dam project – a $1.17 million effort to build a bypass channel in the Argo dam headrace, and to add whitewater features – emerged the week after PAC’s July 19 meeting.

A July 25 memo from city staff reports that the city was recently notified by DTE officials of upcoming remediation work that DTE plans to do in 2012 adjacent to DTE’s property on the south side of the Huron River, between Allen Creek Drain and the Broadway Bridge. The remediation is being required by the Michigan Dept. of Environmental Quality.

DTE is offering to pay for the whitewater feature of the Argo dam project, if the city agrees to hold off on construction of that piece until after DTE completes its remediation. Details of the offer haven’t been finalized.

River Up! Project

Elizabeth Riggs of the Huron River Watershed Council briefed commissioners about the RiverUp! project, which HRWC is facilitating. The nonprofit is partnering with the National Wildlife Federation, the Michigan League of Conservation Voters, and a group of local conservation activists called the Wolfpack – all working to bring a renaissance to the Huron River, Riggs said.

The Wolfpack, Riggs said, was started in 2002 by local residents, and operates under the auspices of the National Wildlife Federation, which has a Great Lakes regional office in Ann Arbor. Wolfpack members include Bill Ford, Bill Martin, Lana Pollack, Jeff Irwin, Del Dunbar, Bob Martel, Phil Power, Mike Staebler, Stephen Dobson, Howdy Holmes, Lisa Wozniak and several dozen others. [.pdf file of Wolfpack members] The Wolfpack has been working on key state environmental issues, but now is turning its attention closer to home, Riggs said.

RiverUp! is a project in its nascent stages that began earlier this year, Riggs said. It was a response to a challenge by U.S. Rep. John Dingell, who called for development of a plan to protect the Huron River – its ecological health, its recreational infrastructure, and the economic health of river communities, including rehabilitating riverside properties that have been abandoned and contaminated by industry. For the first six months of this year, the group has looked at projects and specific improvements that might be undertaken.

The Huron River Water Trail is a project designed to meet some of RiverUp!’s goals. The idea is to make recreating along the 104-mile stretch of the river more enjoyable, safer and accessible. Three work groups were formed to work on different aspects of the trail: (1) infrastructure – looking at where put-ins and take-outs might be added or improved; (2) cultural/natural history – researching what’s happened along the river, and developing a guidebook and other materials, such as signs and a website; and (3) pilot sites – identifying communities along the river to focus on initially. Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti, Dexter, Milford and Flat Rock are the initial pilot sites, Riggs said. Details about what that means are still being worked out.

People are excited about the idea of a water trail, she said, and anyone who wants to volunteer on the project is welcome to join.

Riggs also described other Ann Arbor projects that fall under the RiverUp! umbrella:

• HRWC is working with the mayor’s office and DTE Energy on plans for the former MichCon site on Broadway, next to the river. It’s a brownfield site that needs to be cleaned up and redeveloped, and might be used as parkland or for businesses like restaurants. That’s in the very early stages, she said.
• City parks staff are working with the RiverUp! project to identify infrastructure improvements needed along the Ann Arbor stretch of the river. Improvements could be made at the Barton Dam portage and at Island Park, Riggs said. At Island Park, there’s a “social” landing – one that’s used, but that hasn’t been officially built. There’s been a lot of shore erosion, she said, because the location wasn’t designed to accommodate large numbers of people who put in there. The city has offered to pay for part of the design for a landing, Riggs said, and RiverUp! will look for donations to fund the rest of the design and construction.

Riggs said RiverUp! would welcome PAC suggestions for other projects to tackle.

In addition, several projects are also being planned for the Ypsilanti area. Many of the projects are being done in partnership with other groups, including greenway advocates, Washtenaw County parks & recreation, and the Friends of the Border-to-Border Trail. There are natural linkages between “green” land-based and “blue” water-based trails, Riggs said, “so we’re making those connections.”

Ypsilanti area projects include:

• Improvements to the canoe/kayak portage at Superior Dam, near St. Joseph Mercy Hospital. Right now, it’s difficult to get access, and it’s neglected. This will be one of the first water trail sites to get fixed up, Riggs said.
• An analysis of options for the Peninsular Paper dam.
• A renewal of the Water Works Park.
• Canoe/kayak portage improvements at Ford Lake dam.

Riggs concluded by inviting commissioners to the Tues., Aug. 16 launch of RiverUp! A bus tour begins at 11 a.m. at Island Park in Ann Arbor, with stops at the Superior Dam portage and the Angstrom property (the former Ford/Visteon plant in Ypsilanti). Owners of that property are granting a 100-foot easement along the river to connect to the Border-to-Border Trail, Riggs said. The bus will return to Island Park for some remarks by Dingell, Ann Arbor mayor John Hieftje, HRWC executive director Laura Rubin and others. Gov. Rick Snyder, an Ann Arbor area resident, has also been invited to speak at the event.

RiverUp! – Commissioner Discussion

Commissioners had several comments and questions about the RiverUp! project. John Lawter asked about the river’s water quality – does it change as the river moves east? He also wondered how far east you can travel on the river. Riggs said it’s possible to travel all the way to Lake Erie, though there are several dam portages along the way, and some are more difficult to navigate than others. Portages at the Ford Lake and Belleville Lake are “particularly gnarly,” she said.

Elizabeth Riggs of the Huron River Watershed Council gave a report to park commissioners about RiverUp!, a project to make infrastructure improvements along the Huron River and to support the economic development of river communities, including Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti.

The Huron is the cleanest river in southern Michigan, Riggs said, but it’s common to find contaminants wherever there are human developments. Upstream of Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti is generally cleaner. It’s a good idea to wait 48 hours after major rains before going into the river, she said, because of possible runoff contamination. This kind of safety information would be included in the river guidebook being developed.

The fact that it’s possible to talk about encouraging more recreation in the Huron River indicates that it’s clean enough for that kind of activity, Riggs said. Even so, there are pollution “hot spots,” and HRWC is working with landowners along the river to ensure that they are complying with the Clean Water Act requirements, she said.

Gwen Nystuen asked for more information about the Superior Dam portage, and the city of Ann Arbor’s involvement. The project involves making the portage more accessible, Riggs said, and involves land owned by both the city and St. Joseph’s. Right now, the take-out is at a steep embankment. It then requires winding through a wooded area to a put-in that’s fairly close to the downstream side of the dam. It’s not an easy portage, Riggs said. The project would relocate the put-in to a quieter area downstream, and make a gravel path for the portage. Signs would be added to mark the way – that’s a sponsorship opportunity, she said.

The Wolfpack will be providing funding for the project, Riggs said. That group is in the process of securing permits and getting bids for the work.

In response to a question from Sam Offen, Riggs said the first year’s funding for RiverUp! is being provided by Wolfpack members. For specific projects, organizers will try to identify other funding sources at the local, state and federal level, or from other partners. For example, Angstrom will be donating the 100-foot conservation easement for the Border-to-Border Trail. Another project – creating an underpass or overpass at I-94 in Ypsilanti for hikers and bikers – would be much more expensive. RiverUp! has funding for an engineering feasibility study, but the actual under/overpass project could cost millions. Terri Blackmore of the Washtenaw Area Transportation Study (WATS) is involved in exploring options for that project, Riggs said.

Riggs noted that there would be plenty of opportunities for the city of Ann Arbor to participate.

Lawter observed that there’s no mention of camping sites along the stretch of the Huron River where RiverUp! is focused. Riggs said a water trail map that’s being developed will include locations where canoers/kayakers can take out for camping and other lodging, as well as where to park and store belongings. She noted that there’s a fairly large stretch of the river with no official campsites.

Ann Arbor Skatepark

Scott Rosencrans – a board member with Friends of the Ann Arbor Skatepark (FAAS), and a former PAC chair – delivered a presentation similar to those he’s given recently to the Ann Arbor city council and the Washtenaw County board of commissioners. It focused primarily on safety issues and ways in which skatepark organizers have been collaborating with the city’s commission on disability issues to ensure that the skatepark facility planned for Ann Arbor would be accessible to everyone.

PAC members had several questions after the presentation. John Lawter wondered whether discussions with the disabled community have let to any design changes for the skatepark. Rosencrans said the design hasn’t been finalized. FAAS will be issuing a request for proposals (RFP) for the design and oversight of construction, he said. A later RFP will be issued for the actual construction. Recommendations from the city’s commission on disability issues are meant to inform the design, he said, but many of the recommendations would already be required under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

Karen Levin asked about the project’s funding status. Organizers have raised about $515,000 – an amount that includes $400,000 in contingent matching funds from Washtenaw County Parks & Recreation. In addition, the group has applied for about $350,000 in grants, including a $300,000 grant (through the city of Ann Arbor) from the Michigan Natural Resources Trust Fund.

The group has recently received $20,000 from a donor who wants to remain anonymous, Rosencrans said, and $5,000 from the Tony Hawk Foundation. There are deadlines that the skatepark needs to meet, he said. To secure the county’s matching funds, for example, skatepark organizers need to raise $400,000 by January 2012. ”So we’re under pressure here, but we’re also optimistic,” he said. Several major donors are being cultivated, and skatepark supporters are excited by the prospects, he said.

PAC vice chair John Lawter talks with Julie Grand, chair of the commission, before the group's July 19 meeting.

Lawter asked for more details about the deadlines and the total amount of money the skatepark organizers need to raise. The deadline for the county funding is January 2012, while the memorandum of understanding for use of the city parkland is 2014, Rosencrans said. Organizers are looking at January 2012 to raise $1 million, he said, and they think that’s a doable goal. They’ll need about $900,000 for construction, and $100,000 to set aside for future maintenance. On that timeline, organizers hope to issue a design RFP relatively soon.

