Project Grow site at Greenview last Sunday. Near the end of the growing season, gardeners were starting to clear out cages and wire, preparing the plots for the fall tilling. (Photo by the writer.)

At the Project Grow annual meeting, held on Oct. 8 at the Leslie Science Center, the same contentious issue surfaced as at last year’s meeting: Should the organic gardening nonprofit add members to its board or not?

Last year the answer was yes: Kirk Jones and Royer Held were voted onto the board by the members present at the meeting. [Chronicle coverage: "Project Grow Board Expands"]

This year was no different. In addition to re-electing Damaris Suffalko as a continuing board member, members elected Andrew Comai, David Corsa and Alice Telesnitsky as additions.

The ease with which board members can be added by a member vote is a function of Project Grow’s incorporation as a 501(c)3 membership organization as contrasted with a 501(c)3 directorship organization.

And although the meeting’s written agenda indicated board president Devon Akmon as a candidate for re-election to the board, he withdrew his name in the course of the meeting, which an attendee aptly summarized at one point by saying, “It feels very tense in here.”

The departure of Akmon from the board prompted board member Catherine Riseng to caution the roughly 40 people in the room: “We’re going to miss his skills more than you can possibly realize.”  

The tension at the Project Grow annual meeting was driven both by philosophical differences on the board about appropriate strategies for expanding that body and as well as the logistics of how some green half-sheets of paper were distributed during the meeting. The green sheets listed out a the slate of candidates – Suffalko, Comai, Corsa, and Telesnitsky – and were passed around before the executive director of Project Grow, Melissa Kesterson, had finished her presentation on the organization’s accomplishments over the last year.

The move was characterized later during the discussion by one attendee as “slightly rude.” For her part, when the slate was distributed, Kesterson remarked: “I’m feeling a little distracted. I was feeling good about what we’d done and I thought other people did, too.”

Annual Status Report

Among the achievements for the past year that Kesterson ticked through at the meeting were the establishment of three new gardening sites: Northside Park, Wines Elementary, and Hunt Park. [Chronicle coverage of a meeting to plan the Hunt Park garden: "Project Grow Gardens at Hunt Park?"]

And six existing gardens had been expanded to create 20 additional plots. A plot measures roughly 25 x 30 feet. Eeking out an extra plot here and there, plus the new gardening sites, meant that more than 300 plots were gardened by a total of over 1,300 people, Kesterson reported. She explained that there are  groups who garden some of the plots, and some of the plots are gardened by multi-member households.

The demand for gardening space is high: There were 65 applicants for garden plots who could not be accommodated this year.

Kesterson also introduced a collaboration between Avalon Housing and Project Grow to bring gardening to Avalon residents in the form of raised bed gardens – built of over 24,000 pounds of stone block donated by Fendt Builder’s Supply. The venture is called Edible Avalon, and is funded  by the Ann Arbor Area Community Foundation with a grant made jointly to Food Gatherers and other community-based organizations.

Kesterson also highlighted Go! Gardening, an experiential school gardening program that operates at area elementary schools. Project Grow staff help teachers coordinate activities, lessons and schedules so students get the most out of their time in the garden, with lessons drawing on Grade Level Content Expectations (GLCEs).

The 2008 financial picture showed $57,769 in income against $60,864 in revenue for a net loss for the year of $3,095.  The financial statement offered increases in water costs at the gardening sites, as well as rain during a fundraiser as reasons for the shortfall. Cash reserves were used to cover the loss.

The "Back to our Roots!" slate of Project Grow board candidates.

Division on the Board

As Kesterson’s presentation blended into the discussion of board elections when the half sheets of green paper were distributed, there was some confusion as to whether the “Back to our Roots!” slate was a ballot. It was not.

Early in the discussion, which Akmon led as board president, he indicated he was withdrawing his name from consideration for re-election. He would later during the meeting attribute that decision to the distribution of a slate of candidates – especially its premature distribution – characterizing it as indicative of an “activist board,” which he said he considered to be “toxic.”

Akmon described how the board had sought advice from three different consultants. Among them was Sabra Briere, who represents Ward 1 on city council, and who earlier this year argued the case unsuccessfully to her council colleagues that Project Grow should be allocated a $7,000 grant from the city in its FY 2010 budget.

The other two consultants, Akmon said, were Jim Frenza, who’s a past president of Ann Arbor’s Hands-On Museum, and Diana Kern, of the NEW Center (Nonprofit Enterprise at Work). What the board had heard from all three consultants, he said, was that Project Grow should be planful in expanding its board. The nonprofit should identify the skills of existing board members, and figure out what skills were missing, then recruit people with those skills – as opposed to allowing the board to grow by adding people who had a willingness to serve.

It was board members Devon Akmon, Joan Bulmer and Catherine Riseng who seemed to be more interested in a systematic and planned growth of the board, as contrasted with Held, Jones, and Suffalko, who wanted to open the board to those willing to serve.

In the end, it’s Project Grow members who must vote on the issue, and ultimately, the argument that seemed to carry the day was the fact that the Project Grow bylaws allow up to 15 board members. With the net increase of two members, they’d still have only eight board members – plenty of room to expand in whatever planful way the board might desire. The Chronicle recorded a show-of-hands tally of 33 yes, 1 no, and 6 abstentions to elect the green slate of candidates as a block.

How Does an Organization Organize Itself?

The discussion at the Project Grow annual meeting was couched in terms of whether the nonprofit should be member-driven or not – although Akmon sketched out the possibility of a member-driven organization that still grew its board systematically, facilitated through a nominating committee, for example.

In terms of nonprofit organizational structure, the power that the members of Project Grow have within the 501(c)3 classification derives from the way it was incorporated – as a membership organization. That contrasts with a younger gardening nonprofit, Ypsilanti-based Growing Hope, which was incorporated as a directorship. Growing Hope executive director Amanda Edmonds emailed The Chronicle with the clarification: “We’re directorship-incorporated. When we started we didn’t have anything that would really define a membership.”

Membership organizations, of course, need not be 501(c)3 nonprofits. Think cooperatives. At the last meeting of the Ann Arbor city council, a proclamation of October as “Co-op Month” was presented to Eric Lipson, who’s general manager of the Inter-Cooperative Council, based in Ann Arbor.

Between now and the next annual Project Grow meeting, one measure of how effective the organization has been will be how many of the 65 applicants who did not get gardening plots last year will be provided with a plot in the summer of 2010.

[Editor's note: The Chronicle gardens with Project Grow at the Greenview site. We specialize in potatoes. The potato harvest is donated to Food Gatherers, in part because the favorite vegetable of Food Gatherers executive director, Eileen Spring, is the potato.]

Marianne Rzepka

When Royer Held decides which tomatoes to plant in his garden each year, he doesn’t look through seed catalogs. He simply sorts through a collection of plastic bags that hold his own private stash of tomatoes-to-be.

He’s a seed-saver, cleaning and saving seeds from his own stock of plants and trading with others who have varieties he’d like to try. It’s his way of saving the flavorful tomatoes he loves and maybe even developing a new strain by working with generations of hybrids.

“Seed-saving is the ultimate source of local food,” says Held, a computer programmer who’s been involved in gardening since he was a child.

Held’s slightly disheveled garden at Greenview Park – one of the Project Grow gardens there – is a library of tomato genetics, but with wood-and-wire frames in the place of shelves, and instead of handing you a volume to read, he might give you a tomato to taste – maybe a Lollipop cherry tomato or a sausage-shaped Pirkstine Orange.

Held’s efforts go back to the time when farmers saved seeds from their gardens, developing regional varieties of tomatoes with resistance to local diseases. When seed companies began to sprout, representatives traveled around the country picking up promising tomato lines and developing new hybrids.

