The sign on the door to the Ann Arbor city council chamber, installed in the summer of 2013, includes Braille.

Besides the consent agenda, the council will need to vote on just eight items. And half of those eight are standard easements, which are rarely subjected to any council discussion.

But those easements also mean that not too many councilmembers would have the chance to take the night off. As conveyances of land interest, the easements will require an 8-vote majority on the 11-member council. Two of the easements are related to the construction of a new Tim Hortons on South State Street, one is related to the Arbor Hills Crossing development at Washtenaw and Platt, and the fourth is linked to construction of the new Blake Transit Center in downtown Ann Arbor.

The other land-related item on the agenda is initial consideration of a rezoning request for a site that has been annexed into the city from Ann Arbor Township. The final vote on the item would come at a subsequent meeting after a public hearing at that meeting. The Aug. 19 agenda doesn’t include any items that require a public hearing.

The council will be asked to approve a $107,000 purchase order for continued participation in CLEMIS (Courts and Law Enforcement Management Information System). The service is used by several public safety agencies in southeast Michigan. Among the support services provided by CLEMIS are computer-aided dispatch (CAD), mobile CAD, report management system, fingerprinting and mug shots.

The council will also be asked to approve the issuance of $3.15 million in revenue bonds to fund some electrical improvements for the water supply system.

The final voting item on the agenda is confirmation of several nominations to city boards and commissions made at the council’s previous meeting.

The agenda still offers some opportunity for stretching long. For example, the council could separate out some of the nominations for individual consideration. Among those nominations, the council will be asked to confirm appointments to the boards of two high-profile organizations – the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority and the Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority. Rishi Narayan, founder of Underground Printing, is the nominee to the DDA board. Jack Bernard, who works in the University of Michigan’s office of the general counsel, is the nominee to the AAATA board.

The council could also pull individual items off the consent agenda for separate consideration. Two of those items are street closures for downtown bars to host Oktoberfest activities on Sept. 20-21. It’s possible those items could be pulled out for separate consideration – but not because of a desire to deny the requests. Instead, a possible reason to consider them separately would be to highlight what’s different about the Oktoberfest street closures, compared to a similar request made at the council’s last meeting for “Beats, Eats, and Cleats.” That request, which was denied, was for an event sponsored by The Landmark apartment building. It was scheduled for Friday, Sept. 6, 2013, the evening before the football game between the University of Michigan and the University of Notre Dame.

The Oktoberfest event also takes place on a weekend when the Michigan football team plays a game. But that game against the UConn Huskies will be contested on the gridiron of Rentschler Field in East Hartford, Conn. – over 700 miles away from the intersection of Washington and Main Streets in Ann Arbor, Mich.

Councilmembers also have the opportunity at three different points in the agenda to share communications with the public and their fellow councilmembers.

More detail on the meeting agenda items is available on the city’s Legistar system. Readers can also follow the live meeting proceedings on Channel 16, streamed online by Community Television Network.

The Chronicle will be filing live updates from city council chambers during the meeting, published in this article “below the fold.” The meeting is scheduled to start at 7 p.m.

6:43 p.m. Pre-meeting activity. The scheduled meeting start is 7 p.m. Most evenings the actual starting time is between 7:10 p.m. and 7:15 p.m. Sally Petersen (Ward 2) has arrived. She’s the only councilmember here so far. City administrator Steve Powers has also just arrived.

6:53 p.m. Jane Lumm (Ward 2), Sumi Kailasapathy (Ward 1), Mike Anglin (Ward 5) and Chuck Warpehoski (Ward 5) have now arrived. Nancy Shore, Warpehoski’s wife, is here with their two children. Jack Eaton, winner of the Ward 4 Democratic primary on Aug. 6, is chatting with Kailasapathy. Lumm says the meeting should last about a half hour. She thinks it’s probably the thinnest agenda she’s seen, including both her terms of service dating back to the mid-1990s. Petersen is introducing Powers to a representative of Honda.

7:04 p.m. And we’re off.

7:05 p.m. Pledge of allegiance, moment of silence and the roll call of council. Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) and Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) are absent.

7:05 p.m. Proclamations. An item has been added to the agenda honoring Eastern Michigan University’s English as a Second Language Students for volunteering in the city parks through the GIVE 365 Volunteer Program – for multiple “pool splash days” and the annual Huron River Day celebration.

7:09 p.m. Public commentary. This portion of the meeting offers 10 three-minute slots that can be reserved in advance. Preference is given to speakers who want to address the council on an agenda item. [Public commentary general time, with no sign-up required in advance, is offered at the end of the meeting.]

Only three people are signed up to speak tonight. According to the agenda, up first will be Thomas Partridge to speak on commemorating Martin Luther King Jr., building affordable housing and public transportation, and promoting himself as a declared write-in candidate for Ward 5 city council in November. On the ballot, incumbent Democrat Mike Anglin is unopposed. Partridge is followed by James Rhodenhiser, who is signed up to speak on the protestors outside of Beth Israel Congregation. Rounding out the trio of public speaking reserved time is Kathy Griswold, who is signed up to talk about the city’s crosswalk ordinance.

7:13 p.m. Partridge is now holding forth. He introduces himself as an Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County resident advocating for those who need more government services. He calls for “integrated progress.” It’s the eve of the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s march on Washington, he says. So he calls on all residents of the city and county to make King’s dream a reality. He calls for an investigation of what he calls misappropriation of funds that the city now needs to expand public, affordable housing. He doesn’t think the mayor has answered any of the questions surrounding the economic downturn.

7:17 p.m. Rhodenhiser is now addressing the council. He is rector at St. Clare of Assisi Episcopal Church in Ann Arbor. He picks up on Partridge’s mention of the 50th anniversary. He refers to an anniversary in Ann Arbor – the 10th anniversary of a demonstration outside the Beth Israel Congregation. He characterizes the protests as “picking on” one congregation. He tells the council that he’s given the city clerk a letter from 31 religious leaders. He encourages the council to make a statement about what kind of city Ann Arbor wants to be. He calls for civility. His heart goes out to those in Egypt, he says. He asks the council to consider going on record supporting the congregants of Beth Israel, who might feel their burden will go unremarked.

7:19 p.m. Griswold is criticizing CityWorks as a piece of software. It is a platform for the citizens service request system. It does not have a mobile interface, she contends. She calls for an improvement. She also addresses the local crosswalk ordinance. Is it enforceable? Is education possible? She says she’s angry because she found a pamphlet that says, “Pedestrians Rule.” She calls that shameful. She calls for hiring a professional transportation engineer.

7:20 p.m. Council communications. This is the first of three slots on the agenda for council communications. It’s a time when councilmembers can report out from boards, commissions and task forces on which they serve. They can also alert their colleagues to proposals they might be bringing forward in the near future.

7:21 p.m. Kailasapathy reports that the human rights commission is working on a revision to the city’s nondiscrimination ordinance. Another topic from the HRC is to pursue policy guidelines for installation of video surveillance cameras.

7:23 p.m. Anglin raises the issue of stormwater control. He ventures that sites could be identified for stormwater detention farther upstream, using city land. He calls for “natural projects” upstream as much as possible.

7:23 p.m. Sabra Briere (Ward 1) is commenting on a recent pedestrian fatality on Plymouth Road, highlighting the fact that state law, not just Ann Arbor local law, requires motorists to yield to pedestrians in a crosswalk. Ann Arbor’s law differs from Michigan’s Uniform Traffic Code in requiring motorists to stop, not merely slow as to yield, and in requiring action for pedestrians standing at the crosswalk, not already within the crosswalk.

7:23 p.m. From the Michigan Uniform Traffic Code:

R 28.1702 Rule 702. Pedestrians; right-of-way in crosswalk; violation as civil infraction.
(1) When traffic-control signals are not in place or are not in operation, the driver of a vehicle shall yield the right-of-way, slowing down or stopping if need be to so yield, to a pedestrian crossing the roadway within a crosswalk when the pedestrian is on the half of the roadway on which the vehicle is traveling or when the pedestrian is approaching so closely from the opposite half of the roadway as to be in danger, but a pedestrian shall not suddenly leave a curb or other place of safety and walk or run into a path of a vehicle that is so close that it is impossible for the driver to yield.

7:24 p.m. From the Ann Arbor city code, last revised on Dec. 19, 2011 after a revision a year earlier on July 19, 2010:

10:148. – Pedestrians crossing streets.
(a) When traffic-control signals are not in place or are not in operation, the driver of a vehicle shall stop before entering a crosswalk and yield the right-of-way to any pedestrian stopped at the curb, curb line or ramp leading to a crosswalk and to every pedestrian within a crosswalk when the pedestrian is on the half of the roadway on which the vehicle is traveling or when the pedestrian is approaching so closely from the opposite half of the roadway as to be in danger.
(b) A pedestrian shall not suddenly leave a curb or other place of safety and walk or run into a path of a vehicle that is so close that it is impossible for the driver to yield.

7:26 p.m. Briere has now summarized the laws. She’s ticking through some basic stats.

7:26 p.m. Additional background, based on data pulled from the Michigan Traffic Crashes website for 2004-2012: the majority of traffic crashes involving pedestrians are in the downtown area. [ped crash year-by-year animated map .gif)] The number of traffic crashes involving pedestrians has been somewhat higher the last two years than any of the previous seven years. [ped crash chart by year .jpg] Crashes related to pedestrians also show consistent seasonal variation. [ped crash chart by month total .jpg] [ped crash chart by month broken out by year]

7:28 p.m. Mayor John Hieftje now commends Rhodenhiser and his group, saying that he had watched a conversation between Rhodenhiser and the leader of the protests. He says that rationality had fallen on deaf ears. Hieftje notes that the council had passed a resolution a few years ago. He calls it a tough problem that attorneys have worked on.

