Downtown Development Authority - Regular Meeting

All right, so we will begin our meeting 605 and we will stand for a pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance 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. We'll do roll call.

Yes, Mayor Jacobs here. Chairperson Taylor here. Vice chair be doing here. Secretary Walcones sure to be absent. Doctor Heider here. Trusty Berry here. Doctor Naser D here. I see Perry door here right? You do have a quorum today. Thank you for my 7. Thank you.

Okay, approval of agenda.

I move to approve the agenda as presented. I second.

All right, so we have a motion by Mayor Jacobs, seconded by Trustee Heider. Any discussion by the table? All in favor?

Aye. Any opposed?

All right, that will carry. We have a presentation today. City Manager Tim Gibbons has joined us. Welcome.

Yeah, just stopping back by to check in about our search for a replacement community development director and DDA director. As we all are dreading, Mr. Miller is retiring at the end of the month, and we have faced the need to replace him. It has not been an easy solution. Matt carries on three very important roles. One of them is DDA director. The other is our community development director and runs our building department and operates as a planner as well. And this is from McKenna. So we initially sought to replace someone who could do all three of those things. And we asked Trustee Peridor to participate in what we thought were the best candidates available for the job and really just weren't able to find someone that would fit and perform all three of these roles. So really we've been spending, after finding out that one person just couldn't replace all the things that he does, Matt has unique talents that are unique to the position we created for him. really we're gonna have to solve it in the aggregate we're gonna have to find individuals who can do parts of really the three roles he carries on so we put our heads together and thought really the to present the board with two options today one I prefer the most is one continue to exist within the current cost-sharing agreement allow us to appoint a DDA director subject to your approval which I'll get a little further into, and continue to carry out that agreement, providing the same level of service we did, but just more in the aggregate, not just one person doing all three of those roles, but we appoint a director, and then that director would have the ability to utilize all the city services that come with it, they already do. You know, continue to use our technology, office space, access to a planner, access to economic assistance with grant writing, assistance with all those skills that Matt uniquely brought all in one package, really sort of create them all together with city services in combination. So the agreement doesn't say that I have to appoint one person to do all of the jobs I said. It just says that we have to provide a DDA director. At the last meeting, it was clear to me that the board contemplated promoting or making John Prosh the director to bump him up. I'm more than amenable to that. And then if that is something that the board is inclined to, I'd request that if they choose this option, is to go with that and give me some type of verbalization or vote of support for John. And that would take me to feeling like I could appoint him to carry out that role. Then John would continue to be able to work out of the city, use all the resources and things that come with that and be successful. And then we would just find other pieces for the other missing pieces really around the city side. The other pieces for this are really just from someone to run buildings, someone to do economic development on the city side and assist and can assist John. uh... so uh... that's really kind of my option one that's what i prefer it so i think the best courses i think the city and the dda both mutually benefit a lot from working more together than separate there's a lot of cost the dda would have to bear to re-establish itself on its own uh... a lot of connection to the city that the city would lose that it wants especially such a critical time for the dda we've got a lot of properties that i think being cohesive and together on is very important uh... so that's really option one we continue to maintain the agreement I provide an acceptable director to the DDA board. We use the city services and we move forward as is. The other option would be the contract allows the DDA to volunteer to discontinue the agreement with a 30-day notice. So just coming out of tonight, you know, if you want to go in your own direction, appoint who you want and kind of distance yourself from this cost steering, certainly it's contemplated within the agreement and I don't want to take that off the table. And no matter what you do, the city is supportive of the DDA. We'll be here to support the DDA whatever mechanism I do think this current agreement is the preferable way to do so there's just so much we can provide as a large municipality with all the services we do on a daily basis for the rest of the city that the DDA can continue to enjoy even during Matt's time the ability to utilize communications a planner and all those things to assist in projects the DDA has always been available and extremely beneficial to his success in the program in this position so Just really what I'm looking for tonight is, one, sort of a commitment to stay within the cost-sharing agreement with a new director. Two, an indication of your preference for director. If I was picking up the thought at the last meeting that John would be an acceptable director, gladly would take a recommendation for his appointment through the agreement and the city. Or, third, if you choose to discontinue the contract cost-sharing agreement, just let me know. But glad to answer any questions, any specifics I'm here for. But I do think it's way in our benefit to continue to maintain this cooperative agreement. And I don't think it has to be dependent on one person doing all of those things for all of us to benefit. I think we can piecemeal it together and be just as successful. A little more difficult without Mr. Miller, but he does make things easier and we'll just get by without him.

So I have a question. Yes. Do you see it if John takes the position as a part-time or a full-time position?

It would be part-time. Okay. But then that would allow us to take some of those resources and apply them to other parts. But really, you know, Matt's position, if you look at what the DDA was funding and the total cost of Matt's position, it was a third. Right. So this kind of fits within that budget. We'd keep John at his current hourly rate that he's being paid through the DDA and give him the necessary amount of hours to perform the function and provide him all the assistance he needs to be successful. We already cooperatively help with events, help with any other type of work that EDA needs, so we would just continue to do that.