David Barrett asked whether there’s any aerobic value in the sport of skateboarding – in a culture of obesity, that would be a good thing. Rosencrans said he’s not a fitness professional, but it’s clear from his observations that a lot of calories are burned. It’s also a great way for kids to get out who might not be attracted to traditional sports like baseball, basketball or football. A skatepark and the city’s relatively new BMX/dirt bike course in Bandemer Park are places that might attract more kids to get out and be active.

Tim Doyle asked whether the skatepark would be amenable to winter activities, other than skateboarding. If there’s no ice and it’s a sunny day, people will skateboard even if it’s cold, Rosencrans said. Joe Galante, FAAS chair, told commissioners that skateboarders will shovel the snow themselves so they can use the skatepark in the winter. But a skatepark isn’t designed to be used for other purposes, like sledding.

Mike Anglin asked what the age range is for skateboarders. There are kids as young as 6-7 years old involved, Rosencrans said. He joked that Trevor Staples might be the oldest. [Staples, a board member who was instrumental in organizing the skatepark effort, is in his mid-40s.]

Anglin noted that it’s important for more city parks to be accessible via AATA bus routes. Rosencrans replied that the skatepark is intended to be a “destination amenity,” and the location was chosen in part because it’s on a bus route and near major roadways – I-94 and M-14.

Urban Forest Management Plan

On the agenda for the July PAC meeting was a presentation about the city’s Urban Forest Management Plan. However, no one came to the meeting to give an update. John Lawter, PAC’s vice chair who also serves on the project’s advisory committee, said he hoped that someone could attend the next PAC meeting to brief commissioners and get their input. The group is helping put together a master plan for managing the urban forest. Lawter said the effort includes possible recommendations for ordinances regarding management of trees on public and private property, and how to raise money for the city’s forestry unit.

Parks Budget Update

Jeff Straw, deputy manager of parks & recreation, gave a budget update and answered questions about the year ending June 30, 2011. He noted that there will be additional adjustments – the final report on fiscal year 2011 won’t be ready until PAC’s August meeting.

The general fund portion of the parks system brought in $2.336 million in revenues for the year, with $3.428 million in expenses. The net loss of $1.09 million was covered by the city’s general fund.

Straw went over many of the line items in the budget, and answered questions from commissioners. Matt Warba, the city’s supervisor of field operations, reviewed the budget as it related to his area of responsibility. This report provides some highlights of the budget discussion. [.pdf of financial statements as of June 30, 2011]

Jeff Straw, the city's deputy manager of parks & recreation.

• Facility rental revenues of $308,815 exceeded expectations – this has been an area of growth, Straw said. It includes rentals for Cobblestone Farm, the public market, and athletic fields. Expenses for this category totaled $311,184, and were slightly lower than budgeted.
• It was a successful year for revenues in the city’s pools, Straw said. Revenues of $137,076 at Veterans Memorial Park pool, for example, exceeded the amount budgeted by about 30%.
• Julie Grand wondered why some pools – like Fuller – make money while others don’t. [Fuller Pool brought in revenues of $254,410 with $207,917 in expenses. That compares to Vets Pool, with $137,076 in revenues and $239,868 in expenses.] Straw said each pool as unique characteristics and rental opportunities. Fuller Pool, for example, is used more for rentals and masters swim classes.
• Staff had been too aggressive in projecting revenues for ice rink rentals, Straw said – they didn’t see as many rental opportunities during the year as they expected, and have lowered expectations for the FY 2012 budget. They tried to manage expenses to compensate, but still fell short in FY 2011, he said.
• Straw reviewed the budgets for Mack Pool and the Ann Arbor senior center. [Those operations had been discussed in detail at PAC's June 21, 2011 meeting.] In response to a question from Offen, Straw said that Mack Pool had lost about $22,000 in rental from the departure of a synchronized swimming group. But that will free up the schedule for other rentals in the future, he noted.
• Significant rainfall in the spring affected revenues for the canoe liveries as well as the golf courses. Revenues were down from the amount budgeted, and staff tried to manage expenses accordingly, Straw said. For example, Argo livery had budgeted revenues to reach $246,425 for the year, but the operation only brought in $219,489. Expenses were $204,875 – about $35,000 less than expected.
• The public market – an enterprise fund – fell short on revenues in a couple of areas, but managed expenses, Straw noted. Parking fees were budgeted at $13,000 but didn’t bring in that much – the budget had anticipated more daily fees, he said. The FY 2012 budget has been adjusted to reflect lower parking revenues. The fees are collected only on market days (Wednesday and Saturdays). On non-market days, parking revenue at the market goes to the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority. [.pdf of public market financials]

Commissioners had a more extended discussion about the budget for the city’s two golf courses – Huron Hills and Leslie Park – which the city operates in a combined golf enterprise fund. [.pdf of golf financials] Operations in enterprise funds are those that city staff have determined should be self-sustaining, although the golf operations are not, based on the city’s accounting.

Revenues for the two courses combined reached $1.65 million for FY 2011, with combined expenses of $1.46 million. Straw noted that not all expenses have been tallied for the year. Revenues also include a transfer in of $504,000 from the city’s general fund.

At Huron Hills, cart rentals increased significantly, in part because the city increased its fleet there. Rentals were up about $20,000, while golf fees increased about $10,000, due to more people playing, Straw said. Staff also managed expenses better during the year, he said.

Christopher Taylor, an ex-officio PAC member who represents Ward 3 on city council, clarified that the golf courses combined had a year-to-date net of $191,000, taking into account a transfer from the general fund. Does the net above zero get transferred back into the general fund? he asked. Straw replied that the staff will look at the performance of the courses in FY 2011, plus the month of July 2011. Based on that 13-month period, they’ll determine what’s needed to transfer from the general fund for FY 2012, he said. The transfer will be adjusted to reflect the financial performance of the two courses.

Tim Berla noted that the financial report shows the FY 2011 general fund subsidy to parks and recreation was $1.09 million. However, that figure doesn’t include the $504,000 general fund transfer into the golf enterprise fund. With that, the general fund support is $1.6 million, he said. Of that $1.6 million, nearly 20% was used in FY 2011 to support the golf courses – or about $300,000. [Though $504,000 was transferred in from the general fund to the golf courses for FY 2011, the net loss for the golf courses was lower than expected and only about $300,000 was necessary to break even.] The point is to assess how much of the parks budget is going to support golf, Berla said. Offen said it appeared to be a decent-sized portion, but getting smaller.

Berla acknowledged that the trend was heading in the right direction. He recalled that a consultant’s report indicated that only 4% of residents played golf.

Another area that garnered some discussion related to mowing. Berla clarified that the field operations report covered all mowing, including mowing for non-park city property. Grand wondered why so much money budgeted for mowing – about $600,000 – was unspent in FY 2011. Warba explained that there were fewer full-time employees during the year than they had originally anticipated, and his operation used temporary workers instead – at about a third of the cost. In the future, the city will be hiring some full-time workers so the budget won’t show such a large amount of unspent funds.

Related to funds from the parks millage, Gwen Nystuen expressed concern that it appeared more millage funds are being used pay for routine maintenance. Warba said everything that field operations does could be considered routine maintenance. Straw added that the millage can be spent on capital projects or maintenance.

Nystuen said it becomes an issue when the city asks voters to renew the millage. The city’s general fund support for parks maintenance appears to be declining, she said. In the past, all maintenance was covered by the general fund. Now, it’s shifting to the millage, and general fund support is decreasing, she said.

John Lawter added that part of the concern stems from the uncertainty about future support for the millage. If the city depends more on the millage for things like routine maintenance, what happens if voters reject a millage renewal and those funds go away?

Communications: Argo Dam, Fuller Road Station, Dog Parks

Several other topics were discussed during the meeting, in the form of communications from staff or commissioners. Topics included: (1) an update on work at Argo dam; (2) concerns over the proposed Fuller Road Station and the site design’s consideration of the Border-to-Border Trail; (3) a donation from the Henrietta Feldman trust; (4) the resignation of Greta Brunschwyler, executive director of the Leslie Science & Nature Center; and (5) a preview of an August agenda item regarding dog parks.

Communications: Argo Dam

Tim Berla asked Jeff Straw, deputy parks and recreation manager, for an update on work at the Argo dam. Berla said he thought the project would be done by now, but it looked like the work hadn’t really started.

By way of background, the Ann Arbor city council approved a $1.17 million project to build a bypass channel in the Argo dam headrace and add whitewater features. PAC had previously recommended approval of the project. [See Chronicle coverage: "PAC Recommends Argo Dam Bypass"]

The plan calls for removing the canoe portage, and replacing it with a series of “drop pools” so that no portage is required. The project will also improve accessibility of the path – which is part of Washtenaw County’s Border-to-Border trail – and address problems in the headrace embankment that were identified by state officials. The work is tied to a consent agreement that the city reached with the state in May 2010, laying out steps that the city must take to deal with some long-outstanding structural issues with the earthen berm.

Straw reported that the city was still waiting for the state to issue the necessary permit for the project – that could happen at any time. Meanwhile, the contractor is doing as much prep work as possible, including tree removal.

Berla characterized the situation as depressing. It looked like an entire season would be lost, he said. Was there any chance the work could be completed this year? Straw reminded commissioners that the state had mandated closure of the headrace – that would have been closed regardless of what happened with the new project. It’s possible the project can be completed by November, he said, but in part “that depends on Mother Nature.”

Deer grazing at the bottom of the Argo dam headrace, which has been de-watered in preparation for construction of a bypass channel. (Photo by Sabra Briere)

Following PAC’s meeting, additional information was emailed to The Chronicle by councilmember Sabra Briere (Ward 1). Brian Steglitz, the city’s senior utilities engineer, had informed Briere that although the city initially submitted its application for a permit in March, it wasn’t considered complete by the Michigan Dept. of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) until June 6. This was the city’s third submittal, in response to changes requested by MDEQ. From June 6, the state has 90 days – until Aug. 23 – to issue the permit.