7:30 p.m. Powers invites the public to a swearing in of four new police officers at 1 p.m. on Friday. He alerts the public to the UM student move-in from Aug. 28-30. He says that the AAPD party patrol will be in effect from then until Sept. 3, the start of classes. East University and Oakland will have a free solid waste drop off.

7:31 p.m. Minutes. The minutes from the last meeting have been approved without amendment.

7:31 p.m. Consent agenda. This is a group of items that are deemed to be routine and are voted on “all in one go.” Contracts for less than $100,000 can be placed on the consent agenda. This meeting’s consent agenda includes three mid-September requests for street closings in downtown Ann Arbor. All three resolutions include approval of special permits for serving alcohol outdoors.

The consent agenda also includes two software purchases – one for case management at the 15th District Court and the other for tracking of maintenance needs for city assets. Rounding out the consent agenda is a contract for inspection of two of the city’s dams – Barton and Superior. In more detail, here’s a summary of the consent agenda.

• Street Closing: W. Washington for Oktoberfest Sept. 20-21 (Grizzly Peak Brewing Company and the Blue Tractor). This would be for the block between Main and Ashley, leaving intersections open for north-south traffic.
• Street Closing: E. Washington for Oktoberfest Sept. 20-21 (Arbor Brewing Company). This would be for the block between Main and Fourth Avenue, leaving intersections open for north-south traffic.
• Street Closing: E. Washington for Lite Bike Sept. 15. (Arbor Brewing Company and A2 Bike). This would be from half block between Main eastward to the alley.
• Approve purchase order to Azteca Systems for CityWorks software license and annual maintenance and support agreement ($60,000). This software is based on a geographical information system (GIS) platform and allows the city to track the maintenance of its equipment and assets. It’s also the software on which the city’s citizen request system is based. However, according to city CFO Tom Crawford, responding to a query from The Chronicle, the city is currently evaluating whether to continue using the existing citizen request application or convert to something else.
• Approve professional services agreement with Mead and Hunt Inc. to complete a dam safety inspection and report for Barton and Superior dams ($53,600). This is an inspection required every five years by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) by an independent consultant. The last one was done in 2008. Mead and Hunt’s bid was the lowest of four bids. It was about half the highest bid for the work, which was submitted by Black & Veatch at $107,000.
• Approve purchase order to Michigan Supreme Court State Court Administrative Office for judicial information software (JIS) (not to Exceed $54,000). JIS is case management software provided to the 15th District Court, which the local court uses for day-to-day operations.

7:31 p.m. Councilmembers can opt to select out any items for separate consideration. Lumm wants to pull out two of them and Teall pulls out one.

7:33 p.m. The council is now discussing the Blue Tractor Oktoberfest street closing. Lumm asks if closing part of Washington has been done in the past all day. Sumedh Bahl, community services area administrator, indicates that the timing is requested by the applicant.

7:37 p.m. The council is now discussing the Azteca software item. Lumm totals up several different software items. CFO Tom Crawford indicates that the city tries to negotiate a multi-year, but flat rate contract. The maintenance costs are generally about 20% of the software costs. Kailasapathy brings up Griswold’s point about the lack of a mobile interface for CityWorks. Crawford calls CityWorks a key piece of software. Crawford notes that CityWorks does have a mobile API. A third party had created the citizens request system for the city. But that was five years ago, he says. So the city is now looking at going and and asking a third party to upgrade the mobile application. Warpehoski has looked up last year’s contract and notes that it’s the same as this year.

7:42 p.m. The council is now discussing the dam safety inspection contract. Teall asks for public services area administrator Craig Hupy. She gets confirmation that the funding is coming from the general fund. She asks for the status of discussion about hydro-electric use with interested parties. Hupy says that two years ago or so, a study was done about the feasibility of hydro-electric at Argo or Geddes. Hupy indicates there had been only one party, the VA hospital, interested in pursuing hydro-electric. He essentially concludes that hydro power wasn’t feasibility.

Briere ventures that in 2010 the council had made a decision that dam maintenance would not be funded out of the parks budget. Lumm recalls that previously the dam maintenance fund was an enterprise fund. Hupy confirms that the hydro-electric fund would in general just about break even, paying its own way. Hupy and Lumm are discussing dam operations back in the 1980s and 1990s.

7:43 p.m. Hieftje ventures that the reason that the dam is profitable is due to the fact that the price of electricity has gone up.

7:43 p.m. Outcome: The council has now voted unanimously to approve all items on the consent agenda.

7:43 p.m. Rezoning for 2925 Devonshire: Initial approval. The 0.66-acre parcel is requested to be rezoned from TWP (township district) to R1A (single-family dwelling district). The city’s planning commission recommended approval of the rezoning on a 9-0 vote at its Jan. 15, 2013 meeting. The rezoning comes in the context of the annexation of the land into the city.

7:43 p.m. Outcome: The council has voted unanimously without discussion to give initial approval to the rezoning of 2925 Devonshire. The council’s final vote will come at a future meeting after a public hearing.

7:44 p.m. Issuance and sale of water supply system revenue bonds ($3.15 million) The bonds are being sold to finance some of the additions and improvements to the city’s water distribution system, including electrical improvements at the Barton and South Industrial pump stations. Michigan Finance Authority (the “Bond Bank”) will purchase the bonds as part of its Drinking Water Revolving Fund (DWRF) program. Bond payments are to be made from the water supply system revenues.

At its June 17, 2013 meeting, the council approved a $2.6 million contract with Shaw Electric Company to upgrade electrical systems for the city’s drinking water system. That contract covered replacement of the primary and secondary switchgear at Barton Pump Station and replacement of electrical controls and a check valve at South Industrial Pump Station.

7:44 p.m. Outcome: The council has voted unanimously without discussion to authorize issuance of the water supply system bonds.

7:44 p.m. Approval of a purchase order with Oakland County for CLEMIS (not to exceed $107,000). CLEMIS (Courts and Law Enforcement Management Information System), which is hosted by Oakland County, is used by several public safety agencies in southeast Michigan. Among the support services provided by CLEMIS are computer-aided dispatch (CAD), mobile CAD, report management system, fingerprinting and mug shots. CLEMIS allows for sharing of information among public safety organizations across Southeast Michigan.

7:45 p.m. Outcome: The council has voted unanimously without discussion to approve continued participation in CLEMIS.

7:45 p.m. Resolution accepting water and sanitary easement for Arbor Hills Crossing. The easement is being granted by RSW Washtenaw LLC (3100 Washtenaw Ave.) to the city at no cost as apart of the development agreement for Arbor Hills Crossing. As a land transaction, the acceptance of the easement will require an 8-vote majority on the 11-member council. Arbor Hills Crossing is located at on the southeast corner of Washtenaw and Platt, consisting of four one- and two-story buildings throughout the 7.45-acre site – a total of 90,700-square-feet of space for retail stores and offices. A new traffic signal has recently been installed and is operational at the Platt and Washtenaw intersection.

7:45 p.m. Outcome: The council has voted unanimously to accept the easement for water and sanitary lines for Arbor Hills Crossing.

7:45 p.m. Resolutions accepting public utilities easements and public right-of-way easements for South State Street Tim Hortons. Both easements are being granted to the city, at no cost, from 3965 South State Associates LLC. The granting of right-of-way is 50 feet wide and about 345 feet long along Ellsworth Road. As land transactions, the acceptance of the easements will require an 8-vote majority on the 11-member council. The site plan for the Tim Hortons was approved by the city council last year at its April 16, 2012 meeting.

7:46 p.m. Outcome: The council has voted unanimously without discussion to accept both easements for the Tim Hortons on State Street.

7:46 p.m. Resolution to approve a grant of easement to DTE Electric Company. This easement is to allow electrical service for the new Blake Transit Center currently under construction by the Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority. The easement begins on the Fourth Avenue side of the old Y lot ( 350 S. Fifth Avenue) and extends eastward about halfway across the block. As a land transaction, the acceptance of the easement will require an 8-vote majority on the 11-member council.

7:46 p.m. Outcome: The council has voted unanimously without discussion to grant an easement to DTE to provide electrical service.

7:47 p.m. Confirmation of nominations. Nominated at the previous council meeting were the following:

• Alison Stroud to the Ann Arbor Commission on Disability Issues. On the city commission for disability issues, Stroud would be finishing the term of Ian Scott. Stroud is a public policy intern for the summer at the Ann Arbor Center for Independent Living. She addressed the board of the Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority during a public hearing at its June 20, 2013 meeting.
• Paul Darling (reappointment) to the Building Board of Appeals
• Reka Farrakand to Housing Board of Appeals. Farrakand is city of Ann Arbor fire marshal.
• Alex Milshteyn (reappointment) to the Zoning Board of Appeals
• Rishi Narayan to the board of the Downtown Development Authority. Narayan would replace Leah Gunn. Narayan is founder and managing member of Underground Printing, which offers screenprinting of apparel in more than a dozen cities nationwide. Narayan made the Crain’s Detroit Business “Twenty in their 20s” list in 2010 as a 28-year-old.
• Jack Bernard to the board of the Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority. Bernard is lecturer in the University of Michigan law school and an attorney with UM’s office of the vice president and general counsel. He is also currently chair of the university’s council for disability concerns. Given the nature of wrangling over Eric Mahler’s recent appointment to the AAATA board, Bernard’s chairship of that group could be a key qualification. Some councilmembers objected to Mahler’s appointment, arguing that someone who could represent the disability community should be appointed instead. If Bernard is confirmed by the city council at tonight’s meeting, that would bring the total of UM employees on the board to three, or one-third of the nine members. The other two UM employees on the AAATA board are Sue Gott (the university’s head planner) and Anya Dale (a representative in the office of sustainability).