I'll I'll add a couple things also I know Tim kind of broadly touched on the office space and the resources. When I when I took over as mayor in kind of push for some changes to get rid of the office over there. You know we're paying 900 $900 in rent a month. They're paying electric were paying. I don't know about electric I take that back phone. copier maintenance on copier uh some other miscellaneous things and that's where kind of the agreement to maybe go in a different way and bring them over to city hall came from so i think that's worked out really well and with the offer that tim has made allowing john or whoever we select and i'm in favor of john but um Doing that we still save all that money and we're gonna save a little bit of money on what we were paying our previous DDA directors Not much less, but he'll be a little bit less. But again, we're To me for the DDA. It's a bonus. It's a plus You know, we'll have the resources. We'll still have John to run everything we need in downtown and he takes care of a lot of it as as it is now. You know, he's right next to Matt with the lucky squirrel, if not doing more lucky squirrel, the chili cook-offs, all the events, the gardens, the water, all that stuff. John does a lot of that now, takes that off Matt's plate anyway, so... i think we wouldn't lose anything we wouldn't miss a step and we're still probably saving money overall as opposed to having to go find another building for rent for for dda director plus the salary we'd have to pay them so

to me i think it's it's a win-win for for us and the city again so yeah that's my it's about can we continue to provide the value to the dda that i think we have been providing i think we can um i think uh and also this cost sharing agreement allows for the dda to decide Well, in the future, no, we didn't, or at least put that pressure. Like, hey, we want value out of this. We've got 30 days' notice. This is the most seamless thing I think we can do, and I think you can just continue to keep an eye on it and make sure we're providing you the value in this agreement, and we will do the same. We've got to make sure this works for us, but I do think it's the absolute best direction to head. It's the most obvious solution, and and as the mayor said, there's just a lot of things, because we already have IT, we already have computers, we already have office space, we already have a contract with McKenna for planning, we have building inspectors, we have communications division, we have staff that can supplement, because DDA doesn't always need a ton of staff, but when you need a resource, all of a sudden, to put on an event, we have a pool of people that we can easily. When we have a cost-sharing agreement, that's very easy for me to articulate how we can be very assist the easy to assist otherwise it's a little bit period of doesn't mean the city wouldn't I don't want to be taken is that if you've decided not to go this way we would abandon the DDA or anything like that but I do think this makes it the most seamless way to proceed forward and and I think John spent enough time with Matt to understand the role.

Question is this is this a day that we can

first ask john if he wants to do this secondly is this something that we can vote on today what is okay yes to both correct and what i thought is it could be one motion to continue uh i was thinking about it in my head of course from the last meeting is you know make a motion to you know to continue the agreement number one and then also to support the appointment of john you know that would give You know, you agree to it, and then Tim will, you know, on the city side, we're really going to kind of change GL numbers of where it will be paid from, and it will go to a city side GL number.

The first question he had was, I guess, does Mr. Prash...

get accepted.

I guess that would be the first sorry that the first the first question.

Yes, okay, yeah, yeah, absolutely so I motion that we continue the agreement that we have with the city and to move forward with appointing John is the EDA director. I'll second that.

Everybody seconds. Okay.

Motion by Trustee Heider, supported by, I heard Trustee Perry-Dorfer, so I'm going to put her down. Any discussion by the table? All those in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? All right.

So, easily solved.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. Thank you, Tim.

Thank you.

All right. All right, we're going to move down then to community events.

We don't have anything right now. No community events? We'll talk about them later.

All right, so then we're going to go down to our consent agenda. We need a motion to approve our consent agenda.

I make a motion to accept. I second.

All right, so we have a motion by Trustee Perry. I'm sorry, who seconded? Okay, Trustee Berry. Any discussion from the table? MR. MILLER.

IN THE REPORT, YOU WOULD SEE UNDER LEGAL SERVICES, WHEN I WAS REVIEWING THAT, I ACTUALLY FOUND AN ERROR IN THAT, AND THE CITY WAS ACTUALLY APPLYING, YOU KNOW, THE KELLY FIRM DOES THE DDA LEGAL SERVICES, BUT THE KELLY FIRM ALSO WAS JUST RECENTLY HIRED BY THE CITY TO ACT AS THE CITY COUNCIL'S LEGAL SERVICES. And so we were accruing costs from Kelly Services, the city, but they're really being charged to Kelly Services, the DDA. So I did catch that, and a journal entry was done to reverse all those costs. So just I wanted to let you know, if you spied legal services going crazy, then... we went like that and so um i made sure that it was caught and a journal entry was done to correct it so just in case anybody saw that if i wanted to get it on the record that it was caught and we did correct it very good just so you know all right any other discussion

All right, all those in favor of the motion to approve the consent agenda?

Aye. Aye.

Any opposed? All right, so that motion is carried. Now we're going to go down to our action items, the first being alley repaving and stormwater drain. Mr. Miller, I'm guessing this is you?