Briere said that in order to complete the work (at least substantially) by mid-November, the contractor would need to work very aggressively after the construction permit is granted. The contractor has already begun removing trees, and almost all of the headrace is completely de-watered.

Then on July 25, Sue McCormick and Sumedh Bahl – two senior city managers – sent a memo to interim city administrator Tom Crawford. The memo stated that the city had been notified by DTE officials of upcoming remediation work that DTE plans to do in 2012 along the Huron River, adjacent to DTE’s property on the south side of the Huron River, between Allen Creek Drain and the Broadway Bridge. The remediation is being required by MDEQ. From the memo:

DTE has requested the City to delay construction of the whitewater features of the Argo Headrace Reconstruction project until DTE completes the remediation in 2012 as DTE recognizes that the whitewater features will likely need to be removed and rebuilt if the remediation plan includes these areas. DTE has also proposed paying for the construction costs of the whitewater features with their installation in 2012 following completion of the remediation, although the details have yet to be finalized. [.pdf of memo on DTE/whitewater feature]

Communications: Fuller Road Station

Gwen Nystuen asked Straw about the status of an agreement between the city and the University of Michigan regarding the proposed Fuller Road Station. She asked when PAC would have the opportunity to review it, and noted that the city was already moving ahead with related utility work that would affect the project, even though no public hearing has yet been held.

Straw said he didn’t have that information, but that he’d follow-up and report back to commissioners.

Later in the meeting, Mike Anglin – an ex-officio PAC member who represents Ward 5 on the city council – expressed disappointment over how the city is handling the project. The decision to build on parkland seems to have been made, he said, without adequate input from PAC. Many citizens are upset about building along the Huron River, Anglin said. The level of discourse by city councilmembers had been very discouraging, he added, and information provided to the council was simply dismissed, he said.

Anglin was referring to a recent re-vote that had been taken by city council to approve utility work on the Fuller Road Station site. From Chronicle coverage of the council’s July 5, 2011 meeting:

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) made a motion to reconsider a June 20, 2011 vote that the council took in awarding a $1,216,100 construction contract to Hoffman Brothers Inc. The project involves relocating a sanitary sewer south of Fuller Road, and east of the Maiden Lane and East Medical Center Drive intersection.

The project includes moving and replacing an 825-foot, 30-year-old section of 60-inch sanitary sewer pipe. It also includes construction of 525 feet of 24-inch stormwater pipe, as well as construction of 925 feet of a new 12-inch water main for service to Fuller Pool. The water main portion of the project will be completed in two phases, the second of which is planned for 2013.

Anglin’s effort to reconsider the motion was based on criticism that the work is being undertaken only because of the planned Fuller Road Station (FRS) in the area – a project  to which he has expressed opposition. Proposed in partnership between the city and the University of Michigan, it calls for construction of a large parking structure, bus depot and possibly an eventual train station.

Anglin had originally voted in favor of the utility project. At the July 5 council meeting, he said was bringing forward the reconsideration to discuss with councilmembers what he’d heard from the community about questions to which he didn’t have answers. He said he’d voted for the contract on June 20, thinking it was related to flooding conditions on the city’s northside. He subsequently realized the project was for water utilities at the Fuller Road Station site. Several councilmembers noted that they had understood what the original vote was for. The re-vote failed, with only Anglin voting against approval of the utility project.

Toward the end of PAC’s July meeting, Nystuen distributed two documents related to Fuller Road Station:

• Some reflections by Bob Elton, who was PAC chair in 1993 when the city struck a deal with UM to build a surface parking lot at the proposed Fuller Road Station site – the lot has been leased to the university since then. [.pdf of Elton's reflections]
• An email from mayor John Hieftje in which he answers questions about the project posed by former city councilmember Bob Johnson, who also served on PAC. [.pdf of email Q&A]

Nystuen also raised the issue of how the Border-to-Border Trail would fit into the Fuller Road Station site design. She noted that the topic has been brought up on several occasions, but that the trail wasn’t even mentioned when the council approved the utility work at that site. In the context of projects like RiverUp! and partnerships with Washtenaw County on the Border-to-Border Trail, the trail should be part of the city’s consideration, too, she said.

Tim Berla noted that when he’d most recently raised the issue with Eli Cooper, the city’s transportation program manager, Cooper had said that the portion of the trail running through Fuller Road Station would be widened to 10 feet, but no other changes were planned. That was upsetting, Berla said, because the trail will be crossing roadways where hundreds of vehicles will be traveling – it’s a safety issue.

Another plan has been floated to make a trail that looped under the bridges in that area, Berla said, so that cyclists and pedestrians could avoid the traffic at the intersection of Fuller Road, Maiden Lane and East Medical Center Drive. But that plan hasn’t been incorporated into the project, he said.

Berla suggested that PAC might consider a resolution of support for an alternative trail. PAC chair Julie Grand said that Berla could write up such a resolution – he indicated that he would. Later in the meeting, Grand said that in light of the concerns that had been raised about the Border-to-Border Trail, it was something they could add to PAC’s August agenda. She noted that PAC had made a statement previously about the Fuller Road Station project – the commission had passed a resolution a year ago urging for transparency. [See Chronicle coverage: "Park Commission Asks for Transparency"] That was the kind of thing PAC could continue to do, she said, “with the powers we lack.”

Communications: Feldman Trust

Straw reported that the city has been notified of a roughly $100,000 donation from the Henrietta Feldman trust, to be used for tree plantings or land acquisitions. He said that city staff didn’t yet have a lot of information about the donor or her reason for giving, but that he’d follow up with more details at a later date.

Communications: Dog Parks

John Lawter told commissioners that he’d be making a presentation on “dog issues” at PAC’s Aug. 16 meeting. “I know you’re anxiously awaiting that,” he joked.

Offen noted that dog permits in the city are down. Lawter replied that although permits are down, usage of the city’s dog parks is up. That’s something to add to the “issues” list, Lawter said. At previous meetings, Lawter has mentioned the possibility of establishing another dog park.

The city currently has two dog parks – enclosed areas where dogs are permitted to run off-leash. They are located at Olson Park, on the city’s north side, and at Swift Run Park, located at the northeast corner of the Swift Run landfill. The Swift Run dog park is in partnership with Washtenaw County. Permits are required to use the dog parks, but enforcement is limited.

Communications: Leslie Science & Nature Center

Sam Offen, a PAC member who also serves on the board of the Leslie Science & Nature Center, reported that its executive director, Greta Brunschwyler, had resigned and would be leaving at the end of July. Lisa Brush will be serving as interim director until a new director is hired.

Brunschwyler was relatively new to the position. Hired after a national search for a new director, she started the job in March 2010 and had attended PAC’s March 16, 2010 meeting to introduce herself. Offen said Brunschwyler had resigned for personal reasons, and that board members had been surprised by the decision.

Present: David Barrett, Tim Berla, Tim Doyle, Julie Grand, Karen Levin, Sam Offen, Gwen Nystuen, John Lawter, councilmember Mike Anglin (ex-officio), councilmember Christopher Taylor (ex-officio).

Absent: Doug Chapman

Next meeting: PAC’s meeting on Tuesday, Aug. 16, 2011 begins at 4 p.m. in the city hall second-floor council chambers, 301 E. Huron St., Ann Arbor. [confirm date]

Washtenaw County clerk Larry Kestenbaum was on hand to distribute a written statement encouraging the Ann Arbor city council to wait until after the general election to change the city's ward boundaries. (Photos by the writer.)

It began with public commentary on the topic of a proposed redrawing of the boundaries for the city’s five wards. The city charter requires the wards to be pie-shaped wedges. The redrawing of the lines themselves was not thought to be particularly controversial. But the timing of the redistricting stirred a representative of the American Civil Liberties Union to appear before the council to address councilmembers. Attorney John Shea, speaking for the ACLU, told them they shouldn’t enact boundary changes between the primary and the general elections. Ultimately, the council kneaded the advice into their thinking, and voted to postpone the whole question of redistricting.

The meeting ended with a voting snafu, when the council tried to convene a closed session to discuss land acquisition. So even though the vote was 6-3 in favor of entering into a closed session, a 2/3 majority of members present did not satisfy the statutory requirement of a 2/3 majority of the council’s 11 members. The vote was eventually recognized as only half-baked, and the council came out of their workroom, revoted 8-1 to re-enter the closed session, and completed the meeting without further complications.

Part of the meeting’s creamy dessert filling also depended on a somewhat infrequent parliamentary exercise that resulted in revoting an item that the council had approved two weeks earlier. That vote was on a contract for the reconstruction and relocation of water, sanitary sewer and stormwater lines in the vicinity of the proposed site for the Fuller Road Station. Mike Anglin (Ward 5) brought the resolution back for reconsideration, and council members voted unanimously to roll out the dough again by rediscussing and revoting the issue. The outcome was the same – it was approved – but Anglin registered his dissent this time by voting against it. He told his colleagues that when they’d voted two weeks ago, he had not realized that the project was related to the Fuller Road Station site.

Also part of the council’s meeting was a significant vote that received no discussion by the council. A proposal to voluntarily increase an already-approved contract with Recycle Ann Arbor was voted down 5-4, thus failing by one vote to achieve the six-vote majority it required.

The council also wrapped up a loose end from its previous approval of ordinances related to zoning and licensing of medical marijuana, by approving a non-disclosure policy. The policy ensures that private information of patients and caregivers is not divulged.

