City Commission - Regular Meeting

It is uh 6 PM on Monday, April 13th. This is a city commission special meeting workshop. Uh we are meeting uh to uh interview CA uh applicants for a vacant uh seat on the city commission. We have now seven applicants. One uh withdrew today. That would be Beth Korea. Uh so you can cross her name off our list. Uh if you figure we have 50 minutes uh to take care of most of the business with 10 minutes uh of some discussion perhaps and uh uh some time for public comment. Uh that would give each uh applicant about 7 minutes combined between a three minute introduction to us and four minutes or so for us to question them. Um after they speak uh we can take public comment and uh and then I think that we should uh create a short list. This is what we did the last time around. uh no no uh no parameters other than that. I think that we can we can all talk and it will probably uh it'll hopefully it'll be clear that we have two or three candidates that we think have risen to the top whom we will ask to uh stick around through a very long meeting, a long and sometimes a boring meeting. uh because uh the point at which we will actually take action on this is toward the end of our agenda and we do have a very long agenda and so uh let's get started. Um am I missing anything? Uh roll call please.

Mayor Balor here. Mayor Potlong here. Commissioner Hay here. Commissioner Hos here. Commissioner Cole here. Commissioner Kazowski here. Commissioner Theresa here. Okay, we'll take the applicants in the order that they applied. And the first uh was Richard Weatherhold. Is Mr. Weatherhold here? Let me also ask, are all other seven applicants here? Ilier Doresi. Okay. Uh Beth Korean. No. Gordon Thompson, are you here? Good. Uh Brian Gordon. Brian Gordon sent an email that he's on Zoom. He's on Zoom. Okay. G showing on Zoom.

Okay, good. And Deborah her, Mary Jay, and Doug White. I see. Okay, sir, please uh take about three minutes. Are you going to time it roughly? We don't want to be rude. I'm trying, but we also don't want to go into get the seven minute timer up, but I will keep it on my phone until I can get the seven minute timer up. Okay, Mr. Weatherhold. Did I say that right? Weatherhold.

Yes. Okay. Thank you. Good evening, members of the commission. My name is Rick Weatherhold. I live at 2083 Sheffield Road. I'm a lifelong Michigander and been proud to call Birmingham home for over a decade. This is one of the best cities to raise a family. My wife and I are experiencing this firsthand. Our oldest started in the Birmingham school district this year and our second will join this fall. I'm standing before you because I am deeply passionate about the city with a strong desire to serve. I want to protect what makes Birmingham special while ensuring it remains vibrant and sustainable for the next generation. Our city deserves leadership that is calm, competent, and measured, focused on and connected into the practical issues that affect homeowners, business owners, and families every single day. Complex city challenges require a multid-disciplinary lens. My background is rooted in rigorous education and diverse thinking. I hold degrees from the University of Michigan in engineering, economics, and music along with an MBA. In addition, I hold a masters in product development from the University of Detroit Mercy. This unique blend allows me to look at a problem, see the technical constraints, the economic realities, and the human element all at once. I've spent my career leading complex highstakes decisions, building multi-million dollar business cases, managing complex P&Ls, and driving ROI on billion-dollar investments. At the core of my work is a simple principle. Make strategic decisions based on facts, think long term, and be accountable for results. I bring experience in strategy, operations, and large-scale planning. Daily in my professional life, I leverage artificial intelligence to connect large data sets and drive smarter, more efficient decisions. I see a massive opportunity for Birmingham to further leverage these tools to sharpen our datadriven decision-making in everything we do and unlock greater operational cost efficiency. That is the mindset I would bring to this

commission. To me, fiscal responsibility means transparency and strong returns on every taxpayer dollar. For our homeowners, we must protect property values and preserve the unique neighborhood character through smart development, bridging the Woodward divide, and respecting our past while modernizing for our future. For residents, public safety and infrastructure are paramount. I'm committed to improving pedestrian safety, managing traffic flow, and responsibly modernizing our roads, utilities, and green spaces. For our business owners, a vibrant downtown is the heartbeat of Birmingham. I will focus on solving chronic issues like parking and accessibility and supporting our local businesses to ensure they can thrive in its self- sustaining ecosystem. Our master plan is our strategic vision and I intend to uphold this core focus areas and accelerate progress. I also want to bring fresh eyes to invigorate our younger population and bridge the gap between our long-standing residents and new families, fostering community connection and exploring more self-sustaining business entities within the city. I'm an operational builder by trade and a strategist by nature. Offer a steady hand approach to forecasting and a deep dedication to this community. I'm ready to ensure we aren't just maintaining what is great, but building a future that's even better. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. Uh questions for Mr. Weatherhold. Commissioner Host. Um I'm just curious, could you tell us uh you have so many undergrad degrees. Uh what's the music undergrad degree in? Uh it's non-performance. So it's through literature, science, and arts. I've always had a passion for music. I was in the marching band at U of M

and uh I've had the opportunity to continue that on. I'm in a local cover band that plays all across Metro Detroit. So, started in piano and saxophone in school, has continued on into guitar and other things, but it's just been a consistent passion of mine and something an opportunity to leverage while I was uh while I was in school. And uh a second question, do you mind going through the the growth mindset that you uh you know brought up as opportunities

for for the city of Birmingham specifically? I think I think I touched on a couple of them in particular just starting with AI and just kind of going back through there's been a lot of conversation in past meetings about it even in the last uh uh uh election for prior vacancy that was a that was a topic that you brought up and and we've seen it uh in proliferate through public sector and private sector and it's growing tremendously every day. I think it's just a realization of the fact that this is a tool that's going to continue to grow and empower us to make more strategic decisions. It's not an alternative of whether we're going to use it or not. It's just who's going to use it the best. Um we've got some very complex things to solve in a historic city like infrastructure always comes up. But I also compleimement with the fact of how much material you all have to review on a weekly basis and the amount of data that exists from other municipalities that are solving very similar decisions. The ability to leverage AI, the biggest strength of that is how we can really scrutinize the data and understand in ways that we haven't in the past so we can get to more efficient decisions. In addition to AI, I think there's other opportunities and I know other municipalities include including ours are exploring it. But I'm fascinated by um when I grew up in Rochester Hills, they've done a lot of uh tremendous things outside of the taxpayer dollars. Um partnerships with uh private donations through grants, Innovation Hills Park as an example, or the fact that every year they do an annual fireworks show and it's not funded at all through taxpayer dollars. I think a tremendous opportunity for us particularly in the areas where we've struggled to gain additional funding such as when we talk about comm you know community development through uh the YMCA building and where these things go

is how can we partner with private entities to make our dollars go even further and provide additional services. We already have great services, but to enhance those even more through through additional partnerships that are outside the box of the traditional way that municipalities have run the business in the past. Other questions from commissioners? Yes, Commissioner Cole, please keep an eye on the clock. Thank you. So, I have one specific question. You talked about making strategic decisions based on facts. Um, sometimes we don't have the benefit of all the details. Um, how do you approach decisions like that when you don't have all the facts?

I think part of it is is network. Um, when we don't have facts, we try and see what we can learn from other communities. Maybe that's reaching out. Maybe that's soliciting the advice of others that have uh faced similar challenges. I think that's part of it. Um I think additionally and the strength of the commission is the pulse for which the leadership can get information through the various demographics in the city. I think that's a tremendous advantage that I have in that space. Um so and the other thing is you know it comes down to um talk about a steady hand. Um these are a lot oftenimes difficult decisions with not all the data. So it comes down to a sense of of of trust that's built on how we approach solving problems and our understanding amongst ourselves on the the different things that we bring can be really advantageous through that collaboration.

Thank you. Uh let's move along. Uh next candidate or applicant is Ilier. Did I say that right? Yeah, that's right. I duress Duressi. Yeah, Mr. Duressi. Welcome. Welcome. Thank you for coming. Richard's a good speaker. I'm not going to speak like him. So, yeah. All right. My name is Leo Dessi. I think I'm a great good candidate for this. Uh I grew up here in Birmingham. Went to school here, high school. My kids are going to school here, too, as well. Um might be a little jittery. My wife just went in labor with our fifth child. So, yeah. Wow.

Um yeah. So, I'm going to keep it short. So, with budgeting for my job right now, uh, sales manager BMW, year to year, we have growth. You know, I'm good with budgeting with money without cutting back on other expenses. Um, developing, I just feel like lately, like there's been too much. We've been overpaying for developing in the city of Birmingham. I've been noticing a lot. I'm not sure if you guys are negotiating. Well, not to criticize anybody, but it's easier just to say yes and get the job done. I just noticed extra budgeting is just like uh money's being spent just over over too much. Um other than that is pretty much it. You guys any questions for me?

Does anyone have any questions? I' I'd like to know. Uh another thing too, sorry I cut you off. Another thing too, I lost my paperwork at work. I left early. Another thing too, like the safety of the residents and also the Airbnbs that we have. Um it's just a little too much going on with the inside the neighborhoods having short rentals. Uh that's one of my concerns and I know the YMCA a lot of people are talking about that. I feel like it is a useless space there that needs to be kind of taken care of though. I do agree on that. All right. Okay. Anyone uh have any questions for Mr. Duressie? Thank you.

Yeah. Thank you.

Um we move along. U Mr. Thompson. Gordon Thompson. Good evening. I would like to thank the city commission for their work and for the opportunity to apply for the open seat. I grew up in New Jersey. I went to college in Pennsylvania and graduate school in Florida. I've lived in Idaho, Colorado, Texas, Chile, the Gambia, South Africa, Ecuador, Peru, and many other places around the world. These experiences have given me a rare and broad perspective on how people live, how cities function, what challenges they face, how they can be better, and what processes can make them so. Whether it's planning water main replacement or an outdoor movie night, the issues that come before the city commission are complex and highly detailed. Behind them are individual stakeholders, each with unique needs and desires. As an English teacher and writer, I have a keen eye for language and details. Every day, I sit in a circle with students and engage their thoughts, feelings, and perspectives. We explore things as simple as house versus home and as challenging as how to reconcile Jefferson's racist writing with the Declaration of Independence. I encourage students to expand on their ideas. I seek clarification. I draw them out. Most of all, I listen. Students thank me for making them think and express themselves in new ways. Leading on Cranrook's Wilderness Expedition has stoked my optimism. Even the toughest trail can be conquered and

even the most stubborn problem can be solved. Working with parents, on faculty council, the use of time committee, in the residential program, and in many other capacities has taught me the importance of process and due diligence. As a KA fellow in Peru and Ecuador, I did technical micro finance work, but equally important were the human connections. Some borrowers were afraid to talk or suspicious or distracted. Fluency in Spanish, multicultural sensitivity, and experience with the diversity of people allowed me to bring out the best in each borrower. Like Miriam, the pig farmer who said, "I love my life, but I want better for my children." We tell stories like that, and we study literature not to increase vocabulary, but to develop empathy. Understanding characters enables us to better understand people, whether students, borrowers, city residents, developers, volunteers, police officers, visitors, or most of all, strangers. 25 years ago, I wandered into PPON Park, a stranger to Michigan, never dreaming that I would one day own a house a few blocks away. Now I hear about better pedestrian crossings at Woodward, new developments downtown, or promoting rain gardens, and I long to be part of the decision-making process. Living in Birmingham has been a great privilege, and I welcome the chance to give back to this incredible community and learn more about it by serving on the city commission. Thank you for your consideration.

Questions for Mr. Thompson? Another question. Yes. Um I'm interested in this micro finance work you did in in Chile. How did you get into involved in that? Yeah, it was Peru and Ecuador. But yeah, no, no, it's I did live in Chile on a separate uh project, but um I had a sbatical from Cranbrrook and I wanted to do something volunteerbased or or you know giving back in some sense and since I had some experience in Latin America and other countries. Um so I did a whole lot of things but the main thing was to sort of contact borrowers and sort of connect them back with the office in San Francisco which normally is challenging for them because since it's a nonprofit they have a very small staff. So that was sort of the bulk of it.

Thank you. Any other questions? Uh you are probably one of the more interesting candidates that we have seen in a very long time as far as the diversity of your experience and your interests. Um can I ask why you have not applied for any of the subboard positions? Yeah, fair question. Um, I just saw this one, you know, come up and I thought I would just, you know, sort of grab the opportunity while it was there, but obviously it would be appropriate to do some of those things as well. I've also only lived here for three years so far and so, you know, I haven't quite gotten around to that, but certainly that that's a a good point. Thank you.

Anyone else? Thank you very much. Um, Brian Gordon, are you online? Brian. EG, come in. Brian. Uh, Brian, I see you online. I hope you're paying attention. You got to use the radio. Pay attention. I don't know if you can see me or if you can hear me. Uh, we don't see you. You would have to turn on your video. Um, okay. I've been atte I'm attempting to do that, but it's not allow I'm being disabled by the host. So, to unable to do video. I'm sorry, but we can hear you just fine.

Oh, and I let me comb my hair for you and everything. Okay.

Uh uh. All right. I'll start. Honorable mayor and commissioners. Uh let me introduce myself. I'm Brian Gordon. I've had the opportunity to speak with some of you. For some, this will be our first time. I want to start with an apology for having to attend via Zoom. I had a previously scheduled business trip when this vacancy and tonight's meeting were announced. Uh you've had a chance to review my application and resume detailing 45 plus years of successes in the world of commercial real estate and 10 years of successful contribution to local municipal government, including winning two contested elections. Among my public service achievements were the sidewalk, landscape, lighting, and infrastructure projects which I spearheaded from seed to completion, including a required ballot measure to approve a charter amendment, necessary funding through budgeting and millillage, and organizing numerous community input meetings, all to get the project to successful completion. These projects vastly improved walkability, connectivity, and infrastructure desired by the majority over the objections of a small, vocal, and latigic minority. To those who ask why you should choose a previously unknown for this appointment, I suggest you consider this like any other job opening you face. Qualification should be your first priority. Familiarity would be a bonus. But just as not knowing the applicant for city manager or for police chief would not be disqualifying, it should not be disqualifying here. I understand this commitment requires not just attending commission meetings and workshops, but the additional hours of preparation and participation to make a meaningful contribution. I will be fiscally conservative and unabashedly progressive, promoting development throughout, but only within

the bounds of the current zoning and thoughtful master plan. As long as we stay within these lines, so to speak, change does not have to be change in character. It should be welcomed. I ask each of you for your endorsement to get to the next round and your vote for appointment to the commission. I look forward to the opportunity to work with you and staff on the challenges facing Birmingham, the challenges of aging infrastructure, the challenge of strengthening the community, and overcoming any east west divide, the challenge of fairly committing scarce resources to competing needs of the neighborhoods, the downtown, parks and recreation, and the business of day-to-day operations in the city. I thank you for your consideration. Thank you, Mr. Gordon. Does anyone on the commission have any comments or questions for Mr. Gordon?

Seeing none, thank you, Mr. Gordon. Uh, thank you. I'll mute. Okay. Uh, Deborah her.

Hi. Good afternoon. Um, thank you for having me here today to speak and to apply for an open commission spot. I am Deborah her, 34 year resident of Birmingham. I met my husband in college, and he suggested we move back here to his hometown where both his parents and grandparents had raised their families and were still living. Um, uh, we started out like a lot of young couples do, over on the east side in the Greyfield condominiums. And then after we had our first two children, uh we moved over to Pine Street, just south of Courton Elementary School, right next door to the house where my father-in-law had been raised as a kid and where my mother-in-law still lives. Um so, but it's not my Birmingham history that I think can help me um add value to city leadership. Uh it's really my work at the Center for Local, State, and urban policy at the University of Michigan. Um there I've spent the past 18 years pretty much every day thinking about researching about, writing and publishing about um presenting on and advocating for local government policy here in Michigan. Um, through my research every year, I get to learn about brand new topics in local government policym um, the issues that the local governments share here in Michigan and then I get to explain and distill those policies to national and state level policy makers, but then bring them back out to local governments like this one to do benchmarking and to understand new ideas and solutions for um, uh, creating covering challenges. My research is directly applicable to this particular commission in a number of ways. First my familiarity with the breadth of municipal policym I've worked on everything from intergovernmental cooperation to policing roads pension and oped liability uh water and infrastructure and and sewer I understand the components of a miss a municipal budget um from the unassigned general fund working in cooperation with um assigned and restricted funds u uh proprietary funds for things like water and sewer and parking sources of our revenue and debt um so I can hit the ground running with that um with understanding what our budget needs are.

I've been working on a report right now in fact on GFOA budget recommendations um for budgeting practices that we surveyed on last year. Um so uh as part of my research I work handinhand with numerous staff at the Michigan Municipal League um and frequently present at their Capcon and legislative conferences. I also work closely with state agencies like Eagle and the Treasury Department um to inform their their development of policy that is aimed at local government um and our needs. I've also worked directly with local governments um with our data. For example, helping Oakland County staff um prepare for their materials management plan update after we did uh a lot of research on local recycling policies back in 2021. Part of my job is to write grants um and which we've been awarded from agencies like Eagle or the Secretary of State's office, foundations like Mott and Kresy and the Joyce Foundation. Plus, I've consulted with MML on their MI funding hub, which is an online platform for local governments, helping them to identify and secure grants. And that's the place where I think I can be of really added value for both the commission and for city staff. Um I've volunteered since the early 2000s with the League of Women Voters Oakland area. So, I've gotten to see hundreds of suggestions from our neighboring communities on what their candidates and local officials think are the priorities and ways to solve problems um in areas across the region. And then when it comes to my work here in Birmingham, um the environmental sustainability committee has been knocking it out of the park. Uh we passed our sustainability action plan uh as prescribed in the 2040 master plan and we have been hitting all of our timeline marks for our activities and programming including extensive resident engagement which I think is crucial for pretty much any policy that goes forward in the city. So thank you for considering me for a seat on the commission and I look forward to your questions.

Questions Commissioner Hey. So, um, you've discussed an awful lot about academia. Uh, my question really is for the top issues that Birmingham is facing right now, how do you plan on making a tangible impact over the 18-month period between now and the next election that's not theory,

right? Right. No, I I understand the idea of practice. And so, one of the things that's really um valuable that I can bring is the perspective of so many other local governments across the state. So although I research what local governments are doing, what I am researching is their practice, is their decision-making, is their policym and their choices they're making on their budget, on their infrastructure, how they're going to fund those infrastructure plans, how they're going to approach sustainability or uh the development of um new business or whatever it is that we are facing. So although my my area of research is may be uh not practical, the the thing that I am researching is practical and I have a lot of ideas on how to bring those practices into uh application here in Birmingham.

Is that it? Any other questions? Sure. Commissioner Cole,

how what's your what's your thoughts on approaching conflict? Like how do you approach conflict? Um well, you can imagine that teaching politics at the University of Michigan is not a lowconlict endeavor. Um and so one of the things that I find uh both in the classroom and then in professional relationships is just a making sure that everyone is heard, right? I think a lot of times people just want to be respected for their voice and their perspective and that if we can sit back and listen and understand where people are coming from. We don't always have to agree, but it's really important that everyone's voice is heard whether it's within the commission ourselves or with residents um in the community being able to speak. Sometimes there's misunderstanding, but I think that that can be you know there can be dialogue. There can be um you know heated dialogue even without there being division. So my idea is to make sure that everybody's voice is heard and particularly among our residents.

Questions? More questions? No one. I have a question. Um uh can we can you work full-time for the city? I mean, but seriously, uh the time commitment and and uh I know uh you you are chair of the sustainability board. Is that correct? Yes. And you've been on the sustainability board since day one, correct? We appointed you an ad hoc committee. And the uh just talk about uh your availability. Do you commute every day to Ann Arbor?

No, thank goodness I don't. I actually uh work from home uh four days a week uh those of us who are uh remote workers. Um uh only one day a week am I out in Ann Arbor. Um I actually uh have finished raising my three children. The last one is out of the house now. And so um all of that time that was spent parenting has now been freed up. And as those of you who have been parents know that that can be very uh um uh freeing and also allow you to pay attention to some other issues that are important. So I believe that giving back to the community is now is the time now that that other job of mine is done. It's never really done. We're out of our time right now. True. Uh I think

we we we may have time to come back. Uh Mary J.

Yes. Good evening. Um thank you to the commission and for the opportunity to speak with you tonight. Um since you all my all have my application, um I'm going to focus on my qualifications and the reason I'd like to serve. So, I came to Birmingham uh when I was first looking to own a home and I wanted to live in a town. I grew up in Leavonia, which is six square miles of houses and I think that helped uh initiate or at least spur my interest in um being part of a small town and being um part of a tight community. So, I chose Birmingham for the reasons so many other people do, the green space, the parks, the downtown, the walkability. Um, but for me in particular, I also chose because of the charming old homes. And 33 years ago, I purchased my Craftsman cottage in the little San Francisco area, and I've lived there ever since. So, um, I worked for Chrysler for almost 40 years. And I'm sorry. Oh, I thought I heard a question. Um, I worked with for Chrysler for almost 40 years and had an amazing and challenging career. In my early early years, I was involved in all different aspects of the company, sales and marketing, financial planning, procurement and supply, um product development and operations. Um I learned how the overall uh company worked and how these various areas worked within within the company. Um and in the last 20 years I was able to apply all that knowledge and experience um toward a very important um goal of the company which was to expand internationally and to u make Jeep a global brand. So that in so that entailed um everything from developing new global products um building a strong brand identity in new markets um dealing with regulatory requirements and even deciding where we wanted to have production facilities to meet to meet global demand. Bottom line it was extremely complex and I and my

team dealt with all aspects of the business in 100 plus countries and developing analyzing and approving projects to meet the company's goals. uh it involved a lot of data, a lot of inputs and extensive collaboration uh including working across the various functions and decision-m entities within the headquarters um to be sure that we met the needs of our global constituents. Um I reference all this because I think uh my experience with a lot of different stakeholders and a complex ecosystem is experience that would would benefit working in a municipality. um the same thorough analysis of opportunities and challenges, development and of collaborative robust solutions and tough decision- making on multiple options um I think is also helpful for a city. Um I also have had many interests outside of my work and I've been involved in volunteer or charitable activities my whole life. Um I've sat on many boards on a lot of committees and I've also just rolled up my sleeves and gotten the work done. Um, so I've sp so, um, uh, since retirement, I focused on a few interests, but I think the most important was my time with the historic districts commission. Not only could I be involved in my passion, which is old homes and buildings, but also help address a thorny issue for the city. Um, and also it really helped me u understand a little better about how the the city works. And um, I become more and more interested in that. you know, I've sat in commission meetings or I've watched them online and I've really come to appreciate um the importance of the role that the commissioner has uh the difficulty of the challenges that are facing us all today and the impact that the decisions have on everyone. So, I'd like to be a part of that and like to help those endeavors. Um being involved started when I was a kid. I guess it's uh just part of me and what makes me tick. I like to be part of uh a community. I like to contribute and I like to be a part of something bigger.

So, as a commissioner, I hope to use my experience and capabilities and directly contribute to keeping Birmingham an amazing place to live, work, and visit. Thank you. Thank you. Uh questions? Sure. Commissioner, I'm sticking with one question for everybody that I'm asking. Obviously, I get the same I benchmark. So, same thing. for the top issues in Birmingham right now. How do you intend to make a tangible impact over the next 18 months period? Do you want specifically what I believe are the top issues? You can do that or or explain how you feel you will be making an impact. However you choose to answer it's

okay. I can do both actually. Um so I think the top three top three issues I think the top two are are are very uh evident. It's uh infrastructure, our aging and stressed infrastructure. And I also think spending, you know, everything is costing more. Everything's more expensive. It's harder to uh get supply programs, fix our roads, do everything we need to do, right? Um with costs rising and rising and people concerned about how their tax dollars are being spent and I think a lot of people think that their tax dollars uh should should be fixing everything and and I think it's a reality that they that they can't. So, um, so, uh, the third, uh, I probably would have said the noise on Woodward because I think everyone I talked to, that's their biggest issue. Um, but I really think it's parking, too, because, um, I I' I've come to find out in the last few days by talking with several people that parking really influences people coming to visit the city, the people who live here, and even how we uh, develop. You know, we have to have parking if we're going to have new buildings and such. So I think parking is another one of the big issues. So what would I do? Um I think I would first mer with meet with all the the key stakeholders. So that would be the commissioners um city manager I think the lawyer and and really understand what um what the issues are what the at least what's known so far um get up to speed on that find out what the inhibitors are the enablers and then I guess with that work together to try and develop u um options that can help us start to address those issues. Of course, I have some of my own ideas, but I really think that it's a collaborative uh solution and we have to look at so many different aspects. We need as much input as possible.

Thank you. No scribbling. Okay. Sorry. You can participate. Okay. Uh other questions, other commissioners, you said you uh have some of your own ideas. Sure. I'd love to hear. I'm an idea guy right now. Well, you've got 18 Okay, let's see. Um, no parking, no noise on Woodward infrastructure. Oh, man, there's so many. No, it's not fair. I I really Maybe we'll come back.

I mean, of course, I have ideas because I've been looking at what the issues are. Like I said, I I I I've been reading a lot of what uh the commission has been um faced with or proposed to them and um what's been decided, what are still issues. Um and yeah, I mean, I I I feel like I'm starting to have some ideas of what could bring some uh new approaches, but again, it's it's complex and we all need to work together to make those decisions. So, thank you. Thank you. Thanks. Okay. So, that con Oh, sorry. Doug White. Doug White.