Yes. Okay. This is regarding the alleyway behind Cafe Europe, Fatma's Bakery, the bike store. That alleyway there is also in very poor condition. And we had last year talked about we're going to continue to fix the alleyways that are over there. We did the one behind the eye care. This is kind of rounding the corner and going north. But also we have a slight flooding issue there, too, where water kind of flows to the west when it really should be flowing to the east. So when the kind of kiddies' chop suey got rebuilt and then the addition was put in in that old parking area, the grade was all kept, but it is getting sheet drainage back to those businesses, actually. And so we need to fix that problem also. uh so part of our uh doing the alley repaving is that we were going to have a storm drain extension also um at that location and it will then connect to there's an existing storm drain but we have to cut through the parking lot to get that to go in place and when we put the we did include the stormwater extension in that we did I did put together a request for proposal for the work to be done according to our purchasing policy we actually received 6. contractors that want to do work here in the city for the dda and we did select jb contractors which was the lowest bid and we're required to at least make that recommendation unless we can disqualify them But we cannot actually, JB Contractors has done work for the city before and we think that they'll be able to get the work done in a timely fashion and within budget. And so last year when we did, actually in January of this year, we established the budget to do these improvements. And we're a little over, but I always kind of go 10% when we do the budgeting anyway. So we had recommended $75,000, but we'll have enough to cover this cost for JB contractors. If this does get approved tonight, we'll start to enter into a contract with the contractor. We'll get their insurances put in place, and then we'll notify all the businesses, and we'll start to get the work done over there in that parking area. and this is adjacent to the parking area where we seal coated and striped also excuse me last year

approximate length of time from start to finish.

They're hoping as you just a couple weeks. Okay, so and last year if you can recall it was about a 7 to 10 days to do the one alleyway so we're just going to add a little extra time to do that there. There will be some asphalt to repair the parking lot area where the drains from where the drain is but then the alleyway will be cement and so they're cutting out asphalt and putting in cement in the alleyway area.

There are going to be extra asphalt that we can push over.

Well, later on the agenda, you'll see we've got something in the works for your side. Okay.

Yes. All right. So we can approve it, you know?

I see.

Let's see the total square footage of the area. I forget.

What was in the bid? The total, I think it was 83,127. The cost is 83,000. And then the square footage, I have it somewhere.

One moment please, if I can read it.

Just as site sizes 3750.

And the payment removed 4,800 square feet. So that is about that, about almost 5,000 square feet.

Or that they're replacing with concrete?

Yes. How many inches of concrete are they going down? It's going to be eight inch concrete there.

Are they doing anything with the storm drain that's in the, they're just tapping into that storm drain?

Correct, and they'll reset it to grade also. i think all the specifications for the steps they're doing correct and then also um on the last page of that that's just in the rfp uh was hennessey engineers did a elevation for us so that when the contractors are installing it then we can confirm the elevation so that we have the right fall so we're getting that proper drainage in the alleyway so it'll kind of go south And then it will then connect to the drain there in the alley and then underground over to the storm drain that's existing.

From the leased contractor that you've selected for the most expensive contractor, it's $80,000, which is half of what the contract that you agreed to.

But the bottom four were in... roughly in line. We had thought $75,000. Of course, costs go up, but the other two bid high. That's all I can come up with. OCG, that number four contractor there, when they were our low bid for our other contract for the alleyway by the eyeglass And so I thought for sure they would maybe low bid again. I actually spoke with, I talk to OCG companies every day practically. They're also the contractor in town doing the sidewalks. So I talk to them four times a day probably. And I said, why so much? He said, well, you know, I put it together, but my boss wanted to give some, wanted to make a little more money, I guess what he said. I said, okay, well, somebody is going to get the job and it's not you. So.

So it looks like about 123 yards of concrete. It was about $24,000 in concrete alone.

And then we have the removal, the subgrade, and then the drain extension.

What do we all think? Looking for a motion to go with JB Contractors, if that's what we choose.

If it's gonna help businesses across, I motion to move forward with it.

All right, so we have a motion by Dr. Heider.

I'll second.

Seconded by Trustee Badun. Any further discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? All right, that motion will carry. Down to the SEMCOG planning grant for the Kmart site.

