Margaret Parker, former chair of the Ann Arbor public art commission, attended AAPAC’s Nov. 28 meeting and volunteered to help with outreach and promotion. (Photos by the writer.)

Aaron Seagraves, the city’s part-time public art administrator, highlighted several projects that have been in the pipeline and that will likely be completed in 2013: a $150,000 hanging glass sculpture by Ed Carpenter, to be installed in the Justice Center lobby this spring; artwork for a new rain garden being built at Kingsley & First next spring; and public art for the East Stadium bridges, with a $400,000 budget. Artists haven’t yet been selected for those last two projects, but it’s hoped that the work will be finished by the end of 2013.

Much of the conversation among commissioners focused on how to  improve promotion and coordination of the work they’ve done to date, and to explain their vision for public art in Ann Arbor.

“We’ve got a fair amount of work to do in the next few months,” said Marsha Chamberlin, AAPAC’s chair.

Two members of the arts community – former AAPAC chair Margaret Parker and Deb Polich, executive director of the Arts Alliance and president of Artrain, who had also co-chaired the “B for Art” millage campaign committee – attended the meeting. During public commentary, Parker volunteered to help with outreach efforts, and gave commissioners a list of suggestions for promoting the city’s public art program.

Also attending the Nov. 28 meeting was city councilmember Sabra Briere (Ward 1). She has proposed changing the public art ordinance to narrow the type of projects that could be tapped for public art funding. The effect would be to dramatically cut the amount of funds available for public art. A second proposal, by Jane Lumm (Ward 2), would simply eliminate the program. Both of those proposals were tabled by the council on Nov. 19. But at its Dec. 3 meeting, the city council is expected to act on yet another proposal – made by Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) – to appoint a committee to study the city’s approach to public art. Her proposal would also suspend the expenditure of funds, with several exceptions, that have accumulated for public art.

Update: At their Dec. 3 meeting, the city council voted to suspend the spending of funds accumulated through Ann Arbor’s Percent for Art program until April 1, 2013 – except for projects that are already underway. A committee consisting of Sally Petersen (Ward 2), Sabra Briere (Ward 1), Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), Margie Teall (Ward 4) and Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) has been appointed to recommend amendments to the city’s public art program. The committee is charged with making a recommendation to the council by Feb. 15, 2013.

AAPAC faces other changes as well. At the Nov. 28 meeting, Chamberlin noted that Theresa Reid has resigned from the commission. Reid, who is executive director of the ArtsEngine at the University of Michigan, had been appointed to AAPAC in February 2012. In response to an email query from The Chronicle, Reid cited time commitments for work and family, and said her resignation was not related to the Nov. 6 defeat of the public art millage.

During the Nov. 28 meeting, Chamberlin urged commissioners to solicit potential candidates for a replacement. An appointment will be made with a nomination by the mayor and confirmation by the full city council. An application for all city boards and commissions is available on the city clerk’s website.

Future of Public Art in Ann Arbor

At its Nov. 19 meeting, the Ann Arbor city council considered and ultimately delayed action on three separate resolutions related to the city’s public art program.

Councilmember Jane Lumm (Ward 2) proposed to eliminate the program entirely. A second agenda item, put forward by Sabra Briere (Ward 1), would revise the definition of projects to which the public ordinance applies and would add requirements for public participation. The result would be to reduce the amount of public art funding by about 90%. For the last two fiscal years, the Percent for Art program has generated roughly $300,000. If the ordinance revisions had been in place, only about $25,000 would have been generated. [.jpg of chart showing public art allocations] Both proposals were tabled by the council at its Nov. 19 meeting.

The council also postponed a resolution added to the agenda during the Nov. 19 meeting to appoint a committee to study the issue and to suspend the expenditure of funds currently allocated for public art, although there would be exceptions for projects already underway. The resolution on the committee and temporary suspension, which was brought forward by Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), was postponed until Dec. 3. The timeframe for a recommendation on how to move ahead with either revision or termination of the Percent for Art ordinance would be April 2013.

Briere attended AAPAC’s Nov. 28 meeting, but did not formally address the commission. In an email sent to constituents on Dec. 1, Briere included an online survey about public funding for art. She had previously surveyed constituents in September on the issue. [.pdf of Briere's September 2012 survey results]

These proposals come in the wake of a failed public art millage that had been placed on the Nov. 6 ballot by the city council. The 0.1 mill tax – which was expected to generate around $450,000 annually – was rejected by 28,166 voters (55.86%), with support from 22,254 voters (44.14%). Although the arts community had campaigned to support the millage, many arts leaders had advised the council not to put it on the ballot at this time. Councilmember Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) had first put forward the ballot proposal in August, eight weeks before the election. [See Chronicle coverage: "Despite Worries, Art Commission Backs Millage."]

The current funding program remains in place. For all of the city’s capital projects, 1% of the budget – up to a cap of $250,000 – is set aside for public art. There is currently a balance of $1.526 million in the Percent for Art program. Of that, $845,133 has been earmarked for previously approved projects, leaving about $681,000 unallocated. [.pdf of budget summary]

Implications of the council’s possible actions were an underlying theme throughout AAPAC’s Nov. 28 meeting.

Future of Public Art: Public Commentary

Two people from the arts community attended Wednesday’s meeting: Deb Polich, executive director of the Arts Alliance and president of Artrain, who had also co-chaired the “B for Art” millage campaign committee; and Margaret Parker, a local artist and former AAPAC chair.

Margaret Parker on Election Day (Nov. 6, 2012) in front of the downtown Ann Arbor library, urging voters to support the public art millage.

Polich did not formally address the board, but Parker spoke during both opportunities for public commentary.

Now that the council is reassessing the Percent for Art program, Parker said, it’s important to get out as much information as possible about what AAPAC has accomplished and how the program works. It takes so much time to actually work on the projects, she noted, that there’s little time available to do promotion.

She noted that Bob Miller, an AAPAC commissioner, has been sending out emails with links to public art programs in other cities and states, including some that use videos to promote their work. That’s great, she said, but she wondered who has time to do that kind of thing in Ann Arbor.

Parker told commissioners that she wanted to offer her time and help to promote AAPAC’s work. She provided a handout with suggestions about possible actions. [.pdf of Parker's handout]

Parker’s suggestions include:

• Arrange a panel discussion on CTN’s Access Ann Arbor, a 30-minute program aired on Channel 17.
• Use the upcoming documentary that Dana Denha of CTN is doing on the Herbert Dreiseitl project – show it continuously in a monitor set up in the city hall atrium.
• Line up stories on upcoming projects in a consistent way so that something is coming out every two weeks. Use upcoming projects to teach how the public art process works.
• Establish a press network that takes a positive approach.
• Involve city councilmembers in the coverage of projects in their wards – make them part of the story.
• Get interviews on public radio.
• Give tours of city hall public art, emphasizing the pedestrian scale of the pieces.

Later in the meeting, commissioner John Kotarski praised Parker’s involvement, including her efforts to create the Percent for Art program several years ago, and her previous work on AAPAC. He noted that she jumped into the millage campaign and worked hard on that, too. ”You are a treasure for Ann Arbor, Margaret,” he said.

Kotarski noted that even though the public art millage proposal was defeated on Nov. 6, about 22,000 people did vote for it. After the defeat, Parker had picked herself up again and is now offering more help, he said, and that’s commendable. Other commissioners offered their thanks to Parker as well.

Future of Public Art: Commission Discussion

AAPAC chair Marsha Chamberlin thanked everyone who attended the Nov. 19 city council meeting, and for those who campaigned for the public art millage. She noted that before the election, she and Margaret Parker had spent time at the Ann Arbor farmers market talking with people about the millage. They’d had some interesting interactions, she said. Chamberlin also praised the Arts Alliance for its support, as well as Mike Henry and Jeremy Peters.

Chamberlin reported that the Allmendinger Park mural dedication earlier this month had been a success. It’s the first completed mural in a program that launched two years ago. “When we feel a little under the gun or downtrodden, one day like that can really bring your spirits up,” Chamberlin said

On Monday, Dec. 3, the Ann Arbor city council is expected to vote on establishing a committee to evaluate the Percent for Art program and to look at how the city might best implement a public art program, Chamberlin noted. So AAPAC has a lot of work to do, she said. When Chamberlin mentioned that she had emailed councilmembers offering the assistance of AAPAC in this process, Bob Miller asked whether she’d gotten any responses from them. Chamberlin noted that this was her last week as president of the Ann Arbor Art Center, so she’d been busy wrapping up her work there and had only sent out the emails within the past two days. But no, she had not received any replies.

At that point, Ward 1 councilmember Sabra Briere – who attended the meeting as an observer – spoke up to say that she hadn’t received the email. Chamberlin then explained that she hadn’t sent it to all councilmembers.

Chamberlin continued, saying that AAPAC needs to make sure that councilmembers and others are aware of the work that’s been done. There’s a lot in the pipeline, she noted. But while it feels like commissioners have talked to a lot of people about these projects, as a percentage, she said, they’ve only reached a relatively small portion of the population.

Future of Public Art: Commission Discussion – Public Relations

Later in the meeting, Connie Brown said she felt the commission should address the issues that Margaret Parker had raised. Commissioners have been working diligently to coordinate their efforts and get the word out about AAPAC’s projects, Brown said, but they weren’t always executing to the best of their ability. Perhaps they needed to better coordinate with the city council, she said, or to improve the tracking of each project’s status, or better inform the general public. The lesson of the “quadrant” meetings in October showed the importance of location in their outreach efforts, Brown added.

Connie Rizzolo Brown.

As background, Brown was referring to an outreach effort that involves setting up task forces to represent four quadrants of Ann Arbor that are designated in the city master plan’s “land use elements” section: west, central, south and northeast. [.pdf map of quadrants] Two or more of the nine AAPAC members will be responsible for each quadrant, charged with soliciting input from residents in selecting public art. Four meetings were held in October to kick off this effort, but in general attendance was low.

At the Nov. 28 meeting, Brown said she felt that AAPAC needed to weave its efforts together more cohesively. She didn’t have a specific proposal, but told commissioners she felt it was something important to contemplate. They needed to learn from and build on their experiences, she said, noting that “we kind of keep coming back to this discussion again and again.”

John Kotarski, who joined the commission in January, said the commission’s vision is blurred and they haven’t shown as much leadership as they could. That fact opens them to criticism, he said. They are citizen volunteers and don’t have the resources to manage a multi-million dollar program, he noted, so their vision needs to be as sharp as it can be, and their processes need to be as open as possible. “That’s what I’m hearing from folks,” he said.

Marsha Chamberlin wondered whether other commissioners felt that AAPAC’s vision and mission weren’t clear. She pointed out that AAPAC has a mission statement, though perhaps it wasn’t always at the forefront of people’s minds.

AAPAC’s mission statement is included in its most recent annual report and its fiscal 2013 annual plan:

To bring public art to the City of Ann Arbor that improves the aesthetic quality of public spaces and structures, provides for cultural and recreational opportunities, contributes to local heritage, stimulates economic activity, and promotes the general welfare of the community.

[.pdf of AAPAC bylaws] [.pdf of AAPAC guidelines] [.pdf of fiscal 2013 annual plan] [.pdf of annual report of activities for fiscal 2011 and annual report for fiscal 2012] [.pdf of strategic plan]

Kotarski felt that the mission statement painted with a broad brush. It doesn’t tell people where AAPAC stands regarding public art for gateways, or an art park, or working with schools or businesses, or a range of other issues, he said. When Bob Miller wondered whether Kotarski was talking about the strategic plan, Kotarski replied that it’s more than a vision – it’s a concrete plan so that people will know what to expect from AAPAC, and when.

Chamberlin pointed out that they were discussing two different things: (1) process-related issues like project tracking and public relations; and  (2) broader issues of strategic direction, which she felt were spelled out in AAPAC’s strategic plan. The commission has been hampered with respect to its long-term strategy, she said, because now they weren’t sure whether the public art program will exist in a few months. That uncertainty makes it hard to know where to focus their energies, she said. In general, it was important to build and communicate the case for having a strong public art program.

John Kotarski.

Kotarski argued that AAPAC shouldn’t be distracted by what’s happening at the city council. They just need to work as efficiently and diligently as they can, he said, and to answer some of these questions about their future direction. It’s not just enumerating projects, he added, but rather putting those projects into the context of a strategic vision.

Malverne Winborne noted that AAPAC seems to have gotten away from using some of the tools it has developed – specifically, its project-tracking spreadsheet, and long-term strategic plan. Because that has happened, he said, “we get lost.”

Aaron Seagraves, the city’s public art administrator, said he had previously brought updated versions of the project-tracking spreadsheet to AAPAC’s monthly meetings, but he hadn’t done that recently. He said he’d start that routine again.

Calling for another retreat, Winborne said that even if AAPAC is de-commissioned, public art will continue in some form. So they need to ensure that processes are in place to allow a cohesive continuation of public art in the city.

Chamberlin felt they needed to move the conversation forward, and said she’d like to have AAPAC’s PR committee look at these issues. She offered to coordinate a time for her, Kotarski, Seagraves, and Cathy Gendron – the PR committee’s chair, who did not attend the Nov. 28 meeting – to meet, along with Margaret Parker.

Parker addressed this issue during the meeting’s final opportunity for public commentary. She noted that the public art plan, which AAPAC completes in the spring, should serve as their guide for priority setting. It’s developed based on AAPAC’s mission, she said, and should be tied to the city’s capital improvements plan (CIP). That’s the beauty of the Percent for Art approach, Parker said – as capital projects come through the city, they provide funding for public art, which should be coordinated with those capital projects from the beginning. [For all capital projects, 1% of the budget – up to a cap of $250,000 – is set aside for public art.] She felt that a millage approach, while providing more flexibility, wouldn’t give the underlying organizing principal for public art to be integrated into city projects.

Chamberlin pointed out that the downside to the Percent for Art approach is the requirement that all public art projects must be linked thematically to their funding source, and can’t be temporary.

Outcome: This was not an action item, and no vote was taken.

Partnership with DDA

John Kotarski reported that he and Aaron Seagraves, the city’s public art administrator, had met earlier this month with Susan Pollay, executive director of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority.

As a result of that meeting, Kotarski was offering to chair a rapid-response team for AAPAC that could be available to respond quickly to requests from groups like the DDA. Pollay had indicated that the DDA typically needed a timely response when projects arise, he said. The team might be useful in helping the DDA identify artists for potential DDA-funded projects, or help navigate city bureaucracy if necessary. Kotarski invited others to join the team, which he suggested starting informally.

Saying it was a great idea, Marsha Chamberlin also expressed some caution. She wondered if it would open the city to liability, if something went wrong with a project that didn’t directly involve AAPAC, but that AAPAC was helping to facilitate. Kotarski didn’t think there were liability issues – the team would act as liaisons and advocates, not as official representatives of the city.

Charles McGee artwork – “The Spirit of Ann Arbor” – on the Carver Building at 500-506 E. Liberty St.

Pollay believes that a lot of public art is happening that’s not necessarily funded by the city, Kotarski reported. He gave as an example the recent installation of a work by Charles McGee – titled “The Spirit of Ann Arbor” – commissioned by John Carver for a downtown building that Carver owns at 500-506 E. Liberty St. AAPAC should recognize and celebrate projects like this, Kotarski said, even if the projects aren’t funded by the city’s Percent for Art program.

Kotarski pointed out that part of AAPAC’s mission, as laid out in the city’s public art ordinance, is to facilitate public art in general. [The ordinance lists several duties of the commission, including "promote awareness of public art." .pdf of public art ordinance]

Noting that Carver had contacted Margaret Parker to help find an artist, Kotarski said that were it not for AAPAC, Carver would not likely have known to contact Parker. Parker is an ambassador for art throughout the city, Kotarski said, and AAPAC should recognize that. People should realize that making these connections is one benefit of having a public art commission, he said.

By way of background, AAPAC had attempted a formal partnership with the DDA several years ago. A draft set of guidelines was developed that AAPAC could use for assisting in DDA-funded public art projects. Former commissioner Jim Curtis had spearheaded that effort, but when he left AAPAC in 2010, there was no further action on it.

Project Updates

Throughout the Nov. 28 meeting, commissioners and Aaron Seagraves – the city’s public art administrator – provided updates for several ongoing projects. Here’s a summary:

• Justice Center: Work on the $150,000 hanging glass sculpture for the lobby of the Justice Center – by Oregon artist Ed Carpenter – is moving ahead, and the structural engineering is completed. The sculpture, called “Radius,” was approved by the city council in May of 2012 based on AAPAC’s recommendation. Expected installation: March or April of 2013.
• Argo Cascades: A statement of qualifications (SOQ) will likely be issued in early December for this project to place artwork in the city park along Argo Cascades. [SOQs for the city are posted online here.] AAPAC approved a $150,000 budget for that project in April of 2012. Expected completion: End of 2013.
• East Stadium bridges: The deadline for submitting responses to an SOQ for artwork along the new East Stadium bridges was extended until Dec. 5. There are 15 responses so far, but Seagraves expects more to come as the deadline approaches. The $400,000 budget for that project was recommended by AAPAC in March of 2012. Expected completion of project: End of 2013.
• Kingsley & First rain garden: A request for proposals (RFP) was issued earlier this month for artwork to be included in a rain garden at the city-owned lot at Kingsley & First. [RFPs for the city are posted online here.] Responses are due on Jan. 10. The project has a budget of $27,000. Expected completion: August 2013.
• Forest Avenue plaza: A meeting is scheduled for Dec. 5 with task force members and city staff to discuss a public art project for the plaza, located next to the Forest Avenue parking structure near South University. AAPAC voted at its Aug. 22, 2012 meeting to move ahead on it, with a budget of up to $35,000.
• State & Ellsworth roundabout: Bob Miller is the AAPAC point person for a project incorporating artwork into a roundabout being built at the intersection of South State and Ellsworth. He reported that they’re still looking for people to work on a task force to guide the project. Marsha Chamberlin suggested employees at one of the several Zingerman’s businesses in that area, or any number of photographers and other artists who work in that part of town.
• Sign for Dreiseitl sculpture: Seagraves reported that a sign explaining the water sculpture by Herbert Dreiseitl – located in front of city hall – will be designed and fabricated by Quinn Evans Architects, as part of their existing contract with the city. When asked by Bob Miller how much the sign would cost, Seagraves again stated that it would be part of the original contract that Quinn Evans has with the city. By way of background, Quinn Evans has provided a range of services related to construction of the Justice Center and renovation of city hall, including oversight of the construction and installation of the Dreisietl sculpture. The Ann Arbor firm’s contracts with the city, as amended over the past few years, exceed $6 million.
• Canoe Art: At AAPAC’s Oct. 24, 2012 meeting, Marsha Chamberlin had proposed a possible community project using about 100 old aluminum canoes that the city was planning to get rid of. She plans to bring forward a formal proposal, but told commissioners on Nov. 28 that she hadn’t yet had time to finish that. She thinks the city will need some kind of outside funding for it. Applying for a state grant – from the Michigan Council for Arts & Cultural Affairs – might be an option.

Seagraves also provided commissioners with a budget summary on Percent for Art funds, showing a balance of $1.526 million. Of that, $845,133 has been earmarked for previously approved projects, leaving about $681,000 unallocated. [.pdf of budget summary] There was no discussion of the budget.

Ann Arbor public art commissioners Bob Miller and Marsha Chamberlin.

In his administrator’s report, Seagraves mentioned several other items as well. An update of the city’s capital improvements plan (CIP) will be reviewed by the Ann Arbor planning commission in December, he said, and he plans to bring the CIP to AAPAC for review at its Dec. 19 meeting. Commissioners discussed the importance of identifying potential projects as early as possible, and the CIP plan can be instrumental in doing that.

Another item for the December agenda will be a draft SOQ to create a pre-qualified pool of artists for future projects. The intent is to speed the selection process. It’s an approach that’s already being used more narrowly for future murals, and this broader SOQ will provide a pool of potential artists for any type of project.

A discussion about the next steps for the quadrant project was deferred until the December meeting, too.

A proposal for a possible “street art” program, which John Kotarski had brought forward at AAPAC’s September meeting, was not mentioned.

Project Updates: Maintenance

During the discussion about project updates, John Kotarski questioned how maintenance costs were accounted for in completed projects. He raised concerns that it wasn’t clear how maintenance for public art projects would be paid for in the future.

Aaron Seagraves explained that regular maintenance is paid for by the unit where the artwork is located – for example, the tree sculptures in West Park will be maintained by the city’s parks maintenance budget. However, if it’s more than regular maintenance, the funding would come from the Percent for Art funds. Seagraves noted that specific funds aren’t allocated for maintenance currently because there have always been excess funds in the Percent for Art budget. However, he said it would be good to address that issue, in light of current proposals at city council to reduce or eliminate funding.

Marsha Chamberlin asked Seagraves to prepare a report for the December meeting to clarify the maintenance issue. She noted that AAPAC has been guided by information provided by Sue McCormick, the city’s former public services area administrator. Chamberlin also reported that there is a small amount available for public art maintenance in a fund held by the Ann Arbor Area Community Foundation.

Vacancy on AAPAC

Theresa Reid had been the newest member of AAPAC, appointed in February of 2012, for a term ending Dec. 31, 2015. At the commission’s Nov. 28 meeting, AAPAC chair Marsha Chamberlin noted that Reid had resigned earlier in the month.

Theresa Reid at a February 2012 AAPAC retreat.

Reid is executive director of the ArtsEngine at the University of Michigan. In an email to The Chronicle on Nov. 29, Reid said her university job has greatly expanded – she’s launching a national organization, Alliance for the Arts in Research Universities (a2ru). Beyond that, she said she wants to spend any free time with her daughters, ages 16 and 12.

Reid said her resignation was not related to the Nov. 6 defeat of the public art millage, and that she had decided earlier this fall to resign.

She had not mentioned her intent to resign at any of AAPAC’s regular meetings. She did not attend the October meeting, but in September she and John Kotarski had proposed to form a task force that would explore the possibility of starting a street art program.

In her email to The Chronicle, Reid stated that “I hope very much to be able to rejoin the commission, in whatever form it’s in, when I have more time at my disposal.”

During the Nov. 28 meeting, Chamberlin urged commissioners to solicit potential candidates for a replacement. An appointment will be made with a nomination by the mayor and confirmation by the full city council. An application for all city boards and commissions is available on the city clerk’s website.

There was also some confusion about the status of Tony Derezinski, who had been appointed to AAPAC when he served on city council. He did not attend the Nov. 28 meeting, and some commissioners were under the impression that he would no longer be serving on AAPAC because he is no longer on city council. He lost the August 2012 Democratic primary for Ward 2 to Sally Petersen, who was sworn in as a new councilmember on Nov. 19.