Good evening everybody. I'm Doug White. I've lived on Holland Street in the Rail District for the past 21 years. Married to my awesome wife Joy. Uh who couldn't be here tonight. Might be online. Said she was going to try. Um and we have our two daughters, Emma and Claire. They attended Pierce Derby Covington and Seol. I grew up in Mountain Lakes, New Jersey, kind of a uh northern New Jersey. It's a commuter suburb for for New York City. Not too dissimilar uh to Birmingham other than it's almost completely completely residential and facing a lot of the issues at least back then uh that we're going through now. They went from a uh on from a septic to a sewer system and replacement of of all the water lines. So, not not too dissimilar. Um I went to Washington at Jefferson College. I uh I'm a proud Army veteran. I was an Army officer. I served on active duty and I served like another 18 years in the in the reserves. Since moving to Birmingham, I've been active in the community. First, I served on the Tory Association. Um became the vice president and eventually the association president. It's our largest community association in the city. So, I had an opportunity to be part of some of the city meetings where I met some of our local officials and learned about the volunteer board opportunities here in Birmingham. So I was then appointed by the city commission to the multimmoal transportation board. Served a full term, subsequently reappointed for a second term and elected by my peers as the board chairperson. That was really an incredible learning experience. It gave me deeper insight into how the city works. We definitely have some very talented folks in our city government and appointed boards. I learned and experienced quite a bit. We live in a really wonderful community. I lived in several other towns similar to Birmingham and believe we have something really special here. I'm not seeking an appointment to our city commission because I think the city or its leaders are doing something wrong.

I'm doing it because I love Birmingham and I want to make an impact on issues our residents deal with every day like roads, parks, public safety, parking, and the like. It would be an honor to serve on the commission, serve my uh fellow residents to the best of my ability. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. White. Questions from the commission. Commissioner Hag, my standard question. For the top issues in Birmingham right now, how do you intend to make a tangible impact over the next year and a half?

Wasn't expecting that question, but here we go. Um, what I've made a career of is becoming a student of the issues. I tried to do that uh in in the election cycle. Um, so I would commit to understanding. I did that on the multimotal board. I got into that packet. I reviewed everything. I tried I went out and did my own research, did my own drivebys, walkbyss, ridebys, what whatever it was. So, I think becoming a student of the issue so that I can best debate, decide, and deliver on what's best for the city.

Yes, Commissioner. Uh, Mayor Protown W. So, I don't get a vote tonight, but um how long do you think how many hours per week do you think it takes to be a commissioner on average? How much time do you think you're going to spend? I'll bet it's a minimum of of 10 hours, I'll bet. At least. At least. At least. Yep.

Um some of us a little bit more than that, I think. Um it's a commitment. Um what I like uh and and we served on the multimul board together um and I like uh the fact that um you understand how a board works a municipal board. I like um the fact that you also served locally in your community in the Tory community. Um, and um, I like the fact that you understand the time commitment um, that I think uh, will surprise many candidates. Um, I like the fact that you ran um, in the last election. Um, that in and of itself is um, quite a commitment and quite an undertaking even if you're not successful. Um, so I commend you for that. I commend all the all the people who are submitting to to take this position because it is a commitment that a lot of people are not willing to make and um it is a it is a difficult position because you serve 21,000 residents and on any one issue there has never been an issue in the history of city of Birmingham where all 21,000 residents agreed on what we should do. May maybe movie night, I don't know. Um but um it is a very difficult uh position and it is very time consuming and sometimes um extremely rewarding. So um I like the fact that we have a candidate who or somebody who has served on a board who has already donated their time

with regard to that. I like the fact that you've also uh uh worked as a past and uh past president and vice president on the Tory Community Association. Um I like the fact that you know how this city runs and um what your role may be. Um and I will say having I didn't ask questions to the other candidates because um I wanted to wait to the end. So, I I don't want the other candidates to feel that I'm I'm just I'm just commenting with regard to um with regard to Doug. Um but I've lived in the city for 31 years and when I ran, somebody asked me why you're running, you know, what what's what's your stick? What what do you what what what do you want to what do you want to accomplish? And my response was similar to yours. I love this city and I will know what the right answer is once I've heard all sides. And that is I think what makes a successful commissioner is not being wedded to any one position, but having a love for the city. And I said this before, I think that the seven people sitting up here, whoever they may be, will may argue, may not agree, but I think 99% of the time they make the right decision, uh, even if it's a 4-3 vote. So, um, kind of a general comment as to everybody. Um, got 10 seconds left, so I'm going to yield to the yield the floor, but um, but thank you all for applying and, uh, and one of you will find a very challenging but yet rewarding position.

Thanks. Thank you. Any other questions for Mr. White? Can I squeeze in? I know we're out of time, but um as a an alum of of the multimodal board, um you know, I'm big fan of walkability, big fan of street safety stuff, and I know when I go around town, I will encounter a lot of stuff that just bugs me. And I just think, boy, I feel like I don't know why we don't improve this. I don't know why we don't do that, I don't know why we don't do this other thing. So, I was wondering if you uh in your emmeritus status as a multimodal person uh have had similar experiences and if you could could share one or two of those.

Sure. Um, I think one of the basic pillars here for for a great community is are the streets, whether they're uh the sound, the sites, the condition, all that stuff. Um, and in fact, just last night, as I was standing outside talking to one of my neighbors about this process that I'm going through right now, we heard something backfire and a loud exhaust, and the guy just looked at me and said, "Doug, this is what you got to do. This is something you got to address." So, that the issues are are real. I've heard it firsthand. I heard it during the campaign. That was a long time for me to to learn. So, I I definitely did there. Um, and I think the multimodal really gave me a different perspective on on on all different things from a procedural standpoint, learning as the as the chairperson, how to run a good meeting, how to be patient, how to listen to everybody even after you've given the caveat that, you know, it's already been stated, it's on the record, it's every other thing, but you got to you got to sit and listen. So, learn quite a bit.

Thanks. Great. Thank you. Thank you. Uh I want to take public comment. Uh so if there's anyone in the room or online who would like to make a comment about uh the applicants for city commission, please approach the microphone. Tell us your name. City of residents. If you're online, use the raise your hand function. I see David Bloom online with his hand up. I'm here

trying to double dip on us or something. So, I'm just trying to get double time because I know the mayor's going to cut me short. Um, we've got a lot of great candidates here. I because of my transit over here, I I missed some of the candidates interviews. Um, one of the candidates that that I heard stood out to me as as amazing and that was Deborah her and I think she's got a lot of really good experience. My concern is and why I came over here is the sustainability issue. Um I was at parking committee meeting and I was told last month that and I don't know if this is from the sustainability group or not that that there's an attempt and an interest in putting a $50,000 per deck sir charge on each of our parking decks by raising prices and then taking that $250,000 a year and putting into the sustainability fund. And the rationale for that is we got too much carbon coming into Birmingham. And my thought was if you want to stop the carbon coming into Birmingham, shut down the parking tax. That'll really help things. So um that's like a modest proposal type type of um argument. So I would encourage you particularly because um Deborah her has a lot of experience. Maybe you want to hone it down to who you want to ask some more questions to and ask some more probing questions about politics and what they they want to try and accomplish and what their views on certain city topics are to make sure that you're comfortable with the decision that you're going to be making.

Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else in the room who would like to make a comment regarding the applicants for city commission? Okay. Anyone online? Use the raise your hand function. No hands. Okay. Uh let's bring it back to the commission then. And I think what we should do is try to narrow the field. I don't think there should be necessarily a limit. So, if uh I suppose that if uh any commissioners have uh any candidates they would like to have stick around, let me know. Commissioner Cole, Mary J.

Okay. Mary J. Commissioner Long had her hand up. Uh Deborah her. Okay. Uh anyone else? Anyone else? Sure. Doug White.

Okay. Doug White. Anyone else? Okay. Well, that went more quickly and efficiently than I thought it would. Uh, we still have, let's say, five minutes, six minutes. Uh, is there any pressing questions that either, uh, people on the commission want to ask of any of those three candidates or uh, alternatively, is there anything that any of those three candidates right now want to uh, tell us? We will have an opportunity uh later on, but we have a few minutes and if somebody wants to say anything. I have a I have a quick Sure.

Anybody who heard that it's 10 to 15 hours a week have any second thoughts. Uh it's a labor of love, don't get me wrong, but that's on the low side. Well, you um you you can you can you can make it you can make it what you what you want to make it and what time you have to give. Um some of us um spend more than that and that's an average uh that's an average. So um there are there are 24 meetings a year plus adding a few more in. So anyway um I'm going to spend 10 hours today. Yeah. Yeah. And then and then if you're Yeah. And then if you're mayor then um Yeah. It's maybe 10 hours a day.

Well, today I'm counting the meeting. Yes. Oh, perhaps we could adjourn and have five minutes before the next meeting if we're done. Well, we'll have 10 minutes before the next. So, we good? Everybody happy? All right, let's adjourn. We'll uh reconvene in 10 minutes. Thank

Welcome one and all to uh the regular city commission meeting of Monday, April 13th, 2026 at 700 p.m. We are in beautiful Birmingham City Hall at 151 Martin Street. Please all join me in standing for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. A roll call, please. Mayor Ber here. Mayor Long here. Commissioner P here. Commissioner H here.

Commissioner Cole here. Commissioner Pazowski here. Commissioner Terres here.

Thank you. We have just a couple of things to get through before we get to the main event. So, uh the first thing uh is well, we're on item three, proclamations, congratulatory resolutions, awards, appointments, resignations, and confirmations, administration of oath, introduction of guests, and announcements. So, first, uh we have in our packet an Arbor Day 2026 proclamation. That's something we do every year. We are very proud of being a Tree City USA. I am gonna skip past actually reading the proclamation. Anybody who wants can find it online. Uh it's boilerplate, but it's something we should all be proud of. Uh item B is a Department of Public Services staff introduction. Uh, we have golf operations manager Austin Walker here tonight who is taking over management of our two golf courses, Springdale and Lincoln Hills.

Hello. Hello. And Scott Sinsky, our DPS director. Yeah. Uh, as many people are aware by now over the winter Jackie retired and so he's Austin's been with us for three weeks and I can tell you he was a quick learner and has taken over those golf courses by storm and we're really happy to have him. Uh he's got about 15 years worth of experience around golf and has a degree from Western Michigan and honestly he's one of those uh old souls that you would assume he's been in this forever. So he's a nice addition to the staff. Good. Do you have anything you want to say to us?

No, I'm just very uh grateful for the opportunity and you know I'm very excited to get started and you know see what we can turn this thing into. We're glad to have you and we wish you the best of luck. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you. Uh, next up, not every new employee gets a round. It's a golf club. It's a golf club. Uh, next up we have Birmingham Police staff introductions and 2025 awards. Uh, we have Police Chief Scott Guruy on hand.

Good evening everybody. It's my honor and my privilege to be in front of you this evening to introduce um a new staff member we have in the police department and also our 2025 award recipients. So, first I would like to start with our new officer. This is officer Scott Verick. Scott Verick is a first generation police officer and graduated from the Oakland Police Academy in 2000 uh in 2002, I'm sorry. He brings with him a significant amount of experience first starting his career with the Oakland Community College Police Department. He also worked part-time with the Keo Harbor Police Department and then he transferred to Clawson Police where he worked uh there since 2012. Officer Beer promoted to the rank of sergeant at Clawson and took on numerous administrative duties. His broad range of experience is a valuable addition to our department and he was sworn in on February 18th as a Birmingham police officer. Congratulations, Scott. Congratulations. Would you like to ask the mayor and the city manager if they would like to stand over here at the and shake the hands of our award recipients and our new officer?

So up first we're going to do our certificate of merits. Certificates of merits are awarded to a police officer or a uniformed employee for outstanding performance of duty under unusual or difficult circumstances. Our first recipient is Sergeant Chris Bukowski. On April 15, 2025, at approximately 8:45 a.m., Sergeant Pukowski responded to the area uh to an areawide B request, which is when an other department puts out information asking for support or putting out information about an ongoing issue for request for a drone support after a Berkeley police officer was assaulted and a suspect fled on foot. Sergeant Pukowski, a drone certified officer, arrived on scene and within 10 minutes began coordinating drone operations with responding units. While systematically searching residential backyards, he located an individual matching the suspect's description, observed a suspect flee through yards and climb a wooden fence, and relayed real-time information and movements to officers who then located and arrested the suspect without incident after entering into an open garage. Sergeant Bukowski retor recorded the entire drone operation and submitted the footage as evidence which proved instrumental enhancing the charges when it was determined a resident was presence during the home invasion. Congratulations Up next for a certificate of merit is Lieutenant David Budaj and Officer Joe Joseph Roberts. On February 15th, 2025, at approximately 8:37 p.m., Birmingham PD officers were dispatched to a report of a home invasion in progress. The resident confronted and chased a suspect who had broken into a private residence and assaulted him in the process. The incident involved forced entry, the removal of an attempted theft of property, and the suspect's deceptive claim of being a police officer while inside the home. Lieutenant Bud and Officer Roberts led a comprehensive multimonth investigation employing

camera analysis, vehicle tracking, timed advanced cell data, witness interviews, and coordinated with neighboring jurisdictions and specialized units. The work developed cooperating digital and physical evidence including surveillance hits and recovered footwear matching crime scene impressions and produced probable cause affidavit and search warrants that advanced the case. Lieutenant Budge and Officer Roberts investigation efforts culminated in the identification, apprehension, and prosecution of the offender resolving approximately 20 previously unsolved home invasions reports across multiple jurisdictions including Wixom, West Bloomfield and Franklin. Thank you and congratulations.

Congratulations. Congratulations. Thanks.

Up next, we have Officer Jamie Dano. On June 18th, 2025, at approximately 10:02 p.m., Birmingham PD's officers were dispatched to a retail fraud in progress at the Kroger's. While approaching the scene, Officer Dano observed a male individual matching the suspect description, initiated contact. The suspect immediately fled on foot into moving traffic northbound on Woodward. Officer Dano pursued on foot, issued repeated verbal commands, and took the suspect into custody by herself without further incident. Officer Dano immediately broadcast her location, and maintained radio contact with additional responding officers. Officer Dano coordinated with responding officers and the store representative to recover a backpack containing stolen merchandise. Officer Dano's rapid recognition, controlled foot pursuit, and effective onse coordination directly led to the prompt apprehension and recovery of evidence. Congratulations. Congratulations.

Thank you.

Next up, I have Officer Will Isacson. Luxy Kuza and Lieutenant Budaj as well as Sergeant Chris Picowski. The four of you guys can step forward. I appreciate it. On October 27th, 2025, at approximately 7:53 p.m., Birmingham officers responded to reports of a male damaging Halloween decorations and wandering in the neighborhood. Initial contact with multiple homeowners confirmed the damage, and one residents had visible blood on decorations and yard items. Follow-up led officers to an apartment where they located an individual exhibiting severe self harm. Hundreds of self-inflicted knife wounds uh were covered across his arms and body with excessive bleeding. After repeated requests for medical treatment were refused by the person, Lieutenant Buddhaj authorized entry and the team took the suspect into I'm sorry, the subject into protective custody. Sergeant Bukowski, Officer Isacson, Officer Kuzza, and Lieutenant Uday conducted a coordinated onseene response that included a thorough safety search, staging of the fire department, handcuffing for transport safety, and a transfer of care to emergency medical personnel. The officer's decisive actions, inter agency coordination, and attention to both public safety and the individual's medical needs ensured a safe resolution under emotionally charged situations. Thank you, sir. Congratulations.

Thank you, sir.

Next up, we have the community service awards. These are to be awarded to an officer or other uniformed employee who have contributed to a valuable service to the community through their performance and or engagement with community members. Up first, we have Officer George Toma. Officer Toma came to us earlier last year um with a new idea for a new event um and it's why he's receiving this award. He came to us and wanted to do a donuts and decks and on in October of 2025. Officer Toma organized the gathering at the Birmingham skatepark to connect officers with young residents in a fun informal setting. The event featured complimentary donuts, of course, a skate park a skateboard raffle and lively interaction between police and the community. The event's creativity and positive tone drew drew a strong turnout, fostering trust and approachability between officers and both adult and minor residents. Due to its success and community response, donuts and decks will be held again in the future, cementing officers to Toma's role as an inventive community leaison and deserving recipient of this award.

Thank you. Next for a community service award, I have Sergeant Kyle McCann. Sergeant McCannam is being honored as a 2025 community service award for his outstanding service as a school resource officer for the Birmingham public schools. He was recently selected as a guest speaker at the annual Birmingham Youth Assistance Board meeting where his presentation helped strengthen collaboration between Birmingham Youth Assistance, the Birmingham School District, and the police department. His outreach and community communication efforts have directly supported improved partnerships and student focused programming. In his role, Sergeant McCannam oversees all Birmingham public schools within the city limits and consistently excels at fostering a safe, supportive environment for staff and students. His professionalism and dedication have earned positive remarks from the school district and community representatives, reflecting his effectiveness in building trust and advancing school community relations. Thank you. Congratulations.

Next up, we have uh life-saving awards. This is to be issued to a member of the department who personally saves or is directly responsible for saving a human life. And I have in front of us first here is Lieutenant Alex Linky and Officer Will Isacson. On January 4th, 2025, at approximately 1:30 in the morning, Lieutenant Linky and Officer Eisen responded to her residence for report of an intoxicated and highly agitated seven 17-year-old who had been destructive in the home. While attempting to make contact in an upstairs hallway, the subject made a suicidal threat and hurled his body over the banister. Lieutenant Linky and Officer Isising immediately intercepted, risking their own safety and physically prevented the fall, lifting and securing the subject away from the open stairwell. actions that directly averted a potentially fatal fall. After the rescue, the officers quickly secured the subject for safety. Their rapid intervention preserved the suspect's life and a enabled prompt medical and mental health care. Thank you, Lieutenant Ly. Next up, I have dispatcher Antonet Lucari for life-saving award and dispatcher Brandon Ryan for certificate of merit. On 11:27 at approximately 11:24 a.m., dispatcher Antonet Lucari answered a 911 call in which the female caller reported her husband had collapsed, was unconscious, and not breathing. Dispatcher Lucari immediately and calmly provided clear step-by-step CPR instructions, maintaining control of the call, guiding the caller through continuous effective compressions until responders arrived. Her rapid recognition of the emergency and sustained coaching were critical in sustaining life and directly contributed to the patient regaining a pulse. While Lari administered life-saving step-by-step CPR instructions, dispatcher Brandon Ryan promptly assumed

overall incident coordination, dispatching Birmingham Fire Department, advising them that CPR was in progress, and coordinating a police response to assist on scene. Dispatcher Ryan's timely traffic control and assistance and escorting of the ambulance facilitated the rapid and safe transport of the patient to Corwell, Royal Oak. Birmingham PD later received followup from medical personnel at Royal Oak Corwell and it was determined that the male subject had suffered a massive heart attack. The rapid recognition of the emergency and the immediate CPR instructions provided by dispatcher p by dispatch personnel were critical factors that aided the subject's survival

for this award. For issuing this award, I would like to call up the people involved in this. Lisa and Mike Susella, would you please come forward? Lisa and Mike, can I ask you to stay here for a minute? Thank you. Dispatcher Lar. Thank you. Thank you, Dispatcher. Ryan,

I would now like to introduce the fire chief Matt Barino who has something he'd also like to say.

So on behalf of the Birmingham Fire Department, it's my honor to present the Pat Nagel Community Award. This award was created in memory of one of our finest and most dedicated firefighters, Pat Nagel as an active member of our department uh more than 12 years ago. It stands as a lasting tribute to his service and recognition of those in our community who embody the same spirit of selflessness and commitment to others. The Patagel Community Award is given to individuals who perform exceptional acts of service and make meaningful contributions to public safety. Tonight, we recognize someone who did exactly that this past Thanksgiving. Through quick recognition of a life-threatening emergency, immediate activation of the emergency response system, and the delivery of high quality CPR guided by our wonderful dispatcher, Lisa Salah displayed a direct role in saving a life. for her efforts under extreme stress and remarkable outcome that followed. It is our privilege to present the panagel community award to Lisa Cella.

Thanks. Congratulations. Thank you so much. Congratulations.

Next, I'd like to call up civilian and resident Sad Ahmad. This evening, I'd like to recognize Mr. Ahmad for his assistance, a resident of the city of Birmingham who's being honored for this 2025 civilian award for his quick thinking and decisive actions during a life-threatening incident on October 4th, 2025 at approximately 10:20 p.m. While on a walk in a neighborhood near Oak and Lakeside Bridge on the north side of Courton Lake, Siad observed a juvenile standing on the bridge ledge in obvious distress and contemplating self harm by jumping off. Sad immediately engaged the youth, speaking with him for several minutes and keeping him calm. He relayed the situation to his wife, who contacted the Birmingham Police Department, and he remained on scene with until Birmingham PD and Birmingham FD arrived. His timely intervention and calm demeanor helped deescalate a potentially fatal situation and ensured the juvenile agreed to voluntary transport for mental health evaluation. His willingness to act likely saved this person's life. Sad's example exemplifies civic respons responsibility and compassion making him as deserving recipient of this civilian citation.

Next up we have the Chief's Recognition Award. I want to introduce to you Ken Hitchcock. He's one of our clerical workers in the police department. Ken Hitchcock is being honored with the 2025 Chief Recognition Award for his outstanding service and commitment. Drawing on his extensive prior experience with Leavonia PD as a police officer, Ken has excelled in his role as a records clerk and consistently gone above and beyond departmental expectations. His broad background has enabled him to contribute effectively across multiple areas of the department, including dispatch and parking, bringing valuable perspective and skill to each assignment. Within the records and clerical division, Ken has emerged as a dependable leader, streamlining processes, mentoring colleagues, and ensuring accuracy and efficiency in all records related tasks. He is frequently the first point of contact for members of the public entering the station, and his professionalism and reliability leave a positive, lasting impression. Ken's steady presence and willingness to step in whenever needed makes him a valuable asset to our department.

Congratulations. Now we're down to the civilian of the year award and I'd like to bring back dispatcher Lucari. Throughout 2025, dispatcher Antinet Lucari has provided exceptional performance and unwavering dedication as a dispatcher. Over the past year, dispatcher Lucari has consistently excelled during numerous high stress incidents, demonstrating calm, clear judgment and decis decisive action that directly supported officer safety and positive outcomes in critical situations. Her quick thinking and professionalism under pressure have set a standard for the entire communication center. Beyond her performance on calls, Antima has emerged as a natural leader within a dispatch center, mentoring fellow dispatchers, becoming a peer support team member, helping streamline procedures, and stepping into coordinated roles when needed. She volunteered for extensive overtime to cover manpowered shortages, ensuring unin uninterrupted service and continuity in operations. Simply put, without Antwanet commitment and reliability, maintaining the level of service the community expects would have been significantly more difficult. Her contributions have been vital to the department's success this year. Thank you.

Thank you. Congratulations.

And last not but not least for sure, officer of the year, Officer Joe Roberts. Officer Joseph Roberts is being honored as the 2025 officer of the year for his exceptional investigative skills, leadership, and dedication. As a critical member of the Troy Special Investigations Unit, Officer Roberts has led and supported numerous complex investigations for the Birmingham Police Department, resulting in arrests and recovery of stolen property in cases involving home invasion, unauthorized use of vehicle, lararseny from auto, and retail fraud. His work on stolen vehicle cases that resulted in the arrest of two juveniles in a recovery of a stolen vehicle also led to the seizure of a 9mm AR- style pistol tied to multiple shootings and the linkage of suspects to eight additional stolen vehicle cases across multiple jurisdictions. Beyond case work, Officer Roberts consistently goes above and beyond putting in extra hours, coordinating with the Birmingham Detective Bureau and leveraging his network across neighboring agencies to develop leads and solve crimes. He is recognized by supervisors as a reliable leader and an investigative resource whose initiative, persistence, and collaborative approach significantly enhances department capabilities and public safety. Congratulations and thank you. Thank you. I would like to thank uh everybody for being here, all the family and friends in in attendance, and certainly invite anybody who would like to join us for a small reception downstairs uh for picture opportunity and to meet and greet some of the officers. You're more than welcome to come down and join. So, thank you everybody and thank you commissioner for your time. I I would like to make one remark and that is that uh I note

that the removal of emotion from the job is crucial to what the police do. But we feel for you and we know how scary some of these situations are that you handle for us. And we also feel a lot of uh gratitude. Uh and tonight I think that's what we're all here to do is give them our gratitude and give them a little of the feeling that you maybe sometimes can't express yourselves. So another round. We're going to give these folks a minute to uh move out of the room and then we will move well we can move right to our first announcement.

All right. It's Commissioner Col's birthday and uh we generally give the commissioner the ouching uh if he would like us to sing happy birthday. The answer is no. Uh we have uh another item that we're going to insert uh into announcements and that is uh a report on uh a shooting that occurred in Birmingham yesterday. Uh nobody's uh well Saturday

Saturday sorry it happened Saturday we have Chief Guru again to report on this for us. Uh I and after his report we will tell you what we're doing about it.