Yes, so... I WAS MADE AWARE THAT SEMCOG, WHICH IS THE SOUTHEAST MICHIGAN COUNCIL OF GOVERNMENTS, DOES THE BOARD KNOW WHAT THAT IS? IT'S ACTUALLY A SEVEN COUNTY AGENCY THAT REALLY IS A REMITTER OF FUNDS, MOSTLY FOR TRANSPORTATION PROJECTS. which they have what is called the tip transportation improvement plan but it usually it's a clearinghouse the federal federal government gives to our region and then they disperse it to the counties based on the tip the transportation improvement program well there are also planning a planning side to the organization there's communications there's a semcog university there's many facets of semcog the city is a member of semcog and uh... we are able to then apply for grants that come available to the city available to do different projects the city well one of the one of the grants that was made available to us was really of planning granted since not a huge thing but it is a planning grant that we can work to put together and i made a a proposal to some time and we were awarded the grant as long as we go forward with it. The grant is kind of a two-part and they require a local match. And the local match for this grant is $7,260. The total from SEMCOG, the grant amount is $32,740 for a total of a $40,000 grant to the city. So we're taking funds and leveraging them to get more out of them, correct? And I don't know if you can recall about two years ago, we wanted to just survey that quadrant and we did not because it was so costly. And so part of the grant that I put together was let's get a survey over there and also start a process of getting a redevelopment plan put together for repaving, at least, and some other planning ideas. If you can recall, we also had another grant for housing, and we did kind of an overlay, and I think everyone here, I sent a copy of our housing master plan amendment to you. to really just start to focus on this lot and this block. And so this grant will really put together a survey. It will also get all the property owners, which of course including Dr. Heider, but then property owners that aren't there also. For the Kmart site, the K-Auto, Mr. Newman's property just east of the Kmart site, and then all of the businesses that are there to get in one room to, first of all, make an, I think we should at least PUT TOGETHER A PLAN TO MAKE ENTRANCE IMPROVEMENTS, SPECIFICALLY OFF OF MIDDLE BELT. IT LOOKS LIKE AN ALLEYWAY THERE. BUT ALSO, IT WILL, ONCE WE HAVE A SURVEY, WE CAN IDENTIFY WHO ALL THE PROPERTY OWNERS ARE. how much property they own and really get some cost for how much it's going to cost to pay that because we have a lot of property owners the city owns very little property over there. And really start to formulate a plan that if one either a we're going to have to bond with the DDA have to get bonds to start to repay that and put in the parking lot improvements off of middlebelt this will be a plan that will be put together that we could bond for or at least if we do a bond maybe we do a special assessment district WHERE WE KNOW THAT, YOU KNOW, PROPERTY OWNER X HAS 5600 SQUARE FEET OF PROPERTY HERE THAT NEEDS TO BE PAVED. THEY NEED TO PAY 5600 SQUARE FEET OF THIS COST. AND I DON'T KNOW THAT COST. BUT I THINK THIS WILL BE A REALLY GOOD STEP THAT WE COULD, OF COURSE, GET SOME, YOU KNOW, LEVERAGE OUR MONEY TO UTILIZE to get the survey done to get everyone in the room to talk about that site specifically. It is in the DDA and then that's why I'm actually coming to you to request the match portion come from the DDA in the parking lot improvement line item so that we can start to formulate this and it will again I think it will really focus on just the site and also how to YOU KNOW, HOW WE CAN GET IT TO LOOK BETTER IN THE MEANTIME. YOU KNOW, K-MART IS STILL A BIG PORTION. THEY'RE THE LARGEST PROPERTY OWNER OVER THERE. AND THE K-MART SITE, THEY'RE NOT THE OWNER. I HAVE TO CLARIFY IN CASE ANYBODY'S THINKING THEY BOUGHT IT BACK OR SOMETHING. BUT THAT'S THE LARGEST SITE. BUT THEY ALSO OWN PROPERTY THAT IS IN THE PARKING AREA, TOO. THE LINES, IF YOU LOOK AT IT, THE PROPERTY LINES ARE KIND OF CRAZY OVER THERE. AND IT WAS... NEVER DONE I THINK GREAT OVER TIME BECAUSE THERE'S REALLY RIBBONS OF PROPERTY THAT ARE OWNED BY DIFFERENT PROPERTY OWNERS AND THIS HOPEFULLY WILL BE THE FIRST STEP THAT WILL WE CAN GO FORWARD TO FIGURE OUT HOW MUCH IT'S GOING TO COST TO REPAVE AND ALSO IF WE HAVE A PLAN PUT TOGETHER MAYBE WE CAN USE THIS PLAN TO GET SOMEBODY TO GIVE US MORE MONEY TO GET IT PAVED AND GET THESE IMPROVEMENTS IN PLACE And so that was my thought for applying for the grant, to focus on that block only. So the grant was for the block, of course, Ford, Beachwood, Brandt, and Middlebelt. And so I would like to ask the DDA if they would support the match for this, and then the city will have to enter into an agreement with SEMCOG to actually start to get the funds. And then we will... GO THROUGH THE PROCESS TO GET THE SURVEY DONE, AND THEN MACKENNA AND ASSOCIATES IS A PLANNING AGENCY THAT THE CITY HAS UNDER CONTRACT THAT CAN HANDLE CARRYING OUT THE GRANT TO GET THE SURVEY DONE, TO GET EVERYONE IN THE SAME ROOM TO TALK ABOUT IDEAS AND ALSO MAKE SOME IDEAS FROM EVERYTHING THEY GATHER TO PUT IT ON PAPER TO MAKE IT LOOK DOABLE, AND THEN ALSO START TO ASSIGN SOME COSTS, HOW MUCH IT WOULD COST TO IMPROVE THAT. so that was my thought in getting the grant hopefully you'll support my request for the match and then as we go forward john will be taking the ball and working with mario and mckenna and we will be able to hopefully get everyone on the same page for once over there how about that that sounds good so that's that was my plan and my hope

thank you for doing that work i'd like to make the motion now second it i third it all right so we have a motion that we are going to approve the match for the grant uh by trustee peridor and it was seconded by everybody i'm pretty sure i was hoping to have some more hair on by the time i'm losing it and it's turning white okay any discussion from the board All in favor?

Aye.

Opposed? All right, that motion will pass.

And then the next step, like I said, I'll be going to the city council to ask that we enter into the agreement and start the process there. Thank you.