Royer Held, left, at a Sept. 12 HomeGrown Festival tomato tasting. (Photo by the writer.)

After years of saving and trading seeds, Held is growing genetically sturdy heirloom tomatoes – like Olga’s Yellow Round Chicken – in his 25-by-30-foot plot, as well as a number of hybrids that can result in any number of next-generation variations. A tomato that ripens as green one year, might produce seeds with recessive color genes that grow red or brown or yellow, white or pink fruit the next year. He’s even gotten all those colors from the same generation of tomatoes.

Held got started years ago when he and Marcella Trautmann started planting tomatoes in the Project Grow garden at Catholic Social Services at the corner of Packard Street and Golfside Drive. They must have put in about 200 tomatoes on their plot there, says Trautmann, who also is a walking encyclopedia of tomato information.

Currently, she has a vegetable garden at County Farm Park, along with a separate plot for her tomato crop, which this year includes 70 varieties.

Held is growing only 24 tomato varieties this year; last year, he had 46. One year, there were 100, he says, but he had to make some room for other vegetables, like potatoes – which developed into another seed-saving project.

Each season, Held tries to have a garden that includes tomatoes of every stripe, including cherry, beefsteak, oxheart and salad varieties, with all the shapes and colors that tomato leaves come in. This past season, with its wet weather and cool nights, hasn’t been the greatest for tomatoes. Held says the tomatoes that have done the best in his garden are from more northern climes, such as Manx Marvel, from the Isle of Man, which held up well.

Though the tomato is a New World vegetable, it’s become quite global. What would Italian cuisine be without the tomato?

But different cultures have developed their own tomato varieties – Held’s got a delicious Couer de Boeuf from France and a Canestrino DiLucca from Italy. Still, he’s seen American heirloom names pop up in a number of counties, including during a trip to France last year when he found one woman selling heirloom seeds like Brandywine and Green Zebra.

Besides saving seeds from his own garden, Held also trades with other gardeners through the Seed Savers Exchange in Decorah, Iowa, a nonprofit group dedicated to the preservation of heirloom plant varieties.

Saving Seeds: A Tutorial

If you’ve run into some tasty tomatoes and want to try saving some of the seeds for next year, time is running out with the winding down of the season. Keep in mind that the seeds of hybrid tomatoes won’t produce the same fruits, so save the seeds of heirloom tomatoes, which will be genetically true to their parent plants.

Royer Held at his Project Grow garden, where he grows heirloom tomatoes. (Photo by the writer.)

Some experts recommend soaking the seeds in water, a method to help get rid of some plant diseases. This involves soaking the seeds in water until a smelly mold forms in two to four days. Scrape off the mold and rinse the seeds.

Held simply takes the seeds he wants to save and washes them through a screen to wash off the gel that encases them and inhibits germination.

In either method, when the seeds are clean, let them dry completely. Though Held stores them in plastic bags, he says paper is fine, too. He writes a description of the tomatoes on each bag, including the color and dimensions of the fruit, along with a description of the taste.

Held says he likes a tomato taste that balances the acids and sugars, as well as has a creamy texture. It’s tough for him to choose a favorite, though this year he’s partial to Orange Russian 117, a bicolor oxheart variety.

Trautmann also ponders the question of her favorite tomato. How a tomato tastes can change year to year depending on weather and soil, she says. In general, says Trautmann, “I like a tomato with flavor.”

Both she and Held are working on stabilizing a strain of the hybrid Old Brooks. Held is developing a yellow tomato called Gold Brooks; Trautmann is looking at a variety she calls Tropical Brooks that she says tastes a little salty.

Held is trying to see if he can develop a green oxheart tomato, but that requires time, patience and a working knowledge of botany. In an open air garden, it’s difficult to find the time and patience to pollinate tomato flowers with pollen from a specific plant.

The trick is all in the timing, Held says, and takes a skill that natural pollinators have perfected.

Says Held: “I’m a terrible bee.” 

About the writer: Marianne Rzepka, former reporter for the Ann Arbor News and Detroit Free Press, is a Master Gardener who lives in Ann Arbor and thinks it’s fun to turn the compost pile.

Doodle by city council meeting audience member showing comparison of Project Grow versus police discussion. "Time spent on Project Grow – $7,000; On cops – $6.8 million."

Ann Arbor City Council Meeting (May 18, 2009): Ann Arbor’s city council approved the budget for fiscal year 2010 at its Monday meeting, spending little time discussing a separate resolution key to that budget, which approved an early-retirement inducement for police officers involving a one-time payment of around $6 million – depending on how many officers take advantage of the incentive.

The fact of the lengthy discussion over much smaller items was acknowledged around the council table, with councilmember Sandi Smith (Ward 1) making a note of it when she made an unsuccessful bid to eliminate or delay the introduction of parking meters into near-downtown residential neighborhoods. Smith was comparing the relatively short discussion of parking meters (involving potential additional revenues of $380,000) to the previous deliberations on Project Grow’s funding. And in the course of the more than 45-minute deliberations on Project Grow’s $7,000 grant, Sabra Briere (Ward 1) noted: “The least expensive ones are the ones we fight the hardest over.” Briere lost her fight for the community gardening nonprofit.

The approved budget did include amendments to allocate funds for the Leslie Science and Nature Center. Also related to the budget, the two resolutions to approve fee adjustments for the community services and public services areas were approved with no deliberations by council, leaving the issues raised at the previous night’s caucus by the chair of the market commission undiscussed publicly.

In other budget business, city council passed a resolution to create a taskforce to study options for the Ann Arbor Senior Center, which is slated for closure under the FY 2011 budget plan (i.e., not the budget approved by council at this meeting).

Council also approved an extension to the purchase-option agreement with Village Green for the First and Washington parcel, gave final approval to a completely new liquor ordinance, approved increased water/sewer rates, approved grant applications for multiple properties under the greenbelt program, and asked planning commission to review the C3 zoning regulations regarding the kind of temporary outdoor sales conducted in previous years at the Westgate farmers market.

The funding of the north-south connector study was again postponed, pending coordination with the Downtown Development Authority.

Leigh Greden (Ward 3) is not testing the air currents in city hall chambers. He's explaining why he thinks the early retirement option for police makes good budget sense.

Police Early Retirement Inducement

Background: The police department reduction proposed in the FY 2010 budget would take away a total of 27 full-time employees, with 16 of those (6 command and 10 patrol) sworn officer positions.

As a strategy to avoid laying off personnel, on Monday night city council gave final approval to a revision to the city’s general retirement policy that provides an inducement for police department employees to retire early.

A summary of the general retirement policy, as contrasted with the revision made for police officers, is provided in the actuarial evaluation of the proposed change that was made by the city’s consultant, Gabriel, Roeder, Smith & Company:

PRESENT PROVISIONS: General members are eligible for regular retirement (unreduced pension) at age 50 with 25 years of service, or age 60 with 5 years of service. Police members are eligible for regular retirement (unreduced pension) at 25 years of service, or age 55 with 5 years of service. General and Police members are eligible for early retirement (reduced pension) at age 50 with 20 years of service.

PROPOSED PROVISIONS:  … Members in COAM or AAPOA meeting the age requirement (if any) and within two years of meeting the service retirement conditions (unreduced or reduced) by June 30, 2009 are granted 2 additional years of benefit and eligibility service if they retire on or before June 30, 2009.