Derezinski’s original appointment to AAPAC was not as a council liaison – but rather as an appointment to replace Jeff Meyers in August 2011, for a term ending Nov. 6, 2011. Then at the council’s Dec. 5, 2011 meeting, AAPAC for the first time was included in a list of “council committees” to which councilmembers are appointed annually. And on that list, Derezinski was designated as the appointee to AAPAC for 2012.

AAPAC’s bylaws do not designate a slot for a city council representative to serve as a voting member on the nine-person group. From the bylaws:

Article IV Membership

Section 1. As provided in Section 1:238 of the City Code, AAPAC shall consist of nine (9) voting members nominated by the Mayor and approved by City Council. The City Administrator or her/his designee shall be a nonvoting ex-officio member of AAPAC. Appointments of the nine (9) voting members shall be made from candidates who have the following expertise or affiliation:

Persons who, insofar as possible, have experience and/or an interest in the placement, creation, or design of public art.

Section 2. All members of AAPAC, including members of its subcommittees, shall serve without compensation.

Section 3. All voting members of AAPAC shall be appointed for a three-year term. In order to insure that approximately one third of the voting members’ appointments expire each year, initial appointments shall be three (3) members for a one-year term, three (3) members for a two-year term, and three (3) members for a three-year term as provided in Section 1:238(2)(A) of the City Code.

Section 4. Consistent with City Charter Section 12.2, all members of AAPAC shall be registered electors in the City of Ann Arbor, unless an exception is granted by a resolution concurred in by at least seven (7) members of City Council.

Section 5. Members whose term has expired shall hold over and continue to serve as members of AAPAC until a successor has been appointed. Consistent with City Code Section 1:171, no member shall be allowed to hold over for more than sixty (60) days beyond the appointed term whether or not a successor has been appointed, except that City Council may extend terms for periods of ninety (90) days upon the recommendation of the Mayor and vote of at least six (6) members of Council.

Section 6. Consistent with City Code Section 1:171, the Mayor shall notify City Council of the expiration of a member’s term at least thirty (30) days prior and shall present to City Council all proposed reappointments no later than sixty (60) days after the expiration of the term.

Section 7. Consistent with City Code Section 1:171, any vacancy on AAPAC occurring in the middle of a term shall be filled for the remainder of the term in the same manner as for full-term appointments.

Section 8. Members are expected to attend regularly scheduled meetings and to notify the Chair and the Public Art Administrator or other person designated by the Public Services Area Administrator in advance if they expect to be tardy or absent. If a member misses more than three (3) regularly scheduled meetings in a twelve (12) month period, the Chair shall notify the Mayor and may recommend removal of the member.

Section 9. A member of AAPAC may be removed by City Council for cause following notice and a hearing.

So according to the bylaws, if Derezinski is currently serving on AAPAC at all, it would be as a citizen, not as a councilmember. However, the council did not reappoint him to a full term when the partial term of his original appointment expired in November of 2011.

The second terms for two other commissioners – Connie Brown and Cathy Gendron – end on Dec. 31, 2012. They have not yet been nominated for reappointment.

Commissioners present: Connie Rizzolo Brown, Marsha Chamberlin, John Kotarski, Bob Miller, Malverne Winborne. Also Aaron Seagraves, the city’s public art administrator.

Absent: Tony Derezinski, Cathy Gendron, Wiltrud Simbuerger.

Next regular meeting: Wednesday, Dec. 19, 2012 at 4:30 p.m. at city hall, 301 E. Huron St. [Check Chronicle events listing to confirm date]

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our artful coverage of publicly-funded programs like the Percent for Art, which is overseen by the Ann Arbor public art commission. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle.

I prefer to make a funny face and ask: How is a judicial candidate like the city park system? Or for a question that sounds less like the set-up to a punch line: What’s the deal with downtown Ann Arbor and its connection to the art millage and the library bond proposal?

Voting results from two Nov. 6, 2012 proposals on the Ann Arbor ballot: The Ann Arbor District Library bond proposal and the public art millage. Maps do not include the portion of the library district outside the city boundary. Maps show only in-person votes, not including absentee voters. Shades of green through white indicate a majority voting yes. Shades of lavender through purple indicate a majority voting no. (Maps by The Chronicle.)

Of course, politicians are at least partly right when they say that the voters have spoken. But what did the voters actually say? It’s easy to make true statements about voter sentiment – if you stick to the text of the ballot.

For example, in the non-incumbent race for judge of the 22nd Circuit Court, more voters preferred to have Carol Kuhnke decide future Washtenaw County court cases than to have Jim Fink decide them. You can tell that just from the ballot and from the results. But it’s possible to make a stronger claim: More voters preferred the kind of person Kuhnke is – a candidate endorsed by the city of Ann Arbor Democratic Party. And to support that claim, we’d need to look at other results, like those from the presidential election.

Or by way of another example, the election results indicate that a majority of Ann Arbor voters said they do not want the city to levy an 0.1 mill tax to pay for art in public places. That’s all you can tell from the ballot question and the results. To make stronger claims – related, for example, to what (if anything) voters were trying to say about the existing Percent for Art program – you’d need to find some other way to explore the content of voters’ minds.

The same goes for the Ann Arbor District Library bond proposal and the parks maintenance and capital improvements millage renewal. “Do not tax us to make the bond payments for a new downtown library building, but please continue to tax us to pay for city park needs.” That’s all voters said. They didn’t say anything about their favorite books, or which city park is the best. (By the way, it’s West Park, located in Ward 5, which is indisputably the highest-numbered ward in the city.)

Yet we’d like to divine something more from the results than just the results.

This column, which is heavy on impressionistic conclusions based on maps, and light on rigorous statistical analysis, begins with mapped illustrations of some basics. For example, mostly Democrats live in the eastern portion of Washtenaw County. And in Ann Arbor, Wards 2 and 4 are the strongest city wards for Republicans – even though those wards also lean Democratic. That’s still true 20 years after Ann Arbor’s ward boundaries were drawn to achieve that effect.

The column concludes by illustrating a possible geographic connection between the failed public art millage and the failed downtown library bond proposal – namely, downtown Ann Arbor. 

Ann Arbor City Ward Boundaries

The ward boundaries in the city of Ann Arbor underwent their last substantial revision in the early 1990s. The goal of the redistricting was to establish three heavily Democratic wards (1, 3 and 5), leaving two Republican-leaning wards (2 and 4). Comparing the ward boundaries in Map 1 and the results of the presidential race in Map 2, the ward-wise distribution of Democrats and Republicans has remained fairly stable. Except in the northwest precincts of Ward 4 – where the Ward 5 Democratic strength bleeds down into Ward 4 – the ward boundaries are reflected clearly in the presidential results.

Map 1: Ann Arbor ward boundaries.

Map 2: Ann Arbor 2012 presidential election results (in-person voting only.) Darker blue reflects greater strength for Democrat Barack Obama.

Judges, Dems, Parks

Judicial races are non-partisan. But in the non-incumbent race between Carol Kuhnke and Jim Fink, the local Democratic Party endorsed Kuhnke. And Fink himself, during a candidate forum hosted by the Democratic Party, acknowledged that if it were a partisan legislative race, ”you would not even think about voting for me.” So it was not a secret that Kuhnke was “the Democrat” and Fink “the Republican” in the race. Fink’s pitch to Democrats as voters was that he would follow the law and as a judge set aside his personal views. And in fact, several high-profile Democrats supported his campaign.

In Map 3, the results within the city of Ann Arbor show that support for Kuhnke shows a vaguely similar pattern to the presidential results. But it was not by any means an exact mirroring of the pattern of support received by the Democratic presidential candidate, Barack Obama. In fact, the geographic distribution of Kuhnke’s support within the city of Ann Arbor seems to resemble more closely support for the parks millage (Map 4) than it does support for Obama.

Map 3: Nov. 6, 2012 Ann Arbor city results for 22nd Circuit Court non-incumbent judicial race (in-person voting results only). Darker blue areas reflect stronger support for Carol Kuhnke, who defeated Jim Fink.

Map 4: Nov. 6, 2012 Ann Arbor city results for parks maintenance & capital improvements millage renewal (in-person voting results only). Darker green areas indicate greater support for the parks millage.

Countywide Judicial Race

Countywide, the race between Kuhnke and Fink (Map 6) also showed a roughly similar pattern to the presidential race (Map 5), but it was not by any stretch an exact mirroring.

Map 5: Washtenaw County presidential results for the Nov. 6, 2012 election. Blue shades indicate a majority for Democrat Barack Obama. Red shades indicate support for Republican Mitt Romney.

Map 6: Nov. 6, 2012 Washtenaw County results for 22nd Circuit Court non-incumbent judicial race. Blue shades indicate a majority for Carol Kuhnke. Red indicates support for Jim Fink.

So I think it’s fair to conclude that a substantial number of people voted for the kind of person that they perceived Kuhnke to be (a Democrat, with whatever associations that comes with) as contrasted with the kind of person they perceived Fink to be (a Republican, with whatever associations that comes with). But it’s also fair to conclude that many voters appealed to something other than the “party” in making their choice.

Art and the Library: Downtown Connection

I don’t think the geographic distribution of results in the presidential and judicial races is particularly surprising, even if they do make for pretty maps.

But the distribution of results within the city of Ann Arbor for the public art millage (Map 7) and the Ann Arbor District Library bond proposal (Map 8) reveals something interesting: One factor underlying voter sentiment on those two questions seems to be proximity to the downtown.

Both proposals drew their strongest support from areas near the geographic center of the city. Opposition was strongest in areas further away from the geographic center. For the library bond proposal, which would have funded construction of a new downtown library building, that’s not surprising. For the public art millage, it’s not as obvious that this should be the case.

One possible theory is that folks who live in or near downtown are just more “cosmopolitan” and “arty” and for that reason supported the millage. More plausible, I think, is the idea that greater support in the core areas really reflects less opposition – and that the opposition was based in part on the perception that the public art millage was all about only the downtown. That perception could be based on the fact that the two highest profile, most expensive, and most controversial pieces of public art produced by the city’s current Percent for Art program are located downtown: Herbert Dreiseitl’s fountain sculpture, and Ed Carpenter’s interior piece, both at the new Justice Center. [Carpenter's hanging sculpture has been commissioned, but not yet installed.]

Perhaps some of the votes against the public art millage might be seen as votes against a downtown-centric art program. The Ann Arbor public art commission has recently been working toward an approach that would be more geographically balanced – based on quadrants of the city. And a revision to the city’s public art ordinance that’s expected to be brought forward at the Nov. 19 city council meeting also has a geographic component. The proposed revision to the ordinance includes a requirement that councilmembers for the ward where a piece of art is proposed be notified of that proposal.

To the extent that the results on these two proposals reflect something about attitudes toward the downtown, the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority should take notice. Part of the logic behind enacting a downtown development authority – with its ability to “capture” taxes of other jurisdictions – is to pay for investments in the downtown area that wouldn’t otherwise be made.

Those investments wouldn’t otherwise be made, because the downtown would likely lose every single time, if the use of those taxes were put through the regular budgeting process. That’s because voters in the periphery (who’ll vote like any voters at least partly in a self-interested way) outnumber those in the core. The enactment of a downtown development authority is a mechanism for enforcing the discipline of making infrastructure investments in the downtown, without subjecting them to the relatively volatile annual city budgeting process.

I think one of the minor lessons of the 2012 general election in Ann Arbor is that the case for investments in the downtown is not obvious to many voters, and will need to be made on an ongoing basis.

Map 7: Results of the Nov. 6, 2012 Ann Arbor public art millage. Maps show only in-person votes, not including absentee voters. Shades of green through white indicate a majority voting yes. Shades of lavender through purple indicate a majority voting no.

Map 8: Results for the Nov. 6, 2012 Ann Arbor District Library bond proposal (in-person voting results only). Results from townships outside Ann Arbor are not included. Shades of green through white indicate a majority voting yes. Shades of lavender through purple indicate a majority voting no.

Links to Maps

Links to the dynamic maps built by The Chronicle on geocommons.com:

• 2012 Ann Arbor city parks millage
• 2012 Ann Arbor public art millage
• 2012 Ann Arbor District Library bond proposal for a new downtown library
• 2012 Washtenaw County non-incumbent 22nd Circuit Court judicial race
• 2012 Washtenaw County U.S. presidential race results
• 2012 Ann Arbor city non-incumbent 22nd Circuit Court judicial race
• 2012 Ann Arbor city U.S. presidential race results

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At the Nov. 19 meeting, two proposals will be brought forward on the city’s public art ordinance. The changes stem from the fact that a proposed public art millage failed at the polls on Nov. 6 by a 10-point margin (55.8% opposed and 44.14% in favor).

So at the Nov. 8 meeting, two different proposals were floated on the city’s existing public art ordinance – based on possibly differing interpretations of the expressed voter sentiment. It’s possible to construe the result as either (1) about the way public art is funded or (2) about whether public money should be used to support public art at all. One proposal was announced by Sabra Briere (Ward 1) and the other by Jane Lumm (Ward 2).

Briere’s proposal is to narrow the definition of projects to which the existing ordinance would apply. Currently, the Percent for Art ordinance applies to essentially any capital improvement project undertaken by the city, and requires that 1% of the budget for such projects be set aside for public art. Briere’s proposal would narrow the definition by restricting eligible capital improvement projects to those that are “intended to be open or visible to the public.” Projects to construct roads, highways, paths, and sidewalks would be eliminated from eligibility. Bridges would still qualify.

Briere’s proposal includes a financial threshold for qualifying projects: $100,000. Briere’s proposed ordinance amendments would also require a public process associated with proposed art projects. Part of that process would require notification of the councilmembers in whose ward a project is proposed.

Lumm’s proposal is not to amend the existing public art ordinance, but rather to repeal it. Lumm described her intent at the Nov. 8 meeting to bring forward a proposal similar to one she’d made at the council’s Aug. 20, 2012 meeting – a resolution that directed the city attorney’s office to prepare an ordinance revision that would repeal the Percent for Art program. In an email sent to other councilmembers, Lumm stated that  ”… the version I will bring forward on 11/19 will be the proposed ordinance changes themselves for consideration at first reading.”

The Aug. 20 meeting was the occasion on which the council voted to place a public art millage on the Nov. 6 ballot. It was meant to provide a more flexible funding mechanism for public art in Ann Arbor. The 0.1 mill tax was expected to generate around $450,000 annually.

The proposal won a majority of votes in just 13 out of 59 Ann Arbor precincts, with the most support coming from Ward 5, Precinct 4 where 60.5% of voters supported the public art millage. Ward 5 had six of the 13 precincts where the proposal achieved a majority. And the proposal finished in a dead heat in Ward 5, Precinct 5 with 471 voting for and against it. Opposition among in-person voters was strongest in Ward 1, Precinct 9, where only 34.5% of voters supported it.

The proposal did not win a majority of votes in any precinct of Ward 2, which is represented by Lumm and Tony Derezinski, who also serves on the Ann Arbor public art commission. Nov. 8 was Derezinski’s last council meeting – he was defeated by Sally Petersen in the August Democratic primary.

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]

The proposal won a majority of votes in just 13 out of 59 precincts with the most support coming from Ward 5, Precinct 4 where 60.5% of voters supported the public art millage. Ward 5 had six of the 13 precincts where the proposal achieved a majority. And the proposal finished in a dead heat in Ward 5, Precinct 5 with 471 voting for and against it.  Opposition among in-person voters was strongest in Ward 1, Precinct 9, where only 34.5% of voters supported it. The proposal did not win a majority of votes in any precinct of Ward 2.

The city’s current funding mechanism for public art, the Percent for Art ordinance, will remain in place unless action is taken by Ann Arbor city council to change it. It’s possible that an amendment would be brought forward to redefine what counts as an eligible project is under the ordinance. One of several previous attempts by the council to revise the ordinance had included a restriction on the eligible funds that could be used.

The Percent for Art program, in place since 2007, requires that 1% of all city capital projects be set aside for public art, up to a limit of $250,000 per project. According to the most recent budget update at the Oct. 24, 2012 meeting of the Ann Arbor public art commission, the Percent for Art program has a balance of $1.533 million. Of that, $847,104 has been earmarked for previously approved projects, leaving about $686,000 unallocated. [.pdf of budget summary]

The millage proposal had been introduced without public input in August, brought forward by city councilmember Christopher Taylor (Ward 3), to the surprise of the arts community. Leaders of many local arts organizations had urged the city council to hold off and take a more strategic approach to floating a millage. Concerns included a lack of clarity for voters about how yes or no votes would impact public funding for art, the short time frame during which a millage campaign could be mounted, and the fact that Ann Arbor voters would also be voting on two other millages on the Nov. 6 ballot: (1) renewal of a 1.1 mill tax to pay for park capital improvements and maintenance; and (2) a library millage to support construction of a new downtown branch of the Ann Arbor District Library. [The library bond proposal was also defeated. The parks millage renewal passed.]

Those concerns were not compelling to the majority of councilmembers, who voted on Aug. 20 to put the millage on the Nov. 6 ballot. Subsequently, supporters of the arts community formed a campaign committee (B for Art) to support the millage.

The Percent for Art funds are overseen by the Ann Arbor public art commission, which makes recommendations to the city council about spending decisions for public art. The city’s most high-profile – and controversial – project to date has been the water sculpture in front of city hall, designed by German sculptor Herbert Dreiseitl.

Deb Polich, the alliance’s executive director, attended the Aug. 22, 2012 meeting of the Ann Arbor Public Art Commission, where she and AAPAC chair Marsha Chamberlin indicated they would help lead the effort to pass the millage. [See Chronicle coverage: "Art Commission Strategizes as Millage Looms."]

On Aug. 20, the Ann Arbor city council had voted unanimously to put a millage on the Nov. 6 ballot that, if approved by voters, would fund art in public places. The 0.1 mill tax would generate about $450,000 per year and be in place for four years. Those dollars would temporarily replace the current funding mechanism for the city’s Percent for Art program, which would be suspended for the duration of the millage.

Millage dollars would allow for more flexibility in the types of public art that can be funded compared to the existing program, which requires that projects paid for with Percent for Art funds must be permanent, located on public property, and tied in some way to their capital funding source. The current program, created by the city council in 2007, requires that 1% of the budget for any capital improvement project be set aside for public art, up to a cap of $250,000 per project.

The millage will be listed on the Nov. 6 ballot in Ann Arbor as Proposal B. The “B for Art” campaign has launched a website, Facebook page and Twitter account (@BforART). The group’s email address at gmail.com is citizensforartinpublicplaces

In front of Ann Arbor city hall, from left: electrician Jim Fackert, and Ann Arbor public art commissioners Bob Miller and John Kotarski. Fackert was again working on the system that operates the Dreiseitl water sculpture, which includes water pumps and flashing blue lights. Miller and Kotarski were headed into the Aug. 22 meeting of the public art commission. (Photos by the writer.)

Dealing with the millage wasn’t the commission’s main agenda item, but they did spend some time talking about the need for a separate campaign committee. AAPAC chair Marsha Chamberlin stressed that the commission itself can’t advocate for the millage, ”but we can educate out the wazoo.”

As individuals, though, commissioners will likely be very active – Chamberlin will be among those organizing the campaign, along with Arts Alliance president Deb Polich, who attended AAPAC’s Aug. 22 session. Mark Tucker of FestiFools was there too, and told commissioners that he and others were brainstorming on free or inexpensive ways to support the millage – including a “surprise” that involves football Saturdays and is “FestiFoolian in nature” to attract media coverage.

Ken Clein also volunteered to help. He was on hand to update commissioners on the status of the Herbert Dreiseitl water sculpture in front of city hall, as a follow-up to concerns raised in June about the installation. Clein is a principal with Quinn Evans Architects, the Ann Arbor firm that handled the design of the new Justice Center and oversaw its construction. Though delayed, the Dreiseitl installation is nearly completed and will be handed off to the city soon, along with a two-year maintenance warranty.

The sculpture is the largest and most expensive project coordinated by the commission, and the first one approved under the Percent for Art program. The two newest public art projects were added to the pipeline at the Aug. 22 meeting, on unanimous votes. They’ll eventually be located at: (1) Forest Avenue Plaza, next to the Forest Avenue parking structure near South University; and (2) a future roundabout at Ellsworth and South State.

In a written report, commissioners were given an update on available funds in the Percent for Art budget. Of the $1.668 million balance, $856,997 is earmarked for projects already approved by AAPAC, including $400,000 for artwork at the East Stadium bridges and $150,000 for Argo Cascades – but aspects of those projects are still under review by the city’s legal staff. That leaves $810,276 in unallocated funds. The largest amounts are in revenues from sewer projects ($451,955) and street millage projects ($241,951).

The commission also finalized its four-year strategic plan, and moved ahead on a new effort to involve residents in planning for public art in each of four quadrants in Ann Arbor.

Public Art Millage

On Aug. 20, the Ann Arbor city council voted unanimously to put a millage on the Nov. 6 ballot that, if approved by voters, would fund art in public places. The 0.1 mill tax would generate about $450,000 per year and be in place for four years. Those dollars would temporarily replace the current funding mechanism for the city’s Percent for Art program, which would be suspended for the duration of the millage.

The current program, created by the city council in 2007, requires that 1% of the budget for any capital improvement project be set aside for public art, up to a cap of $250,000 per project. To date, the program has generated just over $2 million. So far, two projects have been completed, or nearly so: the Dreiseitl water sculpture in front of city hall, and metal tree sculptures in West Park. Several other projects are in the works.

The arts community is generally supportive of a millage for funding art in public places, as it would provide more flexibility than the current capital funding. Because of constraints related to the funding mechanism, projects paid for with Percent for Art funds must be permanent and located on public property. The artwork can’t be temporary – so performances or artist-in-residency programs can’t be supported under the current program. The projects must also have some link to the funding source. For example, art paid for out of street millage revenues must be part of a street project, or incorporate street or transportation “themes.” This lack of flexibility has been a frequent criticism of the program. Questions also have been raised about the legality of diverting funds from dedicated millage or public utility funds in order to pay for public art.

Virtually no one in the arts community was consulted about the proposed millage, and many were shocked when it was unveiled by councilmember Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) on Aug. 9, by adding it to the council’s agenda that night from the council table. Taylor contended he simply wanted to start a conversation about it, for consideration at the Aug. 20 council meeting. He indicated that he would like input from the public art commission, whose members had not been informed about the proposal until a few days prior to the Aug. 9 announcement.

This forced AAPAC to call a special meeting on Aug. 15, which was attended by several members of the arts community who spoke during public commentary. The general sentiment was support for a millage, but a strong desire to postpone until a later election so that there would be time for a more thoughtful approach. The commission also heard from Taylor at that meeting, who raised the vague specter of risk to the current program’s funding. That perceived threat appeared to be compelling, and commissioners voted unanimously to recommend that the millage be placed on the Nov. 6 ballot.