Awesome, thanks, Matt. All right, next item is our 2027 downtown banners.

okay i was again i'm thinking often never never land i don't know where i where i think all the time but anyways of our hometown hero banners have been doing a lot of thinking i do a lot of thinking and hopefully thinking turns into action how about that so um i was looking at some ideas for our 2027 banners you know our hometown hero banners have been received well but i think we've kind of run out of uh applications for we we still have a couple that um we could put in there but we get 40 banners and so we've done it three years that's 120 banners we've put forward if you can recall for this year i worked with the straight farmhouse to get people that were killed in action that don't have people in town to represent them anymore and we're able to honor them that way But I was working with the school district in my thoughts I guess when I was thinking and I talked to the superintendent in the schools about maybe doing a student art kind of contest from the schools and I Just put together on that second page. You will see is that some ideas of what a banner would look like and we've got those there and I WASN'T REALLY PICKING ANYONE, BUT IT WAS JUST TO GIVE YOU AN IDEA OF WHAT A BANNER WOULD LOOK LIKE. AND WE WOULD HAVE KIND OF THE SAME PROCESS, BUT WHEN I WAS TALKING TO THE SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS, WE HAVE NINE SCHOOLS, NO, WE HAVE EIGHT SCHOOLS TIMES FIVE, THAT'S 40. SO THERE ARE SEVEN SCHOOLS FOR GARDEN CITY PUBLIC SCHOOLS, AND I WAS GOING TO WORK WITH TIPTON TO GET THE LAST FIVE. AND I ACTUALLY, AT THE GARDEN CITY BUSINESS ALLIANCE MUSIC IN THE PARK, TIPTON ACADEMY WAS THERE. THE ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL WAS THERE. SO I CORNERED HER AT THE MUSIC IN THE PARK. SHE COMES TO THESE THINGS PROBABLY TO ENJOY HERSELF. I cornered her anyways and they love the idea also and would support kind of the same project and I sent her just an idea I said the board has not approved it but I just was again thinking and looking forward to next year and if if this does get approved it will take a lot of coordination but when I was speaking with Derek Fisher the Garden City Superintendent He said he will work with the art teachers to make the selection of the five, kind of the best for that school kind of deal. So it kind of removes us, and then we would have an application. We would have a release. I know that there could be some concern about their name. I would like to do a name and the grade and the school. But in the end, they get that. The student would get that then. and I think it'd be kind of a neat idea. And it will, again, draw people downtown to, first of all, be the family, every family member of that child better go see that banner and they can stop and visit one of our stores or restaurants while they're doing that. And I thought we would, you know, kind of come up with Garden City DDA supports young artists, We'd have a, you know, a cougar paw or something like that saying it's the schools. And then we would have their artwork. And then I was even trying to think that maybe the artwork could be their favorite thing to do in Garden City. My only concern when I thought that, I thought, well, you know, every other kid will make McDonald's the best place to eat in the world. So maybe we don't want that. But again, a business, we could do trees, we could do buildings, something like that connected to the downtown. And then we would, then go forward and have the banners made i talked to uh sinorama greg at sinorama and he thinks he can pull it off because all we'll need really is the same i get an idea and a digital image and then the digital image can transfer to the banner the same way we do all the banners. I don't know, I'm game for input. Of course, it was a thought, but I wanted to, because if we're gonna do this, we really need to start going as soon as school starts, which is less than a month away now, and then we'll kind of get it ready, and then right after the holidays, we'll have the art picked out, and we'll start the process to get the banners printed. So I didn't know what you thought. I'm open to ideas, and let me know.

love this idea personally and do you think this would maybe be able to give us if we did this maybe on an every other year that would give us time to build up the hometown heroes again and do and every other year perhaps highlighting the children and men our hometown heroes just a thought did you by any chance talk to the superintendent about the names

And the school? I did not.

Okay. So that's another conversation. We'll have to figure out. Yeah, it'll be.

Because you're giving their full name and the school they go to that can be, in my opinion, a little dicey.

We would have a release on the application and maybe we'll have the... Dan Kelly, the attorney, may look at that also. Or the schools could have a policy too. I don't know exactly how it all works out. I just wondered if you had asked them.

It can simply say Jimmy third grade.

Maybe not last name.

That's what I had brought up.

Anytime we do anything at the church that I work with with the kids, the parents can sign off so that their kids' images can be used and then they say if their name can be used or not. Last names are a little...

Yeah, we don't have to correct could also be a class project so could be Memorial 3rd grade class. Putting it up so you're not using an actual name. A class.

Some like that but that that's probably the easiest out I just wondered if you talk to Mister Fisher by and not yet.

I think it's a great idea is very interactive and supporting the young generation and I think it's great.

love it good thinking thank you that's awesome all right do we have a motion then for this all right so trustee heider and it's supported by trustee nazardine any other discussion ALL THOSE IN FAVOR?

AYE.

ANY OPPOSED? ALL RIGHT. THAT WILL ALSO CARRY. AND DOWN TO THE SANTA LAND PARADE SPONSORSHIP.

AND TONIGHT WE HAVE ACTUALLY DAN YORKE FROM SANTA LAND. THERE HE IS. SANTA HIMSELF. IS SANTA. bringing joy to all. Anyways, he's here to answer any questions, but in the past we have done a sponsorship for that, and maybe do you want to just tell the board about the parade, what happens on parade day, the chaos and all that?

Why don't you take the microphone over there? He knows how to use his diaphragm.

Thanks.