7:50 p.m. Petersen highlights three of the nominations. She notes that Stroud has a Pittsfield Township address, but she’s hearing-impaired, so she asks that the residency requirement be “waived.” She calls Narayan a young urban professional and says that the future of Ann Arbor relies on such individuals. She points out that Bernard sits on the UM committee on disability issues, to which she serves as a city liaison. She’s reading aloud praise about Bernard from a third party. Bernard is legally blind, she says.

7:50 p.m. Outcome: The council has voted unanimously to confirm all the appointments.

7:51 p.m. Mayoral nominations to boards and commissions. Nominations made tonight will be voted on at the council’s next meeting. Leigh Greden has been nominated for re-appointment to the Ann Arbor housing commission. Devon Akmon’s name was put forward to fill a vacancy on the public art commission. Logan Casey has been nominated to fill a vacancy on the human rights commission. And Al McWilliams is being nominated to replace Newcombe Clark on the board of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority.

McWilliams’ name had appeared on an early version of the list of nominees for the council’s Aug. 8, 2013 meeting. The final version, however, did not include his name. McWilliams is founder of Quack!Media, an ad agency located in downtown Ann Arbor. Quack!Media lists the Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority on its website as one of its clients. McWilliams has written advocacy pieces for bicycling on his blog.

Also originally slated for nomination at the Aug. 8 meeting to serve on the public art commission was Jeff Hayner. But the final version of the nomination list did not include his name. He has filed petitions to run for the Ward 1 city council seat. The Ward 1 city council ballot for November will include incumbent Democrat Sabra Briere, and independents Hayner and Jaclyn Vresics. According to Hayner, mayor John Hieftje had explained to him that he had a policy against appointing people to boards and commissions if they were candidates for the city council.

7:53 p.m. Council communications. Lumm gives an update from the council’s liquor committee. A recommendation would be coming to the council about the fee schedule. Adjustments would be made to make sure that fees charged reflect the costs. A recommendation on liquor license transfer procedures will also be forthcoming, Lumm says, in light of a change in state law. She thanks the various staff who are involved in the annual renewals of licenses, and indicates that their time investment will be tracked.

7:54 p.m. Briere gives an update from the North Main Huron River task force, indicating that the report is almost finished. Demolition of the two buildings on 721 N. Main was taking place today, she notes.

7:55 p.m. Anglin follows up by saying that 133 establishments in Ann Arbor hold liquor licenses. Each one pays $50 a year, Anglin says.

7:55 p.m. Public Commentary. There’s no requirement to sign up in advance for this slot for public commentary.

7:59 p.m. Jim Mogensen comments on the hardship exemption in the city’s living wage ordinance. He recalls the history for its rationale – a recognition that some nonprofits were not able to comply with the requirements of the ordinance. He recounts how the exemption for the Ann Arbor Summer Festival was handled and how an exemption was also put in for work-study students. Last fall, the issue had arisen again. He was bringing it up to provide the history, he said, because a waiver had been granted last fall to Community Action Network over work-study students, he said, who were already exempt under the ordinance.

8:02 p.m. Thomas Partridge repeats the points from his initial public commentary – Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech and his candidacy for Ward 5 city council as a write-in candidate. He laments the lack of affordable housing and effective public transportation in Ann Arbor.

8:04 p.m. Closed session. The council has voted to go into a closed session under Michigan’s Open Meetings Act to discuss land acquisition and pending litigation.

8:20 p.m. The council has emerged from its closed session.

8:26 p.m. Lumm moves a resolution on the pending litigation which authorizes the city attorney to resolve the case Dobrowolski v. City of Ann Arbor in the manner recommended during the closed session. The council has approved that resolution.

8:26 p.m. Adjournment. We are now adjourned. That’s all from the hard benches.

A sign on the door to the Ann Arbor city council chambers gives instructions for post-meeting clean-up.

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Assistant city attorney Abigail Elias explained at the meeting that because the ordinance does not change the city code, it does not require a second reading and public hearing.

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

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

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

The council also approved a level-of-service study for its drinking water distribution system with AECOM. The outcome of the study will be a recommendation for a sustainable level of service for the city’s water distribution system, and determination of how much investment it would take to achieve that level. The study would also help the city decide, for example, which water mains should be replaced first. The council had tabled the resolution at its May 16, 2011 meeting after amending out a $10,550 contingency in the $208,984 contract. Later in that same meeting, at a session reconvened on May 31, the council took the item up off the table and postponed it until July 5.

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

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

During public commentary, Sue Maguire addressed the council on the topic of proposed reductions to the fire department. (Photos by the writer.)

But Monday, at its second meeting in May this year, the city council did not act, choosing instead to recess and continue the meeting the following week, on May 23. The decision to delay was prompted by uncertainty about revenue from the public parking system. The Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority and the city were poised to ratify a new agreement on parking revenue on May 2, but that agreement was put off when questions were raised about the DDA tax increment finance (TIF) capture. The DDA later called a special meeting on Friday, May 20 to address that issue.

Even though the council did not act on the budget, most of the evening’s discussion was dominated by budget talk, including extensive public commentary on the proposed cuts in the police and fire departments. The council also got a briefing from its chief of police and interim fire chief, Barnett Jones, who responded to an article published in AnnArbor.com about fire department response times, calling the calculations presented in the piece inaccurate.

In addition to putting off action on the FY 2012 budget, the council also tabled decisions on human services funding, funding for a water system study, and fee increases for next year.

However, the council did transact some business. It authorized an increase in taxicab fares in light of rising gas prices. The council also approved neighborhood stabilization funds for demolition of three houses on North Main Street to prepare the site for construction of the Near North affordable housing project. Two large vehicle purchases – a street sweeper and a sewer truck – that had been postponed from the previous meeting were authorized.

The council also revised its administrative policy on how the 2006 parks millage is to be spent. Funds outside the general fund can count as general fund money for the purpose of the policy, as long as those funds are not drawn from the parks millage. The council also gave initial approval to an ordinance on design guidelines for new buildings downtown.

FY 2012 Budget Decisions

Before the council was approval of the 2012 fiscal year budget that had been proposed by then-city administrator Roger Fraser just before he left that position to take a post as a deputy treasurer for the state of Michigan. The city’s fiscal year starts on July 1.

The city’s charter stipulates that the administrator must submit the proposed budget to the council in April and that the council must approve a budget by its second meeting in May, which this year fell on May 16. If the council fails to approve the budget – with any amendments – by its second May meeting, the budget as proposed by the administrator is adopted by default.

The budget as proposed included $77,900,405 in general fund revenues and tapped the reserves for a total of $1,022,136. The city of Ann Arbor’s total budget, including all of its funds (major street fund, parks millage, water fund, sewer fund, etc.) stands at $312,182,605 for FY 2012.

FY 2012 Budget: Announcement of Delay

At the beginning of the council’s May 16 meeting, mayor John Hieftje indicated that when the council reached the budget item on the agenda, they intended to recess the meeting and continue it the following Monday. The budget was the next-to-last agenda item.

As a reason for delaying, Hieftje cited uncertainty about the status of a new parking agreement with the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority. Later in the week, the DDA board announced it would hold a special meeting at noon on Friday, May 20 in an attempt to address questions about its TIF capture and to ratify its side of a new parking contract with the city.

Expected amendments to the budget when the council takes it up on May 23 include: (1) use of $90,000 in general fund reserves to add to the parks allocation; (2) use of $85,600 in general fund reserves to add to human services funding; (3) use of a nominal amount of general fund reserves to cover the cost of an additional primary election (as proposed, the FY 2012 budget anticipated primaries in only two of the city’s five wards – there will be primaries in three wards); and (4) elimination of a proposed fee for three-times-weekly trash pickup in the downtown area.

Before the meeting, no budget amendments were anticipated that would change the proposed cuts in public safety positions – 13 in police services and seven in fire protection services. However, at the meeting, Hieftje hinted that some, but not all, of the cuts in police and fire might be avoided.

FY 2012 Budget: Safety Services – Public Commentary

The formal hearing on the FY 2012 budget took place at the council’s May 2 meeting. But several people had signed up for the public commentary reserved time at the beginning of the meeting, including some familiar faces from local government, past and present. [At the council's next gathering on May 23, there will presumably not be public commentary reserved time offered, as it is a continuation of the same meeting.]

Leading off public commentary was Fred Veigel, who serves on the Washtenaw County Road Commission. He introduced himself as president of the Huron Valley Central Labor Council, AFLCIO, which includes 37 local unions with 18,000 members, he said. Terminating police and firefighter positions below national standards would endanger lives and property of Ann Arbor citizens, warned Veigel. Responding to comments by Hieftje at the start of the meeting about the separation of the budget into various funds, he said, “Balderdash!” Money could be borrowed from different funds, he contended, not taken away.

