Jack Eaton and Margie Teall, candidates for the Ward 4 city council seat, engage in the subtleties of negotiation over who would deliver their opening remarks first. (Photos by the writer.)

City council representatives are elected for two-year terms and each of the city’s five wards has two seats on the council, one of which is elected each year. Also in attendance at Tuesday’s forum was Marcia Higgins, the Ward 4 council representative who won re-election in November 2009, defeating independent challenger Hatim Elhady.

Besides Higgins, other elected officials and candidates for office who were introduced at the forum included: LuAnne Bullington (candidate for the 11th District county board of commissioners seat), Ned Staebler (candidate for the 53rd District state Representative seat), Leah Gunn (county commissioner representing the 9th District of the county and seeking re-election), Patricia Lesko (candidate for Ann Arbor mayor). All the candidates are Democrats.

Eaton’s main theme was a need to focus more on infrastructure – those things we need, not the things that might be nice to have. Eaton was keen to establish that his candidacy was not meant as a personal attack on Teall, saying that he expected his supporters to focus on the issues and to conduct themselves in a civil way. His opening remarks were heavy on thanks and appreciation for Teall’s long service on council, particularly with regard to the creation of Dicken Woods, which is now a city-owned nature area.

In the course of the forum, a pointed question to Teall on her biggest regret while serving on the council elicited an acknowledgment from her that she regretted her contribution to the problem last year with city councilmembers emailing each other during council meetings. Eaton was quick to give Teall credit for publicly apologizing in a timely way for her role in the scandal.

For her part, Teall focused on setting forth accomplishments while serving on the council. Those ranged from the longer-term budgeting strategies that she said had helped ensure that Ann Arbor was weathering the economic crisis better than other Michigan cities, to the budget amendment she introduced and the council passed in May, which proposed using $2 million from the Downtown Development Authority, plus more optimistic estimates for state revenue sharing, to eliminate the need to lay off some police and firefighters.

The candidates exchanged different views on basic infrastructure issues like the Stadium Boulevard bridges and stormwater management, to single-stream recycling and leaf collection, to Georgetown Mall, and the transparency of government.

The candidate responses are ordered largely in the order in which they were made. But in some cases, questions of similar theme are grouped in a way not consistent with their chronological order.

Opening Statement

Each candidate gave an opening statement.

Eaton’s Opening Statement

Eaton began by thanking everyone for taking time out of their busy lives to come listen to the candidates and to “ponder the future of our city.” He specifically thanked Tom Johnson and Greg Hebert, co-chairs of the Ward 4 Democratic Party, for organizing the forum. He also thanked Teall for her many years of service on the city council – he thought many people did not understand how much time and effort serving on the city council actually takes.

Jack Eaton, candidate for Ann Arbor city council Ward 4, gives his opening statement during the candidate forum sponsored by the Democratic Party.

He also said that he wanted to thank Teall on behalf of his neighborhood for helping to protect Dicken Woods – they’d stopped a developer and managed to turn it into a park. He said he wanted to make clear that he was not running against Teall for any personal reasons – he does not dislike her, he said, and he would “not say mean things about her.” He and Teall “simply disagree about some issues.”

Addressing his supporters, he asked them to conduct themselves in a civil way – that they discuss the issues and not the people, that they make it a campaign they could be proud of organizing together.

“I am running for city council because I disagree with the current council’s vision for our city.” He went on to say that he disagreed with the current city council’s budget priorities.

Ann Arbor is a great town, he said, that is unique and special – we have fabulously talented people, and live with Midwestern values. Michigan, he said, is facing difficult economic times, as is Ann Arbor, but not to the extent that Detroit, or Flint, or Battle Creek are facing them. Nonetheless, he said, we will have a difficult budget to manage in the near future. The Southeast Michigan Council of Governments (SEMCOG), he said, had estimated that 69% of Ann Arbor residents over the age of 25 have at least a bachelor’s degree. So Ann Arbor has a highly educated workforce that is prepared for the modern economy, he said. As result, Ann Arbor has a lower unemployment rate than other areas in Michigan, and our property values have declined less than other areas of the state. Nevertheless, he cautioned, we will see a decline in property tax revenues, as well as a decrease in state revenue sharing.

During the next two years, he said, we need to focus on our core public services – public safety, roads, bridges and infrastructure, and maintenance of our parks and recreation program. We especially need to pay attention to human services, he said, and to help those who are least able to help themselves.

During these difficult economic times, he said, the city needs to withdraw from real estate speculation and projects that are not necessary but merely desirable. If we take care of core services, he suggested, the highly educated population would draw employers, the economy will stabilize, property tax revenues will stabilize, and we can move on to pursue a different vision. In the short term, however, we have to focus on those things that are absolutely necessary, and put aside the things that are merely desirable.

Eaton promised that as a city councilmember, he would support citizens’ needs and desires for fundamental services.

Teall’s Opening Statement

Teall also began by thanking everyone, including the organizers of the forum, Tom Johnson and Greg Hebert, the co-chairs of the Ward 4 Democratic Party. She also thanked Eaton for his kind comments – she confirmed that it is a lot of hard work serving on the city council.

Margie Teall, Ward 4 city council incumbent, responds to questions during the candidate forum.

Since 2002, she said, the council had been able to accomplish some “pretty amazing things.” What makes that significant, she said, was that the challenges have and continue to be significant. We currently face the most severe economic downturn since the Great Depression, she said, and sources of state and federal funds that cities have counted on for decades have been drying up. Funding that was previously available in the ’80s and ’90s and also in the early part of the current decade was no longer available, she said. Across the state, she said, cities are seeing their budgets stretched past the limits.

Some other cities were letting their fund reserve balances get dangerously low and have put their bond ratings at risk. Ann Arbor, however, has been very careful to protect its bond rating, said Teall. Royal Oak, she reported, was looking at 43 layoffs in July – including 14 firefighter positions and 16 police officers. Grand Rapids is asking voters to increase their income tax rate and they are looking at 14 more layoffs on top of the 125 positions that were eliminated this past cycle.

Teall stated that Ann Arbor was fortunate to have a mayor and city council who had the foresight to make necessary structural budget changes early on. When she was first elected in 2002, she said, the council had prioritized the budget at its first goal-setting session. They had focused on the basics of city government and operation. As a result, she said, Ann Arbor was weathering the economic storm as well or better than any other city in the state. Despite the fact that Ann Arbor had lost up to 5% of its property tax revenues due to the sale of the Pfizer property to the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor was still answering the demands that decades of neglect of roads, water treatment, and sewer infrastructure had left them, she said.

Ann Arbor is still not raising taxes and the fund reserve balance is healthy enough to maintain a very high bond rating, Teall said. That had been the result of very careful planning and decision-making, she said. She herself had accomplished a great deal for Ward 4 residents, she said, as well as for the city as a whole. The very first neighborhood meeting she attended in November of 2002, she said, was in the same room as the forum that evening – and the topic of the meeting had been the threat to the area that is now Dicken Woods.

Teall worked with many of the residents to stop the sale of the land to the developer and to work out a plan to arrange for the city itself to purchase the land, she said. She gave credit to the neighborhood for making the area what it is today, saying that they had taken a “diamond in the rough and polished it.” She thanked the neighbors for “taking the ball and running really hard with it.” She reported that last week the city council had voted to make Dicken Woods officially city of Ann Arbor parkland.

Two years ago, she said, she had worked with her colleague from Ward 4, Marcia Higgins, to rezone part of Lower Burns Park to prevent more single-family residences from being broken up into multiple rental units. More recently, she said she had written and co-sponsored a resolution to create a neighborhood task force to work with the city attorneys and planning staff to provide oversight and input into the redevelopment of the vacant Georgetown Mall and to address concerns about its current security.

Last month, she said, she had sponsored a budget amendment to prevent football-Saturday parking in Allmendinger and Frisinger parks. A year ago, she continued, the Ann Arbor Senior Center had been slated to close two days after the candidate forum was being held – July 1, 2010. She said she had taken the lead during last year’s budget process to reverse that decision – she wrote the resolution creating the senior center task force and had chaired that task force over the last year. The task force had made dozens of recommendations and the city staff had subsequently implemented them to make the senior center sustainable in the future, she said.

On the city’s environmental commission, she said, she had worked on the ordinance that restricts the use of phosphorus in lawn fertilizer. She also cited her role in helping to convert Ann Arbor’s recycling system from a dual-stream to a single-stream system – that would help to establish Ann Arbor as the leader that it previously was in the field of recycling, she said, stating that it would save the city about $650,000 a year in labor and tipping fees.

She concluded her list of accomplishments by saying that she had taken the lead on an amendment to the budget this last spring that prevented the layoff of police officers and had kept all of the fire stations opened. The fire chief had assured the council that response times and staffing levels would not be adversely impacted, and neither would residents’ insurance rates. She said she looked forward to serving the city for another two years – the turbulent economic times required the kind of continuity that only the current leadership could offer, she concluded.

Georgetown Mall

Question: Please comment on the future of the Georgetown Mall. [The property, now a vacant strip mall, is located on Packard Road, between Pine Valley and King George boulevards.]

Teall on Georgetown Mall

Teall indicated that she had been working with a citizens group to follow closely what the current owner is doing – they had taken a tour of the property last month and they have another meeting on July 15. The city attorney and city planning staff are working with the group. They are optimistic that the owner will take the group’s suggestions and input, Teall reported.

Eaton on Georgetown Mall

Eaton said that Georgetown Mall represents an unfortunate failure of the city council to act, based on its first lesson on urban blight. Out on Jackson Road, he said, the old Michigan Inn was allowed to “waste away for years” without any response in the form of legislation that addresses urban blight. The same thing appears to be happening with Georgetown Mall, he cautioned.

There are no ordinances, he contended, that address responsibilities of landowners with regard to abandoned property – the site is a magnet for vagrants and crime. The issue needs to be addressed on a broader level than just the one site, he contended. That’s because apparently the city will face more of this kind of thing, he said. There is an abandoned site at the bottom of Broadway Hill that used to be a neighborhood shopping center – Kroger – that is now just a field of weeds, and there’s an abandoned site at Washtenaw and Platt across the street from the Whole Foods store with a few abandoned buildings – it’s also filled with weeds, he said.

In a best case scenario, Eaton said, Georgetown Mall would be demolished and become a field of weeds. It is important, he said, to assign responsibility to landowners with respect to abandoned property so that properties don’t just “fester” in the neighborhoods as urban blight.

State of the City

Question: How is the city better than it was 10 years ago?

Teall on State of the City

Teall said that the most basic way she felt the city was better is the fact that the budget is much more solid than it was previously. The city is addressing infrastructure needs that had been neglected 10 years ago, she said. When the city was flush and the city had the money to do a lot of things, the city didn’t do them. As examples of projects the city is now undertaking, she pointed to the storm water project at Pioneer High School and the renovations to the water treatment plant. In addition, the greenbelt, she said, was enhancing the quality of life in the whole city.

Eaton on State of the City

Eaton said he’s running for city council because he thinks that in some ways the city is not better than it was 10 years ago. But he said that he did believe there were wonderful things that have happened in the last 10 years. As examples, he said the city has added to its park system, Adopt-a-Park has been implemented, neighborhoods have been activated to become more involved in politics – there are a lot of exciting things happening in town. What’s better now, he said, is that the town has a robust sense of community and continues to improve it.

The Democratic Party

One question was directed only to Eaton.

Question: Can you tell us what you have done for the Ann Arbor Democratic Party in the last few years?

Eaton on Democratic Party

Eaton began by saying that he voted regularly. He also contributed to Democratic candidates, he said. He also said he had helped organize neighborhood organizations in town that focus around Democratic-based issues.

Malletts Creek and Drainage Issues

Question: As a long-time resident of Lansdowne I have witnessed the deterioration of Malletts Creek as an asset of Ward 4. Unfortunately, stormwater and silt from the new developments west of Ward 4 and from within Ward 4 have been directed into the creek. When is the city council going to review the work of the drain commissioner?

Eaton on Drainage Issues

Eaton began by saying he did not think it was the work of the city council to direct the county drain commissioner [now called the water resources commissioner]. But he noted that the city has flooding problems in a variety of areas – not just Malletts Creek. A couple of years ago, the city council had commissioned and paid for a study on flooding, but had refused the results, he contended. It’s becoming a more and more important issue, he said.

Eaton said he was not living in Ann Arbor in 1968 when the city had experienced a huge flood, but he noted that there was an increasing frequency of floods. He said he had visited Lansdowne to look at the problem that they are having with Malletts Creek. It would require a joint effort on the part of the neighborhood, which owns some of the infrastructure, and the city, which owns the bridge. But the flooding problem needs a city response, he said. We can’t allow development to proceed, he said, without gauging impact on drainage and surface water.

Referring to a heavy-rain-related incident that was reported to the city council at a recent meeting, Eaton said that no one should wake up and find 70,000 gallons of water in their basement. It’s not an individual’s problem that happens, he said, but rather a failure of the city to address its fundamental stormwater problems and to address them in a broad-based manner.

Teall on Drainage Issues

Teall said the flood map that she thought Eaton had referred to was expected to be ready in the fall. She said that she and the other Ward 4 representative, Marcia Higgins, had visited the location where a resident had had their basement flooded with 70,000 gallons of water, and toured the entire area with city staff – Cresson Slotten, a senior project manager, and Craig Hupy, who is head of systems planning. She characterized the failure as a failure of the system that had been installed – it had been designed to take the stormwater and treat it in a certain way and the system had failed for that specific heavy rain event.

Teall indicated that the neighborhood association has ownership of some of the infrastructure for a bridge between two ponds.

Malletts Creek Bridge

Question: What about the bridge that goes across Malletts Creek between Morehead and Delaware? It’s been out of service for two years and is getting to be a nuisance.

Teall on Malletts Creek Bridge

Teall indicated it was the same bridge that she was talking about before – it’s a pedestrian bridge. The footings on the bridge are not in good shape, she said, so the city could not simply go in and replace the bridge above the footings. With respect to the ownership of the bridge, Teall was uncertain which parts were privately owned and which parts were owned by the city.

Eaton on Malletts Creek Bridge

Eaton chimed in to say that the structures under the bridge were owned by the neighborhood association, but the bridge itself is a park bridge, built and owned by the city. The neighborhood, Eaton said, was complaining because they’d been trying to work with the city to find a resolution to the problem that has persisted for a couple of years and they have become frustrated.

Eaton indicated that he was uncertain what the city had done or not done, but that he understood that there could be frustration when a process took a couple of years. Given the recent flooding issues during a major rainstorm, he said, now was perhaps the time to take responsibility for Malletts Creek and the bridge.

Stadium Bridges

Question: What could you do to prevent the Stadium bridges fiasco?

[For background on the Stadium bridges, including a timeline of events related to the bridges see Chronicle coverage: "Budget Round 6: Bridges, Safety Services" ]

Teall on Stadium Bridges

Teall began by reviewing some of the history of the issue. The railroad bridge had been at 61.5 out of 100 on the Federal Sufficiency Rating (FSR) scale and the State Street bridge had been at 21.2. She said that they’d begun meeting with the public back in 2007 – there’d been a plan developed by city engineers and staff which had included various efficiencies that come from combining multiple projects.

The project at that point included lowering State Street to allow for trucks to go under the bridge, and was to include construction of non-motorized amenities on Main Street and on Stadium Boulevard. Opposite Pioneer High School, on the east side of Main, she said, sidewalks and bike lanes were to be installed, as well as from White Street to Main Street along the south side of Stadium Boulevard. The proposal would have required land from the Ann Arbor Golf and Outing Club, she said, and residents were incensed. She said she’d received numerous handwritten letters from people upset about it.

At that point, she said, the city had decided to take a step back to reduce the scale of the project. In 2009, she said, there were two additional public meetings asking for input on the design. Within that timeframe, the rating on the State Street bridge had fallen to 2 out of 100. Beams were removed from the south side of the bridge.

The current rating, she said, was 23.5. She indicated that she did not consider it to be a “fiasco” but rather a “long process” which she looked forward to seeing completed. She characterized as “foolish” the idea of going ahead with reconstruction of the bridges this fall – that is, using the road millage dollars for the next few years. The city’s strategy was to see if they could get funding from the federal government and the state government. She said she felt the city had a good chance of getting that funding – it’s what other cities do as a funding strategy.

Eaton on Stadium Bridges

Eaton said that in 2007 the spans were already rated at 21-22 out of 100 – where a score of 50 or less out of 100 means that you need to consider repairing or replacing the bridge. As currently proposed, the project does not include the intersection of Main and Stadium – a plan that does not include the controversial aspects involving the sidewalks that required land from the Ann Arbor Golf and Outing Club. But when the Obama administration offered stimulus money for this very kind of project, Eaton said, the city did not have a “shovel-ready” plan – the city had lost out on the chance at that point in time.

Now, he continued, the city was counting on much smaller sums of money that are distributed much more widely. The city had not received TIGER I money [the federal Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery grant] and would likely not receive TIGER II money either, Eaton said. Given that a score of 50 out of 100 meant that the bridge should be considered for repair or replacement, Eaton said, the bridge, with its history of FSR scores under that number, meant that the problem had been ignored for too long.

He suggested that bonds should be floated if necessary to reconstruct the bridge and that road millage dollars be used to retire those bonds over time. We need to take care of the problem and not just let it linger, he said, hoping that “free money” would come to town. It’s ridiculous to continue to put it off, he concluded.

Airport Runway

Question: Are you for or against the airport runway extension project?

[For background on a possible airport runway extension see Chronicle coverage: "Ann Arbor Airport Study Gets Public Hearing"]

Eaton on the Airport Runway

Eaton said that he was against the extension, citing a variety of other airports in the area that can handle larger aircraft. It’s important to maintain the municipal airport for enthusiasts who fly, but there are other facilities available for heavier aircraft carrying heavier loads. He understood, he said, that pilots always prefer a longer runway, but the concerns of the surrounding neighborhood need to be respected.

Teall on the Airport Runway

Teall indicated she did not have much to add – she is not in favor of a runway extension. She’d been in favor of the environmental assessment [conducted in connection with a possible extension project] because of the drinking water wells that are located on the airport property – the wells were important to protect, she said.

Single-Stream Recycling

Question: What is your position on single-stream recycling?

[For an opinion piece covering much of the background material on single-stream recycling, see: "Column: Recycling Virtues and MORE"]

Teall on Single-Stream Recycling

Teall began by describing the process as one that we’d all be getting more familiar with starting next week, when we begin putting all recycling materials in one cart [instead of the two different totes that the city now uses]. Chicago, as well as many other cities, are now using that approach, she said. She described it as a money-saver for the city as well as an opportunity to increase the city’s recycling performance.

Teall described the participation rate in recycling as high, but said that as a city, not as much material was being recovered as the city could achieve. She cited a view that had been expressed by Dan Ezekiel [who serves on the city's greenbelt advisory commission (GAC)], who has said that recycling won’t be really successful until it’s as easy to recycle as it is to throw something away.

She said she looked forward to being issued her new cart and being able to throw everything – paper, plastic, and the rest – into the same cart. It also would keep the streets cleaner, she said.

Eaton on Single-Stream Recycling

Eaton began by contrasting dual-stream with the single-stream system. Under the current dual-stream system, he began, you put your paper in one bin and the bottles and cans in another bin. Under the new system, he continued, we’ll be issued “another one of those carts that we all love so much.” [The reference there is to the wheeled carts that the city has issued for trash collection (blue) and compost/leaf collection (brown).]

The purpose of recycling is not to see how much you can get people to put in the bin, he said, but rather to see how much of the material can be put into recycled products. The problem with single-stream recycling, he cautioned, is that it all goes in together – it would be cross-contaminated. There would be broken glass and tomato sauce amongst the paper – it would be a mess, he warned, and would result in less material available to go into products made from recycled material.

The solid waste millage, he said, had accumulated a $6 million surplus, which the city was now going to use to convert to a single-stream recycling process. He said he would have preferred to reduce taxes instead of creating a new system. The new system would provide a new cart, he said, which could be used to recycle margarine and yogurt cups, but it would no longer be possible to put motor oil out for curbside pickup. And when people go to the drop-off center, they’ll have to pay a new $3 entry fee to drop off items they used to put out at the curb.

The $6 million surplus was being spent on the new single-stream recycling system, he said, but the city was discontinuing the loose leaf collection program where residents could sweep their leaves into the street. They’d have to be put into a compost cart, he said. You could put your cart out once a week through the fall, and after that, if you had more leaves, you’d be stuck. In addition, he said, we’d be employing low-wage workers to separate the materials – people we don’t currently have to employ because residents separate the materials when they fill their bins.

Leaf Collection

There was a specific question on leaf collection, tacked on to a question about the “bucket system” of budgeting, which is presented here separately.

Question: “… without cutting popular services like leaf collection?”

Eaton on Leaf Collection

On leaf collection, Eaton said he was going to miss the leaf collection. “I have lot of leaves!” he said. The idea of dragging his compost cart repeatedly through the fall out to the curb, instead of having two mass leaf collections, does not appeal to him.

Teall on Leaf Collection

Teall said that the leaf collection issue had been looked at for a long time – Ann Arbor is the only city of similar size that still collects leaves by having people sweep them into the street and then using bulldozers and dump trucks to haul them away. The new approach would keep the streets and the stormwater system cleaner and she’d been encouraging the change to happen for some time.

Teall pointed out that paper bags could be used in addition to the compost carts. She also pointed out that bicyclists would be a lot happier [to not have leaves dumped where they ride in the street], especially in the colder months after the snow falls and the leaves freeze.

Bucket System of Accounting

Question: How do you feel about the current “bucket system” of budgeting? Shouldn’t a program with a surplus be allowed to help fund programs with a shortfall …?

Eaton on Bucket Accounting

Eaton addressed the issue of the “bucket method” by saying that it was simply fund allocation budgeting – there are certain funds that have limited uses. So, for example, when we tax ourselves with a solid waste millage, we can only use that money to address solid waste issues. Monies collected for the water system can only be used for the water system.

But the city takes this one step further, Eaton explained. Within the general fund, the city allocates to specific funds – like the attorney’s office, or the IT department or the mayor’s office – and they refer to those funds as “buckets” as well. The implication, he said, is that it’s not possible to take money out of the legal department and use it to pay for police or to take money out of the IT department and use it to pay for firefighters. And that, he said, is not true.

To the extent that the term “bucket” is misleading, he said, he is against that. But fund allocation of budgeting is an accepted method of budgeting, he pointed out. It is important to understand which funds have actual restrictions on them and which ones are fungible. You can choose to shift money among funds that don’t have legal restrictions on them, he said.

He pointed out that the federal government does not accept the fund allocation method of budgeting for their annual reporting. The city needs to produce a separate Comprehensive Annual Financial Report, which is filed with the IRS, and which he characterized as a more reliable way of looking at how the city uses its money.

To the extent that it’s just an analogy, he said, he had no objection to the “bucket” method.

Teall on Bucket Accounting

With respect to fund allocations, Teall said that Eaton was correct about the fact that there are certain millages that by state law cannot be moved into other funds. When voters tax themselves for a service, you can’t just move it to a different fund for another kind of operation.

In terms of fund allocations within the city, she pointed out that for the legal and IT funds, those departments support other operations. The legal and IT departments do not just work for themselves independently, she said – they support other departments, like safety services. She summarized by saying that “We can’t starve one area in order to feed another area.”

Street Lighting

Questions: Are you in favor of special assessment districts [to fund street lights]? How do you feel about the city turning off street lights in certain areas?

[Special assessment districts and other options for reducing city expenses for streetlights were discussed at a spring budget meeting: "Budget Round 4: Lights, Streets, Grass"]

Teall on Street Lighting

Teall said that special assessment districts for lighting are something that should be considered. The street lights that are being turned off, she said, would save money by reducing lighting in areas that are “overlit,” according to federal and state standards. The initiative to turn off street lights, she said, was something that had been passed as part of the budget in May. She stressed that the light posts are not being removed. The city would evaluate the results of the program, she said, as it was implemented. [The city describes the current program as a "pilot."]

Eaton on Street Lighting

Eaton stated that he was against special assessment districts for street lighting – he could not imagine taxing people on the basis of how many street lights are in their neighborhood. He is also opposed to turning off street lights.

He noted that the police force had been reduced significantly over the course of the last six to eight years, and said that the state is releasing criminals they can no longer afford to imprison. “And now we are going to darken our streets?” he asked. We pay a lot of taxes, he said. If we don’t build underground parking lots, if we don’t spend $0.5 million planning “a train station that may or may not be necessary,” if we don’t do the things that we just want to do, then we would not have to turn off street lights, he concluded. [Eaton's reference to a "train station" is to Fuller Road Station. Most recent Chronicle coverage: "PAC Softens Stance on Fuller Road Station" ]

City Worker Pay and Benefits

Question: How do pay and benefits for the private sector compare to city workers?

Eaton on City Worker Pay and Benefits

Eaton began by saying that as Michigan’s economy has declined, it’s become more obvious that public employees are relatively highly paid and may have higher benefits than a lot of people in the private sector.

A few years ago, the mayor commissioned a blue-ribbon panel, he said, to study city benefits and retirement policy, but had acted on none of the findings of that committee. We need to work with city unions, to address the problem, Eaton suggested.

He reported that he’d received the endorsement of the firefighters union and the way he’d done that was to restore trust and honesty at the bargaining table. He’d told them that the city needed to cut employee costs, but he also told them that he wanted the bargaining to be honest and trustworthy.

They’re willing to work with the city, he reported, but they believe that they’re being lied to. In Ann Arbor, Eaton said, there are a large number of public sector employees that can be used as comparatives – there are a large number of such employees at the University of Michigan, he said. So it’s not just a private-public comparison, he noted. It was important to find a way to work with employees, he concluded.

Teall on City Worker Pay and Benefits

Teall said that the city’s employees are “decently compensated” but said it was not her place as a councilmember to bargain with unions. That’s something that the city administrator and the labor attorneys did, and it was their job to do. If she were to step into that, it would make impossible the job the city administrator had been hired to do. The city’s bargaining side comes back and checks with the council to see if it’s okay to move forward and that’s a councilmember’s role. On the whole, she said, the city was encouraging its employees to take on a lot more in terms of paying for health care and benefits.

Regrets

One question was addressed specifically to Teall.

Question: What has been your greatest regret serving on council?

Teall on Regret

Teall said that her greatest regret was contributing to the problem that the council had last year when councilmembers were sending emails back and forth to each other during city council meetings.

She said the result was that the council had quickly changed the council rules so that emails between councilmembers during meetings are restricted. She said it was a mistake for councilmembers to have done that and that she had said so last year.