In an item added late to the agenda, councilmembers also approved a one-year contract with the city’s deputy police chiefs union.

In other business, the council set a new design review board fee at $500. It also approved three water-related projects: a porous pavement project in the Burns Park neighborhood, a rain garden on Kingsley Street, and a level-of-service study of the city’s water system.

The council also received a presentation from the director of the Ann Arbor District Library, Josie Parker. Highlights included data on the more than 600,000 annual visitors to the library’s downtown location.

Ward Boundary Changes

The council was asked to consider a proposal to redraw the boundaries of the city’s five wards and to make the new ward boundaries effective after the Aug. 2 city council primary elections, but before the Nov. 8 general election. Most of the boundary changes involved reassigning Ward 1 areas to other wards to balance out the population among the city’s five wards.

At left, councilmember Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) talks with city clerk Jackie Beaudry before the start of the July 5 meeting.

By the numbers, if the 2010 census population were distributed perfectly evenly across the city’s five wards (pie-shaped, per the city charter), they would each have a population of 22,787 – the “ideal” number in redistricting terms. Without any redistricting, the imbalance among wards, due to relative population growth in Ward 1 since 2000, breaks down as follows: Ward 1 [24,616 population, +1,829 whole number deviation from ideal (+8.03%)]; Ward 2 [22,419, -368 (-1.61%)]; Ward 3 [22,206, -581 (-2.55%)]; Ward 4 [22,585, -202 (-0.89%)]; Ward 5 [22,108, -679 (-2.98%)].

In 2000, the variance from the ideal for each ward ranged between +1.5% and -1.5%.

As proposed, the city’s redistricting plan would yield the following breakdown: Ward 1 [22,795, +8 (+0.04%)]; Ward 2 [22,739, -48, (-0.21%)]; Ward 3 [22,919, +132 (+0.58%)]; Ward 4 [22,760, -27 (-0.12%)]; Ward 5 [22,721, -66 (-0.29%)]. To restore the balance in the wards, the redistricting proposal focuses on reassignment where the five wedges of ward pie meet, in the center of the city near the downtown. [.pdf of city of Ann Arbor proposed ward boundary changes ] [.pdf of ward boundary changes proposed by councilmember Sabra Briere]

As far as the timing of the boundary change goes, the apparent thinking on the part of the city attorney’s office, which led to the proposal before the council, was that unless this change were made before the general election, the city would be in violation of the state of Michigan’s Home Rule Cities Act 279 of 1908 [emphasis added]:

117.27a Apportionment of wards; definitions.
…
(4) In each such city subject to the provisions of this section the local legislative body, not later than December 1, 1967, shall apportion the wards of the city in accord with this section. In subsequent years, the local legislative body, prior to the next general municipal election occurring not earlier than 4 months following the date of the official release of the census figures of each United States decennial census, shall apportion the wards of the city in accord with this section.

[Previous Chronicle coverage: "Column: Ann Arbor Ward Shifts Should Wait"]

Ward Boundary Changes: Public Commentary

Public commentary included remarks from John Shea – a representative of the Washtenaw branch of the lawyer’s committee for the American Civil Liberties Union – and local attorney Tom Wieder. County clerk Larry Kestenbaum attended the meeting, but did not sign up in time to be included among the first 10 reserved speaker slots. Reserved commentary slots are assigned on a first-come-first-served basis.

Wieder told the council that it’s not always the case that common sense and legal analysis lead to the same place, but they do in the case of the proposal before the council: The council should not change the boundaries between the primary and the general election. It’s a matter of basic fairness that every person should be treated the same. The courts understand that idea and so do the councilmembers’ constituents, Wieder said. Changing the boundaries in the middle of the process is not in the interest of fairness.

Wieder summarized some of the case law on the issue by saying that orderly election processes are not to be disrupted – the courts have said that common sense must apply. From a practical view, he said, if the council does not change the boundaries between the primary and the general election, the city will likely not be sued. And if the city were sued [based on the idea that the city did not adhere to the Home Rule Cities Act and that it left the wards in a disproportionate state for an election cycle], it’s unlikely that the suit would be successful.

But if the council did change the boundaries between the primary and the general elections, it was likely a lawsuit would be filed and it would likely be successful, and that would cost money, Wieder cautioned. Changing boundaries between the primary and the general election would make the city of Ann Arbor’s elections be seen as less legitimate, Wieder said. The common sense solution would be to adopt new boundaries before Nov. 8, but not put them into effect until after the election. That way, the council would meet the strict letter of the statute, but avoid disruption of the process and preserve respect for city elections.

Speaking on behalf of the Washtenaw branch of the American Civil Liberties Union, Shea told the council he’d sent them a letter detailing the ACLU’s opposition to the boundary changes. He made clear that it’s the effective date, not the lines on the map, to which the ACLU objected.

The first objection was based on the idea that when candidates file petitions, they do so with a clear electorate in mind. Changing boundaries could skew who wants to be a candidate in an election. A second consideration is that if a councilmember or a challenger had barely enough signatures on a nominating petition, if some of those signatures were from residents of a different new ward, that could invite challenges. A third consideration is that it would disenfranchise hundreds of voters.

Given the political realities of Ann Arbor’s heavily Democratic electorate, the primary election practically equates to the general election, Shea said. So for people who are redistricted from a ward without a primary into a ward that had a primary but no contested general election, they’ll have no choice in their city council representation. Shea said he had no doubt the proposal had been put forward in good faith. Although everyone knows that redistricting processes can be used for partisan purpose, he didn’t think that was the case here. Still, 10-20 years from now that might become the case. And in the interim, it sets a bad precedent, and that ought to be avoided. The guiding principle of equal protection is rationality. He concluded by encouraging the council to do what is rational.

Kestenbaum handed out copies of a statement to councilmembers. It was made also on behalf of the state elections director Chris Thomas and the county election director Matt Yankee. It urged the council to delay the boundary changes until after the general election:

The proposed boundary changes are minor, but what if they weren’t? There is no bright line between minor changes and changes which have a political impact. And even minor changes will have an impact on the affected voters.

Ward Boundary Changes: Council Deliberations

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) got things started by offering an amendment to the resolution stating that the ordinance would take effect on Nov. 9, 2011, the day following the general election.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) said she was happy to support the amendment but would be willing to make the effective date the start of a month, to make it nice and round. Higgins said her point was to make it after the general election, so she did not have problem with Dec. 1.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) said he was happy to support the amendment. He understood the concern that prompted the original proposal to change the boundaries prior to the general election. But he felt it’s fairly clear that if the boundaries were changed before the general election, “we miss the forest for the trees.” He said it’s important to make sure voters are enfranchised and felt that there is greater risk in moving forward with new boundaries before the general election than in waiting. Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) also indicated his support and appreciated the way the people who brought the issue forward had done so.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) ventured that his ward would probably be one of those that would would be most affected, so he supported the amendment. [Kunselman faces two challengers in the Ward 3 Democratic primary.]

Outcome on the amendment changing the effective date to Dec. 1: The council voted unanimously to approve the Dec. 1 effective date.

Higgins then noted her disappointment at not being able to attend the June 13 city council working session about how the wards were proposed to be reapportioned. She still had some questions about how the process was working. Noting the city charter requirement that wards be roughly the shape of wedges in a pie, she said that Ward 4 [the one she represents] couldn’t be any more of a “log jam.” She said she’d worked on reapportionment 10 years ago with four other councilmembers. [At that time, Higgins was a Republican – she now is a Democrat.]

At that time, the group had wondered when the city would ever do what the charter states, Higgins said. She was disappointed that the council still hasn’t done that. The new township islands that are likely to be annexed will also be a factor. She said she’d like to see the city staff take a stab at making wards more pie-shaped, given that there was now some additional time to work on it.

Higgins moved for a postponement of four weeks until Aug. 4.  Mayor John Hieftje confirmed with assistant attorney Abigail Elias that this would not cause any problems.

In a back-and-forth between Briere and Higgins, it was confirmed that councilmembers could be consulted in some fashion by the staff, as the proposed ward boundaries are developed.

Taylor said he was unclear about the direction to be given to the staff and wondered what Higgins’ view was of “pie-shaped.” Higgins restated that the charter says the wards should be pie-shaped and the direction to the staff is to ask them to look at the charter. Taylor indicated that he felt the proposed redrawing satisfies the charter, so he would vote against a postponement. Hohnke said he’d be happy to support postponement, because no harm results from it.

Outcome: The council voted to postpone the boundary changes. Dissent came from Taylor. Before the postponement vote, the council had amended the ordinance to make the changes that they eventually agree on effective on Dec. 1, after the Nov. 8 election.

Revote on Sewer Project

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) made a motion to reconsider a June 20, 2011 vote that the council took in awarding a $1,216,100 construction contract to Hoffman Brothers Inc. The project involves relocating a sanitary sewer south of Fuller Road, and east of the Maiden Lane and East Medical Center Drive intersection.

The project includes moving and replacing an 825-foot, 30-year-old section of 60-inch sanitary sewer pipe. It also includes construction of 525 feet of 24-inch stormwater pipe, as well as construction of 925 feet of a new 12-inch water main for service to Fuller Pool. The water main portion of the project will be completed in two phases, the second of which is planned for 2013.