In addition to granting two years of service to members of the Command Officers Association of Michigan and the Ann Arbor Police Officers Association, the early-out program authorized by city council allows members of those unions to purchase up to one year of service. The GRS&C summary of the police department’s personnel, based on information provided by the city, is as follows:

Number of active members: 149
Total payroll:            $11,448,056
Average age:              41.3 years
Average service:          14.7 years
Average annual pay:       $76,833
Eligible active members:  32 (+2 covered by AAPOA outside police department)
Payroll of eligibles:     $2,689,706

-

The analysis of the maximum cost, if all eligible members were to take advantage of the offer, is as follows: $3.5 million (pension), $1.6 million (voluntary employment benefit association – VEBA), $1.6 million (leave payouts), for a total of  $6.7 million. That amount would be taken from the city’s reserve fund, which is projected at $15.2 million at FY 2009 – or 18% of expenditures.

That amount  excludes the settlement of the Pfizer tax appeal, which reflects a potential liability of $0.9 million, as well as the Act 312 additional arbitration costs of $0.6 million that council authorized at its May 4, 2009 meeting. If all that actual cost, plus all the potential costs, are calculated in, reserves could be reduced to $7.6 million (9% of expenditures).

Projected operating cost savings, based on planned reductions of 18 FTEs excluding vacancies: FY 2010, $1.6 million;  FY 2011, $1.9 million; FY 2012, $1.9 million; FY 2013, $2.0 million.

Budget Questions Raised During Public Commentary: Two speakers during the public hearing on the revision to the city’s employees’ retirement system raised questions about the financial wisdom of the incentive program. Karen Sidney pointed out that for around $600,000 the civic band, Project Grow, the historic district consultant, plus gaps in human services funding could be covered, leaving around $6 million (from the maximum cost of the early-retirement program) that could be spent in part to pay police officers to do police work for two years, after which time they could retire at no extra cost to the city.

John Floyd echoed the same sentiment, saying that one option would be not to spend the cash from the city’s reserve upfront, and wait to see what ordinary attrition brought over the next two years – then use cash for an early retirement program if necessary. Floyd reasoned that if early retirement buyouts were necessary at that point, then it would be less costly in cash terms than now, because less incentive [in terms of years of service credit] would be required to induce officers to retire. Floyd concluded his brief remarks with a request: “I’d like to see the analysis.”

Deliberations: In terms of the analysis that Floyd requested, during deliberations Leigh Greden (Ward 3), who serves on council’s budget and labor committee [along with Margie Teall (Ward 4), Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) and John Hieftje (mayor)], offered the observation that with an attrition-based approach, there was no guarantee that anyone would retire. Officers needed some incentive to retire, Greden said.

In his other remarks on the issue, Greden rejected the notion that money should be taken from cash reserves to pay for operating expenses [like Project Grow or the historic district consultant], saying that a government using such a strategy would wind up bankrupt. He also stressed the fact that the general retirement program in place for the city was sound – it saves the city around $10 million a year, he said.  What made the enhancement being offered to police officers even better, Greden said, was the fact that it targeted middle management positions, while leaving patrol strength unchanged.

After Hieftje had brought police chief Barnett Jones to the podium to recount some of the history of crime rates and policing in Ann Arbor, Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) took the opportunity to clarify with Jones how the elimination of the downtown beat  [which currently consists of six officers, who walk or bicycle the downtown area on a two-at-a-time basis] would affect the ability of Ann Arbor’s police force to address the “broken window theory” in downtown. Otherwise put: How would the elimination of foot and bicycle beat cops downtown affect the AAPD’s ability to keep downtown from getting out of hand?

Taylor’s clarification could be seen as an attempt to address the concerns of Newcombe Clark, president of the board of the Main Street Area Association and downtown resident, who had spoken during public comment on the issue. Clark reported that even with an assigned downtown police beat, when bars let out around 2:30 a.m., downtown Ann Arbor was something akin to Beyond Thunderdome.

In response to Taylor’s query on the matter, Jones explained that the total number of uniforms downtown would actually increase.  Officers are required to spend one hour every day outside of their cars – partly to conserve fuel, Jones said. And during these out-of-car breaks, they’d be walking around downtown. Sandi Smith (Ward 1) clarified that by “break” Jones didn’t mean sitting in a cafe eating lunch. Jones also clarified for Smith that the new way of organizing the policing of downtown was not a break from the notion of “community policing.”

Although the subject didn’t receive much attention during the council meeting, at the previous week’s budget work session Jones had explained that part of the out-of-car time would be used to write parking tickets. That would compensate for the reduction in community standards officers, who are specfically dedicated to ticket writing.

On the subject of ticket writing, during public commentary general time, Jim Williams of the Local 369 AFSCME union objected to the possible transfer of job activity [here, ticket writing] from one bargaining unit to another.

After hearing Jones’ explanation of the reorganization of policing in downtown, Taylor offered Jones a cheerful: “Go get’em!”

Budget Amendments

The main event of the evening – deliberations on the city’s FY 2010 budget – left little unchanged from city administrator Roger Fraser’s proposed budget. What did change in the budget centered mostly around the Leslie Science and Nature Center. [electronic packet of amendments]

Leslie Science and Nature Center: Amendments #1 and #2 dealt with reallocating money to the nature center – which could have been expected, based on the budget work session.

At that session, Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) had queried Jayne Miller, director of community services, about the implications of eliminating the historic district consultant for the city one year earlier than originally planned. Taylor clarified, as he did at the budget work session, that the consultancy in question was not the city staff position currently held by planner Jill Thatcher, who has expertise in historic conservation.

Amendment #1, which was passed unanimously, reallocated the $24,000 alloted to the historic district consultant (whose job was described at the budget work session as largely completed) to fund the Leslie Science and Nature Center. That left the center short of the $28,350 council wanted to allocate to it based on the previous agreement that had been struck with the center in spinning it off from the city to become an independent entity.

Amendment #2, which was also passed unanimously, allocated the remaining $4,350 from the general fund reserves – something that violated a basic principle set forth by Leigh Greden (Ward 3). That principle was that any additional costs needed to be balanced by an alternate revenue source. In the case of Leslie, Greden introduced five points that convinced him the violation of the basic principle was worth it:

1. It’s not a great deal of money.
2. There’s an agreement with Leslie establishing an expectation.
3. The $28,350 is a 10% reduction from 2009 levels.
4. The agreement with Leslie is designed to transition the center to independence.
5. The center needs the money.

LDFA: Amendments #4, #5, and #6 dealt with the Local Development Finance Authority. They were all sponsored by Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) and Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2). It was left to Higgins to provide the explanations. Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) explained the absence of his Ward 2 cohort by reporting that Rapundalo was attending the Bio International Convention. In broad strokes, he’s there in his capacity as president of MichBio to represent Michigan as a fertile place for biotech companies to locate and grow. Otherwise put, he’s engaged in economic development activity outside the area that is meant to benefit from that activity.

It’s precisely this geographic distinction that’s addressed by Amendment #6.  The basic idea is that it’s meant to enforce the idea of not spending money that benefits areas outside the geographic area of tax capture of the LDFA. The resolved clause reads:

Resolved, The SmartZone LDFA expenditure budget for Marketing be limited to funding [emphasis added] activities within the geographic boundaries of the Ann Arbor portion of the LDFA, specifically promoting the Business Accelerator.

The language of the amendment caught the attention of Christopher Taylor. He asked if  a billboard outside the district promoting an activity inside the district would count. Based on Higgins’ responses, it seemed to Taylor that the intent was that such a billboard would be okay. That being the case, Taylor suggested the resolution in its current form didn’t reflect that intent – the substitution of the word “promoting” for “funding” would capture the intent, he said.

Though the discussion seemed at that point on the verge of resolution, it foundered on the question of whether the resolution was necessary at all, because it was already reflected in either the founding documents of LDFA or else the contract between the economic development agency Ann Arbor SPARK and the LDFA. Skip Simms of SPARK and Tom Crawford, the city’s CFO (who sits on the LDFA board in an ex officio capacity) offered explanations involving a desire to improve clarity, something that Hieftje suggested had not been achieved by the resolution – because council itself had not been able to understand what the resolution meant. Higgins withdrew the amendment, but will perhaps bring it back as a standalone resolution in the coming weeks.