Eaton weighed in by saying that he felt Teall deserved credit for promptly making a public apology over the “email brouhaha.”

Email Policy

Question: What will be your policy/practice regarding constituent emails – will you respond to them?

Eaton on Email Policy

Eaton said that, yes, he would respond to emails. He said it would be his intention to respond promptly. He also said he would favor adopting a council rule that all council business with their constituents be conducted through a councilmember’s official government email address, so that requests under the Freedom of Information Act can be easily met by the city. He said he would not conduct city business through his private email account – he believes in transparency and responsiveness. He said he believed that the council needed rules to govern this.

Teall on Email Policy

Teall indicated that she did try to respond to emails from constituents – she allowed that she did not always do so quickly. She said if she went out of town she might not necessarily take her computer with her. But she said that it was certainly her intent to respond to emails in some fashion.

With respect to transparency, she said she agreed with Eaton. In her experience, she said, constituents emailed her on her government account and receiving emails on a private account had not been an issue.

Transparency in Government

Question: If elected or re-elected, what would you do to create transparency in government?

Teall on Transparency

Teall began by saying that she didn’t think there was a more transparent municipal government in the state than Ann Arbor’s. She pointed to the numerous boards and commissions that the city had, which had meetings that were posted and open to anybody to attend. The city had high ratings – the top 10% – for the transparency of its budget. In her estimation, Teall said, they did everything they could to communicate openly. She told the audience that she knew they had come to a lot of those meetings and they were welcome to come to a lot more.

Eaton on Transparency

[Eaton discusses various aspects of the city charter, which are laid out in some detail in this opinion piece: "Getting Smarter About the City Charter"]

Eaton began by reacting to Teall’s contention that Ann Arbor’s government was transparent by saying cheerily, “I disagree!” He noted that the city charter mandates that city documents are to be available to the public – we have a right to see what goes on. Specifically, he said, when the city attorney renders an opinion, those documents are to be made public so that we can see what the legal advice is on which the council is acting.

On an ongoing basis, Eaton said, you have to file a request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to find out why a police officer is patrolling your neighborhood with unusual frequency. You have to file a FOIA request to obtain documents that should be readily available.

Even filing a FOIA request will not cause the city to produce any opinion that the city attorney has rendered, Eaton said. Instead, the city attorney has taken the position that his opinions are attorney-client privileged information between him and the council. Eaton said he would, therefore, propose a resolution that would waive attorney-client privilege for opinions of the city attorney that do not relate to ongoing litigation. We have a right to know what advice council is being given and how they are acting on that advice, Eaton said.

As someone who attends many council meetings, Eaton said that many times councilmembers will indicate that an issue is going to be decided in a particular way – before the public hearing and the vote. The decision has already been made, he said, and they know how the vote is going to go, before members of the public take the podium and tell councilmembers what they want them to do. That’s not transparent government, but rather “pro forma” government – they go through the motions of committee meetings and public hearings and responding to FOIA requests, but decisions are made before that input.

As an example of the kind of change he would seek, Easton suggested that a council “committee of the whole” would meet during the off weeks between regular meetings, so that they would have open discussions in front of the public about what they were thinking.

Summary

Both candidates gave closing statements.

Eaton Sums Up

Eaton began by saying that Ann Arbor does not need dramatic change – we don’t need to demolish sections of neighborhoods in order to make “shiny new towers,” he said. What we need to do is maintain what we have. Ann Arbor has the third-worst roads in the state of Michigan, he said, but we have several million dollars in the road repair budget – it may go to the bridge or some other project. In any event, he said, the city has not been spending enough money in the last few years on road repair, and it showed.

The Allen’s Creek Watershed Group had reported that the water system was at near capacity, Eaton said– so if we continue to encourage more development, we will extend past the city’s ability to provide water and wastewater services. Instead of going on a “building binge” that would add to the already-high vacancy rate that the city has in rental and residential properties, we need to take care of our streets and bridges, our water system – the infrastructure that we can’t see. When the economy turns around, he suggested, we will then have the capacity to handle the new building that will take place.

We can’t build all of these projects and take care of our infrastructure – the state of the city now demonstrates, he said, that we can’t do both. He promised that he would focus on essential services during tight budget times, so that Ann Arbor would be in a position to grow when the time is right.

He concluded by asking audience members for their vote.

Teall Sums Up

Teall used her summary time to address some of the statements that Eaton had made through the forum.

First, she stressed that when a development goes into downtown Ann Arbor, the developer pays for any necessary capacity increases in the water and sewer systems that result.

On the subject of single-stream recycling and possible cross-contamination of material, she allowed that 10 years ago, when it was first introduced, the contamination issue was valid. Now, however, in the last few years, with improved technology, it was not. Environmental groups in the city supported the switch, she said.

As far as comparing Georgetown Mall to Michigan Inn, she said, Michigan Inn had been a huge problem for the city and for the city’s attorney, because the owner had not been at all cooperative. She said she was confident that the owner of Georgetown Mall would be cooperative.

On street lights, there would be no streets darkened as a result of the “downlighting” and noted that crime rates were down quite a bit in the last decade.

She thanked everyone for attending and thanked those who had supported her in elections and during her time in office. She said she’d worked hard with her Ward 4 colleague Marcia Higgins and with mayor John Hieftje “to create a solid foundation for the city – economically, socially, and environmentally.” It was essential, she said, to keep the leadership that would keep the city on course. She said that she hoped voters would “hire” her for two more years to keep the city’s ship sailing steady and strong as the flagship of the state of Michigan. We need the continuity that only the current leadership could provide, Teall said, and she asked the audience for their vote on Aug. 3.

Editor’s note: Tuesday, July 6 is the last day for residents to register to vote in the Aug. 3 primary. For information about your registration status or how to register, contact the city clerk at 734-794-6140 or cityclerk@a2gov.org, or go to the city clerk’s election website.

Hired six weeks ago, Ann Arbor fire chief Dominick Lanza answers questions about the impact of cutting 20 firefighters from the city's staff. (Photos by the writer.)

Margie Teall (Ward 4) and mayor John Hieftje had indicated at the council’s May 3, 2010 meeting that they hoped a $2 million payment to the city from the Downtown Development Authority would be authorized by the DDA’s board later that week. They’d said they intended to use that payment to stave off as many layoffs in safety services as possible, as well as to keep human services funding at last year’s levels.

Although the DDA approved the $2 million for the city two days later on a 7-4 vote, details were scant on Monday night about how the money might be used – how many positions would still need to be cut, and where those cuts would come.

Dominick Lanza, the city’s fire chief, and Barnett Jones, the chief of police, spoke about specific negative impacts on services that would result from the layoffs scheduled in this year’s budget, unless amendments are made next week.

How grim does the situation look from inside safety services? At one point, Jones paused nearly 10 full seconds before responding to a question from Sandi Smith (Ward 1). She’d asked him to comment on how community standards positions might be filled. When he finally did answer, Jones began by saying, “I really don’t want to.” 

East Stadium Bridges

Heading east on Stadium Boulevard past Main Street – with the university’s football stadium on the left and the Golf and Outing Club’s course on the right – takes you over two bridges. First is the bridge over the railroad tracks, owned by the Ann Arbor Railroad. About 350 feet past the railroad bridge is another bridge, which spans South State Street.

The bridge over State Street is currently just half there – the five beams supporting the two southern lanes were removed in November 2009 due to safety concerns. The city has struggled over a period of several years, with greater intensity over the last year, to secure non-local funding sources to repair the bridges.

On Monday night, city administrator Roger Fraser indicated that the reason the topic of the Stadium bridges replacement would be addressed at the council’s working meeting was because of the many questions that had been raised in the community about it – from design to financing. He described it as a very significant project, having both a physical and financial impact on the community. Fraser said it was important for the council to be clear about the nature of the project before consideration of the capital improvements plan (CIP) next week.

Homayoon Pirooz, head of the project management unit for the city of Ann Arbor, handled the bulk of the presentational duties on the bridges. Sue McCormick, public services area administrator, as well as Michael Nearing, a senior engineer with the city, also weighed in from time to time. Although he was available to answer questions, the city’s transportation program manager, Eli Cooper, was not called to the podium.

Much of the material that Pirooz presented was ground covered with councilmembers fairly recently – at the city council’s April 19, 2010 meeting. At that meeting, councilmembers had been asked to authorize the city’s new application to the state’s local bridge fund for around $3 million.

Stadium Bridges: Background

Pirooz reviewed much of the history of the bridge project – a timeline which The Chronicle has previously published:

• 1917: Bridge is built.
• 1973: Voters approve a millage to fund a bond to repair the East Stadium bridge. The proposed bond sale on the ballot included $800,000 for creation of a citywide bicycle system using existing streets and new pathways, and $360,000 designated for repair of the Stadium bridges. At the time, the debate centered on whether the new bridge design should accommodate a wider roadway for State Street. On the same ballot was a transit millage, which passed as well – the same millage that supports today’s AATA.
• 2006: The city of Ann Arbor is awarded $766,000 from Michigan’s local bridge program (MLBP), but the city allowed the award to expire a year later, because the amount did not go far enough towards funding the project – the alternative to expiration would have been to spend the MLBP money towards bridge reconstruction.
• 2006: The city pays $1,249,467 to Northwest Consultants Inc. (NCI) for preliminary design engineering for the comprehensive bridge project that included bridge replacement, a transmission water main, storm sewer, and a South Main non-motorized path.
• 2007: After a biannual inspection of the bridge, weight limits were reduced on the span. The limits were set as follows: 31 tons (reduced from 38 tons) for one-unit trucks (e.g., school or AATA buses); 39 tons (reduced from 48 tons) for two-unit trucks (e.g., a single-trailer semi); 44 tons (reduced from 54 tons) for three-unit trucks (e.g., a semi with two trailers)
• 2007: On Sept. 18, 2007 and Oct. 2, 2007 at Pioneer High School’s cafeteria, informational workshops are held on a comprehensive project to address replacement of the span over State Street as well as the one over the railroad, including non-motorized improvements (i.e., sidewalks) extending along Stadium Boulevard to Main Street and south along Main to Scio Church road. Those workshops are well attended, especially by members of the Ann Arbor Golf and Outing Club, which is located near the bridges.
• 2007: On Dec. 29, 2007 there are reports of “medium-sized pieces of concrete” falling off one of the 16 pre-stressed concrete box beams supporting the roadway.
• 2008: Early January re-inspection by city staff and bridge engineering consultants leads to the short-term recommendation of a traffic control order further reducing weight limits: 19 tons for one-unit trucks (e.g., school or AATA buses); 24 tons for two-unit trucks (e.g., a single-trailer semi); 26 tons for three-unit trucks (e.g., a semi with two trailers).
• 2008: In March, the vision for a comprehensive renovation of the bridges plus the corridor from Main to White streets meets with a funding setback. The Michigan Department of Transportation awards only $760,000 for the project, though the total cost was estimated at that time at around $35 million.
• 2008: On Oct. 22, 2008 Northwest Consultants Inc. performs biennial inspection.
• 2009: In early February, Northwest Consultants  – the engineering consultant for the bridge – is called back to re-examine the bridge. A 7/8 inch deflection of the beam is found. [Chronicle coverage: "Discontent Emerges at Caucus" and "Building Bridges"] The bridge safety rating has dropped to 2 on a scale of 100.
• 2009: In March, traffic is rerouted so that it’s limited to the northern lanes, and does not pass over the beams showing deflection. [Chronicle coverage: "How the E. Stadium Bridge Gets Monitored" and "Council Gets Update on Stadium Bridges"] The project scope is reduced from the more ambitious work on the corridor to just replacement of the two bridges.
• 2009: On Sept. 15, 2009 the bridge inspection consultant, Northwest Consultants Inc., inspects the East Stadium bridge over South State Street, and recommends removing the five southernmost beams.
• 2009: On Oct. 5, 2009 the city council authorizes expenditure to remove five beams.
• 2009: On Oct. 28, 2009 and again on Dec. 1, 2009, public meetings are held to discuss design.
• 2009: In November, five beams are removed from the bridge.
• 2009: In November, the state’s local bridge advisory board awards no funds for the Ann Arbor bridge project, citing the lack of any other non-city funding available for the project. [Chronicle coverage: "State Board: No Funding for Stadium Bridges "]
• 2010: In February, the U.S. Dept. of Transportation announces the final recipients of the federal TIGER grant – they do not include the city of Ann Arbor.

Pirooz pulled out some highlights from the bridges’ recent history.

Pirooz described the current situation on the bridge as one lane in each direction on the north side of the bridge and “a large hole” on the south side. In 2009, Pirooz said, the bridge had a safety rating of 2 out of 100. The five box beams had been removed, he reminded the council, in November of 2009. Currently, he said, the bridge is categorized as a “temporary bridge.”

Pirooz reminded the council that they had started a project before 2009 much wider in scope than the current bridge replacement project. The more ambitious project had encompassed work from the intersection of Main Street and Stadium Boulevard all the way to the intersection of Stadium Boulevard and White Street. In 2005, he said, the application had been made to the state of Michigan local bridge fund, and in 2006 preliminary design of the larger project had begun.

At the beginning of 2009, the city heard of the possible stimulus funding from the federal government might be available, Pirooz said. It was in March 2009 that the project scope was reduced to just the replacement of the two bridges, he said. The city again applied to the state’s local bridge program in 2009. [That application was not approved. See Chronicle coverage: "State Board: No Funding for Stadium Bridges"]

Stadium Bridges: Two-Bridge Geography

The close proximity of the two existing bridges, which stand only 350 feet apart along the Stadium Boulevard roadway, has consequences for the range and timing of possible replacement options.

Theoretically, either one of the bridges could be eliminated in favor of an at-grade crossing – in one case that would mean a regular road intersection at State and Stadium, and in the other it works out to a railway crossing with gate arms and warning lights to stop traffic for passing trains. But due to their close proximity, it’s not feasible to contemplate eliminating just one of the bridges – both would need to be at grade in order for it to work.

Pirooz addressed the scenario with one bridge and one at-grade crossing as he was ticking through various alternatives that the city had considered besides reconstructing the two bridges. The alternative of leaving a bridge over the railroad track, but creating an at-grade crossing for State Street and Stadium Boulevard, he explained, would be physically impossible.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) asked for a more precise explanation of why it was physically impossible. Engineer Michael Nearing explained that there is a minimum height requirement of 23 feet above the railroad track to maintain freight rail standards. Taking into account the thickness of the bridge, he said, would put the bridge around 30 feet above the track.

It was about 350 feet, Nearing said, from the centerline of the railroad track to the centerline of an at-grade Stadium-State intersection. That would amount to a 10% road grade with a very sharp vertical curve. It would not be possible to maintain sight distance across the bridge, and large vehicles would not be able to get up and down the slopes in the wintertime, Nearing said. He concluded that it would simply be unsafe. It would not even come close, he said, to meeting any engineering “standards of the day.”

The two-bridge geography also has implications for the possibility of reconstructing just one or the other of the bridges at a time. There are cost savings that can be realized because of their close proximity, which involve economies of scale and total duration of construction. In today’s dollars, Pirooz told the council the total cost of a sequenced reconstruction – first the State Street bridge and then the railroad bridge at a later date – would be around $26.5 million. With a price tag of $23 million as the all-in-one-go option of reconstructing both bridges, the savings would be around $3.5 million, Pirooz told the council.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) added some support for the idea of handling both bridges at the same time by introducing the notion of the “mushroom factor” that owners of old houses might be familiar with. When you start to open things up to work on the house, you discover that the project necessarily becomes larger due to the impact that some work has on neighboring fabric of the structure. Pirooz indicated that this could be a factor for any decision about whether to replace just the State Street bridge versus replacing both bridges at the same time.

Pirooz noted that the bridges are only about 300 feet apart, there was no scientific way to estimate what the damage might be to the other bridge, and moving heavy construction equipment back and forth over the bridges. Margie Teall (Ward 4) inquired as to whether the one bridge replacement option would result in the State Street bridge being higher than the railroad bridge. Pirooz indicated that there would be a slight grade difference – it would not look or feel right, but it would be within the allowable standards.

Stadium Bridges: Railroad Bridge Safety

The conversation about the railroad bridge focused briefly on bridge safety. Safety concerns for the railroad bridge are not as acute as for the State Street bridge. The need to replace the State Street bridge is uncontroversial. It had a safety rating of 2 out of 100 before five box beams were removed on the south side of the bridge, leaving a two-lane-wide gap, and is now classified as a “temporary bridge.”

What about safety issues connected with the railroad bridge?

Given the likelihood that a significant portion of local street millage dollars will be required for the reconstruction of the bridges, Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) wanted to get a clearer idea of how pressing a safety concern it was to replace the railroad bridge.

Hohnke asked what the Federal Sufficiency Rating (FSR) safety rating for the railroad bridge was. Pirooz’s answer: 58. Pirooz noted that it was eight points higher than the standard for bridge replacement. Pirooz indicated that as of today, the city had no reason to believe that the bridge over the railroad is unsafe.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) asked how fast the FSR rating had changed for the State Street bridge. Pirooz indicated that it had changed very rapidly. Three years ago, the safety rating on the State Street bridge was 21.5, and over a period of less than two years it had fallen to a rating of 2. He explained that those ratings were derived from the city’s annual inspection reports submitted to the Michigan Dept. of Transportation (MDOT). Pirooz indicated that there is no formula for predicting how fast a bridge might deteriorate once it falls below 50, which is the safety standard for bridge replacement.

Noting that the railroad bridge no longer meets modern engineering standards, Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) asked if the proposed reconstruction would accommodate standards that might change in the future. Nearing indicated that 23 feet of height clearance has been the standard for the last 20 years. Saying it was not possible to know for certain what might happen in the future, Nearing indicated there was a practical maximum on the height of railroad cars, and a bridge designed to accommodate a 23-foot maximum width would meet future standards.

Stephen Kunselman inquired whether the possibility of tunneling under the railroad tracks had been explored. Pirooz replied that it was not a practical option.

Stadium Bridges: At-Grade Rail Crossing?

The most fundamental argument given by Pirooz against eliminating the Stadium bridge over State Street in favor of an at-grade crossing was the fact that it would also require an at-grade crossing for the railway, which the Ann Arbor Railway refused to grant.

In the course of discussions, Mike Anglin (Ward 5) emphasized the fact that there are several at-grade railroad crossings around town, including one at State Street just south of the State and Stadium bridge. Anglin suggested that if the railroad knew there was going to be a football game with a lot of congestion and streets full of traffic on a Saturday morning, it might be a “concession” they would consider.

Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) picked up on the idea that “concessions” could be won from the railroad. He said flatly they don’t have to do it, and characterized it as incredibly naive to think of the railroad granting “concessions.”

In his remarks, Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) noted that the railroad currently crosses State Street at grade very near to the Stadium bridge location. Taylor wondered whether it so very difficult to contemplate an at-grade railroad crossing for Stadium. Pirooz explained that every other at-grade crossing in the city involved one railroad track and one street. In the State Street and Stadium Boulevard configuration, he explained, it would mean interrupting the traffic flow of two streets, having their traffic interrupted at the same time. With that kind of traffic volume, Pirooz said, it was a “recipe for failure.”

Taylor followed up by saying it seemed “instinctive” to someone who’s uneducated in the matter, that if both Stadium Boulevard and State Street were to have some kind of pause because of a passing train, that having both traffic flows interrupted at the same time would be a good way to take care of both situations at the same time. But Taylor confirmed that Pirooz was saying the contrary is true. Namely, it’s much more difficult for the traffic slowdown to work itself through, because both streets are connected.

A brief discussion of the frequency of train crossings on that line unfolded. Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) asked if it was twice a day, and if so, what time they came through. Margie Teall (Ward 4) indicated that the trains passed through town in the morning. Kunselman added that they also came through at three o’clock in the afternoon. Higgins noted that at 3 p.m., traffic to Pioneer High School would also be affected. Pirooz also added that the Ann Arbor Railroad was hoping to have more freight traffic in the future.

Regarding future rail traffic, Pirooz stressed that this bridge reconstruction plan was a 50-75 year plan, not a six-month to two-year plan. Pirooz also said that the cost of an at-grade crossing would not be significantly less once the added cost of the additional signals for surrounding intersections was factored in. Pirooz concluded that there was “no bright spot” in the at-grade crossing scenario.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) asked Pirooz to address the issue of the safety of an at-grade crossing. Pirooz answered that most accidents occur at intersections and that fewer intersections are always better, from a safety viewpoint. He also pointed out that, obviously, train-car collisions are always very serious. He noted that for pedestrians, wide intersections of the kind that would be required at Stadium and State Street represent an additional challenge.

Higgins picked up on the pedestrian thread by pointing out that the corridor is a major walkway in connection with University of Michigan sporting events. Asked how that might play out in moving all of those pedestrians through multiple intersections, Pirooz responded by saying, “I’ll let you use your imagination.”

In response to Anglin, who stressed that there are various other at-grade rail crossings throughout the city, Sue McCormick noted that there are currently 20,000 cars daily that travel over each of the two streets – State Street and Stadium Boulevard – but that currently they never interface.

Sue McCormick, public services area administrator for the city of Ann Arbor, talks about the problems inherent in an at-grade intersection of State Street and Stadium Boulevard. At right is Homayoon Pirooz, head of project management for the city.

So the first thing an at-grade scenario would require, explained McCormick, is to create an intersection for that interface to happen. And in addition to that, she said, on two of the four legs of that intersection, a passing train can stop traffic. That means all four of the legs would back up any time a train goes through, she said. And once the train passes, all of the cars in each of the four legs will be approaching the intersection, trying to make a turn movement or proceed straight through the intersection. And that’s the crucial difference, she explained, between this situation and any other situation in the entire city. “I don’t know how to have it described in a way that at its very essence makes it clear how different the situation is than any other situation.”

Pirooz indicated that under an at-grade crossing scenario, if both roadways were blocked by a passing train, it would take around 30-45 minutes to restore the traffic balance.

Sabra Briere drew out the fact that the at-grade scenario would require easements from several property owners, in addition to the university, along the State and Stadium Boulevard corridors.

Stadium Bridges: Funding, Timing

Pirooz presented the funding strategy for reconstructing the two bridges – including for some design work already completed – as follows, in millions of dollars [* denotes funds applied for but not yet secured]:

                   Prior FY10  FY11  FY12  FY13  FY14  Total

Federal STU Funds              1.19  2.35  2.82  1.64   8.00
Trans. Enhancmnt.*             1.50                     1.50
MDOT Local Bridge*                         3.00         3.00
A2 Water            .06         .90                      .96
A2 Storm Water      .18        1.22                     1.40
A2 Sanitary                     .13                      .13
A2 Street Millage   .60         .25  3.49  2.87         7.21
A2 Major Street     .51                                  .51
A2 Alt Transport    .32                                  .32

Total                                                  23.03

-

The STU (surface transportation urban) funds are part of the federal surface transportation funds for urban areas.

For the four-year period from 2011-2014, Pirooz said, the city had asked the Washtenaw Area Transportation Study (WATS) to include the city of Ann Arbor in a surface transportation application for the Stadium bridges replacement project. Even though WATS has approved its part of the process, he said, there are still many steps left to go. Still, Pirooz had indicated at the April 19, 2010 city council meeting that he considered the funds all but secure.

Sue McCormick stressed that the STU funds were not considered “new” money – the city typically received such funds and they were put towards the major street reconstruction program. In that light, McCormick stressed that what would help the city most is “new” money, namely the potential $1.5 million from the state under a transportation enhancement grant and the $3 million from the state’s local bridge fund. The transportation enhancement (TE) grant, said Pirooz, is typically used for non-motorized components of a project.

In 2010, Pirooz continued, the city will also apply for a second round of TIGER (Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery) funding – the so-called “TIGER 2″ grants. He said that the city was confident that they could begin construction in 2011 and that the project would take around 18 months.

Stephen Kunselman confirmed with Pirooz that the city would have “shovel ready” plans ready this year. Pirooz indicated that by the end of the summer, the construction plans should be ready. Kunselman inquired whether construction could start regardless of whether the funding applications came through, which Pirooz had described.

Pirooz replied that construction could start when they had any “sensible funding plan.” At that point Sue McCormick chimed in, saying that in the capital improvements plan (CIP), the city staff had indicated to the city council that they had identified local funding sources, namely the street millage funds. When the bridge project was identified on the horizon, she said, the city had been very careful in expending the street millage funds. She indicated that the city could move forward and fund the bridge reconstruction project purely with local money – but it would take every dollar of local resources that the city had.

On that scenario, there would be very scaled-back programs and local resurfacing for this year and the following year, McCormick cautioned. “We can do that, if that’s the council and the community’s desire.” But it would have a significant impact, she continued, on the city’s ability to fund local street programs. That’s why the city was continuing to seek state and federal funds with the hope that some of those funds would be awarded and the city could minimize the amount of local dollars expended.

Kunselman noted that if the $4.5 million in new money was not forthcoming, then there would be $11.5 million needed – not just the $7 million from the local street millage funds. Kunselman wanted to know: “When will you ask us for a decision?” McCormick indicated that each of the grant applications has its own timeline. The announcements of the availability of TIGER 2 funds had just been made, she said. “At this point, we don’t have a trigger to pull.”

The original schedule of November or December of 2010, she said, had been tied to the first TIGER grant application. But currently there was nothing that compelled the city to start construction at any point, other than their own concerns about traffic management and the potential for continued deterioration of what is now a temporary bridge.

In response to a question about how much revenue was collected through the street repair millage, Pirooz indicated that it generated between $8-9 million a year. So the funding strategy for the two-bridge replacement scenario reflects about a year’s worth of that millage. Higgins wondered whether that might change the timeframe in which the council wanted to put a renewal of that millage before the voters. Pirooz indicated that the street repair millage would be collected in July 2010 and July 2011 – without a renewal, it would not continue for 2012.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) wanted to know what would happen if the city went forward with local dollars and then later the federal and state funds became available. Would the city be able to replace the local dollars with that money? Pirooz indicated that the short answer was no. McCormick provided an example: STU funds could replace local funds once the STU funds have been approved, but the approval is necessary before the local dollars can begin to be spent, she said. Though the city is confident those STU dollars are forthcoming, they have not yet been officially approved.

Once approval was obtained, she said, in most cases it’s possible to “advance fund” a project with local dollars and seek reimbursement. But it’s crucial that the approval of the funds comes first, she stressed.

Pirooz indicated that by the latest, in December of 2010 they would have a clear idea of how the applications for the various funding sources had turned out.