Anglin’s effort to reconsider the motion was based on criticism that the work is being undertaken only because of the planned Fuller Road Station (FRS) in the area – a project  to which he has expressed opposition. Proposed in partnership between the city and the University of Michigan, it calls for construction of a large parking structure, bus depot and possibly an eventual train station. [Recent Chronicle coverage of that project: "PAC Gets Update on Fuller Road Station"]

The motion to reconsider came in the context of a memo written to the council by Dietrich Bergmann, a transportation planning engineer who participated in a 2008 University of Michigan Sustainable Mobility & Accessibility Research & Transformation (SMART) conference on the transportation economy. The memo is critical of several aspects of the proposed sewer work, including the idea that 30 years is old for a sanitary sewer: “The city staff has not provided any evidence that the sanitary drain at the site should be moved, absent going forward with the FRS project. The 30-year age issue makes little sense. I suspect that most sanitary sewers in Ann Arbor are older.” [.pdf of Dietrich Bergmann memo]

Revote on Sewer Project: Public Commentary

In addition to sending an emailed message, Dietrich Bergmann also spoke during public commentary to address councilmembers about the issue.

The reason he was asking the council to reconsider their previous vote is that the fundamental project has not yet been approved by the city council, Bergmann said.

Project schematic for sewer and water lines. The pink line indicates sanitary sewer, green is storm sewer and blue is a water main. (Image links to higher resolution .pdf file)

If the council did not know if the city is going to proceed with Fuller Road Station and the parking structure, then it did not make sense to do the work now. He summarized the significance of the schematic he’d provided as an attachment to the letter. On the schematic, pink is sanitary sewer, green is storm sewer, and blue is the water main. Neither the green nor the blue lines are usable until additional work is done, he said. So there’s no point in doing it now – it should be done later.

George Gaston told the council he would spare them his prepared remarks. He wanted to simply stress that there is now a website that details what is going on with the Fuller Road Station project and he would like people to have a chance to see it: protecta2parks.org Other people will talk about the sewer relocations – he hoped the issue will be reconsidered.

James D’Amour told councilmembers that he was once again before them to speak. He said he had a swim meet the next day in Detroit and had not practiced, so he was a little cranky. About Fuller Road Station, he said, ”Let’s call it what it is.” He characterized Fuller Road Station as a parking structure for the University of Michigan hospital expansion. He’d read that 500 new jobs are coming to Mott Children’s Hospital, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. As the council looks at the reconsideration, he suggested looking at it in the full context. He allowed that the council was probably favorably disposed to the project, but it needs to be discussed in all its dimensions. The council needs to take a step back, he said. “You’re voting on something before you know what you want to do,” D’Amour cautioned.

Ann Larimore expressed her deep concern about spending $1.2 million on the utilities relocation. Her concern about the expenditure led to looking at the project in context of the city’s stated goals of increasing sustainability and the environment. A 1,000-space, 5-story parking structure will bring thousands of cars into Ann Arbor, she said. The option of using shuttle vans plus peripheral parking lots should be explored instead. Building the parking structure is not in keeping with sustainability, she said. She noted that the mayor annually hosts a green fair, the city is proud of its urban forest and its parks, and the university has launched a campaign for sustainability. In that context, she wondered if building a 1,000-car parking lot could be justified

Revote on Sewer Project: Deliberations – Reconsideration

From a parliamentary point of view, what Anglin was requesting was a reconsideration of a previous vote. Only those who voted on the prevailing side of a vote may make such a motion.

Anglin told his colleagues that he was bringing forward the reconsideration in order discuss with councilmembers what he’s heard from the community about questions to which he doesn’t have answers. He said he’d voted for the contract on June 20, thinking it was related to flooding conditions on the city’s northside. Now he realized the project is for water utilities at the Fuller Road Station site. And in light of an upcoming July 11 work session on that topic, he was hoping other councilmembers would join him to postpone the utilities work. He noted that the city’s park advisory commission had been updated, but the infrastructure project was not discussed by that body.

In response, mayor John Hieftje rejected the idea that there was a work session scheduled on Fuller Road Station, and confirmed with interim city administrator Tom Crawford that there was no new information about Fuller Road Station to provide at such a session.

The issue with the work session stems from an expectation that the council’s addition to its calendar of the July 11 work session would include a presentation on the Fuller Road Station. From previous Chronicle reporting:

At its June 20, 2011 meeting, the Ann Arbor city council revised its calendar for the year to include a work session scheduled for July 11. While the staff memo accompanying the resolution indicates only that the additional session is due to “numerous activities developing in the city,” a likely topic to be addressed at the July 11 session is the city’s proposed Fuller Road Station.

…

At the council’s June 6 meeting, the Fuller Road Station had received extensive public commentary, despite the lack of any item on the agenda related directly to the project.

Partly in response to that commentary and to remarks from Mike Anglin (Ward 5), at that meeting Sabra Briere (Ward 1) pushed for a city council working session on the project. From The Chronicle’s report of that meeting: “Sabra Briere (Ward 1) anticipated mayor John Hieftje’s reaction to Anglin’s comments [Hieftje has pushed hard for the project] by telling the mayor that she knew he had a lot of thoughts about Fuller Road Station. But she thought the council should have a working session, so that councilmembers can become more knowledgable about the issue. Hieftje indicated that he would look into adding something to the calendar.”

When the work session was added, many people, including some councilmembers, concluded that the work session would include Fuller Road Station. As of July 10, no agenda had been posted for the July 11 working session.

The council then considered the motion that the previous vote be reconsidered. Before the meeting there was some speculation that the motion would not receive a seconding motion and would die for lack of a second. But Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) offered a second.

Outcome on the motion to reconsider: The council voted unanimously to reconsider the motion to approve the contract.

Revote on Sewer Project: Deliberations – Substance

Anglin led off the discussion by saying he realized it’s out of the ordinary to reconsider the vote. However, on the previous June 20 vote, he thought the resolution to award the contract concerned an area of the city that had experienced mudslides and water damage. The item had inadvertently slid through, he said. If he had known at the time what the resolution was about, he said he would have raised questions.

By way of background, the second line of the staff memo on the resolution states:

The Northside Interceptor Sanitary Sewer Relocation Project is located south of Fuller Road and east of the intersection with Maiden Lane and East Medical Center Drive.

From The Chronicle’s summary of the park advisory commission meeting of May 17, 2011, which Anglin attended as a council representative to PAC:

After the council gives approval, the city would start immediately with work to relocate utilities on the site – bids have already been secured, [city transportation manager Eli Cooper] said. That might start in June or July, although there’s no firm date for council approval.

At the council’s July 5 meeting, Anglin characterized the sewer relocation as putting infrastructure repairs into the future site of the proposed Fuller Road Station. He expressed concern about moving forward on a project that the council has not agreed to. He said the work sessions have been informative on phase one – the parking structure – but not on phase two, which would include a train station.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) told the council she wanted to to address some details and provide some information based on answers to a set of questions she’d sent to city staff.

Some key points from those answers: (1) the 60-inch pipe is a sanitary sewer and deals with human waste; (2) the sanitary sewer portion of the project serves nearly all residents on the city’s north side; (3) city staff acknowledges that if the Fuller Road Station were not being built, the relocation of utilities would not be as high a priority as it is; (4) starting work now would allow the work to be completed by mid-November 2011, which would allow the replacement of the adjacent soccer field next year, instead of delaying another year; and (5) the pipe, which leads under the river, has greater potential for problems due to the high volume of the flow and the turbulent nature of that flow.

In subsequent deliberations, Cresson Slotten – unit manager for the city of Ann Arbor’s systems planning unit – noted that it’s “not a nice, pretty flow, either.” He clarified that the issue is the potential for “scouring” along the bottom of the pipe and that it would gradually be eroded. Part of the project involves installing access panels so that the condition of this critical pipe can be monitored.

After laying out the additional information she’d received from staff, Briere then contrasted her position with Anglin’s. Two weeks ago, she said, she knew what she was voting on. She’d read her packet of background materials provided for that meeting and knew the pipes ran across the Fuller Road Station site. The fact that staff was recommending moving and beefing up the utilities shouldn’t be surprising. She was less inclined to change her vote, she said, because at the previous meeting, “I knew what I was doing.”

Rapundalo, too, said he was happy to have the discussion, but it had been very clear at the previous meeting what was being proposed. He characterized it as an infrastructure improvement that would benefit the new University of Michigan children’s hospital. It was first and foremost an infrastructure in the city’s capital improvement plan (CIP) that the council had previously approved, he said, so he couldn’t support changing his vote.

Hieftje reiterated Briere’s information that completing the work this year means the soccer field replacement can be done in 2013. The utilities work was going to be done anyway, he said, and would benefit 40,000 residents. He also reiterated Rapundalo’s point about the children’s hospital coming online.

Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) said he wanted to compliment Anglin on his candor – it took a lot to say, “Gulp, I missed it.” He acknowledged the question about whether the utilities relocation is really only about the Fuller Road Station and whether the utilities work is just the beginning of “a rear guard action.” He said he was not at the council meeting when the first vote was taken, but said the staff information was good. He noted that he was getting a chance to vote on it in a roundabout way.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) said he was happy to support the discussion for the sake of understanding the item. He said that on the previous vote, he, too, felt comfortable about what the council was acting on. Early in the text of the staff memo, he noted, was a specific reference to the location of the project along Fuller Road. It’s a mild shift in priority, he said, whether it happens this year or next. It seems like a no-cost option for the ability to consider FRS down the line, and he would not support the postponement, he said.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) pointed to the staff’s acknowledgment that the utilities relocation project had been moved up in priority. So he wanted to know what got moved down. Slotten allowed that off the top of his head none came to mind. The project went through prioritization last fall and winter, he said. Kunselman pressed for any projects that were being deprioritized as a result of this project. Slotten indicated that he couldn’t say for sure if other projects were deprioritized.

Kunselman asked Slotten to describe the infrastructure project’s basic design. The items that are included in the project are in there because of their relationship to one another, Slotten said: a single contractor with the same equipment can more easily work on stormwater, drinking water and sanitary sewer in the same general vicinity. As for the sanitary sewer specifically, it’s been laid out to take Fuller Road Station into consideration. To put it in one location and then move it – that’s not doing a good job of management, Slotten said.