However, during public commentary at the council’s Aug. 20 meeting, Deb Polich, president of the Arts Alliance, asked the council not to put the millage on the ballot. That reflected the clear consensus of sentiment at a cultural leaders meeting, hosted by the Arts Alliance and held earlier in the day on Aug. 20 – that it was not an urgent matter to place the question on the ballot.

Public Art Millage: Public Commentary

At the commission’s Aug. 22 meeting, four people spoke on the millage issue during public commentary.

Margaret Parker told commissioners that she was there to offer help to work on a millage campaign. For any millage, the ballot language is legalistic, convoluted and difficult to understand, she said. The trick is how to communicate to the public and let them know what they’re voting for. They need to know that if they vote yes, she said, then it will expand the types of projects that can be funded. But they also need to know that if they vote against the millage funding for public art will end, she claimed. If the public isn’t clued in, she said, that would be unfortunate.

[In fact, a defeat of the millage would not automatically end funding for public art. The current Percent for Art funding would remain in place, unless the city council voted to rescind it or possibly alter it. More likely is that it would be altered to adopt a definition of "capital project" that did not include, for example, street reconstruction projects. Some observers have expressed the view that the newly-constituted council in November would have enough votes to eliminate the Percent for Art program, and leave no alternative funding mechanism for public art – but it's not clear which six councilmembers would actually support that approach.]

Mark Tucker said he was there representing FestiFools, and possibly the University of Michigan. He also wanted to offer help on a millage campaign. There’s been a lot of talk about how much a campaign might cost, he noted. He and others have been brainstorming on some inexpensive or free ways to publicize the millage, but he didn’t want to reveal them publicly and give away the surprise. However, he indicated that it would revolve around UM football Saturdays and would be “FestiFoolian in nature” to attract the media.

Shary Brown, former director of the Ann Arbor Street Art Fair, also attended the Aug. 22 meeting. Her public commentary was brief: “Go, team!”

Speaking at both opportunities for public commentary, Thomas Partridge said he had no doubt that the millage would pass, but it’s a question about how the money is used. He advocated for public access to art education, as well as for art that represents real people – like the Diego Rivera mural at the Detroit Institute of Arts.

Public Art Millage: Commission Discussion

Marsha Chamberlin began by circulating a communications plan that the city had developed for the 2011 street millage renewal – she suggested that this could be used as a model for the public art millage. [.pdf of street millage communications plan]

As a commission, they can’t advocate for the millage or solicit money for a campaign, Chamberlin said, ”but we can educate out the wazoo.” She reported that Jeremy Peters had volunteered to help with a campaign, and noted that he has experience running political campaigns. A public relations professional has also indicated interest in helping, she said.

An entity separate from the art commission needs to be organized quickly, Chamberlin said, with people like Peters, Margaret Parker, and Deb Polich of the Arts Alliance.

Deb Polich, shown here at an Aug. 20 meeting of arts and cultural leaders, is president of the Arts Alliance, which hosted the meeting. She attended the Aug. 22 meeting of the Ann Arbor public art commission and is volunteering to help lead a campaign to pass the proposed millage for art in public places. Ann Arbor city council voted to put the millage on the Nov. 6 ballot.

Aaron Seagraves, the city’s public art administrator, reported that he was working on an ad to put in the fall issue of the city’s WasteWatcher newsletter, which is mailed to city residents by the city’s solid waste and recycling unit. It will be on the same page as the ad for the city’s park maintenance and capital improvements millage, he said. He’ll also be putting together a Q&A about the millage and creating a website with information, modeled after the park millage site.

Connie Brown noted that a lot of concern has been expressed about communicating a clear message to the public. Saying they can’t take too long to develop a statement, she wondered what the plan would be to engage the broader community.

Chamberlin felt there should be a consistent message on the website, WasteWatcher ad and elsewhere, and commissioners should have a role in crafting that message. Cathy Gendron agreed. The commission takes an active role in communicating about public art in Ann Arbor, she said, and there’s no reason why they can’t be involved in developing the message for the millage.

Regarding the campaign itself, Chamberlin said that commissioners can work on it as individuals – they just can’t use city resources. She, Polich, Peters and a few others would form a small strategic committee to organize it, she said, then figure out a way to implement the campaign with volunteers.

John Kotarski said he assumed that someone would be leading the campaign – would the commission do that? Chamberlin explained that while the commission would help in developing a message and educating the public about the millage, there needs to be a separate entity that works on advocacy.

Polich said it’s clear to the Arts Alliance and others that passage of this millage is critical, so they want to be deeply engaged in the campaign. She’s heard from others who want to be involved, including Conan Smith. [Smith, an Ann Arbor resident, is chair of the Washtenaw County board of commissioners. He has been active in many Democratic political campaigns and is married to Rebekah Warren, a state senator representing District 18.] Polich said that Smith and Peters have worked together on political campaigns in the past.

Outcome: There was no formal action on this item.

Later in the meeting, the commission discussed holding public forums as part of a new effort to conduct strategic planning based on four quadrants of the city. At the end of AAPAC’s Aug. 22 meeting, Polich told commissioners that they should expect to hear questions from the public about the proposed millage at these forums, so they should be prepared to respond. She recommended having an “open flow of information” between the commission and millage campaign committee. It’s important to make sure they’re all communicating the same message in terms of definitions and other information, she said.

Strategic Planning

The commission has been developing a strategic plan for several months. At AAPAC’s July 25 meeting, the group discussed a draft four-year strategic plan, which identified several major goals to pursue through 2016. They voted to approve the plan, with the understanding that AAPAC chair Marsha Chamberlin would make revisions based on the consensus they had reached during the discussion. None of the changes were substantive.

On Aug. 22, Chamberlin presented the revised version. [.pdf of strategic plan] These are the plan’s broad goals (each of them are fleshed out with more detailed objectives):

• Goal A: Ann Arbor will substantially increase the number of public works of art throughout the city through the annual assignment of funds and an expedited project development and artist selection process.
• Goal B: AAPAC will diversify public engagement and participation in the selection of Public Art by establishing a standing task force in each of the city quadrants to recommend public art projects therein. (Quadrants will be based on the “land use areas” from the City of Ann Arbor’s Master Plan, Land Use Element, 2009)
• Goal C: AAPAC will increase the public understanding, appreciation and support of public art through consistent public relations and education efforts.
• Goal D: Pursue private funding for public art.

There was some uncertainty about the timeframe that was outlined in some of the objectives, and several commissioners felt that the dates should be pushed back a few months. Specifically, the dates for these two objectives were pushed back to January 2013:

• Goal A, Objective 1: At the beginning of each fiscal year, the Percent for Public Art funds will be divided to fund public art within each of the four city areas, beginning with FY 2013.
• Goal B, Objective 1: Task Forces for each city area will be approved by the commission no later than October 15, 2012 and serve a term of one year and will be comprised of at least one resident of the quadrant, one business person whose business is in the area, a commission member, and an artist.

Chamberlin observed that the plan might need to be tweaked, depending on the outcome of the Nov. 6 millage vote. She said the plan sets direction and tone for AAPAC, but the commission is not bound to follow it strictly. It creates a structure for how AAPAC operates and engages the public, she said.

Outcome: The commission voted unanimously to approve the revised strategic plan.

Strategic Planning: Quadrants

Later in the meeting, Connie Rizzolo Brown presented a specific proposal to move forward with the strategic plan’s Goal B: Establishing a standing task force in each of the city quadrants to recommend public art projects. This idea had been floated by Malverne Winborne at AAPAC’s four-hour planning retreat in late February 2012, and discussed again at their June 27 meeting. The quadrants are designated in the city’s master plan “land use elements” section: west, central, south and northeast. [.pdf map of quadrants]

Two or more of the nine AAPAC members would be assigned to each quadrant, generally based on where they live. Tentatively, that assignment is: (1) West – Connie Brown, John Kotarski; (2) Central – Marsha Chamberlin, Bob Miller, Wiltrud Simbuerger; (3) South – Malverne Winborne; and (4) Northeast – Tony Derezinski, Cathy Gendron and Theresa Reid. One of the commissioners in the central or northeast quadrant will likely shift to join Winborne in the south.

Brown’s proposal included an outline of guidelines for the quadrant work:

A. Engage the public to create a plan for the quadrant.

Step 1: Set up three meetings in each quadrant at three different public locations.

Step 2: Hold the meetings. They should include a short presentation on public art in general, and on Ann Arbor’s specific Percent for Art program.

Step 3: Work with interested residents to discover and understand your quadrant. This process should include mapping the location of existing art, natural features, parks, well-traveled areas, and both great and “rotten” potential places for public art.

Step 4: Evaluate and make both qualitative and quantitative decisions about locations, type of projects – long-term, mid-term and short-term – and budget, among other things.

Step 5: Review the decisions and evaluate the challenges and proposed outcomes.

Step 6: Assign a percentage of the quadrant’s budget to the project(s) and bring a proposal to AAPAC. [No budgets have been proposed yet.]

Step 7: Keep the information flowing.

B. Form a task force for each specific project. Members would include AAPAC representatives, a city council liaison, artists, design professionals, the city administrator or his designee, one or more representatives from city units that have responsibility for the site, one or more representatives of organizations with a professional interest in the project.

C. Put the project into motion. It would ultimately come before AAPAC and then city council for approval before being implemented.

Commissioners thanked Brown and expressed enthusiasm for this effort. John Kotarski said he liked it because it allowed commissioners to educate neighborhoods – and neighborhoods to educate AAPAC. It puts an emphasis on listening, he said.

Theresa Reid suggested using a presentation that Kotarski had given on public art at AAPAC’s February 2012 retreat, modified for these quadrant meetings. He offered to shorten it and incorporate suggestions and images from other commissioners.

Marsha Chamberlin described the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority’s Connecting William Street effort. She noted that the DDA began by talking with small groups to refine its message, and is now making presentations to larger groups. [See Chronicle coverage of the DDA's presentation to the planning commission: "Planning Group Briefed on William St. Project."]

Chamberlin suggested that AAPAC take a similar approach, so that they’d each be giving essentially the same presentation in their quadrants.

Brown said she’d like to start holding the meetings in October, even though she knew they’d also be busy with the millage campaign. She hoped to work with the schools to do outreach, saying that it’s easier to get the attention of parents at the beginning of the school year. Commissioners discussed other options for getting the word out, and for the logistics of the meetings.

Chamberlin concluded the discussion by calling it a huge step forward.

Outcome: There was no formal vote on this project.

Dreiseitl Sculpture Update

At their July 25 meeting, commissioners had been updated on several ongoing projects, including a follow-up on concerns raised in June about the Dreiseitl installation in front of city hall. The discussion in July resulted in a request by commissioners to invite someone from the project to talk to them about its status.

Ken Clein of Quinn Evans Architects and Marsha Chamberlin, chair of the Ann Arbor public art commission. Clein was on hand to give an update on the Dreiseitl sculpture in front of city hall. He was also recently appointed to the city’s planning commission.

That someone was Ken Clein, a principal and project manager with Quinn Evans Architects who oversaw the Dreiseitl installation. He had also submitted a memo that summarized its current status. [.pdf of Clein's memo] Also attending the Aug. 22 meeting was Patrick Judd of Conservation Design Forum, a firm that helped with the sculpture’s design.

Clein began by telling commissioners that he also wanted to volunteer for the public art millage campaign. After briefly describing the different companies involved in the project, as subcontractors hired by Quinn Evans, Clein apologized that the Dreiseitl piece hadn’t yet been completed. You can’t just go to the store and buy the pumps and other devices needed to operate it, he said – because it’s all custom work, made under the guidance of Dreiseitl. This was a different approach from the way Dreiseitl typically handles his projects, Clein said, so there was a learning curve.

Clein noted that Dreiseitl had intended the sculpture to reflect the seasons, but it has been unusually dry, he said. These drought conditions caused the two large tanks that hold water for the piece – a total of about 2,500 gallons – to run dry. Another factor is that the bronze front of the sculpture faces south and heats up, which causes water to evaporate. Calculations by the Conservation Design Forum estimated that 75-100 gallons would evaporate each day. But water was being lost in excess of that, Clein said, so they looked for – and found – leaks in the system, which were resealed. That helped, Clein said, as did the fact that there’s been more rain in July and August.

Dreiseitl intended the water in the sculpture to be rainwater, Clein said. Certainly it would be possible to hook it up to a different water supply, he added, but that’s not how it was envisioned.

Clein also talked about problems with the six small water pumps, which originally were mounted inside the sculpture. The filters in the pumps became clogged with cigarette butts and other debris, and prevented water from flowing up to the top of the sculpture. Jim Fackert, an electrician with CAE – the subcontractor for the sculpture’s lighting and water system – replaced the smaller pumps with one larger pump that’s located outside the sculpture and is easier to reach for cleaning and maintenance.

Work is continuing, Clein said. Additional LED lights, that Dreiseitl decided to add “fairly late in the game,” will be installed this month. Fackert is working on a punch list, and is tagging all the connections in the system so that when it’s turned over to the city, the maintenance staff will know how it works. They’ll also be given training and a maintenance manual, Clein said. There’s a two-year warranty on that aspect of the sculpture, and Fackert will be back to shut it down in the winter and start it up in the spring.

Dreiseitl Sculpture Update: Commission Discussion

John Kotarski joked that he’s the one who gets credit or blame in asking for more details about the Dreiseitl project. [Kotarski has pushed for status updates and a more formal evaluation of the project.] He told Clein that the building, designed by Quinn Evans, had an awesome design and that the Dreiseitl sculpture was a world-class piece of art. He appreciated the fact that materials and fabrication had been done locally. It’s an example of the kind of thing he’d like to promote, Kotarski said.

When he and other commissioners go out into the community, Kotarski said, there’s a big target on their backs – they have to answer questions, and they don’t have all the answers. He said he wanted to sound knowledgeable about the work. The review is not intended to lay blame, he said, but to identify how things worked and look for ways to improve the process.

Kotarski said he’d been told that holes were recently drilled to allow water to run down from the roof into the tanks that store water for the fountain. He wondered how much water came from the roofs of the Justice Center and city hall. Clein replied that the 8-inch-diameter pipe can handle a maximum of 800 gallons per minute.

Connie Brown reported that according to Fackert, the Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum is planning to develop a display based on the rainwater system that the sculpture is part of. It’s a great way for kids to understand art and technology, she said. Bob Miller pointed out that it’s the kind of thing that the commission has discussed – creating a sign to show how the rain garden and sculpture are part of the site’s stormwater management system.

Patrick Judd of the Conservation Design Forum said there’s also interest in using the site as a project for students in the University of Michigan College of Architecture and Urban Planning.

Outcome: This was an informational report, and no formal action was required.

New Projects: Forest Plaza, Ellsworth Roundabout

The commission took action on two proposals for artwork that had been tabled from previous meetings. The projects would be located in: (1) a plaza next to the Forest Avenue parking structure near South University; and (2) a future roundabout at Ellsworth and South State.

New Projects: Forest Plaza

The Forest Avenue Plaza proposal had been submitted to AAPAC earlier this year by Amy Kuras, the city’s park planner, and Susan Pollay, executive director of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority. The city has held two public meetings to seek input on improving the small plaza, and has about $40,000 in funding for the project. The intake form stated that the city would like additional public art funding – suggested at between $10,000 to $20,000 – for artwork to be placed in the plaza.

Bob Miller began the discussion by saying he’d visited the site, and found it very challenging. There are a lot of other elements in the plaza – planters, trees, transformer boxes – in a very tight space. Putting a sculpture in the plaza would be difficult, and he suggested that a mural on the transformer boxes might be a better option.

Theresa Reid noted that feedback from the public meetings held by the city indicated that people didn’t want a mural there. Miller said he felt there should be another public meeting to talk about what would and wouldn’t work there. Connie Brown pointed out that it might be that the owners of those utility boxes wouldn’t want a mural.

John Kotarski said there were three things that excited him about the site. It’s visually boring now, which means there’s opportunity. It’s a public gathering place, and the project offers an opportunity to collaborate with other entities. Artists love challenges, he noted. It might be worth trying to flesh out the proposal – perhaps even more money would be available than what was suggested.

Marsha Chamberlin described it as a “plug ugly” site. It’s getting better, because there’ll be more foot traffic in the area now. [A new apartment building on South Forest, called The Landmark, is opening for move-in on Aug. 30.] It’s been discussed for years by AAPAC and its predecessor, the Commission for Art in Public Places, she said. It seems like there’s the opportunity to do something interesting there.

Margaret Parker, a former AAPAC chair who was attending the meeting as a member of the public, reminded the group that there was money left in an account administered by the Ann Arbor Area Community Foundation, which had been originally set aside for a project on South University. Chamberlin clarified that about $1,100 remained in that account.

Outcome: After further discussion, commissioners voted to accept the project into AAPAC’s request for proposals (RFP) process, and allocate matching funds in the range of $10,000 to $35,000.

New Projects: Ellsworth Roundabout

The roundabout at the intersection of South State and Ellsworth is a major capital project at one of the busiest intersections south of town, with construction planned for the summer of 2013.

Bob Miller described the location as barren. He didn’t think it was part of the city’s South State corridor study. [In fact, according to discussions held at the planning commission as well as information on the city's website, the corridor study extends along South State between Stimson and Ellsworth. For background on that project, see Chronicle coverage: "South State Corridor Gets Closer Look."]

From left: Art commissioners Wiltrud Simbuerger, John Kotarski and Cathy Gendron. To the right is Patrick Judd of the Conservation Design Forum.

Commissioners talked about the visibility of the site, in part because of the new Costco that opened earlier this summer, off of Ellsworth just west of South State. Other businesses in the area include several Zingerman’s retail stores, and a Tim Horton’s that’s in the planning stages near the northeast corner that intersection.

John Kotarski proposed allocating $50,000 in matching funds, provided another partner would also contribute. He proposed using money in the Percent for Art funds generated by the street millage, out of the $241,951 that’s available.

Connie Brown wasn’t comfortable allocating a specific amount at this point. She also wanted the commission to consider a more holistic approach, looking at the entire corridor rather than just the roundabout. Cathy Gendron supported that expanded approach, as well as emphasizing collaboration, with local businesses or other governmental units like Pittsfield Township.

Kotarski said he’d prefer that they table or amend the proposal to incorporate the things they’d discussed. Voting it down would send the wrong message, he said. Chamberlin was reluctant to table it, noting that the proposal has been on AAPAC’s agenda since April.

After further discussion, Tony Derezinski proposed a resolution to accept the State and Ellsworth roundabout as a project for fiscal 2013, and to seek collaboration on it with the city’s South State corridor project and other interested parties.

Outcome: Commissioners voted unanimously to accept the roundabout project.

Misc. Communications

During the meeting there were several updates and other items of communication.

Misc. Communications: Minutes

As part of their routine business, commissioners were asked to approve the minutes from AAPAC’s previous meeting. John Kotarski had a couple of corrections – instances where he didn’t think the minutes accurately reflected his remarks. He then questioned the need for the level of detail that’s provided in the minutes, and encouraged Aaron Seagraves, the city’s public art administrator, to condense them as much as possible.

Marsha Chamberlin, AAPAC’s chair, said she had talked with Seagraves about simplifying the minutes, but noted that he’s using minutes from other commissions as a model. One possibility would be for him to tape the meetings, she said, to ensure accuracy.

Theresa Reid said she wasn’t sure that’s the best use of his time. Chamberlin replied that undoubtedly there’s some middle ground they can reach.

Misc. Communications: Percent for Art Funds

In a written report, commissioners were given an update on available funds in the Percent for Art budget. Of the $1.668 million balance, $856,997 is earmarked for projects already approved by AAPAC, including $400,000 for artwork at the East Stadium bridges and $150,000 for Argo Cascades.

That leaves $810,276 in unallocated funds. The largest amounts are in revenues from sewer projects ($451,955) and street millage projects ($241,951).

Misc. Communications: Countywide Art Plan

Aaron Seagraves, the city’s public art administrator, reported that he’d been involved in meetings about a possible countywide master plan for public art. The meetings are facilitated by the Arts Alliance, which is leading that initiative. He noted that some the discussions have focused on doing a countywide inventory of public art, and that the Ann Arbor public art commission could be involved in that. There’s already an online inventory of the city’s public art.

Earlier this year, the Arts Alliance applied for a $100,000 grant through the National Endowment for the Arts “Our Town” program to help fund development of a county master plan for public art. That grant was not awarded. Arts Alliance president Deb Polich attended AAPAC’s Aug. 22 meeting and told commissioners she’d recently spoken with an NEA representative who’d told her that the grant had been “on the bubble.” The NEA representative encouraged the alliance to re-apply for the same grant in January.

Polich also noted that there’s still interest among other partners in moving forward with a master plan, and funds have been committed to that effort. Those partners are Washtenaw County government ($25,000); ArtServe Michigan ($5,000); the city of Ann Arbor/Ann Arbor public art commission ($5,000); the Cultural Alliance of Southeast Michigan ($5,000); the University of Michigan’s ArtsEngine program ($92,825); and the Huron River Watershed Council ($10,000).

Misc. Communications: Project Updates

Three projects are still under review by the city attorney’s staff: (1) a statement of qualifications (SOQ) to develop a pool of muralists, (2) an RFP (request for proposals) for artwork at the East Stadium bridges, and (3) an SOQ for an art project at Argo Cascades.

The length of time that projects are reviewed by legal staff has been a point of concern raised at previous AAPAC meetings, most recently at their July 25 meeting. On Aug. 22, Aaron Seagraves, the city’s public art administrator, reported that he’d received feedback on some of these projects from the city attorney’s staff, and that projects were moving along, though they were still being reviewed by legal staff. He didn’t know how much additional time would be needed for that review.

AAPAC chair Marsha Chamberlin said she recently had talked to city attorney Stephen Postema, who had expressed “frustration” that the commission’s concerns had been aired at a public meeting. Chamberlin felt that the process with the legal staff would be expedited now.

Commissioners present: Connie Rizzolo Brown, Marsha Chamberlin, Tony Derezinski, Cathy Gendron, John Kotarski, Bob Miller, Theresa Reid, Wiltrud Simbuerger. Also Aaron Seagraves, the city’s public art administrator.

Absent: Malverne Winborne.

Next regular meeting: Wednesday, Sept. 26, 2012 at 4:30 p.m. at city hall, 301 E. Huron St. [Check Chronicle events listing to confirm date]

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our artful coverage of publicly-funded programs like the Percent for Art, which is overseen by the Ann Arbor public art commission. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle.