Higgins asked if it was certain that sometime in 2011 the city would in fact pull the trigger on reconstructing the bridges. McCormick answered that it was entirely council’s decision, but that was consistent with her expectation.

Stadium Bridges: What’s the University of Michigan’s Role?

The possibility that the University of Michigan might shoulder some of the cost related to bridge and road repair came up a couple of times on Monday night.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) noted that there was a certain amount of cost in the bridge replacement project related to rebuilding some of the university’s infrastructure. She wondered if the university had been asked about their willingness to cover those costs or if they had indicated any willingness at all to participate in the project.

On that question, Pirooz deferred to city administrator Roger Fraser. Fraser indicated that the city continued to have dialogue with the university about ways that the university could work with the city. However, he indicated that the university was very, very good at not answering the city in a quick way. But all of those things were on the table, he assured Smith.

Margie Teall (Ward 4) asked if UM officials had indicated any willingness to help pay for the damage done to Stadium Boulevard in the course of the football stadium reconstruction. She asked if the university was planning to pitch in to help with reconstruction of those roads. Pirooz replied, “Not as of this moment.”

Budget Talk

After discussion of the Stadium bridges, the council turned its attention to the city’s FY 2011 budget, which it must amend and adopt at its meeting on May 17. As currently formulated, the budget would eliminate 20 firefighter and 12 police officer positions.

Budget Talk: Fire Department

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) led off the discussion by asking fire chief Dominick Lanza to provide an update on staffing levels. Lanza said he was working on the assumption that the budget would pass “as is” and that the fire department would have to deal with the cuts that are recommended in the budget this year. That meant 20 full-time employee positions – one which is currently vacant, he said. Losing that number of people, he continued, would mean closing down a fire station. Depending on the outcome of collective bargaining, he said, the closing of a station might be forestalled.

If the fire department were required to close a station, then Lanza said he would recommend moving to what’s known in the business as a “rolling blackout” in the department. That would mean keeping the main fire station – Station Number 1, across from city hall – open at all times. But other stations would be staffed on a 12-hour or 24-hour rotating schedule.

Lanza indicated that it would be a fair way to lessen the impact on the community. It would, he allowed, lengthen the response time for parts of the community where a fire station might be close to a given neighborhood. It was a way of spreading the risk, he said. In some communities, he said, rotations of a week or month at a time were used, but he was not comfortable with that. He preferred to have blackouts based on 12- or 24-hour schedules.

Smith asked how confident Lanza was that he could get four firefighters on the scene within four minutes of a call. Lanza indicated that it’s a National Fire Protection Association standard, which the Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA) has adopted.

But for a “working fire” – which means that everybody on scene there has a specific task – Lanza said the standard is to have 18 people at the scene within 8 minutes. Currently, he said, the city has the ability to put 19 people at every fire on any given day – as long as there is only one fire going. If there are two fires, they have to rely on assistance from other agencies that surround Ann Arbor.

Smith noted that other communities surrounding Ann Arbor are equally stressed. She asked how that might play out with respect to mutual aid agreements. Lanza indicated that Ypsilanti Township had just made a decision to offer buyouts to reduce their firefighter workforce and that the city of Ypsilanti was in the process of looking at cuts. Ann Arbor Township, he said, was not looking at cuts. However, Ann Arbor Township already had a very small force – one person is assigned to each of their two fire trucks, with 40 people “paid on call.” Their only guaranteed response is two firefighters, he said.

Lanza allowed that he was a firm believer in regional response and the regional sharing of resources, but said that he was very concerned that the city of Ann Arbor – unless they planned it correctly – would come out on the short end of those kind of deals. That was simply a fact of everybody else being in worse condition than Ann Arbor is, he said. Even with the reduction in workforce, the city of Ann Arbor would still have the largest fire department in Washtenaw County, he said.

Mayor John Hieftje told Lanza that the council wanted to keep the current stations open and to make sure that they got four firefighters on the scene as quickly as possible. He asked if there was a “magic number” for firefighters that would allow the stations to be kept open and that could still achieve the 18-people-in-8-minutes standard.

Lanza began his answer by saying, “That’s tough.” He said part of the problem in the fire department is that there’s no long-range plan. Part of the long-range plan would include streamlining the operation and spreading the workload a little further with administration and “doing more with less.” All of that factored into the picture of exactly how many cuts the fire department could absorb, he said.

The No. 1 mission of the fire department, Lanza stressed, was to put trucks and firefighters out into the streets to fight fires. He said a lot would depend on whether there were concessions made in the contract negotiations. He noted that Michigan labor laws are extremely strong. The chief indicated that he would get back with the mayor on the number of firefighters needed to keep the stations open, to provide the rapid response with four fighters in four minutes, and the 18 people on the scene in 8 minutes response.

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) asked about the fire department’s ability to fight fires in the kind of tall buildings that are being built and planned in the city. The chief indicated that those site plans are reviewed for compliance with the fire code. He stressed that a 100-foot ladder truck would actually only reach to about 80 feet, given the angles involved. A lot of defense against fires, he said, was achieved through built-in suppression systems and public education.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) asked about the impact of reduced fire protection on insurance rates. The chief indicated that it could have an impact on insurance rates if the city were to call for a ISO (Insurance Services Office) review – he wouldn’t recommend that, he said. Kunselman wanted to know what prevents them from doing it on their own. Lanza indicated that a review can only be called for by a municipality.

Budget Talk: Police

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) led off the questioning of Barnett Jones, chief of police. She told the chief that she wanted to know how reduced numbers of officers would affect the community. The previous year, she reminded Jones, some of the discussion had centered around the reconfiguration of the policing strategy for downtown. The dedicated foot patrol had been eliminated, with the idea that officers would spend their one hour per day out-of-car time in the downtown area, by parking their police cruisers downtown and policing the downtown that way.

Smith asked Jones to walk the council through the various scenarios for a further reductions in force. Jones told Smith he’d anticipated her question. The two then provoked some chuckles when Smith kidded the chief: “Really?” Jones replied, “I’m a Michigan grad.”

Currently, the department has 134 sworn officers, he said. Sixty-four of those are in the patrol division, and 22 are on “special assignments.” Special assignments are as follows: five are on traffic; five are in the critical response unit (CRU); three are school liaison officers; two are transport officers; two are in-service detective officers; one is assigned to LAWNET; one is assigned to AATA; one is a property officer; one is a training officer; and one is a court officer.

If 12 officers are laid off, Jones said, then traffic enforcement would be reduced by four officers. One officer would remain in traffic for licensing, taxi cabs, and investigations along those lines. Those traffic officers would shore up the patrol division in order to spread the workload out among the remaining officers on patrol.

The CRU, Jones said, which represents the proactive part of the force, would be eliminated – the department would go from being a proactive to a reactive department. The CRU includes surveillance, uniformed and plainclothes work, and they make warrant arrests, among other duties, Jones said. Those CRU officers would have to be moved into other areas.

Summarizing, the chief said 12 layoffs meant four positions from traffic, five from CRU, with the other three reduced out of the patrol division. That would leave 61 on patrol. The total number in special assignments would be as follows – in some cases due to contractual obligations: traffic (1); school liaison (3); transport officers (2); in-service detective positions (2); LAWNET officer (1); AATA contract (1); property officer (1); training officer (1); and court officer (1). That’s a total of 13 officers in special assignments. The detective bureau would stay at 13, Jones said, reasoning that “core services have to be maintained.”

With respect to the LAWNET officer, Jones said if that unit ever folds, they would have $2 million in the bank. He wanted to make sure that after all the years of Ann Arbor’s service, the money is equally divided and the city will be able to get its share. He also said that he was open to rethinking the training officer as well. Jones clarified that when he spoke of contractual obligations for special assignments, he did not mean the collective bargaining agreement between the city and the police union, but rather a contractual agreement between the city and the Ann Arbor Public Schools and the AATA.

Asked by Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) if those contracts covered the cost of the patrols, Jones said that they did for the schools, and that they were “playing catch up” with the AATA.

Smith wanted to know if a contract for downtown beat patrol officers by the Downtown Development Authority would help the chief’s scenario. [A preliminary funding plan had been floated at the DDA board's last meeting by Newcombe Clark, but the resolution was tabled and referred to the DDA's partnerships committee.]

Jones’s response was “You want me to put my brown hat on?” The allusion was to his previous service in the Oakland County sheriff’s department, when part of his role was to “sell” safety services to other jurisdictions. As he described it, at the city council’s December 2009 budget retreat:

Chief of safety services Barnett Jones said that when he worked for the Oakland County sheriff’s department, it was actually his job to put on his brown uniform with all of his regalia, and to sell safety services to the townships.

He could do that, he said, because the sheriff’s department was the best provider of safety services in Oakland County.

On Monday night, Jones indicated to Smith that the DDA’s proposal would be similar to the situation that the AATA and the Ann Arbor Public Schools currently have. Pressed to answer the question of whether contracting with the DDA for downtown beat patrols would help, he said, “Yes and no.” Hieftje was somewhat dismissive of the idea of the DDA funding beat patrols, saying that DDA’s recent proposal wasn’t even funded for more than about six months – it was $60,000 a month, to be allocated out of a fund that had around $350,000 in it, he observed. Smith countered that the proposal had been referred to a committee for further discussion.

Hieftje also emphasized that he meets with the police chief every Wednesday morning to go over crime statistics. He said at the most recent meeting, which he had with the deputy chief, there had been a problem with aggressive panhandling downtown, but no one had called the police to tell them. He drew out from Jones his opinion that a foot patrol may not be the best way to police a downtown area. Jones said that a mobile beat, with an associated vehicle, might be a better strategy.

Hieftje then indicated to Jones that there would be a budget amendment brought forward at the May 17 meeting to eliminate or minimize layoffs in the police department. He said he was interested in keeping the department proactive instead of simply reactive.

Hieftje asked Jones how many people were out on patrol on a given day. Jones hedged a bit by reminding the council that a few months ago he told them there was a “greater community” out there. That reminder had come at the council’s third meeting of the year on the budget. From Chronicle coverage “Budget Round 3: Where’s Your Emergency?“:

Jones told Higgins that he was hoping no one would ask that question – there are a lot of people out there, he said, “who don’t have our best interests in mind.” Because of that, he said he was reluctant to talk about how exactly they did things in terms of how many police officers were deployed and where they were assigned within the city. However, he did say that a shift consisted of 20 patrol officers.

But on Monday night, Jones went into greater detail than he had previously. There are 20 officers on each shift. Of those 20, he said there would be 5-6 that would be off on any given day, due to regular days off, vacation and sick time. So the total number of officers available for any given shift, he said, could fluctuate between seven and 14 officers.

Kunselman asked about the DDA’s proposal to take over the enforcement of parking violations in the downtown area. He asked the chief how it would affect the department and how he felt about having non-city employee deputies enforcing parking rules. Though Jones indicated he was not enthusiastic about the idea, he noted: “There is a smile on my face!”

Jones said that the DDA wanted to manage the entire parking system, including enforcement, and that they wanted to handle enforcement in their specific way. He said he felt that his department could have handled it in the way that the DDA wanted to handle it. That, however, he characterized as a “business decision.” In response to Kunselman’s question about whether it could legally be done, he stated that it could be.

And in response to some discussion by Mike Anglin (Ward 5) about some break-ins on the west side in the last year that had been handled in a proactive way, Jones stressed that part of the strategy for keeping the community safe was to make sure it was clear to everyone that Ann Arbor was a hardened jurisdiction. He stressed that Ann Arbor is a “have” community. That means residents have to do basic things to eliminate crimes of opportunity, Jones said – like trim their bushes to improve lines of sight, or add outside lights. The message from Ann Arbor, he said, needs to be that Ann Arbor is not a community to come and play with.

Before Jones had taken the podium, the city’s chief financial officer, Tom Crawford, had answered a question from Smith about revenue from fines and forfeitures. The FY 2011 budget shows increases in revenue from fines and forfeitures. However, Smith noted that the additional revenue from the increased fines for parking violations, which the city council had considered but postponed at its April 19, 2010 meeting, had not been factored into the budget.

So Smith wondered what accounted for the increase in revenue. The increase in fines and forfeitures revenue, explained Crawford, was due to the filling vacancies in the community standards office – there would be more enforcement. [The council will vote on the new parking fine schedule at its May 17 meeting, along with the budget.]

Tom Crawford, chief financial officer for the city, answers questions from the city council on May 10, with one week to go before the city's FY 2011 budget must be adopted.

With Jones at the podium, Smith came back around to a question of the increase in fines and forfeitures, and Crawford’s explanation that the increase in revenues was attributable to vacancies being filled in community standards. She noted that she hadn’t recalled hearing the police chief talk about those numbers, and asked Jones to comment.

Nearly 10 seconds went by before he replied: “I really don’t want to.” If the department were to go through the targeted reduction, he said, then his intent was to take officers who had police experience and to “coax” them into the vacant community standards positions. That way he’d be able to fill those positions – as a safety net, so that he could use their experience at a different position.

Budget Talk: Miscellaneous

The council addressed a variety of other budget concerns, besides safety services.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) led off the initial discussion of the budget by asking about a $20,000 revenue increase due to loading zone fees. She asked for an update from city administrator Roger Fraser on that. Fraser indicated that the discussion had come to a standstill. He characterized the direction he’d received from council as “not so direct direction,” namely, to wait and see what the city had received from the DDA.

Smith also asked about an item on page 78 of the budget book. In the FY 2010 budget there’s a forecast of a $2.5 million expense for risk management that increases to $4.2 million in 2011. The city’s chief financial officer, Tom Crawford, wasn’t immediately available to answer the question, but he was eventually tracked down.

Crawford indicated that the risk fund differences reflected the final transfer needed with the police/courts building. There was a transfer of $4 million originally, from the risk fund, and there was a $1.3 or $1.6 million difference left, and that’s what the difference is, he explained. In sum, it had been part of the police/courts building funding plan, said Crawford.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) wanted to know how many departments use the Track It software, other than planning services. Crawford said he was not sure, but it was envisioned that the tracking software would become more pervasive in the organization. Briere secured an assurance from Crawford that he would eventually let the council know how costs of the software are applied across departments

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) asked about a $975,000 item for the security system in the police/courts building. He asked if that was in the original budget for the building. [Note: During public commentary at the council's previous meeting, which included a public hearing on the FY 2011 budget, Karen Sidney had raised the question of the $975,000 security system, contending that it should have been part of the original budget.]

The explanation provided by Fraser on Monday was that the $47 million for the police/courts building was the cost to actually build the building and everything that is “built into” the building. The security system components covered by the $975,000, he said, were items that were comparable to pieces of furniture that could be removed from the building, such as TV cameras, monitors, and speakers. They were not part of the construction budget, he explained.

Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) noted that for another recent major facility the city had constructed – the Wheeler Center – similar items were also not included in the construction budget. Because the Wheeler Center had come in under budget, he said, some of those items were purchased from the budget surplus.

In Part 2, we wrap up other topics of the meeting. One common theme was capital investments in the community’s physical infrastructure of various kinds.

Michael Nearing, city of Ann Arbor engineer, was available for any city council questions on the East Stadium bridge project. (Photo by the writer.)

The council allocated a total of $313,000 for three different permanent affordable housing projects in Ann Arbor.

The city’s East Stadium bridge replacement project received discussion in the form of a resolution that authorized the city to go after state funding for the third time in the last three years. The anticipated construction start for fall of this year has been postponed until spring 2011 – the earlier date had been tied to the city’s application for federal funding, which was rejected this February.

The ongoing construction of the police/courts building, directly adjacent to city hall (the Larcom Building), received some tangential discussion in the form of an explanation from Roger Fraser about the recent closure of city hall due to elevated carbon monoxide levels. The police/courts building was also the subject of public commentary that prompted some extended remarks from the mayor – which were covered in Part 1 of this report.

Another construction project that will likely factor into the upcoming primary election campaigns is Fuller Road Station. The city-university collaboration to build a combined parking deck and bus station, which might eventually serve as a commuter rail station, was taken up during the council’s communications time. Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) and mayor John Hieftje both responded to some cautionary remarks made by Mike Anglin (Ward 5), which he made based on a recent park advisory commission meeting.

In business related to ethics and rules, the council voted on two occasions to excuse the participation of Taylor in a vote, because of a conflict of interest posed by his employment with the law firm Butzel Long. They also satisfied the requirement of a recent lawsuit settlement that they formally consider a rule about their use of government email accounts – by voting to remand consideration of the issue to council’s rules committee.

Housing

The issue of affordable housing was addressed during public commentary as well as in specific items of council business. One item considered by the council bundled $313,000 of support for three different initiatives: support for the recently re-organized Ann Arbor Housing Commission ($138,000); one to support the efforts of the nonprofit Avalon Housing in connection with its merger with the Washtenaw Affordable Housing Corp. ($50,000); and a foreclosure prevention initiative involving the county treasurer’s office, the Michigan State University Extension, Housing Bureau for Seniors, and Legal Services of South Central Michigan ($125,000).

The council also voted to swap out a previously approved allocation for emergency shelter that had been drawn from an inappropriate fund.

In its final item of business related to housing, the council appointed a resident member of the Ann Arbor Housing Commission (AAHC). That comes the wake of the council’s recent decision to replace the entire commission.

Housing: Public Commentary

Speaking as a member of the city’s housing and human services advisory board, Barbara Eichmuller asked the council to pass their resolution that allocated $313,000 to maintain existing affordable housing in Ann Arbor, as well as to prevent tax foreclosures. It’s costly and time consuming to replace units, she said. She urged the council to support the Ann Arbor Housing Commission as it transitions to a new business model. As a Realtor, she said, she sees every day how painful foreclosure can be. She concluded that it was a wise use of the money.

The vice chair of the housing and human services board, David Blanchard, also addressed the council on the issue of the $313,000 proposed as a housing trust fund expenditure. He described the programs as really important and salient. The funds need to be released now, he said. The AAHC has come and asked for the money – it’s essential for them to be able to retool. Avalon had come and explained that the Washtenaw Affordable Housing Corp. merger has produced a real strain on them.

Preserving basic housing stock is part of a basic strategy, Blanchard said, and foreclosure prevention needs to take place now. The county’s blueprint to end homelessness has been around for years, and looking back, there hasn’t been an increase in actual affordable units, he cautioned. What we have, he said, is “a band-aid” – there’s no other way to get around it. He spoke of the need to weather this crisis and cautioned that there won’t be a great explosion in funding in the next few years.

By way of background, Blanchard recently served as legal counsel for the case of Caleb Poirier, a resident of Camp Take Notice, a self-governed encampment of homeless people. Poirier was charged with trespassing as a result of the tent encampment’s location. The charges were eventually dropped. Poirier was in the city council audience Monday night to hear Blanchard and Lily Au – who’s an advocate for the camp – deliver their remarks to the council.

Delivering a monologue during public commentary, with herself in the role of a homeless person, Lily Au began: “I’m homeless, I have a mental illness.” In that role she described how a volunteer had driven her to Ypsilanti, she had little money left on her Bridge card, and the Delonis center serves only one meal on Saturdays and Sundays. The contents of her backpack, she said, included a Bible, which she read to sustain herself, plus her medication. She reported that Camp Take Notice had accumulated $200, but it can’t be spent, because that’s money set aside for moving, in case the Michigan State Police raid the camp. The camp is located near the interchange at I-94 and Ann Arbor-Saline Road. Referring to the parking issues on the council’s agenda, Au said that she would like to become a car, because at least then she’d have a good parking structure to live in.

By way of historical background, the rhetorical device relying on the idea that Ann Arbor has better housing for cars than for people can be traced back at least as far as Tim Colenback’s public comments at the council’s Sept. 21, 2009 meeting:

Colenback went on to enumerate some of the city’s parking structures, saying how pleased he was to have so many great places in the city where he could “house his car.” He asked that the city think of making the same commitment to housing people as it does to housing cars.

Housing: Funding Allocation

The item before the council bundled $313,000 of support for three different initiatives. At a January 2010 meeting devoted to the subject, the city council council was made aware that they’d possibly be asked to support a re-organization of the Ann Arbor Housing Commission (AAHC) with an allocation of up to $138,000, which they approved on Monday night. From Chronicle coverage of the Jan. 11 meeting: “Housing Commission Reorganizes“]:

The options for addressing the $138,163 difference, [consultant Kerry] Laycock said, included using AAHC reserves, looking at funds held by affiliated nonprofits, using in-kind services from the city of Ann Arbor, and the sale/lease of maintenance vehicles as a part of the outsourcing contract. But Laycock gave city councilmembers a heads-up on Monday night that the AAHC could be asking them for money from the Ann Arbor general fund as well.

The second item bundled into Monday’s council resolution went to support the efforts of Avalon Housing in merging with the Washtenaw Affordable Housing Corp. – that support was a housing trust fund allocation of $50,000. The merger of Avalon with WAHC was planned originally to take place during 2008-2009, but as the staff cover memo to the resolution describes, one of the major players’ support, which had been assumed, has not materialized:

[...] Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA), which was a key partner in the commencement of this merger, has taken increasingly conservative underwriting standards and is unwilling to invest in projects that they previously would have funded.

The 114 units of affordable housing maintained by WAHC, and now absorbed by Avalon, are distributed among three locations: Gateway Apartments – a 43-unit complex located on West Michigan Avenue in Ypsilanti – and two Ann Arbor locations, at 1500 Pauline and 701 Miller.

Although the Washtenaw Urban County has continued to support other Avalon-administered properties, at a recent meeting the Urban County executive committee reallocated $740,000 in funds previously designated for Gateway – moving $640,000 to Habitat for Humanity of Huron Valley for housing purchases and rehabilitation, and $100,000 to the Ypsilanti Housing Commission for Parkview Apartments, a 144-unit complex. [Chronicle coverage: "Urban County Allocates Housing Funds"]

The third program bundled into the city council’s resolution was $125,000 of support for a foreclosure prevention initiative involving the county treasurer’s office, the MSU Extension, Housing Bureau for Seniors, and Legal Services of South Central Michigan. According to the cover memo accompanying the resolution, the city’s contribution of $160,000 to the program in FY 2009 served 410 mortgage and tax foreclosure clients for a cost of an average $390 per household. Preventing foreclosure is analyzed as more cost effective than providing housing and human services to people after they are forced to leave foreclosed properties.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1), who sponsored the resolution, pointed out that the trust fund was being tapped to support permanent housing, not for human services. The money was all going to maintain currently existing permanent affordable housing, she said, urging her colleagues on the city council to support it.

An attempt by Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) to separate out the three projects for separate votes got no traction from his council colleagues. His motion to amend the resolution in a way that would separate them out failed, because no one seconded the motion.

Kunselman indicated that he thought it was the first time the city council had ever given support to Avalon for its merger activities with WAHC. Mary Jo Callan, who heads the joint city/county office of community development, clarified that 18 month ago when the merger began, the council had authorized $195,000 for merger activities. That evening’s resolution brought the total to $245,000, she said. Kunselman asked if this was all that would be expected. Callan indicated that for these particular activities, yes.

Kunselman observed that the council was making an investment in low-income housing where Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA) had not been willing to re-invest and that it was past the date when they thought it would be wrapped up. Kunselman noted that according to a staff report, there would be $95,000 of unobligated funds in the housing trust fund. He wanted to know if that projection for the unobligated portion included the interest-only payment from the purchase on the YMCA lot. If so, Kunselman wondered if at some point the interest-only payment would come from the city’s general fund.

Kunselman allowed that the Burton Road project, which had previously been forecast to eat up a lot of the housing trust fund, will probably be unobligated. But Kunselman said it still made him “queasy,” because the general fund is supporting it. He expressed concern that there seemed to be no long-term plan and that the city was filling in gaps where the “heavy-hitters” are backing off. [By "heavy-hitters," he was referring to MSHDA]. Kunselman said that he was not sure he saw this as a good plan. He also wondered about the $130,000 for the Ann Arbor Housing Commission, indicating to city administrator Roger Fraser that he thought Fraser planned to put the amount into the budget. Fraser responded by saying he’d have to look at the issue.

Outcome: The resolution to allocate $313,000 to the three affordable housing initiatives was unanimously approved.

Housing: Funding Allocation Swap

An item that received no discussion – but served as a reminder of the allocation for emergency shelter that the council had approved at its Nov. 6, 2009 meeting – amounted to a book-keeping adjustment. The city council had appropriated a total of $159,500 in Ann Arbor Housing Trust Funds (AAHTF) for that purpose. However, a city attorney review determined that provision of an emergency rotating shelter is not an eligible AAHTF activity.

So the part of those funds designated for that purpose – a $30,500 contract with the Shelter Association of Washtenaw County – was swapped out Monday night for Ann Arbor city general funds.

Outcome: The re-allocation of the funds for the rotating shelter was unanimously approved.

Housing: Appointment of Housing Commissioner

As part of the city council’s decision on March 15, 2010 to replace the city’s housing commission board, the council restored two of the commissioners to the five-member body, one of whom was the commissioner who satisfied the legal requirement that one member be a resident of the housing stock administered by the commission – Deborah Gibson. However, Gibson, who’d been re-appointed to the board for only a one-month term, resigned in light of the council’s action, which forced the city to find a replacement for her on an accelerated schedule.

Mayor John Hieftje said at Monday’s meeting that 1,500 letters had been sent out, and that they’d received 18 applications. After winnowing through them, Sasha Wombley Womble had been nominated. Ordinarily, appointments are made in a two-step process, with the first step being the nomination, and the second step the confirmation at a subsequent meeting. Hieftje asked that the council confirm Womble’s appointment in a one-step process, because the housing commission board was to meet on that Wednesday.

Outcome: The council confirmed Sasha Wombley’s appointment to the housing commission board in a one-step process.

Construction Projects

The city council entertained discussion of a major construction project by approving a third attempt to secure funding from the state of Michigan for replacing the East Stadium bridges. The bridges span the Ann Arbor Railroad tracks and South State Street. Another planned major construction project – Fuller Road Station – received some discussion during council communications, hinting that the primary election campaign season could be starting to warm up. Reduction of warming was a benefit touted during public comment in support of porous pavement to be used in a Sylvan Avenue project. And the council received awards for two construction projects already completed.

Construction: East Stadium Bridges

The item before the council was an authorization to apply for funding from the state of Michigan’s local bridge program, administered by the local bridge advisory board (LBAB). The application is based on the understanding that the LBAB may have up to $6 million to award for FY 2013 for projects across the state. The city intends to apply for $3 million to support the East Stadium bridge replacement project, which carries a price tag of $23 million.