The other LDFA-related amendments could also come before council in another few weeks, in order to restore the elements of the LDFA budget that they eliminated. Amendment #4 eliminated $25,000 worth of funding for the angel investment group. Higgins reported that assistant city attorney Mary Fales had verified the legality of such support, but Higgins wanted to remove it for now and bring it back in four weeks or so. That amendment passed.

Amendment #4 could also be back before council in a few weeks to have $50,000 worth of funding restored for an LDFA staff position – the amendment cut the proposed new position. Because the position listed in the budget did not yet have a job description, for now council agreed it should come out of the budget. The initial rationale offered was that there was “incomplete justification for the position.” Taylor initially said he was uncomfortable voting for it, saying that the description “‘incomplete justification’ is itself incomplete.” It was Hohnke who brought out the fact that there was as yet no job description. It was enough to bring Taylor on board.

The saved money, perhaps temporarily so, will go to the LDFA reserve fund, which is separate from the city’s budget.

Related to the LDFA budget amendments – via its contractor, SPARK – was Amendment #8, which allocated an additional $25,000 from the prior year’s economic development fund balance [created in order to pay for Google's parking spaces] to provide SPARK with discretionary funding to promote  economic development in the Ann Arbor area. That passed unanimously.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) raises his hand to ask for the floor to say his piece on Project Grow. Hohnke did not vote for the organization's funding, expressing a broader vision for larger-scale community gardening.

Project Grow: The discussion was thorough on Amendment #7, to allocate $7,000 from the general fund park operations budget for contracted services to Project Grow instead. In the end it did not win approval. Its sponsor, Sabra Briere, fought hard for it, citing a citizen survey of her constituents that showed strong support for the program, even among respondents who did not garden with the nonprofit.  Hohnke had a larger vision in mind that involved the city providing infrastructure elements, but not cash. Greden didn’t want to accept the “ruffles” around the edges of the parks that Sue McCormick, director of public services for the city, described as possible when the contracted services budget for light trimming was reduced.

After first indicating his opposition to funding Project Grow, Taylor voted for it. In opposition, he had cited his understanding that Project Grow had applied for and been rejected in the human services funding competition. Briere clarified that Project Grow had not applied as a part of that set of allocations. But Taylor’s vote was not enough.

Parking Meters: There was a late amendment brought forward by Sandi Smith (Ward 1), which required a brief recess in order to formulate, to forestall the implementation of the city’s plan to introduce parking meters into residential areas in the near downtown area. Confusion prevailed for much of the discussion. Smith herself apologized for what she described as the “circus-like” manner in which the resolution was introduced.

Part of the plan at one point seemed to be for the Downtown Development Authority to guarantee any lost revenues by a possible delay in deploying the city’s meters. Higgins expressed concern: While Smith does serve on the DDA board, she’s not in a position to speak for DDA funds, and the council should not commit to a proposal if the DDA has not voted on the issue. [Editorial Aside: That will strike members of the DDA board as ironic, given the assumption of an extra $2 million in the city's FY 2011 budget plan paid by the DDA – which the DDA has not voted on. And yes, on the council side, the quick reply will be that it's just the budget plan, that's why we just call it the budget plan, not the budget, and there's time to sort it all out before FY 2011 decision time.]

Mike Bergren, with field operations at the city, assured council that there would be kiosks (instead of meters) deployed as appopriate to the DDA’s rollout of their kiosks.

Project Already Paid For: The first amendment proposed was actually Amendment #3 in the packet, and it was, as its sponsor, Leigh Greden (Ward 3) put it, “an easy one.” It involved eliminating $85,000 from the general fund community services area administration budget for FY 2010, because the project for which the money had been allocated had already been paid for out of FY 2009′s budget – through a resolution that very same evening.  That project was a capital and operating needs assessment for the housing commission.

Present: Sabra Briere, Sandi Smith, Tony Derezinski, Leigh Greden, Christopher Taylor, Margie Teall, Marcia Higgins, Carsten Hohnke, John Hieftje.

Absent: Stephen Rapundalo, Mike Anglin.

Next Council Meeting: Monday, June 1, 2009 at 7 p.m. in council chambers, 2nd floor of the Guy C. Larcom, Jr. Municipal Building, 100 N. Fifth Ave. [confirm date]

A five-year-old child who's been exposed to the Leslie Science and Nature Center will be able to identify the type of bird, and explain its sleeping habits – though perhaps not recognize that this one is made of plastic.

Ann Arbor City Council Meeting, Part I (May 4, 2009): Despite assurances from Mayor John Hieftje that he’d be surprised if Mack pool and Leslie Science Center weren’t funded, city council heard from several advocates of those facilities Monday night, along with supporters of Project Grow and the senior center.

Audible through the expressions of support for programs facing cuts was also a call for the council to focus attention on bigger ticket items. One of those bigger ticket items was a mediator-mandated agreement with the Ann Arbor Police Officers Association union, which council was constrained by state law to approve – an agreement that will cost the city about $650,000 more than it had anticipated. Another was approval of the early retirement option for police officers as a part of the employees retirement system, which the city is offering instead of mandatory layoffs.

Still another big ticket item surfaced in the form of the approval of an application for funding of the East Stadium bridge reconstruction – though it’s likely to be paid by federal tax dollars. The bridge fit into the general theme of transportation at the meeting, which showed up in the form of an agenda item authorizing a study for a north-south intra-city connector (which was postponed), as well as a lengthy discussion on the Ann Arbor transportation plan update, which was ultimately adopted, despite some sentiment for postponing it. [These items are reported in detail in Part II of our meeting coverage here.]

In other business, council approved two agreements with the public schools for operation of recreation facilities, gave initial approval to a revamped liquor licensing code for the city, and approved an amendment to the partnership agreement between the city and the Leslie Science and Nature Center. [This last accounts for the last word in the headline.]

Early Retirement for Police Officers

Karen Sidney: Speaking during public commentary reserved time, Sidney began by describing the proposed early retirement plan [to reduce positions in the police department starting in FY 2010 and with the fire department in FY 2011] as fiscally irresponsible. Retirement benefits in the system, she said, are already more expensive than the public can afford. She said everyone would like to be able to retire when they’re 40 years old and get lifetime health insurance for their families at a cost of only $500 per year. For University of Michigan employees, who’ve seen their TIAA-CREF accounts fall in value, a pension at 60% of one’s salary would look great. She said that it’s even better if you can work angles in the system with overtime, vacation, and sick time to improve on the 60%. She alluded to a case a few years ago when some firefighters achieved a pension bigger than their base salary. She suggested that the five councilmembers [on the Budget and Labor committee: Hieftje, Margie Teall, Marcia Higgins, Leigh Greden, Stephen Rapundalo] could use layoffs at zero cost to the city to reduce the police force, but said it would be embarrassing to have a public ruckus about police layoffs while the city is building a new police/courts building.

Kyle Mazurek: [Mazurek's comments are included in this part of the meeting report because of item (4) below.] Mazurek spoke during the public hearing on the budget, identifying himself as the vice president for government affairs of the Ann Arbor Area Chamber of Commerce. He alluded to an email he’d sent to councilmembers from which he pulled some highlights. The highlights from the letter itself include one addressing the city’s plan to offer early retirement to police officers as well as a general characterization of employee benefits as “unsustainable”:

1. concern that commercial property values have fallen further than the city has forecasted.
2. objection to the proposal to eliminate downtown area foot and bicycle police patrols.
3. concern about the city’s jeopardizing the Downtown Development Authority’s independence by asking the DDA for monies to cover city expenses.
4. costs associated with the one-time payout to cover retirement system contributions for early retirements would place the city general fund reserve target range of 12% to 15% at risk.
5. application of a 4% fee on water/sewer services runs counter to the notion of demonstrated need as defined by actual cost of providing service.
6. elimination of community standards officers will result in diminished ticketing capacity and a corresponding decline in ticketing revenue with the additional loss of crime deterrent.