Yes. So on uh Saturday uh at approximately 6:15 in the morning, we were dispatched to 1480 East Lincoln for reports of shots fired in the area. Uh we received multiple 911 calls from that. Uh the response drew officers from all of our neighboring communities that came out to assist us. Uh very quickly there was a perimeter set up around the home and very quickly it was evident that there was multiple shell casings located on the ground uh around the house and on the front porch of the house. Um because of the overwhelming response that we had from all our neighboring communities, that perimeter was very tight, very quick. We were quickly able to apprehend numerous suspects that were involved in this situation. Uh we currently have three in custody that we're looking for charges on and been working with the prosecutor's office on that. Um the others that were all there are all have been identified at this point and we're continue to work on an investigation to see if there'll be any additional charges. Uh at this point the investigation has had extensive searches, not only search warrants for different thing, but searches through all the surrounding properties. When we responded, uh all suspects there fled from the scene. Some going north, some going south. Um so we have been searching backyards, alleys, dumpsters for any other possible evidence that we may locate or potentially any other cameras from residents or businesses um that may have captured suspects fleeing from that scene. Um, at this point the the investigation is still ongoing. I can tell you we've had uh pretty much our entire investigative staff in the building since about 6:20 on Saturday morning around the clock and through till today as well working on this. So um I'm happy to answer any questions that I can at this point, but uh obviously there's still a large investigation going on on this and there's no charges from the prosecutor's offer office as of yet. We expect those to come sometime tomorrow.

I have a few questions if you don't mind. Um, uh, how many guns were involved? So, we don't know for sure how many guns were involved. Um, I can tell you that there's at least four shooters, potentially more, but, uh, there was at least four shooters. And how many shots were fired? Uh, again, we don't know for sure. U, but we recovered 35 shell cases. And was anyone injured? There was no injury reported. Uh, and there was one house involved, but were shots directed or did any other homes suffer any damage? There was damage to the homes, I believe, on both sides of 1480.

Does anyone else on the commission have any questions for Chief Ger? Commissioner Host? No, I don't have a question, but I have a comment that I was going to make later, and that is Why don't we hold off on that for a moment while we all just kind of absorb what we just heard uh as far as specific questions about the uh investigation or the incident? Does anyone have any questions? I do.

And and if you can't answer, so be it. I understand it's an ongoing investigation. Um at this point, do we know whether the um individuals invol three three three or four individuals were they working in concert? Were they working against each other? Um do we have any any knowledge on on that sort of dynamic? So there's definitely two different groups involved. Um the three that we have were all part of one group that were firing at the house. Okay. But there were shell casings on the porch. They presumably came from people in the house,

right? Okay. Um, any other questions from the commission? Okay. So, this was already on our agenda. Uh, a motion was made and passed at our last meeting to discuss short-term rentals. Generally, uh, we handle uh, requests for to get stuff on the agenda on a three-step process where the first uh, the first meeting we we don't really discuss it at all. The second meeting, we kind of flesh out what what it is we want to discuss and what we want uh the city staff uh to report on. And finally uh on the third step, we would actually uh take some action if any action is warranted. We will be discussing this on a expedited basis uh at our next meeting. Uh the city attorney is investigating uh uh researching the law and determining uh the extent of what we can and can't do uh with regard to short-term rentals. I can pretty much assure you uh that most of us up here view this as something of a tipping point uh where uh act as much action as we are legally able to take will most likely be taken. Did I pretty much cover everything? Anything else? Okay. I just wanted to add that our building official Jeff Zilki is also looking into this because part of this with these short-term rentals is they're also part of our rental licensing program on the building department side and this particular house was a licensed rental and had been up to date on its inspections and so on. But there may be ways through that process to tighten up enforcement, compliance, etc.

Okay. Uh I I think that pretty much covers it. Uh I I don't want we need to move on. If there's something you have that you want to add or you want to bring it up later, uh I don't want to you know No, you've uh allayed my fears that we were going to go through the process uh when here we are in an emergency situation. So it's very pleasing that we're going to move right to an agenda item two weeks from now and hopefully take care of it. Safe to say. Thank you, Chief Gurley. Um, one question, Chief. Chief Chief Chief,

maybe the city manager can answer your question. No, no, that's okay. It's fine. So, oh, sorry. Almost escaped. Not quite. Are the people in custody from Birmingham, if you can answer that? No, they're not. Okay, thank you.

Okay, uh we move on to appointments. Our first appointments are to the multimodal transportation board. The first applicant, Laura England, which is a reappoint. Uh she uh is home taking care of a sick kid. And unfortunately, oh, she is online. Uh Laura, can you hear us? You can use your raise your hand function. There you go. We'll bring you on. Uh we don't We don't want to keep you too long, but if you'd like to address us, tell us why you want to be reappointed to the board. Fire away.

Yeah, thanks. I appreciate it. Um, thanks for the flexibility with the Zoom meeting. Um, yeah, I've served two partial terms, so I really just wanted to continue the work. Um, it feels like we're finally getting momentum. We've been on moratorum for a while. Um, so really excited to just keep working with the board and with you all on really thinking ahead about how we can continue to make our city really great for all types of ways of moving around. Um, I have been a resident. I think it says my application. It's been almost 5 years that we've been here. We have three very young kids. I think I just counted today for you all. In the garage, we have 14 bikes, wagons, strollers, scooters, you name it. So, um, we're definitely spending a lot of time on the streets. Um, and then where I think it's really relevant that I've been able to help. Um, personally, I grew up in Los Angeles. I have lived in Arkansas, New York City, Boston, San Francisco, um, before making Michigan home. So, I have a lot of experience in different environments, different types of places, different, um, you know, modal options and being able to bring that to our community. Um, along with extensive international travel. Um, I I was a competitive distance runner for years and still running a lot, so I still spend a ton of time outside. Um, and I was also in a federal role of a wreck in college in a car and have a really unique perspective on safety. And then professionally, I've served a variety of roles in marketing, corporate strategy, and partnerships in the mobility and technology sectors. So, I spent a good bit of my career very specifically working on multimodal transportation, um, future vehicle modes, new business models, and how to get people to adopt them, and most importantly, how to drive trust among a community. So, I think being able to understand those things, look at the research, make sense of it, but also do so in a way that works with all our residents and our stakeholders

is something that I can continue to help with. Thank you. Thank you so much. And I think it's so important that the community know how qualified the people we have on our boards are. Uh you've got my vote. Um Monty Huber, are you here? I am here. Hi, Monty. You walk a lot.

I do walk a lot. Um hi. Um it's funny that you mentioned that because I do. It's funny how many people recognize me that don't even know me. They're like they see my wife and I walking all the time. But we we we walk literally over 300 days a year in Birmingham. We love Birmingham. Been a resident about 10 years. A couple of those years we're building. But I'm I'm interested in multimotal board just because of the safety. Um we walk so much. I've been nearly hit run over 15 times or more. My wife got hit two years ago at Chester and Maple. They come around that curve like a racetrack and they don't, you know, when residents when people are driving that are going right, they look left. They don't pay any attention to people coming right. I can tell you all the dangerous intersections. I' I've made a note of it. Um, people don't uh even in the winter, I can tell you who doesn't shovel their driveways. Um, and and I would be willing to bet that there hasn't been a ticket issued in over three years because some people never do it. And it and I think it's getting very dangerous out there. Um we were eating dinner just the other night at Zana on Tuesday night sitting in the outside and these four boys came by in those black scooters with their nice black helmets and my wife said, "Oh my god, I hope there's nothing pulling out of the Daxton." Um they fly through the intersection. Friday when I was walking um f four boys on bikes, black helmets, ebikes coming right down old Woodward on the same side of the street, flew right through Pierce and such. So, I know where all the things I don't think the signage is proper in a lot of areas. We need to do more. I think it's a matter of uh time, not if someone gets seriously um hit and hurt. Um it just there's just a lot of uh a lot of dangerous intersections right now.

Thank you. Uh I failed to ask if anyone had any questions for uh Laura England. Uh let's see if anybody has any questions for Mr. Huber and then we can go back to Miss England if Thank you. Um because I'd like to make a comment about Laura. But Monty, you're amazing. I think we ought to get your wife to do it as well. Uh, you know, we're lucky to have you. Thanks. Any other questions, comments? And did you have a comment?

I have a comment on Laura uh who has previously been on this board. I've I've watched her uh you Laura in action and uh you are nothing short of outstanding and to put up with the hiccup we went through from last August to the last meeting uh is very encouraging. You must be an optimist and I I thank you Laura. Thank you Monty. Uh I would entertain nominations. Commissioner Host.

Uh, I'd like to appoint uh Laura England as a regular member to the multimodal transportation board to serve a three-year term to expire March 24th, 2029. All those in favor? Yes. I opposed. None. Uh, another, please. Sure, I'll make it. Um, I would like to make a motion to appoint Monty Huber as a regular member to the multimmoal transportation board to serve a three-year term to expire March 24th, 2029. All those in favor? I opposed.

Thank you. Uh, we will stick around. We will swear you in. Laura will figure out how to get you reworn uh uh at some opportunity. At the earliest opportunity. Okay. Uh, next up we have the Martha Baldwin Park Board. Caitlyn Miner. Is Caitlyn here? Hi, Caitlyn. Come on up.

Hello. Hi. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Uh, tell us why you want to be. So, I'm looking here to make sure you're not already on the board, right? No, definitely.

Okay. So, I um I've lived in Birmingham for about five years and I wanted to look to get involved. I'm usually a registered nurse and I stay home right now. I have two young daughters um two and four years old and the parks have been a huge part of our life. Um they get very upset when we can't go and it's cold, you know, but and I really am appreciative of you guys making so many improvements and you know, other playgrounds and that stuff. But, um I volunteer at my daughter's school. I could easily, you know, do a healthcare board, but I want to do something more in the community and not trying to downplay the role, but some start somewhere small because I don't have any board experience and just looking to, you know, get involved and go from there.

Great. We're happy to have you. Uh, can I get a nomination? Does anybody have any questions? If not, let's nominate. No, we can. Okay. Um, I'd like to appoint uh to make a motion to appoint Caitlyn Miner as a regular member to the Martha Baldwin public sorry Martha Baldwin Park Board to serve the remainder of a four-year term to expire on May 1st, 2028. All those in favor? I I opposed. None. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. Stick around. Uh, next up is the Birmingham area cable board. Deanna Browning. Are you here? Deanna, Deanna, are you online? Uh, if she is a reappointment, is that correct? Yes. Okay. Uh, what is the pleasure of the commission? I'll make a motion to reappoint. Okay. If you give me the full Just checking if you're comfortable with it. Okay. I then uh make a motion to reappoint Deanna Brown as a regular member of the Birmingham area cable board to serve the remainder of a three-year term to expire May 1st, 2029. All those in favor?

Yes. I opposed. Excellent. Thank you. Um next up, we have uh the planning board is on the agenda. Uh Mr. Curry, are you here? You are here. Hi. Uh I understand Hi. Hi.

Duncan Curry. I'm currently a u uh alternate member on the planning board. Uh I did apply for the open position for regular member of the planning board. I've since learned that um there's an architect who intends to apply for that position. So I think the board would be well served, including architect. So, at this point, I'd like to withdraw my application to enable the architect to apply for that regular position and continue my role as an alderman member. Excellent. And uh just to note, that uh position is reserved uh for an architect if we can find one. Uh we found one. Apparently, you did. Thank you very much. I appreciate of you to do that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Curry.

Uh next up, we have the architectural re review committee. Javier Alvarez Isasi, are you here? This is also a reappoint, Mr. Asasi. Uh I don't see you online. And so what is the pleasure of the commission uh regarding his uh reappointment to the architectural review committee? I would uh like to make a motion to re uh appoint him since he has served a full term already. um to appoint Javier Alvarez Asasi as a regular member of the architectural review committee to serve the remainder of a three-year term to expire April 11th, 2029. All those in favor?

I opposed. Good. Thank you. All right, we move on to item four. Open Oh, we're going to do that. We do have some team come on up. Yeah. Yes. Come on up. Raise your right hand.

Raise your right hand and say, "I do." I do soly swear or affirm that I will support the Constitution of the United States of America and the Constitution of this govern to secure and maintain an honest and efficient administration of the Clairs of Birmingham from partisan distinction or control and perform the duties of the Office of Multimotal Transportation Board and Martin Park Board according to the best of my ability. I do. And then you guys each have

and then I'll finish the rest of it with

good. Okay. Thank you. Well uh now uh we move on to open to the public for matters not on the agenda. We welcome public comment which may be limited to a certain number of minutes per person speaking announce mayor's discretion at the beginning of public comment portion of the agenda on items or discussions that do not appear anywhere else on the printed agenda. uh we're not going to participate in a question and answer session uh necessarily and we'll take no action on any item not appearing on the agenda. Uh the public can speak to agenda items as they occur when the presiding officer opens the floor to the public. Uh so if you would state your name and town city of residence uh we'd happy to hear from you.

Hi Eve Pickman. I'm sorry. Before anyone speaks, if you are setting a time limit, mayor, you ought state how many minutes per speaker. Uh, okay. Three minutes.

Hi, Eve Pikman, Birmingham. Um, it's not an item on agenda, but it has been discussed. I'm here to talk about short-term rentals in Birmingham. The incident this past weekend was inevitable, as we have no short-term rental oversight regulation of any merit. um did a quick Google search. Website called short-term rental profit map lists us as very investorfriendly as there are no specific short-term rental regulations. I live in the Pemrook Park, Pemrook Manor area, we have an elementary school, we have a park, we have a middle school. We have no regulations overseeing the amount minimum amount of time someone can be in a short-term rental. Pretty much every city, including Waterford, which is a township around us, has a 30-day minimum. Are any of you aware of why there is a 30-day minimum on a short-term rental? I'll clue you in. If you're a registered sex offender, you must report your location if you are somewhere for more than 30 days. Once again, I have a park, I have an elementary school, and I have a middle school in my neighborhood. I have multiple short-term rentals. Some are strictly Airbnb, some are Airbnb and Verbbo, but they're there and there are lots of them. Furthermore, there is no inspection or oversight of these facilities. At least two of them in my neighborhood are in violation of state fire code where they have bedrooms that only have one point of egress. That's Michigan. That's not Oakland County. That's not Birmingham that they are in violation of. These are my concerns and something hopefully your city attorney will look into as you go forward with your regulations. But I looked at Gross Point, Rochester, Rochester Hills, Waterford, where you have to actually go before the building commission to get approved to put in a short-term rental. I lived in

Waterford. They don't care what you do. They care about short-term rentals. I looked at Ann Arbor, which has zones. I looked at West Bloomfield, Bloomfield Hills, 30-day minimum. We have nothing and we have a problem because of it. That shooting, it's what we know about. We don't know about other stuff that goes on in these short-term rentals. So, that's my concern, and I appreciate y'all looking into this, but do keep that 30-day number in mind. It is there for a reason. Thank you,

Mr. Mayor. Before we go on, I think it's really important, if I interject, a piece of the law that our residents are unaware of, if I may. Okay.

We do regulate all rentals in the city of Birmingham, including what some term short-term. We don't differentiate between the terms. We demand that all rental properties, all rental properties must have a license annually. and they do go through an inspection. So, I think it's important for our residents to realize we do in fact have oversight and regulations over all rentals, which is extremely important to understand. We are going to be reporting back in two weeks with a lot more information and some recommendations, but I think it's important for our residents to know we do in fact have oversight.

Thank you. Thank you. I'm sorry to interrupt public comment. It's very important. But all right.

Good evening. My name is Sharon Roy and I've been a resident of Birmingham for over 50 years and I'm coming to you this evening with my very very serious concerns about the city's ongoing relationship with flock safety and about the broader surveillance infrastructure being built around us in Oakland County. Presently, the Birmingham Police Department participates in the flock network alongside more than 500 cameras across Oakland County. And last week during um the county board of commissioners of Oakland County, um they voted to add seven flock drones to the the network. And while I understand the benefit of drones, um there were a lot of objections from the community about the addition uh uh to the flock network. I want to be very clear. I support effective ethical policing, but what Flock Safety represents is something different. It is a privately held surveillance company valued at $7.5 billion with deep ties to Palunteer. It is building a regional tracking network using our tax dollars, our roads, and our public trust. And every time Birmingham renews or expands its Flock contract, we become a node in their network. So my specific concerns are these data sharing. Flock says it doesn't share directly with federal agencies, but analysis shows that um local police across the county have routinely run searches on behalf of ICE and other federal uh partners. The Oakland County under sheriff acknowledged his department hasn't yet

received such a request, but that is not a guarantee that it won't happen. There is no state regulation. Michigan has no law governing how license plate reader data is collected, retained, or shared. 16 other states do. We are operating on promises, not on law. And there are security vulnerabilities. Security researchers have found that cameras have had critical vulnerabilities, including systems left completely open to the internet. There is a precedent for um suspending these contracts. Ferndale ended its FL flock contract last fall after sustained community opposition and Bay City has rejected flock cameras. Our community deserves the same conversation openly before contracts are signed, not after. So, what I'm asking for is for Birmingham to abandon tools, not to abandon tools that protect public safety. I'm asking the commission to do what Oakland County Commissioners failed to do last week. Listen to your residents first. Please conduct a full public review of Birmingham's flock contract, its terms, its data sharing permissions, very important, its renewal conditions, and hold a community forum before any renewal or expansion is approved. The residents of Birmingham deserve this sort of oversight. And thank you.

Thank you. Hi, Kathleen De. Can we get Commissioner Hey, could you get the microphone situated a little bit better for Thank you.

Perfect. Thank you. Thank you. Good project. It works well. I'm Kathleen Deo and I live on Riven Oak Street in Birmingham. I'm here to address the uh community house bankruptcy. I know it's on the agenda later, so I'm asking to be allowed to address it. Go ahead now. Okay.

Um I'm just going to hit the highlights of an email which I sent which you all have copies of. Good evening, commissioners and Mr. Mayor, by the way. Um, by filing for bankruptcy protection, the Community House Association has launched their most outrageous gambit yet. They are forum shopping for a court, which will let them carry out their plan to defy the deed restrictions and abandon their original charitable purpose. The association's bankruptcy petition for chapter 11 reorganization seeks to, and I quote, A, preserve its ongoing operations, b pursue a sale of its assets, and C, through its restructuring, continue its philanthropic mission to serve the community after the conclusion of chapter 11," unquote. a restructuring that is not really a restructuring because they're closing the community house as of June 30th to serve a mission that was never their mission. I seriously question whether this bankruptcy filing is in good faith. I suspect it was undertaken mainly to block progress of the city's lawsuit. Most nonprofits that file Chapter 11 do so, I imagine, to stay in business. However, the Community House Association, under the guise of Chapter 11, is actually seeking a form of liquidation, allowing it to sell its historic building at 380 South Bay Street for more than $7 million and then to begin their new identity as a community foundation. In other words, they want to have it both ways.

They want to obtain debt relief, but still reap a huge profit by selling the building that represents the core of their actual mission. The community house association as debtors aren't exactly insolvent. My email contains more detail, much more, but according to disclosures filed with the bankruptcy court, the Community House Association's assets far outweigh their secured debt and other liabilities. Those assets include an endowment of nearly 1.6 million held by the Community Foundation of Southeast Michigan. The decision to shut down operations has led to more expense such as event deposits to be returned, retention bonuses paid to employees, and more than $65,000 so far for bankruptcy attorneys. They turned down the ECC parents proposal to keep the ECC going. Um, and I refer refer you to Kristen Boundy's letter in your packet tonight. They have also turned down all of the settlement overures from the city. Although because although they could reorganize, they don't want to. They want to turn the community house into cold hard cash to fund a nonprofit that was never part of their original mission. So I ask again, can they do that and will we let them? Thank you. Thank you.

Hi, I'm Moren Field. I live on Norfolk Street in Birmingham and I've lived uh in this community for 48 years. Um I urge the commission to look at the entire picture regarding the building at 400 East Lincoln Street. The city needs additional place places and additional place for recreation and exercise for both young and old. In other words, we need a pool. The other communities in the area have pools. This is an especially good one because it's a deep water pool, which means it's available for additional exercises and additional uh it's not just a play pool. Um in addition to that the uh building needs additional tenants. The we know that next is renting about onethird of the building space 1/3 to 40% of the building space and we need additional tenants to help pay for this building. Otherwise the city taxpayers are going to carry the entire burden. I have been quoted. I wrote a letter to the commissioners and I got one commissioner said it's going to take $6 million maybe five it was I don't know five or six million dollars to uh uh to make this ADA compliant. I don't know where that figure came from. I I have I don't think it will uh I I I don't understand that at all. uh the uh in addition to that the commu the business community needs the revenue that pool members generate uh for lunches and shopping and things like that. And so I think that you should look at the entire picture and very seriously consider keeping the pool in operation. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Hi, my name is Kevin Kiefski if you want to say it the Polish way. Kajooki the English way. Uh I live right on Adams just south of Maple. My lovely wife and two and a halfyear-old daughter. I've spoken with your wonderful mayor about community house, but that's not why I'm here. The reason why I'm here is because you were talking about the short-term rental situation. I'm in kind of in a unique situation because at 6:00 am on Saturday, I was actually in route to go to Michigan State Law School to judge the 1L's in their final competition. And how do I get there? I go on Adams and then I take a right on Lincoln in order to get to Southfield to make my journey. On Lincoln, if you actually turn the other way, of course, that's where the shooting happened. But that shooting actually happened at a parcel or more so property that my wife and I own. The bullets actually went into that home. Went into the kitchen, went into the windows, and in fact, not only did the bullets go through that home, it went into the next home right next door as well. It went through two homes. Now, I believe in terms of your city attorney and this particular commission, you will take the action, I'm sure, that it's absolutely necessary to address short-term rentals. I just want to bring something to your attention really quickly because when speaking with the neighbors in that particular community, they actually told me that several times that that particular venue or that home was treated as a party place. And frankly, it was sort of like a whole bunch of transients coming in there. And apparently, I wasn't aware until about this a few days ago. Several people made complaints to individuals at the city. I don't know to whom or to the individuals that they spoke with, but apparently

this was really widely known in that particular community. And I've been here in Birmingham for quite a few years. But what I'm very concerned about is really the future of the city because I take a look at the individual I'm actually leasing that particular which is a licensed rental but the individual I'm leasing that home to. He's actually a surgical resident right now. Two years he actually signed a lease for and what did my wife and I get today? A text message saying I do not feel safe to live here in Birmingham. This guy is going to be a surgical resident probably operating on gun gunshot victims all the time, right? He's in his training phase. It would be lovely if we're able to, you know, attract and maintain the talent that we need. But he's really shooken up about this. And I don't blame him. Good thing for him he wasn't home because he was actually in a long shift already at the hospital doing his surgical residential work. I see that my time is almost up, but I would actually, you know, behoove the or ask the, uh, city commission, uh, it would behoove you to take a look, for example, Ann Arbor in addition to Dearbornne because in terms of short-term rentals, they largely prohibited them and in fact, they put them into particular zones. So, I would kindly ask this commission to take a look into that. I know you're going to take the appropriate action and I'm not going to get into the details, but uh my wife and I are going to be taking some legal action against the land owner next door that knew about this and permitted this to occur. Anyway, thank you very much.

Thank you. Hi.

Hello. My name is uh Steve Sandy, a Birmingham resident. I live on uh Suffil Avenue in the city of Birmingham and I am an Airbnb owner, short-term rental owner uh in the city of Birmingham as well. Uh my children attend uh Seome High School and uh I got concerned just as everyone else did when I heard about the issues that happened on East Lincoln. Now, Birmingham has about 95 uh short-term rentals. I don't know if you knew that or not. And the vast majority of people who stay in uh rentals, short-term rentals, are from Bloomfield Hills and Birmingham. They are our neighbors when their houses get renovated or when they come back into town for those family vacations. So, I do think that um the bad apples should definitely be dealt with. This particular property did not become a short-term rental until nove November or December of this year, and since it became a short-term rental, there have been nothing but problems of all types with it. But that is not the norm. uh you could check the history and I I was speaking to the chief to see if he had any way of categorizing what kind of reports and complaints you get uh from those, but the vast majority of people that stay, they stay long-term. They're business people, they're community members in the city, and most of us are good actors. So, I would I would hate that the the city would just paint everything with a a broad brush because Birmingham residents when they travel, I'm sure they like to use uh short-term rentals as well from time to time. I think there is a a fair way to do this

and I don't think we should tolerate this kind of violence uh disrespect or danger in our community. But uh I'm against any kind of blanket um condemnation of all owners or for that matter all guests because the guests and the people that stay there are also our neighbors and are also residents of the city. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. David Bloom, Birmingham resident. I think we should be all we are very lucky and should all be grateful for the legal research that you heard tonight from one of our residents and I I forget her name about the community house situation. I I believe I'd seen something that she had submitted um in a prior communication to the city that was in one of the packets and I looked at it and says, "Wow, we got a we got we got free lawyer work." Um I I think for this matter you're going to need a really really good bankruptcy lawyer. When I saw that there was a $2 million loan to a from a credit union, I had never heard of getting a mortgage from a credit union for like a business, but I guess it happens. And I'm just wondering why did they go to a credit union? And I don't know what the legal requirements for getting that mortgage were, but it seems to me that they pledged assets in exchange for the loan if they couldn't repay it to the credit union that they might not be able to deliver on given the potential deed restrictions that are there. So, I don't know if they knowing maybe they couldn't get it from a bank. Maybe they had friends at at at at the credit union. Maybe the credit union wasn't as thorough as they should have been. I I don't know. I'm just suggesting that those are questions that you might want to ask. Also, from what I had read in the Crane's article, there's a $2 million secured loan and a million dollars of unsecured credit, and the propertyy's valued at $6 million. I don't know if this would help, but I'm sure the bank would want to get paid if Birmingham wrote them a check and the unsecured credits would want to creditors would want to get their

million dollars back. And then Birmingham holds the notes and maybe or maybe not. Again, a bankruptcy lawyer would have to tell you, our city attorney would have to tell you if that would give the city any more leverage in negotiating with the community house. Thank you. Thank you. Do you allow a package deal? Sure. Come on down.

