Comments on: Ann Arbor: Stim City?

By: Dave Askins

Dave Askins — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 21:21:03 +0000

For those who like their stimulus package wish lists printed off on giant plotter-sized pieces of paper, on the second floor of the Larcom Building, just to the left of the elevators (same wall), next to the Greenway posters, there’s a printout of the city’s wish list measuring at least five feet tall.

By: Dave Askins

Dave Askins — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 02:58:33 +0000

Sabra Briere asked: "Could you reformat the County and City spreadsheets so they cover the same fields?" Here's a merged Excel file of city and county wish lists. City of Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County wish lists in one MS Excel Sheet Our initial intent was to create PDFs for greater accessibility to those who may not have MS Excel installed on their machines. In formatting the separate Excel sheets to fit onto a single landscaped page, two people made two different decisions about what columns to drop.

By: Fred Zimmerman

Fred Zimmerman — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 15:48:39 +0000

I love the fact that our list is mostly maintenance items. I think Obama et al. are trying to do too many things at once.

Let’s just fix everything that’s broken. I’d like to see a complete, nation-wide package that focuses exclusively on deferred maintenance. Now that would be stimulating!

By: Sabra Briere

Sabra Briere — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 20:08:48 +0000

Dave.

Could you reformat the County and City spreadsheets so they cover the same fields? I’d like to compare like to like, and right now, they are slightly different.

Thanks!

Sabra

By: Steve Bean

Steve Bean — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 17:41:45 +0000

The nature of the items on the list is essentially dictated by the requirement that they be “shovel-ready” projects in order to be considered for funding. If you look closely, not all are maintenance projects. So next time you needn’t bother trying to rationalize your pot shots.

By: johnboy

johnboy — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 06:17:20 +0000

Interesting to note that most of the AA projects are maintenance items that the city will have to perform weather or not they get any federal monies. They are just trying to get the federal government to pay for normal expenditures. And if they succeed what will happen to the money saved in the city budget? More double digit raises for the staff?