A section of a partially complete mural at Allmendinger Park, funded through Ann Arbor’s existing Percent for Art program. (Photos by the writer.)

The public art millage would be levied at a rate of 0.1 mill, which would raise around $450,000 from Ann Arbor taxpayers annually. Passage of the public art millage would, according to the corresponding charter amendment, suspend the city’s public art funding mechanism embedded in the Percent for Art ordinance – but only for the duration of the four-year millage.

A selling point of the millage, compared to the current Percent for Art program, is that millage money could be used more flexibly than money set aside under the Percent for Art program. The Percent for Art ordinance requires that 1% of all city capital projects be set aside for art. But this funding mechanism carries with it a legal requirement that art paid for through the program be in some sense “monumental” art that is permanent. Performance art or temporary installations would not qualify under the current program.

Even though a millage offers more flexibility, leaders in the arts community are concerned about a possible perception that it would be completely flexible – which led the council to change the ballot language and charter amendment from “public art” to “art in public places.”

A proposal from Jane Lumm (Ward 2) to begin the process of revising the Percent for Art ordinance in advance of the millage vote got little traction from the council. Lumm indicated that she wanted to offer voters a clear choice – that unless the millage were approved, public funding for art would disappear. But her resolution was voted down, with additional support only from Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) and Mike Anglin (Ward 5).

The majority of councilmembers felt that such a move was “premature.” Mayor John Hieftje indicated that he was open to a scenario in which the millage passed, the tax was levied for four years (which would generate roughly $1.8 million in money that could be spent flexibly), but then was not offered to voters for renewal after four years, which would mean an automatic reversion to the current Percent for Art program.

In other business, the council declined to take action on two pieces of land at opposite ends of the downtown – 414 N. Main St. (site of the old St. Nicholas Church), and 350 S. Fifth Ave. (the former YMCA lot). The council rejected a proposal to begin the rezoning process for the St. Nicholas Church property – in advance of a public auction of the land starting Sept. 6. The council also declined to support a directive to the city administrator to prepare for disposition of the old Y lot, citing an ongoing planning process for the area of downtown Ann Arbor that includes the city-owned parcel. That process – Connecting William Street – is being led by the Ann Arbor DDA under direction from the city council.

The council transacted a mixed bag of other business, including approval of a collaborative effort with Washtenaw County to handle towing. The council also approved the final grant contract necessary for completing an environmental study in connection with a runway extension at the Ann Arbor municipal airport.

The council rejected a proposal from Comcast for a new franchise agreement, opting instead to allow the current arrangement to stay in place at least through the end of its term in 2017.

The meeting ended around midnight with jostling among councilmembers on the issue of mayoral appointments. Prompting the discussion was the reappointment of Sandi Smith (Ward 1) to the board of the Ann Arbor DDA. Kunselman and Lumm voted against the reappointment, objecting to Smith’s dual service on the city council and the DDA board. Smith was originally appointed to the board before her election to the council in 2008 and is not seeking re-election this term. Other councilmembers defended Smith’s selection.

Less controversial was the appointment of Michael Benson to the taxicab board. That body had been unable to meet because it had only two voting members out of five, and could not achieve a quorum. If all three members show up now, that body can hold its meeting.

Public Art Millage

The Aug. 20 council agenda included a resolution to place a public art millage on the Nov. 6 ballot for Ann Arbor voters. A second related resolution dealt with the existing Percent for Art program.

Public Art Millage: Background

The possibility of placing a ballot question in front of voters this November had first been revealed at the council’s Aug. 9, 2012 meeting, when Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) added the item to the agenda at the start of that meeting. The millage that voters will be asked to approve will be levied at a rate of 0.1 mills, which will generate around $450,000 annually. For the owner of a house worth $200,000 the tax will cost around $10 a year.

Approval by voters on Nov. 6 would mean that the funding mechanism already provided by Ann Arbor’s Percent for Art ordinance would be suspended for a period of four years – the duration of the millage. That program, in place since 2007, requires that 1% of all city capital projects be set aside for public art, up to a limit of $250,000 per capital project.

The source of funding – city capital projects – has legal implications, requiring that the funded artwork be “monumental” or permanent-type works. The public art funds from a millage would not necessarily be restricted to such permanent art, as the current Percent for Art funds are. The additional flexibility afforded by a millage-based public art program might include the ability to fund performance art, for example.

The arts community and others voiced several concerns about placing the item on the Nov. 6 ballot. Those concerns include a lack of clarity for voters about how yes or no votes would impact public funding for art, the short timeframe during which a millage campaign could be mounted, and the fact that Ann Arbor voters will already be asked to vote for two other millages on the Nov. 6 ballot. Those two millages are: (1) a renewal of a 1.1 mill tax to pay for park capital improvements and maintenance; and (2) a library millage to support construction of a new downtown branch of the Ann Arbor District Library – expected to cost 0.56 mills in its first of 30 years, but averaging 0.47 mills.

As altered slightly by the council on Aug. 20, the ballot question reads:

Shall the Charter be amended to limit sources of funding for art in public places and to authorize a new tax of up to one-tenth (0.10) of a mill for 2013 through 2016 to fund art in public places, which 0.10 mill will raise in the first year of levy the estimated revenue of $459,273?

The corresponding charter language would be [emphasis added]:

Funds for Public Art
SECTION 8.24. In addition to any other amount which the City is authorized to raise by general tax upon the real and personal property by this Charter or any other provision of law, the City shall, in 2013 through 2016, annually levy a tax of up to one-tenth (0.10) of a mill on all taxable real and personal property situated within the City for the purpose of providing funds for art in public places, including but not limited to the permanent and temporary acquisition, maintenance and repair of works of art for display in or on public structures or sites and/or as part of or adjacent to public streets and sidewalks, and performance art on city streets, sidewalks or sites. Except for funds previously raised, set aside, allocated or otherwise designated to be used for public art, including such funds in the July 1, 2012 to June 30, 2013 fiscal year budget, and except for funds that are received by grant, gift, bequest or other donation to the City for public art, for the duration of this millage, the City shall not raise, set aside or designate funds for public art in any other manner. This millage also shall not preclude the grant, gift, bequest or other donation to the City of works of art.

A separate resolution concerning the existing Percent for Art program was also on the council’s agenda. It was meant, according to its sponsor Jane Lumm (Ward 2), to provide clarity to voters about what their vote on a public art millage would mean for the future funding of public art. Lumm’s resolution directed city staff to prepare an ordinance revision to the Percent for Art program, with the idea of repealing the current funding program before the millage vote. The idea is that voters would understand clearly that unless the public art millage is approved, no public funding for art would remain.

Public Art Millage: Public Commentary

Eight people spoke on the topic during public commentary.

Thomas Partridge introduced himself as a Democrat from the city of Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County – an advocate for public transportation and access to health care, including free health care for middle class and low-income people to be provided by the University of Michigan hospital. It’s important to take a universal and integrated approach to funding public art and affordable housing and truly affordable transportation. On the subject of public art, he said, in a city known for its prominent educational institutions – like the University of Michigan, Eastern Michigan University and Concordia University – we need to have public art education instead of extraordinary amounts spent on public art.

Russ Collins introduced himself as the executive director of the Michigan Theater. He followed Dennis Brewer (owner of Brewer’s Towing) during the public commentary, who was there to object to the council’s resolution on public towing. Collins got a laugh when he said, “When I was in college, that was the guy who towed my car!” Settling in to the topic of public art, Collins began by thanking councilmembers for serving on the council, calling it a thankless job. He told them they had at least one deeply appreciative citizen. He grew up in Ann Arbor and had long admired what the city council has done to keep the city vital. He thanked Christopher Taylor for bringing the subject into a public discussion. Collins said he’s always happy when residents talk about the arts. He wanted to make clear to everybody that it’s not a broad-based public arts funding program – but rather, it’s a narrow program for art in public places. He suggested that people refer to it as an “art in public places millage.”

A lot of people will think that the millage could benefit the Michigan Theater, or the University Musical Society, or other cultural institutions like the Hands On Museum, Collins said. Such organizations would not get funding through such a millage, he contended, saying that they could in fact be damaged by that assumption – because when governmental funding comes, sometimes the private sector reduces its funding. So it’s important, Collins said, to be clear that the millage would be for “art in public places.”

Collins reported that his colleague Ken Fischer, president of the University Musical Society, is actually quite opposed to the millage for that reason. Collins told the council that he felt the Percent for Art is a good way to fund this type of program – art in public places funded with public money. A lot of communities support that approach and make it work, Collins said, and it could be made to work in Ann Arbor too. If the council chooses to put this on the ballot as a millage, Collins said, it’s very important to the Michigan Theater and every institution that doesn’t provide art in public places, that the millage is very narrow.

Meg Crawley told the council that she’d never spoken to them before but she was there to advocate for public funding for public art – because she thinks it’s important. She’s lived in Ann Arbor for 40 years. She’s the neighborhood representative for a mural project at Allmendinger Park, she said, which would be completed in the next few weeks. The mural is being constructed by Ann Arbor artist Mary Thiefels, and she’s including artifacts from the community in her mural. Crawley has volunteered to help by collecting the items and logging them into a spreadsheet. Over 50 families had participated, she said. The process has brought home to her how much the community treasures art and its connection to parks.

Allmendinger Park is showcased each fall when the University of Michigan football fans park in the neighborhood. The art project will draw people to it, and show them the true heart of Ann Arbor. The project has had an energizing effect on the neighborhood, she said. It’ll be free for anyone who wants to see it, she noted. The mural would facilitate pride in our community. She asked the council to find any way they can to keep public funding for art in the future.

Margaret Parker told the council she’d served on the Ann Arbor public art commission for many years. She helped bring about the Percent for Art program. She reviewed the program since its existence over the last five years. She told the council that three works had been completed, with 12 more on the way. [The Herbert Dreiseitl water sculpture in front of city hall and a metal tree sculpture in West Park are completed, but it's unclear what third work Parker was referring to that's been funded by the program. Artists are working on two other projects that were approved earlier this year, but aren't yet complete: A glass hanging sculpture in the Justice Center lobby, and the Allmendinger Park mural.]

Parker noted that the Percent for Art program works with one part-time administrator and a revolving band of nine volunteers who serve on the commission. Before the program, there was no permanent art being made in the city, she said.

If the council wants to change the funding mechanism, Parker said, it’s important to be sure to use what we’ve learned over the last five years: how to work with city departments; how to connect with the long-term city planning system; how to use the city information and communication technology; how to work with the art administrator; how to keep the city council informed; and how to keep public informed. She allowed that the public art commission might not be successful at all those things, but one thing is sure, she contended: Before the Percent for Art program, no one knew how public art was done. It’s true that the Percent for Art funding mechanism is complex, and can be restrictive. But learning how to work with the city was by far the hardest part of the start-up, she said.

She invited people to stand in front of the mosaic wall on Washington Street, or the Plymouth Road water tower or the new city hall, and then to shut their eyes, and to imagine the scene without any art. She asked them to then open their eyes and to contemplate whether those scenes were better with or without art.

Marsha Chamberlin addressed the council as chair of Ann Arbor’s public art commission (AAPAC). She said that one thing the group does not want is for funding for art to disappear. The resolution as proposed gives more flexibility in the implementation of the public art program, she said, and gives some real opportunity for “rapid innovation,” which she felt would be a positive thing for Ann Arbor citizens.

Marsha Chamberlin, chair of the Ann Arbor public art commission, sat in the audience before the Aug. 20 city council meeting started. Chamberlin also serves as president of the nonprofit Ann Arbor Art Center.

The funding for public art – art performed or temporarily installed in public places – will expand what AAPAC can do as a commission, Chamberlin said. When the Dreiseitl sculpture was dedicated, she said, the international quality of the city was talked about – the thousands and thousands of visitors who come to Ann Arbor. Public art is part of what makes the city a great place and lends a quality of life that she wanted to make sure is sustained in the city. At the end of September, she said, the mural in Allmendinger Park – which Meg Crawley had described – will be celebrated. It will be another great example of a completed piece, she said. She invited the council to join that celebration and to celebrate another victory for the city of Ann Arbor.

Debra Polich introduced herself as a resident, a 30-year arts administration veteran, and director of the Arts Alliance. The alliance advocates for the creative sector of Washtenaw County, she said. The alliance facilitates the Cultural Leaders Forum, which monthly brings together leaders from Ann Arbor’s largest cultural institutions. Over the last 10 days, more than 50 of them have expressed their opinion about the millage. Almost all of them are supportive of the concept, but greatly concerned about the timing. Based on surveys, Ann Arbor places a high value on arts and culture. Public funding approved in a millage would reflect the high value that residents put on arts and cultural offerings – in a way that public funding for parks and libraries and transportation reflect the high value that residents place on those services.

Polich told the council that experienced advisors had suggested to the arts alliance that in order to do any arts millage properly, it would take 12-18 months of due diligence. It might be expedited to a minimum of six months, she said. [It's roughly a three-month span from the time that Christopher Taylor first unveiled the proposal publicly (Aug. 9) until the Nov. 6 vote.] That time can be used to engage the community, and build consensus. Work should include polling the community, and if favorable, setting the millage at the right level, she said.

The advisors to the Arts Alliance had also recommended talking to community leaders, in order to expose support and opposition. The Arts Alliance absolutely supports the public funding of art, Polich said, and appreciates Taylor’s millage proposal. But as appreciative as the Arts Alliance is of the suggestion, she added, the short timeframe is of concern. She called Jane Lumm’s resolution that would lead to the elimination of Percent for Art funding prior to a millage equally premature. The alliance recommends not approving either proposal now. Instead, she said, she would ask that the Arts Alliance, the public art commission and others work together to improve the functioning of the Percent for Art program.

John Kotarski introduced himself as a member of the public art commission. He supported placing the millage on the ballot on Nov. 6. He said he’d served on the commission just since January 2012, but that he could already say that the restrictions imposed by the current funding arrangement have been a major roadblock to funding the types of projects that are near and dear to Ann Arbor. Delaying the millage vote would confuse voters, he cautioned. A millage-funded program would make the program stronger and more accountable.

Kotarski said that those who fear that the millage won’t pass are underestimating the leadership ability of councilmembers. If every councilmember wants the millage to pass, he contended, then it will pass.

Kotarski then stressed the symbolic value of art. He related a story of how Dolly Madison had elected to save a portrait of George Washington instead of her personal belongings back in 1814, when the British army was approaching Washington D.C. The British had planned to burn the portrait in London. He told councilmembers that Dolly Madison would be proud of them, “even though she was a Republican.”

John Carver told the council he was there to support the Percent for Art ordinance. He’s involved with several groups of private entrepreneurial types, who are trying to do some things that could make Ann Arbor more vital and interesting. The Percent for Art had gotten the ball rolling, he contended. There’s a group that is trying to bring more live music to Ann Arbor, patterned after a program in Austin, Texas. Another group is trying to enhance the architectural lighting in the theater district – and they’ve had meetings with representatives of McKinley Inc. and the Michigan Theater. Carver also told the council that he’s involved in a group called the Wolfpack on the RiverUp! project. That project involves upgrading amenities along the Huron River – and Carver reported that the Superior Portage is completed. Gallup Pond and Island Park will also be a part of the project. He stressed that the effort involved only private funds.

He told the council that he owns the building downtown at 500 E. Liberty, which he said is in the theater district. He had commissioned an artist to do a sculpture on the building. It would be called the Spirit of Ann Arbor and would be created by the artist Charles McGee, a World War II veteran.

Public Art Millage: Council Deliberations

Sandi Smith (Ward 1), who serves on the board of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority with Russ Collins, led off the city council deliberations with an amendment that took a suggestion made by Collins during public commentary: to change “public art” to “art in public places” throughout the ballot question and charter amendment. She wanted to make sure that people did not mistakenly think that passage of the millage meant that they no longer needed to make their membership payments to The Ark or the Michigan Theater or other similar organizations.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) greeted meeting attendees, assuring them that she was certain the council would definitely take the action of approving the minutes of the previous meeting.

Smith’s wardmate Sabra Briere floated the idea that the change be considered “friendly” and could be adopted without a vote. Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) was himself amenable to the idea, but worried that the language of the existing proposal had already been reviewed by the state attorney general on a preliminary basis. City attorney Stephen Postema ventured that he did not think the attorney general would have a problem with the change. So the “friendly” amendment was adopted.

Taylor noted that the purpose of offering the resolution at the council’s previous meeting was to initiate public conversation. That mission has been accomplished, he declared. The public art commission has met [in a special session on Aug. 15, due to the unexpected nature of Taylor's proposal] and other arts groups have met and discussed the issue. Taylor said he’d received a tremendous amount of feedback.

It’s clear that Ann Arbor really values art in public places, he contended, and they see it as something that warrants government support. In his view, a millage is the best way for that government support to be realized, so he’s eager to have that question put to voters. Those in the arts community have questioned whether it’s an opportune time for the millage, and he shares that concern. There are a number of particularities about why this is not the best time for a millage. He is not yet convinced, so he’s eager to hear what his colleagues think. He then ticked through the specific concerns: whether it’s the proper cycle; the lack of polling; the inchoate nature of funding; high costs of promotional materials; potential for misunderstanding as to scope.

Many of those things are true, Taylor admitted, but he was not sure they pushed him over the edge. He felt that the benefits and detriments are a “gut check” for people. He stated that “we all want it to succeed,” and stated that he is confident it will succeed in any election – so he’s not certain it wouldn’t be best to ask the most people about it. [This was an allusion to the fact that it falls in a presidential election cycle.] He felt that Ann Arbor at its core is a community that will support art in public places.

However, he stated that he was “still up in the air” and was eager to hear the thoughts of his colleagues.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) said he had “jumped on this” as soon as Taylor had initiated it. [He asked to have his name added as a sponsor.] He ventured that everyone knows he’s been very vocal in criticizing the existing funding mechanism. The community has been debating the funding ordinance, and no other community in Michigan has adopted the same kind of ordinance. That indicated to him that no other city is willing to stick its neck out and take money out of utilities and special millages to pay for art in public places. “A millage is the only way to go,” Kunselman said. He appreciated the comments from people in the arts community who were hesitant to see the millage placed on this November’s ballot.

But he felt that in a presidential election, it would get out the greatest number of voters – many of whom are just going to love art, regardless of whether they’re paying for it. And that could tip the balance in getting the millage passed. Kunselman claimed that the library board is moving forward with a millage without waiting to do a big review of community sentiment. Kunselman implied that the library’s millage would pass because everybody likes books and that Ann Arbor is a well-read community. [In fact, the Ann Arbor District Library has undertaken a systematic effort to measure community sentiment. That effort has included a scientific survey of voters, the results of which were released four months ago. The AADL subsequently conducted public forums on their plan to construct a new building, before the board voted to put the bond proposal on the ballot. An informal campaign committee started its work several months ago.]

Kunselman looked at art as being something that needs to get out in front of the most voters, in order to give it a chance of passing.

From left: Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) chats with Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) and Ann Arbor art commission chair Marsha Chamberlin after the vote to put a public art millage on the Nov. 6 ballot.

Kunselman liked the idea that it will “unchain the restrictions” so that not just monumental art but also cultural arts can be supported. He said he came from a cultural arts family – pointing out that he’d at one time worked as a projectionist at Michigan Theater.

Responding to the short timeframe for mounting a millage campaign, Smith noted that she’d twice been involved in bringing forward a proposal to roll back the Percent for Art program to a half percent. That was not because she’s not a fan of art, she said. On both occasions, in a very short period of time, the arts community and the broader community had come out and convinced her that’s reducing the percentage to a half percent is not the way to go. So she was not concerned about the arts community not having that kind of energy when it comes to voting in November. She felt that “we’re a passionate and creative bunch and recognize a good thing.” She said she’s looking forward to living in a city that has parks and a new library when a lot of cities are still struggling. In contrast, Ann Arbor is not just moving forward, but rather “surging” forward. Now is as good a time as any to do it, and she would do her part to make sure people know that they should vote yes on the millage.

Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) distinguished between the politics and substance of the issue. The substance has been discussed frequently, and frequently it’s been upheld, he said. The community has supported the Percent for Art ordinance, even with its imperfections, he contended. The millage proposal is better, he said, because it eliminates some of those restrictions associated with the Percent for Art program. It’s a pleasure to agree with Kunselman on something, Derezinski said. On the issue of the timing, he said “we don’t live in an ideal world.” He felt it was important to go ahead and put in on the ballot. He thinks the community support is there, and he would vote to put it on the ballot right away.

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) said he’s always supported the Percent for Art program. He’s had problems with how it was funded, he allowed. But he thanked the members of the public art commission for their service. He said that this change to a millage-based proposal would allow performance art on city streets and sidewalks. He felt that a millage would be a fair way to approach it – given that it was for a relatively short period and could be evaluated at the end of four years.

Jane Lumm (Ward 2) indicated that based on what she was hearing at that point, it didn’t sound like the council was inclined to postpone. She reviewed the various concerns that had been aired at a cultural leaders forum held by the Arts Alliance earlier that day – a gathering that she, Derezinski, Taylor and Hieftje had attended. She noted that there were basic questions – about the amount of the millage, for example. She lamented the fact that Taylor’s proposal does not offer residents a clear choice about whether to use public money to pay for art. She felt there should be a clear choice. She indicated she would support placing the question on the ballot, based on her commitment to offer voters a clear choice – with her subsequent proposal to prepare to eliminate the Percent for Art funding mechanism prior to the millage.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) allowed that she’d been more of a critic of the Percent for Art program than a supporter. But unlike Kunselman, she did not oppose it on the grounds that it involves capital improvement dollars. She thinks that the program has started out with a lot of money and with no guidance about how to spend that money. Based on her own observations at AAPAC meetings, it continues to be a struggle to spend the money. She said the amount Ann Arbor sets aside is inordinately large – based on conversations she’s had with art administrators in other cities.

Briere said her issue is the definition of capital improvements. She viewed the ballot proposal with favor. She felt that the inherent restrictions in the existing Percent for Art program have been more onerous than effective. The fact that the amount to be generated by the millage is more than the money already being set aside bothers her. If the commission is given more dollars to spend, it’ll be difficult to balance all the demand – but at least the commission will have the ability to spend some of it on things other than monumental art.

She’s not concerned about the short timeframe of the next two months, saying that the conversation has been going on for the last five years. Respondents to her informal poll over the weekend were as likely to say they support the current Percent for Art program as they were to say they oppose all dollars going to a millage. If councilmembers are going to do this, she said, they have sell it. They have to be confident as they communicate to the public that the council is not trying to hedge its bets too much. That is, if the public goes ahead with the millage, it means that the council needs to re-examine the Percent for Art program and change the way it reads on the books.

