City Commission - Regular Meeting

2nd, 2026 at 7:00 p.m. We have a motion of silence to send our positive thoughts and prayers to those in our community that need our support. And now please join me in 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. Roll call, please. Mr. Bryson, here. Mr. Hendrick, here. Mr. Claus here. Commissioner May here. Commissioner O'Brien here. Commissioner R

here. Mayor Van here. City manager reads here. Okay. On approval of the agenda, can I have a motion to approve the agenda as presented? So moved. Support. Any discussion? All in favor? I opposed.

Okay. On to five for public comment. This is time for public comment. Any member of the public may address the city commission on any topic. Please step to the podium, state your name for the record, and be heard. No commissioner, department head, or city staff will respond. City manager will follow up on the public comments as necessary. Please limit your comments to five minutes. Please direct all comments to me as the meeting chairperson. Please refrain from the use of profanity. Please do not direct any comments to any other members of the public. Do we have anybody who'd like to speak tonight? Okay. Hearing and seeing none, we'll move on to six, approval of the minutes. We have 6A, the city commission meeting minutes of March 19th, 2026. Can I have a motion to approve the city commission meeting minutes for that meeting of March 19th, 2026?

So moved support. Any discussion? All in favor? Opposed? Carries. For consent agenda, we have a the special event permit for the Marine City Chamber Music on the River and B the business license application of Jenny's Venue LLC. Can I have a motion to approve the consent agenda items A and B as presented? I'll make a motion. Support. Hey, roll call, please. Commissioner Bryson. Yes. Commissioner Hendry. Yep. Commissioner Blossom. Yes. Commissioner May, yes. Commissioner O'Brien, yes. Commissioner Roy, yes. Mayor Vanash, yes. Motion carried.

Okay. We have eight items removed from the consent agenda and we have none this evening. On to nine for financial business. We have 9A expenditures including payroll of $746,72959. I have a motion to approve those expenditures including payroll in that amount of $746,72959. Make a motion to approve expenditures including payroll for $746,72959. The report any discussion. Hey, roll call, please. Commissioner Hendrick, yes. Commissioner Clson, yes. Commissioner May, yes. Commissioner O'Brien, yes. Commissioner, yes. Mayor Vanderbush, yes. Commissioner Bracen,

yes. Motion carried. Okay. On to 10A. Under new business, we have the Guy Center restroom bid approval. I have a motion to wave competitive sealed bidding. Recognizing that we have four bids that are included in our packet. I'll make a motion. Support. Any discussion? The the motion is is to wave only the sealed part of the competitive bidding. We we did get four valid bids, but uh Yeah. Yep. That's your motion? Yeah, good seal. Perfectly set. Thank you. Thank you. All right. No other discussion. Roll call, please. Commissioner Clawson, yes. Commissioner May, yes. Commissioner O'Brien, yes. Commissioner, yes. Mayor Vanabush, yes. Mr. Bryson, yes.

Commissioner Hendrick, yep. Can I have a motion to approve the recommendation for the purchase of the restroom from CTX in the amount of $172,000? Make a motion app to approve the purchase of the restroom from CTX for $172,000. Support. Okay. And discussion. Uh, one small correction. It's CXT, not CTX. If we can amend the motion, I'll amend my motion.

Okay. Just for your information, um, I I you see that there's a photo of representation as an example. Ours will be similar to that other than there will be some um stonework towards the bottom of it. Um the um board and batten will still be horizontal. It'll be uh what I call a marine city colors, the blue and white similar to our building. And uh one of the advantages here is uh I'm trying to stay consistent with a a theme across the board. will be able to utilize the same restroom at the pavilion area uh of which I just applied for an additional $225,000 grant and they'll give us a $9,500 discount on that one based upon our purchase of this one. We were able to arrange that uh because we'll be basically using the same engineering and uh drawings. I'd also draw uh note that this is a fourseason uh use restroom and uh one of the only ones that uh really allowed that and uh it had uh everything mounted in it um including uh um what I call target hardened um accessories in the restrooms which uh are important for us.