Well, this is the 65th year of the parade. The DDA has been the title sponsor, I believe, since 2006. It might be 2009. I get those years mixed up. It was basically the same first year as the Kmart in town. The parade is put on by the Santa Land Parade Committee, which is part of... the Garden City Community Coalition. So that's our 501c3. It's all volunteer. Pretty much the same thing that it's been, you know, at least since I got involved, which was in the early 2000s, I think. The JCs had done it for a while, then a couple of other groups did it for a couple of years, but it was originally the JCs parade. And... Today we announced the theme for the parade, which is 80s, an 80s Christmas. We put it out there and let everybody vote on it, so we let them vote for about a week and a half on it, and that's what came out of it. But we've always used the DDA's money since I became a part of this as the seed money just to get us started. We don't operate at much of a profit, that's for sure. The cost of everything has gone up, and you'd be surprised the things we're expected to pay for. We have insurance. We have to pay for porta-potties. We need to rent golf carts, although I think we may have found an out on that the last couple of years. If you don't pay bands, they don't show up. High school bands don't show up for free. They need to have their buses at least paid for. The list of that kind of stuff goes on and on and on and on and on. When we have Miss Michigan here, they expect that we make a donation to whoever Miss Michigan's charity is. It costs around $26,000, between $26,000 and $30,000, but closer to $26,000 to run this every year, which seems like a lot of money for that amount of time, but it is what it is. Like I said, we don't leave much money in the bank every year. We spend what we bring in. We don't spend more than we bring in, that's for certain. And it's obviously the longest running tradition in Garden City. And with the chili cook-off, it's probably the largest event in Garden City. I just were here with our hand out again every every two years open for some help we did ask for an extra thousand dollars this year simply because our costs have gone up so much and it is it is in the past when either the downtown garden city sand land parade or the garden city DDA sand land parade John Prash and I had spoke about the possibility of migrating back to downtown garden city sand land parade because it sounds better uh but it was a couple of board members about 10 years ago that didn't think the dda was getting enough attention with it being called downtown garden city sandline freight so we're open to anything on that concept but i mean that's that's pretty much it if you have any questions i'm i'm here

Mr. Miller I would I I believe we budgeted for that don't we yes, yes, so it's not like this is unexpected we we know what 3 years what's been coming so it's budgeted for and it's a 2 year deal that to your deal normally.

I second the 2 years, 10,000 here.

Okay. Do we have a second for that?

I second.

Okay, sorry. So we have a motion by Trustee Badun, seconded by Trustee Berry. Any discussion from the table? All those in favor?

Aye.

Anyone opposed? All right. Thank you, Dan. Happy to help. Trade's always a favorite.

Thank you.

ALL RIGHT, WE DO HAVE SOME OTHER BUSINESS BYLAWS COMMITTEE REPORT. I KNOW MAYOR JACOBS, TRUSTEE PERRIDOR, AND I HAD LOOKED OVER THE BYLAWS AND THERE WERE SOME.

I ALSO HAVE A PRINTED COPY, TOO.

OKAY, THERE WERE SOME CHANGES.

IF YOU'D LIKE TO TAKE ONE AND PASS IT ON, THANK YOU.

SOME CHANGES SUGGESTED, SO WE'LL LOOK OVER THOSE.

And in the changes that the committee had discussed, kind of green means go, red means no kind of deal. So I did a kind of a color coordinated version on that just so you would see that difference.

All right, so do we need to go over these separately or should we just kind of glance at it on our own?

How do you want to do this? Well, if you would like to go through each one, or I don't know who would like to speak on behalf of the committee.

I know you did a lot of work, so would you like to present what your thoughts were on these changes?

My thoughts were, okay. A lot of it's house cleaning. Well, it is. It is. A lot of it's just updating. Rewarding. Changing. With the changes that have come along.

So, for example, we're... The ordinance numbers were wrong or the act was wrong. We cleaned all that up. We also, I don't know, changed some things based on how we are with the city right now which would be um for example taking out a treasurer because the city now does all the financials for us so that the treasurer position has been removed um the Oh, the attendance policy, because we went to quarterly, we had to change. The nominations, we've kind of changed because of the way that they've been handled. So now we would be in compliance. The committees, we basically don't do. So we have made it so it is may instead of shall, right? You can have the committees. Article what, seven? We've added, we've defined the city of Garden City again as the trustee of the financials. And then I think there was one other thing that we thought was important and I probably skipped over it.

Well, we said the amendment at the bottom there, Article 9, just a total membership. We took that out. It would say that, or make sure that everyone has one. And it used to, you had to mail it by person, but we could use electronic mail now also. Yeah, so we added that.

So a lot of it was housekeeping. A lot of it... was forced upon us by going to quarterly meetings and by changing the way we do business as a whole working with the city.

All right, so we have a motion to accept the bylaws with the amendments as they're shown. I'll second.

seconded by Trustee Baydoun. Any discussion from the table? All those in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? Okay.

I did want to say that when I was working with Trustee Peridor, I did not mean to lock her in City Hall for eternity. But literally, I locked her in accidentally.

How does that happen?

Yes. So anyway, so we owe her at least a bit of gratitude for not coming apart. But when we were meeting, it was after 5. SHE LEFT MY OFFICE AND SHE WENT DOWN A HALLWAY THAT LOCKED HER IN A VESTIBULE. SO SHE COULDN'T GET OUT. EITHER WAY, ALL THE DOORS WERE LOCKED. AND THEN OF COURSE I HAD STEPPED OUT OF THE OFFICE TO COME IN HERE TO SET UP FOR A PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING AND LEFT MY PHONE ON MY DESK.

So then what he did in the answer is when I started the claustrophobia. Oh, no. Anyway, so how long was she in there?

Five, ten minutes or so. That was 15 minutes. Maybe 15.

Knocking on walls. Well, I was contemplating calling the police department because I didn't know what else to do. And the city clerk walked past and I... to banging on the glass freaked him out too so thank you for that effort and i apologize publicly to causing you consternation

Okay, a chili cook-off community event coming up sooner than we know.