A timeline overview of some of the bridge’s history:

• 1917: Bridge is built.
• 1973: Voters approve a millage to fund a bond to repair the East Stadium bridge. The proposed bond sale on the ballot included $800,000 for creation of a citywide bicycle system using existing streets and new pathways, and $360,000 designated for repair of the Stadium bridges. At the time the debate centered on whether the new bridge design should accommodate a wider roadway for State Street. On the same ballot was a transit millage, which passed as well – the same millage that supports today’s AATA.
• 2006: City of Ann Arbor is awarded $766,000 from Michigan’s local bridge program, but the city allowed the award to expire a year later, because the amount did not go far enough towards funding the project – the alternative to expiration would have been to spend the MLBP money towards bridge reconstruction.
• 2006: The city pays $1,249,467 to Northwest Consultants Inc. (NCI) for preliminary design engineering for the comprehensive bridge project that included bridge replacement, a transmission water main, storm sewer, and a South Main non-motorized path.
• 2007: After a biannual inspection of the bridge, weight limits were reduced on the span. The limits were set as follows: 31 tons (reduced from 38 tons) for one-unit trucks (e.g., school or AATA buses); 39 tons (reduced from 48 tons) for two-unit trucks (e.g., a single-trailer semi); 44 tons (reduced from 54 tons) for three-unit trucks (e.g., a semi with two trailers)
• 2007: On Sept. 18, 2007 and Oct. 2, 2007 at Pioneer High School’s cafeteria, informational workshops are held on a comprehensive project to address replacement of the span over State Street as well as the one over the railroad, including non-motorized improvements (i.e., sidewalks) extending along Stadium Boulevard to Main Street and south along Main to Scio Church road. Those workshops  are well attended, especially by members of the Ann Arbor Golf and Outing Club, which is located near the bridges.
• 2007: On Dec. 29, 2007 there are reports of “medium-sized pieces of concrete” falling off one of the 16 pre-stressed concrete box beams supporting the roadway.
• 2008: Early January re-inspection by city staff and bridge engineering consultants leads to the short-term recommendation of a traffic control order further reducing weight limits: 19 tons for one-unit trucks (e.g., school or AATA buses); 24 tons for two-unit trucks (e.g., a single-trailer semi); 26 tons for three-unit trucks (e.g., a semi with two trailers).
• 2008: In March, the vision for a comprehensive renovation of the bridges meets with a funding setback. The Michigan Department of Transportation awards only $760,000 for the project, though the total cost was estimated at that time at around $35 million.
• 2008: On Oct. 22, 2008 Northwest Consultants Inc. performs biennial inspection.
• 2009: In early February, the engineering consultant for the bridge, Northwest Consultants Inc., is called back to re-examine the bridge. A 7/8 inch deflection of the beam is found. [Chronicle coverage: "Discontent Emerges at Caucus" and "Building Bridges"] Bridge safety rating has dropped to 2 on a scale of 100.
• 2009: In March, traffic is rerouted so that it’s limited to the northern lanes, and does not pass over the beams showing deflection. [Chronicle coverage: "How the E. Stadium Bridge Gets Monitored" and "Council Gets Update on Stadium Bridges"]
• 2009: On Sept. 15, 2009 the bridge inspection consultant, Northwest Consultants Inc., inspects the East Stadium bridge over South State Street, and recommends removing the five southernmost beams.
• 2009: On Oct. 5, 2009 the city council authorizes expenditure to remove five beams.
• 2009: On Oct. 28, 2009 and again on Dec. 1, 2009, public meetings are held to discuss design.
• 2009: In November, five beams are removed from the bridge.
• 2009: In November, the state’s local bridge advisory board awards no funds for the Ann Arbor bridge project, citing the lack of any other non-city funding available for the project. [Chronicle coverage: "State Board: No Funding for State Bridges "]
• 2010: In February, the US-DOT announces the final recipients of the federal TIGER grant – they do not include the city of Ann Arbor.

At Monday’s council meeting, Margie Teall (Ward 4) asked Homayoon Pirooz to take the podium – he’s head of project management for the city. She led off by asking him to explain what the local bridge program is.

The Michigan Dept. of Transportation (MDOT) makes funds available to cities every so often through the local bridge program, not every year, explained Pirooz. The city’s application last year was for the FY 2012 budget, and the city did not receive approval, he reminded councilmembers. Since that time, he said, the city of Ann Arbor has been in constant communication with MDOT, and MDOT has encouraged Ann Arbor to apply again – for FY 2013. So Ann Ann Arbor is applying for $3 million from the local bridge program.

The city has been working on additional funding strategies, Pirooz reported, and since June of last year there have been some successes and some disappointments. The major disappointment was Ann Arbor not being selected for the federal TIGER (Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery) grant, which would have paid for almost all of the project.

Among the successes that Pirooz reported was $8 million that the city could “almost count on” as part of an earmark in the federal surface transportation fund. There’s also an MDOT transportation enhancement grant, which could mean as much as $1.5 million to fund the non-motorized improvements that are part of the project. That would bring the non-city share of the $23 million project to $12.5 million. The design is expected to be complete this summer.

The construction, which had originally been announced to start in the fall of 2010, said Pirooz, had been tied to the application requirements of the TIGER grant.

Teall asked if the city was still going after some other federal grants. Pirooz said that there had been some talk of a “mini-TIGER grant” and the city would apply for that if it becomes available.

Mayor John Hieftje indicated that a formal announcement hasn’t been made of the second round of TIGER funding, but that Congressman John Dingell believes a second round of funding will happen.

If the construction starts in March of 2011, Teall wanted to know how long it would last. Pirooz indicated that it would depend on whether the bridge was completely closed to traffic during the construction period. If the bridge is completely closed to traffic, he said, the construction would take around 18 months. If one lane is left open, that would add six months to the schedule, he said. Teall confirmed with Pirooz that the longer the project takes, the more it will cost.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) confirmed that this would represent the third attempt to get funding from the state’s local bridge program. Kunselman also confirmed that the letter from MDOT indicates that the reason the city did not receive money during the most recent round of funding was that the city had no outside funding for the project.

Kunselman wanted to know why the city’s position was any different now than before, with respect to outside funding that had actually been secured. Pirooz indicated that the city was in the process of securing it, citing the $8 million in surface transportation funds. Kunselman confirmed with Pirooz that the $8 million was not “for sure.” Pirooz allowed that “nothing is for sure.”

Kunselman wanted to know what the city’s chances are. “Better than last time,” said Pirooz. Last time, he added, the city had ideas about sources, and the city told MDOT that, but the city couldn’t say how much from each source it could expect. Someone has to offer part of the funding and then the city can go after the other parts. Last time, the state’s local bridge program didn’t want to be the first award of money. This time, explained Pirooz, the city can tell the state that $8 million in federal surface transportation funding is in the works and that a $1.5 million transportation enhancement grant is in the works.

The tone of the conversation has changed, said Pirooz. Asked by Kunselman if the money had been promised, Pirooz said that no, it would not be wise for anyone to make that assumption. He estimated that the chances for getting funding from the state’s local bridge program was 70-80% this time, when last time it had been perhaps 30-40%.

Kunselman asked about the plan for the city to use two years worth of its street repair millage. City administrator Roger Fraser explained that the use of the street repair millage to fund the entire project had been the “fall-back plan.” Fraser said the city staff is trying to do “anything but that.” If the city was forced to do that, Fraser said, then “we’ll have a serious conversation with you.” That conversation would come as early as this fall, if the city can’t obtain the dollars.

When asked by Kunselman if the project would start this fall if the local street repair millage had to pay for all of it, Fraser stressed that the fall 2010 construction start had been based on a requirement of the TIGER grant application. It will now be a spring 2011 construction start, but funding needs to be in place by the end of the year.

Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) asked at what point the $8 million of federal surface transportation funding becomes certain. Pirooz indicated that in the process, the first step was WATS (Washtenaw Area Transportation Study) approval, and that’s been done. The next step, said Pirooz, is for SEMCOG (Southeast Michigan Council of Governments) to approve it, which the city believed it would. Once that happens, said Pirooz, the city had a promise that the surface transportation program would pay the $8 million. The one last piece is the federal highway bill – the surface transportation program is part of that, and it’s still in the Congressional approval process. As long as there’s a highway bill, said Pirooz, the $8 million will happen. There’s a “slim to none” chance that the highway bill won’t happen, he said.

Outcome: The council unanimously approved the authorization to apply for funding from the state’s local bridge program to help pay for the replacement of the East Stadium bridges.

Construction: Fuller Road Station

Eli Cooper has presented the Fuller Road Station project on several occasions to different public bodies, most recently at an Ann Arbor Transportation Authority board meeting [Chronicle coverage: "AATA Gets Its Fill of Fuller Road Station"] Cooper also presented an update on the project to the city’s park advisory committee (PAC) at its March 16, 2010 meeting.

The city council appoints two of its own members as non-voting ex officio members of PAC: Mike Anglin (Ward 5) and Christopher Taylor (Ward 3).

At Monday’s city council meeting, during his communications time, Anglin reported that when Cooper had made his presentation at the March 16 PAC meeting, a lot of concerns were raised – noting that it is the park advisory commission, and that naturally they’re passionate about the parks – “as they should be,” he said. The city/university were working together, said Anglin, to build what most people see as a parking structure. Anglin said he shared some of their concerns, but also sees the larger vision [of a train station for commuter service] that could take place. The fact that there’s no guarantee that the train will become a reality is a concern to many people, he noted, especially at a time when the city is cutting expenses.

Taylor indicated that compared to Anglin, he had a somewhat different take on the PAC meeting, as far as the nature of the concerns that were expressed there. He suggested that among PAC members the main focus of concern was whether the city was getting a “sufficient deal” as expressed in the memorandum of understanding. The equity of the deal between the city and university was something that everyone would need to keep an eye on, Taylor said.

Mayor John Hieftje took up the issue of Fuller Road Station, saying that a question from the previous night’s caucus about when a specific set of information would be posted on the city’s website had been looked at by city staff. He also took the opportunity to respond to Anglin’s remarks on Fuller Road Station, pointing out that the last time the council had voted on it, Anglin had supported it.

Construction: Plymouth Green Crossings

The item that came before the council was a request for a change in the PUD agreement for the Plymouth Green Crossings project. What the change did was swap out a proposed restaurant for 26 temporary parking spaces plus 11 motorcycle spaces. At a planning commission meeting in February, the change received support of all five commissioners who were present, but fell short of the six votes needed to win an official “recommendation” from that body. [Chronicle coverage: "Plymouth Green Crossings Gets Every Vote, Still One Short"]

During public commentary at the city council’s Monday night meeting, Jim Mogensen told the council that the project had an interesting history. He said he first learned about it from a clerk’s report and he noticed that the project was going to need a water permit from the MDEQ. Mogensen said he just happened to be in the city hall building, and he asked Jerry Hancock about it, who said, What project?  [Hancock is Ann Arbor's stormwater and floodplain programs coordinator.]

Any citizen can call for a public hearing, Mogensen said, which he did. And that caused a delay, which gave Hancock some additional time to review the plan. Now there’s a bunch of underground detention tanks – which were required of the developer – that would not have otherwise been required. He asked the council to think about the tanks – whether it’s a parking lot or a restaurant, eventually the tanks will fail. If it’s a substantial building on top of the tanks, what do you do?

The other part of the project involves payments into the affordable housing fund by the developer, which the developer has experienced difficulty making, Mogensen noted. When a developer of a property has a problem, Mogensen observed, society will sort out the solution for the developer. What happens, though, when a tenant has a similar problem?

Outcome: The city council voted unanimously without discussion to approve the amended Plymouth Green Crossings PUD agreement.

Construction: Porous Pavement on Sylvan Avenue

Sylvan is a short one-block-long street running east-west, nestled into the upside down”V” formed by State and Packard streets, near Yost Ice Arena. At the city council’s Oct. 5, 2009 meeting, the city council had already approved an expenditure for $54,271 to pay for engineering services (from Fishbeck, Thompson, Carr & Huber, Inc.) for the Sylvan Avenue porous pavement project.

At that meeting, Margie Teall (Ward 4) had requested that it be pulled out of the consent agenda for individual consideration. Nick Hutchinson, a civil engineer with the city, fielded questions from Teall, in whose ward Sylvan Avenue is located. At that time Hutchinson indicated that the project should be finished in the spring of 2010.

At that October 2009 meeting, several benefits of porous pavement were drawn out. Many of them were the same as those mentioned at Monday’s meeting by Vince Caruso during public commentary. He noted that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency considered it best practice: it reduces heat in the summer, it’s quieter under traffic load, requires less salt and plowing during the winter, because as the snow and ice melt, the water drains straight through.

The project’s budget is $481,245, drawing funding from the street reconstruction millage ($159,983) and the stormwater maintenance fund ($321,442). The stormwater funding portion of the project will be repaid as a loan secured by the office of the Water Resources Commissioner [formerly called the Drain Commissioner].

Before the council on Monday night was the approval of a construction contract with ABC Paving Co. for $343,875.

Outcome: The council approved the construction contract with ABC Paving Co. for $343,875.

Construction: Awards

The city council bore witness to the presentation of two awards from the Michigan chapter of the American Public Works Association (APWA). As part of their Project of the Year Awards, the city of Ann Arbor had won an award for the Huron Parkway-Nixon Road intersection improvements. The project won in the category of transportation projects under $2 million. The city also won an APWA award for the Harvard Drain and Nichols Arboretum stormwater enhancement project. The arboretum project won in the the environment category for projects under $2 million.

Making the award on behalf of the APWA was Evan Pratt, who is familiar to the city council as a member of the city’s planning commission. Pratt stressed that he was not part of the awards committee for the APWA. The APWA’s 29,000 national members, Pratt told the council, includes 800 members of the Michigan chapter.

Construction: Carbon Monoxide Levels

As a part of his city administrator’s report, Roger Fraser told the council that on the previous Wednesday afternoon [April 14], the carbon monoxide (CO) monitors in the building had started to ring shortly after 1 p.m., and that city hall – the Larcom Building – had quickly been cleared. They asked the fire department to come measure with their more sensitive equipment and firefighters had confirmed elevated CO readings in Larcom and the adjacent police/courts building currently under construction.

Speculation on Wednesday afternoon was that those CO emissions had come from several factors. There were strong winds out of south, and at the base of a hole where an excavator was working there were 8-inch uncapped wire feeds. Also, while work is being done in the basement, there is an opening in the south side of the building. The working theory was that diesel fumes were being sucked into the building through the wire feeds and the opening in the basement via the stair towers that have their base in the basement.

Overnight, there were clear CO levels, said Fraser. And the 6 a.m. test indicated clear readings. Staff had been told the day before that unless they heard otherwise, the plan was for everyone to come in to work as usual. After 7 a.m., the CO alarm went off again. “We were dumbfounded,” said Fraser. It turned out that a propane-operated skid loader working in the basement was emitting high levels of CO and was probably causing previous CO readings, not the excavator. Propane-operated equipment is not supposed to emit CO, said Fraser. The city has done additional sealing work and has looking into the issue of the skid loader, Fraser said.

City Charter and Council Rules

The city council considered a rule on email, and demonstrated in actual practice how a charter provision governs council conduct.

Charter and Rules: Email Rule Consideration

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), who chairs the city council’s rules committee, asked that a resolution be added to the agenda that would formally direct the council’s rules committee to take up the issue of a rule on the councilmembers’ use of government email account to do its city business.

Whereas, The Council has agreed to consider the following amendment to the Council Rules: “City Council members will use their City e-mail accounts when sending e-mail communications about substantive City business, to the extent feasible. This rule does not cover communication to constituents or residents or communications regarding political activity.”

Whereas The Council considers it appropriate to have the Council Rules Committee review this Rule further;

RESOLVED, The Council formally considers this Rule and directs the Council Rules Committee to review the Rule further.

The consideration of the rule stemmed from a requirement in the terms of recent lawsuit that the city settled. [Chronicle coverage: "City Settles Lawsuit, Must Conduct Study"] The settlement agreement specified that:

21. As the City Council has previously been reviewing e-mail usage policies, the City Council will further consider the following amendment at the April, 2010 Council meeting(s), “City Council members will use their City e-mail accounts when sending e-mail communications about substantive City business, to the extent feasible. This rule does not cover communication to constituents or residents or communication regarding political activity.”
22. The Plaintiffs recognize that the City Council will address this through the council process and that this Agreement is not dependent on any particular result, other than the Council formally considering this possible amendment in some manner in April, 2010. The parties recognize that such a rule, even if adopted, is not binding on any subsequent Council and each new City Council enacts new rules after each general election.

There was no consideration by the council at Monday’s meeting in terms of a debate or discussion of the merits of amending their set of rules in the manner so specified. The scant discussion centered on an explanation from city attorney Stephen Postema that there was no requirement under the settlement terms that the council do anything with the rule. But Postema asserted that it was appropriate for the council to look at the rule. Postema did not repeat a previous statement he’d made to the media that to his knowledge the council used the government email system for their city business. Instead, he said he knew that councilmembers generally used the system, but allowed that there are difficulties in using it.

One of the issues that such a rule might address is the city of Ann Arbor’s failure under Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to produce electronic communications by city councilmembers or other public officials that are sent using non-government email accounts. In The Chronicle’s most recent experience on April 13, 2010, the city failed to produce such records at least in part because the city does not consistently request of public officials that they produce writings from their non-government email accounts, which could be responsive to FOIA requests.

Despite a lack of discussion, by using the statement, “The Council formally considers this Rule …” the council can rely on the statement as a performative utterance to satisfy the requirement of the settlement agreement. Performative utterances, as explicated by J.L. Austin in his seminal work “How to Do Things With Words,” are sentences that are neither true nor false, but which are used to perform some act upon the world. Standard examples of these kinds of sentences include:

1. ‘I do’ in a marriage ceremony.
2. ‘I name this ship the “Queen Elizabeth.”‘
3. ‘I give and bequeath my watch to my brother’ as in a will.
4. ‘I bet you sixpence it will rain tomorrow.’

Some things are not achievable with a performative utterance, of course. For example, “I hereby lift this piano” does not effect a piano lifting.

Mayor John Hieftje was keen to emphasize that the settlement agreement would not cost the city anything, because the environmental study, which is also a requirement of the settlement, was being performed in-house.

Outcome: The council unanimously approved the remand of the email rule to its rules committee.

The council’s rules committee will be adding the consideration of an email rule to its current work plan of developing an ethics policy for the council.

Charter and Rules:  Glacier Hills and Jolly Pumpkin

Some of the ethical considerations under which the council does its work are prescribed not by council rule or by an ethics policy, but by the city charter. Applied on two occasions Monday night was the following charter provision:

4.4 (f)  Except as otherwise provided in this charter, each member of the Council present shall cast a “yes” or “no” vote on each question before the Council, unless excused therefrom by a vote of at least six members.

The reason for excusing Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) from voting on those two occasions was also charter-based:

4.4 (i) A member of the Council shall not vote on a question in which the member has a financial interest, other than the general public interest, or on any question involving the member’s own conduct. If a question is raised under this section at any Council meeting concerning the eligibility of a member of the Council to vote on any matter, such question shall be finally determined by the concurring vote of at least six members of the Council, not including such member.

Specifically, Taylor explained to his council colleagues, his law firm Butzel Long represented a potential beneficiary of the council’s action in two cases.

First, Butzel Long represents Jolly Pumpkin. So the council voted to excuse Taylor from the discussion on a resolution that allowed for a new outdoor service area for the Main Street bar.

Outcome: The new outdoor service area for Jolly Pumpkin was unanimously approved.

Second, Butzel Long provided the bond counsel for the city’s Economic Development Corporation (EDC) in connection with an EDC project that Glacier Hills had applied for – it includes $23 million in bonds. So the council voted to excuse Taylor from the discussion of that project, which was approved. As part of the resolution, two people were added to the EDC board: Dan Slee and John A. Rasmussen, who are representative of neighborhood residents and business interests likely to be affected by the project.

Outcome: The resolution to approve the EDC Glacier Hills project was unanimously approved.

During public commentary at the end of the meeting, Stephen Ranzini, a member of the city’s EDC, thanked the council for passing the resolution and reminded the council to use their leverage with business owners, because the EDC had been allocated $17 million in tax-free bonding authority as part of the federal stimulus package. The Washtenaw County EDC, for which Ranzini also serves as vice chair, had been awarded another $33 million in tax-free bonding authority, said Ranzini. He noted that neither the city nor the county EDC had received any applications for funds – despite Ranzini’s attempts to to communicate through Ann Arbor SPARK, and through personal meetings. [See Chronicle coverage of Ranzini making the same point to the Ann Arbor DDA and of a recent Washtenaw County Economic Development Corporation meeting.]

Street Lights

Pulled out of the consent agenda for specific consideration was an item that approved a contract with DTE to convert 58 conventional streetlights to LED  fixtures. The location of the lights is the Hill-Packard-East University neighborhood, which was chosen in part in response to concerns about safety raised by some University of Michigan students in 2008.

As part of the contract, DTE is dropping the annual charges for the streetlights from $11,887 to $6,293.  The annual savings of $5,594 would result in a four-year payback on the city’s share of the $22,288 conversion cost. The city and DTE are splitting the conversion costs 50-50.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) called that kind of collaboration “exciting” and asked Andrew Brix to take the podium. Brix is the city’s energy programs manager.

Brix said that the city had been at the forefront in moving towards LED back in 2005. They’d been working with DTE on the issue. The state Public Service Commission had ordered DTE to produce a proposal for a uniform tariff for LED lights, Brix said, but they were “not there yet” based on what they submitted.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) asked about the safety issue and how the LED bulbs addressed it. Brix explained that the LEDs would produce “whiter” light and better color conditions. “You’ll be able to make out color,” he explained.

Asked by Margie Teall (Ward 4) what kind of fixtures were chosen, Brix said it was the same fixture used on Nixon Road – it was DTE’s choice, but the city was happy with it, he said.

Mayor John Hieftje noted that it’s difficult to work on something owned by someone else and that the city had to win DTE’s cooperation.

Brix broke down the statistics for streetlights: The city owns 800 streetlights outside the downtown. The other 5,500 are owned by DTE.

Christoper Taylor (Ward 3) said he wanted to “pile on the praise” for DTE taking the step. He also noted that in connection with the A2Fiber response to Google’s request for information, DTE had been a “100-percent partner” on the project.

Hieftje allowed that he’d been impatient at the pace that the LED conversion has been moving forward, but that from DTE’s point of view, they are setting a precedent, so DTE is reluctant to go too fast.

Crosswalks

Resident Kathy Griswold addressed the council once again on the topic of moving the mid-block crosswalk at King Elementary School from its mid-block location to a four-way stop intersection about 300 feet away. She reported that she’d sent an email that day to Todd Roberts, the superintendent of the Ann Arbor Public School system, asking him to email city administrator Roger Fraser stating his support for the move.

Griswold noted that the parents of children attending the school are instructing their kids to cross at the intersection, but that the school crossing guards can’t guard that crosswalk – they can only serve at the mid-block location. A request made under the Freedom of Information Act, said Griswold, had revealed over 50 emails, but the project had come to a halt in the fall of 2009. It seemed mysterious, she said. She expressed the hope that she’d only be at council a few more times talking about the crosswalk.

How many times has Griswold addressed the council on the King School crosswalk issue? Here’s a (possibly incomplete) chronology:

• 2009 Aug. 16 city council caucus [link]
• 2009 Nov. 5 city council meeting [link]
• 2009 Dec. 21 city council meeting [link]
• 2010 Jan. 4 city council meeting [link]
• 2010 Feb. 1 city council meeting [link]
• 2010 Feb. 16 city council meeting [link]
• 2010 March 15 city council meeting [link]
• 2010 April 5 city council meeting [link]
• 2010 April 18 city council caucus [link]

Also crosswalk related, during his communications time Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) reported out from the WATS policy committee that there would be a presentation on HAWK (High Intensity Activated Crosswalk) signals at the next meeting. The city is looking at the possibility of a HAWK signal for the crossing at Third & Huron, near the Ann Arbor YMCA.

Other Commentary

Appearing briefly during public commentary to thank the council was the new executive director of the Leslie Science Center, Greta Brunschwyler. She thanked city administrator Roger Fraser and said she look forwarded to continued partnership.

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

Next council meeting: May 3, 2010 at 7 p.m. in council chambers, 2nd floor of the Guy C. Larcom, Jr. Municipal Building, 100 N. Fifth Ave. [confirm date]

From left to right: Mayor John Hieftje, Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) and city administrator Roger Fraser. The trio were basking in the blue glow of the slide projector before the start of the council meeting, which began with Fraser's budget presentation. (Photos by the writer.)

The council must adopt amendments to the budget by their second meeting in May – May 17 this year – or else see the administrator’s unamended budget enacted by default, as stipulated by a city charter provision.

The council also heard a summary of the parking plan that they had commissioned the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority to produce.

Related to the city budget and the DDA board – but not reported during communications time at the council meeting – members of the DDA board and city council held a closed-door meeting last Friday afternoon with city administrator Roger Fraser to discuss a $2 million payment by the DDA to the city this year.

At Monday evening’s meeting, the council postponed a vote on a schedule of fine increases for parking violations. The estimated $635,000 in additional revenues that the increases would bring, said CFO Tom Crawford at the meeting, was not part of the FY 2011 budget assumptions.

The topic of the University of Michigan’s upcoming graduation exercises on May 1, which will feature an address by President Barack Obama, found its way into deliberations at various points in the meeting. The city approved road closures around the football stadium in conjunction with the UM commencement. Residents who live near Elbel Field will contend with floodlights and loudspeakers as early as 4 a.m. on commencement morning. And during public commentary, one resident expressed concern over the city’s denial of a permit to demonstrate – organizers of “Fulfilling the Dream” expect to draw hundreds on May 1, but as yet have nowhere to gather.

The city administrator’s report to the council featured an explanation of parking citations handed out during the previous Saturday’s UM spring football game, as well as an explanation of the closure of city hall last week due to elevated levels of carbon monoxide.

Public commentary was weighted towards an agenda item that allocated $313,000 from the Ann Arbor Housing Trust Fund for three different permanent housing projects. The council approved the allocation.

The council also satisfied an obligation it had under the settlement terms of a recent lawsuit by voting to remand consideration of an email rule to its rules committee.

In Part 1 of this report, we focus on the budget, parking and UM’s commencement.

FY 2011 Budget Presentation

The city of Ann Arbor’s fiscal year runs from July 1 through June 30 the following year – FY 2011 starts in about two months, on July 1, 2010. The public hearing on the budget will take place at the council’s next regular meeting on May 3.