He asked if the last audit of fund balances has been reviewed to see if funds are available for public safety services. The council should cut other services first, he said, like human services. The council should amend the city’s parks policy and let Washtenaw County take over the two city golf courses – that would save several hundred thousand dollars. He said he’d talked with councilmember Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) about enforcing state vehicle codes on unmarked commercial vehicles that don’t pull permits to work in the city – that could generate additional revenue.

Following Veigel to the podium was Wes Prater, who currently serves on the Washtenaw County board of commissioners. He introduced himself as a retired firefighter, and vice president of the Huron Valley Central Labor Council, AFLCIO. He told the city council it was good to be back before them – he hadn’t been there in a while. He asked to council to reflect on some basic points. What services do citizens expect to receive from government? What are the basic quality of life issues? What will ensure sound economic development in the community? What are best practices for re-entry of those who are incarcerated and for dealing with mental health issues? These are all related to the function of the emergency safety system of the city, he said.

For the fire department, eight minutes is too long for a response time – four minutes is recommended by national standards, he said. After four minutes, Prater said, a fire doubles in size every minute. Closing stations and rotating stations gives citizens a false sense of security. The fire department is struggling at this time to provide a basic level of service to the citizens, and the further reductions will make it difficult to answer more than one fire at one time. Multiple fires would require mutual aid from departments in other communities, which would require more than eight minutes, he warned.

Prater noted that according to a recent report from Washtenaw County’s equalization director, Ann Arbor’s property values had dropped less than the values in the rest of the county.

University of Michigan Graduate Employees Organization (GEO) supporters in the audience at the May 16 Ann Arbor city council meeting.

Chelsea Del Rio introduced herself as the vice president of the Graduate Employees Organization (GEO) at the University of Michigan. She told the city council that the GEO stands in solidarity with the firefighers. The GEO is concerned about the rotating closure of fire stations, especially when Station 5 on the university’s north campus is closed. It’s a great concern to the UM community, she said. It’s a concern about physical property, ranging from the safety of historical documents to research facilities, as well as a concern about safety and well-being of students, faculty staff and all Ann Arbor residents.

The unions at UM – from lecturers, to building trades, to nurses – have expressed this view to UM president Mary Sue Coleman as well, Del Rio said. She concluded by saying that the members of the GEO stand with Ann Arbor firefighters, and they urged the council to do the same.

Noting that he was a former member of the city’s park advisory commission and the planning commission, James D’Amour told the council that he was speaking to them as a citizen, not as a member of any group. He said he’d seen declines in terms of services and the promise the city was supposed to keep with respect to the parks, but said he might address that issue later. That evening, he said, he wanted to put a face on the important public safety services offered by the city.

D’Amour then recounted how 12 years ago, his second-floor neighbors – he and his wife lived on the third floor – had started a fire through careless behavior. He said that without help from the fire department, his wife wouldn’t be alive today and likely neither would he. He said he’d seen thousands of dollars paid by the city for consultants, parking structures and public art. He concluded by thanking the firefighters who saved his wife’s life 12 years ago.

Lisa Dusseau told the council she was born and raised in Ann Arbor. She was speaking to them for the first time due to the pending fire department layoffs. She said she admired the skill and fortitude it takes to be a firefighter. She said she’d been following the budget discussions on AnnArbor.com. She wondered why it took so long to get the information out. She had concerns about response times and deaths per calendar year. Increased cuts will turn Ann Arbor’s fire protection service into a surround-and-drown department. If she wanted that level of service, she said, she’d move to a township.

Dusseau contended that once staffing levels fell below 100 firefighters, the number of deaths due to fire had started to increase – even one is too many, she said. Non-essentials need to be eliminated from the budget. She’d read that money to supplement the budget was available but not applied for. She said that people wearing swim goggles at the city council was good theater, but doesn’t serve needs of the city as a whole. [This was an apparent allusion to the May 2009 public hearing on that year's budget, which included advocates for keeping Mack pool open. They had worn swim goggles – among them was James D'Amour. ] She told the council to take another look at the budget and not let staffing levels deteriorate.

Standing is Wendy Woods, former Ward 5 councilmember and current city planning commissioner. She was talking to Sandi Smith (Ward 1) before the meeting.

Former Ward 5 councilmember and current planning commissioner Wendy Woods told the council she wanted to address the issue of police and fire fighters. She said the myth needs to be debunked that fewer fires means we need fewer firefighters. The fire department has served our residents admirably, she said. They are first to respond when you’re at the lowest point in your life. They bring a calm reassurance that someone is there to help you.

Woods said she was concerned about protecting lives of citizens and their property, and also about the safety of firefighters. She urged the council to take the steps necessary to bridge the gap between the fire department and city hall. It’s just a street [Fifth Avenue] that separates them, but it might as well be the Grand Canyon, she said. She concluded with three requests: (1) don’t cut the fire department; (2) don’t cut the police department; and (3) keep residents safe.

University Bank president Stephen Ranzini introduced himself to the council as speaking for himself. He noted that he was a member of the city’s economic development corporation board.

He criticized spending $59 million on the Fifth Avenue underground parking garage at around $90,000 per parking spot – he called the project “the Big Dig.” He continued by criticizing the $43 million expenditure on the “Taj Mahal.” [He was alluding to the new municipal center, or police-courts facility, which the city is officially calling the Justice Center. Some residents have tagged the facility with the name "Raj Mahal" after former city administrator Roger Fraser.]

Ranzini said the city had a $29 million net increase in assets in FY 2010 – which the private sector would call a “profit.” He also said the city had $103 million in unrestricted funds, based on the city’s audited statements. He was referring to the city’s Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) [emphasis added]:

$103,726,801 is unrestricted and may be used to meet the government’s ongoing obligations to citizens and creditors, subject to the purpose of the fund in which they are located. This balance is comprised of $43,955,179 in governmental activities and $59,771,622 in business-type activities. [page 10]

“Governmental activities” include general fund activities such as police and fire protection and parks and recreation. “Business-type activities” include funds like water, sewer, and solid waste.

In light of the increase in assets and the amount of unrestricted funds, Ranzini questioned the need to cut police and fire staffing. There’s only one ladder truck owned by the city that is capable of responding to rescue his family from the 10-story building downtown where his family lives, he said. [The 95-foot ladder truck is deployed at Station 1 on Fifth Avenue, across from city hall.] If that ladder truck is responding to a fire in another part of the city that would have otherwise been handled by a station that is closed, he and his wife and children would die, because they can’t jump to safety, he said.

As a downtown resident, Ranzini said he could tell the council that it’s already unsafe at certain times of the day to walk outside. It’s a hostile environment for pedestrians, he said, because a culture of panhandlers is allowed to operate with impunity. The city had allowed 10 Level IV registered sex offenders to take up residence in the homeless shelter, he said, which is one block from the YMCA, and there is no visible police presence.

Ranzini said his wife is correctly afraid to leave their home by herself at night. It’s not just a rainy day, but a “financial hurricane,” he said, so what else is the $103 million rainy-day fund for, if it’s not for times like now, he asked. People say that the money is in buckets, he said, and that the money in one bucket can’t get access to the money in other buckets. So, he said, “Let’s drain the buckets.” Persisting with the fiction of the various buckets enables claims of poverty, he said.

Ranzini noted that there are “leaks in the buckets,” citing as an example the $12 million in revenue to the general fund – used in part for police and fire protection – which the city has received from the city’s public parking revenue via the Downtown Development Authority over the last six years. If the DDA had not decided to build the Fifth Avenue underground parking garage, he said, more money could have been transferred to the city. He contended that one fund can lend money to another fund. He said the city is very talented at charging fees to funds located outside the general fund. If the leaks in the buckets aren’t enough, then he suggested that the city’s charter be amended to access the money the city needs until the storm passes.

Sue Maguire introduced herself as a life-long Ann Arbor resident. She told the council how she’d been driving down Eisenhower Parkway recently, when her daughter yelled at her to call 911. Why? she asked her daughter. She pointed to the sign on the fire station, which read “Fire station closed. Call 911.” [The city is currently closing some fire stations on a rotating basis. The station near Eisenhower has a Briarwood Circle address.] They got a good laugh out of it, she said, but it really is an emergency – it’s an emergency that the city council has the ability to respond to. She told the council they need to say no to public safety cuts. She said she works in the field of crash research and knows the importance of immediate emergency response. As an Ann Arbor resident who has paid taxes her whole life, she wants public safety service to stay the same.

Thomas Partridge introduced himself as a Democratic Party member and leader. He called on the city council, the public attending the meeting and the community at large to look at major issues and the direct issues. He told them to look at the movement to recall Gov. Rick Snyder. He called on the citizens of Ann Arbor to think creatively when it comes to budgeting and to do it for multiple years, not just a single year. [The city of Ann Arbor's charter mandates that budgeting be done year by year, but the city has a two-year planning cycle.] He asked that responsible business owners think about “adopting” fire stations and police stations. He called for joining the fire departments of Ann Arbor with those of neighboring communities.

FY 2012 Budget: Council Commentary – Municipal Center

After public commentary, several council members used their communications time to discuss budget-related issues.

Mike Anglin (Ward 5) said he wanted to address a FY 2011 allocation for non-departmental contingencies – $639,000 in construction overruns for new the municipal center. He said there is money allocated in FY 2012 for asbestos abatement, but he thought the asbestos abatement had already taken place. Funds seem like they’re being shifted, he said. The building is 50,000 square feet over-sized, he said.