While allowing that the quality and transparency of proposed budget data and information had improved, the chamber’s letter urges the city to explore opportunities for “earlier public presentation of the proposed budget thus affording greater public scrutiny and dialogue with regard to it.”

Resolution: Add to the Early Retirement Option for Police Officers

A key element in the resolution provided for the city to

provide to eligible employees two (2) years of service credit (as determined in accordance with Section 1:561(a) of the Pension Ordinance), which will be applicable to eligibility for retirement, as well as calculation of pension benefits.

Officers also have the option of purchasing up to a year of service credit.

Councilmember Sandi Smith asked for some clarification. City administrator Roger Fraser allowed that Karen Sidney’s characterization of the possibility of retiring at a higher rate of compensation than their base salary would have been possible eight years ago, but was no longer the case. He said that the only real benefit to the deal was being able to retire early.

Outcome: Passed unanimously.

Resolution: Approve the Ann Arbor Police Officers Association Collective Bargaining Agreement

The state of Michigan’s Act 312 outlines requirements for compulsory arbitration of labor disputes for police and fire departments. The Ann Arbor Police Officers Association exercised its right to arbitration, which resulted in

Effective April 1, 2009, a redesigned health care plan which adds deductibles of $250.00 single and $500.00 family per year with increased co-payments for office visits and chiropractic services and cost differentiation between brand and generic drugs with mandatory mail order for maintenance drugs and a pro-rated $500.00 HRA deposit for the 2008-2009 contract year for each active employee, as well as a $500.00 per member health care bonus for low health care utilization for the July 1, 2006-June 30, 2007 period;

• A 2.5% wage increase, effective July 1, 2006;
• A 1.75% wage increase effective July 1, 2007;
• A 1.25% wage increase effective January 1, 2008;
• A 3.0% wage increase effective July 1, 2008;
• Effective February 24, 2009, a wage structure change will be made to increase the educational bonus for members who have obtained an associate’s degree;
• A reduction in certain double time overtime payments to time and one half;

The city has included $927,000 in the fiscal 2009 general fund budget for pay contingencies, but the cost of the contract settlement for the three-year period is expected “not to exceed $1.6 million.” The resolution considered by city council on Monday appropriated an additional $673,000 from the general fund reserve to cover the cost of the settlement.

In deliberations, Leigh Greden (Ward 3), who sits on the budget and labor committee (along with Hieftje, Higgins, Rapundalo, and Teall) expressed his dissatisfaction with Act 312 itself, saying that the process needs to be changed at the state level “to reflect local financial realities.” Mike Anglin (Ward 5) asked if there was any possibility of accepting “some but not all” of the agreement mandated by the arbitrator. The answer from city attorney, Stephen Postema, was no.

Outcome: The collective bargaining agreement was passed unanimously.

Budget (General)

While much of the public commentary on Monday night addressed specific programs, some of it address more general issues, or else focused on general principles using specific examples to illustrate.

Paul Bancel: Bancel said that the Community Television Network was an underutilized professional organization. He suggested that when councilmembers looked at the budget, they’d see $1.5 million for allocation by the charter to community television. “It’s up to you to make it relevant,” he said. With the demise of the Ann Arbor News, he said, there was an opportunity to upgrade CTN to make it a professional organization that brings the community the most relevant and up-to-date news. He named three organizations not currently shown on CTN: the Downtown Development Authority; Ann Arbor District Library; and the Ann Arbor Public Art Commission. [The DDA board meetings are now starting to be videotaped with equipment installed at DDA offices for later airing on CTN. The April meeting's taping had issues with sound quality. No word yet on how the May taping went.]

Karen Sidney: Speaking during the public hearing on the budget, Sidney noted that the city had a $350 million budget. But most of the discussion, she said, will be about a few hundred thousand dollars of cuts to popular programs. What about the big ticket items, she asked? Why are safety services positions down more that others? Based on peak employment figures in 2001, the police department is down 26%, fire department is down 37%, and other departments except for the city attorney’s office and the IT department are down 24%. The attorney’s office and IT department have more employees than in 2001, she said. Why? she wondered. The benefits tax millage in 2001 paid more than 100% of the cost of retirement benefits, she pointed out. Last year it paid less than half the cost of retirement benefits. By 2014, she said, it will pay for only 25% of the cost. To make up that gap with increased taxes would require a homeowner with $100,000 in taxable value to pay an extra $600 a year in taxes. Alternatively, she said, we could eliminate the police department. Or we could sell city property. She wondered if the map included in the city’s budget presentation – which depicted all the tax exempt properties in the city – was the beginning of a PR campaign to sell city parks. [Note: The letter sent by the Ann Arbor Area Chamber of Commerce to council outlining its position on the budget proposal includes the sentence: "The Chamber believes that the City is well positioned to realize significant revenue generation through policies promoting the sale of City owned land, as well as greater private development." cf. Kyle Mazurek's turn during the public hearing.]

Jim Mogensen: Mogensen said that he wasn’t enough of a gardener to know whether it was perennial or annual, but there were a number of things that kept on coming up over and over again as possibilities for cutting: the civic band, Project Grow, Mack pool, and similar programs. The reason for that, he said, was that they’re funded through the budget, but there’s nobody really in charge of them. Mogensen said it wasn’t individual programs that he was responding to, but rather the structure of the budget. He compared the budget to a movie set where there are a lot of buildings but nothing behind the facades. He drew an analogy to football: In Ann Arbor, you fake left and run right! We have a lot of things in place to make it appear that we’re working on things, Mogensen said, but the budget is really pretty thin.

Glenn Thompson: Speaking during the public hearing on fee adjustments in the community servcies area, Thompson said that he’d inquired at a recent farmers market commission meeting why the fees for stall rental at the market were being increased. [For example, the cost for a single stall per year would go from $250 to $300, which is expected to generate an additional $2,900. The increase would take effect on July 1, 2009. The last fee increase was July 1, 2004.] Thompson said he’d been told that the reason was for salary increases and a percentage of the additional cost of a newly created position of deputy manager of parks and recreation. While he’d heard the council speak often of the efforts to reduce staff and improve efficiency, he characterized this step as “empire building as usual.” Adding another layer of management, he said, not an improvement in efficiency, either. As to whether it made the city “lean and mean,” he said that while it didn’t make the city lean, asking vendors to pay more was, indeed, “mean.”

Karen Sidney: Speaking during the public hearing on fee adjustments in the community services area, Sidney noted that the budget proposal includes a 4% safety services fee for water and sewer, which residents will notice when they pay their water bill. The idea is that water/sewer facilities require police protection. Sidney began by sketching out some history of attempts to use funds from other sources to pay for police protection. She cited $250,000 from the parks millage that had previously been proposed to be used for police protection in parks. She noted that an early version of the financing plan for the new police/courts facility included a provision to take 1.5% from the water/sewer bill to help pay for the building’s construction. At this point, Hieftje interrupted Sidney to inform her that on the advice of the city attorney [Stephen Postema], he wanted to suggest that she make her remarks during the public hearing on the budget, because this one was meant to address only the community services area fee schedule – of which the 4% fee increase was not a part. Sidney said that she had something else to say during that part of the agenda, and wrapped up quickly by saying that such fee increases amounted to “backdoor tax increases,” and encouraged council to focus on getting city costs under control. [The 4% safety services fee is an internal service charge, as opposed to a water rate hike. The consequence of applying such a fee could be that the rate for water would go up.]