Kunselman drew out the fact that the stormwater aspect of the project would serve the surface parking lot currently at the site, but only later would add flow. His concern was that the project would to some degree make infrastructure improvements that would sit idle. [Essentially, Kunselman was pressing the same kind of issue that Bergmann had raised during public commentary.] Slotten told him that the sanitary sewer part of the project would be active immediately on completion.

Kunselman said he understood Anglin’s issue, because there was not a direct communication in the packet about the project’s connection to preparation for the Fuller Road Station.

Anglin wondered what the risk would be to allowing the utilities to remain in place as they are – right now, those utilities are operating efficiently, he contended. He wondered if the council was now starting a project that the entire council hadn’t agreed to, referring to Fuller Road Station. He called it a “wading in” approach.

Responding to Anglin, Slotten said that the project would extend fire hydrant coverage down the roadway on Fuller Road – there’s currently a gap in fire hydrant coverage with respect to car fires. On the sanitary sewer side, the 30-year age of the pipe had to be put in the context of the amount of flow through the pipe. It’s at a high volume and it’s very turbulent. The pipe can thus be susceptible to scouring and would be worn out from the inside out. By having access panels in the new pipe, the city will be able to monitor that better, he said.

Briere drew out from Slotten why simply lining the sanitary sewer pipe, instead of replacing it, was not a feasible option.

Anglin reiterated his objections, saying that the council was dealing with a park, which is a sensitive area. To him, he said, it seems to be site preparation for the Fuller Road Station. As far as the access panels for monitoring, he said, the city has cameras for doing those kinds of inspections, so he was “not buying that argument at all.”

Outcome: The council voted again to approve the contract for the utilities work, but this time with dissent from Anglin.

Contract Increase for Recycle Ann Arbor

On the July 5 city council agenda was a proposal to increase the payment that the city makes to Recycle Ann Arbor (RAA) for curbside collection of the city’s single-stream recycling carts – from $3.25 to $3.55 per month per cart.

The city council had voted on March 15, 2010 to adopt the single-stream recycling program, which began exactly one year ago, on July 5, 2010.

At that time, the city approved a contract with RAA that called for a payment of $3.25 per month per cart that RAA empties, plus a per-ton payment of between $18.74 and $30.00. The amount of revenue RAA has received through these two kinds of revenue was less than projected last fiscal year. Specifically, the tonnage payments received by RAA for fiscal year 2011 (which ended June 30, 2011) for recyclable material were projected to be $406,332. In fact, tonnage payments only generated $187,560 for RAA – 46% of what was expected. The shortfall was $218,772.

Also, the city expected to distribute 32,779 carts, but only 29,734 carts were deployed, or 9.3% fewer than planned. The staff memo accompanying the resolution explained the reduced number this way: “… many of the smaller multi-family residential units that were previously using the 11-gallon recycling ‘totes’ are able to share recycle carts, resulting in a smaller number of deployed carts.” In terms of revenue, the reduced number of carts meant that RAA received only $1,159,626 compared to the projected $1,278,381 – for a shortfall of $118,755.

Summing the shortfalls in the two kinds of revenue ($118,755 + $218,772), RAA received $337,527 less than it expected for FY 2011. The increase in the monthly per-cart service fee requested (but rejected by the council) – for all five years of the five-year contract – would have worked out to nearly cover the annual shortfall that was due only to the decreased number of carts: $107,042 versus $118,755.

The overly-optimistic projections were made by the city’s recycling consultant – Resource Recycling Systems – and RecycleBank, a company that administers a coupon-based incentive program to encourage residents to recycle. When the council approved the single-stream recycling contract with RAA last year, it also struck a 10-year deal with RecycleBank, at roughly $200,000 per year, to administer their coupon-based incentive program to help boost recycling rates in conjunction with the single-stream rollout.

At the time, Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) questioned the length of the RecycleBank contract, and established in the course of deliberations that the city’s opt-out clause would be less costly than the cost of the contract. He was concerned that the city had options in the event that RecycleBank’s incentives did not boost recycling tonnage to the levels that were forecast. [Chronicle coverage: "Council Banks on Single-Stream Recycling"]

As of May 2011, roughly 10,000 out of 23,600 (42%) households have signed up for the RecycleBank program. The city is nine months into the contract, which started September 2010. The termination clause allows the city to end the contract with 30 days notice if funds are not appropriated. However, the contract was presumably funded through FY 2012 as a part of the budget the council adopted in May this year.

Outcome: The council voted 5-4 to increase the amount of the contract, which meant it fell short of the six votes it needed to pass. The vote was made without any deliberations. Voting against it were Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5), Mike Anglin (Ward 5) and Sabra Briere (Ward 1).

Non-Disclosure on Medical Marijuana

Before the council for consideration was approval of a non-disclosure policy on information that the city might collect as part of its medical marijuana licensing and zoning ordinances. The council approved those ordinances at its June 20, 2011 meeting. In relevant part, the resolution states that a long list of various kinds of information “shall be protected against public disclosure in the course of the zoning and licensing process …”

The resolution was also amended to read: “Ann Arbor city staff shall treat the foregoing information as exempted from disclosure …”

A similar non-disclosure policy had been discussed, but postponed, at the council’s March 7, 2011 meeting. When the matter was before the council again, at its March 21, 2011 meeting, the council chose not to pursue that non-disclosure policy. That’s because the amendments to the medical marijuana legislation it approved on March 21 did not include the collection of personal information. So the resolution had been withdrawn by its sponsor, Sabra Briere (Ward 1).

Non-Disclosure on Medical Marijuana: Public Commentary

Not all of the public commentary regarding medical marijuana related specifically to the non-disclosure policy on the agenda, but it fits most naturally into this section of the meeting report.

Gersh Avery said he wanted to let the council know he understands there are supporters among them. He has a sense that people are concerned about the increase in marijuana use in the community. He said he doesn’t believe anyone is trying to attack patients. With respect to the confidentiality section of the ordinance, he noted that former attorney general for the state of Michigan, Mike Cox, had issued an opinion when he was still AG, because he was concerned about farming out the printing of patient and caregiver registry cards. The new attorney general, Bill Schuette, has expressed a similar concern. He cautioned councilmembers that they were essentially asking people to photocopy their information and hand it over.

Charles Ream – alluding to his frequent appearances before them to speak on issues related to medical marijuana – quipped that perhaps soon they’d have a meeting where councilmembers didn’t get to see him. Describing Briere’s proposed non-disclosure policy, Ream said it’s really important: “Let’s do it.” He noted that the policy is what the law says already. He contended there was a discrepancy between the licensing and the zoning: home occupations do not require licenses, but they require zoning compliance permits. People won’t participate in the program if the requirement for zoning compliance permits remains part of the code, he said.

Matthew Abel told the council that he was there as legal counsel on behalf of Rhory Gould with Arborside Health and Wellness. He said he supported the non-disclosure policy, but wanted to speak about the number of licenses allowed by the city’s ordinance. He cited the ordinance language on the cap to the number of licenses:

7.502 (4) The first year’s licenses shall be capped at a number 10% higher than the number of complete applications for licenses submitted to the City in the first 60 days after the effective date of this chapter, but not more than 20 medical marijuana dispensary licenses shall be issued in the first year. Any license terminated during the license year returns to the City for possible reissuance.

He asked if 10% of 15 or 18 would be considered one or two? When the language goes on to say “not more than 20,” it seems that it rewards the “cowboys” who went ahead and started businesses, and penalizes those who waited, Abel said.

He also pointed to the language about the issuance of licenses [emphasis added]:

7:505. Issuance of License. If the applicant has successfully demonstrated compliance with all requirements for issuance of a license within 10 weeks (70 calendar days) after the date of City staff’s official confirmation that the application for a license was complete, the city administrator or designee shall grant renewal of an existing license or issue a new license for a medical marijuana dispensary to the applicant if a license is available.

That sounds like a first-come-first-served approach, he said, and that’s why there’s someone standing in line outside city hall waiting for a license. A different mechanism needs to be created for that, he said. Otherwise, he’d have to advise his client to stand in line.

Non-Disclosure on Medical Marijuana: Council Deliberations

Briere led off the discussion by saying that during the last three weeks, since the council had approved the zoning and licensing ordinances, they’d heard from many people about the requirement of a zoning compliance permit. She stressed that this requirement in the zoning regulations is what is required of all home occupations. The council was careful, she said, not to make the requirements any different for medical marijuana home occupations. Still, she said, there was concern about the compiling of lists and making them available. She said she thought the exemptions in the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) were sufficient to give direction. But she said she also believed in a “belt and suspenders.”

Briere reminded her colleagues that a similar proposal was before them at the March 7 meeting, but she had eventually withdrawn it.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) wanted to know how the resolution overrides the law. Assistant city attorney Abigail Elias indicated that the way she read the resolution was for the city to treat the information consistent with state law. There’s no overriding, said Elias.

Briere offered as a point of clarity that the city would indeed continue to require zoning compliance permits of medical marijuana-based home occupations, but the information wouldn’t be subject to required disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act unless the state law changed. Under the proposed resolution, the information on zoning compliance permits remains private, Briere concluded.

Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) indicated he understood the intent of the resolution: The city will treat the information as exempt. The way it’s drafted is that it’s already the law, and he didn’t mind it being restated. But he asked for additional clarification. Elias indicated that the resolution can’t create a privacy protection, but gives direction to city staff to consider it in connection with the request for documents.