Sign on the Huron Street entrance to city hall before the May 16 meeting. As the logistical routines settle into place for use of the new building, staff use practical means to ensure things work as planned.

Anglin suggested that the city should simply complete the work that needs to be done – and not do anything else on the extra 50,000 square feet, until it’s an economically better time. At that point we could put money into it. He noted that this year the city had eliminated the $700,000 economic development fund. [It's been folded into the general fund balance reserve.]

He noted that there was $3 million promised from a developer of the city-owned First and Washington parcel, but the city had not ever seen that money. [The city council extended the purchase option for the developer, Village Green, most recently in August of 2010, through June 1, 2011. The council set in place a series of milestones to be met and amended the development agreement in February 2011.] Anglin said that if he’d been asked in 1990 about building a new building, he’d have been right on board. But now we need to know what we can afford and what we can’t afford.

Responding to Anglin’s remarks about cost overruns with the municipal center, mayor John Hieftje asked interim city administrator Tom Crawford about cost overruns: Were there any? Crawford said that no, he was not aware of any.

Hieftje also clarified with Crawford, who’s the city’s CFO, that it would be possible for the city to amend the budget after it’s adopted if the financial situation changes. Crawford noted that the city council does not do it frequently, but it’s a possibility, and includes bringing back laid-off workers.

FY 2012 Budget: Council Commentary – Funds/Buckets

Mayor John Hieftje asked Ann Arbor’s CFO and interim city administrator Tom Crawford to respond to comments by Stephen Ranzini during public commentary about $103 million being in a rainy day fund. Crawford suggested that Ranzini was referring to the aggregated fund balance. For some of that amount, it’s not appropriate to use it for the general fund, he said, because it comes from ratepayers for utilities.

A lot of that $103 million is reserved for construction of the new wastewater treatment plant, Crawford said. Use of those funds is not a city charter issue – it’s a basic law. Crawford said that he had a lot of concern about the idea of borrowing funds from one fund to another. He allowed that the current situation is painful, but said the city has historically not taken short-term solutions for long-term problems. And that’s the kind of fiscal discipline that has allowed the city to remain financially stable.

Hieftje asked city attorney Stephen Postema to lay out what the legal consequences would be from the state if the city were to take money inappropriately from a utility fund. Postema said he’d have to get back to the council with the specifics on that.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) noted that it was an opportune time to discuss the issue of using restricted funds as they relate to public art. [The city's Percent for Art program allocates 1% of all capital projects for use on public art.] Kunselman said the council had never received a written opinion from the city attorney on that issue, and now was perhaps a good time to get that opinion.

Kunselman asked if it were possible to pass an ordinance to pay for human services in the same way that public art is paid for. Kunselman said that for the public art program, the city is pulling from restrictive funds to build a fountain. [Kunselman has raised this issue previously about obtaining a legal opinion from the city attorney: "Getting Smarter About the City Charter"]

Kunselman wanted to know about possible increases in revenue now being projected by the state. He asked Crawford if the council would receive adjusted revenue projections by their next meeting. Crawford said that would be very unlikely. Of the additional revenue being discussed by the state, Crawford said, it’s not clear how much may roll down to the local level. It will be well past May before that’s clear, he said.

Kunselman asked about the city’s own property tax projection. Crawford told Kunselman that the numbers are pretty solid – he’s not expecting a change.

Marica Higgins (Ward 4) responded to public commentary by saying what she’d heard was not a suggest to take money from one fund and put it into another, but rather to borrow against it. That, she thought, was a fair question. Hieftje said he thought that would not be wise, even if it’s possible.

Kunselman asked about a comment from the city’s public services area administrator, Sue McCormick, to the effect that there is a formula through which the city is paying for police and fire protection from utility funds, not borrowing it. Hieftje commented that the formula-based allocation is made because the city’s public safety area is delivering a service for protection of facilities, given heightened national security concerns. Crawford added that the reason for the safety services fee as applied to utility infrastructure is that the property is government-owned, so there’s no property tax collected. The fee for safety services is a mechanism the city utilities can use to contribute to the city, Crawford said.

FY 2012 Budget: Response Time Reporting by AnnArbor.com

Mayor John Hieftje introduced the topic of an AnnArbor.com article about fire protection in the city that was published over the weekend, noting that for him, it raised more questions than it answered. From the podium at the front of city council chambers, chief of police and interim fire chief Barnett Jones agreed that the article called to mind a lot of questions.

Jones said the information he’d seen in the article was not in the official reports. The article contended that at an April 23, 2010 fire, a father and six-year-old had “jumped” from a roof. Jones said that no indication of that had been made by firefighters in the written report. When he looked at it, it made him wonder, “Where did that come from?”

By way of clarification, an AnnArbor.com article published last year on April 23, 2010 about that fire included the headline: “House fire injures 3 Ann Arbor firefighters; father, child jump from roof to safety.” The first sentence of the article states: “A father and his 6-year-old daughter jumped to safety from the roof of a burning house …” Near the end of the article, the description of the descent from the roof attributed to then-fire chief Dominick Lanza is less dramatic: “Lanza said they had made it off the roof by the time firefighters arrived.”

The AAFD official documentation for that fire includes the reports that people were on the roof, but indicates firefighters were told on arrival that everyone was out of the house:

LADDER FIVE RESPONDED FOR A REPORTED HOUSE FIRE WITH PEOPLE TRAPPED ON THE ROOF. UPON ARRIVAL THE TWO STORY RESIDENCE WAS WELL INVOLVED WITH FLAMES THROUGH THE ROOF AND FIRST AND SECOND FLOOR. A BYSTANDER STATED THEY THOUGHT EVERYONE WAS OUT.

The fire investigation documentation reports an interview with the father of the family as follows:

He went to [the daughter's] bedroom and woke her up to get her out but when he attempted to escape he could not make it down the stairs through the smoke so he exited out the window on to the outside ledge and proceeded to the garage roof and then to the ground.

The Chronicle was not able to identify any descriptions in the report, or attributions to fire department officials in the AnnArbor.com article, that specifically indicate a jump was made from the roof.

Jones said the AnnArbor.com article stated that the response time for that fire was 9 minutes [and 4 seconds], but Jones said that in fact the total complement of firefighters was on the scene in 7 minutes. These are professional firefighters whose reputations could be damaged by what’s in the article, he said. Jones said he wanted to look at the reports and get together with the assistant fire chiefs and reach out to Ryan Stanton, the AnnArbor.com reporter who’d put together the article, and compare it to what’s in the actual reports. The information in the article doesn’t appear to be what the city has in the fire department reports, Jones said.

Hieftje wondered if it would make a difference if six people or four people were staffed – he wondered how they would get to the scene any faster. Jones said that for some of the fires discussed in the AnnArbor.com article, the houses were totally engulfed before the firefighters arrived. They did their best to get there as quickly as they could. So to have information put out in the community that indicated that they didn’t get to the scene fast enough – when the official reports show a different time – that needs to be clarified and corrected, Jones said.

Hieftje asked for a clarification of how “response time” is calculated. Jones said you hear a lot about the National Fire Protection Association’s (NFPA) 1710 Standards. Jones described the standards to the council. The text of the response time standard [emphasis added]:

5.2.4.1 Initial Arriving Company.
5.2.4.1.1 The fire department’s fire suppression resources shall be deployed to provide for the arrival of an engine company within a 240-second travel time to 90 percent of the incidents as established in Chapter 4.
5.2.4.1.2 Personnel assigned to the initial arriving company shall have the capability to implement an initial rapid intervention crew (IRIC).
5.2.4.2 Initial Full Alarm Assignment Capability.
5.2.4.2.1 The fire department shall have the capability to deploy an initial full alarm assignment within a 480-second travel time to 90 percent of the incidents as established in Chapter 4.

Jones told the council that it’s the four-minute “response time” standard they’ve been hearing a lot about. And based on the fire department official reports, Jones said, the fire trucks are covering the distance in the appropriate time from anywhere in the city. He said he believed there are some errors in Stanton’s calculations published in the AnnArbor.com story that need to be cleared up.

FY 2012 Budget: AnnArbor.com Fire Reporting – Background

In terms of the NFPA standards, it’s clear that the “response time” of the fire department is a time interval – with a beginning and an end. The start of the “response time” interval is when the firetruck is on the way (i.e., is en route) to the fire scene. The “response time” interval ends when the truck arrives on the scene of the fire.

This fits with the idea that the “response time” standard is meant in part to address the issue of adequate geographic fire protection coverage, which is related to the number of fire stations, hence to staffing levels. That standard does not address how efficient firefighters are at getting themselves into their gear and onto their trucks after they are notified that they need to roll. And the “response time” also does not include the interval before firefighters are notified – that is, the time it takes the 911 operator and fire dispatcher to deal with a call.

Obviously, the intervals that precede the “response time” interval also matter. And separate standards apply to those intervals. For the interval that starts with the call to 911 and ends with the notification of a fire station that it needs to roll its trucks down the road, the standard is 60 seconds. From the time a fire station receives notification, i.e., is dispatched to the fire scene, to the point when the trucks are actually on the way, the standard is also 60 seconds.