Thomas Partridge: Partridge reflected on the fact that he’d been elected as his high school student body president the same fall that John F. Kennedy was elected. He called for an advanced center for social research to be added to the budget to focus on real funding for affordable housing. He called on council to reverse plans and to save the senior center. To seniors he said, “Take heart, take courage, stand up, and lead.”

Paul Lambert: Lambert said that he’d learned that council was contemplating cutting money from the human services division. [The plan for FY 2011 calls for cutting $260,000 from the human services allocation.] In this time of great general need, he said, he didn’t understand how that could be considered. He cited Martin Luther King Jr. as saying that a community would be judged by how they treated the least affluent. He said that council was funding “all kinds of Disneyland bullshit,” which in good times might be a good idea. But cutting human services to fund them was unethical, he said, and encouraged council to reconsider.

Program in Jeopardy: Ann Arbor Senior Center

Margaret Leslie: Leslie said that she was there to protest the proposed closing of the Ann Arbor Senior Center. She noted that it was an important community resource for seniors who’d become isolated due to retirement, loss of spouse, or distance from their nearest family members. She also noted the emotional and intellectual enrichment that was provided there. She concluded by saying that we needed to ensure that the senior center continues to operate after July, 2011.

Program in Jeopardy: Mack Pool

Matt West: He said he’d been swimming at Mack pool for the last six years as a part of the masters swimming program. He asked all those in the audience to don their goggles and stand and support. [In The Chronicle's field of view were at least a dozen people who did.] He asked for more time to address the budget shortfalls. In particular, he said Mack pool users support the plan that allows them until July 2010 to turn around the finances. He cited the cross section of the community that used the pool, and highlighted the handicapped access ramp. Instead of being a liability on the balance sheet, he suggested, Mack pool could become an asset – by making it a “green pool” and increasing revenues through increased usership and swim classes. He cited his own experience using the pool to train to help guide a blind athlete in triathlons in different parts of the world – which would not be possible without the masters swim program at Mack pool.

Malloria Miller: Miller allowed that she didn’t know much about the budget, but said that swimming at Mack pool had helped her quite a bit, specifically in the area of health (as a diabetic it helped her keep her blood sugar down) and friendship. She said it had helped her overcome some of her fears: “I can swim now!!” She said she felt like she’d found a family at Mack pool.

Alma Fisher: Fisher approached the podium in a wheelchair and finding that the microphone was unreachable asked, “How wheelchair accessible is this?” [There is a hand-held mic available, but it took a few minutes to track down.] Once she was provided a hand-held mic, she said that she lived at Miller Manor and was there to support the Mack pool contingent. She noted that she was in a wheelchair, so getting to a pool could have been a hardship. But because she lived just cross the street, getting to the pool was not a hardship. She said it was nice to have a neighborhood pool without being run over by “jocks.” She allowed there were “jocks” who swam at Mack pool, but said there’s a lane for slow swimmers.

Kristin Burgard: Burgard related how swimming at Mack pool had helped her through postpartum depression. She described swimming as a “sanctuary.” She said that even though she still didn’t feel good, it helped “take the edge off.”

James D’Amour: D’Amour appeared wearing swim goggles around his neck, and said that swimming had had a great positive impact on his life. He referenced his background serving on the recreation advisory commission and planning commission in the past. He said he hoped that a way to keep all of the various programs that had been mentioned could be found. He found it inappropriate that the Park Advisory Commission had “robbed Peter to pay Paul” in suggesting that Mack pool be closed earlier than originally proposed, in order to save the Leslie Science and Nature center. He said he appreciated Christopher Taylor’s willingness to volunteer to be on the recreation advisory commission. He suggested there needed to be some improvement on both sides for the city and the school system in working together.

Ed Sketch: Sketch said that people might be trying to place his accent as “extreme east Boston, otherwise known as England.” He described a “good better best” scenario, noting that the “bad” outcome would be the loss of the the pool services. The good option would be to keep it open through July 2010 originally, which was a wise idea. He passed around 30 letters from first graders at Mack School on behalf of the pool. Other grades were also working on letters, he said, but the first graders had “lived up to their name.” The better plan, which is now in outline form, would be to promote greater usage, increase fees for non-seniors, and increase the public schools’ contribution. The best plan would be to implement solar heating and replacement of chemicals for purification of the water to create a “green beacon.”

Program in Jeopardy: Leslie Science and Nature Center

Adela Pinch: Pinch spoke in support of the Leslie Science and Nature Center. She stressed that the scientific content at LSNC is a vital part of her child’s education comparable to what they received in the Ann Arbor Public School system. She praised the staff as outstanding educators who are as passionate about teaching children as they are knowledgeable.

Eleanor Pollack: She encouraged council to maintain funding for LSNC. Though she no longer had school-age children, she said, she believed that the funding should be continued at a time when the federal and state governments are stressing the importance of science education. LSNC offered a hands-on approach, which she said is not possible in our school system.

Ryan Shea: Shea introduced himself as a 9th grader at Community High School. He said he’d been involved at LSNC for nine years starting out as a camper when he was five years old. He stated that he volunteered there during summer and throughout the year. He mentioned that LSNC works with the local schools. He said that on a recent trip to Traver Creek with his 9th-grade science class looking for water bugs, they’d come across a 5th-grade class from Northside School. The Northside group was led by someone from LSNC and they were also fishing in Traver Creek for water bugs. He said he “found that to be really cool” because his was a class of 9th graders and they were a class of 5th graders – learning the same material. Shea said he would like other students to have the opportunity to experience the same thing.

Marc Smith: He said he was speaking as a resident and on behalf of the National Wildlife Federation. His children had enjoyed the programs at the LSNC. He described the LSNC as a “crown jewel” of Ann Arbor. He said that the NWF had participated in negotiations to create the strategic plan to eventually put the LSNC on independent footing [the center was previously a part of the city]. That had resulted from the fact that the NWF had recognized a rare opportunity to work at the local level. The proposed cuts, he said, would undermine the sustainability plan that had been worked out, and thus he encouraged council to restore the funding.

Frances Wang: Wang said that she had four children who were attending five different local (double-enrolled) schools. She related a recent anecdote to illustrate the impact of LSNC. After the LSNC had visited her five-year-old son’s preschool, she said, they were walking down Washington Street going to the YMCA. Her son spotted a plastic owl sitting on a second story balcony, and said, “That’s a great horned owl!” He began to hoot at it like he’d learned they did in class, and was at first puzzled that it didn’t hoot back. But he concluded that the owl must be asleep, “because owls are nocturnal.”

Joe Reilly: Reilly spoke on behalf of LSNC, where he said he’d been happily employed for four years. He reflected on the symbol of the city of Ann Arbor – the Burr Oak. He said it was his personal favorite. It illustrated how they taught children about community – the tree housed a commmunity of organisms within itself. He invited everyone to come take a walk in the woods.