FY 2011 Budget: Process

City administrator Roger Fraser’s presentation began with a timeline overview of the budget process to date and how it would move forward. Last year at this time, in May 2009, the council had adopted the FY 2010 budget as part of a two-year fiscal plan that included both 2010 and 2011. [Although the city council, per the city charter, adopts budgets one year at a time, the city takes a two-year approach to planning.] Then in August of 2009, the city had forecast a revenue shortfall for the FY 2010 year.

By November 2009, a revised revenue shortfall was calculated with a specific recommendation to make mid-year adjustments. Those adjustments included the layoff of 14 firefighters starting in January 2010, instead of July 2010 as outlined in the two-year fiscal plan presented last year. Negotiations for a 3% pay cut with the firefighters union resulted in a delay of those layoffs to their originally scheduled date of July 1, 2010. The FY 2011 budget proposed by Fraser on Monday cuts the firefighter force by an additional six firefighter positions, for a total of 20.

At the December 2009 city council budget retreat, the council heard that the mid-year adjustments would be implemented. They also engaged in a “big idea” discussion. Since the beginning of 2010, continued Fraser, the council had met in five sessions devoted specifically to the budget – one in January, two in February, and one in March. Chronicle coverage of the December 2009 budget retreat plus the 2010 city council meetings devoted specifically to the budget:

• Ann Arbor City Budget: Cuts Begin Now
• Budget Round 1: Community Services
• Budget Round 2: What’s the Big Idea?
• Budget Round 3: Where’s Your Emergency?
• Budget Round 4: Lights, Streets, Grass
• Budget Round 5: Economic Development

Fraser’s Monday presentation to the council is required by the city charter. Next steps:

• May 3, 2010: City council public hearing on the FY 2011 budget
• May 17, 2010: City council must adopt any amendments to FY 2011 budget

Budget FY 2011: How the Financial Picture Has Changed

Fraser reviewed for the council what they’d been shown this time last year. [The previous year's budget had included a planned use of general fund reserves to pay for early-retirement incentives offered to police officers, in order to achieve a reduction in force without layoffs and demotions.]

                    FY 09–Adptd   FY 10          FY 11
Revenues           $86,169,851   $85,202,388    $82,868,508
Expenses            89,214,660    84,735,376     83,250,520
Surplus/Deficit     (3,044,809)      467,012       (382,012)

-

The difference between the planned and actual deficit in FY 2009 of $3 million versus $8.5 million was a result of two main factors: More police officers opted for the early-out retirement program than the city needed in order to achieve its long-term budget goals ($4.9 million), and the city had to pay to settle a police union arbitration case ($673,000). The early-retirement incentives resulted in 24 sworn officers and 2 dispatchers leaving the force. This chart shows the actual general fund activity for FY 2009, and current projections for FY 2010 and FY 2011:

                    FY 09–Actl    FY 10          FY 11
Revenues           $82,593,860   $81,830,921    $76,345,552
Expenses            91,019,044    82,368,636     77,877,563
Surplus/Deficit     (8,425,184)     (537,715)    (1,532,011)

-

The $6.5 million change in revenue projections for FY 2011 are due to a variety of factors other than property tax revenues – which have actually performed better than predicted. Property tax revenues were forecast to be down in FY 2010, but have not been down as much as expected, with the result that the city received about $300,000 more property taxes than expected in FY 2010.

The specific issues that have caused the revenue shortfall, Fraser said, were first and foremost the reduction in state shared revenues. State shared revenue is the portion of the Michigan sales tax that the state redistributes to local municipalities in an arrangement whereby municipalities have relatively little authority to levy taxes of their own – property and income taxes are the extent of Michigan city tax options.

Fraser said the city had made a mistake in believing the state when they said state shared revenue would be held harmless in the state’s budget planning. In October 2009 the state announced that  reductions in state shared revenue would be implemented. This year, the city is forecasting that by this time next year the state will cut the statutory portion – that part of state shared revenue controlled by the legislature – by half of what is currently left. That would mean another $1.2 million reduction for the city.

Roger Fraser takes the podium to start his budget presentation.

In addition, investment income is off, traffic citations are down, development review fees compared to previous years are virtually nonexistent, and revenue that had been forecast from the installation of new parking meters in neighborhoods near downtown has not been realized, Fraser said. [In large part, the parking meters have not been installed, due to efforts undertaken by a group of councilmembers led by Sandi Smith (Ward 1) to find alternative revenue options besides the meters.]

In forecasting property tax revenues and state shared revenues, Fraser did not paint an optimistic picture. On a mid-range forecast of property tax revenues, they’re not predicted to come back up to FY 2009 levels until 2015. The statutory portion of state shared revenues is predicted to disappear completely by FY 2012.

Fraser also pointed to the city’s problem over a lack of agreement with the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority regarding the DDA’s lease for operating the city’s parking system. The previous five years, Fraser said, that agreement had yielded around $2 million for the city. For this budget, however, the city could not yet report that $2 million as revenue, because there was no agreement in place.

Budget FY 2011: The $2 million DDA Question

Last year, the city and the DDA publicly enacted a mechanism to begin consideration of a revision to the agreement by which the DDA administers the city’s parking system. The 10-year deal was struck in 2005 and calls for the DDA to pay the city $1 million a year, but provides the city an option to request up to $2 million in any given year. However, there’s a cap of $10 million on payments for the 10-year period. The city has exercised the $2 million option every year for the first five years of the contract, leaving the DDA under no obligation to make a payment for FY 2011.

The publicly enacted mechanism for reconsideration of the city-DDA parking agreement included the appointment of sub-committees last year – one committee of the DDA board and another from the city council – to negotiate the deal. [These have been referred to as the "mutually beneficial" committees.] Under the requirements of a 1991 city council resolution, sub-committees of the city are required, to the best of their ability, to comply with the requirements of the Open Meetings Act.

On Friday, April 16, at 3 p.m. members of the DDA’s committee met with some city councilmembers in Roger Fraser’s office to discuss the deal. In barring The Chronicle from the Friday meeting, which we attempted to attend, Fraser rejected the applicability of the council resolution that requires the meetings of city sub-committees to comply with the Open Meetings Act, contending it was a “working group,” not a sub-committee.

Present in addition to Fraser were six others: Susan Pollay, executive director of the DDA; DDA board members Roger Hewitt, Sandi Smith and Russ Collins – all members of the DDA’s committee established to discuss the parking  deal; and city councilmembers Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) and Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5). Hohnke is on the council’s committee, while Taylor is not. The council’s committee consists of Hohnke, and Margie Teall (Ward 4), and originally included Leigh Greden before he was defeated in the August 2009 Democratic primary by Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3). [Note that Sandi Smith (Ward 1) serves on the city council as well as the DDA board.]

Since establishing its committees to renegotiate the parking agreement, neither the city council nor the DDA board has reported at any of its meetings on the replacement of its publicly enacted committee process, in favor of one involving a “working group.” [Previous Chronicle reporting on this topic: "Parking Report Portends City-DDA Tension"]

If the city is to include the $2 million in its FY 2011 budget, the DDA board could authorize an expenditure of a $2 million contingency in its budget at its regular May 5, 2010 meeting. Failing that, the board could also convene a special meeting to authorize the payment.

Budget FY 2011: Cost Reduction Strategies

Highlights of some of the cost reductions that have already been implemented, said Fraser, include a 25% reduction in personnel since 2001. Overtime charges continued to be reduced – in particular in public safety services. Technology is being used to improve services. Health care costs are being reduced through use of self insurance, with premiums and co-pays for nonunion workers.

Fraser pointed out that in 2006, nonunion employees, as well as Teamster police professionals and Teamster civilian supervisor employees, started contributing a greater amount to their insurance costs. For 2010 and 2011, nonunion employees were already subject to a pay freeze and they will have a 3% total compensation reduction this year.

In January of this year, firefighters agreed to a 3% wage reduction, and increased employee contribution to the pension plan by 1%. The existing contract with the AFSCME union has a 3% wage increase specified for this year, scheduled to start on July 1, 2010 – they are the only group of employees that are due for an increase, said Fraser.

It is fair to point out, cautioned Fraser, that this year is the final year of a five-year contract for AFSCME and for the first three years of their contract, they had no wage increases at all. Fraser allowed that there had been some lump-sum payments for those years, but in terms of base salary they had gone for three years without a wage increase. Still, the city has asked AFSCME to open the contract for July, and that request is still pending.

With other bargaining units, Fraser said, the city is still negotiating. Fraser then ticked through a list of various collaborative efforts with other government and nonprofit entities.

Budget FY 2011: Assumptions

The proposed budget for FY 2011 assumes that there will be no new major sources of revenue either in the form of an income tax or property tax. However, in the printed budget message to the council, city administrator Roger Fraser indicates that after July 1, 2010 he plans to discuss other revenue options with the council.

In conjunction with the budget, there will be a set of selected fee increases recommended where the city feels that it is out of place with the market or with the city’s costs, Fraser said.

The assumption is that the state of Michigan will continue to struggle with its own budget deficit. That is compounded this year, Fraser said, by the fact that there will be a massive turnover at the state legislature with a number of people in the House and the Senate and in the governor’s office, who will not be seeking election this fall because of term limits. It is yet to be seen what the impacts will be in terms of their willingness and ability to make decisions affecting the future of the state, Fraser concluded. “We have not assumed a great deal of optimism about that,” Fraser cautioned.

For FY 2011 for nonunion workers there is an assumed 3% total compensation reduction, which will include increased pension contribution and health care premium co-pays.

Budget FY 2011: Specific Recommendations for General Fund

Specific budget recommendations presented by Fraser included eliminating 15 positions in police services, one of which is vacant, in addition to the five vacancies that occurred last year – for a savings of $1.6 million. This proposal differs slightly from the drafts of budget impact sheets prepared in the course of the budget season, which showed $1.6 million in savings resulting from nine police officer layoffs, and five community standards officers – two of them supervisors. However, during deliberations on parking fine enforcement later in the council meeting, when questioned by Sandi Smith (Ward 1) about reductions in community standards officers, Fraser said that the final reductions did not include community standards officers.

Savings for FY 2011 include a reduction in the number of police vehicles, which would result in a $270,000 savings. In addition to the 14 firefighter positions originally planned for FY 2011 as part of the two-year fiscal plan, another six positions are to be eliminated for a total of 20 fewer firefighters – a savings of around $2 million.

Community services recommendations include a $260,000 reduction in funding to nonprofits. A transfer of funds to the affordable housing fund would be eliminated, for a savings of $100,000. A restructuring of staff in the planning and development department, which eliminated one full-time position, would result in a net savings of around $75,000.

Mack Pool and the Ann Arbor Senior Center would be kept open. Implementing suggestions of two task forces – formed as a result of last year’s discussion of the FY 2011 plan, which originally proposed shutting those facilities – will allow them to operate at a cost in the coming year that’s $140,000 less than before. Increases in parks and recreation fees will generate around $60,000, and football parking at Allmendinger and Frisinger parks is projected to generate $34,000. In public services, the mowing cycle for parks will be lengthened from 19 to 23 days, but hand trimming would be kept in place, for a savings of around $112,000. Maintenance in 17 parks would be eliminated except for right-of-way areas – that would save a little over $50,000.

Fraser reported that the city had an agreement in principle with DTE on the de-energizing of certain streetlights for a savings of around $120,000. The cost of right-of-way tree planting is proposed to be shifted to the stormwater fund for a savings of $142,000. This is based on the city’s research, said Fraser, indicating that the most effective thing that they can do to reduce runoff is to plant trees.

The implementation of loading zone fees would generate around $20,000. Revised agreements with the Downtown Development Authority on revenues from the 415 W. Washington parking lot and the Fifth & William surface lot will generate around $180,000.

This year’s budget – for the first time, said Fraser – would include increased maintenance costs due to the construction of the new police/courts building, for an increased expenditure of $277,000. The plan for installing new parking meters in near downtown neighborhoods, which was included in the FY 2010 budget but not implemented, will also not be part of the FY 2011 budget, for a projected revenue loss of around $450,000.

The 15th District Court, said Fraser, had been responsive to the city’s communications about cost reductions, and had proposed that the staff work week be reduced to 37.5 hours. Salaries for the magistrate, the court administrator, the deputy administrator and probation supervisor would be reduced by 3%. The financial manager salary would be set at a lower level – $55,000. The district court would also eliminate three full-time positions, two of which are currently vacant. One of the positions would be eliminated after the court moves to the new police/courts facility currently under construction at Fifth and Huron.

In the clerk’s office, costs would be reduced by publishing legal notices in the Washtenaw Legal News, for a savings of $24,000. Overtime charges associated with the election preparation season would be eliminated. On Fridays in advance of the election season, the clerk’s office service windows would be closed, as clerk’s staff would be working on preparation for the elections. In previous years, because of the demand at the window, that preparation work could not be completed during the day, which necessitated overtime, Fraser said. Staff believes that by closing the window on Fridays and devoting that time to election preparations, $17,000 can be saved.

In financial services, one position is being eliminated in the budget office for a savings of $90,000. An accounting position is being re-allocated so it would be serving on a project for the remainder of FY 2011 – that would save $82,000 in the general fund. Virtually all professional consulting would be eliminated in financial services, with the exception of the auditor and the fraud hotline, for a savings of $55,000. Installation of the new phone system has also resulted in savings, which would be recognized in this year’s budget in the amount of around $165,000.

Budget FY 2011: Outside the General Fund

Outside the general fund, the first item in the set of budget recommendations is the evaluation of Huron Hills Golf Course as a self-sustaining enterprise with private management. Fraser indicated that an RFP had been put out – or if it had not been put out yet, it would be soon – for proposals to run that parks facility with a private vendor.

Other proposals centered on the parks maintenance and capital improvements millage: focus on maintenance of existing facilities, with no building of new infrastructure; and eliminate the 3% annual increase that the city’s natural area preservation (NAP) unit is provided by a council resolution governing allocation of the millage funds.

Leaf collection will take place via a containerized operation, with residents no longer invited to dump their leaves loose into the street for collection via front-end loaders and dump trucks. The city’s compost operation is also currently undergoing an RFP process.

Not this year, but for FY 2012, the city will be looking at the privatization/franchising of its trash collection service.

Fraser concluded his presentation: “That’s it. Council?” Councilmembers had no immediate questions. Those will come at the next two council meetings.

Budget FY 2011: Public Commentary, Response on Police/Courts

As she has done occasionally since the summer of 2009, Libby Hunter delivered her remarks during public commentary in the form of a song. This week’s melody was from the final movement of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125 “Choral” – the “Ode to Joy” choral part. Her lyrical focus was on budget issues, with particular attention to the police/courts building currently under construction.

The criticism of the decision to build the police/courts facility and the lyric’s contention that police officers were laid off in order to afford its construction provoked a reaction from mayor John Hieftje during the council’s communications time on the meeting agenda.

Hieftje stressed that the city of Ann Arbor had never laid off a police officer. In the course of his remarks, he allowed that there’s “a lot of leeway in a song.” [The budget proposed by city administrator Roger Fraser less than an hour previously had called for police layoffs.]

On the merits of the decision to build the police/courts facility, Hieftje’s response began: “I thought everyone had figured out the need for the police/courts building.” He then recounted some of the history of the decision to build the facility. Back in 1999, he said, there was discussion of rebuilding the entire Larcom building, but the city chose not to go forward.

The decision to restart a building project was triggered by the Washtenaw County administrator, he said, because the county had another use for the courtroom that the city was leasing from the county to house the 15th District Court. [The city is required to house the court.] That alternate use, Hieftje continued, was for the juvenile court, which will be moved from its location on Platt Road to the space that the city now leases for the court.

The city looked at 10 different locations for constructing a new building, Hieftje said, after not being able to find another building to retrofit.  There was never a plan to keep the police department in the Larcom building, he said. He noted that the city will save $700,000 in rent with the new construction. In addition, the DDA is helping out, which is consistent with their mission of developing buildings in the downtown area.

Police/Courts Building: Historical Perspective

In his remarks at Monday’s council meeting, Hieftje was echoing sentiments he’d expressed online a few years earlier on ArborUpdate, in a comment that responded to a question from local attorney David Cahill. Cahill had challenged Hieftje to explain why he had not vetoed the police/courts building after voting against it and threatening a veto on the key council decision made on March 5, 2007.

The ArborUpdate comment was written a year after that key vote. Hieftje wrote the comment on March 23, 2008, after an effort by Mike Anglin (Ward 5) at the council’s March 17, 2008 meeting had failed to win support to restart the conversation with the county on the court’s lease question. Hieftje’s comment reads in part:

I have not vetoed the proposal because I have no viable alternative to constructing a new police/courts building. I have been searching for an alternative to a new building but could not find one. We have investigated existing buildings both on the edge of the city and in the downtown but none have met the requirements for a secure court house, even with extensive, expensive renovation. We investigated building on the Library parking lot and the Ann Arbor News lot. [link to complete ArborUpdate comment]

As Tom Gantert reported in a March 13, 2007 Ann Arbor News article:

Ann Arbor Mayor John Hieftje has backed away from his promised veto of the resolution that cleared the way for the city to start planning for a new police station and courts building next to the existing city hall.

Hieftje said Monday that after meeting privately with various council members that he expects the council will reconsider the vote and bring it back up at next week’s meeting. He said a final decision will then be postponed until after the 2007-08 budget is passed in late May.

The mayor had said he would veto the resolution after the council voted 7-4 at its March 5 meeting to pay an architect $1 million to design the $34 million building. Hieftje and Council Members Ron Suarez, D-1st Ward, Stephen Kunselman, D-3rd Ward, and Bob Johnson, D-1st Ward, all voted no.

The reconsideration of the vote at the council’s following meeting resulted in the splitting of the architectural fees. An amount of $129,250 was specified for initial architectural services, leaving the decision on spending another $833,350 for later. The later expenditure was also approved.

Some hint of the nature of the private meetings reported by The News is provided by a March 5, 2007 email exchange among Margie Teall (Ward 4), Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2), and former councilmembers Leigh Greden and Joan Lowenstein [.pdf file of email exchange discussion of councilmembers about Hieftje's potential veto].

In that exchange, Greden initially proposed that the group threaten the mayor with specific kinds of uncooperative behavior:

We say the following: “If you follow through with your veto, we are prepared, as a group, to vote against all committee appointments, Agenda items, resolutions, budget amendments and other projects you bring to the City Council for the foreseeable future. We constitute a working majority of City Council. We will not announce this to the public in order to give you the chance to do the right thing w/o our position being made public. The choice is yours.”

In a later draft, Greden appears to settle on softer language:

If you follow through with your veto, you should know it will change the nature of our working relationship with you on this Council. We will not announce this to the public in order to give you the chance to do the right thing w/o our position being
made public.

Hieftje’s ArborUpdate comment reflects that his decision was affected by a potential level of non-cooperation from the Greden-led majority if he vetoed the project. Wrote Hieftje:

I have worked for several years with the “veteran” majority on City Council that is supporting the Building. They are thoughtful individuals who have been working on a solution to this problem for years. [...]

Council veterans supported me in devoting more funding and staff support to non-motorized transit. They supported the Greenbelt Campaign and the Clean Communities Program. They supported the Mayor’s Green Energy Challenge and the commuter rail proposal and One Percent for Art. Disagreeing with a majority of council members whom I respect is one thing, a veto is yet another. A veto would make it harder for me to work with the majority of council members on other issues. Frustration over this issue could spill over into other council business even more than it already has. A cohesive majority has a much better chance of coming together around solid solutions than a fractured council.

Ann Arbor Parking

The topic of parking was woven throughout the meeting in the form of the DDA’s report, a discussion of parking violation fines, and University of Michigan commencement exercises.

DDA Parking Plan: Presentation

Susan Pollay, executive director of the DDA, and Roger Hewitt, who serves on the board and chairs its operations committee, shared the presentation of a parking plan. The city council had asked in December 2009 that the DDA produce a plan. In her opening remarks, Pollay referred to the December 2009 city council meeting as featuring some “fairly intense dialogue.”

By way of some recent background to the report, at the DDA’s partnerships committee on March 14, 2010, which was attended by city councilmembers Margie Teall (Ward 4) and Tony Derezinski (Ward 2), tweaks to the final draft of the parking report were considered. DDA board member Jennifer S. Hall objected to any edits of the language that would soften the idea that revenue generation was the impetus behind the city council’s consideration of the evening enforcement idea back in December.

An email was circulated at the partnerships committee meeting from an unidentified city official, who wrote:

My only comment is the report starts out indicating it was kicked-off by a request from Council to extend meter enforcement in order to obtain additional money for the City. I think this oversimplifies the questions and concerns of Council and suggests the issue was raised just as a method to solve the City’s budget.

The draft of the report’s executive summary considered by the partnerships committee reads as follows:

Partnerships Draft Version:
Executive Summary
On December 21, 2009, the question of extending parking meter enforcement past 6pm came before Ann Arbor City Council as a revenue‐generating idea, as City Council and City staff have worked hard over the past several years to find new sources of revenues that enable the City to maintain current service levels for its citizens. The discussion about “evening enforcement” was enlarged to a broader conversation about public parking, and the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority (DDA) was asked to pursue the development of a parking plan that included the following elements [...]

The final version of the report’s executive summary delivered to the city council reads as follows:

Final Version:
Executive Summary
[Ann] Arbor DDA has managed public parking since 1992 with the goal of a healthy, attractive, and diverse downtown. Over the years the DDA and Ann Arbor City Council have engaged in an ongoing conversation about how “demand management” can be used to shape policies and programs to gain even greater efficiencies from the public parking system by spreading demand, as well as encourage even greater use of sustainable transportation. As part of the 2009/10 City budget, parking meters were to be installed in several near downtown neighborhoods where commuter parking demand had been detected. During the fall of 2009 there was much discussion about these new parking meters, and on December 21, 2009, City Council approved a resolution that had three components 1) it suspended the plan to install these parking meters, 2) it requested that the DDA direct net revenues from the 350 S. Fifth Avenue parking lot (the former YMCA parking lot) to the City General Fund, and 3) it requested that the DDA present a public parking plan at its April 19, 2010 meeting that was to include the following elements [...]

[Previous Chronicle reporting on the content of the report: "Parking Report Portends City-DDA Tension"]

The report that the council asked the DDA to deliver was supposed to address issues like a communication plan to downtown patrons, merchants and evening employees, options for low cost parking for evening employees, variation of rates and meter time limits based on meter location, as well as the original change in hours of enforcement.

The final report is structured around nine strategies:

Strategy 1: Downtown curbside public parking should be managed to create turnover at the most convenient, commercial locations so these spaces can be more easily used by a large pool of downtown users.

Strategy 2: A comprehensive TDM [transportation demand management] strategy should be developed and utilized to support the downtown evening economy, including a management strategy for on‐street parking spaces, creation of additional evening employee parking/transportation options and communication strategies.

Strategy 3: Develop new off-street parking strategies to make it more attractive for patrons to park off‐street in public parking facilities, and thus relieve pressure on curbside parking, support downtown commerce and entertainment, and increase patron awareness of their parking use and costs.

Strategy 4: Develop policies and plans to add and subtract public parking downtown based on redevelopment, walkability, and transportation goals.

Strategy 5: Develop additional parking options for personal transportation vehicles, including motorcycles, bicycles, and vehicles using new energy.

Strategy 6: Increase downtown employee use of public transit by expanding AATA service hours, developing a strong Ypsilanti/Ann Arbor transit plan, and making downtown transit stops more user‐friendly.

Strategy 7: Improve communications to downtown business owners, employees, customers and visitors by developing new communication tools and sharing information more broadly.

Strategy 8: Develop a parking and transportation strategy for downtown & near downtown residents.

Strategy 9: Miscellaneous parking and transportation suggestions.

At the conclusion of the report presentation, Hewitt asked the council to consider a joint working session with the city council and the DDA board after the council had wrapped up its budget process – that will be the end of May, at the earliest. The point of the working session, said Hewitt, would be to go through each strategy in detail and to figure out a way to move forward.

DDA Parking Plan: Council Deliberations

After Hewitt and Pollay delivered the report, council deliberations were dominated by praise for the DDA staff for their work on the report, which had been completed in a relatively short timeframe.

Susan Pollay hands a copy of the DDA parking plan to Sandi Smith (Ward 1) before the start of the council meeting.

Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) drew a parallel between a Huron Parkway-Nixon road roundabout project – which received a project-of-the-year award during the council’s meeting from the Michigan chapter of the American Public Works Association (APWA) – and the DDA parking plan.

With both projects, Derezinski said, there was suspicion initially with a lot of questions. But there was a large public process and explanation. As a consequence, the suspicions and complaints have disappeared for the most part, he said, and also because the project is actually working. He felt the same would be true of the blueprint for parking that the DDA had put together.

Derezinski complimented in particular: (i) the comprehensive nature of proposal; and (ii) the interrelated nature of how parking is linked with transportation. On the question of whether the DDA had completed the council’s assignment, he concluded: “We asked for it to be addressed and it has been addressed.”

Mayor John Hieftje also complimented Hewitt and Pollay and everyone at the DDA – he said the work was done on a short timeline and the council appreciated the work.

Sand Smith (Ward 1) echoed Derezinski’s comments. One piece of the plan that wasn’t brought out is that “parking is going to be friendlier.” It will be less an attempt to ticket and punish. It would be more about carrots rather than sticks.

She also stressed that the parking violation fine schedule, which the council also considered the same evening, was not an outcome of the parking plan: “It’s distinctly different – those rates are not informed by the plan.” The parking plan presented by the DDA, she said, is a different philosophy of managing parking.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) asked if any consideration had been given to making parking free. Naperville, a city in Illinois west of Chicago, had implemented free parking, said Kunselman. Pollay asked if the free parking rule applied to the whole city – Kunselman replied that it did. Pollay noted that best practice in the industry is going away from that. She said she was very eager and interested in seeing how a retrograde shift backwards worked in actual practice.

Responding to Kunselman, Hewitt said that it’s more a suburban community in Naperville. He also pointed out that Ann Arbor’s parking system is self-sufficient. If parking were free, said Hewitt, that would be a $14 million hole in the parking system budget.

Following council discussion on the parking plan – it was simply heard without any council action – Ray Detter addressed the council about the plan during public commentary. He spoke on behalf of the Downtown Citizens Advisory Council, echoing in large part the sentiments that he had expressed at the DDA’s last board meeting. Only the DDA, Detter concluded, had the expertise to administer the parking system.

Parking: Fine Schedule

The council considered two resolutions related to parking fines at its Monday meeting. One related to how the fines are administered, while the other affected actual fine amounts. The first was approved, while the other was postponed.