In terms of time points and the intervals between them, this is The Chronicle’s summary of what the NFPA timeline looks like:

Timepoint 1: The time when the emergency alarm is received by the public safety operator.
Interval: 1-2 [Dispatch Time (or Call Processing Time)] 60 seconds
Timepoint 2: The time when sufficient information is known to the dispatcher, and the relevant fire station is notified of the emergency.
Interval: 2-3 [Turnout Time] 60 seconds
Timepoint 3: The time at which a fire truck is en route to the emergency incident.
Interval: 3-4 [Response Time] 240 seconds (4 minutes), 480 seconds for full-alarm assignment of vehicles and personnel.
Timepoint 4: The time when a fire truck arrives at the scene.

Determining the actual intervals for a given fire is a matter of performing the clock arithmetic on the correct timepoints. The reporting in the AnnArbor.com article about the AAFD response times was based on timepoints drawn from AAFD official reports. However, instead of using Timepoint 3 (the actual en route time) for the arithmetic, it appears a different timepoint was used.

The fire reports used in the AnnArbor.com article were uploaded by that publication to a2docs.org:

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Based on The Chronicle’s review of the AAFD reports used in AnnArbor.com’s arithmetic, it seems that AAFD’s practice is not to record Timepoint 3 as a separate datapoint, but instead to copy the timepoint labeled “dispatch time” into the report field labeled “enroute time.” From a Sept. 16, 2010 report:

Ann Arbor Fire Department report for Sept. 16, 2010 fire reporting, illustrating the identical timepoint recordings for "notify time" and "enroute time."

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If the timepoint labeled “enroute time” is used for the clock arithmetic, ignoring the fact that it’s identical to the “notify time” (an equivalence that seems impossible), the result of the clock arithmetic for “response time” is 4 minutes 9 seconds [05:59:44 – 05:55:35 = 00:04:09], or 9 seconds longer than the NFPA standards that should be met for 90% of fires.

In multiple places elsewhere in the same Sept. 16, 2010 report, a “dispatch time” is recorded as 05:55 – it’s only precise to the minute. And an “alarm time” is recorded as 05:55:35 – which is also identical to the “notify time” and the “enroute times.”

The sum of the NFPA standards for the interval between the dispatch timepoint (Timepoint 2) to the on-scene arrival time (Timepoint 4) is 5 minutes. Based on that interval, the Sept. 16, 2010 “response time” + “turnout time” would be classified as meeting the NFPA standard.

One of the reports used in the AnnArbor.com article does include Timepoint 3 as a separate datapoint – in the form of a screen grab from a dispatcher’s screen. For the April 23, 2010 fire, a separate timepoint – between “dispatch” and “on-scene” – is recorded as “respond.” That’s the timepoint when the firefighters alert dispatchers that they are on the way.

Excerpt from a dispatcher screen grab included in the Ann Arbor fire department report for April 23, 2010. The "respond time" corresponds to the "enroute time," or Timepoint 3, when the firefighters let the dispatcher know they're on the way to the scene.

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Using the “respond” timepoint for the clock arithmetic on the April 23, 2010 fire yields a 2 minute 37 second “response time” for the first-arriving vehicle and a 7 minute 6 second response for the fifth vehicle on the scene (including the battalion chief), which is Ann Arbor’s “full alarm assignment.” Both of those “response times” meet the NFPA standard.

In an email to The Chronicle, assistant fire chief Chuck Hubbard noted that sometimes firefighters tell the dispatcher over the radio at the station that they’re responding to a call, then climb aboard the trucks and head to the fire scene, rather than radioing from the truck. That introduces some uncertainty in the response time data.

Assistant fire chief Chuck Hubbard attended the council's May 16 meeting.

While the “response time” standard addresses travel time to a fire scene, and relates to the number of stations maintained in the city and their geographic distribution, the other time intervals relate to call-center efficiency and the ability of firefighters to assemble their gear and start rolling down the road. It’s not clear what accounts for the three-minute interval between “dispatch” and “respond” for the April 23, 2010 fire.

It does seem clear that, without an understanding of actual AAFD operating procedures and how they relate to the data included in official AAFD reports, it’s difficult to draw definitive conclusions from those reports about the actual time intervals that are relevant for evaluating Ann Arbor fire department performance against NFPA standards.

The uncertainty of the data in the reports is supported by a notation in a report made five days after an April 13, 2010 fire [emphasis added]:

04/18/2010 09:51:55 ETAYLOR All individual personnel names were added to each apparatus for complete accountability of who was at the scene. The injury report was updated with the proper age of the firefighter who was injured at the scene. Also wanted to note that some of the times were estimated because of inaccurate times reported by central dispatch.

FY 2012 Budget: AnnArbor.com Community Comparison Reporting

At the council meeting, chief Jones went on to say that a AnnArbor.com article had failed to include in its presentation of data about other Big 10 university communities that some of those fire department have their own ambulances. That requires additional staffing, he said.

Each ambulance would require an additional seven staff, he said. Taking East Lansing as an example [home of Michigan State University], Jones said that if the ambulance personnel were subtracted, it would work out to approximately the same relative staffing level as Ann Arbor.

FY 2012 Budget: Council/Staff Response – Fire Protection

Speaking about the fire protection study that the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) is conducting for the city, chief Jones characterized that organization as the neutral third party that would bring in experts from the fire service profession to do the study. [The contract with ICMA, for not more than $54,000, was authorized at the city council's Feb. 7, 2011 meeting.]

Toward the beginning of the council meeting, mayor John Hieftje had asked interim city administrator Tom Crawford about the status of the fire protection study that the city has commissioned. Crawford said it’s expected to be delivered in July. [In connection with the appointment of the interim administrator from an internal pool of candidates, the fire protection study was one of the major projects identified as important for the appointee to carry forward.]

Chief Jones noted that he’d been working with the two assistant fire chiefs, and he’d be bringing a recommendation to fill the open fire chief position by promoting from within. [Jones is head of public safety services for the city and is serving as interim fire chief in the wake of Dominick Lanza's resignation this spring, after only about a year on the job.]

Ann Arbor is an intelligent community, Jones said, and we need to have the facts in front of us. The ICMA would provide those facts. ICMA would give clear advice so that Ann Arbor is prepared to go in the right direction, he said.

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) wanted to know who would be doing the fire protection study – city managers? Who are the actual people who have the expertise to evaluate the fire department, she asked. Jones told her it would be experts from the relevant field of city government. For Ann Arbor’s study, it would be Don James, a firefighter from Florida, who would lead the study. He’d be assisted by a data analyst and a third person who is an ex-fire chief, Jones said.

Higgins asked who would write the report. She wanted to know if it would be filtered. Jones told Higgins, “No, ma’am.” He said a personal friend of his – the fire chief in Troy – had tried to influence that report, and they’d “slapped him” a few times. ICMA will not “water down” their results, Jones assured Higgins.

During his communications time, Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) said he wanted to clear up some misinformation. He said there’s a perception that the city has refused to meet with firefighters to negotiate a new contract. He said that’s clearly not accurate. The city has met at least 16 times with the firefighters’ negotiating team, most recently a week or so ago. A state mediator has participated in meetings on three occasions. Another another meeting was scheduled later this week. The firefighters had filed an Act 312 petition requesting arbitration in March. Among the issues in dispute are wages, pension, rank differential, and staffing levels. All of those have the potential to affect the budget, depending on how the arbitrator rules, Rapundalo said.

Despite the uncertainty of the situation, the city continues to meet and hope that “cooler heads will prevail,” Rapundalo said. He hoped that the two sides can come to an understanding to mitigate some of the cuts.

FY 2012 Budget: Council Deliberations

The decision to recess the meeting and continue it a week later is driven by a city charter requirement that the council adopt its budget no later than the second meeting in May, which began May 16. When the meeting resumes on May 23, it will be considered to be the same meeting.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) said she’d looked it up in Robert’s Rules of Order and what should happen is to “adjourn to date and time specific” After clarifying with city attorney Stephen Postema that either the word “recess” or “adjourn” would work, Hieftje noted that the date and time would be 7 p.m. on May 23.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to recess the meeting until Monday, May 23 at 7 p.m.

Human Services Funding

Before the council was a resolution to allocate $1,159,029 in funding to nonprofits in the city that provide human services.

The $1,159,029 amount to be allocated reflects a 9% reduction from FY 2011 human services funding levels. The council had postponed consideration of the human services allocation at its May 2, 2011 meeting in order to explore ways of “finding another dime.”

The city’s support for human services is allocated in coordination with other entities: the United Way of Washtenaw County ($1,677,000), Washtenaw County ($1,015,000) and the Washtenaw Urban County ($363,154).

On Monday, councilmembers were inclined to delay action on all budget-related issues, given their plan to delay action on the FY 2012 budget, which was achieved through a recess of the meeting until Monday, May 23. When the meeting continues at that time, the resolution on human services funding can be taken off the table for deliberation and a vote.

It’s possible that when the budget resolution is considered on May 23, an amendment will be proposed to draw $85,600 from the city’s general fund reserve to increase the human services allocation. That budget amendment is expected to be proposed by Sabra Briere (Ward 1) and Marcia Higgins (Ward 4).

Outcome: The council voted to lay on the table the resolution on human services funding. It can be taken up off the table when the meeting resumes on Monday, May 23.