So, uh, Eric Kohler, um, resident since 2000 on Lincoln. So, I wanted to provide some, uh, additional perspective on what happened. Uh, was it maybe we live about six houses down. We obviously heard and were experiencing that entire event all day. Um, there is another there's actually three Airbnbs on that block. The one of them is directly across the street from our house. So, we have very good experience of observations of how that really is happening on a day-to-day basis. Um, I want to make sure that the committee here is looking at the police reports and calls that have been made. We've made many calls on parties. Um, you can imagine when the host advertises it as a good place for parties or groups to attend. Um, this encourages that kind of dynamic. Um, many cars parked in the street, full driveway. Um, we had a film shot out there with large trucks lighting at night. Um, we called and, uh, the police is always very responsive, but they are limited in what they can do, of course. Um, but again, I wanted to provide this additional perspective. Um, we see a lot of parties, a lot of issues. I agree with the other individual, my neighbor here, who mentioned this was in inevitable. I think it was. We see weird dynamics. We've had dog abuse that we called just a couple months ago where I think a dog died because we we tried to interact with that um renter and they ignored our concerns about their dog running wild on Lincoln with cars screeching to a halt and not hit the dog. Didn't seem concerned and left it out there to run around and eventually uh we believe it it froze to death in the backyard. Um these are not our neighbors. These are not unfortunately in my experience. I don't want to speak to how how you've been experiencing that. These are out oftowners um that are using that to experience Birmingham of course and I understand that. Um but the short-term rental back to the 30-day I think that's maybe one way good way to look at it. Um

we have a really a lot of bad experience and it's it's weekly. It's weekly and they the the renters are a couple days to to five days at most and it's it's typically um I would say 50% 25% of to 50% of the time it's an issue we're calling. So please look at the records. You'll see that. Uh, I think you'll see that with the the house that actually had the event. Many calls from my neighbor. We talked to them. They also were calling and letting the police department know that there was parties. It was loud. They had to come there and shut it down. So, it was a a known issue. Um, and then maybe while I'm here, I have the time and I'm not typically in these types of environments. Please look at East Lincoln. Um, I lived there for 20 years. I've seen it change. It is a high-speed thoroughfare. People are using that to cut through. Um, I'm sure Google Maps has encouraged people to find that route to cut through and uh the speeds are excessive. I know the city's trying to look at that for um improving the road, maybe doing boulevards like on West Lincoln, but please look at that as well. That is a forgotten part of your city. Um, that side, that area, it it doesn't feel like the other side, and I I don't think the residents maybe um deserve that.

Anything to add? Uh well, yes, I guess your three minutes. My three minutes are maybe this is my husband. You can take I'll take a minute. Go ahead.

Uh I'm Kelly Kazowski. No relation to the commissioner that I'm aware of. Um this is my husband. And I would just add I appreciate that the city has some regulations in place regarding short-term rentals. Uh and that may account for some of the challenges living in a community that includes them. I don't think it accounts for all of the challenges. And and at the most basic level, you know, when you think about what makes a community, I know my neighbors. If I ever have an issue with a neighbor, it's easy for me to go next door across the street and chat with them. We know each other's names. We know each other's routines. We're looking out for each other's lots. When you have a short-term rental that doesn't exist, my husband explained a situation where we were just trying to like help out, make sure that a dog was taken care of. and the the hostility that I got from that renter for even, you know, having an interest in the dog's well-being and then for it to lead to the dog actually dying. Like I that that seems really unreasonable to me. And and every time we've uh dealt with the the Birmingham police, they've been incredibly responsive, very respectful, very helpful. And also what they tell us every time when we call about the short-term rental and when we ask, you know, what can be done, just keep calling whenever you have an issue. And that feels like a very reactive way to deal with the problem. And if I have to wait for someone to throw a party and if I have to wait for there to be another shooting or have to wait for something to happen to someone or some animal on my block, suddenly it's not a community that I want to live in. So, I just appreciate the consideration. Hopefully, it's helpful for you to hear from people who live on that block, who woke up to that, who spent the weekend dealing with that. It's not just a a one-time frustration. This is an ongoing frustration that really changes the nature of the community. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you for coming in and please stay engaged. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else? Um uh do are we have we done anything? Uh we're not going to meet for a week. So there's another weekend in between now and our next meeting. Has that rental been is that a is that a crime scene? Has it been off the platform? Is it yours? It's off the platform. Is it yours? No. Uh, a point. I'm sorry. I did not intend to open a free-for-all. I just want to give Hold on.

Context. The city attorney has something to say. Sure. city manager has already put this in the works to investigate, but there is an opportunity under the ordinance that I was referencing to revoke a a permit. Okay, good. Thank you. All right, we're done with open to matters for open to the public for matters not on. Did you have a comment on a specific to that listing? It was advertised on both Airbnb and Verbbo. The Airbnb was pulled down almost immediately. Last time I looked, which was Okay, that's just

Verbbo had it as actively taking reservations. Okay. Uh I don't know that we can do anything about that. Maybe they can do something about it. At least you now know. Thank you. Um we're going to move on to the consent agenda. All items listed on the consent agenda are considered to be routine and will be enacted by one motion approved by a roll call vote. There will be no separate discussion of the items unless a commissioner or a citizen re so requests in which event the item will be removed from the general order of business and considered uh later. So uh does anyone on the commission would anyone on the commission like to remove an item?

Uh yes. Uh H, hotel H, item H by Commissioner Kazlowski. And anyone else? Anyone in the public either in the room or online like to remove an item from the consent agenda? Okay, seeing none, can I get a uh resolution or a motion? Make a motion. Yes, please. like to make a motion to approve the consent agenda including items A through K with the exception of item H that has been pulled. Second. Roll call, please. Commissioner Cole, yes. Commissioner Hay, yes. Mayor Prom,

yes. Commissioner Host, yes. Commissioner Kazowski, yes. Commissioner Theres Long, yes. Mayor B, yes. Okay, let's consider. Is it okay if we consider item H right now? Sure. Okay. Uh, Commissioner Kslowski.

All right. So, I was a little bit frustrated to see this. Um, I was a little bit frustrated with the original plan because it cuts off pedestrian access on Woodward on the east side and there is no sidewalk on Woodward on the west side. Um, and seeing that this has now been delayed and I was under the impression that the sidewalk would only be closed for the duration of demolition. Um but now it looks like well it's actually going to be closed at least through August of 26 and that is maybe without the delay. Um so it is not really clear to me when exactly Woodward will be navigable to pedestrians again. Um

are you saying that if you are walking north or south on either side? There is there is no sidewalk on the west side of Woodward. Okay. Right. By 555. Right. Right. it down. We have completely eliminated the sidewall. That that is my reading. I mean, that was my experience being down there recently and that is my reading of these diagrams about what it's going to look like in the future.

And that's your concern and your question might be is there anything we can do to make this more pedestrian friendly? Well, to make it more pedestrian friendly and to expedite in both this case and future cases because I don't like feeling like when somebody says, "Oh, I I can't actually finish the project on time." We just have to say, "Well, what are you going to do? We'll just give you an extension." that, you know, blocking the right of way is an important taking of public goods and we should have some sort of way to incentivize people to complete their projects on time or somehow compensate the public for their consumption of public resources. Okay. Do we get the bond back? Do

I don't think they have I'm sorry. Hold on. Hold on. Let's uh Mr. Zalinsky, do you have something to offer? Yeah, I'm standing in for Melissa tonight, so I was just going to pull up the actual uh diagrams for the the different items. Have we received any complaints from residents about the closure of the sidewalk on the east side of Woodward in I have not heard of any? No. Okay. Have you received any direct complaints from residents about the issue? None other than myself. Has anyone on the commission heard anything about this? Sorry, I was just down. Have you heard any complaints from residents about the closure of the sidewalk on the east side of Woodward? Not yet, but it's coming.

All right. From me because I can't walk that way myself. Okay. Now, I've walked on the west side and while there's no sidewalk, you can walk through the sort of dumpster area of oftable. Okay. It's not completely unnavable, but it would force you if you were on the east side to cross over to the west side and continue on and then come back. Um I I you know, he's going to find a picture that's going to show what you're describing. Uh I'm not sure there's any Yeah. What are you proposing? Are you proposing we deny this?

I'm I am not proposing we deny this because I don't think we have in the past. I'm mostly saying that this frustrates me and I think that should something like this come up again, uh, we should probably have something in our back pocket to sort of light a fire under them to say we we really value these public rights of way being open, especially as a walkable city. We value this passageway being walkable and um, we're going to expect you to to treat that with some seriousness. So that was the primary reason I pulled it was just to point out my frustration and the feeling that we should not always just extend extend extend um at the pleasure of whomever is is you know preventing pedestrian access to our streets.

Okay. I think that the uh the city manager can hear what you're saying. Uh it it is a fairly serious thing when we block access to pedestrians. In this case, I believe it was necessary. They wouldn't be doing it if they And they're also, aren't they improving Elm Street? That short section of Elm. So, in a way, we're getting something in return. Uh, I want to move this along because we're either going to approve this or deny it. And that's what we need to do. And we have a big agenda. So, go ahead with whatever comment you have.

I'm with him on um penalties. I'm just curious if this has influenced the loss of the T-Mobile store on Elm because I noticed it was empty the other day. Has that destroyed their foot traffic because the walk I walked to that store now I have to drive to Troy. I have not heard any comments regarding that being a factor impacting the decision to leave. Okay. All right. That's what I wanted to know. Does Scott have anything to say? So, this is showing phase three, which is to come after they do phase one, the new phase one that we're describing. And there is supposed to be pedestrian traffic. That's what that orange is

along here. That is supposed to be a pathway so that they can actually get through this area. And I can tell you from during the winter, it was not slowing down foot traffic. The fact that the sidewalk was actually cut off, we could see in the snow lots of foot traffic in the area. They were working their way through that area even though there wasn't truly a sidewalk there even though the detour had them going around the block technically. So there were were the people walking around the barricade through Woodward or were they just like they were in the rightway space off the edge of Elm and that they weren't actively walking into Woodward. Okay. This was on Elm. Yep.

Okay. Would it be for sufficient for someone to say I move the suggested resolution? Hold it. Yes. Hold it. Okay.

Because uh I want to make a comment. Sure. and that is uh all of the taxpayers own the public roads, the sidewalks, the easements, and for us to continue to give away the rights of our assets at no cost to the developers is not prudent. again. Uh, city manager, is the, uh, developer paying to redo Elm Street between Woodward and Bowers? Yes. So, one might say the city is getting something in return.

Yes. Thank you. Can I get a motion? Sure, I can move it if you want. Uh, I move resolution to approve the addendum to the construction staging area and construction coordination agreement with Lavy Michigan dealership properties number one LLC and SAC constru construction and development for the coordination of construction activities related to 34350 Woodward Avenue on South Elm Street and Hayne Street and to authorize the mayor and the city clerk to sign the agreement on behalf of the city. Second. Uh, roll call, please. Mayor Rally. Yes. Commissioner Theres Long. Yes. Commissioner Kazowski. Yes. Mayor Promlaw. Yes. Commissioner Ho.

Yes. Commissioner Hay. Yes. Commissioner H. Yes.

Thank you. Uh we have no city managers report tonight. Uh we move on to item seven unfinished business. A public hearing uh regarding 298 South Old Woodward the Daxton. Uh, this is for a special land use permit and final site plan and design review. We're going to open the public hearing at 8:21 p.m. and hear from city staff. Thank you, Mayor Balor. Nick Dew, planning director. Hello. Uh, if I may, I'll give you the short version. We have heard this several times, but I thought since it's been a while and since there's a lot of public here, I'll just give you the cliffnotes version and I'll answer questions um as necessary. So this is the Daxon hotel. It is a special permit amendment. They've got a special land and use permit to allow the sale of alcohol for on premise consumption. Unrelated though, they've got a project going on where they are looking to bring their laundry uh facilities inhouse. As of right now, they contracted out and it very related to the amount of deliveries on site. They look they're looking to bring that facility within the building which will displace another facility, the solid waste facility. um already has displaced the solid waste facility into the existing approved off- streetet loading space which is a requirement of a development that size. So what they're proposing is to instead of the what feels like 250 rolloff carts that they store in that off- streetet loading space to introduce a large compactor, a trash compactor which would effectively eliminate the off- streetet loading space. That is a requirement of our zoning ordinance. They've been to the planning board, received a recommendation to approve. They did receive uh excuse me, the board of zoning appeals did approve a variance for one-off street loading space. So, their last stop is here uh as the final say in their special end use permit amendment. Of course, I've got representatives from the Daxon here for more questions. I may wrap up by suggesting the last public hearing was

postponed to see uh to allow us uh council staff to look through the slop language, special entities permit language to see if there's anything we could add to kind of increase enforcability. I understand those conversations were had and if I may summarize, I think the parties agreed that there was sufficient language within that existing contract. So, we're here things were unchanged. So, you're not crazy thinking they're unchanged. And I guess I'll kick it back to you, Mayor Beller. Okay. Quick question with regard to the planning board. They make a recommendation to us and they recommended approval. The BCA makes no recommendation to us. They simply approve or deny uh varants which they have approved. Correct.

Correct. Thank you. Uh is the uh applicant here and would you like to approach and uh make any uh comments, reports, say anything you want to say? Thank you for the opportunity. My name is Ian Fleming. I'm the director of operations. Wait, did you say Ian Fleming? Yes, you did.

Not the author. I wish. Uh we think this uh application is a great way to reduce the uh deliveries coming into the property uh and laundry going out of the property up to three times a day. Um so this has a significant reduction in uh the overall uh volume.

Excuse me. Is that it? Okay. Then we will uh take comments from the public. If there's anyone in the room who would like to comment, please approach the microphone. I see somebody on the move. If you're online, be prepared to press the uh raise your hand button. Uh I think we know who you are, but state your name and city of residence, please.

David Bloom, Birmingham. Yesterday I walked by on Brown Street, the property, and I believe there are two garage doors there. One that goes to an underground garage, then the other is the loading dock. And it was full of garbage receptacles. And I was before this commission quite a while ago and complained about it because I had seen traffic blocked on Brown Street because a vehicle, a truck delivering goods to the Daxton was parked on the other side of the street and then they were like unloading stuff and taking stuff across the street. I don't know what we do with this property because it's already there and it's it's a significant building and the hotel's important to our community. We allow development and we have rules and then it seems to me that I the architects didn't design the property right or they decided to use it differently, but basically they have a loading dock that's not a loading dock. I guess it's good that they're going to they're proposing to reduce the deliveries. I just think this creates a whole bunch of questions that require more than the five minutes that you have for this discussion as to why and how we approve things and what's the right thing to do for that loading dock that's not a loading dock and do we want to this kind of develop I I don't think anyone is against good development but is it good development when we're cramming buildings in and they have a loading dock that they can't even use because it's full garbage cans. So, I just think this requires a lot more dialogue. I don't know. I'm assuming you're going to approve this, but but maybe there's some other questions and discussions that

have to happen between this commission and the planning board and looking at future development and discussions to be had with the Daxton about why something was developed and put in that is not able to be utilized properly. Thank you. Uh, may I ask in the interest of saving time or assuming that there's a motion to approve this, are you speaking in favor or against that motion? I don't know enough about it. I'm just concerned that it's been going on for a long time. Okay.

And we've got a loading dock that that's not a loading dock and they're looking to make some other arrangements with the city for it. I don't know if it's good or bad. I I I would just encourage you if the public you answered my question. Thanks. Thanks. I appreciate it. Any other comments from the public?

Anybody online? Use the raise your hand function. We will seeing none close the public hearing at 8:28 p.m. I have a question. um the terms of this slope and any changes in operations that might occur according to the slope. Have you already implemented those changes or are you waiting for the slop to be approved to then implement whatever changes? You'll have to come up. In other words, can the public expect that whatever this spells out is already occurring or do they need to wait and be patient until we finalize the agreement?

There will be some patience required to reduce some of the overall deliveries. Um, we have already made efforts to bring any delivery that we can down below the building through our garage uh rather than uh have it offsite or off uh off the streets. Okay. Thank you. One more question for the city manager. This came up the last time around, I think. I don't know if it was this uh issue or not. When we designed Old Woodward with the center lane, did we anticipate that it would be used occasionally for deliveries? Yes, we did.

Thank you. Open it up to the commission commission. Uh Commissioner Long, I think, had her hand up. Uh I was going to comment that uh the last time this item was before us, we heard asurances from the Daxton that they were going to reach out to all their vendors and ask them to switch from large semi-trail type delivery to the smaller box trucks and vans that would move the deliveries into the other garage door into the underground and um do their very very best to not allow and to communicate to their vendors that They were not allowed to uh have delivery trucks parked on Brown.

Do you Is there a question in there? Nope. I'm just saying we that to reassure Mr. Bloom, we have anticipated this and discussed it. Sure. Along along those Well, just it's just along those may. Um, I had asked when this came up before and we we adjourned it or tabled it, um, whether they would whether we could have language where they committed to use their best efforts and what have you. And my understanding is is that they did so as part of the as part of the slop. And Mary, can you talk to that?

Yes. Um there was the conditions that were um already implemented to state the applicant may only receive deliveries at the hotel through van or similarsized vehicles that deliver within a lower floor parking facility on site. That language is baked into the special land use permit which they signed. So I asked if they do it they they did they went ahead and did it and it's in the slot as of right now just so everybody is clear. Okay, Commissioner. Um, uh, Mary, when was that enacted? The slope with the new language. It was, but that language was there the last time this was presented.

Not been enacted. We are we would enact it tonight. Okay. They signed it last time it was in front of you. Is is the point though.

Well, uh, I have a comment and that is by design it has two truck wells. They've never used one of the truck wells other than for staging containers. And the fact that there are so many vehicles that are delivering to the Daxton out in the center lane on Old Woodward. Uh this doesn't make any sense that we're going to allow them to shut down a legitimate truck well when they're unloading in front of the building when it's uh a safety hazard.

Do you have any idea how many deliveries you take a day? Uh we would I would say about seven to eight deliveries per day. 7 day today. And how many of those are linens? Linen is three. So three out of seven, that's 40%. So by shifting to in-house linen service, you're going to automatically eliminate 40%ish of the deliveries per day. Yes, that's correct. Okay. The existing uh as he calls it bay loading zone. A truck has to back into that. Correct. Right.

It's on Brown. It's on the north side of Brown. What What does a truck have to do in order to back into that space? Shut down traffic. Yep. And they can't currently with construction. Is there anything more you want to say? And they can't currently with currently with construction going because that's occupying. They cannot get a truck into that space. Right. Additionally, the truck drivers have damaged their trucks doing that. Um, and so many refuse to do that, if that is even an option.

And, and were you on the planning? Were you the planner when this thing was who was who was the city planner when the site plan was approved for the Daxton? That is a good question because it went on for quite some time. Okay. I think that potentially I was I'm gonna say I'm gonna venture and you can tell me whether this is reasonably accurate that nobody saw that loading dock as a feasible thing but it was put in there because we required it. It was required.

That's all I have to say. I would feel a lot more comfortable if there was actually proof of action. I walk by that hotel every day and there are always two or three trucks in the center lane and they're walking through your bellman. Tell the bellman not to let them in the in the hotel. You got to go downstairs to bring this stuff in. You can self-p police this on our behalf and on your behalf and on the behalf of the community. It's it's based on our last conversation when we discussed this. I'm surprised that that wasn't kind of self-evident. Can you do that? Yes, we can. Absolutely. You will you will give the bellman

the authority to talk to the truckers. Okay. I'd like to move this along. Yes. Kind of two questions. Okay. So, you want to turn it into a trash compactor. You still need a truck to take the trash away, right? Yes. How's that truck going to get to the trash? We have tested this already. Uh, and they have been able to make that turn to pull it out. It h it will have um sort of a function to pull the trash compactor to the front rather than have the truck pull all the way in. But the truck blocks the traffic to turn in there. So, you're not actually changing any traffic blocking condition whatsoever.

We will reduce the amount of times that there is a pickup uh per week. So, currently there's six times per week where they pick up. and they have to pause the truck on Brown while they take all the rolloffs and empty them into that uh into their truck. This will be a much quicker process with a reduced uh number of pickups per week, which is what uh three to four.

Okay, next question. You're limited to van size or smaller, not box trucks like my colleagues had vans. There's a very specific difference there. What happens when you need a larger delivery to come in? What's your plan? Do you have a plan? And what is it?

Uh we would make every uh every uh action to make that as quickly as possible, but it's likely that there will still have to be some deliveries in that center lane uh just due to what types of trucks they may arrive on. I think that's somewhat a condition of being in the in the city and and not having the full ability to to make a turn into um that truck bed. Have you spoken with the business behind you that has a private parking lot with a barrier to see if they would lease you space for temporary unloading purposes? Yes, we have. And they refused us. Okay. All right. It's fairly telling all by itself.

Good. Yeah. Okay. While he's here. Yes, sir. Uh Ian, can you uh how when once 370 West Brown stops construction, is that second truck well uh available? You know, once they uh put the meters back on the parking meters and uh there's no second truck well for delivery. There is an uh a ramp in and a ramp out. Uh and then there is one truck well for uh delivery, namely trucks can't pull into where you have all those containers.

That's the only well that we would that we have and that's where the trash compactor would go. Yeah. Well, no, the point is those are are two uh two different uh truck wells. They're side by side, but one is used for your containers. No. No. No, no. The one on the one on the left is the ramp down to the garage. That's the entrance to the garage. On Old Woodward, there's Right. On Old Woodward, there's the uh exit out of the building. Yes.

Okay. Uh any further comment? Okay. I'm going to I'm going to just make the comment that you we're a city. This is a an asset to the city. Uh it's not a perfect situation. We anticipated and I that that there would be this kind of traffic uh occasional disruption and the net effect I believe of what they're proposing is a reduction in the amount of uh disruption uh possibly a significant if you take uh you remove 40% of the the linen the trucks and the test over time are able to go in the basement. Hallelujah. Right.

Motion. Yes. I'd like to make a motion adopting a resolution to approve the special land use permanent amendment and final site plan and design review application for 298 South Old Wood to permit the modification of the existing required off- streetet loading facility to make room for a new in-house laundry facilities and a new trash compactor. Second uh comment from the commission on the motion. Um okay. Uh could the city attorney read us the the slope? The whole slope? No, not the whole slope. The paragraph the paragraph that pertains to what we're voting on.

You're voting on the entire slope. So I can't just read the I think what he means is the po part that that you guys were talking about earlier with what are you putting in there trucks and and enforcement

Bernie planning board on May 28th, 2025 reviewed the application for special land use permit amendment and final site plan and design review and moved to adopt the findings of the planning department in the report dated May 28th, 2025 and the applicant statement as to the way in which deliveries function at the present time that were made on the record related to the approval criteria outlined in article 7 section 7.27 and 7.36 of the zoning ordinance and to recommend that the city commission approve the special land use permit amendment and final site plan and design review application for 298 South Old Woodward Daxton Hotel with the following conditions. One, the applicant may only receive deliveries at the hotel through van or similarsized vehicles that deliver within the lower floor parking facility on site. Two, the applicant must submit the revised site plans demonstrating an off- streetet loading facility that meets the minimum requirements of the zoning ordinance, obtain a variance from the b board of zoning appeals, which I believe they did. Three, the applicant must comply with the request of all city departments.

Thank you. Sure. Okay, Commissioner Hake. Um, fundamentally I I only see one flaw which makes me very torn on this. If we follow the letter of the law as it's written, it takes one incident, we can pull slop, which is an extremely binary way of looking at things effectively. I mean, if there's a if there's a deviation, then we can pull it. Do we want to do that? No. So, I'm wondering if there's more of a graduated response because yes, we've heard self-p policing, but I don't want it to be this binary. We use discretion. I'd just like to have something that's a little bit more formalized with the discretion so that we don't end up in uh he says, she says, or any

commissioner, we have a motion on the table. We do I'm not sure whether you're speaking in favor of the motion or I'm looking for guidance because at this point we're either going to approve or deny the motion. We're going to take a vote. the time for talking about tweaking the tweaking this slope is passed. I'm sorry, but that's how that's how we work. There's a motion, a second. If you have a comment on the motion, great. Otherwise, let's let's move to a vote.