Public Art Millage: Council Deliberations – Amendment

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) asked for some confirmation about the impact of the millage passage: If the millage passes, then the funding specified in the city’s Percent for Art ordinance would be suspended. Assistant city attorney Abigail Elias pointed Hohnke to the language of the charter amendment, which prohibits using city funds from any other means than the millage for the duration of the four-year period.

Left to right: Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) chats with Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) during a recess in the meeting. In the foreground is Jane Lumm (Ward 2).

Hohnke offered a different perspective. He contended it was his experience that the majority of people in Ward 5 and throughout the city think that “Percent for Art is great!” He claimed that it’s been solidly supported by a vast majority of constituents, when revisions have come before the council. He thinks that additional funding for arts that addresses constraints of the Percent for Art program is a great thing. He appreciated the effort to find a way to support other types of art. His view is that the folks in the city would support both. He is a little concerned that people want to see the funding mechanism replaced. He then proposed an amendment to the ballot proposal that would eliminate the part that suspends the Percent for Art funding for the duration of the millage.

Hohnke thinks both funding mechanisms should be available, and he’s concerned about constraining future councils. If the public wants to pass this millage, then the council could also modify the Percent for Art ordinance at the council table. He felt there are two separate questions: Percent for Art funding, and millage funding for a set of art that is less constrained by the current program. It’s not just different funding mechanisms, Hohnke said. The Percent for Art program involves the way the city impacts the built environment. When we choose, as a community, to make capital expenditures, we’re saying that we want art to be a part of how we’re impacting our built environment, he said. He felt that’s important and that it has been effective in many communities around the country.

Briere called Hohnke’s idea “an interesting approach.” Her perception is that it’s been difficult to spend the money that’s already been allocated. She ventured that if both propositions went forward, the public art commission would suddenly have $860,000 to spend, which is quite a lot – especially because it’s not been easy to deal with half that amount. So Briere asked Hohnke if that’s what he intended.

Hohnke confirmed that was his intent, and allowed that she’d made a good point. He called the challenge one of process. And he contended that process challenges are not beyond our means to address, because we have energetic, smart people working on it.

Derezinski feared that Hohnke’s proposal “might very well kill it.” Given the short timeframe, you have to be careful about how to sell it, and be careful not to ask for too much, he said. He couldn’t go along with Hohnke’s idea.

Smith respected Hohnke’s feeling behind the amendment. But she’d rather vote down the proposal and come back with more tightly crafted language and wait for next ballot than to pursue Hohnke’s amendment. She felt that it risked losing it all.

Anglin was not in favor of the amendment, and indicated he was inclined to see how well the millage proposal worked out.

Kunselman said he couldn’t support Hohnke’s amendment, but picked up on a reference Hohnke had made to Percent for Art-type programs outside the state of Michigan. He felt that in Michigan, the Percent for Art approach doesn’t have a legal basis. Kunselman pointed out that the council had voted down directing the city attorney to produce an opinion. Kunselman felt a lawsuit could strike down the city’s ordinance.

Hohnke allowed that he could not give a specific example of another city in Michigan that had a Percent for Art program. But he argued that other Michigan cities also don’t fund human services in the same way that Ann Arbor does. Hohnke doesn’t see any problem with Ann Arbor “taking leadership.” Despite Kunselman’s concerns about a lawsuit, Hohnke pointed out that no lawsuit had yet been filed. He claimed that the city council had an assurance from the city attorney that the city’s Percent for Art program is a perfectly appropriate way to fund public art.

Mayor John Hieftje said he wouldn’t support Hohnke’s amendment, but appreciated how zealous Hohnke was.

Jane Lumm (Ward 2) also said she wouldn’t support it. She felt it would be hard to sell. She echoed Briere’s concerns about the sheer amount of money that would be involved. She described being lost in Philadelphia recently, which has a Percent for Art program. She described a long stretch of blight, but then in the downtown you see some nice pieces of art, she said. She referred to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs [the implication being that basic needs like food, water and shelter should be satisfied before higher needs, like self-actualization.] She responded to the several claims around the table that the Percent for Art program is solidly supported, but noted that residents have not had a chance to vote on it.

Outcome on Hohnke’s amendment: Hohnke was the only voice of support. Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) appeared only inadvertently to vote for it.

Public Art Millage: Council Deliberations – Finale

Mayor John Hieftje said he’d support putting the proposal on the ballot. He was happy it’ll have widespread support. He felt that it’s rightly a four-year millage. Next time around, the council would be able to reduce the amount of the millage or add more to the amount that is put before voters. Hieftje made a standard economic development argument for public art, saying that having public art in your city creates excitement and that excitement can cause people to want to be in the place and make people think that this is a great place to be.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) indicated he’d support the proposal, despite the failure of his amendment.

With respect to “performance art,” Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) asked if the Ann Arbor Summer Festival could be supported by the millage. Assistant city attorney Abigail Elias indicated that “performance art” is a well-known term of art in the arts community. She said it’s pretty flexible, but excludes something like a theater performance. A performance at a venue like a theater isn’t performance art. She was not able to say whether something like a performance in an outdoor setting like the Summer Festival would be performance art or not.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to place a public art millage on the Nov. 6 ballot.

Public Art Millage: Beginning Ordinance Repeal?

Jane Lumm (Ward 2) pitched her proposal later in the meeting. It would direct the city’s legal staff to prepare of a repeal to the existing funding mechanism of the Percent for Art program. She related to her council colleagues how she’d told the meeting of cultural leaders earlier in the day, that she would withdraw the proposal, if the millage proposal were postponed [as president of the Arts Alliance, Deb Polich, had asked the council to do]. Lumm said the ordinance has been controversial from the beginning, and she felt the time to reexamine it is now – by asking voters the fundamental question of whether they support public funding of art, rather than simply which method.

Jane Lumm (Ward 2) and Christopher Taylor (Ward 3).

The approach of asking voters to support a millage, with the existing program as a default, says to voters: We’re going to use public funds for art regardless, but we’d sure like your input about what method. She felt that it’s important to ask the basic question of whether citizens support public funding of art. By repealing the existing Percent for Art ordinance before the November election, voters would get that clear choice. She said she trusts the voters, regardless of the outcome. She did not want to set up a “have your cake and eat it, too” situation where voters are given a Hobson’s Choice.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) said the first time she read through Lumm’s resolution, she got out her virtual red pen because she wanted to cross out various “whereas” clauses, saying that they were “unnecessarily inflammatory” about a program that is just finding its legs and “demeaning” to volunteers on the public art commission who’ve spent a significant amount of time of this program. She called the “whereas” clauses “judgmental” with respect to the commission’s progress.

Smith felt the choice offered to voters will be clear in that there will be no funds other than this millage available for funding public art. [If the millage passes, it will be the only source of funding; but if the millage fails, the Percent for Art program will continue as before.] Smith felt it’s a yes or no question that is delivered to the voters. She said she’s received such overwhelming support for arts in Ann Arbor that she feels, “People know exactly what they want, and they want art.”

Rather than trying to revise the “whereas” clauses, she said she’d simply opt to reject it.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) indicated he’d support the resolution, noting it just directs staff to prepare a resolution to change an ordinance – something for the council to digest at a later meeting. He doesn’t want to terminate the entire ordinance, but rather some of the funding mechanisms for it. The charter millage language only suspends the funding mechanism, but doesn’t resolve it. He ventured that the council would be dancing around the issue for a time – until we get greater community consensus about funding of public art. He also wants to see language prepared in case the millage does fail. The resolution would get the council to start thinking.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) respected the idea of the proposed resolution and the intent that councilmembers Lumm and Kunselman brought to it. If the Percent for Art funding mechanism is repealed, then if the millage were to fail, there would be no public funding for art. Even though the council had reviewed the possibility of reducing the funding for the existing Percent for Art program on several occasions before, she noted that no one had ever proposed to eliminate it altogether. Briere said that if the council weren’t putting a millage on the ballot, she would not even flirt with the idea of Lumm’s resolution. She’s happy to wait, she said, and see where we are after the millage vote. The idea of being prepared for the millage to be defeated and the need to address the Percent for Art program is one she thinks is worth remembering. But she didn’t think she could support this resolution.

Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) agreed with Smith, saying that some of the language demeans some of the people who’ve worked hard on the public art commission. He said that as a member of the public art commission, he’s seen how the members have worked. It’s not necessary to try to demean the efforts of those who’ve been trying to work through the operational details of a new program, he said. He felt that it should be “toned down.”

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) viewed Lumm’s resolution as supportive of the millage. He didn’t read it as negative, but rather as going through the pitfalls of the current program, which the public art commission itself has brought to the council. The resolution simply says that the city is going to put aside what they’ve used before.

Responding to the characterization by Smith and Derezinski of the “whereas” clauses as demeaning to the members of the art commission, Lumm simply read the clauses aloud:

Whereas, In November of 2007, City Council approved an amendment to the City Charter creating the “percent for art” program that funds public art through the allocation of funds from capital improvement projects;

Whereas, Allocating funds to the “percent for art” program results in reduced funding for much-needed capital infrastructure improvements and many Ann Arbor residents believe the allocation of capital project funds to public art represents an inappropriate and unrelated use of dollars raised through tax millages and water and sewer system funds that they believe should be fully dedicated to their primary streets, parks, water/sewer, and solid waste purposes;

Whereas, Voters were never provided the opportunity to have their voices heard on either the “percent for art” program specifically or more importantly, on the fundamental question of whether public art should be supported by public/taxpayer funding, regardless of its form;

Whereas, It is expected that City Council will place on the November ballot a proposal to amend the city charter to authorize a new, four-year millage of 0.10 mill to fund public art which if approved by voters, suspends the “percent for art” program funding only for the duration of the millage (the “percent for art” program funding would be re-instated if the millage were not renewed). If not passed by the voters, the “percent for art” program and funding continue in their present form;

Whereas, To truly enfranchise residents, voters should be offered a clear, yes/no choice on public funding for public art rather than an either/or choice of the mechanism used to fund public art;

Whereas, City Council action to repeal the funding provisions of the current “percent for art” program prior to the November ballot question would offer voters a clear, simple “yes/no” choice – an affirmative vote results in public funding for public art, a negative vote does not;

Whereas, A July 1, 2013 effective date for repeal of the “percent for art” program maintains the funding commitments for public art previously made to the program;

By way of additional background, it’s likely that Smith and Derezinski were not reacting specifically to the “whereas” clauses, which are difficult to see as demeaning to the public art commission. Instead, they were likely reacting to the memo attached to the resolution, which refers to “The slow launch of the program, accumulated, unused surpluses at a challenging fiscal time for the city, and projects not universally accepted” – statements that might be seen as laying blame on the public art commission.

Lumm rounded out her remarks by ticking through the various interpretations that yes and no votes for the millage might have. She reported that other councilmembers at the meeting earlier in the day with cultural arts leaders had acknowledged that voter sentiment would be difficult to read.

Left to right: Sandi Smith (Ward 1) tells Sabra Briere (Ward 1) how many minutes Jane Lumm had been speaking – five. Councilmembers are supposed to be limited to two speaking turns on any given question, the first of which has a limit of five minutes and the second three minutes.

Lumm’s turn ended when Smith raised a point of order – that Lumm had exceeded the time limit on her speaking turn.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) came back to the issue of the “whereas” clauses, saying he felt the clauses make bold assertions that he claimed are only weakly supported. As an example, he gave ” … many Ann Arbor residents believe the allocation of capital project funds to public art represents an inappropriate and unrelated use of dollars.” He dismissed that assertion by saying, “Many Ann Arbor residents believe yada yada yada. Many Ann Arbor residents believe a whole bunch of things and you can insert whatever you want.” He contended that the evidence is to the contrary. In the repeated conversations the council has had, he continued, the council had heard overwhelming support for the public art program. So he felt the statement was not an accurate reflection of the facts.

Hohnke then took up the statement in the “whereas” clauses that “Voters were never provided the opportunity to have their voices heard …” Hohnke ventured that what that statement meant was that voters had not had a chance to vote directly on the issue, and he admitted that was true. But he claimed that it’s inappropriate to say that their voices haven’t been heard. It had been thoroughly debated when the ordinance was enacted, he contended, and people’s voices were heard. The Arts Alliance was very rigorous in seeking out the opinions of councilmembers and making them widely known, he said, so that people had a clear understanding of where their councilmembers stood on the Percent for Art program.

Ultimately, though, Hohnke felt that the resolution was unnecessary. He noted that councilmembers can simply ask staff to prepare a resolution. He claimed that the controversy that Lumm and Kunselman talk about surrounding the program is one that they and a small number of folks are manufacturing. There are significant and honest questions about the funding mechanism, he said, not the existence of support for public art.

Public art is something that we don’t want to leave unsupported, Hohnke said.

Mayor John Hieftje said he’d have a hard time supporting the resolution. He described the “preamble” as resembling more a political document than a resolution.

If the millage fails, then it’d be appropriate to review the Percent for Art program, Hieftje said. He felt there’d be plenty of time to do that in November, with three new councilmembers coming on board. It just seems premature to take a look at it now. It might be the case that four years from now the city council says, “Great, the millage gave us a real boost, let’s see what we can do back with Percent for Art.”

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) introduced some confusion by appearing to indicate that Lumm’s resolution would continue the Percent for Art funding, even if the millage failed. Briere indicated that her expectation would be that Lumm’s resolution was meant to revoke the Percent for Art funding mechanism before hearing from voters.

Kunselman suggested striking all but the final “whereas” clause so that the council would not have to “dicker” about it. Lumm was fine with that.

The deletion of the “whereas” clauses did not change anyone’s mind.

Outcome: The resolution to prepare for the repeal of the Percent for Art funding mechanism failed, with support only from Mike Anglin (Ward 5), Jane Lumm (Ward 2) and Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3).

St. Nicholas Auction, Rezoning

In front of the council was a resolution to start a process to change the current PUD (planned unit development) zoning on the former St. Nicholas Church property on North Main Street. The land is being put up for public auction on Sept. 6, 2012. The resolution indicated that the proposed new zoning would match the surrounding land, which is D2 (downtown interface).

The property is being offered at auction by the Washtenaw County treasurer at a cost of $365,051, which covers back taxes and demolition costs. Demolition is expected to begin in the coming weeks. [See also Chronicle coverage: "Rezoning Process for North Main Site on Agenda."]

Downtown Ann Arbor zoning designations. Color key: blue, D1 (downtown); green, D2 (downtown interface), red, PUD (planned unit development). Kunselman’s Aug. 20 resolution would direct city staff to begin a process for rezoning The Gallery PUD to D2 (downtown interface), to be consistent with surrounding properties.

The property has an easement on it held by its neighbor to the south, McKinley Inc., for 57 parking spaces, which poses a challenge for future development.

Authorized by the city council in 2006, the PUD zoning was intended to allow construction of The Gallery, an 11-story building (158 feet tall) that would include 224 parking spaces and 123 units of residential housing. Of those units, 18 would have met the definition of affordable housing derived by a formula based on area median incomes. In contrast, the D2 zoning has a height limit of 60 feet.

If the property does not sell at the Sept. 6 auction (which concludes on Sept. 11), the property will be offered again for auction in October. If it does not sell after the second auction, it will revert to the city.

Assistant city attorney Kevin McDonald explained at the Aug. 20 council meeting that in any case it would not be possible to complete the rezoning process before the first or the second auctions – due to the noticing requirement for all the relevant public hearings.

St. Nicholas Auction, Rezoning: Council Deliberations

The sponsor of the resolution, Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), reviewed the basic history of the four parcels in question. Because the property is currently in public hands, he felt there was very low risk that the downzoning from PUD to D2 could be analyzed as a “taking.” In his conversations with Washtenaw County treasurer Catherine McClary, who’s technically the current owner, she had indicated to him that she didn’t have a problem with the rezoning.

When The Gallery had come through the pipeline, Kunselman recalled that he’d served on the city planning commission at the time. He reviewed the details of that project, including the easement of 57 parking spaces that is now permanently attached to the land.

The D2 zoning, which was put in place after The Gallery was approved, Kunselman said, is a fair statement of how the character of the Kerrytown neighborhood should move forward. Kunselman felt that the city is going to end up owning the land unwillingly.

Assistant city attorney Kevin McDonald arrives at the meeting.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) asked assistant city attorney Kevin McDonald to the podium to talk about the timetable for rezoning compared to the planned auction on Sept. 6 and the possible second auction in October. McDonald told the council that the city wouldn’t be able to rezone the property before the first or the second auction, given the amount of public notice that is required: “There is simply not time to do it,” McDonald explained. Briere wanted to know what the effect of the resolution would be on the ability of the county treasurer to sell the land. McDonald said that any answer he gave would be speculation.

McDonald noted that the county treasurer has a view and staff has a view. One of the constraints on the property is the 57 parking spaces that have to be provided to the neighbor. And any project has to incorporate those 57 spaces. So if you don’t have a project of some density, there’d probably be no way to recoup the costs of building it, he ventured. The 57 spaces were built into The Gallery project, he pointed out. He felt there was some belief that if somebody bid at first auction, that might allow the prospect of building The Gallery. But anecdotally, he reported hearing from developers that the numbers just don’t work. There’s also an affordable housing component to the PUD zoning, so 15% of the units would have to be affordable, he pointed out. It’s hard to predict, and everyone has a different view on this, McDonald concluded.

Briere was concerned that some prospective buyer might feel the city had changed the rules by discussing rezoning. So she wanted to hear from McDonald what his interpretation was of the effect of the resolution. McDonald reported that in his conversations with the county treasurer, she’d been very helpful. For the first auction, she felt that keeping the zoning in place would enhance the value of the property. If the council decides to pass the resolution at whatever time, what’s really important is simply that the city gives notice to any buyer that the rezoning process is in place, so that it could be put into someone’s evaluation of the property.

The treasurer is willing to take whatever action and attach it to the due diligence documents for the auction. For example, the easement is already included. If the rezoning process were to begin, then a prospective buyer would have notice of that, if that’s what the council decided to do. It could affect someone’s view of the land’s value, he allowed, but the important thing is to clearly communicate council’s intention and desire.

Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) characterized the 57 parking spaces as running with the land without regard to the zoning. He wondered if a rezoning, given the 57-parking space easement, would render it functionally un-developable. McDonald didn’t know that he’d say that. It’s a complex easement, he noted. The holder of the easement currently has no cost, and if construction of The Gallery takes place, then that’s when the payment for the parking begins. He said there’s no way to tell what’s going to happen at these auctions. If it doesn’t go at the first auction, there might be more speculative bids at the second auction.

Kunselman observed that the 57 parking spaces would need to be provided, even if city ends up with the land. McDonald confirmed that, but said that the city could choose not to accept the land, in which case, it would go back to the county.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) felt that the timing was off. She wanted to see how the process unfolds at the auction. It’s in the city’s best interest to see someone purchase the land, she said. She did not want to add to the already existing challenge of disposing city-owned land. She felt that “getting out of the way” is the best approach.

Jane Lumm (Ward 2) agreed with Smith, and described the resolution as premature.

Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) wondered if the process of rezoning would perhaps give the city additional flexibility. It wasn’t totally clear what Derezinski meant, and McDonald noted that the proposed D2 rezoning was more restrictive. At the end of the day, he said, it depends on whether you want to see something like The Gallery built there or not.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) felt the resolution was a little bit premature at this point.

Outcome: The council voted down Kunselman’s resolution to initiate the rezoning of the North Main Street property.

Old Y Lot (350 S. Fifth Ave.)

The council considered a resolution that directed the city administrator to prepare options for the disposition of the city-owned land at the corner of Fifth and William – 350 S. Fifth Ave., known as the former YMCA lot. The resolution was explicitly worded so that the city administrator was to proceed independently of a planning effort by the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority called Connecting William Street. [See also Chronicle coverage: "Planning Group Briefed on William Street Project."]

The resolution would have directed city administrator Steve Powers to evaluate the parcel at 350 S. Fifth for possible public or corporate use. If no such use were found, the resolution directed Powers to report back to the council with a timeline for the disposition of the property – based on state and city laws and policies. That parcel is also known as the Fifth and William parking lot, because it’s currently used as a surface parking lot in the city’s public parking system, or the old Y lot, because it’s the location of the former YMCA building.

Left to right: City CFO Tom Crawford chats with Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) during a recess of the Aug. 20 meeting.

The resolution’s sponsor, Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), has frequently raised the issue of ongoing interest payments associated with a loan used by the city to purchase the property from the YMCA for $3.5 million in 2003. The council voted in 2008 to extend the five-year loan with the Bank of Ann Arbor for another five years, through the end of 2013. The interest rate is 3.89%. The interest-only payments work out to roughly $140,000 a year.

By 2013, the total interest paid will be around $1.4 million. When it was condemned, the cost of demolishing the old YMCA building and abating asbestos was around $1.5 million. The DDA covered the demolition costs and has covered half the interest payments. So the total amount of Ann Arbor governmental investment in the property is at least $6.4 million.

The Connecting William Street project was undertaken by the DDA based on a directive from the city council, on a unanimous vote, given at its April 4, 2011 meeting. Kunselman voted for that planning effort to take place – but was also vocal at the time, as well as before, about his view that the old Y lot should simply be put up for sale one way or another.

Old Y Lot: Council Deliberations

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), who sponsored the resolution, said it was intended to get the council to start thinking about what to do with the land. It addresses the $3.5 million balloon payment that’s due in December 2013. The interest-only payments will have accumulated to $1.36 million, he noted, which means that the city has $4.86 million in a piece of land that’s not worth it, he said.

Kunselman said he knows that the Connecting William Street process includes the old Y lot, but pointed out that the planning effort is supposed to result in a presentation of a recommendation to the city council in late October. His resolution doesn’t have a timeframe per se, he noted, but just directs the city administrator to provide a timeline for disposition. He pointed out that the city hasn’t sold any land recently, and ventured that not many people on the city council had any idea of what the process for that is: Do we put a notice on the city website, saying “For Sale”? How would we get the best value, he wondered. Given that December 2013 is going to come up pretty quick, he felt that it’s important to start thinking about that now.

Kunselman stated that the city had not had a lot of success with issuing RFPs (requests for proposals) in the past. And this particular property is costing the city a lot of money over time, Kunselman pointed out, while the other surface parking lots within the scope of the Connecting William Street study are not costing the city money.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) called the resolution premature and unnecessary. More than a year remains before the balloon payment is due, she pointed out, and there’s no reason, she felt, that the city would not be able to do another 5-year loan arrangement. She allowed that the city has not done the RFP process well in the past. That’s part of the Connecting William Street mission – to prepare the lots in a way that has full public buy-in and that is economically feasible for sale. It’s a matter of hitting that special target of what the citizens need and will demand out of the sale of public land, and what is actually sustainable and economically feasible to be built.