Water System Study

Before the council was a $208,984 contract with AECOM for a study of the city’s water distribution system. The money for the study, which dates from a 2007 request for proposals (RFP), was allocated in the fiscal year 2011 budget of the city’s water fund. The level of service (LOS) study to be done by AECOM will recommend a sustainable level of service for the city’s water distribution system, and determine how much investment it would take to achieve that level. The study would also help the city decide, for example, which water mains should be replaced first.

Water System Study: Council Deliberations

Cresson Slotten, unit manager in the systems planning department, fielded questions from the council on the study. He described it as the second part of a two-part study. The first part had addressed the capacity and technical function of the water distribution system. The second phase looks at the level of services and will involve a citizens group, addressing issues like taste and odor, and will provide cost estimates to deliver the desired level of service.

Mayor John Hieftje pointed out that the money for the study derives from fees paid by water consumers.

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) asked Slotten if the four water main breaks in his neighborhood in the last year would be included in the scope of the study. Slotten allowed that this kind of issue is part of the study. Other factors include taste – as pipes begin to age, taste might be affected – color and odor.

Kunselman then noted that the city has a very qualified staff. They know where breaks are, so why can’t the city do this internally? Why do they need to hire it out? Slotten said the city has maintained the system well, but hasn’t gone out to citizens and asked them for their views.

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) said if she understood the proposal correctly, what the city is seeking is a consultant to communicate better with people who live in Ann Arbor, to ask the right questions and give the staff the information they have to share. Briere said it seems not to be a one-time thing – it seems to be a recurring theme about why the city hires consultants. Is it that the city doesn’t have the capacity to do the work, she asked, or doesn’t have the capacity to communicate?

One thing a consultant brings, Slotten said, is the ability to compare standards to other communities across the U.S. and Canada. The consultant has evaluated assets in communities across the country, and brings that experience and context. Sandi Smith (Ward 1) said the question has come up from residents about the city possibly privatizing its water distribution system. Smith provided the historical note that Ann Arbor had actually purchased its system originally from a private company in 1908.

Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) asked Slotten to speak to the value of the consultant as it relates to the city’s capital planning. Slotten said that one of the reasons this particular firm was selected is that they use a capital asset prioritization simulator (CAPS) that takes advantage of information that the city is already tracking, like where breaks are occurring.

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) said she could appreciate that the city wants to have the study done. However, she had a problem taking on a $200,000 study. She said she was not sure she could support it. She was particularly concerned about the $10,550 contingency. She felt like the city did not do a good job making sure that unused contingencies are returned to fund balances.

CFO Tom Crawford noted that contingencies are used only if needed. Contingencies are reviewed quarterly, he said, and when the project is closed, contingencies go back.

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) said he was not for the amendment, saying that if there are concerns about accounting and how contingencies are closed out, then that issue should be addressed directly. Hieftje said he would not support the amendment either, saying the contingency could cover critical work that needs to be done.

Outcome on contingency amendment: Amending out the contingency was approved on a 6-5 vote with support from: Smith, Briere, Rapundalo, Higgins, Kunselman and Anglin.

Hieftje then asked if Higgins perhaps would like to delay a final vote until other budget issues were also addressed. So she moved that the issue be laid on the table.

Outcome: The council voted to lay the resolution on the table. They’ll be able to take it up off the table when the meeting resumes on May 23.

Neighborhood Stabilization Program Funds: Near North Demolition

Before the council was a resolution to add to its neighborhood stabilization program (NSP) budget, and a corresponding expenditure to pay for the demolition of three houses as site preparation for the Near North affordable housing project on North Main.

The addition to the NSP budget came from a reimbursement. The owner of a house paid back NSP money to the city, previously expended to demolish the owner’s property. That reimbursement amounted to $24,135. NSP funds come originally from federal grants allocated through the Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA).

In addition, city staff identified an NSP homeowner acquisition and rehabilitation project that was completed under budget by $11,750. Combined, the additional revenue to the NSP budget and the savings on the rehabilitation project amount to $35,885. Of that amount, $33,292 will be used to pay for the demolition of 718, 722, and 724 N. Main St., with the remaining $2,593 going to administration costs in the office of community development, which oversees the NSP. The money will be allocated to the nonprofit Avalon Housing, which is developing the Near North project with Three Oaks.

The city council originally approved rezoning for the project – a four-story, 39-unit mixed use residential building on a 1.19-acre site – on Sept. 21, 2009.

NSP Near North Demolitions: Council Deliberations

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) asked Mary Jo Callan, head of the city/county office of community development, to explain how the funding worked. Neighborhood stabilization program (NSP) funds received in 2009 were used initially to demolish a residential property. A lien was placed on it for $24,135. When the property was sold, the sale proceeds were used to pay back the city. When the NSP program receives income, the city tries to apply the money to an existing, shovel-ready project, Callan said.

Kunselman noted there are lots of blighted properties in the city that could use these funds. Why were these houses on North Main selected and not others? Why wouldn’t the developer be responsible for tearing down the houses? Callan told Kunselman those were great questions. The funds have a time limit on them, so part of the reason to use them on the Near North demolitions is that it’s a project ready to go, there’s a clear owner, a clear title, and there are no potential delays. In addition, NSP funds can only be used on certain census tracts.

Kunselman wanted to know if a lien would be placed on the property and how the Near North developer would pay it back. Callan said that certain liens are forgiven. But if the property were sold, it would have to get paid back. Kunselman concluded from what Callan said that the money for demolition is a grant. Callan told him, “It’s an investment in permanently affordable housing.” The expectation is that the housing will be permanently affordable. The city’s strategy is not heavily weighted towards “recycling” the money, as Kunselman was suggesting: use money for demolition; place a lien on the property; the property sells; the lien is paid back; and the money becomes available for demolition of another blighted property.

Kunselman asked community services area administrator Sumedh Bahl how many blighted properties the city’s nuisance committee had identified. Bahl said the committee is prioritizing a list and in the next few months, that list would be shared with the council. Kunselman wondered if the city would have any money to undertake demolitions. There was a house torn down in his neighborhood where the money was paid back. Was there any way to make sure the North Main property owner does pay it back?

Sabra Briere (Ward 1) said she was intrigued that it’s a permanent loan that gets paid back only if a property is sold. She said it’s a disincentive to sell, and a reason to give this kind of grant. She asked if there are other similar situations in the offing. Callan said this is the city’s model for investing in affordable housing. She said the need to repay on sale of the property is absolutely a disincentive to sell, but that Avalon Housing doesn’t need the disincentive in the case of the Near North project, because affordable housing is their mission.

Briere wondered if, generally speaking, NSP funds were not for demolition. Callan explained that demolition is, in fact, an allowable activity for NSP funds – it’s about stabilizing neighborhoods. Although the city has not used NSP funds often for that, she said she’d talked with Margie Teall (Ward 4) about setting aside some of the NSP funds for demolition.

Outcome: The council voted to approve the NSP allocations so that the houses on North Main could be demolished in preparation for the Near North housing project.

Large Vehicle Purchases

Before the council were authorizations for the purchase of two large vehicles – an Elgin street sweeper ($273,300) and a combination sewer truck ($398,806).

The staff memo accompanying the request for the sweeper states: “The sweeper being replaced has been in service ten years and has 5,960 hours of use. Over the last two years, this unit has been taken to Fleet Service for maintenance and repairs 87 times of which 33% have been for breakdowns. The total cost of all repairs over the same time frame have exceeded $113,250.”

About the combination sewer truck: “This truck will replace a 2004 unit with 8060 hours of use. Over the last two years, this unit has been taken to Fleet Service for maintenance and repairs 53 times of which 58% have been for breakdowns. These breakdowns have taken the unit out of service from as little as four hours to as long as two weeks.”

The council had postponed the purchases from its May 2, 2011 meeting with a request for additional information about the vehicles.

Large Vehicle Purchases: Council Deliberations

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) wanted to know if the trucks had any resale value. Craig Hupy, head of systems planning for the city, said they did. The city is known for keeping its trucks in pretty good shape, he said. But the city kept the trucks in service for a longer time than a dealership would be willing to offer a guaranteed buy-back, so the re-sale value depends on the market, Hupy said.

Kunselman asked if the same sewer truck purchase proposal had been brought before the council last year. No, said Hupy. It was in a previous year’s budget. But Hupy described how the city had a desire to do cooperative bidding with other cities and they’d gone together with three other cities to bid for the truck. Agreeing with the other cities on the specifications for the trucks was like “herding cats,” Hupy said, but in the end the city had gotten about a 10% better deal than if it had gone out to bid by itself.

Mayor John Hieftje drew out the fact that the vehicles to be replaced had frequently been out of service, and in the case of the combination sewer truck could delay cleaning out of sewers, which could result in sewers backing up.

Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) picked up on the idea that the city needs the truck – it’s needed to do sewer clear-outs, which can result in sewer backups for residents if they’re not done. Hearing that, said Higgins, boggled her mind. She said she understood comments by Hupy and Hieftje to mean that if the city doesn’t do sewer clear-outs, it can cause sewer backups in the basement. Hupy allowed that the failure to do sewer clear-outs “can result in” sewer backups – not “cause.” Hupy said it was his understanding that if the city has not performed adequate sewer maintenance and a resident experiences sewer backups, then it can result in a payable claim.

Higgins also wanted to know how the vehicles were being paid for. If a vehicle is not originally paid for out of the fleet fund, does the revenue from resale go back to the fund it was paid out of? Hupy said he’d defer to the financial folks to answer the question – Sue McCormick, public services area administrator. The truck was originally paid out of sewer funds, said McCormick. So money from resale goes back to the sewer fund.