You didn't let me speak at the last meeting on it. You shut me down, so I didn't have a chance to say it then. So, this was my only opportunity. Go back and review the records. So I take the opportunity when it's given to me. Sorry. Okay. The opportunity was during the discussion there was extensive discussion back and forth with the owner or or the representative of the property with the city attorney. Are there any other comments on the motion? Roll call vote, please. Commissioner Gates. Yes, Mayor Balor. Yes, Commissioner Host. Yes,

Commissioner Kazowski. Yes, Commissioner Cole. No, Mayor Pro. Yes, Commissioner Teresa. Yes. All right, we move to item B of unfinished business, a resolution to approve the updated design for the North Old Woodward project. Uh, Mr. Zalinsky, on behalf of the city engineer.

Yes. Um, so this was previously in front of you guys. Um, for review, for those that aren't aware, this is for a paving project with some water mane replacement on the north end of Old Woodward. Um, there would be some minor sewer improvements as well. The main items that they changed in the design are removal of a pulloff lane for the smart bus within the project limits uh on the north side on the west side of North Old Woodward. and they uh talked with SMART about also removing another uh bus stop that they found to be unnecessary outside of the proposed limits. Um and that the newer bus stop that where we're actually being putting a structure up by south of uh Oak Street they found to be sufficient for their operations. This is resulting in five extra spaces on the west side of the road. And additionally, they were able to accommodate in nine extra spaces on the east side um of the curb uh roughly across from where Bloomfield Court is. And that layout uh is feasible in that area with the exception of it does require the removal of six evergreen trees. I can tell you that there's at least one of them that we were already eyeing for removal. So, it's not not all loss. Um, and that's the cliffnotes version of it. If there are any specific questions, we do have the designer uh from Noak and Fra on the line if there's some specific questions.

Um, my understanding is that that delivered what we wanted. Yes. In fact, maybe even more in terms of park. Yes, it was more. Yep. And I just wanted to add that although there is a row of trees that'll be removed, there's still another row of trees that's that's in that same area. So there'll still be trees there. It won't be as thick as it is. Okay. Does that prevent us from planting new ones anywhere in the area? As per normal, we will find ways to replace the trees. I just I just wanted to check. We are Tree City USA. Yeah. Okay. Can I ask one question? Sure. Yeah. Quick one. I I thought when I was reading this it said like two bus stops had been moved. Yes.

And they're basically all being consolidated into that corner south of Oak where where they were going to install a bus shelter. Yes. Cool. Thank you. Great. Any other comments? I'll make a motion. Uh hold on. Anybody in the public online? Raise your hand online. Nobody. Okay. I'll take a motion. Make a motion, please. All right. Uh, make a motion adopting a resolution to approve the proposed updated design for the North Old Wood. Roll call. I think we have it probably. Mayor B. Yes. Commissioner Theres Long. Yes. Mayor Cohen. Yes. Commissioner Kazowski. Yes. Commissioner Hols. Yes. Commissioner Haye. Yes. Commissioner Co.

Yes. Okay. Now we move to new business. Item 8A is a public hearing of necessity for a staircase special assessment district uh in the little San Francisco uh neighborhood. We're going to open the public hearing at 8:46 p.m. Fire away. So, in short, uh this item's been before you guys before. Originally, there were five staircases that were going to be part of this assessment district. Uh, after further discussion with the residents, it came down to just one that is wanted. Um, the resident will be required to pay 100% of the cost associated with that staircase for access to that sidewalk area as part of that wall work and all that.

Uh, I think we're familiar with the project. Does anybody have any questions or comments? Is this uh well that I'm sorry. Anybody in the room? It's public hearing. Anybody online use the raise your hand function? Seeing none, we're going to close the public hearing at 8:47 p.m. And now any comments? Somebody like to and the motion must be thorough for this particular one only tonight. I will accept the suggested commission action link just that language and I'll do it.

I move the suggested commission action. That is what she needs. Okay. Yeah. I move the suggested commission action. Don't get used to that. Yeah. Okay. Well, we're not going to have Anthony Wong to uh give us legally second. All right. U Mr. Long, yes. Mr. Cole, yes. Mr. Sowski, yes. Mr. Hay, yes. Mayor Balor, yes. Mayor Pro, yes. Mr. Holtz,

yes. Excellent. Moving right along, we have another public hearing on a special land use permit and final site plan and design review application for 211 Hamilton Row. That is an establishment called number 28. We're going to open the public hearing at 8:49 p.m. Hi, Leah. Hi.

Hi. Thank you. Leah Bzinski, city planner. Um, as stated, the project tonight is a public hearing for 211 Hamilton Row for number 28 for a special land use permit final site plan and design review. Um, this site is located in the B4 uh business residential district and the D4 downtown overlay. And uh we received an application for the special land use permit final site plan design review um for an a food a new food and drink establishment. Um the application proposes a new restaurant serving alcoholic beverages for on premise consumption um which includes extensive interior renovation and the addition of a new outdoor dining patio. The tenant space is currently a vacant firstf flooror tenant space. It's located within an existing five-story commercial building that is uh known as the Palladium building. Um the liquor license to be utilized for this establishment is an existing Birmingham class C regular license uh which is a full liquor license and it's not subject to bero requirements. Um so the new proposed restaurant named number 28 um was described in the application as a small intimate indoor setting with food prepared and provided through the adjacent um kitchen of Terra kitchen and cocktails as well as a a concept taking place in the restaurant which I'm I'm sure they'll describe um when you talk to the applicant um a sushi concept concept. Um, so chapter 10, uh, oh, sorry, skipped a part. So, um, they did indicate that the hours of operation would be Wednesday through Sunday until 2:00 a.m. Um, and that they're reserving Monday and Tuesday for private events. Um, chapter 10, section 10-42 of the

Birmingham Code of Ordinances, uh, says that any and all transfers of a of a license for consumption of alcoholic beverages um, for intoxicating liquor on premises. uh requires the approval of city commission. So, we're here tonight. Um and the lency must comply with all provisions of the contract and special land use permit. Um so, in addition to the special land use permit and final site plan and design review, the applicant is also required to submit an application to the city clerk to perform an investigation into the applicant. So, they look into a complete history of past business experience and liquor law violations. if they have any. Um that process can be uh completed at the time of the public hearing and a lot of times we do that here in Birmingham. Uh so you would see that with the special land use permit. However, it's not required and um in this instance, we decided to bifurcate the two items for the benefit of the scheduled public hearing today. Um, so the applicant has indicated that they're working with the Birmingham Police Department and they um are in in the process of completing that second part of the process. Um, on August 27th, 2026, the planning board moved to recommend approval to the city commission of the special land use permit final site plan and design review um application. And uh subject to the conditions listed in the packet, there are five of them. Um the design considerations for this uh for this site, um they're proposing an 8seat 143 foot outdoor dining patio that's directly in front of the tenants space. And this patio is proposed on private property. Um so they will be expected to apply for an outdoor dining permit annually once the site plan is approved

for that. And so, as I uh stated before, um so the planning department requested the city commission adopt a resolution to approve the special land use permit and final site plan and design review application for 211 Hamilton Row. Um, as I stated before, uh, we, um, typically would see that liquor license investigation at the same time, but as we aren't seeing that tonight, we just, uh, recommended that you add a condition, um, that the approval of the special land use permit, final site plan, and design review is conditioned upon the applicant completing the required investigation uh, pursuant to chapter 10, section 10-43 of the Burman County Code of Ordinances. Um, and so we have that suggest suggested commission action in your packet and I'm happy to answer any questions. The applicant is here tonight as well. I'm sure they'd love to talk to you about their concept.

Good evening. Uh, Kevin Bison, Bison Architecture, 320 Martin Street. Um, I'm uh here to represent uh uh the owners and um as well uh Randy who is the owner of the Terara restaurant is also uh going to be uh managing uh this development. So um has a great record uh and been doing a great job at uh at that restaurant and we're excited to see him uh uh expand a little bit. Um, as well, uh, Jordan Jonah, the owner, uh, who also, uh, owns the, uh, license. If there's any questions relative to that, they'd be happy to, uh, speak about the, uh, existing license. Um, as the um was stated, the uh the use of the uh uh Terra restaurant really is this this operation. And I'll let Randy speak a little bit more to it if there's a specific question, but um this is basically uh fresh sushi every day. It'll be brought in fresh every day and it's gone at the end of the day. So, this is not this is not a cooking. There's no cooking within this facility. uh they're not going to be dragging food back and forth from Terara. It's not that type of a connection. It's more of a managerial type connection. Um so if you have anything specific relative to that, he'd be happy to answer that. But um it is a uh bar where you're going to sit at the bar and you're going to be interact with the sushi chef. And uh it's not a it's not a bar to sit there and bend your elbow and and uh have a drink even though you will have a drink while you were while you're part participating in that. Um any other general questions? Be happy to uh I'm sure one of the three of us can uh handle that for you.

You guys good with that? Okay. Um anybody in the room in the public have a comment? This is public hearing. Have your opportunity. Anyone online? Anyone online? Use the raise your hand function. Seeing none, we will close the public hearing at 8:56 p.m. Commission. Any questions? Commissioner Host. Um, there's going to be eight eight seats outside and they are on private property. I'm asking.

Yes. Commissioner the private property being the overhang the yellow correct commissioner hake a question about the license is it shared with terror or is it a separate stand it wasn't clear from this to me that's why I'm asking for clarification is it a separate license that is like an escrow or something right now because it's not being used or yes it is a separate license that's sitting in escrow right now ah okay yeah I just like I said it didn't make it clear and I saw the connection to the kitchen. I'm like, do you share a license with two businesses or how does this work? It's two different businesses, two different operations. That's why I wanted to clarify. Thank you. That was it. Make a motion.

Certainly. Can I ask Kevin? Uh, one more question. Um, are you moving the bike rack? I feel like its position in the diagram is not quite what I would uh We're not moving. Yes, you're there's no plan to move the bike rack. I think we talked about you had talked about moving the bike rack and the trash can seating to pull it in. So the the bike rack didn't have to be bike rack's not moving trash can. The trash can right now floats. It's not attached to the ground. So it sits in different places at different times, but we're we're not interfering with it. Plenty of walkway. Great. Now, can I make uh Yes. We've moved the suggested resolution. You just want to do that? Yes, I do.

We can't do that. Can we just move the suggested resolution? I'd prefer you read it. Okay, there you go. We got our one pass. So, there we go. I'd like to make a motion adopting a resolution to approve the special land use permit final site plan and design review application for 211 Hamilton Row number 28 to permit a new food and drink establishment serving alcoholic liquors for on premise consumption with the condition that the applicant complete the required investigation pursuant to chapter 10 section 10-43 of the Birmingham Code of Ordinances. Second. Motion second. Roll call. Commissioner Trese Long. Yes. Commissioner Host. Yes, Mr. Kazowski. Yes, Mr. Cole.

Yes, Mayor Protown. Yes, Mr. Hay. Yes, Mayor. Uh, yes. Be random, but I'm always blessed. Your privileges, mayor. Congratulations. Thank you. Can't wait to see you. Thank you.

All right. Uh we move on to item C, initial beastro screening. A resolution to move forward a beastro application uses daycap night cap and permit the beastro to submit an application for a slope and a final site plan design review to the planning board. Uh I want to be clear uh this is simply a question of whether we should forward this to uh the planning board for their review. Um, do we want to get into it now? I say let the presentation happen first.

Okay, let's Oh, of course there's a presentation.

Very sneaky. Uh, Nick Dew, planning director. Hello again. Uh, it's it's a relatively short presentation. We do these twice a year. So, I was just before you in October and actually just before you again in February explaining sort of what we do here with the beastro operations. We allow two new and two existing year to have an opportunity to apply to serve alcohol for on premise consumption in the beastro format. Uh we did move forward to in the October cycle only one has applied that would be snap taco which you saw on your agenda tonight. So it is true that there has only been one a year so there is an opportunity for another should you decide to do so. This is a um sort of an unusual circumstance. We see a lot of downtown. The last few we've seen are downtown. This would be on the east side of uh Woodward in the what's known as the Triangle District. Wouldn't be the first beast on the triangle, but it'd be uh one of the few I'll say. It is taking over a space, excuse me, Daycap is operating right now. It took over a space formerly known as Sensa Cafe. to f familiarize yourself with that area. It's set back from the street and it's going to be what they're proposing is they're called Daycap now coffee breakfast type um fair. They would transition in the evening to a wine and shakurerie style restaurant. Now what I mentioned in here I described it a little bit to you and as as they did in their little fivepager here is we talk about the definition of beastro often here when we're doing this sort of exercise. a uh an establishment with a full service kitchen. No more than 65 seats inside, no more than 65 seats outside. Oftentimes, we're focused on the ladder seats. This particular establishment has no problem with seats well under the 65 for both. Actually, the uh the real consideration here is the full service kitchen. They are um again existing. They have several prep counters. They are doing shakuderie. I think the question exists whether or not they um kind of fall into that category

of full service kitchen which is what question I posed to you all tonight to hopefully discuss. I've also prepared the applicant to discuss that as well. Uh Valent and his wife are here to discuss the proposal. So I guess I'll just be available for questions um should you have any but back to you may

thank you. U we will probably want to hear from you. Uh and I think we need to flesh out this question of what a full service kitchen is. Uh and uh so I will ask uh the city attorney to give an opinion as to whether my understanding is that there is a the state defines full service kitchen. The city of Birmingham does not.

That is true. So the definition of a beastro is a restaurant with a fullervice kitchen with the seating as described. So the question is what is a full service kitchen? That is undefined per our zoning ordinance or any other ordinance. Um when you look to the state law regarding uh food law um they do talk about a commercial kitchen which includes um certain types of equipment. Um they discuss what is a food establishment which means an operation where food is processed, packed, canned, preserved, stored, prepared, served, vended, sold or offered for sale. So certainly this is a food establishment doesn't really tell us what is a fullervice kitchen. So I would propose that because it's undefined, the commission can discuss opine what the commission would think is a fullervice kitchen. Maybe get some facts, further facts as to what they do have uh in order to prepare food, serve food, and whether or not that that is going to be satisfactory for this particular operation. So because it's not defined, I think you have some

what's the word I'm discussion. Discretion. Thank you. Um I would suggest that it's something that we talk about in the future because there is a a zoning recotification occurring. Um and whether or not that needs a further definition. Whether also too the commission has an appetite to explore what that could or couldn't mean. I I think the beastro ordinance went into effect Um I want to say it's like back in 2003 maybe and then amended. I think it was a bit later maybe six 2006 probably.

You know a lot has changed in 20 years and the concept of types of establishments and things like that have changed. So, another legal question. Is there any obligation that a term used in the city of Birmingham ordinances uh have the same definition as uh if such a term were used in state law?

The answer is yes. Generally, is as long as we are more restrictive, not less restrictive than the state law. However, in this particular circumstance, it's not technically defined. They talk about what a commercial kitchen is. They don't define a fullervice kitchen. If it did, I would tell you that you should rely upon the state law definition. It does not. Where it's going to become important is you may determine that in this particular case whatever they have factually could satisfy your minds that this is a full service kitchen for this establishment. However, from a practicality standpoint, they still have to satisfy the health department to get proper certification for food handling. and they the state may determine that they they don't qualify to receive it. That's going to be up to them to figure out what the state

state or county county under the state umbrella. Okay. You had a comment. Yes. I was just going to add one more comment being part of the drafting of the beastro ordinance back way back when. Um the intent behind it, not that it's in there, is to make sure was or was to make sure that we got food restaurants as opposed to bars. I just wanted to put that on the And we did get a lot of them, didn't we? We did.

Um well, generally I would speak last, but I'm gonna say that I'm thrilled with this concept. Uh I and I like your presentation. The uh it truly is the way uh places you work in Europe, you'll go in in the morning or the afternoon and have espresso, but in the evening it's a a wine bar. Uh the location is terrific. You're going to serve two neighborhoods, Pleton Park and uh the Triangle District. And it's uh you've got plenty of parking. Um, I mean, I we I've been in there numerous times and it's just a pleasant neighborhood atmosphere. So, I would like to see a way to make this work. Um, whatever that entails. And I'm going to shut up now and

I mayor, I think it's important for them to lay out maybe some facts about this kitchen. And then also I'm I'm looking at this strictly from legal and how one can interpret language. Sure. With a finesse or not a finesse, but I would imagine your planner has a comment or two about the intent as well. Do do you want to talk or do you want them to? Mine's short. I just agree with Jana that the intent was food. They clearly have a menu. I think in talking with the applicant, it may not be exactly what you saw here. It might be more. So I'd love to hear more about what so the introduce yourself.

I'm I'm Val. This is my wife Shantel. We own Daycap Coffee and Eat and Market right now. We just purchased these two businesses in the last two years. And we're trying to make Daycap into night cap. And as of now, we don't have like a full-blown kitchen, which means like we don't have fryers. We don't really grill anything. We have a panini press and we have um uh equipment like what? Two food prep station. Yeah, two food prep stations. couple freezer, three compartment sink. We've been

approved by the health department multiple times. So, our plan is not to really be like frying anything or grilling anything or doing anything like that. We want to keep the kitchen like pretty clean because this is such a small space and we don't want to really deal with that kind of stuff. And um I think the wine just pairs well with cheeses and things like that instead of like grilling a burger or something like that. So, our our our kitchen right now is up to code and everything and the equipment we have is almost brand new and um we've had no issues with it and you know we have ice maker, refrigerators, freezers, I mean you name it, but we're not really grilling anything or using any hood.

If you're in the space as a customer, is there I'm trying to remember is there's do you have additional space that's not necessarily visible to the customer, a back room or anything? No, it's all right there. All right. There. Is there any Do you have any opportunity for expansion at some point? Possibly. Possibly. All right. Um, okay. Questions? Commission questions? Sure. You said you have things like the three. Yeah. Where? I was in there on Sunday. I couldn't see it.

So, right now we're a coffee shop that serves breakfast items and sandwiches. And so when you walk in on the far left back there's a three compartment sink with a dishwasher next to it. Yeah. We wouldn't be able county gives us our um Yeah. I I believe I just I intentionally went in there on Sunday. So some of us do homework. Yeah. Um maybe because it's so tight. It's 430 square feet or something. Yeah. That's where I was kind of struggling because it's kind of behind the espresso maker. So, like if you're if you're front facing, you're not really going to see the the dishwasher unless you come from the other side to grab your coffee. Then you can see it's visible.

Because if we go back to the previous slide, please, Nick. That's it. I'm a little concerned by this that it basically it defines a European wine bar. It doesn't define a beastro. And I say that with a brother-in-law who's an Italian living in Italy as a train chef whose family own cafes, which is French for coffee. Mhm.

And that's a wine bar. That's not a beastro. The way it's written up, pre-prepared, small, dried, that's snacks that you get in a wine bar. It's not a beastro to me. And that's where I have my reservation is it seems like it's trying to take just my perception of it. It's taking the definition and stretching it paper thin really and tension on that paper to me. I understand where you're coming from. Um, the Eden market, fabulous, do a great job. So, clearly you got credentials that write for themselves. Like him, I think trying to do something in this part of town is a great idea as well.

The definition is a little bit too tenuous for me. Well, I think with a wine bar in general, you know, especially even ones here in Michigan, most of them don't even really serve like hot food or anything like that. It's mostly charerie. It's snacks. Exactly. For example, the Royce in downtown Detroit, they don't they have chari maybe a couple little paninis, tinfish, peanuts, nuts, and things like that. Exactly my point. And that's why they have class C's. I don't even need I don't That's not what you're asking for. A class C liquor license. You need

Exactly. You're asking for a beastro, which by everything we've done so far was you can go there and have a meal, not you can have finger bites and drink a wine. And that's why that definition seems like it's being really stretched super thin to me. That's the difference. I know what you can do from the eaten market. So I got no no quanss about we could provide quality wise. I'm not sure how you're going to make that work there and actually meet the intended. I can go and have dinner because I can't. That's my concern. Yeah. No, I want I have I have a comment. Okay. I'll make a motion. Okay.

Okay. I'd like to make a motion adopt a resolution to forward to move forward with the beastro application for night daycap night cap and permit the beastro to submit an application for special land use permit final site plan and design review to the planning board for review and recommendation. Comment. Second. I need a second. Oh, second. Okay.

I have a comment. So, if you just Google what a beastro, it says a small, informal, and often cozy restaurant. We're good so far. Uh, originating from France that serves moderately priced simple meals in a relaxed atmosphere. The menu is simple, consistent, and locally inspired dishes often featuring wines and classic French comfort food. It's not meals. That's what they're doing. That's the definition. Other comments? I have a I have a comment. I She seconded, so Oh, she gets to comment. Um, Nick, what happens if TUDA does show up or are they

Well, I suppose that this particular instance hasn't really been tested in our in our past, but it it's two a year. So, I would say if daycap night were to get their special needs permit in and get to the point where you were to approve it, then Tuty would have to probably just wait wait till October and reass. And there's yeah been no action from them. No, since October, no applications, conversations, but no, nothing formal. I was in there. I told they were working on the design. Commissioner Klo

comments on the motion. Okay. So, um I like this idea. I think it's very cool, but I feel like what you guys are doing is all fine and I feel like we are sort of dropping the ball a little bit on the beastro ordinance. And I had made a comment to this effect earlier when we were looking at uh Toyota and Snap Taco and it felt like they were jumping they were going to jump through all these hoops and we were willing to play a little fast and loose with definitions in order to try to get people to get the beastro license. And I feel like as was brought up, we are doing a zoning review. We are the policymaking body here, right? The beastro ordinance is our ordinance. And if we don't like what it says, I feel like it is on us to change the ordinance. And so I am disincclined to say, you know, I mean, the words full service kitchen are in there. Should they be in there? I don't know. But I don't think this qualifies. I don't think it meets the ordinance.

Okay. So you you're says it's up to us to define what full service kitchen means. Yes. And you you say whatever they have doesn't qualify. Yes. Okay. Did you have I'm sorry. Did you have a comment? Yeah. My comment is uh I I'm in favor of this. I normally don't like more beastro, but in this particular location as well as I've enjoyed your food. Uh I think uh it would be a real asset to the triangle and Pelton Park.

Yes. I I would say that I live closer to this location than any other commissioner and have been in numerous times and under its previous iteration as fence where where it had a fairly substantial sandwich. You know, they served a lot of different types of food with the kitchen that they had. Um, I believe that the intent of the beastro ordinance, the way it was written, as manager Eker stated, was to make sure that we didn't get people who just wanted to be bars. Um, and and didn't pay any attention or have any intent to have unique, unusual, uh, clientdriven new offerings for Birmingham. Um, which is what the intent was. Um, you obviously are going to have a menu. You're obviously going to serve foods. There are many other uh places that that exist that are only small plates or orderves. And I think that that's something Birmingham doesn't have. And um I think it has uh the opportunity to be very successful with um no burden to residential neighbors with existing parking um and that it would only be additive. So, I'm in favor of moving it to the planning board. Uh, knowing that at the planning board, the concerns we have about language and about definitions and about beastro ordinances can be fleshed out in full by people who do that, you know, for a living. And so, um, I don't think we have anything to lose by moving this to the planning board and then letting them express any concerns that they may have. Any other comments from the public?

Come on down.

David Bloom. I think this does stretch approval of the ordinance in terms of the intent of the beastro was to get a meal. This isn't a meal. It's an accompaniment to the wine. There's also some good points that it's in an area where there's already parking and it's not a residential area. I would suggest if you want to do this that one way out of this predicament for the commission is a slop where only wine is allowed to be served and no hard alcohol and and maybe something like that would because then then someone else is going to come in and say, "Well, you allowed this." So, so maybe there's a way to to to finesse this by allowing them to to implement their concept, but also keep it just to wine and not hard hookah hug.

Thank you. Can I say something? No. No. We have another

Good evening, Stuart Sherman. Um, I know most of you, I think. Um, as I was listening to this, it reminded me of the discussion that we had shortly after this ordinance was adopted, uh, about Lstrada. And when Lstrada originally opened, it had an extremely limited kitchen. Uh, they had some panini presses. They had, um, they weren't microwave ovens, but they were quick cooks. uh they didn't have what we would now consider to be a fullervice kitchen with, you know, grills and and fryers and all of that. And we were okay with that because the idea was to bring new concepts in and new things that would bring people down. And this is a great this really does meet what when we adopted that ordinance what we intended. So, I would highly encourage you to uh move this on to the planning board. And in response to what happens if uh somebody else comes forward, uh it actually is whoever comes forward first and gets here gets that license. If somebody if you have three in the in the in the queue and the third one doesn't quite get there in time, you always can look at them again next year. So, it just depends who gets through first. So, I hope that helps. Thank you for that historical perspective. Can you uh can you confirm uh

city manager what he said? Yes, I can confirm that that was the entire I recall that too. And and the the part about LRAD. Yes. And I I believe they had meat and cheeses if I'm not mistaken when they first opened as well. Okay. Uh any other comments? I cut you off because I don't want you making any any unnecessary concessions. Okay. Um, are we ready for a vote? U, is this a a a roll call? No. We can do a voice vote. All those in favor? I.