Smith felt Kunselman’s resolution is unnecessary and sends a clear message that there’s no faith in the Connecting William Street process. She pointed out that half of the interest payments are being borne by the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority. She also pointed out that the city receives 17% gross revenues from the surface parking spaces now located on the old Y lot [as well as the rest of the public parking system].

By way of background, the Fifth & William parking lot generated $199,839 in revenues in fiscal year 2011. And 17% of that works out to $34,000, which is 25% of the total interest payment on the loan, or half of the city’s share of that payment.

Smith allowed that lumped together, the total cost seems traumatic – and she said she’s not sure she’d have supported the purchase of the land in 2003. But she fully supports the process underway.

Mayor John Hieftje described the group of citizens who are working hard on the Connecting William Street project, who will come back to the council with a report. Yet he appreciated Kunselman’s direction for action. Responding to Kunselman’s contention that the old Y lot is not worth as much as the city has invested in it, Hieftje ventured that if you look at recent comparables – like the property at South University and Forrest – the old Y lot has a lot of value. He acknowledged that the city might well just say here’s the zoning on the property, and just sell it. The city might turn to that approach, he said. His issue right now is the timing of the resolution. He was content to wait, but might support the resolution after the Connecting William Street report came back.

Spotting an opportunity to win Hieftje’s support for the resolution, Kunselman asked him if he was suggesting a postponement until the council’s second meeting in October. Then the council could have both items on the agenda at the same time. Hieftje declined the gambit, by saying he felt it would take time to digest the DDA’s report, and he did not see a reason to postpone it for future consideration. He did respect the concept of just putting a property on the market.

Jane Lumm (Ward 2) highlighted the fact that the resolution focuses on the administrator’s recommendation. She felt the intent is quite reasonable. She described it as “kickstarting” the process of thinking about the site. The property has been off the tax rolls for a decade, she noted. Lumm did not feel the resolution presupposes any outcome of the Connecting William Street process, and it’s not about excluding the DDA. Mike Anglin (Ward 5) also expressed his support of the resolution.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) indicated he felt the resolution was premature, so he couldn’t support it.

Smith stressed that the goal of selling the property should not be simply to avoid paying interest on the loan. There’s a larger public policy issue at stake, she said. There’s a “juicier conversation” to be had than one about directing the city administrator – and she’d appreciate people raising the level of the conversation around the table.

Lumm read aloud the resolved clause, saying she thought it was reasonable.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) felt that the council should allow the Connecting William Street process to play out without “shadowing” it. She appreciated Kunselman’s constant concern about the interest payments and the looming balloon payment. But she wanted to be able to dissect the DDA’s proposal without comparing it to the city administrator’s efforts.

Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) noted that the city council had asked the DDA to take a good long look at the property. And in his view it would be “proper, prudent and polite” to wait for the DDA to conclude its work.

Outcome: The resolution on the old Y lot failed, with support only from Mike Anglin (Ward 5), Jane Lumm (Ward 2) and Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3).

Public Towing

A goal for the city’s financial services unit, which is listed out in the fiscal year 2013 budget book, is collaboration with Washtenaw County to centralize the administration of public towing. Parking on someone’s private property or having as excessive number of parking tickets are examples of this kind of situation.

Left to right: City administrator Steve Powers, Jane Lumm (Ward 2) and Dennis Brewer, who owns two local towing companies.

Currently, the city contracts with three different companies, in three districts of the city: Brewer’s Towing Inc., Sakstrup’s Towing, and Triangle Towing. But those contracts expire at the end of 2012.

In front of the council was a resolution authorizing the city to contract with Washtenaw County, which will administer the towing under a single contract. The city will share responsibility for various aspects of the towing administration. On the city’s side, the existing manual, paper-based system will be replaced with one that uses CLEMIS (Courts and Law Enforcement Management Information System) and e-impound.

The new approach is also supposed to reduce costs to those who have their cars towed – because outside storage fees of $20/day would no longer be assessed immediately when a vehicle arrives at the storage lot. Instead, the new city/county fee structure would not permit a storage fee to be applied until a vehicle has been stored for at least eight hours. [.pdf of fee schedule]

The city will point to this collaboration with the county as part of the state’s economic vitality incentive program (EVIP), which encourages municipalities to demonstrate efforts at collaboration with each other.

Public Towing: Public Comment

Dennis Brewer told the council that he and his wife own both Brewer’s Towing and Sakstrup’s Towing. He started Brewer’s back in 1963, he said. He’s opposed to the “suggestive language” in the resolution. He questioned how the first 8 hours of storage could be free? He ventured that this would be a real problem for customer relations. What if it turns out to be 8 hours 5 minutes – then people will object to paying, just because they were 5 minutes too late. He predicted it would be a real headache.

When would the clock start ticking, Brewer wondered: When the tow company gets the call? When the tow company arrives on the scene? When the car reaches the storage facility? Brewer also told the council that his company’s computer system is based on calendar days for storage. The storage changes at 12:01 every day. Their current practice is that vehicles must be in storage at least 8 hours before a second day of storage can be charged. He reminded the council that it’s necessary to carry insurance to cover the cars in storage, and that the storage lots need personnel on duty 24/7 to release the vehicles.

Public Towing: Council Deliberations

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) stressed that the primary issue is that it makes things more efficient as the two governmental units cooperate. He encouraged everyone’s support.

Jane Lumm (Ward 2) asked the city CFO Tom Crawford to approach the podium. She called it a good collaborative effort, but noted that it differs from the previous approach in some details. She asked about “custom criteria” that could be applied – involving grace periods and the like. She noted that the council had heard from Brewer about the economic difficulty involved.

Crawford explained that the two objectives were to reduce costs and improve service. The city and county are reducing their administrative fee from $60 to $45 – and the county will be sharing a portion of that $45 with the city. The city and the county also looked to the towing companies to help with those objectives. Some towing companies had a practice of starting the clock for the storage fee as soon as the car hit the lot. And at midnight, no matter what time the car hit the lot, the timer would click to a new day.

Crawford allowed that some of the towing companies never had that custom. [Dennis Brewer, during his public commentary, explained that for his companies, the timer would not click to a new day unless the car had been on the lot for at least eight hours.] What the city wants to do for people who are quickly in and out, is to reduce the cost for those people. That might mean that the costs for those people who don’t pick up their cars within the first eight hours could increase. As it’s currently written, there’d be no fee for the first eight hours, Crawford explained.

Washtenaw County sheriff Jerry Clayton was on hand at the Aug. 20 city council meeting to answer questions about the public towing contract.

Lumm expressed concern that the towing companies have been doing this for a number of years – operating under a certain number of assumptions. She saw the attempts to make things more user-friendly as a good thing. She noted that some other councilmembers had questions about towing distance. She asked if the council would be able to weigh in. Crawford explained that the request for proposals (RFP) from the county would be going out soon, and he could take input from them that night. One of the criteria that they’ve received input on is one that measures the distance of a storage facility from the center of the city, defined as the intersection of Main and Huron streets, with additional consideration given to a facility’s location on a mass transportation line.

Kunselman followed up on the question of how to ensure that a storage yard is on a mass transit line – he didn’t suppose the council would see the RFP before it went out. Crawford indicated that Washtenaw County would be issuing the RFP, but councilmembers could certainly see it if they wanted. Kunselman wanted to make sure that the city’s needs are being met with respect to the location of vehicle storage yards.

Sheriff Jerry Clayton was on hand to explain that some criteria could be added to the evaluation process that relates to being located on a mass transit line. He didn’t see that as an obstacle that can’t be overcome.

Lumm expressed appreciation for the hard work of staff, and said she felt that people who have their cars towed should pay the full cost of the service, but she appreciated efforts to lower the costs. Crawford stressed that the city and the county were working really well on this project.

Outcome: The council unanimously authorized contracting with Washtenaw County for public towing.

Ann Arbor Municipal Airport Study

Ann Arbor’s municipal airport was back on the city council’s Aug. 20 agenda, possibly the last time for a long while to come. That was expected, based on action taken earlier this year in April. The first of two agenda items on Aug. 20 related to the fifth of five different grant contracts for the completion of an environmental assessment (EA) for a possible 800-foot extension of the runway. The $42,500 in the grant consists of $40,375 in federal funds, $1,062 in state funds and a local match of $1,063.

A second airport-related item on the council’s agenda involved the use of those funds in the grant item to study the need to relocate federally owned navigational aids (ODAL lighting system) for the EA.

The city council had initially authorized funding for the first of the grant contracts related to the environmental assessment project at its Feb. 2, 2009 meeting. The assessment began on May 4, 2009. The process appeared to culminate in a public hearing in April 2010. [See Chronicle coverage: "Ann Arbor Airport Study Gets Public Hearing."] In the interim, city councilmembers have removed the runway extension from the city’s capital improvements plan (CIP) each year they’ve been asked to give the CIP its annual approval.

However, when the Federal Aviation Administration responded to the EA draft report, that prompted communication between the city of Ann Arbor and the FAA in late 2011. And that back-and-forth has resulted in FAA requests for more work, which is meant to wrap up the environmental assessment.

The most recent previous council action occurred on April 16, 2012, when the council considered several resolutions in connection with the airport, including the fourth EA grant contract.

Ann Arbor Municipal Airport Study: Public Comment

Andrew McGill addressed the council on behalf of a grass roots citizens group – on the topic of the environmental assessment (EA) study for the airport runway extension. If approved, he said, it would bring the total price of the EA to $400,000 – $100,000 more than what the council had been told 3.5 years ago, when it approved the original EA grant. The EA has become a “money pit,” for taxpayers – federal, state and local, he said. Part of the measure would pay the FAA to review the final EA, and his group did not have a problem with that.

What McGill was concerned about was a provision in the grant regarding the navigational aids – or the approach lighting. He contended that this is not just a series in a long series of grants. Part the navigational aids study, he contended, would give the FAA a blank check from the city of Ann Arbor. A condition of that grant contract, he explained, is that Ann Arbor taxpayers must pay to move or replace the runway approach lighting, long into the future. Right now, he said, there’s no federal money for that, and he feared it could cost Ann Arbor taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars. That’s different from all the previous airport grants, he told the council.

Ann Arbor Municipal Airport Study: Council Deliberations

In light of McGill’s public commentary, councilmembers had a number of questions for Matt Kulhanek, the Ann Arbor municipal airport manager. They were essentially trying to get an assurance from Kulhanek that their vote for the two items would not expose the city to financial risk.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) gets a briefing from Andrew McGill before the Aug. 20 council meeting.

Their questions drew out several salient points from Kulhanek. He stressed that the city was under no obligation to move the navigational lights. City attorney Stephen Postema added his view that there’s no additional obligation to the city other than what is specified in the grant agreement related to the study.

But Kulhanek did say, in response to a question from Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), that with each grant agreement the city approved, came with it an obligation to operate the airport for another 20 years.

Kulhanek explained the relationship between the two items on the agenda. One was a grant agreement. The second was the expenditure of the grant funds received under the first item.

Mayor John Hieftje was keen to get some kind of assurance that this would be the end of the EA grant process.

Responding to a question from Sabra Briere (Ward 1), Kulhanek indicated that the federal dollars derived from fees applied by the FAA to airline ticket prices. The local money derived from fuel fees and hanger rentals. He concluded that there were no general taxpayer dollars involved.

Responding to a question from Mike Anglin (Ward 5), Kulhanek estimated that there are a total of 75-100 jobs at the Ann Arbor municipal airport.

Responding to a question from Jane Lumm (Ward 2), Kulhanek estimate there are about 170 aircraft at the airport.

Outcome: On the resolution for the grant contract, the council approved it, with dissent from Jane Lumm (Ward 2), Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) and Sabra Briere (Ward 1). The resolution to expend the grant funds was also approved, with Briere dropping from the dissenters.

Comcast Franchise Proposal

Comcast asked that the city council approve its application for a franchise within the city. An existing franchise agreement with the cable company runs through 2017.

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) explained the implications of the vote on the Comcast franchise application.

It was important that the council act at its Aug. 20 meeting, because Comcast had sent an application dated July 17, which the city and Comcast agreed should count as “submitted” on July 23. And based on a recent ruling in the U.S. District Court on a matter involving the city of Detroit, the city needed to make a decision within 30 days of July 23.

A staff cover memo recommended rejecting the applications. Reasons include the fact that the existing franchise will remain in place through 2017. In addition, Comcast was taking the position that under a new agreement, it no longer had the obligation to allow the city to use parts of the firm’s institutional network that are essential to ensure public health and safety and other public services.

A third reason given for rejecting the application is that the new franchise agreement would grant use of the city right-of-way, and it’s not clear that continued public access to all public, educational, and governmental (PEG) channels would be ensured. And finally, according to the staff memo, Comcast’s application is not consistent with a formal renewal process – because it did not reasonably purport to meet local needs; and the application is not consistent with an informal process that would require the public to have an opportunity to comment.

Comcast Franchise Proposal: Council Deliberations

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) led off deliberations by urging support of the resolution to deny the application. He wanted to make clear that by voting for the resolution, the council would be voting to deny Comcast’s application. He noted that the resolution had the support of the city’s cable commission. He said the resolution would give the city greater bargaining power.

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) stressed that voting to deny the application would preserve the city’s CTN (Community Television Network) channels – for the duration of the existing contract, which is 2017. She said those channels are very important in the city’s communication system.

Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) ventured that there’s a complicated governmental relationship. It’s under the current state act, assistant city attorney Abigail Elias explained, that Comcast has submitted its application. She stressed that the city’s contract continues for another five years, according to its term, so the application by Comcast is premature, she said.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to deny Comcast’s franchise application.

Bluffs Nature Area Rezoning

The council was asked to give final approval for the rezoning of two parcels acquired by the city of Ann Arbor to add to the Bluffs Nature Area at 1099 N. Main St., north of Sunset Road. The council had given its initial approval on July 16.

The steep slope of the Bluffs Nature Area as it rises from North Main Street is easy to discern in the two-foot counter topographic map.

The city planning commission had recommended the rezoning at its June 5, 2012 meeting.

A 1.12-acre parcel to the north of the Bluffs – connecting the existing parkland to Huron View Boulevard – is currently zoned O (office), and had been donated to the city by a nursing home near that site.

A 0.57-acre addition to the south connects the existing parkland to Sunset Road and is currently zoned R4C (multiple-family dwelling). It had been purchased by the city from the Elks lodge, using funds from the open space and parkland preservation millage. Both parcels were given approval to be rezoned as PL (public land).

The addition of the parcels will make entrance to the nature area easier. The current entrance off North Main Street is a challenge to pedestrians and cyclists, the road bears heavy traffic, and no sidewalks exist on the west side of the street where the nature area is located.

Bluffs Nature Area Rezoning: Public Hearing

Thomas Partridge described himself as a progressive Democrat. He criticized a lack of public access to facilities, buildings and land sites as required under the Americans with Disabilities Act. He called for using vacant land for affordable housing. He told the council that the rezoning should go back to the planning commission for further review.

Bluffs Nature Area Rezoning: Council Deliberations

During deliberations, Sabra Briere (Ward 1) said it’s worth noting that Bluffs Nature area is peculiar in its terrain – it would be difficult to build on, which is partly why it’s a park and not a building site. It’s used heavily by people who navigate by foot or bicycle, and that’s part of its charm, she said.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to finalize the rezoning of the parcels being added to the Bluffs Nature Area.

Eden Court Rezoning

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

At its Aug. 20 meeting, the council was asked to take another step toward conversion of the land to city property – by giving initial approval to zone the property as PL (public land). Because a rezoning is a change to the city’s ordinances, the change will require a second council vote after a public hearing at a future meeting.

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

During her staff report given to the city planning commission on June 5, 2012, city planner Alexis DiLeo said the property contains a single-family home that will be used by the community center to expand its operations. Eventually, the center would like to renovate the interior and build an addition to connect the two buildings, she said. The center is managed under contract with the nonprofit Community Action Network.

The planning commission had voted unanimously to recommend the rezoning at its June 5 meeting.

Outcome: Without discussion, the city council voted to give initial approval to the Eden Court rezoning.

Appointments: City Boards, Commissions

Nominations and appointments to city boards and commissions come at the end of every council meeting.

Appointments: DDA

Nominated at the previous council meeting for a renewal of their appointments to the board of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority were Roger Hewitt, Keith Orr and Sandi Smith. Smith also serves on the city council, representing Ward 1.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) pulled out Smith’s nomination for a separate vote so that he could vote against it. He felt it’s inappropriate to appoint a city councilmember to the DDA, referring to the situation as having a “double-agent” on the council. He objected to the idea that someone with dual service on the DDA and the council could vote on a contract between the DDA and the city – because they’d get to vote twice. He called the two offices incompatible and said it was unethical for someone to serve in both positions.

By way of background, the question of whether it’s possible to hold simultaneously the office of councilmember and DDA board member is addressed in Michigan’s Act 566 of 1978. At first glance, the state statute appears to rule it out. The kind of incompatibility of office that is not allowed is expressed in the definition of “incompatible office”:

(b) “Incompatible offices” means public offices held by a public official which, when the official is performing the duties of any of the public offices held by the official, results in any of the following with respect to those offices held:
(i) The subordination of 1 public office to another.
(ii) The supervision of 1 public office by another.
(iii) A breach of duty of public office.

A city councilmember “supervises” the office of a DDA board member in the sense that city councilmembers must confirm the appointments of DDA board members. However, there’s an explicit exception in the statute for a DDA [emphasis added]:

(3) Section 2 does not prohibit a public officer or public employee of a city, village, township, school district, community college district, or county from being appointed to and serving as a member of the board of a downtown development authority under 1975 PA 197, MCL 125.1651 to 125.1681;

As for Kunselman’s point about contracts, the state statute on conflict of interest plays out somewhat counterintuitively – explicitly providing an exemption for contracts that are between governmental entities.

This issue arose at a May 5, 2010 DDA board meeting, when Smith and mayor John Hieftje, who also serves on the DDA board, were set to vote on a revision to a contract between the DDA and the city. In analyzing their ability to vote, the DDA’s legal counsel, Jerry Lax, viewed it in terms of Act 317 of 1968 “Contracts of Public Servants with Public Entities.”

The statute prohibits public servants from soliciting contracts with entities by whom they are employed:

(2) Except as provided in section 3, a public servant shall not directly or indirectly solicit any contract between the public entity of which he or she is an officer or employee and any of the following: (a) Him or herself. (b) Any firm, meaning a co-partnership or other unincorporated association, of which he or she is a partner, member, or employee. [...]

However, Lax pointed out that there was a specific exemption for contracts between two public entities [emphasis added]:

15.324 Public servants; contracts excepted; violation as felony. Sec. 4. (1) The prohibitions of section 2 shall not apply to any of the following: (a) Contracts between public entities.

Later at the same May 5, 2010 DDA board meeting, the issue considered by the board was analyzed not as a contract, but as a grant, and Lax asked Hieftje and Smith to recuse themselves from the vote.

At the Aug. 20, 2012 city council meeting, when the council voted on Smith’s reappointment to the DDA, Jane Lumm (Ward 2) joined Kunselman in objecting. However, Lumm went to considerable lengths to stress that her vote was not about Smith individually. She noted she’d had the pleasure of serving on the DDA partnerships committee with Smith and she respected and admired Smith’s work. Her objection was about the philosophy of appointing a councilmember to the DDA board.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) noted that when Smith ran for city council in 2008 for the first time, she was already serving on the DDA board. Smith has chosen not to run for re-election to the city council this year. Her appointment to the DDA board, Briere concluded, is independent of Smith’s position on council.

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) ventured that perhaps the council could have a larger discussion at a different time. He described Smith as having been very fair about things, so he supported Smith’s appointment.

Hieftje indicated that he understood the argument that some were making, but felt it’s important to have someone on the DDA board who understands the big picture. He pointed out that Smith has just five more voting sessions as a city councilmember.

Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) noted that there are sitting city councilmembers on other boards and commissions, like the LDFA, which is a similar authority to the DDA. [The local development finance authority, however, has explicitly in its bylaws an appointment for an Ann Arbor city councilmember, so the two boards are not comparable in the way that Taylor was suggesting.]

Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) pointed out that he also serves on the city planning commission as a voting member. [The slot filled by Derezinski is specifically designated for a city councilmember, so when Derezinski leaves office in November, having tallied fewer votes than Sally Petersen in the Aug. 7 Democratic primary, he will no longer be able to serve in that capacity on the planning commission. Derezinski's spot on the public art commission, however, is not a council-designated position, so he'd be able to continue to serve as a public art commissioner.]

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) felt that it’s good in general to have members of the city council as members of a larger board. It was not clear to him why the DDA board is different.

Kunselman pointed out that none of the other positions that people had mentioned would typically engage in contract negations with the city council. The mayor is authorized to sit on the DDA board under the enabling legislation for downtown development authorities, he allowed. But even there, it would be possible for the city administrator to fill that slot instead of the mayor.

Smith, for her part, took the comments from Kunselman with apparent good humor, telling him that if he’d like to change who sits on the DDA board, he should run for mayor.

Outcome: The council voted to reappoint Sandi Smith (Ward 1) to the DDA board, over the dissent of Jane Lumm (Ward 2) and Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3). Other appointments were approved unanimously, without comment.

Appointments: Taxicab Board

Without discussion, an additional member was added to the Ann Arbor taxicab board – Michael Benson. The addition will allow the body to achieve a quorum of three out of five voting members for its meetings. It has not been able to do that since July 2012, when Tim Hull resigned after taking a job on the west coast.

Benson was added to the board in a one-step confirmation process. Ordinarily, nominations to a board or a commission are first announced at a city council meeting, then confirmed by a council vote at a subsequent meeting.

The taxicab board will now consist of Benson, city councilmember Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), Tom Oldakowski, Tom Crawford (a non-voting ex officio member, as the city’s CFO) and Bill Clock (a non-voting ex officio member, as representative of the Ann Arbor police department).

The taxicab board is responsible for administering the city’s taxicab board ordinance. [.pdf of taxicab ordinance] Application forms to be appointed to city boards and commissions can be downloaded and returned to the mayor’s office for consideration.

Outcome: Michael Benson was unanimously appointed to the taxicab board.

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 council. And every meeting typically includes public commentary on subjects not necessarily on the agenda.

Comm/Comm: Pedestrian, Non-Motorized Issue

During the public commentary at the conclusion of the meeting, Kathy Griswold told the council she was there to address the most important activity for elected officials: the safety of citizens, especially children. She contended that the city was confusing an engineering problem with social policy. There are effective public policies like “share the road” or “complete streets,” but what we need is traffic engineering, she said. She called for the issue to be reviewed by independent engineers with the state. She asked the city attorney to consider the risk that’s being created when the city tells pedestrians that “they rule.” She warned against putting up posters telling children they have the right-of-way as pedestrians. She called that crazy, and called for an independent traffic engineer to evaluate the situation.