The first resolution changed the city’s ordinance so that all parking violation fines are reflected in a schedule that can be changed by simple resolution of the city council, rather than embedded directly in the ordinance, which requires two readings before the council.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) clarified with the city treasurer, Matthew Horning: “I just want to be clear: This is not setting rates, it’s just setting ordinance about how we set rates.”

The change approved on Monday had received its first reading on Jan. 4, 2010. It removes fines related to handicap parking, odd/even parking districts, and snow emergencies from the city’s code and places them in the rest of the fine schedule.

Outcome: The ordinance amendment to place all parking violation fines in a fine schedule instead of embedding them in the city’s code was unanimously approved.

The fine schedule for parking violations was ultimately postponed on Monday. It had previously been postponed from the Jan. 19, 2010 council meeting. Still, it received a fair amount of discussion from councilmembers. The most basic change in the fine schedule is to increase expired meter violations from $15 to $20 – keeping the discounted rate of early payment the same, at $10.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) indicated she’d received an email asking her a question she’d never been asked: Had there been any effect to research the impact on parking rate increases on downtown businesses?

City treasurer Horning indicated that the specific effect of rate increases had not been looked at but it was a fairly common belief, he said, that to get turnover of vehicles using parking spaces, you need to have a fine.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) – who had asked for the original postponement in January, so that the DDA parking plan would eventually inform the fine schedule – asked Horning to talk about adjustments he’d made since the last time. Horning was not sure what Smith meant. Smith clarified that back in January, city council had just put in a request to the DDA to deliver a report on a parking plan. Parking enforcement was a piece of that plan, she said. Her hope, Smith concluded, was that the plan would inform the direction of fines.

Horning said that no changes had been made to the schedule of fines since January.

Smith noted that in the DDA plan, proposed fines are presented in an appendix. Safety hazard fines, said Smith, should be higher than nuisance violations. Horning allowed that there was a logic to that.  Smith asked about the projected $635,000 increase in revenue that was projected. Horning explained that the increase was a result of all proposed changes in the schedule. They’d assumed the same level of ticketing and enforcement as 2008 in the initial estimate of $875,000 additional revenue, but based on more recent data from 2009, revised it downward to $635,000.

Smith said she’d like to see it discussed more fully in light of the reduced number of community standards officers that would be available to enforce tickets. City administrator Roger Fraser indicated that no further reductions were planned in community standards officers – there’d be the same number in 2011 as 2010.

Smith moved to postpone the change in parking violation fines.

Briere asked if there was a reason why it’s outside of budget deliberations, instead of being part of the budget discussion. The city’s CFO, Tom Crawford, indicated that the fine schedule change was kicked off before the budget season started.

Mayor John Hieftje then asked if the increase in fine revenue was part of the budget. Crawford indicated that the increase was not assumed as part of the FY 2011 budget – it would be additional revenue.

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) then asked Smith what she was looking to accomplish during the postponement. Smith explained that she wanted to look at that part of the parking plan addressing fines – she wanted to understand the number of people who would be writing tickets.

Before the council voted, Horning pointed out that the new schedule includes discount rates for early payment for all categories of fines, and the discounted rate for expired meters would remain the same, at $10.

Outcome: The council unanimously postponed the new schedule of parking fines.

Parking: Commencement Logistics

Parking was also part of the council’s discussion of logistics for the upcoming University of Michigan commencement exercises at Michigan Stadium, which will feature an address by President Barack Obama.

Parking is expected to be a challenge, due to the decreased inventory of usual parking spaces normally associated with Saturday football games. The Pioneer High School parking lot is not available, due to a project under construction that will install massive underground stormwater detention tanks as part of the city’s effort to improve water quality in the Allen Creek watershed.

Margie Teall (Ward 4) asked on Monday that the usual off-street rules for football Saturdays be put in effect, which allow residents in neighborhoods around the football stadium to park cars on lawns [emphasis added]:

5:166.  Use of off-street parking facilities.
(1)   No person shall park a motor vehicle in the front open space, except on the driveway, in a structure or within an approved parking space or lot. This subsection shall not be applicable on those days when football games are played in The University of Michigan stadium.

Because Obama’s speech is not a football game, the ordinance would not apply. Teall was concerned about the ability of traffic to move around the stadium area.

Another kind of exception likely to be made for the commencement exercises is to treat on-street parking as if it’s a football game day. In neighborhoods around the stadium there are some streets posted as no-parking zones for football days.

On Brown Street near the Michigan football stadium, on-street parking on football game days is prohibited where posted.

Last weekend for the UM spring football game, the city initially ticketed cars parked on the street, if they were in no-parking-on-football-day zones. Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) asked if those tickets had been voided. City administrator Roger Fraser indicated that 95 citations had been issued in violation of the parking restriction on football days.

Fraser allowed that this had not been well-communicated to the neighborhood area. He reported that the city staff has voided every one of those 95 tickets, but stressed it was only those tickets written for violation of football day parking rules that had been voided.

Jim Kosteva was on hand to answer questions from the council about UM’s request for street closures around the stadium [.pdf with map of UM commencement street closings]. Main Street will be closed in both directions between Pauline and Stadium. The university also asked that the council prohibit sidewalk vendors around the stadium, to help reduce congestion.

The University has requested that the City prohibit sidewalk vendors in the vicinity of Michigan Stadium on May 1 to reduce congestion in and around the ceremony area. Chapter 47 (Streets) and Chapter 79 (Solicitors and Peddlers) allow Council to determine by resolution that on certain dates congestion in the City or a part of the City will be too great to permit peddling and soliciting and sidewalk occupancy.

Kosteva, who is director of the university’s community relations, was asked to the podium by Margie Teall (Ward 4) to comment on the university’s plan.

Kosteva said he appreciated consideration of the resolutions to facilitate desired lane and street closing. He expressed appreciation for the responsiveness of city staff in working with the university. He noted that the change from the normal course of commencement has brought additional responsibility to a whole host of folks. The university was establishing a secure area around stadium – all four lanes of Main Street would be closed. There’ll be a real shortage of parking in and around the stadium area, he cautioned, but the university would be making  aggressive use of  shuttles.

Kosteva also broke down the seating allocations. There are 80,000 seats that will be available in the stadium, but he reminded the council that first and foremost, it’s a commencement exercise. Of the 80,000 seats, 60,000 have been set aside for graduates and families. Other students, faculty, and staff who are interested in attending can get up to two tickets. If there are any extra tickets, they’ll be made available to the general public on Friday at 9 a.m. in the Michigan Union basement ticket office.

Teall asked Kosteva at what time the graduates would start assembling on Elbel field. Kosteva said that it would be as early as 6:30 a.m. However, even earlier – at 4 a.m. – floodlights will be turned on and instructions will be given to students, he said. [Instructions will be delivered via loudspeaker.]

The university has used a neighborhood email group as one of various means to alert neighbors around the stadium [emphasis added]:

Neighbors,

Undoubtedly you have heard that the University of Michigan is honored to have President Barack Obama as its May 1 commencement speaker. Hosting such a prestigious guest means some changes to our normal commencement plans to accommodate increased security.

Among these changes is the closing of all lanes of Main Street from south of Pauline to Stadium, from about midnight Friday April 30 to about 2 pm Saturday May 1.

In addition, our plan is to have graduates gather at Elbel Field starting at 6:30 a.m. We wanted to alert you that field lights will be on as early as 4:00 am and loud speakers will be in use for this gathering.

We apologize for any inconvenience these changes may cause and hope you will join us in congratulating our graduates on their achievements.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to approve the university’s traffic control plan and to prohibit sidewalk vendors in and around the stadium area.

Parking: Allmendinger Park and UM Commencement

Part of the recommendations reported by Roger Fraser in his budget presentation included a plan to generate revenues by parking cars in Frisinger and Allmendinger parks. Allmendinger Park was also mentioned during public commentary by Alan Haber, who reported that a permit for demonstration in the park on the morning of May 1 had been denied by the city. The demonstration, called “Fulfilling the Dream,” is expected to draw hundreds of people, one of the organizers, Laura Sanders, told The Chronicle in a phone interview on Wednesday after the Monday council meeting.

Sanders works with the Washtenaw Interfaith Coalition for Immigrant Rights, but the demonstration is sponsored by other groups as well, including Michigan PeaceWorks, American Friends Service Committee and One Michigan. The most recent group email sent out by organizers reads
in part:

Please pass the word about Fulfilling the Dream in Ann Arbor on the morning of May 1st, when President Obama is in town, and our trip to the Fifth Grand Peaceful March for Immigration Reform in Detroit in the afternoon. So far, the city of Ann Arbor has denied us a permit for Allmendinger Park, but we are looking into alternatives and will not give up! Please stay tuned for the exact location, and in the meantime, spread the word with the brief advertisements pasted below in both English and Spanish.

After Haber made his remarks, Sabra Briere (Ward 1) indicated that it was her understanding that something was being worked out.

However, Sanders told The Chronicle that as of mid-day on Wednesday, nothing concrete had been put in place to provide a place for the demonstration to be held. She said that six weeks ago her group had begun working with the city to find a way to hold the demonstration. Their efforts had included applying for a parade permit for Main Street past the Stadium, but that had foundered on the planned closure of the street.

A permit to rent Allmendinger Park had been denied, she said, with the city citing the park’s proximity to the stadium. They’d also asked a private property owner at Stadium & Prescott, who ordinarily rents out the space for football day parking, if they could rent the area for their demonstration. The property owner had agreed, Sanders said, but the city’s planning department had pointed out that the area is zoned residential, which prevented its use for a demonstration. Sanders said that they’d contacted Pioneer High School for use of the school property, but that effort had also not been successful in gaining permission for the demonstration.

Sanders said that there’d been indications in her communications with the city that “free speech zones” would be established in connection with the commencement exercises, but it was not clear where or how big they would be. The demonstration is planned to run from 9 a.m. to noon.

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

Next council meeting: May 3, 2010 at 7 p.m. in council chambers, 2nd floor of the Guy C. Larcom, Jr. Municipal Building, 100 N. Fifth Ave. [confirm date]

Bob Snyder reads aloud from the preliminary report of the Ann Arbor fire department, which summarizes the events of a recent nighttime house fire that killed one resident.

A recent fire on South State Street, which killed a resident of the house that burned, prompted a call to revisit a 2004 proposal to ban from porches the use of indoor furniture, like couches. That measure was ultimately tabled by the council six years ago, left to demise without any action.

A couple of residents expressed some disappointment that the councilmembers would not be discussing the budget that evening, but budgetary topics did make their way into the conversation. Chief among them were the relationship of the new parking fine schedule – which is expected to generate an extra $635,000 for the FY 2011 budget – to the parking plan that’s scheduled to be presented on Monday night to the council by the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority.

Questions about the planned Fuller Road Station were also raised, including the plan for financing the project. That project is not on Monday night’s agenda. But a different major capital project does have an associated Monday agenda item: the East Stadium bridge replacement. The item involves authorization for the city to apply for funds from the state’s local bridge fund – the city’s most recent application was denied. Caucus attendees heard Hieftje explain that the city would delay the start of replacement construction from fall 2010 to spring 2011, to allow for another round of funding applications.

The council also got an update on one resident’s ongoing efforts to move a mid-block crosswalk in front of King Elementary School to an intersection where cars already stop.

Porch Couch Ban Redux

Bob Snyder led off caucus discussion by echoing similar sentiments he’d expressed at the council’s April 5, 2010 meeting. Citing the house fire at 928 S. State St. – which occurred in the early morning hours of April 3, 2010, killing one of the residents – Snyder called on the council to revisit the possibility of a ban on the use of indoor furniture on porches. The preliminary report on the fire indicates that it started in a trash can on the porch, spread to a couch, then ignited the rest of the structure.

Snyder read aloud from the preliminary report released from the fire department [.txt file of preliminary report on the fire from AAFD]:

The fire was first noticed in the corner of the porch. It was a trash fire in a waste container. Fire built and spread to the adjacent sofa (positioned across the front of the residence windows on the porch). From there the fire continued to build from the ready fuel load of the sofa, building up heat and spreading to the structure itself.

Snyder allowed that he was “riding high on [his] high horse” on the issue. He noted that some landlords had already removed couches from their rental properties. He allowed that it was too early to say whether it was arson that had caused the fire or whether an upholstered couch was to blame. However, Snyder stressed that the consequence of the fire had been tragic. From the report:

The third occupant was difficult to awaken and eventually exited through the front doorway, through the fire, as Fire apparatus was arriving on the scene. He was on fire and ran across the street in front of arriving apparatus. He was attended to by Fire personnel, extinguished and cared for until HVA arrival. He was transported to the hospital where he passed away approximately 12 hours later.

In that context, Snyder asked the three councilmembers present to revisit the Aug. 16, 2004 resolution considered by the council, but ultimately tabled, that would ban the use of indoor furniture on outdoor porches. Snyder allowed that the proposal had been met with “derision” at the time, with the representatives from the Michigan Student Assembly saying that couches created a “home-like atmosphere.”

Later during caucus deliberations, Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) said that some of his fondest memories of college life were of taking a nap on the porch. He also mentioned that he’d recently bought a new couch, and had stored the old one on his porch for a time, before it eventually found a new home with his uncle. During that time, he said, he would have been out of compliance with an ordinance banning couches on porches.

Snyder noted that back in 2004, the city council had concluded that it could not legislate aesthetics. He sought to counter that idea by noting that we already legislate other kinds of aesthetics – like trash or cars parking on lawns.

Snyder then cited his 15 years of experience in the furniture industry with Herman Miller, saying that no furniture could be made permanently flame retardant. He concluded by saying, “I’m worried. I don’t know whose hands to put this in.”

Briere noted that the area of the city that Snyder had discussed – where he owns rental property – is a confluence of Ward 1, Ward 2, Ward 3 and Ward 4. She allowed that fires were undoubtedly a problem – whether it was a problem caused by couches on porches was difficult for her to say. She noted that the city council were not the parents of students, and observed that any ordinance would apply equally to student neighborhoods and other parts of the city, like the Old West Side and Pontiac Trail.

Kunselman introduced the idea that couches on porches could be addressed by landlords, by building prohibitions of porch couches into leases. He noted that the city council had received a letter from property management companies lobbying for a couch ban. Kunselman’s response: “You ban it!” Until he sees property management companies take a stronger position, he said, he was not favorably inclined to an ordinance on porch furniture.

Hieftje indicated that he thought Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) was taking a look at the ordinance language that had previously been proposed and that if he had to guess, he thought that the council would be considering something. In relevant part, the 2004 proposed ordinance reads [.txt file of 2004 proposed couch ban resolution]:

Upholstered or other furniture designed or manufactured primarily for indoor use shall not be used or left:
1. On residential unenclosed, exterior porches or balconies
2. In an exposed open area of private property
Exceptions:
1. Wood, metal or plastic furniture.
2. Outdoor patio furniture with weather resistant cushions
3. Upholstered furniture designated for pre-paid special pick-up by public or private haulers complying with sections 2:7 and 2:12 of Chapter 26 of this Code.

Fuller Road Station

Gwen Nystuen, who’s a member of the city’s park advisory commission (PAC), asked at the caucus about answers to questions that had been compiled from a Feb. 10, 2010 public meeting on Fuller Road Station. She said that the questions collected at the meeting had been posted on the city’s website, but that the answers had not. The questions that PAC had posed about the project had also not been given answers.

Mayor John Hieftje and Sabra Briere (Ward 1) indicated that they’d look into getting the answers to those questions posted – Briere composed an email on the spot to someone at the city.

Fuller Road Station – a proposed parking structure and bus station, and possibly an eventual train station – has been controversial from the point of view of PAC, due to the land’s status as parkland. But it’s also been controversial from the point of view of its financing. The city has not yet put forward a plan to finance its share of the city-University of Michigan joint project.

Fuller Road Station can be connected to a question asked by resident Brad Mikus at caucus, about $750,000 in the city’s economic development fund. At the council’s most recent meeting, April 12, to focus on the city’s budget, Sandi Smith (Ward 1) drew out the fact from city administrator Roger Fraser that the proposed budget would provide authorization for spending the $750,000, but he said that there was no spending plan for the money.

Both Hieftje and Fraser have stated publicly that no general fund money will be used to pay for Fuller Road Station. The city’s capital improvements plan shows the money coming from the city’s economic development fund. At caucus, Briere and Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) traced the history of the money currently in the economic development fund – it had been appropriated from the general fund to pay for free parking incentives for Google. The $750,000 is the amount that is now left over. Briere indicated at the caucus that the expectation by some had been that if the money were not used for that original purpose, it would revert to the city’s general fund.

Asked if he would consider the $750,000 currently in the economic development fund to be general fund money – thus not eligible for use on Fuller Road Station, Hieftje said he hadn’t thought about that question. Kunselman, in contrast, said flatly: “It’s general fund money.” Attaching a different label to it did not change the status of the money as general fund money, he said. Kunselman compared it to “Steve” versus “Stephen” – “I’m Steve, but I’m also Stephen, still the same person.”

Parking Plan and Fine Schedule

On the agenda for Monday’s council meeting is a presentation of a parking plan from the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority. [Chronicle coverage: "Parking Report Portends City-DDA Tension"] Parking is generally a fertile ground for Ann Arbor discussion and Sunday’s caucus was no different.

Questioned by residents about features of the plan to be presented by the DDA, mayor John Hieftje, who also sits on the DDA board, stressed that the council would not be taking action on the plan – they’d simply be receiving the report.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) noted that a parking issue on the agenda that would possibly result in council action was a proposed increase in fines for parking violations. [Previous Chronicle coverage: "Parking Fines to Increase in Ann Arbor?"] The increase for one of the the most common violations – expired meters – would be bumped from $15 to $20. The discounted amount for those who pay the ticket immediately would remain $10.

The new fine schedule is estimated to generate an additional $635,000 in revenue over the current levels, and that additional revenue has been baked into the budget that will be presented formally by city administrator Roger Fraser on Monday night.

Residents at the caucus questioned the wisdom of making the assumption of the extra revenue. Briere allowed that the budgeting process was not an exact forecast. It involved trying to overestimate expenses and underestimate revenues, she said. These estimates are based on expenses and revenues in past years, but ultimately no one could know the future.

Currently, the parking system for the city is administered by the DDA under an agreement that was struck in 2005 and included payments of up to $10 million over the life of the 10-year deal. Mid-way through the term of the contract, the DDA has paid the full amount of the contract.

The city council and the DDA each have a committee charged with the task of renegotiating the parking agreement between the two entities, with the city hoping that the DDA will agree to continue paying the city $2 million a year. At caucus, Hieftje indicated he would be “very surprised” if the DDA did not agree to make that payment for FY 2011.

Asked by resident Nancy Kaplan whether the DDA was interested in making the right to enforce parking rules a part of the current negotiations over a possible $2 million payment, Hieftje confirmed that several members of the DDA board were interested in that possibility. He cautioned, however, that it’s not clear how such a plan would be implemented. Among the challenges is the geographic question of enforcement of those meters outside the DDA district. Another major challenge is a labor union issue – enforcement is currently performed by unionized labor in the form of the city’s community standards officers.

Caucus discussion of parking issues also included a review of the new ePark stations that have been installed in downtown areas. Jim Fuester, an interior designer with Mir’s Oriental Rugs on Main Street, reported that in working the “front lines” of downtown he’s encountered numerous complaints about the new stations from customers. He said that he’s resorted to going out to the meters with clients to help them learn how to use the machines – just so that they are able to spend time in his store without risking a fine.

A suggestion for the machines made by Fuester was to provide an audio version of the instructions – when the glare from the sun hits the screen, it’s impossible to read, he said.

Fuester’s experience with the machines contrasted with Kathy Griswold’s – she said she loves the machines.

But Griswold feared that the city was not going to collect the amount of revenue it expected from ticketing, because based on her own experience, she was not getting the number of tickets she previously received. She wondered if the city was still putting the same resources into ticketing.

Briere allowed that revenues from ticketing were  down this year, but that based on a Chronicle item she’d seen, she knew that the city continued to ticket.

East Stadium Bridges

On the council’s Monday night agenda is an item that authorizes the city’s application for another round of funding from the state’s local bridge fund. [See Chronicle coverage: "State Board: No Funding for Stadium Bridges"] Mayor John Hieftje indicated that the city hoped to receive some money from the state and was also pursuing funding at the federal level. As part of the city’s effort to secure some federal funding, Hieftje reported, Congressman John Dingell was setting up a meeting with the assistant secretary to the U.S. Dept. of Transportation.

The upshot of the effort to secure funding was that the construction scheduled to start this fall based on a funding plan using just the city’s street reconstruction millage will be delayed until the spring.

Asked whether the option of an at-grade crossing had been explored – as opposed to retaining a bridge at that location – Hieftje and Sabra Briere (Ward 1) indicated that yes, it had. In addition to the engineering and logistical challenges, they said, the thing that made it impossible was the Ann Arbor Railroad’s refusal to give permission for an at-grade crossing of the rail track.

King School Crosswalk

Resident Kathy Griswold addressed the caucus on the issue of a mid-block crosswalk in front of King Elementary School, which she’s been seeking to have moved to an intersection since fall of last year. She said that the new crosswalk had been designed, funded and had been supported by the neighborhood. She contended that city administrator Roger Fraser had stopped the project. When Todd Roberts, superintendent of Ann Arbor Public Schools, had asked Fraser about it, she contended, Fraser’s reply had been: “It’s not going to happen.”

Mayor John Hieftje indicated that he thought a meeting was being set up. Griswold confirmed that attempts were being made –  by the mayor’s assistant – to set up a meeting, but that people were not available and there was difficulty scheduling, that had persisted over considerable time. “This stalling technique has gone on for months,” she said.

Griswold noted that she had followed the process: the crosswalk had been reviewed by the transportation safety committee, had the support of the King Elementary principal and the transportation director of AAPS. She concluded “I’m a bit frustrated.”

The East Stadium bridges, looking west along Stadium Boulevard. (Photo by the writer.)

The city of Ann Arbor’s attempt to start accumulating cash to replace the East Stadium Boulevard bridges failed on Thursday when a statewide board appropriating money for large bridges declined to give the city a share of the available dollars.

City officials had hoped to secure a portion of the $5.7 million in federal and state dollars awarded by the Local Bridges Advisory Board on Thursday at a meeting in Lansing.

But with a limited pot of money, and applications for projects totaling tens of millions of dollars, the eight-member board opted to put the resources behind smaller-ticket bridges.

“Throwing a little bit at that big a problem isn’t going to get people anywhere,” said board chairman Robert Clegg, the city engineer in Port Huron.

Why Ann Arbor Didn’t Win State Funding

A share of the available dollars would have provided just a fraction of the $23 million that Ann Arbor officials estimate it will take to replace the bridges, which lead over the railroad tracks and State Street just east of the University of Michigan’s football stadium and Crisler Arena.

In contrast, significant portions of the three bridges that were funded on Thursday will be covered by the money approved by the board. The money will pay for projects in Kalamazoo County and in the cities of Hastings and Manistee.

Ann Arbor’s proposal was, in fact, the most costly of the 10 projects before the bridge board. And board member Wayne Harrall, of the Kent County Road Commission, also commented on the minimal impact an appropriation would have on the second largest project – a bridge in the City of Sterling Heights. That request also went unfunded.

Other concerns weakened Ann Arbor’s funding request as well.

Clegg, in particular, faulted the city’s application for the absence of any financial commitment from the University of Michigan.

“You’ve got a large partner next to the road that’s generating traffic impact,” he told Ann Arbor city engineers who were in Lansing to address the board, which is made up of representatives from county and local governments. “I don’t understand why the university hasn’t stepped up or used its influence to get federal dollars, and it’s disheartening.”

City of Ann Arbor engineers Mike Nearing, left, and Homayoon Pirooz responded to questions at the state Local Bridges Advisory Board meeting on Thursday in Lansing. (Photo by the writer.)

Ann Arbor engineer Homayoon Pirooz responded that it was unfair to punish the city for UM’s decision.

“Yes, the university benefits (from the bridges) like everyone else does,” he said. “We wish the university would contribute, but it’s not and the city can’t change that.”

Pirooz told the state board that the city was prepared to take on the lion’s share of the cost, if necessary.

That would mean using local street millage dollars normally dedicated to paving and maintenance. If Ann Arbor needed to use those locally-generated dollars on the bridges, most other maintenance work would be suspended for 3-4 years, he said. “It would have a significant impact on streets and roads.”

City officials have also contemplated the prospect of something like a 50-50 split between local and other funding sources, and of course still hope for a larger state and federal contribution, Priooz said.

The city is seeking federal funds either from a pending transportation bill or an economic-recovery program, known by the acronym TIGER (Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery.)

It’s possible that yet another federal program could provide a low-interest loan to pay for sidewalks and bike lanes, Pirooz told The Chronicle. “If we get a little here and a little there, hopefully it will add up,” he said.

Clegg would have been happier to see more of that “adding up” done before an application for assistance reached the board.

“I’ve seen communities work and work and get [congressional] earmarks and then come in and tell us how much more they needed,” he told The Chronicle after the board meeting. “That gives you something to work with. This is a really big project and Ann Arbor’s asking ‘What can you do for us?’”

Short-Term Work to Address Safety Issues

Built before 1930, the bridges carry traffic over State Street and Ann Arbor Railroad tracks. They’ve been subject to weight limits for some time. Two of the four lanes were closed to take the load off a weakened beam on the State Street bridge earlier this year.

City officials last month decided to remove the sagging beam as well as several others alongside it, based on the advice of an outside consultant.

That will eliminate the risk of concrete dropping on to State Street. It will also leave “a big hole in the bridge,” said Pirooz, who heads the city’s project management office.

The beams would need to be removed anyway, as part of an eventual bridge replacement.

Concrete barriers and fencing will be put in place as part of the work scheduled to take place Nov. 15-18.

Statewide, Condition of Bridges a Concern

A federal bridge engineer attending the five-hour session in Lansing expressed concern about the condition of the state’s bridges in general and the East Stadium bridge over State Street in particular.

Jon Nekritz, Federal Highway Administration division bridge engineer for Michigan, said he was relieved to hear that a crumbling concrete beam will be removed later this month.

“I’m real concerned about this and other bridges I’ve seen recently,” he said. “We need to take this much more seriously than we are.”

He voiced similar worries about an Oakland County bridge that was also reviewed for potential funding.

Mark Harrison, bridge program manager for the Michigan Dept. of Transportation, at Thursday's meeting of the Local Bridges Advisory Board in Lansing. (Photo by the writer.)