Program in Jeopardy: Project Grow

Sheri Repucci: [The budget proposal would eliminate funding of $7,000 for Project Grow. Last year, the $7,000 had already been eliminated from the budget, but the budget was amended later to include the funding.] Repucci said that until recently she’d been a staff member at Project Grow, in charge of the Discovery Garden, which serves seniors, children, and people with visual handicaps. She emphasized that most of the gardeners grow food, not flowers. She presented her remarks as a response to a memo written by community services administrator Jayne Miller. Miller noted that the Project Grow balance is equal to one year’s budget.  [By way of comparison to this 100% fund balance, the city of Ann Arbor's budget includes a fund balance of something like 12-15%.] Repucci explained that this was due to the fact that Project Grow’s income comes in all at one time [garden plot rentals]. The reason for the fund balance, she said, was that it would take a full budget cycle to replenish the reserve fund. In response to Miller’s memo, which suggested that Project Grow was not partnering with other organizations, Repucci noted that it was the the University of Michigan’s Matthaei Botanical Gardens that stopped the process of a possible partnership there. [Previous Chronicle coverage of part of that effort is here]. As for the suggestion that Growing Hope was a potential partner, she said that because Growing Hope did not fund staff, they had a different funding structure that was incompatible with Project Grow’s. As for the possibility of partnering with Food Gatherers, she said that there was some collaboration [e.g., some Project Grow gardeners donate food they grow to Food Gatherers], but Food Gatherers has its own struggles with funding.

LuAnne Bullington: Bullington said that she was a volunteer at Project Grow, and it was the only place she knew in the area that offered raised garden beds at Leslie and raised beds that are accessible to seniors, little kids, and people with visual impairments. After having gardened at a raised bed, she said, she didn’t think she’d ever go back. She stressed the food-growing capacity of the program, saying that she grew food for other people at her plot. She lamented the fact that expansion of Project Grow plots into city parks has encounterd roadblocks. She concluded by pointing out that the amount of money at issue was only $7,000.

Council Response to Programs in Jeopardy (Leslie and Mack)

Christopher Taylor in his communications to council thanked the members of the Park Advisory Commission for a “high degree of good faith and diligence” in bringing forward to council an affirmative recommendation. However, he said that he expected that council would be making a different recommendation, which the mayor had alluded to at the start of the public hearing.

At Higgins’ request, Fraser said that the recommendation on the table currently (not PAC’s recommendation) was to close Mack pool this summer when other pools are open and to re-open again in the fall.

In his communications to council, Mike Anglin (Ward 5) said that he was impressed by all the hard work that PAC had done, but wondered if the work was really necessary – it might have been unnecessary if there had been clearer communication between administration and PAC. [Anglin and Taylor are both ex-officio members of PAC, and attended that commission's April meeting, at which the funding recommendations were approved.] Taken as an umbrella concept, Anglin said, the commitment to a “healthy city” – a prerequisite to being a “green city” – would lead council to support the programs under discussion.

Community Services Resolution: Leslie Science and Nature Center

An item that was originally a part of the consent agenda – extracted by councilmember Sandi Smith – was a resolution to approve an amendment to the restated partnership agreement between the city of Ann Arbor and Leslie Science and Nature Center. Jayne Miller, director of community services, said that the original agreement was for 10 years, but that the time period was somewhat problematic for attracting support through donations. The proposal was thus to extend the time period to 20 years.

Outcome: Passed unanimously.

Community Services Resolution: Shade Structures at Fuller Pool

The second item extracted from the consent agenda by councilmember Smith involved a contract to construct shade structures at Fuller Pool for $46,335. Smith wanted clarity from Jayne Miller, director of community services, about how the work was getting paid for. This, apparently was to clarify if the same money could have been spent on Mack pool operations and maintenance. Miller said that the money was being paid out of the old parks capital improvement millage, which can only be spent on capital improvements, not operations and maintenance. The new, combined parks millage allows for more flexibility, Miller said.

Outcome: Passed unanimously.

AAPS: Ball Fields and Cultural Arts Building

Council considered two resolutions involving agreements with the Ann Arbor Public Schools. They’re related thematically to the Mack pool issue, because that facility is operated by both the city and schools – it has frequently been expressed during the commentary on the Mack pool facility that a more equitable arrangement could be achieved between the city and the school system for its operation.

On Monday, council adopted agreements with the schools concerning the operation of two facilities. The first was a lease agreement for the Eberbach Cultural Arts Building.

The schools will now pay the city $9,900 in “capital facilities payments” and rent of $1. The $1 lease comes with a set of obligations for the schools:

In exchange for the $1.00 annual rent payment, the Ann Arbor Public Schools will be responsible for maintaining the premises in a condition that is satisfactory to the City and will perform the following responsibilities at its sole cost and expense with respect to the Premises: (1) custodial upkeep, (2) snow removal and exterior grounds care, (3) maintenance and repair of the parking lot, (4) maintenance and repair of the heating, ventilation, air conditioning, plumbing and electrical systems, (5) installation and maintenance of exterior signs identifying the Building, (6) interior painting, (7) general inspection, repairs and maintenance, including at a minimum, all items listed in the Inspection and Maintenance Schedule. In addition, the Ann Arbor Public Schools will be responsible to provide all utilities for the Premises, including electricity, heat, air-conditioning, ventilation, water, and sewer services as well as a insure the Premises, at its expense, against loss or damage.

The other agreement with the schools concerned the recovery of the city’s costs in preparing fields for use by the school’s Rec & Ed program. Highlights:

The services provided by the City include mowing, field grooming, removing trash and loose litter, opening and closing restrooms, and making ball field repairs. The proposed fees are listed as follows:

Ball Field Usage – Resident – $21.00 per booking

Ball Field Usage – Non-resident – $24.00 per booking

Ball Field Grooming Fee – $80.00 per grooming

Ball Field Anchor Placement Fee – $121.84 per anchor placement

Outcome: Both resolutions specifying the agreements between AAPS and the city were approved.

More Coverage

Editor’s note: Coverage of the meeting continues here. The articles have been broken apart due to apparent limitations of either browsers in reading or else the WordPress platform in publishing super-long articles. We continue to explore alternatives to our Meeting Watch presentations that strike a useful balance between the granularity of detail and the summary of content with a more timely publishing schedule – a week is a long time to wait. One possibility we’re entertaining is live Twittering, copyediting that feed with reader collaboration.

Marianne Rzepka

Winter is so over. And what was all that about, anyway?

Gardeners have no time to fret over winter anymore. The time for looking at catalogs and polishing up pruner blades is over. It’s also past time for cruising through garden stores, peering at seed packets and picking through boxes of gladiola bulbs.

It’s time for getting out, for appreciating the early spring flowers (note to self: more crocuses and chinodoxia next year), clearing out the debris of leaves, windblown newspapers and fallen branches, maybe even cleaning out the garage on a warm day. It’s a maddening time of year: One week snow is covering your daffodils; the next temperatures hit 70s. You can’t be fooled by either extreme.

On those cold, wet days, you stay home and swear. On those warm and sunny days, you just have to get outside. In the past few weeks, I’ve been knocking around my yard like an outdoor Roomba, peering at the buds and new leaves on my lilac and redbud tree. I squint along the ground, looking for the first signs of emerging bloodroot and hepatica – the cutest of the cute spring blooms.

“There is some serious garden fever out there,” says LeighAnn Phillips-Knope, the incoming coordinator for garden activities and volunteer services at Project Grow, Ann Arbor’s community garden program.

It’s understandable. After the long, cold winter, “We need our connection with the earth again,” says Phillips-Knope. Landscape gardeners can look at their yards and either appreciate their planning or bewail their mistakes – no more daylilies, thank you – but there are limits to what can be done now. You might be able to transplant a few things, or put in some bushes, but the tender annuals have to wait until May to go outside. If you’ve planted petunias in containers, you’d better cover them on frosty nights.

In many cases, vegetable gardeners can thumb their noses at light morning frosts and ignore the weak spring snows. Several weeks ago, Phillips-Knope planted cold-weather vegetables like lettuce, radishes, beets and kale, as well as potatoes and onions.

Bloodroot, an early sign of spring.

The first seeds  that Sheri Repucci, Project Grow’s outgoing coordinator, puts in the ground are peas. As soon as you can stick your finger in the soil, you can plant peas, she says. Of course, these are people with home gardens. I’m still waiting to get out into my Project Grow garden as soon as the plots are staked sometime this month. That’s when I can start my own row of peas, onions, spinach and lettuce.