After thanking the council for his appointment to the taxicab board, Michael Benson related what he’d seen while attending a recent academic conference in Munich – bike lanes separated from the right-of-way. It was amazing to see the number of bicycles there, he said. Relating his experience in Ann Arbor – trying to cross Huron Street near the University of Michigan campus – he’d witnessed three near accidents, both as pedestrians and as a driver. He suggested looking into driver education.

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

Absent: Margie Teall.

Next council meeting: Tuesday, Sept. 4, 2012 at 7 p.m. in the council chambers at 301 E. Huron. [Check Chronicle event listings to confirm date]

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The wording change was undertaken to make clear that organizations like The Ark or the Michigan Theater would not benefit from such a millage, so that their supporters would not mistakenly believe that the millage would support those organizations and thus decide to diminish their donations to those organizations.

The possibility of placing a ballot question in front of voters this November was first revealed at the council’s Aug. 9, 2012 meeting, when Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) added the item to the agenda at the start of that meeting. The millage that voters will be asked to approve would be levied at a rate of 0.1 mills, which will generate around $450,000 annually. For the owner of a house worth $200,000 the tax will cost around $10 a year.

If it’s approved by voters on Nov. 6, the funding mechanism already provided by Ann Arbor’s Percent for Art ordinance would be suspended for a period of four years – the duration of the millage. That program, in place since 2007, requires that 1% of all city capital projects be set aside for public art, up to a limit of $250,000 per project.

Concerns about placing the item on the ballot voiced by the arts community and others include a lack of clarity for voters about how yes or no votes would impact public funding for art, the short time frame during which a millage campaign could be mounted, and the fact that Ann Arbor voters will already be asked to vote for two other millages on the Nov. 6 ballot. Those two millages are: (1) a renewal of a 1.1 mill tax to pay for park capital improvements and maintenance; and (2) a library millage to support construction of a new downtown branch of the Ann Arbor District Library – expected to cost 0.56 mills in its first of 30 years, but averaging 0.47 mills.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) attempted to amend the public art millage question so that its proceeds would be added to the existing program, instead of suspending the program. But that amendment got no support from other councilmembers.

A separate resolution concerning the existing Percent for Art program is meant, according to its sponsor Jane Lumm (Ward 2), to provide clarity to voters about what their vote on a public art millage would mean for the future funding of public art. It came much later on the council’s agenda, and had not yet been decided when this brief was published. Lumm’s resolution would direct city staff to prepare an ordinance revision to the Percent for Art program, with the idea of repealing the current funding program before the millage vote. The idea is that voters would understand clearly that unless the public art millage is approved, no public funding for art would remain.

This item will be updated when the outcome on Lumm’s resolution is known. Update: The council voted down Lumm’s resolution. It got support only from Lumm, Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), and Mike Anglin (Ward 5). 

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]

From left: Ann Arbor city councilmember Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) and Mark Tucker, founder of the annual FestiFools and FoolMoon events.

At that meeting, he indicated a desire to start a conversation about public arts funding, and expressed the hope of getting input from the Ann Arbor public art commission and the community in general.

Some of that conversation took place at the public art commission’s Aug. 15 meeting, which ended in a vote of support for the millage proposal.

Much of the reaction so far from the arts community has focused on the short timeframe until the November election, and the lack of clarity that a yes or no vote would indicate, based on the wording of the proposal.

In response to that perceived lack of clarity, on Friday, Aug. 17, councilmember Jane Lumm (Ward 2) added a resolution to the Aug. 20 council agenda that would lead to a choice for voters on Nov. 6 between: (1) a millage to support public spending on art; or (2) no continued accumulation of public funds to be spent on art. Her resolution would direct city attorney staff to prepare ordinance language to repeal the funding mechanism in the Percent for Art ordinance – effective July 1, 2013. The intent is to repeal the ordinance in a way that allows funds already set aside for art to be spent on art, and to provide for maintenance of existing works.

If approved by the council on Aug. 20, Lumm’s resolution would lead in late September to the first of two city council votes necessary to repeal the ordinance section. In part, Lumm’s resolution states that “to truly enfranchise residents, voters should be offered a clear, yes/no choice on public funding for public art rather than an either/or choice of the mechanism used to fund public art; …” [.pdf of Lumm's draft resolution and memo]

Lumm’s resolution hadn’t been proposed when AAPAC held its special meeting on Wednesday to focus on Taylor’s millage proposal. The commission had essentially been forced to call a special session because its next regular meeting, on Aug. 22, falls after an expected vote by the council on Aug. 20.

The special meeting drew more public commentary than at any of AAPAC’s previous meetings. Nine people spoke, including leaders of several local arts institutions: Deb Polich of the Arts Alliance, Russ Collins of the Michigan Theater, Mark Tucker of FestiFools, and former AAPAC chair Margaret Parker, among others. Several more people attended but did not formally address the commission.

It seemed clear that neither commissioners nor members of the arts community who spoke during public commentary had been consulted about the millage proposal, and only a few had been informed that it would be brought forward. While there was broad support for the idea of a public arts millage, many people questioned the timing and felt that 11 weeks until the Nov. 6 election was too short a time to mount a successful millage campaign.

When asked by commissioners who would lead such a campaign, Taylor said he assumed it would be led by the arts community, with money raised from private contributions. He felt the amount of time was sufficient, and that the millage would be approved by voters. He thought the November election would be a good time for the vote, with higher participation by students and renters – that’s a good core, he said.

During AAPAC’s meeting, Taylor told commissioners that if a millage vote is delayed, that puts the current Percent for Art program at risk. He said his sense is that the risk is growing, though he was unclear about why he believes that’s the case. Marsha Chamberlin, AAPAC’s chair, wondered whether the concern stems from a change in composition to the council, following the November election. Taylor did not respond directly to that question.

In the Aug. 7 primary election, Democrat Sally Petersen defeated incumbent Tony Derezinski in Ward 2 – Derezinski also is a member of AAPAC, though he has not attended a regular meeting since May, and did not attend the Aug. 15 special session. No incumbents ran in the Ward 1 and Ward 5 races, where Democrats Sumi Kailasapathy and Chuck Warpehoski prevailed in their respective primaries. No Republican is running against Petersen or Kailasapathy in November. And though Warpehoski faces Republican Stuart Berry in Ward 5, it’s likely that Warpehoski will win that heavily Democratic ward. Taylor is also running for re-election, but was unopposed in the Ward 3 Democratic primary and is unchallenged in November.

In a pre-election survey conducted by the Arts Alliance, Petersen indicated support for the Percent for Art program, though she suggested some changes. Warpehoski supported “looking for ways to establish a more flexible funding stream for the arts.” Kailasapathy did not respond to the survey, according to the alliance, but her campaign website did not list public art among her priorities. [.pdf of Arts Alliance candidate survey]

In general, another complicating factor with the millage proposal is a separate effort to develop a countywide plan and funding mechanism for public art. The Arts Alliance is leading that initiative, and earlier this year applied for a $100,000 grant through the National Endowment for the Arts “Our Town” program to help fund it. At AAPAC’s Aug. 15 meeting, Polich – the alliance’s executive director – advocated for more time so that a fully-developed, comprehensive strategy could be prepared.

Polich questioned how the millage rate was determined in Taylor’s proposal – a 0.1 mill tax for four years. She raised the concern that the city is “leaving money on the table” – that is, it’s possible that voters would be willing to pay more for public art than the amount proposed. Polich also mentioned concerns about the millage’s potential impact on private contributions to arts and cultural organizations, which wouldn’t necessarily get funding from a public arts millage. There might be confusion about that, making fundraising more difficult.

Despite a range of concerns, AAPAC ultimately voted unanimously to recommend that the council place the proposal on the Nov. 6 ballot. Among the commissioners, John Kotarski appeared to be the most enthusiastic supporter of the proposal, praising Taylor for bringing it forward.

Background

The city of Ann Arbor already has one means of paying for works of art with public funds – the Percent for Art program, which is funded through a city ordinance. The context of the proposed millage is this existing funding program.

Background: Percent for Art

The current Percent for Art program has been in place since 2007. It requires that 1% of the budget for any capital improvement project be set aside for public art, up to a cap of $250,000 per project. The program has generated just over $2 million, and more than $1 million in Percent for Art revenues have been expended to date – primarily for the program’s first and largest project, the Herbert Dreiseitl water sculpture in front of city hall.

Projects paid for with Percent for Art funds are restricted in two major ways. They must be permanent “monumental” type art, which means that “temporary” art like performances or artist-in-residency programs can’t be supported with Percent for Art funds. The projects must also have some link to the funding source – that is, art paid for out of street millage revenues must be part of a street project, or incorporate street or transportation themes. This lack of flexibility has been a frequent criticism of the program. Questions also have been raised about the legality of diverting funds intended for capital projects to use for public art. The city attorney, Stephen Postema, has never made public a legal opinion on this issue.

The amount of funding has also been a point of contention. There have been three proposals brought by city councilmembers over the past few years to reduce funding for the program, though none have received enough votes on council to pass. There has never been a formal proposal to eliminate the program completely.

The idea of a millage for public art had been mentioned by councilmember Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) earlier this year, during the council’s May 7, 2012 meeting when councilmembers voted on artwork for the city’s new justice center. However, no formal proposal was presented or further discussed by the council. Nor was the issue pursued by the city’s public art commission, even though they recently crafted and approved a four-year strategic plan at their July 2012 meeting.

Background: Public Art Millage – Ann Arbor

So it came as a surprise to many – including Kunselman and other councilmembers, AAPAC members and leaders of the arts and cultural community – when Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) proposed putting a public arts millage on the Nov. 6 ballot. He took that action at the council’s Aug. 9 meeting. An email from assistant city attorney Abigail Elias to Taylor and mayor John Hieftje on July 25 indicated that by then the ballot language had already been reviewed by the state’s attorney general.

The ballot proposal would levy a 0.1 mill tax for a four-year period, which would bring in an estimated $450,000 annually. The proposal is worded so that passage of the millage would suspend the collection of Percent for Art funds under the city’s ordinance only during the four-year period of the millage. So if voters approved the public art millage this year, and then failed to approve a millage renewal four years from now – either because the council did not place a renewal on the ballot, or voters rejected the renewal – the Percent for Art ordinance would again require that funds from capital project budgets be set aside for public art.

If approved by the city council on Aug. 20 as proposed, the ballot question would read:

Shall the Charter be amended to limit sources of funding for public art and to authorize a new tax of up to one-tenth (0.10) of a mill for 2013 through 2016 to fund public art, which 0.10 mill will raise in the first year of levy the estimated revenue of $459,273?

The corresponding charter language would be [emphasis added]:

Funds for Public Art
SECTION 8.24. In addition to any other amount which the City is authorized to raise by general tax upon the real and personal property by this Charter or any other provision of law, the City shall, in 2013 through 2016, annually levy a tax of up to one-tenth (0.10) of a mill on all taxable real and personal property situated within the City for the purpose of providing funds for public art, including but not limited to the permanent and temporary acquisition, maintenance and repair of works of art for display in or on public structures or sites and/or as part of or adjacent to public streets and sidewalks, and performance art on City streets, sidewalks or sites. Except for funds previously raised, set aside, allocated or otherwise designated to be used for public art, including such funds in the July 1, 2012 to June 30, 2013 fiscal year budget, and except for funds that are received by grant, gift, bequest or other donation to the City for public art, for the duration of this millage, the City shall not raise, set aside or designate funds for public art in any other manner. This millage also shall not preclude the grant, gift, bequest or other donation to the City of works of art.

The reaction on Aug. 9 from councilmembers to Taylor’s proposal was generally positive, though considerable dissatisfaction was expressed regarding the secretive nature of the work that had produced it. In making the proposal on Aug. 9, Taylor first read a prepared statement then asked for postponement of the resolution. The council agreed unanimously to postpone action until its next meeting, on Aug. 20.

During council deliberations, Taylor indicated that he hoped to receive input from the public art commission, before the council voted on whether to put the proposal on the ballot. This essentially forced the commission to schedule a special meeting on the issue, as its next regular meeting – on Aug. 22 – fell after the Aug. 20 council meeting.

For additional background, see Chronicle coverage: “Ballot Questions: Parks, Public Art Funding” and “Column: Two Questions on Public Art.” Or click here for a list of Chronicle reports on past meetings of the Ann Arbor public art commission.

Background: Public Art Millage – Countywide?

Part of the dynamic related to the current Ann Arbor millage proposal is connected to a quiet discussion that’s been taking place about a possible countywide millage for public art. That effort is being led by the Arts Alliance and its Cultural Leaders Forum – an invitation-only group focused on advocacy and sustainable funding for local arts and culture.

Earlier this year, the alliance submitted a $100,000 grant proposal to the National Endowment for the Arts “Our Town” program. If awarded, the funding would be used to help develop a public arts master plan for Washtenaw County over an 18-month period. According to an excerpt from the grant proposal, the total budget for this effort would be about $400,000, with other funds anticipated to come from Washtenaw County government ($25,000); ArtServe Michigan ($5,000); the city of Ann Arbor/Ann Arbor public art commission ($5,000); the Cultural Alliance of Southeast Michigan ($5,000); the University of Michigan’s ArtsEngine program ($92,825); and the Huron River Watershed Council ($10,000).

Update after publication: The alliance has been informed that the NEA grant for this project would not be awarded. In an email to the proposal’s partners, Polich described it as a “blow to the full project” but indicated an intent to explore options and move forward with some aspects of the proposal.

The grant proposal noted that in 2008, the Arts Alliance developed a Washtenaw County cultural plan, as well as individual plans for seven communities within the county: Ann Arbor, Chelsea, Dexter, Manchester, Milan, Saline and Ypsilanti. Public art wasn’t a part of that plan, however. More recently, according to the proposal, the alliance “convened a meeting with all interested parties during which it was decided to have the Arts Alliance apply its expertise and the methodologies it used for the Cultural Plan to create a Washtenaw County Master Public Art Plan.”

Among the activities cited in the grant proposal, one major goal would be to “assign responsibility, stewardship and accountability” for public arts in Washtenaw County: “With citizen input, guiding principles, goals and best practices will be set to determine who is accountable for how public art is to be administered, funded, proposed, selected, installed and maintained in each city specifically and in the county in general.”

During the Aug. 15 AAPAC meeting, Theresa Reid – the commission’s newest member who’s also executive director of UM’s ArtsEngine – noted that the alliance’s Cultural Leaders Forum has discussed the possibility of a countywide millage. She said there doesn’t yet seem to be a consensus on how to proceed with that effort, and it’s unclear how long it might take to put forward a countywide public arts millage. She noted that one concern is whether a public arts millage in Ann Arbor would undermine that broader effort.

Public Commentary: Pre-Vote

Eight people spoke to the commission at the start of AAPAC’s Aug. 15 meeting.

Margaret Parker introduced herself as an artist and co-owner of Downtown Home & Garden – her studio is located above the Ashley Street store. She noted that she served on the commission since it started in 2004, and had been chair for many of those years. She had helped get the Percent for Art ordinance passed and had helped develop the guidelines for the commission. Parker said when she first heard about the millage proposal, she had been shocked because it had happened so fast. She allowed that she’d made some errors in calculating how much the current program generated in revenues. She had been worried that the millage wouldn’t bring in as much, but now she felt it would be generally an even exchange. It would be a good start. She’s been told that a lot of the administrative duties would be the same, but there would also be different guidelines so a lot of their previous work “would be thrown out the window, but that’s how it goes.”

Parker was also concerned about the short time – until Nov. 6 about 11 weeks – but said it doesn’t appear they have a choice about it. She noted that other millages have passed, so while she was initially worried, she’s feeling better about the situation now.

Lynne Friman, a Saline resident and chair of the Ann Arbor-based Arts Alliance board, noted that the Ann Arbor region is widely recognized for its arts community. The area is an arts and cultural mecca and destination that’s known throughout the country. The community places a high value on arts and culture, she said. Adequate funding is critical to the growth and sustainability of the arts community throughout Washtenaw County. It’s disappointing that while other cities nationwide invest in their public art, Ann Arbor must continually defend the Percent for Art program. Friman noted that the Arts Alliance is exploring public arts funding across the county, possibly through set-asides in individual communities, or through with a countywide millage.

Friman told commissioners that the alliance is developing a public arts master plan for the entire county, an effort that has included several members of AAPAC, she said. While she applauded Taylor’s initiative, she would have preferred it if he had consulted the arts and cultural community to get a better understanding of the risks and impact of his millage proposal. The alliance believes that more time and thought is needed to work together, improving the current functioning program and determining what’s necessary to ensure that the Ann Arbor region benefits from a well-conceived, successful funding plan.

Standing: Ann Arbor public art commissioner John Kotarski and Margaret Parker, former chair of the commission. Seated is Cathy Gendron, another art commissioner.

Shoshana Hurand, program manager for the Arts Alliance, said that everyone in the room supports arts and culture. Her points would be more focused on process and timing. If approved by voters, the millage would reflect that the community highly values the arts. But it takes 12-18 months to do a millage campaign properly, she noted – to consult with community leaders, get a sense of the appropriate millage rate, educate the community and select the right time to put it on the ballot. There needs to be sufficient time for all this to happen.

Hurand acknowledged that the Percent for Art program has issues. For example, she said she’d love to know the language that explains exactly what the Percent for Art funding can support. There needs to be time to explore other models. “We want to make sure we do this right,” she said, and that will take more than 11 weeks.

Tom Petiet introduced himself as a commercial artist and illustrator, and member of the Ann Arbor Comic Opera Guild. He indicated that the millage vote was essentially a good idea, in that it would allow everyone to know the public’s view. He wanted the support for arts to expand beyond the visual arts. This area probably has more performing artists than any other city of its size in the country, he said. But there’s no place to perform other than the university, and that’s too difficult. There’s no affordable rehearsal and performance space, he said. Arts groups are suffering from a lack of funding, and audience levels are also falling. That means more money has to be spent on advertising – all of this needs to be considered, Petiet said. The public art ordinance should be more inclusive, and should include funding for the creation of a public performance space. There’s an opportunity now, he said, and people would be receptive to the idea.

Russ Collins, executive director of the Michigan Theater, began by thanking commissioners for the work they do. He noted that he serves on the board of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority, and indicated that he knows how hard it can be. He said he was glad that Taylor had brought forward the millage proposal, because now it creates a dialogue about funding arts in this community. He noted that the community hasn’t really funded the arts very much. Ann Arbor aggressively funds other things that contribute to quality of life – parks, schools, public transportation, the library. But the thing that’s missing is governmental funding of the arts. The No. 1 source of government funding for the arts comes from local communities, not the state or federal levels, he said. And in that regard, in general this community’s public funding for the arts hasn’t reflected its community values.

Collins said he was sorry that this conversation had been imposed on the commission, but it’s now the start of a dialogue. Yes, it’s a short time, he said, but he hoped this proposal could be leveraged into a dialogue about the broader role of government in subsidizing the arts. Our community has been very generous in private giving to sustain the arts, Collins said. The University of Michigan has also been very generous, and that’s often taken for granted. There needs to be a broader discussion within the county, he said, and they need more time to talk about these issues.

Mark Tucker told commissioners that he was there as a representative of FestiFools, FoolMoon, and as a resident and artist. Because Taylor had mentioned FestiFools and FoolMoon as a possible recipient of funding from a millage, Tucker felt it was appropriate to comment about it. The millage is a good idea, he said. It takes what’s already strong about the public art commission and the Percent for Art program, and releases some of the baked-in restrictions of the current ordinance. That’s beside the fact that FestiFools and FoolMoon might benefit from millage funding, he added – he noted that he’s been an outspoken supporter of the Percent for Art program even after receiving a letter from the commission stating that FestiFools couldn’t be funded by it. Tucker said he didn’t know about the timing of it, but he supported a millage. He hoped everyone could leave the room on the same page, heading in the same direction – with or without a millage.

Shary Brown, an Ann Arbor Township resident, described herself as a retired arts administrator. She was director of the Ann Arbor Street Art Fair and before that was director of the Ann Arbor Summer Art Fair. It would be a terrific thing to look at funding episodic, temporary art events, she said. Ann Arbor is known for its stellar line-up of art festivals, which brings money into the community – money that’s spent locally. The Street Art Fair alone pays the city close to $60,000 in fees, she noted. She urged the commission to take a broad look at the issue, but she observed that the timing is very short to educate the arts community, let alone the community at large.

David Esau, of Cornerstone Design Architects, is an Arts Alliance board member, and said he endorsed the alliance’s position. He supports waiting on the millage, but if it does move forward, he’d encourage publicity about the parameters of what the millage can or can’t fund. He doesn’t want people to stop funding arts organizations, thinking that those organizations would be supported by the millage revenues.

Public Art Millage: Taylor’s Comments

Marsha Chamberlin, AAPAC’s chair, asked Christopher Taylor to talk about his proposal, joking that he’d get more than the three-minute speaking turn allowed for public commentary.

Taylor began by saying that he hadn’t prepared anything, because he hadn’t anticipated making a presentation. He noted that his proposal is clearly “animated” by the principle that public art is a public good. Arts and culture are one of the community’s core values, and it ought to be something that people can rally around and support. The current incarnation of the public art funding is contentious in a manner “that we all regret,” he said. To the extent that the program is contentious, it relates to the manner in which it’s funded, he said. It takes infrastructure dollars and uses them in a related manner for public art. That’s a policy matter, he said, and there’s some controversy about it. The current program also constrains the commission’s work and its ability to make decisions, he said. Those strong limitations are inhibiting the program’s success – it’s a vicious circle.

Marsha Chamberlin, chair of the Ann Arbor public art commission, with city councilmember Christopher Taylor (Ward 3).

It appears that the way to fix this, Taylor said, is to revitalize the program by changing the funding model. He believes the millage would pass, and would demonstrate wholeheartedly the citizenry’s support for public art. And it would free the commission to use its best judgment about what to fund. The millage funds could be used for a broader range of projects, including performing art and temporary art.

Taylor explained that the current program is a “creature of the city council,” so passage or rejection of the millage wouldn’t automatically alter the Percent for Art ordinance language. The millage vote would be a point of information, one way or another, he said, as to whether the program would be continued. The millage wouldn’t terminate the program, he said.

The millage proposal was intended to initiate a conversation, Taylor said – and that’s happened, so that’s good. He thinks 11 weeks is sufficient time, and the November election is a good time for the proposal to be on the ballot. His emails are running more than 2-t0-1 in support of the millage, Taylor reported. That’s not scientific, but it’s encouraging.