As the city moves ahead, McCormick said, it purchases new vehicles from the fleet fund. So the next time a truck like this is replaced, it’ll be bought out of the fleet fund with money contributed by the sanitary sewer fund. Sabra Briere (Ward 1) wanted McCormick to explain why the city was moving to a strategy of paying for vehicles out of the fleet fund.

McCormick described the history at the city related to pressures on general fund fleet purchases. That had resulted in a very slow vehicle replacement schedule, with older vehicles. And the city wound up with very low reliability on daily production work. So the decision was made years ago to stop purchasing vehicles from the fleet fund and to pay for vehicles through cash flow. The city has now done away with that practice, McCormick said, and is returning to a strategy of paying for new vehicles out of the fleet fund. The reason, she said, is that if you think about paying annual depreciation on a vehicle, as opposed to “cash flowing it,” the cash-flow approach impacts utility rates in the year when the expense is incurred, instead of spreading it over the life of the vehicle. The fleet fund approach is thus more favorable to ratepayers, she said.

Kunselman wrapped up his comments by saying he would be supporting the purchase. He noted there have been four water main breaks within two blocks of his house, and when the city comes with the trucks, they’re right there and they pull everything out of the hole.

Outcome: The council approved both truck purchases on separate votes.

“Parks Fairness” Resolution

Before the council was a proposed revision to the 2006 administrative policy that governs the use of the city’s parks capital improvements and maintenance millage, including how the city’s general fund should support Ann Arbor’s parks.

A key point to the revision includes an additional provision that “for the purpose of this resolution all funds other than the Millage which are used to support Parks and Recreation system activities shall be considered the same as City’s General Fund support.” The proposed budget for fiscal year 2012 calls for using money from the METRO Act fund and the city’s stormwater fund to pay for certain parks operations, which the city would like to count as general fund support.

The new provision in the policy helps the city’s planned budget for FY 2012 conform with another administrative policy requirement – that the amount of general fund parks support not decrease any more than other parts of the general fund.

A further amendment that was before the council on May 16 would have changed the standard of general fund support from one that is based on hard dollars to one that is based on service levels, with FY 2011 as a baseline: “[T]he General Fund budget supporting the Parks and Recreation system for that year may be reduced by a higher percentage than the average percentage reduction of the total City General Fund budget as long as the FY11 level of service within Parks and Recreation system is not materially reduced.”

That second amendment would have helped the city conform with the policy this year, because the proposed FY 2012 budget called for spending $90,000 less on parks than would otherwise be required if the administrative policy were left unamended. The city contends that the $90,000 reduction in expenditures is due to increased efficiency, and would not affect service standards. [Chronicle coverage: "Council to Get Reminder of Parks Promise"]

The city council also revised the 2006 administrative policy during the FY 2010 budget cycle, so that millage funding for the natural area preservation program would not automatically increase by 3% every year.

Parks Fairness Resolution: Council Deliberations

Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) began by introducing the background for the resolution: The 2006 parks maintenance and capital improvements millage was accompanied by a city council resolution outlining how the millage money should be spent. Generally speaking, he said, the resolution was meant to have any reductions/increases in parks funding be on a parallel track with general fund reductions/increases.

Taylor indicated that he’d be suggesting a friendly amendment to a resolution revising the 2006 policy. In the midst of his remarks, which Taylor self-described as a “long and wandering introduction,” Mayor John Hieftje wanted to get the issue of the amendment settled. But Taylor told the mayor that he’d not gotten to the actual amendment yet.

The amendment that Taylor wanted to make to his own resolution was this:  Strike the proposed addition of a clause that would establish service levels as the standard that parks spending would be measured against, instead of a hard dollar figure comparison to the general fund. The reason he wanted to strike the clause was that he felt it might be possible to find a way to make up the additional $90,000 for parks in the FY 2012 budget, which the current administrative policy would require, if it were not amended.

Confusion ensued among councilmembers as they struggled to understand what Taylor intended. In sum, the following language from his amendment was stricken, which left that part of the administrative policy intact.

… [T]he General Fund budget supporting the Parks and Recreation system for that year may be reduced by a higher percentage than the average percentage reduction of the total City General Fund budget as long as the FY11 level of service within Parks and Recreation system is not materially reduced.

Surviving amendment was the part of Taylor’s resolution that allowed non-millage funds outside the general fund to count for purposes of calculating the amount of general fund support for the parks.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to revise the parks millage administrative policy to allow non-millage funds external to the general fund to count as general fund money for purposes of the policy.

Taxicab Fares

Before the council was an increase in the allowable fare for cabs operating in the city. The rate increase affects only the mileage component of fares, which were last approved on May 19, 2008.

The mileage increase from $2.25/mile to $2.50/mile had been requested by several taxicab companies in light of rising fuel prices, which are currently just over $4/gallon. The city’s taxicab board has indicated that with this increase, it does not anticipate considering another rate change until the gas prices are over $5/gallon for at least two consecutive months. The board had voted to recommend the change at its April 28, 2011 meeting.

Members of the taxicab board include the city’s CFO Tom Crawford, and William Clock, an officer with the Ann Arbor police department, as non-voting members. [The city's ordinance actually requires that the city's CFO and the chief of police serve as non-voting members.] The five voting members are Stephen Kunselman (representative to the board from the city council) as well as Barbara Krick, C. Robert Snyder, Tom Oldakowski and Timothy Hull.

[Hull has filed nominating petitions to contest the city council Democratic primary in Ward 2 against incumbent Stephen Rapundalo. Kunselman will be running for re-election in the Ward 3 Democratic primary.]

Crawford, who is also interim city administrator, had announced the public hearing on the taxicab fare increase at the city council’s May 2, 2011 meeting.

Taxicab Fares: Public Hearing

Michael Benson introduced himself as a Ward 2 resident and president of the University of Michigan graduate student body. He told the council he wanted to speak about the process for the increase. He noted fuel costs are in fact going up and he understands the need for the increase. But he noted that in the past, a temporary surcharge has been used to address increased fuel prices – why not this time? He asked that the increase be amended with some kind of sunset clause that would require the increase to be reviewed after a certain period, and that a recommendation be brought back to the council.

Thomas Partridge called on the council to postpone the increase. Any increase in rates harms the most vulnerable residents first, he said. Executives in limousines pulling up to Google are not concerned about taxicab rates, he said. He called on the council to table the measure and come up with a better proposal.

Taxicab Fares: Council Deliberations

Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) inquired whether a formula been considered that would tie taxicab rates to some objective third-party measure of fuel prices, so that requests for fare increases would come before the council less frequently. Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), who sponsored the resolution as the city council’s appointee to the taxicab board, responded to Hohnke by saying that other costs have also increased – it’s not just the gas increase that’s driving this. He told Hohnke that no formula tied to fuel prices has been discussed.

In response to Benson’s suggestion made during public commentary to sunset the increase, Kunselman said he was not going to make that recommendation. Taxicab companies are struggling for other reasons. Kunselman amended one of the “whereas” clauses to make it clear that gas prices have now exceeded $4/gallon – they didn’t jump by $4/gallon.

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to approve the fare increase.

Downtown Design Guidelines

Before the council was initial approval to an amendment of its land use control ordinance that will establish design guidelines for new projects in downtown Ann Arbor, and set up a seven-member design review board (DRB) to provide developers with feedback on their projects’ conformance to the design guidelines.

All city of Ann Arbor ordinances require approval at an initial first reading before the council, a public hearing, and a final approval.

The project review by the DRB will come before a meeting with nearby residents – which is already required as part of the citizen participation ordinance. While the DRB process is required, conformance with the recommendations of that body is voluntary.

The city council had previously approved the design guideline review program at its Feb. 7, 2011 meeting. The city planning commission unanimously recommended the change to the city’s ordinance at its April 5, 2011 meeting. [Previous Chronicle coverage, which includes a detailed timeline of the design guidelines work, dating back to a work group formed in 2006: "Ann Arbor Hotel First to Get Design Review?"]

Council deliberations were brief. Marcia Higgins (Ward 4) noted that the ordinance now before the council is coming back after being presented at the February meeting. The city’s planning commission had been asked to expedite it, she said, and they had done that. That means that new construction will fall under the ordinance. She urged her colleagues to pass it, saying, “It’s exactly what we wanted.”

Outcome: The council voted unanimously to approve the design guidelines, which will need a final approval before the ordinance is enacted.

Communications and Comment

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

Comm/Comm: Transformers in Neighborhoods

Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3) informed his council colleagues that in response to an issue raised in Arbor Oaks subdivision by a city engineer – it concerned electrical transformers in the easements of backyards – he and Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2) had contacted Paul Ganz, DTE’s regional manager, and DTE had sent crews out to investigate. Everything is safe, he reported, and there is no danger of electrocution. DTE is going to address some of the visual issues that had caused concern.

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

Council meeting to be continued: May 23, 2011 at 7 p.m. in the second-floor council chambers at 301 E. Huron. [confirm date]

The item was tabled for essentially two reasons. First, councilmembers expressed concern about the general issue of using consultants to communicate with residents, instead of relying on city staff. Second, councilmembers had concerns about the cost of the study, and they were inclined to delay action on all budget-related issues, given their plan to delay action on the FY 2012 budget, which was achieved through a recess of the meeting until Monday, May 23. When the meeting continues at that time, the water distribution system study can be taken off the table for deliberation and a vote.

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