Michigan Department of Transportation’s Mark Harrison, an engineer and the bridge program manager, said he’s seen a marked increase in bridges in poor condition – but no additional money.

Clegg also pointed to the lack of funding. “It’s a little bit daunting to have tens of millions of dollars in projects and less than $6 million to award,” he said.

Despite that, there was no objective set of criteria or any real system used to make the decisions.

A rating system is used in decisions made at the regional level, said Harrison. But members of the state-level board use their own discretion.

For Clegg, that included the view that the East Stadium plan is simply overlarge.

“They’ve got two bridges connecting, sidewalks and bicycle lanes. They’re going to raise them from where they are now… If you need more clearance, that’s what you do. It’s just too much,” he told The Chronicle.

The planned replacement bridges will be higher to meet current design standards. Like the old structures, they will have two lanes in each direction. Unlike the old structures, they will have sidewalks on both sides and bicycle lanes.

Federal authorities require both, said Nekritz, the federal bridge engineer.

Only one Ann Arbor resident – Arnold Goetzke – attended the session. But rather than call for support, Goetzke spoke against funding for new bridges and instead favored at-grade crossings. Goetze also addressed the Ann Arbor city council at the conclusion of their Thursday meeting during public commentary. He reiterating the view that he’s expressed before to them: The no-bridge option should be given formal study.

What About Bridge Replacement?

However, the preliminary design for the new bridges is done. Pirooz said work has begun on construction plans. “We hope to have the blueprints by midsummer.”

Work to replace the bridges is expected to begin next October, Pirooz told The Chronicle. The new bridges would be completed in the fall of 2012, he said. If neither the earmarks on the transportation bill nor the TIGER grant application are successful, they may well use up the majority of Ann Arbor’s street repair millage funds.

A yet-to-be-made decision about whether to close traffic completely or allow one-way traffic during construction would affect the duration of construction. That decision will fall to the city council.

The bridges carry an average of 25,000 plus cars a day.

About the writer: Judy McGovern lives in Ann Arbor. She has worked as a journalist here, and in Ohio, New York and several other states.

Leigh Greden, who chaired the meeting as fourth in the line of mayoral succession, did not at any point abuse the temporary power by saying, "Everybody show me your hands!" Sabra Briere (Ward 1) and Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) are in fact sussing out which version of the Argo Dam resolution the city clerk had circulated. (Photo by the writer.)

Ann Arbor City Council meeting (Oct. 19, 2009): A city council whose ranks were reduced by four members – due to family medical issues and personal illness – tabled a resolution on Argo Dam that would have expressed the body’s intent to keep Argo Dam in place and to perform necessary repairs mandated by the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality.

The tabling came only after long deliberations, which included a recess, and focused mainly on the question of tabling versus postponing until a date certain.

Several people spoke during reserved public commentary time on the issue of Argo Dam. But the dam question was somewhat overshadowed for some in the audience by a presentation on homelessness at the beginning of the meeting from Mary Jo Callan, who’s director of the combined county-city office of community development. Said one speaker during public commentary: “After hearing the stats on homelessness, I’m ashamed to be standing here talking to you about Argo Dam.”

The presentation on sheltering the homeless – especially during the winter – included a specific call to action from Ellen Schulmeister, director of the Shelter Association of Washtenaw County. She asked community members to start conversations at their churches, synagogues, mosques or other community groups about how they might be able to provide volunteer support and space to expand the current rotating shelter program. Schulmeister asked that the conversations begin now, “So that when we ask, you’re ready to go.”

In other major business, the city council authorized the expenditure of $100,000 for removal of five failing beams on the East Stadium bridge over State Street – beams which run under a portion of the bridge currently closed to traffic. The work is scheduled for Sunday, Nov. 15 through Tuesday, Nov. 17 and will require the closing of State Street during the work.

The council also approved the next step in the creation of a Business Improvement Zone (BIZ) along Main Street between William and Huron streets.

“These people are not strangers. They are our neighbors.”

Background to the presentation on the homeless

Mary Jo Callan’s presentation to city council on the specific strategies that are under consideration to increase sheltering capacity short-term – as well as to increase the number of affordable housing units in the longer term – came in a context of recent heightened community awareness of the plight of the homeless population in and around Ann Arbor.

Slide from a presentation given at city council's Oct. 19 meeting showing the faces of the homeless.

That awareness has come in part from publicity surrounding a tent community, Camp Take Notice, which was evicted in September from its location behind Arborland, as well as from an area just north of the park-and-ride lot at Ann Arbor-Saline and I-94, where it had re-located. [Previous Chronicle coverage: "Laws of Physics: Homeless Camp Moves"]

The city council has also heard from advocates for the homeless at public commentary during some of its recent meetings. And a public demonstration in front of the Delonis Shelter last week called attention to the arraignment of a homeless camper on charges of trespassing. [Stopped.Watched. item: "Delonis Center on Huron"]

Callan’s presentation stemmed in part from a series of at least three meetings held in late September and early October among key community leaders and staff to explore alternatives to address the situation. The meetings included Sabra Briere (Ward 1), Sandi Smith (Ward 1), Ellen Schulmeister (director of the Shelter Association of Washtenaw County), Susan Pollay (executive director of the Downtown Development Authority), Jennifer L. Hall (housing program coordinator in community development), Andrea Plevek (human services analyst), Deb Pippins (program administrator for PORT), and Mayor John Hieftje.

Camp Take Notice, which hews to a principle of self-governance, has asked local churches to sponsor the camp in the form of land use. Discussion at the series of meetings reflected some of the obstacles to the support of encampments as part of a community strategy of sheltering those without homes. Besides concerns about the necessary sanitation infrastructure (chemical or composting toilets) and fire hazards arising from attempts to heat tents, there are worries about legal liability. Still, at least one congregation locally is exploring the possibility of responding to the camp’s request.

Callan’s presentation to council acknowledged the homeless camps in and around town, putting the total estimated numbers at anywhere from 30 to 80 people. The residents of such camps had a variety of histories, Callan said. Some people have been through the existing shelter system and are still homeless, while others are unwilling to follow program guidelines on sobriety, and still others do not want to participate in a shelter program at all.

The strategy that Callan presented was not centered around homeless camps. After sketching out a fairly grim statistical picture, Callan described some short-term expansions of the existing shelter system, plus longer-term affordable housing solutions. Total estimated cost of the short-term solutions could reach close to $200,000 for a full year of implementation.

Statistics on the growing crisis and existing capacity

Callan projected numbers on the wall showing the increased demand on area shelters: The number of single adults has increased 20% from 919 to 1,106; the number of chronically homeless adults has grown 33% from 179 to 238; and the number of families has risen 29% from 368 to 474, which reflects an increase in total family members from 1,162 to 1,359.

Those numbers have had an impact on organizations that provide shelter. The Interfaith Hospitality Network has received a 16% increase in calls for shelter, but perhaps more significantly, the group has seen a 52% increase in length of shelter stay. SOS Community Services has seen a 22% increase in requests for housing crisis services. The Salvation Army has served 11% more people at its shelter and seen a 30% increase in assistance requests for the newly unemployed. The Shelter Association of Washtenaw County has served 44% more people.

The current local shelter inventory presented by Callan includes 159 beds and 50 places for single adults in the winter only:

Shelter Association of Washtenaw County
     Delonis Center – 50 beds (individual adults)
     Delonis Center – 25 chairs serve as warming center
     Winter Rotating Shelter – 25 overnight spaces (individual adults)
Salvation Army: 35 beds (families and individual adults)
SOS: 6 family units/24 beds (families only)
Interfaith Hospitality Network (IHN):  6 family units/24 beds (families only)
Ozone House: 6 beds (youth only; ages 10 to 17)

-

Proposed short-term action

The proposed short-term actions, which Callan acknowledged are only temporary, have as a goal to keep more people safe during the approaching cold weather. As Ned Staebler put it later in the meeting, the effort is partly to make clear that “This is not the kind of place where we let people freeze to death on the streets.” [Staebler, who recently announced his candidacy for state representative in the 53rd District, chairs the Housing and Human Services Board.]

There are two components to the short-term strategy – one for individuals and one for families.

The first is to increase by 50 spaces the sheltering capacity for individual adults. This is proposed to be accomplished, Callan said, by (i) increasing the number of winter rotating shelter spaces from 25 to 50, and (ii) adding 25 beds to the Delonis Shelter. The increase in Delonis beds would be accomplished by moving the warming center to community kitchen space through the winter.

Cost for the single-individual component of the short-term strategy would be $25,000 for the winter, or $55,000 for the full year.

The second component of the short-term strategy is to provide housing vouchers (a rent subsidy) for 10 additional families. Callan explained the conceptual difference in the approach to families versus individuals by pointing out there is no equivalent to the Delonis Center for families. So there’s no existing family shelter facility where some additional space can be eked out. A temporary shelter-type response would entail creating a new group shelter space and support structure. [One possibility considered and rejected in the course of the three meetings of community leaders and staff was to remodel the Ann Arbor Community Center].

Instead of temporarily sheltering families for a short time all at one location, the idea of vouchers is to allow families to provide for the potential of longer-term stability in housing that could be permanent – at least through a complete school year, so that children would not need to switch schools. The cost of rent vouchers for 12 months would be similar in cost to a group shelter for 4 months, Callan said. She described the plan to work with the nonprofit Avalon Housing, the Ann Arbor Housing Commission, and private landlords to fill vacant rental units.

Cost of the family component of the short-term strategy would be $45,000-$55,000 for the winter, or $140,000-$155,000 for a full year.

In responding to Callan’s presentation, Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2), who also serves on the Housing and Human Services Board, asked Callan to address the other increased costs that are incurred with increased numbers of homeless people. Callan said she could not offer a dollar amount, but that there were additional costs associated with public safety, incarceration, and mental illness interventions.

Leigh Greden (Ward 3) drew out for emphasis the part of Callan’s presentation where she discussed the longer-term measures that the city had undertaken: Since 2005 there had been 58 new units of supportive housing created, and 161 units maintained. Greden asked her to explain what “supportive housing” is. Callan clarified that while “affordable housing” meant that it was accessible to poor people, “supportive housing” was accessible to those who had more challenges related to housing stability than just financial issues. Supportive housing, she said, was for people who needed help through life skills training, case management services, or psychiatric services.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1), in addition to clarifying what the cost of the proposed short-term solutions would be, drew out the specific ways that community members can provide their assistance to meet the immediate short-term need. Ellen Schulmeister, director of the Shelter Association of Washtenaw County, identified the rotating shelter expansion as an area where community volunteer help would be needed. Currently, congregations at different churches take one-week shifts staffing temporary warming shelters at their churches. The Delonis Shelter checks in people before they’re transported to the churches.

Ned Staebler, who spoke to council in his capacity as chair of the Housing and Human Services Board, responded to Smith’s question of specific ways people could help by suggesting that they look to whatever nonprofit or community group they were members of. Staebler, in his previous remarks to the council, had characterized the homeless population this way: “These people are not strangers. They are our neighbors.”

A funding request for the short-term proposal could come before the city council at its Nov. 5 meeting.

Artist's conception of what the Huron River would look like if Argo Dam were removed. (Image links to higher resolution file.)

Argo Dam

Eight of the 10 speakers who signed up for reserved time to speak during public comment at the start of the council meeting addressed the issue of Argo Dam. [For preview Chronicle coverage, see "Finally a Dam Decision on Argo?" ] Notable among those who spoke in favor of keeping the dam in place was Bob Johnson, former Ward 1 representative to the city council. Laura Rubin, executive director of the Huron River Watershed Council, spoke in favor of the dam’s removal and for a formal public hearing by city council on the issue.

Rubin showed the council an artist’s rendering of the river with the dam removed. That prompted some commentary from speakers who weighed in for keeping the dam, who questioned whether the river would follow the same course downstream from the dam that it currently does.

For council’s part, their deliberations focused exclusively on the question of process, as opposed to the dam-in/dam-out question. At the beginning of the meeting, the dam resolution was moved forward on the agenda, to the slot just after the consent agenda, in consideration of the many attendees who were in council chambers for that item alone.

Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2), one of the sponsors of the resolution, began by indicating he’d be moving to postpone it until the first council meeting in December. But before making the motion for postponement, he said he wanted to set the record straight with regard to some specific issues. On the question of adequate public input, he recalled how the subject has been talked about for nine years, and ticked through the various points of public process along the way, summarizing by saying that there’d been “quite a lot of dialogue.”

Sue McCormick, the city’s director of public services, had delivered an update to council at its Sept. 8 meeting. Rapundalo reported that after that update, Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), who was the lead sponsor of the resolution, had begun communications with himself and the mayor to try to be proactive about addressing infrastructure issues identified by the MDEQ – the toe drains in the earthen berm, which needed repair or replacement.

The desire to fix the basic infrastructure and to “clear the decks” with the MDEQ had been the only motivation behind the resolution, Rapundalo said. He expressed discomfort with the idea of going to court with MDEQ, saying that there were many higher priorities for the city to deal with, such as the approaching budget season. [At the budget and labor committee meeting immediately prior to the council meeting, councilmembers and Tom Crawford, CFO for the city, began calendaring the process, with the idea of slotting in certain elements slightly earlier than last year. For example, the council's budget retreat may be convened in December instead of January, as it was last year.]

Rapundalo also indicated that he wanted a public hearing attached to the meeting when the resolution would be considered.

There was mild confusion when Rapundalo expressed some frustration that the most recent version of the resolution was not reflected in the council’s packet, despite assurances from staff that it had been updated. Subsequent sleuthing at the table indicated that the version he’d sent via email 20 minutes earlier was accurately reflected in the online packet.

When it appeared that the updated text would not be read into the record, Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) weighed in to point out that the newly revised council rules on electronic communications required that the language be read aloud, and Rapundalo then did so.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1), who was a co-sponsor of the resolution, then addressed the issue of whether there should be a public hearing on it. She said that from her point of view, the expectation of a public hearing had always been attached to a resolution on the dam-in/dam-out question – which this resolution was not. This resolution, she contended, was not meant to decide the longer-term issue, but was meant to address the shorter-term maintenance issue.

Based on the original text of the resolution posted with Friday’s agenda addition – which meeting attendees may have had in mind – Smith’s contention could have been somewhat confusing. But given the revision that Rapundalo read aloud, her remarks make more sense. Here’s the revised version with some emphasis added:

Resolution Pertaining to Argo Dam [Revised]

WHEREAS, The City of Ann Arbor has for years owned and maintained several dams along the Huron River, and
WHEREAS, Studies of the Huron River have raised the question of the need to manage the river and each of the impoundments created by these dams, and
WHEREAS, The Argo Dam and Argo Pond have recently become the focal point for considerable discussion about the “pros and cons” of keeping the Argo Dam in place, and
WHEREAS, The Ann Arbor community enjoys many recreational opportunities and environmental attributes created by the existence of Argo Pond within the Huron River system, and
WHEREAS, The best interests of the Ann Arbor community will be served by preserving the Argo Dam at this time given its sound structural integrity, and
WHEREAS, The Argo Dam includes several associated structural features, including the “headrace embankment”, which has drawn the concern of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) for safety reasons related to the adequacy of toe-drains which are designed to drain seepage from the headrace, and
WHEREAS, Repairs to the headrace embankment could be completed for a small fraction of the cost of removing the entire dam, and therefore be it

RESOLVED, The Ann Arbor City Council declares its intent to maintain the Argo Dam and Argo Pond for the time being and allow staff to develop and implement specific strategies to mitigate any infrastructure deficiencies with the headrace embankment and thereby satisfy the MDEQ’s requirements, and
RESOLVED, The Ann Arbor City Council directs the City Administrator to take actions in support of this declared intent, including identifying a timetable and necessary funding sources to support the infrastructure improvements.

The original resolution differs mostly by ordering and the lack of temporal qualifiers:

Resolution Pertaining to Argo Dam [Original]

WHEREAS, The City of Ann Arbor has for years owned and maintained several dams along the Huron River;
WHEREAS, Studies of the Huron River have raised the question of the need to manage the river and each of the impoundments created by these dams;
WHEREAS, The Argo Dam and Argo Pond have recently become the focal point for considerable discussion about the “pros and cons” of keeping the Argo Dam in place;
WHEREAS, The Ann Arbor community enjoys many recreational opportunities and environmental attributes created by the existence of Argo Pond within the Huron River system;
WHEREAS, The Argo Dam includes several structural features, including the “headrace embankment”, which has drawn the concern of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) for safety reasons related to the adequacy of toe-drains which are designed to drain seepage from the headrace;
WHEREAS, Repairs to the headrace could be completed for a small fraction of the cost of removing the entire dam; and
WHEREAS, the best interests of the Ann Arbor community will be served by preserving the Argo Dam and all the amenities associated with the dam,

RESOLVED, The Ann Arbor City Council declares its intent to maintain the Argo Dam and Argo Pond and directs the City Administrator to develop specific strategies to mitigate any infrastructure deficiencies with the headrace embankment to satisfy the MDEQ’s requirements, and to take actions in support of this declared intent, including identifying a timetable and necessary funding sources to support the work.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) asked for a recess in order to adequately assess the language of the resolution, pointing out that the most recent revision had been emailed only 20 minutes ago, and that even the original text of the resolution had come relatively late – on the previous Friday.

Hohnke’s request for a recess was granted by Leigh Greden, who chaired the meeting in the absence of Mayor John Hieftje, Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), and Margie Teall (Ward 4), who precede him in the line of mayoral succession.

On return from the recess, Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) weighed in against the idea of postponing, saying that tabling the resolution instead was the proper thing to do.  The resolution as it was written, Taylor contended, clouded the intended effect, which was to decouple the issue of the dam-in/dam-out question from the issue of needed repairs to the earthen berm. Instead of decoupling those two issues, Taylor said, the language of the resolution intertwined them.

Taylor was concerned that by postponing the resolution to the first meeting in December, there would not be an opportunity to alter the language so as to make clear to the public what the language would be for the resolution on which the public hearing would be held. He sketched out how the tabling would allow council to bring back the resolution at a subsequent meeting, revise the language in a way to clarify that the two issues of dam-in/dam-out versus the need to repair were decoupled, then postpone to a certain date with the attached public hearing – something he allowed was a “tortured process.” But, he concluded, “That’s what happens under circumstances such as these.”

In a  follow-up to an emailed query after the meeting, Taylor wrote to The Chronicle that what he had in mind was a single resolution for a future council meeting that would achieve alteration of the language in a way that would be transparent as to council’s intent concerning the fate of the original resolution: “I think there should be a single resolution to de-table [the original resolution], amend, postpone to a date certain and hold a related PH [public hearing] on that date. This resolution should appear in the initial packet [of meeting materials].”

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) echoed Taylor’s sentiments, saying that by postponing the resolution, the issue of whether to keep the dam in the longer term was coupled with the intent to repair the berm. She said she’d rather not see those issues coupled.

In light of Taylor’s comments, Smith then clarified with city attorney Stephen Postema that it was possible to amend the language of the resolution in the future, whether it was postponed or tabled. [Taylor's point, however, had seemed to be about the timing of the alteration of the language, not about the possibility of altering the language per se.] She then said she felt she’d rather vote down the postponement and vote down the resolution itself, and then bring back a different resolution with clearer language.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) queried Smith about her preference: Did she want to decide the resolution tonight? Answer: Yes. Smith said she’d vote no on tabling, postponing and the resolution itself.

For his part, Hohnke said that his preference was to table the resolution, saying that the phrase “for the time being” was incredibly unclear for a resolution of this magnitude.

Rapundalo, arguing for the postponement instead of the tabling, suggested that to achieve the timing of the alteration of language that Taylor wanted in advance of a public hearing, a second postponement could be moved. Tabling it, Rapundalo contended, makes it “out of sight, out of mind. We want to keep it on the front burner … The greatest failure is that council hasn’t acted.”

City attorney Stephen Postema advised that to execute Rapundalo’s suggestion of two successive postponements – one to get the language right, and the second to postpone to the date when council planned the public hearing and its vote – it would be best to unlink the public hearing from the postponement that council was at that moment considering.

Rapundalo was able to unlink the hearing from the postponement, only because Briere moved to suspend the council rules to allow him to speak a third time. Typically, motions to suspend the rules apply generally to all councilmembers, but this one was specific to Rapundalo, which prompted him to quip, “I feel honored!”

Greden weighed in last saying he was against the postponement, adding that the council should either table it or vote on the resolution and vote it down. The roll call vote had only Rapundalo in support of postponing to December.

Smith then moved to table the resolution.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to table the resolution on the Argo Dam.

Stadium Bridges

A recent report from a engineering consultant, who was asked to perform an extra inspection of the East Stadium bridges, recommended removal of five beams supporting the section of the bridge (the southern lanes) that has been closed to traffic. They are no longer performing their designed function, the report states, and leaving them in place poses the potential hazard of falling pieces of concrete to traffic traveling on State Street under the bridge. The winter freeze-thaw and the use of de-icing salts would tend to exacerbate that potential hazard.

Before council were two resolutions concerning the bridges. One was to authorize the city administrator to enter into a construction contract to remove the five beams (up to $100,000) and the second was for an agreement to relocate power lines near the bridge to be out of the way of construction cranes ($340,000).

Michael Nearing, a city engineer and senior project manager, explained to the council that the beam removal was out for bid with three different companies.

Homayoon Pirooz, project management manager with the city of Ann Arbor, apprised the council that the beam work was planned in a way to have a minimal impact on Stadium Boulevard traffic. Pirooz indicated that it was planned for a Sunday through Tuesday. [It's now planned specifically for Sunday, Nov. 15 through Tuesday, Nov. 17] After the work is done, the traffic pattern on the bridge will be the same as it is now. What will be different is that concrete barriers will prevent cars from driving off the new southern edge of the bridge, as opposed to the current orange barrels that provide a visual cue not to traverse the southern lanes.

At Mike Anglin’s (Ward 5) request, Pirooz reminded the council of the funding possibilities. The TIGER grant for which the city has applied could fund the entire $21 million cost, but there’s intense national competition for those grants. [TIGER stands for Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery, a federal program.] Notification on the outcome of the TIGER grant application will come no later than Feb. 17, 2010, but it could come sooner. There’s a  federal highway re-authorization bill that has support for earmarks from Ann Arbor’s Congressional delegation. And finally, the state’s Local Bridge Program offers a chance for as much as $2-3 million, Pirooz said. There’s a meeting on Nov. 5 of the Local Bridge Program administrators – Ann Arbor will make a presentation at that meeting, and funding will be determined then.

Leigh Greden (Ward 3) added that there are also various other alternative funding sources the city is exploring with the help of state Rep. Rebekah Warren.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to approve both resolutions related to the Stadium bridges.

Ed Shaffran, who's one of the leaders of an effort to establish the BIZ on Main Street. (Photo by the writer.)

Business Improvement Zone

[See previous Chronicle coverage on the proposed BIZ between William and Huron streets on South Main, based on last week's city council work session: "Trains, Trash, and Taxes"]

Before the council was a resolution to support the creation of a business improvement zone by authorizing the city clerk to begin public notifications associated with the next phase in the process, which city administrator Roger Fraser described as “not one of the most swift,” saying that he admired the perseverance of the people involved.

Two people spoke during time reserved for public commentary at the beginning of the meeting. Bob Dascola, who owns a barbershop on State Street, said that his family had been in business in Ann Arbor for more than 70 years. In support of the BIZ he cited the example of Boulder, Colo., where a business improvement district, which is similar to a BIZ, had so well enhanced the downtown area that it had put a mall out of business on the edge of town.

Lee Adams introduced himself as a masters of urban planning student at the University of Michigan who had interned at a BID in Washington, D.C. He spoke in favor of the council’s initiation of the next step in the process for creating a BIZ on Main Street. He said the fact that Main Street was iconic – as evidenced by the recent American Planning Association designation as a Great Street – meant that it was worth continued investment. A BIZ would help business retention and growth, plus provide a unified voice for business owners, as well as economies of scale for services.

Leigh Greden (Ward 3) noted that supporters of the BIZ in the audience “looked content.” They were not asked to the podium to answer questions, nor did they wish to communicate additional information to the council.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to authorize the next step in the creation of the BIZ on South Main.

Planned Unit Development (PUD) Proposals

The council considered two different PUD rezoning proposals. The first related to a Briarwood Circle location where two four-story hotels, consisting of 227 rooms and 227 parking spaces, are proposed.

The second, for Casa Dominick’s, concerned a consolidation of properties under one zoning classification on Monroe Street, and addresses existing zoning nonconformities. The expanded PUD district comprises four areas (A, B, C and D) for regulation purposes. Areas A and B will permit restaurant; residential; grocery, prepared food and beverage sales; classroom and educational instruction; beauty salon; general, medical and dental office uses. Area C will permit hotel and residential use. Area D will permit artists and craft studios with sales and residential use.

Public Commentary

Thomas Partridge: Partridge spoke at the public hearings on both PUD proposals. He asked the council not to approve any zoning changes until there were ordinance changes and amendment to the PUDs to assure access to public transportation to the sites and a requirement that developers pay into a fund to finance development of affordable housing on adjacent sites.

Earl Ophoff: Ophoff, of Midwestern Consulting, spoke in connection with the Briarwood Circle hotel project, essentially just to establish that he was present and available to answer questions when the council took up the matter for a vote.

John Barrie: Barrie spoke on behalf of the owner of Casa Dominick’s. He described the zoning revision as addressing the land’s transitional function between the University of Michigan campus, which surrounds it on three sides, and the residential neighborhood to the south. The rezoning, he said, would allow for slightly greater density and would consolidate all of the restaurant uses on one property.

Outcome: The council unanimously approved both PUD proposals.

Communications from Council

In his communications from council, Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) noted that council’s recent revisions to its rules didn’t constitute an ethics policy. He indicated that in the next couple of weeks, there would be a policy brought forward to fill that gap.

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) called attention to a fundraiser for Meals on Wheels to be held at the Big Boy on Plymouth Road on Nov. 5 from 5-9 p.m. The public can participate by going to the restaurant and eating during that time period, with tips going to the nonprofit.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) reported that the Ann Arbor Skatepark Action Committee had held a workshop the previous day, which was facilitated by skatepark designer Wally Hollyday.

Public Commentary: End of Meeting

Often there are no members of the public who choose to address the council at the end of its meeting. At this meeting, however, five people made remarks to the council.

Thomas Partridge: Partridge noted that he’d called repeatedly for the last decade for the city to join with other municipalities to facilitate regional transportation, but had repeatedly been disappointed by the 7-member Ann Arbor Transportation Authority board. He alluded to the “AATA’s war against disabled people,” and said that the focus should not be on high-speed rail or service to the airport, but rather on basic bus service.