Okay, I got a couple questions. Um it says that it's a cedar shake roof. Is that a metal or some type of composite? Not shingles. It I believe it's shingle. I'll have to look. Let me because those don't I mean I the steel roof was additional and I chose to not take that with uh 25 and 50 year shingle. Now uh plus our ability to uh do any type of maintenance on the shingle roof. So these are a type of regular shingle, not a cedar. Not a cedar. My understand that's what I want to make sure cuz it said it just said cedar shake texture so I'm assuming

that's okay. So that's that. Um so let me ask this on the heat. Uh we haven't done that with any of the others. What's the advantage if we don't use them all winter just so you don't have to? Well, one is winterization. Um although we will winterize these to some point. Uh the pavilion that you'll see next is a fourseason pavilion. Although we're we're our original purchase. Uh all of this is covered under grant by the way. Okay. Is um um not including the garage doors, but we'll have that as an add-on in a second round of grant process here.

So our intention is to use the guy center year round. So uh as an example, uh we'll have a little bit of parkland there. We could have an ice skating rink over there. You'll have restroom outdoors. Uh that'll be available. There's a gas fire pit that's available for use in the fall or cooler months. and we thought it was important that there'd be restrooms available outside for them to use schedules. Yeah, event schedules meet that. Yeah, I wasn't sure that we were going to have the ice rink thing. So, yeah, I I'm just trying to Well, I don't want Don't pin me down 100%, but that's the plan. All right, that's the plan. And then the skylights, are they going to give you a good warning on that? Because I know if they don't

um if there's any issues, we'll make sure that they're addressed or corrected. I I know sometimes skylights can be tricky, but uh um that's why we have a warranty. Okay. All right. That's it for me on that. Any other discussion? Hey, roll call, please. Commissioner May, yes. Commissioner O'Brien, yes. Commissioner Ror, yes. Mayor Vanabush, yes. Commissioner Bryson, yes. Commissioner Hendendrick, yes. Commissioner Clawson, yes. Motion carried. and to 10B for the Guy Center Pavilion bid approval. Again, can I have a motion to wave competitive sealed bidding recognizing that we've received four bids in our packet?

I will make a motion to wave competitive sealed bidding. Support any discussion? Roll call, please. Commissioner O'Brien, yes. Commissioner Rick, yes. Mayor Vanabash, yes. Commissioner Bryson. Yes. Commissioner Hendrick, yes. Commissioner Clawson, yes. Commissioner May, yes. Motion carried. Hey, can I have a motion to approve the recommended purchase of the Guy Center Pavilion from Backyard Living in the amount of $231,500? Make a motion to approve the purchase of the Guy Center Pavilion from Backyard Living for $231,500. Support.

Discussion. Um, you should be familiar with Backyard Living. We bought two additional pavilions from them before. Those pavilions, I think, uh, are performing to our expectations. They're a local company, which I like to support. Uh, the warranties are strong. The construction of the project, uh, was, uh, flawless. Um, they cleaned up after themselves, and, uh, I think the, uh, the best, uh, uh, advantage of this is you've already seen the results of what they they produce. um they were one of the only ones that met all of our concerns and uh um I know there was concerns in regards to steel versus timber, but we did a lot of additional research in regard to uh to timber and use and longevity in that. And uh in some cases it rivals or surpasses uh steel. So I'm very comfortable in recommending backyard living for uh this quote.

And again, it's all grant funded. all grant. Everything we're doing here is not coming out of the city's general fund, but is rather grant funded, and I'll uh go over that in my remarks to the board later on. And then you hope to do the garage door portion later. Yes. Uh it's designed for uh uh doors to be added. Um because that portion is granted by the Ralph C. Wilson foundation includes the quesons and cement work uh coming in at that price. I couldn't include the garage doors, so I'll have to do that in phases. Okay. Any other discussion? So, roll call, please. Commissioner Rory, yes. Mayor Vanabash, yes. Commissioner Bryson, yes. Commissioner Hendendrick, yes. Commissioner Clawson,

yes. Commissioner May, yes. Commissioner O'Brien, yes. Motion carried. Okay. on to see the Bedzinski and Company engagement letter for the fiscal year 2026 CWRSF project. Can I have a motion to approve the engagement letter from Bedzinski and company as presented? So move support and discussion. Okay. Roll call, please. Commissioner Bryson, yes. Commissioner Henry, yes. Commissioner Clawson, yes. Commissioner May, yes. Commissioner O'Brien, yes. Fisher, yes. Yes, Mayor Vanabush. Yes. Motion carried.