Taylor told commissioners that there’s risk in delaying a millage vote. The current program is contentious. We live in a politicized environment, he added, and if nothing is done now – if there’s a delay in order to prepare for a millage vote several months away – that puts the current program at risk. What that risk is, he added, is impossible to say. But his sense is that the risk is growing.

Taylor concluded by joking: “Fix it or risk it, if I can go Johnnie Cochran on it.”

Public Art Millage: Deliberations

Commissioners spent much of the next hour asking Taylor questions about his proposal. And at the behest of John Kotarski, the meeting rules were relaxed to allow for input from the public during the discussion. This report organizes that discussion thematically.

Public Art Millage: Deliberations – Timeline

Connie Brown began by noting that the city’s parks millage will also be on the Nov. 6 ballot, and she wondered how Taylor would compare the timeline for that proposal with the much shorter timeline for the public art millage, and whether the shorter timeline is adequate.

By way of background, the renewal of the city’s parks maintenance and capital improvements millage – at the rate of 1.1 mills from 2013-2018 – has been discussed by city staff for months. The park advisory commission was first briefed about the millage renewal at its March 22, 2012 meeting. At its June 19, 2012 meeting, PAC voted to recommend that council place the millage on the ballot, which the council did at its Aug. 9 meeting.

Responding to Brown, Taylor said the public art millage proposal was made with the stated and actual intent of starting a conversation. If it’s the consensus of the community’s cultural leaders that a millage is generally a good idea, but that the vote should be held off until a future date, then he’d be inclined to defer to that. So holding off is a real possibility, Taylor said. There are many possibilities, and he’d be open to them.

Broadly speaking, he continued, there’s been a lot of discussion about the benefits of public art for a long time. In discussions about problems with the current program, there’s virtually always the statement that the criticism isn’t about funding public art, but about how the city is going about that funding. So the groundwork for a millage is laid, he said. The economic benefits of public art are well known, he said – that’s largely a given throughout the community.

Connie Rizzolo Brown, an AAPAC member and local architect.

What if the millage isn’t put on the Nov. 6 ballot? Tom Petiet asked. What would be the next opportunity for it?

Taylor replied that the state now limits elections to four times a year. They can be held on the fourth Tuesday in February, and the first Tuesday after the first Monday in May, August and November. Petiet clarified with Taylor that it would therefore be possible to put a millage on the ballot within a year.

Taylor noted that if the commission stated that the Nov. 6 election is too soon for a millage question, and if the council concurs, then the council could postpone action on the issue until a later meeting.

Margaret Parker weighed in, saying that November will be a huge election because of the presidential race. She felt that the more people who turn out to vote, the better chance the millage will have to be passed. Mark Tucker asked if that’s what Taylor thought, too.

Taylor thought the November election would be a good time, with higher participation by students and renters – that’s a good core, he said. [Those two groups do not pay property taxes directly – and the millage is a property tax.] He said he liked the idea of asking more people about something like this, since it has been the subject of some controversy.

Cathy Gendron pointed out that if they don’t have time to educate the community, then voters won’t be informed. There might be less risk with a smaller turnout, when people would be well-informed and feel strongly about it.

It’s a judgement call, Taylor acknowledged. With a February election, you can know with a fair degree of “granularity” who the voters will be, he said. In November, you’ll get a wider swath of the community.

Sabra Briere, a Ward 1 councilmember who attended the meeting, added that in a special election, you’ll get a certain kind of voter who’ll likely feel passionate about the issue, compared to the November general election. Another factor is that on Nov. 6, there will be a significant number of statewide and local issues on the ballot, she noted. An issue like this public art millage might get lost, she said, yet it might still garner enough votes. If it’s the only item on the ballot – during a special election, for example – then it becomes difficult to sell, she said.

Lynne Friman of the Arts Alliance board reported that in her day job, she works for the Cultural Alliance of Southeast Michigan. That group was involved in the recent successful millage campaign for the Detroit Institute of Arts, which had been on the Aug. 7 ballot. There had been many conversations about the timing of that vote, she said, and much research was done about when to place the millage on the ballot. They learned that a general election is not the best time for an arts issue, she said. The DIA specifically put the millage question on the August ballot in order to reach a certain kind of voter, Friman said. She suggested looking at the timing of similar arts millages that had been successful.

Public Art Millage: Deliberations – Relationship to Current Program

Connie Brown wondered if the current Percent for Art program would automatically be suspended, if the millage passes. The funding would be suspended, Taylor replied, but the ordinance would be “live and active” until the council acted to change it.

Theresa Reid asked what would happen in four years if a millage renewal doesn’t pass. Does the other Percent for Art funding kick in again? Taylor said it would surprise him if there weren’t changes to the ordinance before then, assuming that the millage passed in November. He would suspect that some aspects of the ordinance would be changed by the council. But right now, the only thing that would change is the funding.

Marsha Chamberlin noted that when the current ordinance was created, there was tremendous support for it from the arts community. With a millage, it would expand the ability to fund projects like FestiFools. In a way, it would be simply switching funding mechanisms while opening up the options for projects to fund. That’s one way of looking at it, she said. Taxpayers currently fund the existing program, and would be paying taxes on it in a different way with a millage.

Taxes would be raised with a millage, Taylor said. The current program might need to be tweaked to allow for the freedom of the new funding model, he added, but there wouldn’t be the need to start from scratch. [This might have been an indirect response to Margaret Parker's public commentary earlier in the meeting, when she stated that a lot of work they'd done to create the program's guidelines would have to be thrown out the window.]

Reid said there seems to be support for fewer restrictions on how the money is spent. Why couldn’t the council simply change certain aspects of the current ordinance, such as decoupling the artwork from its source of funding, or allowing for temporary art? That might be a way to address these issues while they work toward a longer-term solution, she said.

Taylor didn’t think that was possible. He said the ordinance had been created in this way based on state law, not the council’s whimsy.

Public Art Millage: Deliberations – Assessing Risk

Theresa Reid noted that people who are concerned about funding for public art are weighing the likelihood of losing funding because of city council action versus a public vote. She acknowledged that Taylor and others felt confident about the passage of the millage, but she observed that voters had recently rejected a schools millage. Sabra Briere clarified that the millage Reid mentioned was a countywide millage, not one in Ann Arbor. [In fact, Ann Arbor voters in May of 2012 approved a technology bond, at an estimated annual average millage rate 0.51 mills. Reid perhaps was recalling a countywide school millage that was on the November 2009 ballot, and defeated – though supported by a majority of Ann Arbor voters.]

Theresa Reid, an AAPAC member and executive director of the University of Michigan’s ArtsEngine program.

Wiltrud Simbuerger pointed to Taylor’s statement about the risk of waiting. But if the millage is voted down, what does that mean? Is that a statement against public art? That result could be a greater risk for the existing program than waiting and taking more time to educate the public, she said.

That’s clearly true, Taylor replied. If the millage loses 40% to 60%, that means one thing, he said. If it loses by a single vote, that means something else.

Briere observed that now they’re talking about voter intent – which was something the council had discussed with regard to a proposed parks charter amendment that councilmembers voted down at their Aug. 9 meeting. Reasons for voting no could vary from voter to voter, she said. Some might vote no because the millage rate was too high or they didn’t support any public funding for art or they liked the current funding model. Defeat of the millage wouldn’t automatically mean that the council would agree not to fund public art, she said.

Taylor agreed with Briere’s assessment. He noted that he’s received about 170 emails about the millage, and some of those are against it because they like the current funding.

Simbuerger cautioned that defeat of the millage could be used as an argument to cut other funding, too. Taylor said defeat of the millage wouldn’t be a definitive sign, but it wouldn’t be a win, either.

Marsha Chamberlin raised another issue. Some councilmembers don’t think the current funding is legal or appropriate, so a no vote on the millage would fuel that fire. She didn’t think the majority of councilmembers felt that way, but some did.

Chamberlin said the commission has felt hamstrung by the current ordinance, because of restrictions that tied projects thematically to their funding sources, and that required a level of permanence that prevented the funding of temporary work. There’s been no doubt that the program took a while to get up and running, she added, as the commission developed policies and procedures. Now they have a strategic plan and 14 projects in the works, but their work isn’t yet visible – except for the Dreiseitl sculpture, which has been controversial.

For the past 1.5 years or so, Chamberlin said, the commission has been hearing from some city council members and others that the city is spending public dollars on art, but the public hasn’t voted to do that. The sense is that some of the new councilmembers feel strongly about this, she said, and that perhaps the Percent for Art ordinance might be repealed. She asked Taylor if that’s true – could the current ordinance be repealed?

Taylor replied that if someone wanted to draft a resolution to that effect, they could do so. It would require an initial vote, a public hearing, then a final vote at a second meeting. Briere, who had been out of the room at the start of Chamberlin’s question, said she didn’t think the council would consider simply eliminating the Percent for Art ordinance [leaving no public art funding in place].

In that case, Chamberlin said, it didn’t sound like that was an immediate concern. Taylor said the objections had primarily been related to funding, not to the overall program.

Public Art Millage: Deliberations – Communication, Mounting a Campaign

Connie Brown noted that there hasn’t been much dialogue on the public art commission or among leaders of the arts community about this millage. She asked Taylor to address this lack of engagement.

That’s a legitimate concern, he said. The council is under a time pressure because of the deadline to place a question on the Nov. 6 ballot – they would need to vote at their Aug. 20 meeting, he said. But if the arts community speaks with a clear voice that it wants to seek a millage – but not just now, then that would be something to weigh very seriously, he said.

Brown wondered how the voice of the arts community will be part of the publicity, assuming that the council decides to pursue a millage. There’s a lot of misunderstanding about the current ordinance, she noted, even though it’s been in place for several years. If a millage question is placed on the Nov. 6 ballot, there’s such a short time to communicate what that vote will mean, she said.

Taylor clarified with Brown that she was essentially asking how to run a millage campaign. Theresa Reid added: And who pays for it? Private donations would pay for a campaign, Taylor replied.

John Kotarski asked who would run such a campaign? “I don’t know,” Taylor said. He suspected that arts leaders would be engaged and do it.

What if arts leaders are divided on the issue? Reid asked. That sometimes happens, she joked. Taylor said it depends on the nature of the disagreement, and the manner in which it’s articulated.

Later in the meeting, Brown asked how much it would cost to mount a campaign. Taylor estimated it would cost about $25,000. Lynne Friman of the Arts Alliance board thought it would cost significantly more than that. [By way of rough comparison, in for the Aug. 7 primary, the eight city council candidates, in four two-way races, raised about $50,000 combined. As a one-way race, a campaign for the millage could conceivably be mounted for half that, or $25,000.]

Responding to another question, Aaron Seagraves – the city’s public art administrator – explained that although the city staff can’t advocate for a millage, they can provide information about it. Reid jokingly asked if the commission could spend Percent for Art funding on yard signs “if we keep them for five years?” [The reference to five years is an allusion to the need for current art projects funded through the program to be "permanent," because the funding comes from capital projects. The timeframe for what constitutes permanence has been somewhat fluid over the years.]

Public Art Millage: Deliberations – Commissioners Weigh In

John Kotarski read a prepared statement expressing his support for the millage to be placed on the Nov. 6 ballot. It will strengthen public art, and if it passes, it could be the start of expanded support countywide for public art. It appears it might have support even from councilmembers who oppose the current funding mechanism, he said. The current funding arrangement doesn’t allow for things like performing arts and artist-in-residence programs. Art monuments are important and Ann Arbor should have more of them, he said, but temporary art is also important, adding to the creative energy of the city. He cited Christo’s installation in New York City’s Central Park (The Gates) as an example of temporary art that generated more than $250 million in the local economy over the 14 days that it was in place.

From left: AAPAC chair Marsha Chamberlin, who also is president of the Ann Arbor Art Center; Shary Brown, former executive director of the Ann Arbor Street Art Fair; and Mark Tucker of FestiFools and FoolMoon.

Kotarski also said that the millage would allow the public art program to be more accountable, and give the commission a chance to explain what they do. He might be naive, he said, but he takes councilmembers at their word when they say they’d support a millage and campaign for its passage. The art commissioners aren’t politicians, he said, so they need to trust that these seasoned politicians mean what they say. He thanked Taylor for giving Ann Arbor a chance to weigh in on this issue.

Theresa Reid began by noting that she’s a member of the countywide Cultural Leaders Forum. The CLF has talked about a possible countywide millage to support arts and cultural organizations, she said, but there are still a lot of questions. There isn’t a consensus yet on important issues like the timing and amount of that possible millage, she said, and how it might affect funding for local arts and cultural institutions.

Reid said she understood the concern of some CLF members and the Arts Alliance about putting forward an Ann Arbor-specific millage. But Kotarski had assured her, she said, that in the experience of other communities, passage of a city millage later ended up helping pass a broader millage, too. She was concerned about the 11-week timeline, but felt it would take the CLF and Arts Alliance a long time to bring forward a countywide millage proposal, and she didn’t think the Percent for Art program could wait. If it doesn’t hurt the countywide effort, she thought they should move forward quickly. She “cautiously trusted” the council’s sense that the millage would pass. So the next 11 weeks would be spent on educating the public and moving this forward, she concluded.

Connie Brown spoke next, saying that the millage proposal is an improvement, and there are a lot of good things about it. She was concerned about the timing – she’d been surprised by that. But now she’s leaning toward faster movement. Her biggest concern is for the educational campaign to be effective, and so far, for the current program, it hasn’t been, she said. You want to have informed voters.

Cathy Gendron agreed with what others had said. She’s also concerned about the timing, but said she’s willing to dig into it.

Wiltrud Simbuerger said there’s no question that a millage would be a better funding mechanism. She just wondered how they can do it in such a short time. She still didn’t know how that would work out, but she would love for it to pass so it would resolve the whole question about how the public feels about funding public art.

Kotarski said the commission wasn’t going to do a millage campaign alone. They need the support of all arts and cultural organizations in the county, and he encouraged everyone to support it. There’s a synergy that everyone can build on, he said. If it passes, it will be a start. They’ll learn how a cultural millage campaign can work locally, and use that knowledge to support a larger, more vibrant cultural community. They want to raise everyone’s boat, he said, and this is an easy start. The city is willing to support it, and if they can present a united front and pass this millage, it will bode well for everyone.

Kotarski said he enthusiastically moved to recommend that the city council put a public arts millage on the Nov. 6 ballot.

Malverne Winborne entered the meeting just as a roll call vote was beginning on this resolution. He asked for clarification about what exactly he would be voting on.

Outcome: Commissioners voted unanimously to recommend that the council place a public arts millage on the Nov. 6 ballot. Two commissioners – Bob Miller and Tony Derezinski, who also serves on city council representing Ward 2 – were absent.

Public Commentary: Post-Vote

Four people addressed commissioners after the vote.

Russ Collins pulled out one of his frequent observations – that politics is the art of the possible. The commission had spoken very strongly about its intent, he said. He appreciated Taylor’s intent, but said there are a lot of unknown dynamics in politics. He guessed they should all keep their fingers crossed and see what happens on Monday, when the council votes. He hoped councilmembers would think clearly about how things play out in the November election, in the press, and what the long-term benefits and liabilities might be. In 1982, citizens voted to support the Michigan Theater [by voting for funds to pay off its mortgage], but that didn’t include any operating funds, he noted. The theater has been supported through private giving, he said.

City leaders and the electorate need to be encouraged to think carefully about the role of government funding in supporting the arts, he said. Currently, community values aren’t reflected, and this proposed narrow millage doesn’t change that in any significant way. It’s a start, he said, and he hoped it could be built into something more dynamic. “Hope is something we should always have,” he concluded.

Margaret Parker told commissioners that she was proud of them, of the arts community and of city council. It’s tremendous that there’s so much more discussion about the arts. Artists are being looked at as adults who should be paid, and who live all over the county – it’s a much broader conversation, she said. It’s important to see each of these actions as a building block, Parker said. The Percent for Art program was a tremendous accomplishment, Parker said, because it showed the community how public art funding could be allocated in a targeted way. That narrow focus was used to accomplish a lot of things, she said. And now there’s further planning at the county level. In Seattle, which was used as a model for the Ann Arbor program, Parker said there are many different groups that fund public art. It’s always been known that the Percent for Art program couldn’t provide all the funding, she said. In addition to grants and private giving, the millage is just another, larger building block. People have expressed the wish to support more Michigan artists, too, Parker noted: “I say yes!”

Deb Polich introduced herself as president of the Arts Alliance. Based on discussions about the millage since it was proposed on Aug. 9, everyone thinks that a millage is a good idea, she said, but the timing of it is a great concern to leaders of cultural institutions and members of the Cultural Leaders Forum. For one thing, there are a lot of other issues on the Nov. 6 ballot. Also, the CLF has been quietly talking about a possible countywide millage, but one of the concerns about that has been the impact on private contributions to arts and cultural organizations that wouldn’t get funding from a public arts millage. That remains a great concern, she said. The messaging for a millage is critical, and many people don’t believe 11 weeks is sufficient time for an effective millage campaign. A millage, and the ability to fund a broader range of projects, could be a very positive thing, Polich said, so it’s important that it’s successful.

Another concern is whether the city is “leaving money on the table,” Polich said. It’s not clear how the amount of the proposed millage was determined, she said – some people believe that voters would support a higher millage. But the real concern is whether there’s enough time to make this happen. The proposal is well-intended, and the Arts Alliance supports a millage. But they encouraged Taylor to withdraw the current proposal to allow time for a more fully-developed, comprehensive strategy to be prepared. More time is needed for a well-conceived, comprehensive, sustainable public arts funding plan that’s worthy of support from the city council and local citizens.

Mark Tucker said that as an artist, he’s pleased about the direction of this discussion. He noted that there’s the expectation that you’ll hit a home run, but as artists know that it’s rare to hit a home run. You rarely come up with fantastic pieces, he said. So the risk of not moving forward is that it will make the commission’s job more difficult, because people will expect home runs from the projects that are funded. If the millage fails, the only thing worse is to walk around and see a lot of disappointing public art.

Meeting Coda

Marsha Chamberlin concluded the meeting by noting that they now have their work cut out for them. They’ll begin at AAPAC’s next regular meeting, she said, on Aug. 22. [The meeting starts at 4:30 p.m. in the basement conference room of city hall, 301 E. Huron.]

Speaking personally, she said, her career has been in the visual arts and she’s been torn on this issue. Professionally, she felt caught in the middle. If she didn’t support the millage, it would run counter to her day job [as president of the Ann Arbor Art Center]. She said she’d heard encouraging things that evening, and she urged people to attend AAPAC’s Aug. 22 meeting too. Assuming that city council votes to put the millage proposal on the November ballot, “we’ll need help in keeping the ball rolling,” she said.

Margaret Parker added that if anyone is interested in speaking to the city council at its Aug. 20 meeting, they’ll need to call the city clerk’s office first thing on Monday morning to sign up for public commentary. There are only a limited number of speaking slots, she said. [Ten spots are reserved for people to speak on agenda items. The clerk's number is 734-794-6140. Additional public commentary, with no sign-up required, is available at the end of the council meeting.]

John Kotarski asked whether there will be a public hearing on the millage. Taylor indicated that there won’t be a formal public hearing.

Meeting Coda: Post-Meeting Actions

The day after the AAPAC vote, the Arts Alliance sent out an email announcing a special meeting to talk about the millage. The meeting is set for Monday, Aug. 20 from 2-3:30 p.m. at the second floor south conference room of the NEW Center, 1100 N. Main St. in Ann Arbor.

From the email: “We know we want to make sure the messaging is clear. What else do we want? Please invite anyone who has a stake in this conversation! During this meeting we will also begin to look at how we position and leverage this millage to the advantage of the whole creative sector.” The alliance also has posted a position statement about the millage. [.pdf of Arts Alliance position statement]

Also on Thursday, Margaret Parker sent out an email to her distribution list of arts supporters, saying that she now supported putting a millage on the Nov. 6 ballot. [In an earlier email, sent before AAPAC's meeting, Parker had lobbied against the millage.] Part of her reasoning in support of the millage seems linked to Taylor’s intimation that the risk to the current program is growing, though he did not explicitly tie that risk to a turnover on council in November. New councilmembers will be replacing Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) and Sandi Smith (Ward 1), who did not seek re-election, as well as Tony Derezinski (Ward 2), who was defeated in the Aug. 7 Democratic primary by Sally Petersen. It’s expected that Chuck Warpehoski and Sumi Kailasapathy, who won the Democratic primary in wards 5 and 1, respectively, will also prevail in the general election.

“The big picture is that the new council will not have the votes to continue support for the Percent for Art funding,” Parker contended. “Setting aside 1% of funds from capital improvement lines in the budget proved to be complex and difficult to implement. It also restricted the use of funds in many ways, excluding temporary projects and events. So a millage looks like the next step to continue and broaden public art funding in the city,” she wrote.

Commissioners present: Connie Rizzolo Brown, Marsha Chamberlin, Cathy Gendron, John Kotarski, Theresa Reid, Wiltrud Simbuerger, Malverne Winborne (who arrived at the end of the meeting). Also Aaron Seagraves, the city’s public art administrator.

Absent: Tony Derezinski, Bob Miller.

Next regular meeting: Wednesday, Aug. 22, 2012 at 4:30 p.m. at city hall, 301 E. Huron St. [Check Chronicle events listing to confirm date]

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Ann Arbor city councilmember Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) also attended the meeting and answered questions from the commission. He had unexpectedly proposed the millage at the council’s Aug. 9 meeting, although action was postponed until Aug. 20.

The resolution would ask Ann Arbor voters to pay a 0.1 mill tax for four years to support public art. The public art commission oversees the current Percent for Art program, but had not previously been consulted about the proposal. AAPAC chair Marsha Chamberlin had only been informed of it a few days prior to its presentation to the council. [See Chronicle coverage: "Public Art Millage Mooted, Postponed," "Ballot Questions: Parks, Public Art Funding," and "Column: Two Questions on Public Art."]

The ballot question would read: “Shall the Charter be amended to limit sources of funding for public art and to authorize a new tax of up to one-tenth (0.10) of a mill for 2013 through 2016 to fund public art, which 0.10 mill will raise in the first year of levy the estimated revenue of $459,273?”

The public art millage would at least temporarily replace the city’s current Percent for Art program, which was approved by the council in 2007, but has been controversial. The program requires that 1% of the budget for any capital improvement project be set aside for public art – up to a cap of $250,000 per project. For the current fiscal year, it’s estimated that $320,837 in new revenues will be made available through this funding mechanism. That’s in addition to about $1.367 million in unspent funds that have accumulated from previous years.

This brief was filed from the basement conference room at city hall, 301 E. Huron, where the public art commission meeting was held. A more detailed report will follow: [link]