Tim Hull: Hull introduced himself as a graduate student in the school of information at the University of Michigan and expressed concern about the proposed changes in bus service as a result of the new Plymouth Road park-and-ride lot. He told council that while the AATA is proposing to continue weekend service on Route #2 on Green Road as far south as the park-and-ride lot, the weekend service on Route #2 on Green farther south and on Glazier Way and Earhart is proposed to be discontinued. He asked council to consider a focus by the AATA on residents as contrasted with commuters, and suggested that they look for future AATA board members who lived within the AATA service area.

Kathy Griswold: Griswold thanked councilmembers for the work they’d done so far on getting a crosswalk installed at the intersection of Waldenwood and Penberton drives, which would move it from its current mid-block location. She asked that action be taken within the next few weeks, while the concrete season lasts.

Jacob Djakovic: [spelling unconfirmed] He described an outdoor architectural tour beginning and ending at Liberty and Maynard streets, which he’d like to offer people for a fee. He was trying to make sure that in setting these tours, he did not violate any local laws. He’d heard some reaction that Nickels Arcade, for example, might not be a suitable location through which to lead a tour. He asked for any advice on relevant policies that might help him prepare.

Edward Vielmetti: Vielmetti told the council that on Oct. 6 he’d requested under the Freedom of Information Act all records related to sidewalk repair, including communications with the homeowner, for an address on Gott Street. He thanked the city staff, saying that the sidewalk had been repaired about 10 days after he’d made the request.

Present: Mike Anglin, Sabra Briere, Leigh Greden, Carsten Hohnke, Stephen Rapundalo, Sandi Smith, Christopher Taylor.

Absent: Tony Derezinski, John Hieftje, Marcia Higgins, Margie Teall.

Next council meeting: Thursday, Nov. 5, 2009 at 7 p.m. in council chambers, 2nd floor of the Guy C. Larcom, Jr. Municipal Building, 100 N. Fifth Ave. [confirm date]

Jim Kosteva, UM director of community relations, and Sue McCormick, director of public services for the city of Ann Arbor. Council agendas like the one Kosteva is holding are always printed that color – i.e., there was no pandering to the university reflected in the use of maize-colored paper. (Photo by the writer.)

Ann Arbor City Council meeting (Aug. 17, 2009): When Jim Kosteva appears at an Ann Arbor city council meeting, it usually means that there’s a city-university issue before the body – Kosteva is the university’s director of community relations.

Was it the report from city staff on the status of the East Stadium Boulevard Bridge replacement that had brought Kosteva to council’s chambers? There’ll be easements required from the university to complete that $22 million project.

But no, Kosteva was not there to hand over a giant fake check symbolizing a university contribution to reconstruction of the bridges.

However, he was there to affirm the university’s support for a different project – called FITS. University support will come to the tune of $327,733 out of a total project budget of $541,717 – for the site investigation, project definition and development of conceptual plans for the Fuller Intermodal Transportation Station (FITS). The station will be nestled between Fuller Road and East Medical Center Drive, just east of Fuller & Maiden Lane, near the university’s massive medical campus.

In other business, the city council put a charter amendment on the November ballot that would relax current charter requirements regarding publication of ordinances passed by the council. The Chronicle’s coverage of that charter amendment takes the form of a column published earlier this week.

The council also revisited a resolution it had passed at its previous meeting to establish a historic district study committee, along with a moratorium on demolition within the district. That moratorium was expanded Monday night to include all “work.”

And finally, as had been suggested at the council’s Aug. 16 Sunday caucus, councilmembers indicated that they’d be considering rules changes at their Sept. 8 meeting. In connection with that discussion, Mike Anglin (Ward 5) indicated he’d be calling for the city to make available all city council emails dating back to the year 2000.

East Stadium Bridges

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Bridge Background

Homayoon Pirooz, project management manager with the city of Ann Arbor, gave city councilmembers an update on the status of the bridges over East Stadium Boulevard. [Additional background in previous coverage by The Chronicle on the East Stadium bridges.]

Pirooz began with some background. The 13 bridges in Ann Arbor get biannual inspections and are given a Federal Sufficiency Rating (FSR), which is a 1-100 scale. There are two bridges at State & Stadium – one that spans State Street and one that spans the Ann Arbor Railroad tracks just to the west of State Street. The bridge over the railroad tracks was built in 1928 and is considered functionally obsolete. Its FSR is 61.5.

The bridge over State Street was built in 1917. In addition to being functionally obsolete, it currently has an FSR of 2 out of 100 after holding steady at 21-22 for a number of years. The deterioration, Pirooz said, had been rapid and had dropped to 2 six or seven months ago.

Funding for such bridge reconstruction projects, Pirooz explained, is typically accomplished through a combination of state, federal and local funds. To illustrate how a funding mix can work, Pirooz broke down the Broadway bridges project this way: Out of a total project budget of $31 million, $18 million had come from a combination of state and federal grants, while $13 million had come from Ann Arbor funds.

For the Stadium bridges, the cost of the basic bridge construction project is around $22 million, Pirooz said. The current plan is focused on bridge reconstruction, as contrasted with what had been a more ambitious road construction project explored two years ago, which would have included non-motorized amenities along the Main Street corridor to the west of the Stadium bridges.

In 2006, the city had applied for and been awarded $766,000 from the Michigan Local Bridge Program, but the city allowed the award to expire a year later, because the amount did not go far enough towards funding the project – the alternative to expiration would have been to spend the MLBP money towards bridge reconstruction.

In 2006 the city also paid $1,249,467 to Northwest Consultants Inc. (NCI) for preliminary design engineering for the bigger bridge project that included bridge replacement, a transmission water main, storm sewer, and a South Main non-motorized path.

In September and October of 2007, two public meetings were held on the topic of the larger-scope project, and there was considerable resistance from members of the Ann Arbor Golf and Outing Club to the installation of the non-motorized path along the club’s property – it was not clear that there was room to install the paths without jeopardizing a row of trees, among other concerns. Asked to comment later in the meeting by Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2), Sue McCormick, the city’s director of public services, explained that no consensus had been reached as a result of those public engagement meetings.

Then in early 2009, increased degradation was observed in the fifth beam (counting from the south) of the 15 box beams that support the East Stadium bridge over State Street. Up to that point, the degraded state of the bridge had been addressed by a series of weight limit reductions. However, in early 2009, traffic was reduced to two lanes, in order to lead vehicles over the north lanes of the bridge, away from the fifth beam. The city also prepared an emergency traffic control plan as a contingency if the bridge needed to be closed. [At an early February Sunday night city council caucus meeting, Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) had expressed frustration that no plan for traffic rerouting had been developed at that point.]

In March 2009, the scope of the project was reduced to just the bridge reconstruction, with a directive to NCI to expedite the design. That design process is nearly complete.

Key dates on the project schedule shown by Pirooz include:

• August 2009 – complete design
• September-November 2009 – public involvement on design
• September 2009-October 2010 – complete construction plans, acquire easements, put out bids, relocate DTE energy lines, preconstruction
• November 2010 – start construction
• July 2012 – finish construction

The $22 million cost has nearly $3 million of contingencies built in, as well as a total as $2.2 million for design.

Pirooz highlighted the fact that the construction costs for the bridges themselves – at $1.9 million for the State Street bridge and $2.7 million for the railroad bridge – were only slightly more than the $4 million that would need to be spent on retaining walls alone.

Funding Prospects Now

At the state level, the Michigan Local Bridge Program – which had in 2006 granted $766,000 for the project, and which the city allowed to expire – has $8 million to distribute across the state. There are eight different projects that already have their applications in.

On the federal level, there are two possibilities. One is the 2009 Federal Highway Re-authorization bill. Out of that money, it’s possible to gain earmarked funds, and according to Pirooz, there is support among Michigan’s U.S. House and Senate delegations – specifically from Congressman John Dingell – for earmarking funds for Ann Arbor’s bridge project. A second federal opportunity comes from the 2009 Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) grants. TIGER is funded with $1.5 billion for projects across the country. There’s a Sept. 15, 2009 deadline for application on the TIGER grant.

Assessing probabilities of getting funding from each of these three sources, Pirooz said that the TIGER grant offered only a small chance, because of the intense nationwide competition. The upside on TIGER, however, is that if that grant came through, it would pay for the whole project.

Pirooz said that he thought chances were good that Ann Arbor could receive something along the lines of the same $766,000 it had previously been awarded by the Michigan Local Bridge Program, but pointed out that “our bridge is not the only bad bridge in the state.” He also thought chances were good that Ann Arbor could receive some earmarked money through the Federal Highway Re-authorization bill – the question was when that money might be available.

The best case scenario, according to Pirooz, is that there’ll be $22 million in state and federal grants with $2 million in design work paid for out of the street reconstruction millage funds – Ann Arbor has a dedicated street repair millage. That would have no negative impact of the street reconstruction program, Pirooz said.

The worst case scenario would see no state or federal money at all. In that case, $22 million would be taken from the street millage. The negative impact would be felt in two ways, said Pirooz. From 2010 through 2012, 29 street resurfacing or reconstruction projects would be eliminated. It would also mean an additional $3.5 million loss in revenue due to the inability to provide local matches for various surface transportation grants. As for when the city would have enough money to get back to repairing its streets after paying for the bridge on the worst case scenario, Pirooz said that those projects could resume in 2013 – if the street millage is renewed in 2011.

Pirooz guessed the funding picture would fall “somewhere in the middle” between the best- and worst-case scenarios.

Comments on Bridges from Councilmembers

Both Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) and Margie Teall (Ward 4) had praise for staff’s work on the issue – the bridge is located in their ward.

Assuring the public that the bridge was currently safe for travel, Teall said, “I will continue to use the Stadium bridges a lot.”

Teall got confirmation that there’d been communication with the University of Michigan and that they’re on the same page with respect to the bridge design. An easement will be required from UM.

Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) asked Pirooz to speak to the at-grade or “no-bridge” option that has some advocates in the community. The idea would be to eliminate the bridges and create a State & Stadium intersection, along with an at-grade rail crossing. Pirooz said there were three main reasons why that option was not feasible. First, Ann Arbor Railroad must give permission for an at-grade crossing of the railroad tracks – but Ann Arbor Railroad is against such a crossing. Second, in the city’s opinion the impact on the overall traffic and signaling system within a half-mile of the crossing would be negative – around 20,000 vehicles cross the bridge every day. Finally, he said, safety was an issue – there’s not a high number of train-car crashes, but when they happen, they’re usually deadly.

Adding to Pirooz’s remarks, Michael Nearing – an engineer with the city – said that a no-bridge option is also complex and not cheap. “It’s more than just tearing down a bridge,” Nearing cautioned. He guessed it would be around a $10 million project, but had not run the numbers.

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) asked why communication was not better with the railroad. Mayor John Hieftje said that when there’d been communication with them – in connection with the north-south commuter rail and the greenway – they seemed “cautious and wary.” McCormick said that the city did communicate with the railroad, but that they had categorically rejected the idea of an at-grade crossing.

Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) described a possible plan by the state legislature to change the way the gas tax was calculated to come up with additional money. [Currently, Michigan's gas tax is a per gallon rate, so revenues from it do not increase as gas prices increase. In fact, revenue tends to decrease as gas prices increase, if motorists drive less to save fuel costs. The proposal would tie the tax to the wholesale cost of gasoline.] Pirooz said that any additional funding would be helpful.

Higgins suggested constituents contact Congressman Dingell to encourage his support. Hieftje said that based on conversations he’d had with the congressman, Dingell was doing everything he could.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) asked for a clarification on what “somewhere in the middle” meant as far as funding scenarios. Based on the 42% of the Broadway bridges project that came from local funds, here’s how that math would work for the Stadium bridges project: .42 x $22 million = $9.2 million from local funds.

Anglin probably expressed the thoughts of many in the community on the funding prospects for the project when he said, “I hope the stars align.”

FITS (Fuller Intermodal Transit Station)

Before council began deliberations, Leigh Greden (Ward 3) acknowledged that the item considering an initial design and study phase for an intermodal transit station just south of Fuller Road and just north of East Medical Center Drive had been a last-minute addition to the agenda. He asked Sue McCormick, director of public services for the city, to give the council an overview. [A preliminary sketch of the station's concept was presented at a neighborhood meeting held in January 2009 at the Northside Grill.]

Eli Cooper, transportation manager with the city of Ann Arbor, pitches FITS (Fuller Intermodal Transit Station) to the city council. (Photo by the writer.)

McCormick described the collaboration between the city of Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan over the last several months to partner on a multimodal transportation facility on Fuller Road. She put the transportation station in the context of an expected demonstration service for east-west rail to start in October of 2010. The parcel, at the foot of the university hospital, is currently used for parking, she said. The location was within the corridor of analysis for the north-south connector study, McCormick explained.

[The north-south connector study for the Plymouth Road and State Street corridors got approval from the AATA as the final partner at the AATA's July board meeting. The other three partners are the city of Ann Arbor, the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority, and the University of Michigan. Both the north-south connector and FITS were discussed at the July 16, 2009 UM Board of Regents meeting, in the context of the university's overall transportation plan.]

The reason for the late notice of the agenda addition, said McCormick, was that only that afternoon had the city received a written commitment from the university to shoulder 75% of the cost of the project’s preliminary phase. The city’s 25% share would go towards the environmental impact assessment, which would position the project to eventually apply for federal funding.

Invited to comment, Jim Kosteva, UM’s director of community relations, affirmed that “We’re pleased to be engaged.”

Eli Cooper, the city’s transportation program manager, described how the intermodal station would have various platforms on different levels to accommodate buses and rail-based transportation of different types, including high-speed trains – those capable of traveling faster than 100 mph.

The location, said Cooper, was within walking distance of 10,000 to 15,000 workers. Employees of the hospital could walk off their train right into the University of Michigan medical campus. Cooper cautioned that he was not suggesting that all of those workers would necessarily use the station.

Cooper also pointed out that the station is located where the Border-to-Border Trail emerges from the west.

Council Deliberations on FITS

Mayor John Hieftje, in expressing his support for the project, said that he had been involved since day one in making it happen.

Sandi Smith (Ward 1) asked how the public would be engaged. Sue McCormick advised that during the initial phase, for which the council was approving funding that night, work would focus on site assessment, inventory and surveying, as well as program definition and concept planning. They’d been looking for a footprint that would fit onto the site, she said.

The conceptual plans would be ready sometime in an October time frame, added Eli Cooper. The environmental analysis would require about a year, and that process stipulates that public input is required, Cooper said. With respect to the environmental assessment, Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) asked what level of assessment would be performed. Cooper said it would be a National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) category 4(F) determination. The findings could be either that there would be no significant impact or that there would be a significant impact. In the latter case, mitigation could be required. Higgins asked if the city’s environmental coordinator, Matt Naud, would be involved, and McCormick confirmed that he would be briefed.

Smith asked that the staff think broadly about the station’s design, given that it might be the first vision of Ann Arbor people see as they arrive in the city. Comparing the current Amtrak station and the old train station that currently houses the Gandy Dancer restaurant, Smith suggested that the new station should be “a significant building.”

From UM’s Jim Kosteva, Smith wanted to know how the FITS project affected the university’s plans to construct parking structures on Wall Street. Kosteva said that the university was “pausing” those plans, which had been explained by Tim Slottow, UM’s chief financial officer, at a regents meeting earlier this summer. Kosteva cautioned that the Motts Children’s Hospital expansion would require more parking, and that the Wall Street site was being prepared for surface parking. It was the plans to build structures, Kosteva said, that had been paused.

Smith offered the suggestion that the word “road” be included in the acronym (Fuller Road Intermodal Transit Station) to make it somewhat more appealing: FRITS.

Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) said he was excited to see the project moving forward and applauded UM for their participation. He noted that the city’s contribution was to come partly from the street fund operating budget and he wanted to know what the impact on that would be. McCormick reported that the major streets fund balance was around $5 million and the roughly $50,000 to be appropriated from that fund would come from what was considered to be winter contingencies.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) sought clarification on when construction would start. Citing an in-service date of June 2012, Cooper said construction would begin in 2011.

Cooper allowed that Briere’s description of the time frame as “a short window” was a fair assessment. She concluded that “we’ll need a lot of publicity” and commended Cooper and the staff for “being brave enough to take this on.”

Outcome: The funds to begin the initial study phase and site assessment for FITS passed unanimously.

Historic District Study Committee

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) brought back a resolution for reconsideration – which the council had passed at its Aug. 6 meeting – that established a historic district study committee for a two-block area along Fifth Avenue south of William Street. Along with the study committee, the resolution had established a moratorium on demolition in the area. The resolution had been brought forward by Higgins and Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) as a late addition to the agenda on the day of the meeting. This resolution to reconsider was also placed on the Aug. 17 agenda on the same day as the council meeting.

The resolution was brought back to be amended to expand the range of activities to which the moratorium applies. In relevant part, with additions in blue, the resolution reads:

RESOLVED, That the City Council declares an emergency moratorium on all construction, addition, alteration, repair, moving, excavation or demolition in the proposed South Fourth and Fifth Avenue Historic District, consistent with Chapter 103 Section 8:411 of Ann Arbor City Code for six months from August 6, 2009.

The reason for the revision was to make the language expressing the moratorium mirror exactly what is allowed by the Michigan Local Historic Districts Act, which gives the city council the authority to establish a moratorium on all “work.” And “work” is defined as “construction, addition, alteration, repair, moving, excavation or demolition.”

In deliberations, Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) said that the need to bring back the resolution to correct the language underscored what he’d said at the last council meeting about the importance of process. He’d asked for a postponement of 12 days – the time between the last council meeting and this one – and he hadn’t been granted it. “Nonetheless,” he said, “we decided to ram it through.” In the future, Derezinski said that consideration of resolutions on such short notice should be a rare occurrence.

Higgins, for her part, emphasized that the resolution had been prepared by planning staff and the attorney’s office and that accounted for its late addition to the agenda.

Outcome: The resolution passed with dissent from Smith and Derezinski, who had both voted against the resolution at the previous council meeting as well.

Council Communications

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A2D2 and AHP

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) gave an update on the A2D2 rezoning project – the design guidelines had been given a new format, which would be shared sometime the first week of September. The issue could be coming before the city council at its second meeting in September or perhaps in October.

Higgins also updated other councilmembers on the Area Height and Placement project. She said that altogether over 100 people had attended the five meetings held in the different wards of the city. She reported that the AHP committee had decided there would be two additional community-wide meetings scheduled – one in small-group format and another in large-group format.

Leigh Greden (Ward 3) and Sandi Smith (Ward 1). Power supply issues for Ward 1 representatives forced Smith and Sabra Briere (Ward 1) to relocate to chairs that were vacant – due to absences by Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) and Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5). It's unlikely that Greden welcomed Smith as his neighbor for the evening by telling her the story of The Ward Three Bears. (Photo by the writer.)

Council Rules and Open Meetings

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) introduced the topic of transparency, although he said that he had withdrawn a resolution that he’d intended to bring forward that evening. Instead, he said he’ll be bringing it forward at the council’s Sept. 8 meeting. As a preview, he read aloud some of its text. It calls for all emails sent at city council meetings from the year 2000 to the present to be made available to the city. It also calls for emails sent during council meetings to be attached to the minutes of meetings going forward. Anglin acknowledged that what he was suggesting would cost some money. But he asked, “What is the cost of a good democracy?”

Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) said he appreciated the intent of Anglin’s resolution and wanted to get the city attorney’s input on it. He was interested in knowing what the cost of the proposal would be, in particular with respect to the retroactive proposal. “I’d hate to see the city put at fiscal risk,” he said. He also raised the question of scope: Would the proposal include emails sent from any private email accounts? Rapundalo said he’d have no objection to that, as he had nothing to hide.

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) informed her colleagues that the rules committee had been working on various changes and that Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) was putting the finishing touches on them. They would be available for perusal within the next couple of days, she said, and would come before council at its Sept. 8 meeting. Some of the issues that Anglin had raised, she said, would be addressed in the rules changes. Two readings at council would be required, she advised, because the changes could be substantive in nature.

Closed Session

At the conclusion of the meeting, the city council voted to go into closed session as required by the Open Meetings Act. They conducted the closed session in the usual location – the workroom adjoining council chambers. The workroom has two doors, one leading to council chambers and the other leading the outer hallway. At the conclusion of the closed session, the council is required to go back into open session to adjourn the council’s meeting.

What The Chronicle observed was that Mayor John Hieftje opened the door to the workroom, and – while standing in the doorframe with any councilmembers still in the workroom not visible to the public in council chambers – chaired the portion of the meeting that was meant to take the councilmembers out of closed session, through the motion to adjourn and the vote on adjournment.

When city attorney Stephen Postema emerged from the workroom and was asked by The Chronicle to account for how the council’s adjournment conformed with the Open Meetings Act, Postema seemed content that it was satisfied because the door to the workroom had been open.

Temporary Liquor Licenses

The council considered two temporary liquor licenses, one for the Kerrytown District for the Nash Bash Country Music Festival (Aug. 20, 2009), and a second one for the HomeGrown Festival (Sept. 12, 2009). Sandi Smith (Ward 1) offered the clarification that the HomeGrown Festival’s license was connected to a mayoral proclamation at the start of the meeting that recognized September as local food month.

Outcome: The liquor licenses were passed unanimously.

Rezoning to Parkland

The city has undertaken a systematic review of all parcels citywide that are used as parks and is formally designating their zoning as parkland. As city staff make their way through the process, periodically a raft of different parcels are brought before the city council to be rezoned all in one go.

Audience Member: Identifying himself as a longtime Ann Arbor resident, he said that he objected to tearing down nature areas for the sake of development and thus opposed the measure.

Thomas Partridge: Partridge suggested that a requirement of access to public transportation be a requirement in order to cement the status of the parcels as parkland. He also suggested a requirement that affordable housing be built adjacent to the land if not on the land.

Mayor John Hieftje, Sabra Briere (Ward 1) and Leigh Greden (Ward 3) all commented at various points to clarify that the parcels were being rezoned to parkland. “To be very clear,” said Greden, “they’re being rezoned to parkland.” This was the exact opposite of development, Greden said.

Outcome: The parcels were unanimously rezoned to parkland.

Public Comment

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City Finances

Karen Sidney: Sidney criticized the city’s plan to rectify its budget situation by raising taxes and cutting fire and police staff. The focus, she said, needed to be on employee benefits like retirement and health care. She suggested bringing city benefits more in line with those of the University of Michigan. The cost of city benefits, she said, were currently around $25 million and would grow to $41.5 million in five years. She suggested a charter amendment needed to be placed before voters to change the membership of the retirement plan boards so that they would no longer be controlled by employees – a recommendation made by a 2005 blue ribbon committee that studied the issue. [Chapter 17 of the city's charter deals with the retirement system.]

Sightlines and Vegetation

Kathy Griswold: Griswold asked councilmembers for some specific revisions to Chapter 40 of the city code: “Trees and Other Vegetation.” She cited recommendations in “Roadway Safety and Tort Liability” from the Lawyers and Judges Publishing Company that stressed the need for adequate sightlines. She also warned councilmembers that once the city has been notified of a sightline issue, liability is attached. She said that she’d looked at the three cities that had achieved a Platinum designation from the League of American Bicyclists – Davis, Boulder, and Portland – and all had ordinances with well-defined regulations on sightlines. Among her specific recommendations for Ann Arbor: consolidate all ordinances related to sightlines, streamline the user-interface on the web for notifying the city of a complaint, launch an educational campaign and allow property owners to do trimming of lower branches of trees in the public right of way.

Musical Interlude on Bridges and Parking Garage

Libby Hunter: Hunter led off public commentary with a lyric sung to the tune of the Battle Hymn of the Republic. Selected verses included: “Glory, glory, Hallelujah, Mayor Highrise wants to sock it to ya … He’s pouring $50 million down a big hole in the ground, while our bridge is falling down.” Her speaking turn is documented – in its full glory – here: link to YouTube.

Discrimination

Thomas Partridge: Partridge introduced himself as a Washtenaw County Democrat, who’d run for office in the last three years – to represent District 3 of Washtenaw County as a county commissioner, and to represent District 18 in the state Senate. He was there as a “uniter,” he said. He asked councilmembers to turn their backs on divisive voices that called on them to build walls between people. Instead, he said, they should back efforts to end discrimination in the area of housing, transportation, health care, and education. This, he said, goes to the core of who we are as Americans.

Palestine

Mozhgan Savabiesfahani: Savabiesfahani segued into her remarks by saying that Partridge had asked a great question: “Who are we?” We are a country, she said, that currently occupies two other countries: Iraq and Afghanistan. We also occupy Palestine, she continued. What the U.S. is good at, she said, was developing new weapons and selling them to other people so that that they can kill each other. The U.S. is not well-liked in other places, but not on account of our democracy – that, she said was a blessing. “I can speak my mind without fear of being shot,” she said. She told the city council that she was there again to talk about boycotting Israel – which she said had destroyed Lebanon and continued to “choke Gaza.” She asked for a city-wide discussion of the issue of a boycott against Israel.

Blaine Coleman: Coleman began by describing the sign he was holding, which depicted an Israeli soldier pointing a gun at children. He continued by criticizing the $300 billion of U.S. aid to Israel as supporting the killing of Palestinians and Lebanese. He told the city council that they had the ability to consider a resolution, hold a public hearing, and vote on a measure that would enact a boycott of Israeli goods. He characterized both the U.S. and Israel as built on robbing people of color, saying that black America has been robbed for centuries. The $300 billion of aid that has been spent historically on aid to Israel, he said, should be spent to rebuild Detroit and other inner cities.

Henry Herskovitz: Herskovitz laid out what he described as the meticulous planning that went into Plan Dalet, documented in “The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine” by Ilan Pappe. Herskovitz presented the analysis in Pappe’s book, which he said counters the received notion that it was a way to shore up a fledgling Jewish state from attack in 1947-48. He described how detailed files were prepared on each of around 1,200 villages in Palestine, which included topographical information, sources of revenue, and a list of men aged 16-50. These lists, he said, were used for search-and-arrest operations and resulted in the systematic expulsion of non-Jews from Palestine

Present: Stephen Rapundalo, Mike Anglin, Margie Teall, Sabra Briere, Sandi Smith, Tony Derezinski, Leigh Greden, Marcia Higgins, John Hieftje.

Absent: Christopher Taylor, Carsten Hohnke.

Next council meeting: Tuesday, Sept. 8, 2009 at 7 p.m. in council chambers, 2nd floor of the Guy C. Larcom, Jr. Municipal Building, 100 N. Fifth Ave. [confirm date]