Okay. On to D. The Miller Canfield engagement letter for fiscal year 2026, the CWSRF project. I have a motion to approve that engagement letter from Miller Canfield as presented. So move. Support. Any discussion? Hey, roll call, please. Commissioner Hendrick, yes. Commissioner Clawson, yes. Commissioner May, yes. Commissioner O'Brien, yes. Commissioner Ward, yes. Mayor Vanovash, yes. Commissioner Bracen, yes. Motion carried. Okay. On to E, the Civic Plus Municode online code hosting proposal.

Just want you folks to be aware. I'm going to have the clerk go over this. The next three items don't require your ratification. and they're they're allowed under our purchasing policy, but I thought it was important that you understand what we're doing and the reasons behind it and that we give you a little bit of uh understanding of where we're going and the reasons why. Jason, if you could go over that program form, please. So, we've been talking about this for a few months now since we created the ordinance review committee and the need for a large amount of ordinance amendments uh upcoming. With the current contractor that we have, American Legal Publishing, they charge per page to codify ordinances. Um, we figured in the long run it's going to end up costing us a lot of money when we amend all those ordinances. Um, we also wanted to look at, and this started in the charter amendment process, uh, attorney Davis, looking at, you know, legal review and changing language to be genderneutral and state laws, making sure all that stuff was up to date. Uh, so I did go out, uh, I talked to city manager Reeves. I went out and got some quotes. They all weren't apples to apples because they don't all service that type. Um, we contemplated an entire recotification, which is a years'sl long process and probably triple the amount of money of what we're paying. So, we opted with a republication with Civic Plus Municode to do online code hosting and a legal review as well. I think the legal review is important and and speaking with attorney Davis, I think it gives us um a little bit more leverage in our ordinances and making sure that everything is correct. Uh, with the pricing on this, I think it came out to um first year initial $8,750. Uh, that does include a total annual cost of $3,750,

but that includes a annual supplementation that's printed. So, we do that. Now, currently with American Legal, you get the printed leaflets. You got to go through and put them in. Um, so that's that's the printing, the online code hosting, uh, annual 1375. They have an option called Orblink. It's optional, uh, but they recommend it at $175 a year. And in that packet uh their entire proposal that gives you like the ability to search codes in that municode uh universe if you will across the country anybody so you can take from them build your own ordinances and I think it's important especially going through the review process now uh the mun docs again is optional uh but we opted to go with a 25 gigabyte per year storage I think that's going to promote more transparency we can upload upload our resolutions to that. Uh any policies, any contracts that should be out there to the public, we can host there. So everything is in one spot. You have your charter, you have your ordinances, resolutions, everything all in one spot. And then the state statute linking um city manager and I talked about this. It kind of takes the the brunt of the work off of administration and city attorney to go through if there's any state law or uh federal law changes, they will go through and change those and update those as they're updated. We were under the assumption that you could click the MCL in the ordinance. That is not the case, but it just does. If any of our ordinances refer to uh state statute or MCL, it'll it'll dictate that in there, but they're they're updated on a regular basis. So they go through and review that annually as well. Um I mean operationally I I think this is beneficial for us to to make the change. We've been with American Legal Publishing for 20 years from what I could find back in 2005 when we were codified with them. Their

pricing structure is the per page I think is is going to be astronomical with all of these reviews. But we pay the flat fee with Munich code for the year. And if we have 20 men amendments that are 120 pages, you still pay that that fee for the the codification. Uh the service itself, I think, is more robust. It's easier to use. It's easier to navigate uh than American Legal Publishing. And the other one out there is is ECode 360. I don't know if any of you are familiar with that. Uh they're a sister company to American Legal Publishing. I believe East China uses them. their search functions are almost the same as what ours are. And if you've ever searched our ordinances, sometimes things are hard to find. Um, or you end up in a completely different state with their ordinances and think they're yours. This doesn't allow that. This is strictly ours and the search function is a lot easier to use. I think it's going to be easier for residents to find those ordinances as well. So that's why we decided to to make the change and and go to this a little bit more upfront, but I think in the long run it's it's going to save us some money.