Any opposed? Okay, we have one opposed. This guy when he comes in. I'm a pet man. What can I say? mine. Thank you very much. Thank you. Uh right now, we move on to item D. Uh resolution approve an agreement with Sock Socky Construction uh for police department renovations. Uh Chief Gruy,

good evening again. One second. I have a PowerPoint for you. So, I just put together a quick PowerPoint just to kind of go over uh where we're at and how we got there so that we're all on the same page here. Um, just briefly, um, if you remember, uh, we've introduced the four different construction um, projects to address our safety security needs. One is the interview room that we're looking to add in the clerical area. The other is the evidence storage garage over at DPS, expanding our current um garage space that we have over there already. Um adding a sally port here in front of city hall, I should say in back of city hall and then expanding our dispatch center uh into the what is the current IT closet for dispatch, moving that upstairs to the IT room here to expand our dispatch area. So, those are four projects um that we're working on right now and kind of a timeline on how we got to where we're at. So, back in January of 25, we had our long range planning meeting and that was the first time that these four projects uh were proposed to the commission. Uh the slides that I just quickly went through were part of that presentation back then. Prior to this in the long-range planning meeting and actually 24 there was discussion about if you remember that time we were kind of transitioning to whether we need a whole new police department if it was going to be on-site here maybe some off-site locations. Um that was part of the 24 long range planning meeting, but it was in 25 where uh we changed directions and went to addressing these four specific needs uh smaller projects with what we already have um in the budget for the 2526 fiscal year at the budget hearing that was held on April 26 of 25 is when these projects the first phase of these projects was uh budgeted for and that was part of my presentation to the commission uh during the budget hearing. Part of that budget was 250,000

for a garage, 50,000 for an interview room, and then 100,000 for um starting the design phase for kind of everything, but mainly the the Sallyport. That was first introduced at that um budget hearing and then which was approved in the budget and then in October 6 of 25, the commission approved a contract with MCD Architect um to start designing these projects. That went through the whole RFP process. They were selected by the city and approved by the commission on October 6. Then this year at long range planning, we discussed these projects again. Again, same those same four slides were reviewed. Um, a little bit a little discussion took place in terms of the budget and in term of the phasing that we're doing. And then March 5th of this year is when we went out uh for RFP for construction manager to move this project forward. March 18th, uh the planning director took it to the historic district commission for the design of the sallyport. Um it went to their meeting for an approval. There was some slight changes they asked for, but I believe it was some of the casings and stuff around the window. So, the architects have gone back um and started to redesign that and have almost to the point where they've finalized those designs for the um construction manager RFP. We did receive five bids. Uh the due date on those was April 1st. So on April 1st, we had the bid opening for the bids that we received for the construction manager for this project. This is just a estimated future timeline. We wanted to make sure you're up to date on kind of where we're going with this project. So coming up soon here, I think in another week and a half, we have the budget hearings for the next fiscal year, 26 27th fiscal year. Uh there are funding requests in there from the police department to continue to fund this project. the second phase of that project which is the dispatch expansion and the

construction of the Sallyport. Um the city commission meeting on April 27th, we are planning to bring to you the design that was approved by the historic district commission to review the designs and the expenditure expenditure request for phase one of the project that was already approved in this current year's fiscal year. uh May 26. Uh we're looking somewhere in that time frame where we'll be coming back for the budget approval. I think it is the somewhere in May that meeting that the city will actually approve that budget request for phase two of the project. And then we're expecting sometime in June, maybe late June where phase one construction would get started with the approval of a construction manager tonight. down the road. We're looking probably June, July, uh once the budget is approved in May, that we come back for um approval of expenditures for phase two of the project as we would expect to roll right into that once we start phase one come July 1 to start working on uh the dispatch expansion and Sallyport and phase two construction. We we think that will start probably in July. We would expect based on um staging and stuff for a construction company that once they're here working on interview room that would only make sense for them to continue with the dispatch expansion in Sallyport uh all three of those projects kind of at the same time since we're really coming up close on the next the start of the next budget year anyway. So, so this project over the last couple years, there's been a lot of discussion. Uh there's been a lot of departments involved in this. Obviously, the city manager, um the building department has been part of every stage in terms of reviewing the RFPs, reviewing the bids with us that we received. We've had discussions with the IT department in terms of relocating all the IT equipment that's in the server room and dispatch up to this server room, made sure there was space for that so we could do that. and also the department of public services for the expansion of the garage

over there that we have. Um after really consulting with MCD once they came on board and started working on our project and with our building department is where um they expressed a desire that the best way to go forward with this was what with a construction manager. Um and that RFP again was posted on March 5th and those bids were returned on April 1st. Um just again to go over it, there was five that were submitted to us. two of the biders that you see in your in your package, uh, they did not fill out the correct cost proposal form. Um, but the costs are in there that they did submit. And, uh, when we reviewed all the bids that came in, there was a discussion with, uh, MCD, our architects, as well as our building department to go over the bid proposal proposals that we received and their recommendations on how to move forward. This is just kind of a snapshot review of the budget and what's been approved. So, in fiscal year 2526, um those are approvals I just previously mentioned minus the amount that was approved for MCD leaving us with $320,000 and the currently approved budget year. And then you can see the budget request that will be discussed at the budget hearing coming up. Uh that is a total of $900,000 uh for the next fiscal year. We expect the project cost to be somewhere between one and $1.3 million um at this point because the designs are not completed. We don't have a construction manager on staff yet. We haven't got an actual estimate of what that's going to be. Um but the ba the best I guess budget they can look at is probably between 1 and 1.3 million. When the RFP went out for a construction manager, they were asked to bid on the project as if it was a $1 million project for built. Um the construction manager fees that came in, it was recommended uh after review and consultation with the architect and the building department to move forward with Sachi. Um there total cost assuming a $1 million project was $269,347.

There was no separate line item placed in the budget for this uh which is why we're asking for the budget transfer um to approve this. However, if if the project comes in at a $1 million project, there is about um $220,000 left over based on the 1.3 that has been budgeted or and is requested. Um and if approved, there'd be about 220 that most of that would be able to go back. Assuming we stayed within that budget, but at this time it's right now it's kind of a contingency fund because we don't know what the actual estimate is going to come in at. And with that, I'm happy to answer any questions. And we have reps from Sashi here and MCD I believe is online if you have any questions for them.

Thanks. Questions public. Do you want the public first? No. Okay. It's not a public hearing, is it? No. No. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, Chief Guru, uh, do you have, uh, operationally, uh, efficiencies while this is going on? Are you going to be able to continue to conduct your normal business?

Yeah. So, we've we've already worked out um operation, how we'll work with the sally port being built and how that will block off access to our booking room and prisoner cells. We do have access coming through clerical. So that's how we'll maintain that access. Uh we just did a project in our dispatch center where we had to remove a lot of old wiring and when we did that we relocated our dispatch operations up to the county. Um they were up there for about a month. Um and it worked seamlessly. So it was a great test for us to kind of test out how that was going to work with them being up there. Um it did work great. But when that dispatch expansion occurs, they will be relocated to the county again to do that.

Okay. And now I have a comment and that is uh it was nice of you to give the history. Uh going back to I think 2021 we asked then the city manager to uh update the police department and he gave us the entire building at $26.7 million. And what is so heartening about what you're doing here, chief, is you're renovating versus uh you know going somewhere else to a Taj Mahal. So it's it's exciting. We're opening some pretzels. It's a long night. We've been up here for one, two, three and a half hours. give us stuffed with peanut butter. Anyone?

No, I'll take Yeah. Okay. Anybody out there? As long as we went through all the trouble.

Uh, does anybody else have any questions or comments? City commission. Uh, I have a question first. I just want to understand the difference between uh construction manager and a general contractor. And I think that you're the guy, right? Come on up. Uh that you you do both of those things, right? I uh decided to start doing yoga again this weekend, so I'm a little sore. Um, so what's your name? Sorry, my name's Rick Stanza.

Would you like some pretzels? Yeah, we're done. Those pretzels are making me thirsty. We can handle that, too.

Uh, so I'm the pre-construction manager for It's pronounced sexy construction. Um, it's as Midwest as it as it sounds, as it could get. Um so construction manager uh uh facilitates the pre-construction uh phase of the project. So, we would work with Chief Drewie and the architect um to start putting together actual numbers based on uh the design as it um starts to take shape and and more of the engineers get involved and finishes get selected and things like that. So my job at Saxi is to take all that information um get it out to some of our trade partners um look at our historical data for similar projects and start really putting the numbers together for the project. The ultimate goal of a construction manager is to uh get the get the budget to a point where it's makes sense for the project. Um, but also to help the architect with the development of the drawings and offer different value management exercises and things like that and getting to the point of construction to where the drawings are complete, we can get a permit and we can break ground

and then you go byput when the construction occurs or what what happens from there? No, so I I stay involved um after the construction starts. I I help with, you know, meetings and making sure that everything is under this contract. Under this contract. Yes. So, your involvement doesn't end when construction begins. No, you But you are not the general contractor. You assist us in going out to bid for the general contractor. We would go out to our trade partners, our subcontractors. So, you would be the general. We would then become the general contractor. Correct.

And that's covered under this. So, our our staff rates are in here for the duration of the project, the duration of the construction. Um, we then bring in more of our staff. So, we have an on-site superintendent, we have a project manager, a project engineer, project accountant, a whole team of people that come after your they come in during pre-construction, but most of the time is spent by me to do all of that. So my I guess my question is is there going to be another contract with you guys or is this it does this contract is that you guys just for clarification the staffing cost you mentioned are part of this bid.

Yeah. Oh yeah, I see that. I just want to know if this is if this contract covers us to the end of the project or by one, but it's broken into Yeah, there's there's in the RFP, it states which contract we would enter in with the city of Birmingham. Pre- construction, construction, closeout is where I see three discrete blocks in the staffing numbers. Right. So,

it's phases within one umbrella contract. Is that the best way of understanding what he's asking? We have we would have a a a construction management proposal that would be the the basis of the contract and then once we get to what's called the guaranteed maximum price then we would enter into a guaranteed maximum price contract which is an AIA format I believe contract that you guys I think so. Yeah. Yeah. Usually with these kind of construction manager we use the standard Okay, you're satisfied. You want to make a motion?

All right. I'll make a motion adopting a resolution to approve an agreement with Saxi Construction for police department renovations and expansion construction management services in the amount not to exceed $284,197 and to authorize the mayor and city clerk to to sign the agreement on behalf of the city and further to appropriate and amend the 2025 2026 city commission budget as follows. General fund revenue draw from fund balance 101.0 0-0000.0000-400.0000 $284,197 Expenditures into other contractual services 101.0-301.0000-811.0000284,197. Second point just point of point of clarification.

Clarification correct. Did I miss I'm not sure which number is correct because we have um on in the packet here 269,347. I'm reading it out of the main package. I'm not sure which one's correct. I just think we should get the right number. All right. One of the two numbers 269 347 or that's the correct number. 269 is the correct number. Okay. I don't that was not the number one. So friendly because what happened was uh Chief Guru made a correction to the it apparently did not make it in the front page of the agenda but it was corrected in the report. Okay. So friendly amendment is to the number. Yeah that's what I'm reading off page 261 though of the packet that I got. It's not the packet is different than the agenda. Correct.

Yeah. I'm reading out of the packet. The packet number is correct. 269. The packet say the packet says 284. Packet said 284. Oh, it says 269. 269. We agree. I was trying to go to the main source here. So, let's just let's just read the correct number into that. So, okay. Friendly amendment for the correct dollar amount to be provided by the city manager. $269,347. Second. Both accounts. Yes. Both accounts. Yes. Perfect. Second. He accepts the second. Comment on the motion from the public. Comment online. If you're online, use raise your hand.

Commissioner Kazowski. Yes. Mayor Valard. Yes. Mayor Prom. Yes. Commissioner Hay. Yes. Commissioner Co. Yes. Commissioner Cole. Yes. Commissioner Taw. Yes. Well, thank you very much. All right. Thank you.

We look forward to having this work done. Good night. Uh we move on to the mo most exciting item on the menu and that is a item E a resolution to award the 2526 sewer rehabilitation program to Payar Enterprises $714,499 and then some.

Correct. Uh so the engineering department received four bids towards their contract. Payar was the lowest qualified bid uh that came in. Uh basically covers several areas within the city that are in requirement of you know as we continue to maintain our infrastructure mainly sewer lining doing some uh other types of repairs such as cleaning out minerals that are growing inside the sewers um and doing some like adjustments at specific manholes as needed. I had a question. Oh, are you done? Yes.

Okay. I had a question. Uh, I live on Shirley. You just redid Shirley, but somehow Shirley's in this. There are portions of the sewers that weren't done with the project because we knew they could be lined at a later date and that's why they're they're part of this and weren't part of that project. We felt they were of sufficient condition that they could be extended in life significantly by aligning. Save money, take care of the problem. Okay, guys, a quick question. You may. I would have guessed that once you dug up the street, putting in a new pipe would be the pretty cheap rounding era. Yeah. Is it I guess that's not the case.

I don't I don't have the exact numbers in front of me. was some of it was related to the age of the infrastructure where lining brought significant life to where you expect it to maintain through the uh length of the road. It it is possible to be done with lining. Okay. Interesting. So basically that you're saying you you're going to have to tear up the street again before you'd have to fix that sewer anyway. So yeah, that's like you don't gain anything by fixing it this time. You tear up the street. Correct. Cool. Any other questions, comments? Anybody in the public? Did we have a motion?

No. Yeah, we didn't. Okay. I'm late.

A motion would be nice. Um, I will make a motion adopting a resolution to award the 2025 20246 sewer rehabilitation program number 425 parentheses S to Pamar Enterprises Incorporated in the amount of $714,499 with a 5% construction contingency for a total of $750,223.95. In addition to order to authorize the mayor and city clerk to sign the agreement on behalf of the city and to further appropriate and amend the 2025 2026 city commission budget as follows for general fund revenue to be drawn from fund balance 590.0000y 400.0000 000 in the amount of $170,223.95 and expenditures from other contractual services fund number 590.0-537.0000-981.02000 in the amount of $170,223.95. Second

comments uh from the commission, comments from the public. Anybody? No. Online, any comments? Raise your hand. Nope. Roll call, please. Mayor Ballard, yes. Mayor Prom Long, yes. Commissioner Pazowski, yes. Commissioner Ho, yes. Commissioner Cole, yes. Commissioner Long, yes. Commissioner H. Yes. So, you see, if we hadn't read resolutions the way we do, we would have not we would have approved what language.

Well, now we come to a very sad portion of our meeting. Um, Mayor Prom Long, you have been a valued member of this commission. Uh, and I I'm pretty sure I speak for all of us in saying we have appreciated your service and we are really sad to see you go. Thank you.

And uh in particular uh your skill as an attorney has uh helped us and I hope will continue to help us in certain matters. Um and it highlights how important it is to have uh you know certain skills on the commission uh whether it's uh business skills or legal skills or you all the other skills that we all bring engineer. Uh so uh we're very sad to see you go, but uh happy to present you. And I suppose I should have opened this earlier because it's wrapped in plastic. This recognition of service to Anthony Long, April 2026, in grateful appreciation for your outstanding leadership in the city of Birmingham. Your dedicated service to the city commissioner as city commissioner yielded benefits that have enhanc enhanced the community and will improve the quality of life for generations to come.

Very nice. Thank you. Wow. Who read that? You have been a diligent and thoughtful and helpful and informative colleague and we're going to miss you and and all your service on the ad hoc senior services committee. Thanks. Done a lot of work.

Well, thank you. Um, not much really to say. It's been an honor, a privilege. Um, turned 59 this year and I I learned very uh very late in life not to ever say never say never. I lived here for 31 years and thought I would live the rest of my life here. Um, I will spend a lot of time here though. Um but uh sad to go but happy about um my new my new home and new life with my new wife. So um it's definitely bittersweet. Um but uh I uh I've really uh been honored and a privilege to work through some very difficult issues. Um, and I've said before, we may go about it in a different way, and that's kind of how the sausage is made. And I think 99% of the time, we make the right decision. And the 1% time, we still have an opportunity to correct it. Um, and I think everybody who's up here is here and and donates an extensive amount of their time. As I said before, um, it is a lot more time than I ever thought. It is a labor of love. Um uh as I said, I've lived in the city for 31 years and I still plan to be a a visitor uh but I will no longer be a resident. Um but I think we are all here for the same reason and that's because we love the city and we want to uh make it even better uh than it already is. Um and uh Janet, it's been a privilege, Mary. Um so thank you.

Thank you. And with that, well, I hope you'll stick around. We have some more business later. Sure. Absolutely. So, I'm going to uh most comfortable seat now. I'm going I'm going to I'm going to vacate the seat and uh watch some pretzels if you want. Pretzels here. I leave you my pretzel bit. Thank you.

I won't let them go to waste. Okay, now we move on uh to the real highlight of the evening, the appointment uh of uh a city commissioner and the uh first we're going to accept nominations. We're going to uh I know it's late. We've been doing it this for a while. If there's any sense right now that anybody wants to take a break, you want to take a break? two minutes. Okay. Are we good with a two-minut break? We're going to take a two-minut break. Uh and then we'll come back and I'll tell you how we're going to go from there.

We're going to come back into session. Uh, I don't know if I need to say the time, but it's 9:54 p.m. Uh, we are at the point where we will accept nominations for city commissioner. Uh I uh I want to um take our time here. There's no need to rush this process. We're going to take the nominations. We are going to have plenty of discussion. Uh if we if if the nominees, we will engage the nominees. We will engage the public. So

thank you, Mayor Ber. Commissioner Kslowski.

Um, so first I would like to thank everyone for applying. Uh, Birmingham is lucky to have such a deep pool of talented and experienced and uh, dedicated people and I will add that the city definitely needs everybody's talents. Um, so to those of you who are already serving on boards, thank you so much. To those of you who are not yet serving, I encourage you to apply. there are many places uh where we could really use um your talents and skills. Um so it is our responsibility tonight to select and appoint the person who is the best who will best meet the needs of this city and this commission in this current moment. And I believe that person is Deborah her. She is a long-term resident and she has shown dedication to the city as chair of the sustainability board and through aiding in the crafting of our resident survey. Uh she has also dedicated her professional career to studying and working with municipalities uh with municipal governments, researching and working with policies, budgets, state laws and funding mechanisms and uh many other things that this commission deals with on a week- toeek or month-to-month basis. I think that she is a uniquely qualified candidate and presents a special opportunity to have a commissioner already so well-versed in municipal government. I think this is especially true given the current composition of the city commission because I do not believe to the best of my knowledge that we have anyone with a background in policy or public sector experience. So, I think that Deborah her will bring us new insights, uh, round out our collective resume as a commission and serve the city with skill, care, and dedication. And so, I would like to, uh, nominate Deborah her to the city

commission to serve a term ending November of 2026. Thank you. 2027. I I apologize. 2027. Okay. And we will discuss, let's get all the nominations on the table and then uh we can discuss them. We can call the nominees up, ask any questions, have any conversation. You want You're pointing at him? Yeah. Okay. I'm not sure which one you were pointing at. Commissioner Cole. Cole. Okay.

Um first I'd like to second everything. Commissioner Kosowski said about thank you for taking the time and thank you for all of you who are currently involved. Um Deborah, you and I have gotten to work together a little bit recently and I've enjoyed that very much. Um person I would like to nominate is Mary Jay. I think her extensive experience across very complex different groups of people um and having to live with the decision is a very valuable part of this and I think she could bring a new perspective to us that would add a lot of value. So with that I nominate Mary Jay. Okay.

Any other nominations? Okay, then we'll close nominations. Um, would anyone on the commission like to engage with either of the nominees? I would like to I Okay. Yeah, I'm happy to.

I would absolutely like to uh I'd like to engage with both of them. Um, I'm not sure which first and I'm and I it's not as if I have a prepared list of questions, but uh I sure as heck want to hear more because we didn't I mean, what did we have? Seven minutes. Uh, and I don't think that's a sufficient amount of time. So, you want to flip a coin as to who goes first? Suggest coin. Huh? I was going to suggest a coin. Go ahead. You got one? Who carries coins these days? I don't have any. Flip a pretzel. Mary, you're sitting closest. Come on.

I got a coin. I've already asked her to come up. Oh, all right.

Um, if no one else uh has any questions, we met. I enjoyed our conversation greatly. I think uh in almost any circumstances you're qualified. Part of this is going to be me talking, okay? Because, you know, these guys did their thing making their nominations and I'm just going to tell you what I think and maybe ask you some questions. Uh, I think you're a great nominee and uh I I'm interested in hearing more about uh how your specific Well, there's two things I want to hear about. One is uh how your resume a adds to the board. In in other words, we just lost a lawyer. You're not a lawyer. You're not going to take the place of a lawyer. Uh you I don't want to misrepresent what your career was all about, but I think it's safe to say you you were an executive at a big three automaker. You uh were engaged in all sorts of uh uh departments. Is that fair to say? Why don't you tell us? But was there a focus? Was there a particular focus through the course of your career? Oh yeah, absolutely. Um I it is unusual one that I've was with the same company for 39 years. I mean it's I feel like a bit of a dinosaur these days. It's it's it's rare especially amongst my colleagues and um in in other I should say in other comp other other companies. I mean I've worked on a lot of boards. I've been interacted with a lot of different people and I realized that staying with one company for a long time is very unusual. Um, and I was worried when I first joined Chrysler because my biggest fear was being pigeon holed. You know, I

I thought, "Oh, you're going to join finance and you'll never get out of finance or um, you know, or whatever, whatever department." And it was the exact opposite. Um, at Chrysler, I think one, it's was a smaller company. There's less of us. We had a broader view of a lot of things. We got our hands in a lot of things. It was a lot of hours. Um, one of the reason I actually did finally retire is just it just was getting hard to keep going 40 years at those kind of hours, right? But, um, uh, I I have interest in so many different things and I wanted to work in different departments and people wanted me, you know, I was effective in the areas that I was in and I brought new perspectives when I went to a different area.

And then, as I was mentioning, that was, you know, I worked primarily, uh, my first couple years were in financial planning. I had a marketing degree and I got a job in financial planning. I never thought I would do that but it was for sales and marketing finance u for the sales and marketing finance. So I worked with all the sales and marketing people uh supporting them um and then a good chunk of my career was in procurement and supply um and dealing with contracts um negotiating with suppliers um delivering products and and um components really but my components particularly when I was a buyer was um engines which are huge so it's really it's really a strategy I dealt a lot um and I guess maybe that's the best way I could uh summarize my career career is that um I'm very good at setting the strategy and I'm also very good at implementing the strategy. So I would go from different departments. Some departments I worked primarily in the strategy and others was more in the implementation but it all come ahead.

Let me ask you just as you go through this and talk about your experience if if you can relate it to how you might contribute. Sure.

Here that would be awesome. And again, I think it's just the the concept that you're dealing with so many different stakeholders, right? You have to consider so many different stakeholders and their input. Um, and you have to work together to reach a consensus and you've got to take those opinions from the different groups and you've got to weigh them all. Um, and then in the end, but in the end, you need to make a tough decision. Um, and I just believe that my experience would be very beneficial. I mean, the type of things that you're looking at, you know, um delivering on budget, um who you're choosing to do things, um what's best for the for for the majority of our constituents, those are all the things that that I worked into in my career. So and I you know again I think the the success in my career um again I was an executive for the company so I you know I performed and would therefore move up and and upward but um with more responsibility and more decision-m so I'm I'm very comfortable with that. I'm very comfortable with a lot of data. I think I'm quite good at um synthesizing what the critical points are. I don't know if it's common sense or just I don't know life experience, but for whatever reason, I've I've always had a a good hand at getting to what the real root of the problem is and um addressing that. Um but again, considering all inputs and and participants. So

So what I hear you saying is you're good at problem solving and decision making. Is that fair to say? And I think I think collaborating, getting people to provide their input and to consider the input and and I would also say I think dealing with conflict um you know and everything I like back at Chrysler almost every day was a conflict you know um with some department or some hey we're all working together but each one has their own goals so together you got to make those those all come together but um I I don't shy away from that. I think I'm quite good at resolving conflict also uh working with the stakeholders talking being objective being calm patient um and listening and uh taking uh different perspectives perspectives into account into account. Does anybody along that line? I have another line of questioning. But before I shift, does anybody have additional questions to ask about her experience and her how she will contribute to the board?

No.

Okay. No. Okay. I've always had an agenda. It's not my agenda. It's an agenda for the city. So going back 25 years, I've approached my involvement in the city, whether it was to renovate Booth Park or uh or or argue in favor of the Beastro ordinance or more recently uh argue that we need to improve the aesthetics of the parking decks or hire Plant Moran to to do a to help us with public private partnerships and even negative I fought hard against the North Old Woodward parking deck. So I want to ask you and I and I could I could give you a list of things that I might be uh interested in doing in the next couple of years. But I'll I've said enough about me. These are all things they're not for me. In fact, there was great sacrifice on my part, my business, my family, for the work that I put in uh then uh before I was a commissioner on the Birmingham Buzz and stuff like that. And and now, you know, I kid you not, we're going on 10 hours today at least.