Some vegetables will have to wait until late May, when the threat of frost is over. As usual, I’ve started tomato plants inside under fluorescent lights. Usually, I plant the seeds straight into a seeding mix. This year, inspired by a Project Grow class on tomatoes and peppers, I sprouted some seeds in a wet paper towel. They’re already in their peat pots and seem to be doing well. I plan to put them in the garden come Memorial Day weekend. 

Now is the time to sow a row of lettuce or spinach. If you want to harvest cherry tomatoes in your backyard or on your balcony, keep an eye out for upcoming plant sales – Matthaei Botanical Gardens will have their annual sale May 9 and 10 with annuals, perennials and some vegetables for sale.

Pick a sunny spot, add some compost (it comes in a bag) and make sure whatever you plant gets enough water. The worst you can get is a dead plant, but you just might end up with a tomato.

And if you wish you had some color in your lawn right now, you’re a few months too late. What you can do is write “get bulbs” in your calendar for early September. Get tulips, get daffodils, get hyacinths and plant them in the ground. In a year – gardens are long-term projects – you’ll be glad you did. 

About the writer: Marianne Rzepka, former reporter for the Ann Arbor News and Detroit Free Press, is a Master Gardener who lives in Ann Arbor and thinks it’s fun to turn the compost pile. 

The hand wielding the pen belongs to Amy Kuras, a city of Ann Arbor park planner who was sketching out roughly to-scale plot sizes for potential gardens, in the area south of the tennis courts where they are proposed. The aerial view photo of Hunt Park is oriented in this photograph looking from north to south.

With snow on the ground outside and temperatures around 10° F and headed even lower, a dozen people gathered in the 5th-floor conference room of the Larcom Building to talk about warmer days ahead: a possible new Project Grow garden at Hunt Park, which could be implemented as early as this spring.

Amy Kuras, park planner for the city of Ann Arbor, and Melissa Kesterson, executive director of Project Grow, were joined at the meeting by neighbors of the park, which is located  in the block bounded by Sunset, Spring and Daniel streets. Councilmember Sabra Briere, whose Ward 1 includes the park (it’s right on the boundary between Ward 1 and Ward 5), attended the meeting as well.

Kesterson had an easy pitch to make to the gathered neighbors – the meeting was sparked by their own interest in seeing a community garden in Hunt Park. The Park Advisory Commission had directed city staff a few years ago to begin identifying potential locations for community gardens in city parks. With neighborhood buy-in, Kuras said, no special resolution by city council or PAC would need to be passed in order to make the Hunt Park gardens a reality. In other parks over the last couple of years, Kuras said, there has not been adequate support for gardens – in fact, there’d been opposition.

Key to the neighbhood buy-in for Hunt Park gardens was the location within the park: to the south of the tennis courts and just east of the tree line that runs down the center of the southern part of the 7-acre park. The space, which could accomodate 6 to 8 gardening plots, was identified by neighbors as the best location within the park as far as neighbhood support. The space to the north of the tennis courts, for example, would be a non-starter, they said, because it’s heavily used as a soccer field. While the proposed space is under-used, one neighbor said it was not completely un-used: she and her friends used it for volleyball. Still, she said that this was not an impediment to her support of the garden there.

The location in the area just south of the tennis courts is also dictated partly by the requirements of gardening: the topography of a steep hill on the park’s north end founders on the basic requirement of flatness. The proposed location easily meets most other basic criteria used by Project Grow to determine suitability – like sunlight, availability of at least some parking options, and overall ease of access for gardeners – except for one: access to water. There is water available in the park roughly 400 feet north of the gardening location, but running a garden hose that distance did not capture the imagination of anyone in the room.

Kuras said that she could not imagine that the city would pay to put in a permanent water line, but that it’s something that could be done. Kesterson gave the Project Grow garden at Greenview as an example of a permanent water line that had been installed (from a fire hydrant) and paid for by Project Grow. Another option is to simply install a second city water meter at someone’s house (nearer to the proposed garden location) who would agreed to allow it.

In the short term, Kuras said that a conversation between Kesterson and the city’s field operations staff could better determine what options might be available for filling water barrels at the site that gardeners could use to water their plants. Based on Tuesday evening’s meeting, it appears that Project Grow will move forward and try to make gardening plots available for spring 2009, treating the challenge of water supply as a problem to be solved.

Among the neighbors gathered, five or six indicated they’d be interested in renting a plot at Hunt Park.  Although they would receive no preferential treatment in allocation of plots – Project Grow plots were fully subscribed last year with a wait list – they had a defacto advantage in knowing about the Hunt Park location, because the site is not yet a part of Project Grow’s written materials.

Plot sign-up for the rest of Project Grow’s locations is underway, said Kesterson. Gardeners who rented a plot in the previous year are guaranteed the same plot only if they submit their application by March 15. Kesterson said she’d already received applications from hopeful new gardeners, who will be assigned plots on a first-come, first-served basis. After the meeting, Kesterson said she wanted to “gently urge” gardeners from last year who wished to garden the same plot to get their materials and applciation fees turned in.

At the meeting, Project Grow board president, Devon Akmon, announced that Karen Sikkenga, associate director of Matthaei Botanical Gardens, had approached Project Grow with a proposal that the two organizations form a more robust relationship. The exact nature of such a relationship, said Akmon, was being evaluated by an exploratory committee of six people, which included Held and Jones. The evaluation, stressed Akmon, would involve a close assessment of Project Grow as an organization, which would ultimately make it stronger, whether the outcome resulted in a merger, a partnership, or no new relationship with Matthaei, which is part of the University of Michigan.

Reaction among the roughly 20 assembled members to the word “merger” was uniformly negative, with one member saying, “That would make us a part of U of M. So, no, no, no.” Some kind of partnership, however, was something people in the room seemed more prepared to contemplate. And they were keen to see Held and Jones take a role as board members in that contemplation, not just as members of the exploratory committee. With the agreement of Akmon, as well as verbal support from board members Damaris Suffalko and Terre Fisher, a decision was made to expand the number of board members from eight to 10, which reversed a board decision made prior to the annual meeting to fix the number of board slots at eight.

A more robust arrangement between Project Grow and Matthaei would build on collaboration already in place. That collaboration includes Matthaei as a gardening site for Project Grow gardens as well as a combined plant sale in the spring. Matthaei runs the cash register for the combined sale, but separates out proceeds from plants tagged as Project Grow plants, issuing a check to Project Grow.

Asked what motivated Matthaei to seek a more robust relationship with Project Grow, executive director of Project Grow, Melissa Kesterson, attributed it in part to the existing collaboration between the two organizations, noting that Bob Grese, who is director of Matthaei, was a longtime gardener at the Zion Lutheran Church Project Grow site, before construction plans by the church led to its elimination.

Further, said Kesterson, Matthaei saw their overture as a way to offer Project Grow a financial safety net – the city of Ann Arbor restored $7,000 of funding to Project Grow this spring after previously having eliminated it. The city’s contribution represents about 13% of Project Grow’s overall budget of $55,000. And finally, Kesterson said that public gardens represented a part of Matthaei’s vision for its own community outreach, and that  Matthaei did not want to duplicate what Project Grow was already doing.

Mention of the financial safety net prompted a question from one member about whether the financial clout of Matthaei was something that Project Grow needed in order to survive. Kesterson replied, “We’re very healthy. We’re doing great.” Acknowledging that the organization was currently solid, Akmon stressed that the organization’s budget needed to grow.

Akmon said that a time frame for the assessment of the overture from Matthaei will be a matter of a few months.