Taylor observed that as drafted, the resolution is not a direction to the city’s FOIA officer, which seems like what the council is trying to do. Taylor said that’s all well and good, and he agreed that it should be so, but he wanted to amend the language “on the fly.” He offered first something along the lines of: “Ann Arbor’s Freedom of Information Act officer shall treat the foregoing information as exempted from disclosure …”

Briere responded by agreeing that the FOIA officer should be directed, but she wondered about including other city staff. The final version of the amendment was: “Ann Arbor city staff shall treat the foregoing information as exempted from disclosure …”

Outcome: The non-disclosure policy passed on a 6-3 vote. Dissenting were Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) and Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2).

It’s worth noting that withholding information under the Freedom of Information Act is optional. The resolution approved by the council appears to confirm only that the information meets the criteria for exempting it from disclosure, but does not establish an administrative policy that states the city will not disclose that information.

In broad strokes, the FOIA says that public bodies must produce information upon request. But certain exemptions apply. The two FOIA exemptions relevant to the council’s discussion include one that allows a public body to withhold information that would represent an unwarranted intrusion on someone’s privacy, and another that allows a public body to withhold information if an exemption is provided by some other statute [emphasis added]:

15.243 Exemptions from disclosure …
Sec. 13. (1) A public body may exempt from disclosure as a public record under this act any of the following:
(a) Information of a personal nature if public disclosure of the information would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of an individual’s privacy. …
(d) Records or information specifically described and exempted from disclosure by statute.

The operative verb is “may,” which means that while a public body can choose to withhold certain information, it is not required by the FOIA to withhold it. The attorney general’s outline of the FOIA statute affirms the withholding of information as optional: “A public body may (but is not required to) withhold from public disclosure certain categories of public records under the Freedom of Information Act.” The attorney general’s outline was last updated a decade ago, but the AG’s office has confirmed for The Chronicle that the document is still accurate – in the intervening period, no changes have taken place in the statute or with case law.

Deputy Police Chiefs Labor Agreement

Before the council for consideration was authorization of a collective bargaining agreement with its deputy police chiefs. It’s a one-year deal, expiring June 30, 2012. As part of the deal, the deputy chiefs are exempt as employees under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, which means they are not eligible for overtime. The deputy chiefs will also continue on the same health care plan as non-union employees, which requires a contribution by the employee.

In adding the item to the agenda that night, Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2), who is chair of the council’s labor committee, lamented the fact that the much larger police officers union had voted down a contract with similar provisions to those accepted by other bargaining units and the city’s non-union staff.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to approve the deputy chiefs collective bargaining agreement.

Water-Related Projects

Councilmembers were asked to approve several water-related items.

Water-Related Projects: Permeable Surface Alley

On the agenda was a permeable surface alley project in the Burns Park neighborhood – the alley connects Wells Street and Scott Court, running parallel to and between Lincoln Avenue and Martin Place. The porous pavement will allow rainwater to soak through the surface, reducing runoff. Money for the $121,139 contract with Audia Concrete Construction Inc. on the $200,000 project will come from the city’s stormwater capital budget. But that will be repaid as a loan from the State Revolving Fund (SRF) and will include 50% loan forgiveness. The use of stormwater funds on road construction was a practice that was criticized during the public hearing held at the council’s June 20, 2011 meeting, on the increase in stormwater rates.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to approve the Audia Concrete contract.

Water-Related Projects: Rain Garden

The council also approved a $25,440 contract with Conservation Design Forum to design and construct a rain garden on the property at 215-219 W. Kingsley St. The rain garden is meant to alleviate some of the flooding that occurs there during heavy rains. The parcel has drawn the curiosity of Chronicle readers due to its boarded-up house and the prodigious amounts of water that accumulate there during heavy rains. At its Nov. 15, 2010 meeting, the council accepted a FEMA grant that will help pay for the demolition of the structure to aid stormwater remediation efforts.

Originally part of the consent agenda (a set of items that are moved and voted on as a group), the rain garden was pulled out for separate consideration by Sabra Briere (Ward 1). Conversation between Briere and Jerry Hancock, the city’s stormwater and floodplain programs coordinator, revealed that the land parcel would be back before the council for actual purchase. Currently the house is not habitable. FEMA is paying 75% of the cost for demolition.

The idea is that instead of filling the hole back in, the city will use the space to alleviate the flooding, Hancock said. The scale of flooding in the area is greater than the area of the house, but the rain garden should provide some relief for some of it, he said. The timing was such that the grading plan for the rain garden would be provided to the demolition contractor. Hancock said he hoped the demolition would take place this fall.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to approve the contract with Conservation Design Forum.

Water-Related Projects: Level-of-Service Study

The council also approved a level-of-service study for its drinking water distribution system with AECOM. The outcome of the study will be a recommendation for a sustainable level of service for the city’s water distribution system, and determination of how much investment it would take to achieve that level. The study would also help the city decide, for example, which water mains should be replaced first.

The council had tabled the resolution at its May 16, 2011 meeting after amending out a $10,550 contingency in the $208,984 contract. Later in that same meeting, at a session reconvened on May 31, the council took the item up off the table and postponed it until July 5.

In support of the study, city staff prepared additional documentation for the July 5 vote.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to approve the contract with AECOM.

Design Board Review Fee

The council was asked to consider approval of a fee for the city’s new design review process, which is now part of the city code. Projects in Ann Arbor’s downtown area, zoned D-1 and D-2, are now subject to a mandatory process of design review, but compliance with the board’s recommendations is voluntary.

The application fee was proposed at $1,000 – to cover estimated mailing costs of $500 and about five hours of city staff time.

The vote on the fee had been postponed at the council’s June 20 meeting. At that same meeting, the council also had confirmed the nominations for initial membership of the design review board: Tamara Burns, Paul Fontaine, Chester B. Hill, Mary Jukari, Bill Kinley, Richard Mitchell, and Geoffrey M. Perkins.

On July 5, Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) led off discussion by saying she wanted to reduce the fee to $500. It’s a new processs, she said, and most of the review is done by the board, not by staff.

Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) asked Wendy Rampson, head of planning for the city, how the $1,000 cost was determined. Rampson explained that part of the cost arose from mailings to people to invite them to the meeting. She estimated it took an hour of staff time to put together the mailing list. For the first meeting that the board had convened, the staff spent a couple of hours at the meeting, plus subsequent time putting together the design review board’s report and posting it on the web.

Rampson concluded that five hours is fairly realistic. She offered that staff could track that time for the next year. She noted that the fee [having been postponed by the council at its previous meeting] wasn’t passed in time to capture any of the costs associated with the board’s review of The Varsity at Ann Arbor.

Outcome: The design board review fee was set at $500. On the voice voice, Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) dissented, but did not offer any comment at the council table.

Retirement Benefit Technical Changes

Before the council for consideration was final approval to purely technical changes to its ordinance on retiree benefits for non-union employees. For example, the phrase “three years” was revised to read “36 consecutive months.”

During the public hearing on the issue, Thomas Partridge voiced his opposition to the changes, characterizing them as the downgrading of Ann Arbor retiree benefits. He admonished mayor John Hieftje that Hieftje, as a teacher at the University of Michigan, should understand the connection between political and social issues.

Outcome: The council approved the changes without discussion.

Parks Renovation Projects

On the agenda were two items that had been discussed and recommended by the city’s park advisory commission at that body’s June 21, 2011 meeting.

One was a $166,331 contract with ABC Paving Company to renovate the tennis courts at West Park. The second was a $119,700 contract with Construction Solutions Inc. to renovate locker rooms at Veterans Memorial Park pool.

The council did not deliberate on the items, but at the PAC committee meeting, commissioners had questions about the lack of additional bidders on the tennis court project. Only one firm had responded to the city’s request for proposals.

Outcome: The council approved both parks renovation projects.

Closed Session: Land Acquisition

Near the conclusion of the meeting, some confusion unfolded about whether there would be a closed session.

The council had reportedly planned to convene a closed session on the subject of the ward redistricting, citing attorney-client privileged communication. It did not follow through on that possibility. If the council had convened such a closed session, it would have been the first such session convened since being sued by The Chronicle over a similar session in early September 2010.

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) indicated she did not see any closed session listed on the agenda. It was established that a closed session did, in fact, appear on the agenda. However, mayor John Hieftje told assistant city attorney Abigail Elias that he’d received communication from city attorney Stephen Postema (who did not attend the council meeting), to the effect that no closed session would be necessary. But Elias told the mayor that the session was in fact necessary, and that it involved land acquisition.

Land acquisition is within a narrow range of reasons for which a public body may hold part of a meeting out of public view, according to the Michigan Open Meetings Act (OMA). The OMA stipulates that a public body must vote to go into a closed session and that the vote be done in a roll call fashion – i.e. not as a voice vote as one group.

On the roll call vote, Higgins expressed her dissatisfaction by voting against the session, and Sabra Briere (Ward 1) joined her. When Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) added his no vote, the final tally was 6-3, which appeared just barely to satisfy the majority required for action. The council then retreated to their work room.

A few minutes later, a somewhat sheepish group emerged for a revote. The OMA requires that the vote to enter a closed session be at least a 2/3 majority of the members of the entire body, not just a 2/3 majority of those who are present. Although there are certain exceptions to the 2/3 rule for some closed session topics, land acquisition is not one of them.

On the second try, all councilmembers voted to go into the closed session on land acquisition, except for Higgins, who again dissented.

Ann Arbor District Library Update

As part of the scheduled introductions at the start of the council meeting, councilmembers received an update from Josie Parker, director of the Ann Arbor District Library.

Several representatives of the library attended the meeting in addition to Parker. Eli Neiburger, AADL’s associate director for IT and production, was in the audience, as were current board members Nancy Kaplan, Barbara Murphy, Prue Rosenthal, and Jan Barney Newman. Parker also pointed out to councilmembers Don Axon, who was one of the original AADL board members in 1996.