So, I'd like to know what you what what's on your agenda for us. So, my I don't necessarily have an agenda, but I do have things that I'm I'm passionate about and things that I think will help the the city. Um I I do think the Woodward noise problem is one of them. Uh it's just it's an emotional problem. It but it resonates with so many people. It's a really difficult problem and I think it's going to be tough to solve, but I think there's there's got to be some ways that we that we approach it. I mean, I think when you and I were talking about it a little bit, you know, maybe it is more grassroots involvement that we need and maybe it's rallying neighborhoods to to really express what their concerns and their, you know, I I had mentioned I I wanted to go out myself and and put signs up on the median that said, you know, you're waking up my baby, you know, um because I don't think the people that are doing these things um are I don't think they're realizing perhaps that that they're disrupting so many people. Um I'm trying to understand from their perspective. I don't want to ruin their fun. Uh we're a motor city. I love the whole idea, but in the end it's it's just caus causing havoc in the city, right? So to me, there's got to be some ways. I don't know if it's marketing. I don't know if it's more messaging. I don't know if it's getting more neighborhood involvement, but that's one thing I'm passionate about. I think um uh I know in the master plan there's this this um the vision of having the north um Woodward entrance if you will and the south Woodward entrance you know working on that as the as um obviously as the the gateway into the city but even that might be something that we can do to maybe help with the noise abatement or the speed or whatever you know maybe somehow showing that those

those ends of the city um in the area that it's impacting. You know, again, maybe it's signage, it's things like that, but I do think that those are possibilities. Um I I love some of the ideas of engaging more of our neighborhoods and while also increasing some um commercial interests. Like I love the idea of like the Hannes area project because I think it would bring more uh foot traffic down to that southern corridor where there's there's businesses that maybe aren't so well served. Um but it also would help the neighborhoods, you know, and have this gathering spot and um and and greenery and areas for activities that I think would help engage both business and and residents. So, um I mean those are some of the ideas and some of the things I'm cap passionate about. I I mean I can't uh forget the uh the uh preservation plan that we developed with the historic district commission. It's it's it's really tough. I mean in in in our city, I totally get that it is really tough to to save all these wonderful old buildings that we want to because of the the interest in living here, the the price of the land. Um, uh, it's it's it's a tough one and and and individual owners rights, you know, what they do with their land. But I do think there's ways and you know, being on the commission, we're trying to come up with those to market market um the availability of those homes, the interest in the homes, the the attraction that they provide. I think there's people out there that don't want just another big home, you know, big new home, and big isn't always better. We we have people that are interested like myself. I I live in a historic home because I want to live in a historic home and I think we have people that are interested in that for the city. So, you know, that want to come here and and and also do that. So, again, thorny issue. We need to we need we need more options. We need to keep working at it. Um there no easy solutions but I think together you know with clear minds and thoughtful

thoughtful um thoughtful analysis we can we can come up with some things that are going to make a difference for the city. Um, as long as you brought that up, uh, when the plan first came to us, it had a provision that, uh, it was regarding a demolition delay.

And the recommendation was that we pass pass, approve, enact a demolition delay ordinance. And I think several commissioners expressed concern about that. uh said that the plan ought to say we ought to study it rather than just reaching the conclusion that we should do it and it was sent back to you guys or to staff. They did change the plan to say we would study it and now you are studying it.

Great. Um this I think the concern arose from the potential for something like that to significantly impact property rights, right?

Um and you know whether it's a resident who lives here and owns the property or a developer who purchases the property and is then the property owner and technically the taxpayer. there's still uh there's a concern for all uh there's a concern for the next door neighbor and the whole neighborhood. Uh but I'd be interested in knowing like sort of where you stand on that uh on that whole idea. Uh because with and if you could provide or confirm some specifics because um personally I have not viewed your meeting but others have and you can confirm for me that you're considering recommending for some u structures a 90day delay. Well, okay. So, first of all, um

and then uh what would you do after the delay?

Okay. So, um first we we propose to change the wording to to consider this demolition review uh delay on our commission. We've actually we want to re rename it um a demolition review. So um and we want what first thing we're doing is that we're looking at um more data, right? Because we realize you you you we can't save every every home and also the the the inventory of historic homes is just getting bigger and bigger, right, as the years go on. So, um the intent is not to save everything, but it but it is to try and save or try and um look at all their alternatives to tearing down homes, buildings that that ma make a significance to the town. And we can follow the the national preservation historic preservation guidelines and they have very objective and specific um requirements for considering something historic. you know, was it did somebody of of uh some a historic figure live there? Did a historic event happen there? Um or is that architecture, you know, um very uh if you want to say indicative uh reflective of that neighborhood? So, it you know there's right off the bat you're going to take off an awful lot of homes, right? So, the idea is to keep everything very objective. It it's not any mandatory um u u designation. We would not do that either. We're we're not looking to say that we have to just say something is going to be designated. It obviously is the owner's rights. Um and if it's a new owner and they want to tear it down. It is I have to be honest, it is usually a developer. Um but that is they're the owner of the property. But um the idea is just to one is to raise awareness that there may be alternatives to

tearing down a historic home and it a one of significance. So um we're trying to make the the process um very objective, very clear who who decides what when and what the impact would be. um 90day. We don't have any specifics again on what ex you know I think what was thrown out were some potentials and some considerations but what we're doing is looking at what other cities have done. We're looking Nick and his team they're like I said are looking at the inventory. We've actually even gone through the history and looked at, you know, what would we what what are the few things that we really wished we could have saved and and would they have then be able to follow this kind of a flowchart? Again, in the end, no. I mean, we can't require that somebody not tear it down. But it is to raise awareness that there may be other alternatives to just to just raising a a whole a historic building that that does have some significance to residents and to the community. Anyone have any? Go ahead. Yes.

Yeah, I have kind of a a followup on that. Um, and you don't, you know, I just thought of this now and you know, you don't have to have a rockolid thought about it, but you had mentioned that well there is some demand. You know, a lot of these these old homes are quite beautiful. Um, they have special architectural features or something. Um and yet some and and there are probably people who are interested in living there and yet somehow right they always get outbid the house goes down a big one goes up and somebody happily pays a pretty penny for it right

so I'd be interested if you had some Right you you're on the historic district committee right is this something you've been thinking about and but but like why not why what is what you know it seems like there's this huge huge delta in how much people are willing to pay, right? People pay a huge amount of money for a new tear down or for a tear down in a new house, but like they won't out bid the developer for some of these old houses. And I was just wondering if that was something where you thought is there

I guess I'd have to see more data on that, right? Because I I really don't know if that's if that is totally what's happening. If it's always a developer outbidding somebody who does want to live here, I I you know, that's tough statistic to get. Um I I I I do know that our our homes are expensive. Even the the older ones that don't have the amenities of of some places um are quite, you know, they're quite expensive to buy and you'd have to put in some cases you have to put time and and money into into renovating them. You know, again, um others are are in great shape, you know, and can easily um someone could easily do it easily live there. But um you know, I don't have the answer to that. I don't know how you keep a a developer from outbidding someone. Um I think to be honest they're not going to go so far that they won't make money on the on the proposition themselves and and um I'm sure they they as we know they target certain areas and and areas that they know that they can have a return in some areas maybe that did we have like no what is it called? I think it's the Tory area right with a lot of little homes. They were post um postwar homes. They went up quickly and they were the starter homes, right? And a lot of those are becoming now twostory because modern living is requiring a little bit more than those small homes were were offering and you know maybe now it's almost like another phase. Maybe that's where our our you know the starter homes or the entry into Birmingham are. So, it doesn't again we can't save everything and I and and we shouldn't save everything, but I think there's some that we can save and I do think that there's people out there that like them. I think it's just maybe it's increasing awareness of that. Um I don't know how you out bid developers. Again, I think

that that's a tough one. I I have to be honest. You I'm not sure how you answer that. I don't know if there's any kind of regulations or zoning or or No, I I was I was more asking if you felt like, you know, somebody looks at the home, they see that it's beautiful. You know, some buyer is out there willing to pay one $2 million for a new built, but like the developers don't usually pay a million dollars for the old house, right? No. So, like there's some kind of willing gap in the willingness to pay there. I don't know if you felt like like you said maybe it's a square footage thing.

You know, maybe a lot of these houses are small, but I'm I'm just it's just something that I'm interested in. If there was something that you had thought about as a member of the historic district committee, why does it seem so hard to find buyers who are willing to purchase and live in the old homes, but people don't seem to have any trouble finding buyers for the new builds? That was that was sort of my question there. Well, and I I would like to ask a followup. Okay. And I'm going to be I will uh warn you that I'm going to challenge you. Okay. Uh how long have you been on the historic district commission? Years. And for most of that time, you were working on this plan. Correct. Uh we were developing the plan. Yeah. As well as other proposals that were

And you have you have a strong uh interest in historic preservation. Correct. You have told us that you are a a problem solver, a decision maker, a collaborator,

and I hope you're a leader. Okay. I think a good leader has a vision. A good leader has thinks if I were in charge, this is how I'd do it. Forget about collaboration. If I was if I was the pooha and I could say whatever I want to say would happen. Now, I can't imagine that after two years on this commission and with that such a strong interest and all these skills that you have that you don't have some answers for us.

Well, I I I'll be very honest with you. I mean, it's historic preservation is tough here. I mean, it's a reality. Houses are expensive. People want to live here. People are willing to spend the money. It It is a reality. You've said repeatedly, there must be a way. I think those were the words. There must be a way. What's the way? You're the leader. Yeah, but we're working on the way. You know, there's so it's complex, right? There's no simple answer to this. So, I don't think it's possible there's no answer to not be able to save any of our historic buildings. No, I don't think that that's the answer personally.

Okay. But um no, I think we can and I think we have people that are interested and I think there's strong neighborhood support for it. Like in my area, you know, the people that have historic homes feel very strongly about it and are are very involved and and will continue to own an old home. So um sorry I don't think it's a leadership issue that there's not a clear answer on such a to be really I I don't mean to be rude but I mean I think it's very difficult

and we would dis we would disagree there because on likewise on the the the Woodward noise question there's all of these problems that we face require leadership and we have very smart people in this town we have I I am so proud of what we have here and I think often times we have a there's a reluctance to lead to get out in front and take the risk.

Okay. So it is it's don't I won't take offense at what you say. Please don't take offense at what I say. Uh I would like to see I would like to see more leaders just all around. Doesn't matter whether it's on the parking board or the planning board or this city commission. We need people with vision who are willing to stick their necks out and and fight for that vision and then you collaborate. Uh thank you very much. I think we're I don't know how much time we gave you, but did anybody keep track? I don't think that's I don't think that's important.

Uh if no one else has anything else Commissioner Commissioner Hay.

So, um, I got a lot of pontification out of that conversation rather than targeted. I asked a I asked a very specific question earlier and we were rushed through answers, but I was looking at what are key issues that we're facing right now. And and if I were to be very blunt about it, historic preservation isn't in the top five. It's not unimportant, but it's not what's on the forefront of anybody's minds, including what we have had to deal with over the last however long, preceding all of us, actually. There have been some very common themes, I would say, but they've been growing and growing. So that's where my original question went when I asked it about where would you try and make a tangible difference. So the mayor's asked about a vision, a pathway. I think if any one person in this city had the perfect answer that have stood in front of us, whacked us all around the head and said, "Here you go, you dummies. This is what you need to do better." But nobody's come up with it. So, I'm going to ask a very similar question for the issues that we're most likely to be handling over the next 18 months or so. You got more time to tell me what do you think? How do you see pathways? How can you help us enable success? Because I see I see from your career path a an execution of task and I I'm not sure how to phrase this appropriately but surviving 39 years at Chrysler going through how many bankruptcies and different leadership changes and course directions and what have you. Yeah. shows a fairly clear

ability to navigate complicated situations and survive and thrive because that's not been that's been Detroit's tumultuous story. So to go back to my original question, we have very forefront issues that are more within our hands. Noise, that's a bigger picture. It involves state level multiple municipalities. Narrow your focus down to the scope of what we can work on within our five square miles. Give me ideas or proposals on what you would how you would try and work with the future.

Wow. It's it's um it's hard. I'm going to ask you the same question, by the way. So, I'm assuming you're doing homework right now. Wow, I have to think about this. Um, it's not an easy question.

No, it's not an easy question because there's a lot of issues. They're complicated, but um, you know, I mean, I can go to issues like our infrastructure, but I mean, we have a plan. I think the biggest issue with infrastructure is um determining how we spend to support it and um so that I don't think that's what you're looking for. I mean is it something like the community house? You know the fact

no I what I'm trying to look at look for um I guess this is this is sort of the partial answer. As I said no one person is going to sit here and stick a piece of paper down on the table and go this is the pathway. What I'm looking for is a mindset of how we go to execution. Um the mayor said right at the very beginning of his tenure and I I said this to him the other day he wants to drive efficiency and I'm on board with driving efficiency but to me that drives in everything and not just this particular meeting format. That's the entire execution. Um, I work for a very bureaucratic company and interestingly I had a meeting with a director today about this exact same subject about how we can be more efficient with what we have that you touched on that with how do we do more with what we have. I'm looking for how we as a whole enable efficiency of execution in everything that we do. Absolutely everything. Now that's a conversation we need to have with the city manager about how we can look at that in the future and that's maybe broaching a little early but that this has sort of precipitated it happening earlier in my mind. Sorry Janna but we do need to have a separate conversation but I'm looking for what will you how would you try and bring experience from execution to help us execute better because I will put my hand up and say I don't think I or the rest of us are executing to the best of our abilities. I don't think any of us are. And I look at all of us sitting up here in that as well. We're not doing a bad job, but I think we could do better. So, I'm looking for guidance on how you feel we could all do better together

if you have them. And I said it's a it's a complex question. Well, and and I have to be honest, you know, I have a lot of experience with uh process improvement and uh merging organizations and looking for the most efficient and and effective way to to run a business. So, um, it's getting down to understanding how you're doing things now, where the where the problems are, finding the the pressure points, if you will, um, and and addressing those, looking for solutions that alleviate those pressure points um, or roadblocks, if you will, um, to the efficiency. Um sometimes it's it's um you know maybe it's availability of data, maybe it's unclear decision-m uh maybe it's um unclear responsibilities. Um I in the past I've I've first I merged our operations in Europe. So when we merged with Daimler, we took a very decentral organization and our um decentralized was Chrysler and centralized was was Daimler and we put those together and we had to merge the operations in all these countries. Uh primarily I was working in Europe but eventually we did that in every country and it's a matter of you literally just start listing what your what your processes are. You know who does what and when what seems what is the most efficient what isn't. Is there is there system um capabilities we don't have? Is it people? Is it staffing? It's you we we would call them a gap analysis, you know, where are we now and where do we want to be? And I think that's the the the starting point and it's an objective way of looking at how do you want to improve things, right? It's the start you have you can't you can't know where to go unless you know what where you are and where your your problems are. So I think I have that kind of experience. I think I that's how I would approach a

problem. Um specifically. I mean, that's to efficiencies and and operations, but um I think you can apply it to almost any um activity that we're involved in, you know. Um I I guess to keep things short, I think that's probably the start I would have and the best way I would approach it, right? Thank you. I I hope I I know we that was probably more or harder or whatever, but appreciate it. That's all right. Thank you. I appreciate I appreciate the chance to talk, so it's good. Thank you. I do not demand equal time.

Don't worry, we'll get we'll give it to you. You can stay. You can come over here. You don't have to. No, but it's comfious. They both people are more comfortable putting their arms up and you know. Excellent. Whatever. Great. So, uh well I I will ask again if anyone has any questions for Miss her. Uh if not I would ask you similar questions if you need me to repeat them.

I I do. It was a long conversation but not not there were essentially question two approaches. There were there were two approaches, you know, uh I think uh you use the term the commission resume as if we all as if the commission has a resume and you will be adding to it. You're not an attorney. We've lost an attorney, but you are something. And uh the knowledge and skills that you would bring to us to to help us to make us and Birmingham better. So that was the first part. The second part was, you know, what's what if any agenda do you have for for the city? Not for yourself, but for the city, right?

Um okay. So, in terms of my resume and how I add to the the commission, I think one of the things that is that I I talked a little bit about um in reaction to to Andrew's earlier question earlier today is I have this broad scope of information and data and knowledge and experience with what other local governments are doing across the state and across our region. So, I think that one of the things that I'm going to be able to bring to the commission is this perspective of benchmarking and understanding of other people's approaches to how they've they've grappled with some of the similar problems that we face in Birmingham. And so to the extent that I'm going to be able to bring in some of the uh the opportunities that other places have sought some perspectives from other kinds of elected officials, data from other communities like ours. I think those are all things that I'm going to be able to add to the commission. Um, in addition, I I think I I as I think Kevin said when when he was leading off or you did, um, I have spent a lot of time thinking about what municipal governments do, right? What what can we do? What's within the scope of our range? How can we do it? How can we pay for it? What are our resources? What kind of resources do we need the state to help us with? And how can we lobby for those? So I I have in political science, local government is really um the the this the last and the least, right? People don't necessarily study and care about local government. I care about local government. I care about good governance. I care about how local governments take care of their communities. And so I bring that perspective of my years of study about how can we as a city do better in a lot of ways, not just kind of in our economic efficiencies, although that's a very important part, but also in our outreach to citizens. And so I'm going to pivot for a second and talk a little bit about Andrew's question, which is

how how do we do better to meet the moment that we have? Um, I think a lot of it comes back to our residents. I think a lot of the challenges that we face, whether it's with the the 400 Lincoln building or the community house or our infrastructure spending or things like that has a lot to do with what we're going to ask of the residents, what whether they're going to support us in our decisions and what they want to see. And we will get buy in. We will do better if we both understand them and that's what the survey is going to help us do. But then also if we gain their trust and if they trust us to be good decision makers, they're going to be willing to um agree to different kinds of funding mechanisms for infrastructure payment. They're going to commit to re um you know backing us when we make decisions that might be unpopular um and that we have to make. So I think that that a lot of the efficiencies and effectiveness that we can can develop can come from not having to fight with the residents as much or not having to argue as much or understanding what they want and being able to deliver it more quickly by collaborating and and understand them. So so there's a lot of kind of specific things that we can do programmatically to be more efficient, more effective, less waste, better, you know, use of of taxpayer dollars. But I think a lot of it comes down to can we ask taxpayers for a bond or a special assessment or a hopefully not a millillage to to pay for things that we need the city to pay for. We we have crumbling infrastructure. We have buildings that need attention. We have roads that need um you know some some roads that need attention as well. We have sewer and water that has has uh uh 100 years old in the city that that needs attention. Some of those are not glamorous. going to the citizens and saying you need a new roof, you need a new furnace in your house. Those aren't fun renovations to make, right? But so

we I think one of the ways that we can really improve our own policym at at the at the council level is to, you know, kind of really work on our resident buyin for some of these programs. A lot of that is communication. It's outreach. I know I've spoken to all of you about how much time you spend in the community talking to residents. Um, and so it's that kind of fostering that kind of atmosphere where we're very approachable and then the citizens are going to trust us to make decisions we need to. So I think that's a little bit of my vision about how we we can improve the great things that we're already doing in terms of the board. Um, in terms of kind of more my specific leadership vision of what should we be doing, you know, a lot of it's going to come out of the sustainability work that we've done on the sustainability committee. I think a lot of the the work we're doing on the sustainability infiltrates into a lot of policymaking. It infiltrates into how we make decisions about infrastructure. It it's going to definitely impact how we deal with the ordinance update next year. Um when we start thinking about how we streamline planning and permitting and some of the things that we do, sustainability can be in there. I think the master plan kind of directs us to do that. Sustainability is a big chunk of it and and it shows the ways in which we foster trees, we foster parks, we develop the rouge, we do these things that aren't just because we want to be green, but because by encouraging residents to do permeable pavement or storm water retention, we actually protect our sewers. Right? So there's a lot of ways in which the sustainability work that I think is crucial to the city also allows us to do really good work in some of the other infrastructure and amenities sections that we also want to pursue. So, so for me it's it's finding the ways to which to marry the sustainability goals of being green, being less carbon emissions, you know, some and some of the other, you know, air quality and water quality, marrying

those to some of our other objectives like quality of life and parks and um recreation and and infrastructure repair. So, those are I think I I answered those in in not in order, but that's kind of the things I've been thinking about as we've been sitting here tonight. Sure. You know, uh, early in your discussion, Deborah, uh, I'm wondering, were you alluding that, uh, uh, we should have a bond that would pay for things that, uh, we can't do out of the budget? Um, in terms of kind of long-term infrastructure investment, yes.

Yeah. Well, I I don't know. I have start I've only started looking at uh expenditures and how much money we have versus how much is demanded by our infrastructure currently. But I think there are lots of different ways in which communities approach these kind of balance between a special assessment, a communitywide um uh bond, communitywide milled um uh approaches. Look, I really strongly believe that there is state level funding through the rotating water fund and other funds that are out there that I see local governments leaving on the table all the time. Now, that's not to say that you guys are not pursuing grant funding. I know you are. I know Nick is. Um, but I think that from what I've seen at the state level when Eagle will talk or when um, uh, DHS will talk about grants that why is no one applying for this grant? A lot of times my response is, well, the city's very busy. they don't have the resources to do it. But the grant money is often out there to support us in some of the larger scale expenditures we may want to make. And so what I'd like to do is think about how we can marry kind of our own budget outlays, what what capacity we have here in the city to spend money with what other external money we can bring in to maybe to to match that. So, I'm not necessarily saying I would support one particular funding mechanism over another, but I do think we do need to look at some long-term uh investments that maybe have been deferred over time with our kind of main infrastructure, roads and sewer, the things that our residents do really care about. And we hear about it when they talk about their flooding or we hear about it when they talk about um the roads. So, I don't know quite how to ask this question, so I'm just going to wing it. Um,

good. I'll wing my answer.

Anthony Long is an I'll try to do it this way. Anthony Long is an attorney. He bring He brought the knowledge and skills of an attorney to hear, but he didn't really bring Howard and Howard into the room, I don't think. I mean there was what whatever he was working on as an attorney he was working on and it was just his skills and knowledge that was contributed. I wonder to what extent you w could or would bring something even more than your skills and knowledge, but your actual daytoday work in what you do and the stuff that that's coming past you every day. So that it's actually like sort of a superchar. Do you understand what I'm saying? Sure.

And and but I don't know. I could be dreaming.

Right. No, I I work in in a in an office every day where the there are people talking about pro policy improvement. That's that's kind of our our job is to think about how we can do better with policies and whether that's bureaucracy or whether that's uh you know uh AI and technology. Um there's all of these this the minds at the University of Michigan are are discussing these topics within my my school. Um, and then I'm also plugged into things like the National League of Cities or EKMA or MML and which is the Michigan municipal league, Michigan Township Association, the counties association. So all of these people who are really thinking a lot about alternatives to policies, new ways of grappling with the same questions that we're all asking. Um, so yes, this is I swim in that water. So, it's fair to say that we get we get more than just

I've got you on my back. Yes. I would I I mean uh And what does your office look like? What I mean what what does your Well, four days a week it's my couch with my dog. No, that's not that's not what I meant. I meant the organiz the organization. You say you work with people. How many people do you work with? What are their what I I mean I'm not saying that you're going to go in and start putting these people to work on Birmingham's problems, although that isn't such a bad idea, but you know, give us give us some sense.

So, specifically, my job is to run a survey research program. My survey research program looks at 856 counties, cities, villages, and townships across the state of Michigan. I interact with the mayor and the city manager. I interact with the township supervisor and the clerk. I gather their opinions. They get back to me. They tell me we're a republic, not a democracy when I'm asking questions about democracy. They tell me that I don't understand their problems. Um, and we have nice conversation. It's great. Um, that is my job. I have, however, at my little center, my research center for local, state, and urban policy, the other main flagship research program is about fiscal health. It's specifically about how local governments can preserve their fiscal health. So it is look so that's not necessarily my um what I'm in charge of but that's what my colleagues are working on is is doing outreach specifically. Now right now we're doing a lot of work with rural governments because they really need a lot of help. They don't have as much capacity as Birmingham. They don't have professional staff. They don't have as much you know a large a budget. So we're doing a lot of work with them to try to to give them the capacity external capacity that we can. But that is kind of one of the things we're doing. I don't know if you guys have heard about this, but we've developed a tool for XBRL, which allows the state to download F65 um uh reports that are currently in PDF form and turn it into data that residents can see. So, it's a transparency project about fiscal health, local government fiscal health. So that's some of the things that we're doing kind of like um uh consulting on fiscal health and then also kind of developing tools for the state to use to make fiscal health more transparent. Um so yes I have colleagues who are really working on specific things for local governments. I have colleagues down the hall who are working at the uh the center for technology and I'm now I'm going to not remember their acronym but anyway it's about um how governments in general not just local governments um develop new technologies. So, we consulted with them when we did our

survey back in 24 about policing because we really wanted to know more about the use of drones like we were talking about tonight. The use of of predictive technologies for policing, the use of simple technology like body cams or or dash cams and things like that. How we how we can understand how those kinds of things are beneficial for local governments, if the investment is worthwhile, you know, what kind of places what what kind of um jurisdictions are adopting different kinds of new technologies. So, I'm working with those people who are specifically looking at local government technology. They've put out a pamphlet about AI use. They've put out a pamphlet about um uh all kinds of different um uh suggestions for local governments and what we should do. Th those people are down the hall. Uh another colleague of mine is working in the Graham Sustainability Institute and she's doing oh she her whole center is called empowered communities and she's working with Michigan on uh Michigan communities on solar and wind and how they can bring energy efficiency into their build municipal buildings things like that. So yes I have I have a cadre of people who I work with who are who are thinking about all of these things that that we're thinking about here in this room but doing it at the statewide level or even the national level. Thanks. I want to try to wrap it up pretty soon, but go ahead, Commissioner Hake.