Fast approaching on September 26th. We got all our applications have been approved or submitted for various things, including food license, liquor license, all that stuff. The awards have been ironed out as far as ordering those. Registration for everything is open. We're looking for chili teams. If you know anybody that's interested in putting a team together and wants to be part of that, that would be great. We're looking for chili teams still. We're looking for food trucks. We're also looking for volunteers and all of our equipment orders have been submitted. So really we're just in the process of working through it and keeping planning and meeting and doing all the things. The Autos for Autism has agreed to operate and facilitate the auto show. Rick and Nikki from Rick's Custom Cycle are going to handle the motorcycle show again, which is great. So that makes that easy.

Pancake day.

Oh, yeah, pancake. It's International Pancake Day. Matthew's very excited about that because we're going to have pancakes in the morning. So that went over well last year, and we're going to continue to do that. And then I'm working with Parks and Rec. They're going to handle all the kids' activities for us, along with the open houses from the police and fire and the DPW.

Is the chili being cooked on site?

Mm-hmm. It is? Yeah. Those teams are there seven in the morning, I think. They get inspected. Or sooner. Yes. And it's all cooked on site. We got some judges from an outside source. They're part of an international food tasting company.

So they bring their own equipment?

Or it's on site? It's all on site. Any team that comes to cook brings all their own cooking equipment. Oh, they bring their own cooking equipment. Yeah.

We provide what, the crackers, spoons, bowls, cups, the bare minimum. But the propane is on who? That's on the teams.

John I have a question about that. And I don't remember from last year do you do do on offer an online sign up for volunteers like the parade because I thought I saw that but I wasn't sure I just think that reaches a lot more people. Yeah, when it that way for sure.

Yeah, we're trying to do all the majority of all things electronically now it's easy to track it and you know monitor it and spreadsheet it.

You have to give us all folks options.

I'll ask the questions and fill it in for you. Any other questions?

Weather permitting, wasn't it SEMCOG that did that drone survey for us? They said like 5,000 people had visited the chili cook-off. I don't know how they count, but they came up with a number of somewhere around 5,000 people wandering around there during the event.

A little bit of a correction. It's actually, it was through SEMCOG again actually. And I don't know if you remember I gave out to the board that map with the dots that said where everyone came from. It's through a company called Placer AI. And it is a digital company that utilizes actually pings from phones. And it uses, so if your phone is there, Placer AI knows this. And what was kind of neat about it is that it told us how many people kind of in general who were there. It even does age range, where they came from, where the phones register to, all this information. It's all this public data that's out there that this Placer AI uses. You know, this is, you carry a phone, it just comes, you know, you think it's listening. I think it does, actually. But what was great about that is that we started to see where everyone was coming from and that we could, you know, we could start to really get a good count of how many people were there. And it was just, you know, we're handling a lot of people in one day in one place coming to Garden City. I think it's important. And it was actually the first time we were able to use that data and go from there. And actually, John and I went to the Michigan Downtown Association Conference, and they gave a whole session on AI, PLACER AI. And I thought, well, I'll fill out the form and get it. Why not? And so we did it. And they want a specific event so that they can use that data and look for a specific time frame and what it all tells us. And that was, I think, a really good report we got.

Very cool and they're going to continue to do that.

We if we make the request after we have the event.

Yes, OK. Well, they can do it in past in time.

well no um yes it they can look back and and get the data from the day that it occurred yes because we may i made the request a month or two after correct and and they it's stored somewhere i don't know where in in a data center somewhere i guess i'm always watching always always watching i'm worried about when the kids last outside company's going to be all of the judges this year

We have a title sponsor. We're allowing that title sponsor to choose two of their own judges. So if you have a certain commitment as a sponsor, then we let you pick a judge and send a judge or come yourself or whatever.

Anybody that has judged it knows it's a... I consider it way better to let someone else do it. I did it the one year it's a lot of chili to eat and tried to judge and sample. I'm really happy I'm not in it.

It's like a company can have all the eaters they want. This year, Bocelli Group is our sponsor again. We had a two-year agreement from last year, and they've submitted their check for the title sponsorship. We're looking for any sponsors all the time, so anybody who would like to do a sponsorship, we'll be glad to put your name out there and be a sponsor for the event.

Is there a minimum amount you look for for a sponsorship?

I think we have a $100 sponsor, and then it goes to $250, and then up from there.

Each level gives you more visibility.

Okay. All right. How about the hometown hero banners?

We kind of talked about a little bit, just so you know, they're all up, all 40. And, you know, we had a terrible windstorms and actually they all held. So I think it was a good, I think it was a great, the next morning I drove around like, oh boy. And they all held. So I was really happy about that. And I talked to Gary Carter and gave him kudos. They were latched on really well. So that's good. I mean, cause it's a little bit of a liability. You know, it's on a, you know, it's a sail on a pole, you know, that could cause us some issues. So. Correct line on anyone's windshield correct, so they all held so I think that was great, right?

Then come is that community shed or shred?