Parker told the council that the information in the presentation was “as upbeat and as positive as it can get.” She began by countering the idea that the Internet had eliminated the need and demand for libraries. Parker said that Ann Arbor proves that claim is patently false. She pointed to Ann Arbor’s recent ranking as the community with the highest per capita circulation: 59 items per capita. The listing was compiled from a 2008 national study by selecting the 549 libraries from that study that serve a population of over 100,000. Ann Arbor also ranked fourth on an Amazon list of most well-read cities. Ann Arbor was one of only two cities on both lists, Parker said. Portland, Ore. was the other one.

Parker emphasized the high number of active library card holders, compared with the total number of households in the community. In the 48103 area code, there are roughly 20,000 active card holders and around 23,000 households. That’s significant, she said, in the context of a system that requires a person to affirmatively obtain at library card – that is, they’re not automatically issued to everyone in the community.

Parker’s update included data on the impact of the library’s Fifth Avenue location on the downtown.

Other highlights of the presentation included the organization’s funding stream, which comes not just from the city of Ann Arbor property taxes. In fiscal year 2010, in addition to the $7,344,364 that the AADL received from Ann Arbor property owners, it also received taxes from Pittsfield Township ($1,849,036), Scio Township ($1,252,179), and Ann Arbor Township ($804,236), as well as other surrounding municipalities.

In 2010, 1,792,526 visits were made to the library’s five branches – 627,196 of them to the downtown location. In 2010, a total of 62,696 visitors attended library events – 23,612 of them at the downtown location. For those downtown events, 79% of attendees arrived to the event by car, compared with 7% by bus, 2% by bicycle and 12% by walking. Of those who drove a car to the event, half parked either at an adjacent surface lot or at the Fourth and William Street structure, and 31% used street parking.

If one-third of all 627,196 visits to the downtown library location are assumed to be made by people who pay to park downtown, then visitors to the downtown library in 2010 generated at least $200,000 in public parking revenue.

The presentation came in the general context of an effort by the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority, at the direction of the Ann Arbor city council, to start leading a public process to evaluate alternative uses for city-owned surface lots in the downtown area. Immediately to the north of the downtown library location is the construction site of an underground parking garage, expected to offer around 640 spaces. Known as the Library Lot, though not owned by the library, the top of the underground parking garage is one of the pieces of land that the public process is meant to address. [Recent Chronicle coverage: "Ann Arbor DDA Continues Planning Prep"]

Responding to Parker’s presentation, Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) noted that she’d mentioned the Internet won’t result in the death of the library. He asked Parker to share with the council what the current mission of the library is, if it’s beyond books. Parker told Hohnke that the mission of the library is to guarantee public access to facilities for life-long learning, and that hasn’t changed. From the AADL website:

Vision Statement

The Ann Arbor District Library provides collections, programs, and leadership to promote the development of literate and informed citizens through open and equal access to cultural, intellectual, recreational, and information resources.

Mission Statement

The existence of the Ann Arbor District Library assures public ownership of print collections, digital resources, and gathering spaces for the citizens of the library district. We are committed to sustaining the value of public library services for the greater Ann Arbor community through the use of traditional and innovative technologies.

Parker pointed to two significant projects the library had undertaken in the past couple of years that have served that mission. First, AADL had agreed to absorb responsibility for the library for the blind to keep it from being eliminated by the county, which previously supported it. The library had also agreed to preserve the old Ann Arbor News archive to preserve the history of the community as reflected in the newspaper. If the library had not done that, she said, the material would be sitting in a warehouse somewhere.

The library’s commitment requires and uses technology, Parker said. The mission is still about literacy and learning – it’s just that there’s another way to achieve those goals. Hohnke asked if there was any discussion between the library and city about opportunities for consolidating services and for providing greater impact for tax dollars. Parker told Hohnke that this is something that former city administrator Roger Fraser was good about – making sure the Ann Arbor District Library was part of those opportunities. That will continue, she said. Parker pointed to some money saved for the city through the library’s collaboration with the city clerk’s office – the library provides space to test voting machines, and serves as a polling place. No one is reading about those kinds of things, she said, but the library does them.

Parker alluded to other services that libraries in other areas provide to their communities, which the AADL might also explore, but said she was not prepared to name them at that time. [.pdf of AADL slide presentation to the Ann Arbor city council]

Communications and Comment

Every city council agenda contains multiple slots for city councilmembers and the city administrator to give updates or make announcements about important issues that are coming before the city council. And every meeting typically includes public commentary on subjects not necessarily on the agenda.

Comm/Comm: DDA – Outside the District Investment

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) expressed his satisfaction that TIF (tax increment finance) reports from the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority had been located and submitted to the city clerk’s office. He’d previously complained that the Ann Arbor DDA had not complied with certain reporting requirements of the state’s DDA statute.

But another issue he’d identified, said Kunselman, was a statement on the state tax commission website, a substantial portion of which he then read aloud. From the statement:

Question: Can a DDA or TIFA plan spend revenue outside of its development area?

Answer: According to state law, the plan may spend revenue only for projects described in the development plan and/or tax increment financing plan, and the projects must be allowable under the law. The revenue must be spent for the benefit of the development area. Revenue of one plan may not be used to pay an obligation or expense of another plan. The State Tax Commission’s policy is that revenue must also be spent on improvements or properties located in the plan’s development area. …

The State Tax Commission may waive this requirement for certain infrastructure improvements made in the development plan that must extend outside the development area’s boundaries.

Kunselman said he was interested in finding out whether the Near North affordable housing project has such a waiver. He alerted his council colleagues that he had requested information on that issue.

Left to right: councilmembers Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2), Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) and Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) before the start of the July 5 meeting.

By way of background, the question of spending TIF dollars outside the DDA district is not novel. The Ann Arbor DDA has its own explicit policy on affordable housing that allows for investment outside the DDA district. A resolution establishing the policy of investing in projects up to 1/4 mile outside the district was approved at the board’s March 4, 2009 board meeting.

When the question of outside-the-boundary investment has been posed at DDA board meetings, the legal position of the board’s legal counsel, Jerry Lax, has been characterized by staff and board members as essentially this: It’s not explicitly proscribed by the state statute. That’s reflected in the DDA renewal plan, which includes explicit reference to spending outside the district in at least two places.

In an effort to accomplish its mission, it is understood that the DDA may elect to participate in important projects outside the DDA District.
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The funds allocated by the DDA are intended to strengthen the downtown area and attract new private investments. This Plan recognizes that solutions to downtown problems (for example, traffic, access, and parking problems) may best be developed by spending funds outside the DDA district.

Comm/Comm: Society in Peril

In the final turn at public commentary, held at the end of the meeting, Thomas Partidge told the council that society is in peril – the mayor and the council have not taken up the question of the immediate danger if Congress fails to come to an agreement on the budget by Aug. 7. Failure by the Congress to adopt a budget would leave a large cross-section of society in peril and at risk for robberies, holdups and murders, he said. Alluding to the city council’s recent approval of licensing and zoning ordinances for medical marijuana, Partridge contended that the city has taken on a campaign to increase drug use. When 911 is called, he claimed, people are too often met with a surly, dismissive response. It leaves the impression that the city does not have a working police department patroling the city.

Comm/Comm: General Disconent

In an earlier turn at public commentary, Thomas Partridge introduced himself as a Washtenaw County and Ann Arbor resident who is an advocate for those being left behind. He said he’s a Democrat dedicated to significant reforms. He supports the recall movement of Gov. Rick Snyder and other members of Snyder’s administration. We should not sit back and go backward in time, he said. The city had suffered undue losses, he said, including in the fire department, the police department, and the civilian work force. As part of the reapportionment of wards, Partridge contended that access to polls for seniors or disabled persons is not taken into consideration.

Comm/Comm: Huron River Day

The mayor handed out a proclamation recognizing Huron River Day on July 17, 2011.

Comm/Comm: Volunteer of the Month

Paul and Tyler Clark were recognized for their efforts in volunteering for the mayor’s annual green fair.

Present: Stephen Rapundalo, Mike Anglin, Margie Teall, Sabra Briere, Sandi Smith, Tony Derezinski, Stephen Kunselman, Marcia Higgins, John Hieftje, Christopher Taylor, Carsten Hohnke.

Absent: Margie Teall, Sandi Smith.

Next regular city council meeting: Monday, July 18, 2011 at 7 p.m. in the city hall’s second-floor council chambers at 301 E. Huron. [confirm date]

The motion was seconded by Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) and was unanimously approved for reconsideration. But the re-vote yielded the same result as the vote on June 20, with the council approving the contract on an 8-1 vote. Anglin’s was the dissenting vote.

The project includes moving and replacing an 825-foot, 30-year-old section of 60-inch sanitary sewer pipe. It also includes construction of 525 feet of 24-inch stormwater pipe, as well as construction of 925 feet of new 12-inch water main for service to Fuller Pool. The project will be completed in two phases, the second of which is planned for 2013.

Anglin’s effort to reconsider the motion was based on criticism that the work is being undertaken only because of the planned Fuller Road Station (FRS) in the area – a project  to which he has expressed opposition. [Recent Chronicle coverage of that project: "PAC Gets Update on Fuller Road Station"]

Anglin’s effort came in the context of a memo written to the council by Dietrich Bergmann, a transportation planning engineer, who participated in a 2008 University of Michigan Sustainable Mobility & Accessibility Research & Transformation (SMART) conference on the transportation economy. The memo is critical of several aspects of the proposed sewer work, including the idea that 30 years is old for a sanitary sewer: “The city staff has not provided any evidence that the sanitary drain at the site should be moved, absent going forward with the FRS project. The 30-year age issue makes little sense. I suspect that most sanitary sewers in Ann Arbor are older.” [.pdf of Dietrich Bergmann memo]

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