Uh, so I think I got one question. Oh, well, actually two questions. So, the first one, what stops you from sending this information to Janet anyway? Oh, I do. She sees my emails all the time.

All right, so technically there's no incremental benefit. Um, the second one, well, if we get it already, we're kind of getting it anyway. The second one I'm more worried about what you're proposing with the position is to act as a policy maker in the field that you influence throughout the state by helping craft policy. So, the first thing that came to my mind there, and if this was at work, I'll be calling our compliance attorneys and saying, "Where's the conflict of interest?" because I can see where you being influential in all of these other fields could either force your recre recusal from all of those fields for you at work, which would be crippling at work, or it forces a potential recusal here because you may have access to information from other areas that we do not normally have that we would not be able to normally get under open communications. Or you may be viewed as being the the conduit to a potential bias either two or four actually it could work against us or work for us for any potential grants cuz it I it

I think I'm expressing it right I'm just worried about that because it's it's hitting my head really hard the more you explain what you do so so thank you for asking I have already confirmed with my policy school that I am allowed to serve on an elected board um So in terms of the University of Michigan's concerns around um uh conflict of interest, they are not concerned about me serving here and also being a faculty member at the University of Michigan or research at the University of Michigan. I have again one of my friends who is in green sustain the same friend who's in Graham sustainability institute is on Ann Arbor's planning commission. Okay, let me let me just stop you because we got to I know I'm sorry. Yeah, that and so you answered the question for U of M,

right? Uh, does the city have any problem? I I'm not seeing a conflict of interest. If there was something that was of a a particular interest or or any time that there's something that would um any specific instance, we would discuss whether a conflict occurs. Many of you call me and say here's the issue. Do I have a conflict of interest? And I say yay or nay. So that's how we would handle it as a broad scope. I uh just because one has knowledge about other communities doesn't create a conflict of interest in serving as a commissioner. Okay. Are you satisfied with the answers? I mean, she's got an opinion from her own attorneys which helps a lot.

Okay, good. I Yeah, I can still see some questions. Any other questions? Uh yeah. Yeah, sure. So, I wrote this down while you were talking, so I apologize. I'll try to make it as coherent as possible. you brought up in uh environmental sustainability. Um all budgets are are under pressure everywhere. Your first opportunity should you be appointed to work with us will be on April 25th when we're talking about budgets,

right? Um, if you're forced to make a decision that meeting between a popular sustainability initiative versus a critical road repair, how would you make the call and how would you explain it to our residents? So, hypothetically, there's a pot of money and it could go to either and we have to decide. We're either going to spend that money this way or over here on this program.

Oh. Um I think I would weigh the costs and benefits. I would see like and and look at our our our resident survey and I think there's a lot of support for sustainability uh across the the city, but I think there's a lot of support for fixing our roads, too. So, I don't think that I'm going to necessarily die on the hill of sustainability to the exclusion of other good policy. Right. There's there's definitely uh you know every dollar spent has meaning and so it's not necessarily that I would say we're we're only going to spend things on sustainability. Now I think there's actually opportunities to build sustainability into a lot of programs. It might not be the same as if we spent a million dollars on electrifying our city's cars or some you know large scale project. But I also think that our sustainability plan is very much an incremental plan. We're we have goals that are set forward to 2030 and 2050 and we're going to be working towards those goals. We're going to be trying to implement as many of the the laundry list of items that we're trying to produce that will all come together to achieve sustainable goals and be greener as a city. We sacrifice one to to meet other goals that are important as well. We'll work we'll continue to make the incremental pro progress on on sustainability. So I don't I don't necessarily think it's like you got to do sustainability today or never. Um, I think it's definitely a a an incremental process. It's a rolling process. It's a goal that we have. It's a goal in our master plan and we can build it into so many other programs that that just kind of gradually get us to where we want to go.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. Uh, uh, I want to, uh, give the public an opportunity. If anyone wants to speak, I'll give you a minute. Uh if nobody online or in the room has a comment. You got one in the room. You're using your minute.

I came I'm coming up for some more pretzels. I ate them. But we have peanuts. No. Come on. Really? We We're keeping really quick question. So, so Commissioner Balor, you went Mayor Mayor Mayor Balor,

my apologies, that that was not in um you asked some very tough questions to the first the first candidate about whether she would be a leader and what's her vision and and what are her top issues and what she would do, what what she sees she could do and and bring to the table. And you had a very nice question with with Miss her. I I didn't feel that she was asked the same question or or challenged in the same way. And and would you want to ask her that question and talk about leadership and driving things and what her top issues are like the first candidate? That's my comment question.

Thank you. The answer is it's 5 to 11. We need to move along. I'm satisfied what I heard from both uh applicants and I think it's time uh to vote on each uh nomination in the order they were nominated. Is that if I'm doing anything wrong? Shouldn't we be commenting about the candidates? Yes, if Yeah, sure. Absolutely. Absolutely. I'm sorry. You're absolutely. By the way, I think it was just pointed out you uh had biased questions with the first interviewer versus the second. Okay.

I just thought I'd start with that. Um you know, we have great problems here which need solutions and I've made some notes here. Um Deborah's uh vite is very impressive. She's making observations, comments, writing papers, doing theories. Uh that's I feel that's not what we need. Uh I don't think she aligns uh with our role here. Uh let me start with uh we have major problems infrastructure, the YMCA building, the community house, STRs, roads, and uh if I may digress for a moment. Uh you know, we get a a letter from J.R. reculta about Baldwin Court that hasn't been resurfaced since 2005. I hope he was mistaken, but you know that's a good 21 years. Uh and then the last item that's very important is the Woodward noise. All these are vital issues and I think our role is to make decisions where we spend our taxpayers hardearned money uh wisely and and I think Mary Jay brings practical tested 39 years worth of collaborating with other people to get things done and even more importantly she's had to live with those decisions for 39 years. I don't see um Deborah as having decision making in her wheelhouse.

I'm more into I think our voters, our constituents demand results and we need less talk and more action, less policy per se, more action and implementation. So, I I'm not going to vote for Deborah. I'm voting for Mary. Commissioner Long.

Um, I'm going to respectfully disagree with Commissioner Host. Um, I think that both candidates are excellent. I think that Mary Jay has all the attributes that Commissioner Host uh enumerated. Um, however, we're not hiring a CEO who makes decisions singularly or unilaterally. So um all of us who are on this commission make decisions and we all have experience in making decisions and we all work together because you have to have at least you know three friends to get anything done. Um I also uh think about what we what we can get that adds to the commission as far as skill sets and again why Mary Jay has wonderful 39year experience. I see her as duplicating the skill set that Commissioner Hag has about data analysis and um and um gap analysis and the experience that Bill Cob has as an executive and a a sales and marketing advertising background. I am going to disagree and and say I don't think we need less policy. I think we need more policy. My concern is is that uh if you talk about building trust, one of the criticisms we get from the community is that we look at everything as a one-off and we don't have overarching policies, especially in how we're going to pay for roads. Um I think that at this point in the city's evolution, we are a either a very big small town or a small big town, but we have constraints. We have constraints that this is a volunteer position. we have constraints with FTEES and staff and why while uh Deborah her may be sending emails to the city manager Eker with information or notification that

here's a grant opportunity or here's a new policy. We struggle with doing useful things with that information because of the constraints with city staff and this constraints on this commission. So I don't disagree that Mary Jay would make great decisions. My concern is great decisions based on what and what excites me about Deborah her is that this is what she does for a living. So the overlap is wonderful. Um I am interested in making decisions based on best practices and and learning how to do policym. We all know that we need to develop policies about how we're going to pay for infrastructure and how we're going to improve our roads. I want to know without having the city manager have an intern or an ACM call six communities and say, "Hey, what are you guys doing?" Somebody who can bring to the table, what are the best practices? What are the policies? We do a terrible job of applying for grants because, hey, we're Birmingham and nobody thinks we need the money, but maybe somebody who knows what's out here there that's not being touched and can tell us how to position ourselves um would be helpful. So, I think that we are absolutely missing a bet by not if we don't bring Deborah her on as the next commissioner because she does not duplicate the experience that we already have. I have no doubt that she is a good decision maker. But we're not she's one of seven. That is not the primary criterion is to somebody who can just make hard decisions because one of seven and she will have she will listen and learn from the rest of us and give us her her knowledge about best practices about uh what other communities are doing, what solutions are out there that we don't know about because we tend to frankly operate in a bit of a bubble. Um that's just the nature of who we are. Um, we have a lot of people who who

we've all lived here all of our lives. We have a lot of staff who've worked here for a very long time. It's kind of hard to get fresh air in the window and to really be on top of what policies, trends, best practices, benchmarking, data analysis is for the issues we have to solve. So, I will be um you know advocating for Deborah her because I think it's absolutely additive and it's what we need at this point in our evolution as a community and as a commission. Thank you.

Two very strong candidates. very strong. Um, I do feel that both bring an awful lot of different qualities to the table. I do also feel that we in our bubble, which is true, we have a very precious bubble. We don't understand the bigger picture of economics as well as we need to. And a lot of what we've been doing is looking to spend money to fix problems. But the thing that I hear the majority of residents saying to me is, I'm done paying vast amounts of money in some cases every year, and what do I get out of it? I mean, I look at we talked about with the historic district, we have these houses, a developer buys it, outbid somebody else and can sell it. So, one of my co-workers lives out Mcome Township way. He has a house that probably cost him half the amount the same house would cost here. So, what creates the value that Birmingham has that means we can charge people that much more money? He laughs at me at how much money I pay in taxes compared to him. It's absolutely ridiculous what the comparison is. And so for the longest time, there's been a perception that we can afford to do everything. Well, the reality is we can't anymore. We see that with the the expenditures that we have. And so I'm much more into efficiency, savings, and maximizing spending of very, very limited resources. And I am a

little concerned. I so it's difficult to say it this way. Sustainability will go by the wayside when money gets tight. And I say that as a parent of two small children and we're looking at another parent of two small children. And both of us got a long way for our kids to go. Even for all the other parents here, we got much younger kids. So we need to do it for them. But if I got $10 to spend and $11 is asked of me to fix the infrastructure that keeps my Maslo's hierarchy intact and then someone wants to spend another $5 because it might be fancy and and ecologically sound. I'm already a dollar over budget and that's where we sit right now. So I'm more into execution of efficiency and I look in the mirror with that because that's what I'm supposed to do as a day job and I've felt really challenged with it in this position ever since I got here. And Tom Marcus said to me, I think it was the first week I got here and then he repeated it to me almost every week for about 6 months until he hammered it home. We don't move fast here. You got to get used to a total different speed and a different bureaucracy level. Well, that doesn't make it right. I think we need to act more effectively and efficiently. And again, I look in the mirror and I throw that stone inside my glass house. So based on that, I want to go for a do and less theory, but I think I've said that for years anyway.

I'm not sure I understand the Are you expressing support for one or the other candidate? That's what I'm looking for from a candidate. And yeah, if I to pick one, Mary Jay gives more of a do than than Deborah Horner, but Deborah Horner brings an awful lot of other qualities as well. So, it's a very difficult decision, but I I really want to go over execution now. I'm tired of talk. I want to execute. I feel we we lack execution efficiency, but that's just my opinion. And as one of six sitting up here, I'm allowed it. Yeah, absolutely. I'm just trying to understand what the opinion is. Kevin, Mr. Kazowski,

thank you. So, I'm a little bit So, I will I will echo what Commissioner Hey and Commissioner Long said. I don't think I have a bad word to say about Mary Jay. I think she's great. I think we are we are very lucky to have her serving on one of our boards and we're very lucky that she is interested in serving on this board. The criticisms of Deborah her I find completely baffling. Um, the idea that she like doesn't collaborate or doesn't have to live with her decisions, I don't even think I know what that means. And I don't think you have any real basis to to say that. I mean, I it just completely eludes me what that is even saying. Um, and this idea that that what we should be doing is focusing on like execution. I guess I'm not exactly sure what we you think we're going to be executing on. Like I feel like what you're saying is well we need to look at the budget and Deborah her has lots of experience looking at municipal budgets. She works with a lot of people who do it all the time and I'm sure Mary Jay knows a lot about finance and will be helpful there too um from a corporate context but we have other people who also have experience looking at corporate finance. So, like she's like none of these people are going to be out actually paving roads. Um, they're not going to be out rebuilding the parks like we are a policymaking body and we have before us somebody who has spent their life researching municipal policy. I just feel like the line doesn't get any straighter than that. So, I will be I will be supporting Deborah her

Mary J. You have nothing more to say? Nope. I think Okay. I think you I I I I can't make you speak,

but uh as a commissioner who was elected by the community, uh it would be it's my opinion that we all uh need to need to speak and and and I'm I'm really sorry. I I'm It's just late. Uh I said I wanted to take it slow. I I almost went to ask for a vote before we got to talk, but we each have a responsibility uh to the candidates, to each other, and to the community to uh to explain our vote. And I I have to say that I agree. I'm not sure I understand if you explained how you're voting. I still don't know. But maybe that's part of the part of what's going on. I I agree about about what what they say about you're a great candidate in any other circumstance. This person is a a gift from above. I don't know any other way to say it. We're getting not only her, we're getting you of them. I don't know. Maybe you guys are state fans or something, but that's all I have to say. Everything's been said. It is crystal clear to me uh that Deborah her can contribute to this city, not just the commission, the entire city, the administration. Uh I don't know, maybe maybe you're afraid of her. I don't know. I don't know what it is. But I will be supporting death.

I'm not sure what you're trying to edit. Even his phone doesn't understand it. And I put it.

If I may make one more comment, I understand uh Commissioner Hags um interest in efficiency um and budgeting. uh you know I will repeat that Deborah her has a research project on financial health of municipalities which I think would be uh immensely helpful to us. I and I understand a doer and an executor and it we do and we execute. The question is is are we doing and executing on the best information and I would have to say sometimes no. We are winging it sometimes. We are one offing it sometimes. um you know the the Shirley, the Arlington, the Wimbledon um we have no problem making decisions, doing and executing here, but we are not doing it in the best context with the best information and with the benefit of understanding how other communities have looked at these problems and the solutions that they have arrived at. I think we could be doing better doing and executing if we had the benefit of that context and that information that we frankly don't have access to and that city staff has such limited bandwidth that they don't have the time to have that or the you know the background to have that global perspective that she would bring. So, I I agree with doing and executing, but I want to do it based on better context, better information, more knowledge about best practices, and more knowledge about what solutions may already be out there or approaches or policies that we don't know about.

Okay. No, let's move to a vote. The first nomination was Deborah her. So, do we want to do it by uh roll call, please? Commissioner Terres, yes. Commissioner Hay, no. Commissioner Klowski, yes. Commissioner Host, no. Mayor Ballard, yes. Commissioner, no.

Okay, we have a three-3 vote. That's a tie. We're going to try this again. We'll try it uh maybe three times. Uh if anybody wants to take a break, uh we can take a break. Uh if you don't do it tonight, then it's going to move to the next meeting. We have 30 days to execute this decision. Um so uh uh I I personally if anybody wants to make a comment, I'm going to tell you I am absolutely firm. I'm not budging. Sir.

Well, I'm absolutely firm because one of our candidates is a policy researcher. The other candidate is a decision maker based basing everything on data and not hypothesis. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Any other comments? Let's do another roll call. Would you want to have a vote on Mary Jay? Oh, I'm sorry. Let's Yes. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. That's okay. Do a roll call on Mary J. Mayor Ballard? No. Commissioner Cole? Yes. Commissioner Trace Long?

No. Commissioner Kazowski? No. Commissioner Host? Yes. Commissioner H? Yes. What? Yes. I know it's late. Okay, we still got a bunch of other stuff to do as well. Now, does anybody want to take a break? It's 11:15. Let's go again on Miss Her, please.

Commissioner Host, no. Commissioner Hay, no. Commissioner Cole, no. Commissioner Long, Terres Long, yes. Mayor Balor, yes. Commissioner Kazowski, yes. Okay. I don't see uh I don't see anybody budging. U Commissioner Hey, I see you as the potential uh person to change his vote. If you're you tell me right now you're not changing your vote. Commissioner Cole, you have not He's already said he's not changing his vote. So, I don't want to waste anybody's any more time up here. If neither of you are changing your vote, we might as well just move along.

Not tonight. Okay. So, we're not going to do that. Uh uh. Excuse me. Should there be any uh do we need to take public comment? You already clerk asks.

I think we had public comment uh prior. We don't need public comment at this point. We are at a dead end for tonight. That means uh we're also at a dead end with regard to uh the appointment of uh Mayor Prom to fulfill uh uh the rest of Commissioner uh Long's term. Uh that in my opinion would require a full commission. Uh so uh we need uh a temporary mayor prom. Yeah, I think you should put a motion um to uh adjourn this topic to the next meeting.

I need a motion to adjourn the topic of the selection appointment of a city new city commissioner uh to the next meeting. I'd like to make a motion to adjourn the appointment of a new city commissioner to the next meeting. Second. All those in favor? Yes. Comment on the motion. Comment on the motion. Yes. What would happen David Bloom, Birmingham resident? What would happen if Mayor Balor walked out of here tonight and got hit by lightning? Who would be mayor? You You're You're not meeting again for another two weeks,

right? We're about to appoint a temporary mayor prom. Okay. I think you need a temporary mayor pro I think you need a tempor you need a temporary mayor proton thank you we appreciate the input just as a point of order mayor you don't have to take public comment on every motion all right um all those in favor

I opposed okay now uh we need a temporary mayor prom I'm going to exercise mayoral privilege or uh and and nominate meet theres long to be temporary mayor prom at least until uh our next meeting. Uh at what point in our next meeting will this be taken up? May I ask? More or less? It actually won't be at the next meeting because the the next meeting is the budget hearing. Oh, the next regular meeting would be the 25th. Uh, we can put it on.

It would be unfinished business, so it would come up fairly. So, uh, there's a nomination. Uh, if anyone else wants to make a nomination, uh, for mayor, yes, temporary mayor prom. I'd like to nominate Commissioner Heg as temporary prom. Okay. Uh, my only comment on the motion is that uh, she's sitting next to me. uh we don't we won't have to play musical chairs and uh she has a lot of example. So that's the only reason. What motion? There's a nomination. Yeah. Okay. So we're going to take a vote on the nomination of uh Theres Long as temporary mayor prom. All those in favor?

I. Thank you. Opposed. Thank you. Uh approved. we move on uh to uh I'm very sorry. Um we're going to skip

we don't need to deal with we don't need to make a motion or anything on skipping uh appointments to the retirement board and all that, right? We'll just do that. I need uh quickly resolutions to meet in close session. There's three. Take one. Give me one. All right. Please. Uh I move to resolve to meet in close session pursuant to MCL 15.268 section 81D of the open meetings act to consider the purchase or lease of real property up to the time an option to purchase or lease that real property is obtained. Second. Roll call, please. Commissioner Host, yes. Mayor Balor,

yes. Commissioner Cole, yes. Commissioner Kazowski, yes. Commissioner P, you're recused. Commissioner Theresa, yes. Uh, go ahead. I'd like to make uh the motion under item H, resolution to meet in close session pursuant to MCL 15.268, 268 section 81E of the Open Meetings Act to discuss pending litigation entitled the C city of Birmingham versus the Community House Association Birmingham, Michigan, Oakland County Circuit/Business Court case number 2025 hyphen 219218 CB Honorable Michael Warren

second. Roll call, please. Commissioner Long, yes. Mayor Balor, yes. Commissioner Cole. Yes. Commissioner Kazowski. Yes. Commissioner Host. Yes. Commissioner Hus. Commissioner Cole, could I get a resolution on number on letter I, please?

Like to make a resolution to meet in close session pursuant to MCL15.268 268 section 8 open PN one closed PN open PN E clos of the open meetings act to discuss pending litigation entitled Paul Wells versus city of Birmingham at all US District Court Eastern District of Michigan court case number 225-CV-13640- TGB-app second roll call Commissioner Kazowski. Yes. Commissioner Theresa, yes. Mayor Balor, yes. Commissioner Host,

yes. Commissioner, yes. Um, I can be in that one. Congratulations. Yeah, I didn't get my name though. Oh. Oh, Commissioner Hay. Yes. Um item J, commission items for future discussion. Anyone? Well, you know, it would actually be prior discussion, you know, the next one. Okay. Well, then you can raise your hand on the next one. Are you raising your hand on this one? No.

Okay. Does anybody have anything for uh future discussion? I'd like to ask that we discuss flock. Well, I was going to do two of them and I want to compliment you, Mr. Mayor, for taking care of the STRs right at the beginning of the meeting. Thank you. Uh, but I have one other. Wait, hold on. We're dealing. We have commission items for future discussion and I raised flock cameras. That's all I need to say. Does anybody have a comment on that? Second. A tad more quantification. Cameras, drones. They're two different subjects.

I just want to report from the city on everything regarding what we're doing with cameras. Okay. Thank you for the quantification. Okay. All those in favor? I I opposed. None. Okay. Good. Great. Thanks. Commission discussion on items from a prior meeting. We have none. There are none on the on the agenda. Is there is there something you thinking you could add to the agenda?

I would like to. Yes. what um at this point in our discussions regarding the future of the YMCA building um there's a need for us to look at this urgently like our public roads, our golf courses, our parks, our parking decks, our public buildings. 400 East Lincoln is an asset. 100% of our taxpayers own and they expect us to be responsible stewards of those assets financially and operationally. Here's where we are. We uh know the space allocation timing and expense of next. We'll call that phase one. The building does not have an ADA acceptable elevator to accommodate second floor tenants, leaving everything other than the basement except uh essentially unusable. Beginning in September, the YMCA will be gone and the taxpayers who own a 100% of this building will be paying for at least 9 months 100% of the expenses on this building. In June 2027, Nex will come in and pay their portion of the expenses, leaving the taxpayers with the bulk of the expenses of the building. Here's what I'm suggesting. Let's form an immediate uh an an emergency just like the STR's task

force of city staff and commissioners decide to decide what we want 400 East Lincoln to be. Let's get back to the plan for the facility to be a community center and define what that means and what it requires. Let's do that now so that the needed renovations can happen simultaneously as we move next in with their construction. And obviously we could start with adding an ADA elevator. The time is now, not a year from now when next moves in. And twothirds of our asset being unused or mothballled is an expensive building serving only 4% of our population and 100% own it. Namely, 96% aren't in on it. I volunteer to be on that task force. A community center was the original vision we had when we bought the property. We can turn 400 East Lincoln into an asset that 100% of our taxpayers can use and enjoy.

Great. Uh could you put that under commissioner comments where it's more appropriate? Thank you. Um, one correction, when we bought the building, it was for next. There was no idea of a community center. That came later, but other than that, you're entitled to uh your comments. Uh, we are on uh communications.

Remove from consent agenda. We already covered that. Communications. I want to call the community's uh attention to a letter in the packet from Parish Underwood, president and CEO of the YMCA, once again affirming the YMCA's uh desire to exit and inability to uh economically uh continue there. We had several communications regarding 400 East Lincoln, the community house, ICE, and Oak Boulevard, and uh the resident survey. Um we have uh any commissioner reports. We have a notice of intent to appoint to the historic district study committee. We had one commissioner comment. Do we have any other commissioner comments? Thank goodness. We have advisory board, committees, commission reports, legislation, city staff. The 2025 Birmingham Police Department annual report is included in our packet and probably posted on the city's website under uh the police page as well. Correct. Probably maybe

if it isn't today, it will be tomorrow. Excellent. And uh that's it. We will uh now go into close sess. Excuse me. I'm sorry. It is 11:27. According to the ordinance section 229, uh, city commission meeting shall be held in the commission room of city hall commencing at 7 p.m. and ending no later than 1200 a.m. with the option of a majority vote of the commission to extend past midnight and 30 minute increments. I have every reason to believe we will not be done at midnight. So, we may want to undertake that motion now to extend the 30 minutes until 12:30. or one in the morning. Sure.

Uh, I would like to make a motion to extend the meeting past midnight to a minimum of 12:30. And if it goes to 1:00 a.m., so be it. Second. All those in favor? I. Any opposed? No. Thank you. We're going to uh adjourn.

Are we recording? Yes. Okay. We've returned from closed Gotcha. Uh we've returned from a closed session and I have nothing to report. So I need a motion to adjurnn. Second. Uh all those in favor? I I aure.