Yeah, actually Okay, if you go by the lucky squirrel area you will notice a shed there now. I'm good the community shed we were able to get a First of all I asked OCG even though they weren't our low bidder but I did ask if they would donate concrete for a shed and And they did. So I'm giving them kudos for that. OCG, they're in town pouring tons and tons of concrete and they donated to the DDA a shed pad for us. So I thought it was very kind of them. And then we were able to get a tough shed at a deeply discounted price because we had bought another one over at the Ratcliffe Center. And so we were able to get one for about $4,200 a shed that is going to be at place. And it actually was built in place by Tough Shed Corporation. And it's going to hold all of our pylons, banners, the chili cups. uh... tense all of that you were working on food truck friday sauce on that area we have those canopy time so we put up around the on the picnic tables all that were just kind of making it a little a place that will store those the material for community events and uh... it looks very good if you can on central street take a look at that and i just want to let you know it's there so if you're going by thinking where'd this come from that's where it came from and we'll be able to i think it'll expedite at expedite at the end of these events you know we're going over to dpw to radcliffe over the park taking stuff back maybe we can kind of start to centralize it there we do have our storage at dpw that will hold larger things but it will it is 10 by 10. think 10 by 10 yeah it's not huge but it'll hold a lot of stuff it's the stuff that you named to fit into it yes so the pylons actually we have pylons at stack so that that's good we were hoping they'll all fit in there and we we found a shelf just um over at radcliffe that was not being used and we put in there too to hold things so all right so that kind of morphs right into the next one lucky squirrel update

Yeah, and that's when September 19th, it's already full. So we were taking people for the waiting list. As you may or may not know, the July event was, we decided to play it safe and cancel that due to the air quality at the time. I was still showing some terrible, unhealthy, and there's a lot of elderly people that worked that event and just didn't want to have that thought of reliability because we kept the event going so those those events are pretty hard to reschedule due to the fact that these vendors are usually planned out for the full summer all weekends so we just did not host it but september's ready to go um the feedback from most of those vendors is it's one of the the bigger better ones for them for their business around the area so it's great

all right side note ann arbor chose to have their event the same day and they had nine respiratory runs that day because of the air quality so it was i think it was great that we canceled choice for sure it was a hard choice yeah yeah oh yeah for sure

all right uh last but not least in that category is our lighting repairs still waiting on delivery of the light poles they said by the end of august is this still the ones that were knocked down by the drivers three light poles from last winter that's correct and we had talked about maybe having some on hand maybe that's not a bad idea in light of how long it takes to get them we're just concerned about having them there and then they change something and we have obsolete parts that's our only concern did they give a reason for the delay

They probably order them from overseas. We also, correct, I didn't think of that, but I'm sure. Also, we're working with our municipal insurance carrier, so we're getting most of the costs are being covered by insurance, but then in turn they're going after the driver's insurance if they have it to get us made whole, get the insurance company made whole also. So it takes some time also that part to go through MMRMA, our municipal risk management company.

Okay. Maybe we'll have better news about that next time we meet.

Yes, they'll all be up and ready to go.

Okay. All right, public comments. Oh, I see Council Member Gold back there. Have anything? No? And Dan, do you have nothing else to add? All right, Director Report, I think Matt, have you covered everything or is there anything else you'd like to add?

I DID WANT TO OF COURSE THANK THE BOARD FOR MY CONFIDENCE IN ME AND TO KIND OF START A NEW PATH FOR THE DDA AND I WILL MISS EVERYONE I WON'T BE FAR I LIVE IN WESTLAND SO I WON'T BE VERY FAR AWAY BUT I PLAN TO KIND OF GO THERE AND ALSO FLORIDA SO I'LL BE IN AND OUT YOU'LL SEE ME STILL WE'LL BE MISSING YOU AS WELL RIGHT THANK YOU WE'LL MISS YOU FOR SURE ALL RIGHT TRUSTEE BOARD COMMENTS I GUESS WE CAN START DOWN AT THE END WITH THE MAYOR

I don't have anything other than I want to thank Mr. Miller for all his time and effort and everything he's done for us. I'll just speak for DDA because I'm sure we'll speak again as we go into the city council stuff. Thank you for everything you've done and we appreciate it. Congratulations to Mr. Prash for stepping up and being appointed as the new director. Good luck and

you know we'll support you the same way we supported matt absolutely trustee barry i'd like to say the same thing you know we're going to miss you and um if you ever change your mind come on back yeah congratulations sean all right trustee yes we're all going to say the same thing but no you you did a lot you know a lot of people were afraid of this whole merge and everything but you showed it otherwise that it was a great idea and now i'm sure It's going to be hard to replace, but I'm sure John will do a great job too.

All right. I will also add all those comments, but thanks, Matt, for everything. So many innovative things you've brought here, and it's changed the city for the better. So thank you, and I know John will pick up where you left off.

well and i'm sure mr miller will answer mr brush's phone call absolutely yes so i i'm going to say the same thing matt's done a lot for the dda but he's also done a lot for garden city so we're going to miss you on as many levels as we can i also wanted to say that the grand reopening for family heating and cooling was fabulous that building is beautiful stunning. Stunning so I've noticed now other places around them or start starting to call. I need to spruce up a little bit. So it's a great thing for family and it's a great thing for garden City domino effect.

Yeah, and they did take advantage of the architectural fee that you call the grant and so again we're seeing it real bricks and mortar in motion.

again ditto uh to everything that was said and thank you and and looking forward john to making it making better better into better okay the best the best same like everyone said looking forward with john to work with you and enjoy florida as much as you can thank you

All right, unless there's anything else, we'll close our session at 7.05, with our next meeting being October 20th.