Probably the most widely used service among municipalities. Um the search function is easy and to me the print function is easy. The um some of them you have to run to cancel your print job because you just printed the whole damn ordinance scheme. This one you can click these boxes. It isolates. you can print just provisions and uh I I think it's more familiar to people looking up ordinances. MUN code is very popular good service. It so I'm sorry. Go ahead. If I could just ask a quick question. Um and Jason, I didn't foreground this question for you before tonight or anything, but do you know what we pay annually for American Legal Publishing?

I I tried to add it up. It's it's hard with them. It's a bunch of pieces, but it it because it comes in pieces. They charge you by the editing. Uh what I could find over the last year based on what we codified with them, it was about $2,800. I can get more structured numbers uh for that, but their services are very limited. That's your supplementation printed as an additional cost from them, but your codification and the editing is a big chunk of that, especially with our ordinances being, you know, as long as they are some of them. So, I I can get a more hard price on it, but from what I could find just in that realm, it was about 2,800.

So, that was one of my questions is is the value worth the extra money? And as I dove into this, looking at the amount of ordinances that our committees are reviewing right now, and we're about a half year in to our work, and we have a significant number to go. There's been a significant number of work. just the stuff that we've gone through already. If you were to bill by page, it's almost every page.

It's it's going to cost more than what this system will cost going forward. So, I saw an immediate cost saving going forward into the next fiscal year. I liked this also aligns to two other things we're doing. One, we're trying to strengthen uh communication with our residents and the ability to use our website. You're going to see something here within the next couple months in regards to a website redesign and a website. I'm I'm haven't been a fan of our website in terms of finding information and misinformation and that and Jason and I have talked and he's working on that now. This is a step in that direction as as a part and parcel, if you will, in order to enhance the usability and and the easiness of residents and staff and everybody else of finding stuff within one or two clicks and not being misled. As an example, you can get into our ordinances or the charter. uh uh I probably in here 10 times a day and I'll click on an ordinance and then I'm looking for the uh MCLA number that goes with it and then I'm googling over here. It it's a one-stop shopping and uh I think that'll be helpful not only to uh us but also to our residents or anybody else somebody wants to open a business they can open up and find that information clearly. And I also think uh something that kind of gets bypassed a little bit is we have a number of policies that people wonder about or they ask questions. They'll be available. So now transparency, we're laying everything out there. You'll have access to that. You'll be able to see that. So I can justify the cost at this point in this fiscal year in order to provide a better product and over the long period of time reduce cost based upon our ordinance revision. And very candidly we all realize we were years

behind in tackling the ordinance revision. We finally bit the bullet and now we're halfway in and we realize it's a lot of work and there's a lot of work yet to be done and it would be end up being costly and the legal review itself to review that would I I don't even want to put a price tag on it. Crazy. So, um I did just check, Commissioner Brian. It was approximately $4,200 within the last year we paid for. So, we're currently paying more in the annual amount than what we will be paying in annual amount. Yeah. Yes. And if you start going page by page in the in the ordinance review work, we've had, you know, some pages, a lot of changes, but we have like one change on a page near here and there that

and you still get charged and and you're still going to get charged for that whole page. So, um, excuse me. So, the initial charge is 8,000 and then yearly it's going to be 3750. 3750. 37. Yeah. Okay. And those are things, some of the optional ones we could remove if we feel they're not working, you know, uh, from there, but I would recommend them. Just the cost. It's easier to search because I've searched. It's real easy. You You'll be surprised. You get stuck on all sorts of things or it doesn't even find it and I know it's there because I found it before, but the next time you search for it, it's not there.

And with this one too, you can actually filter the search more. So, if you type in, let's say, water, it's going to show you every section it's in. But if you know you're not looking for water and zoning, you can uncheck that box and it it narrows it down. Instead of 300 pages to look through, you may only have 20. So, how it was sold is I went to other cities that have this currently in use. And I went on their website and I pulled it up. Then I pulled ours up and I tried. It was like like night and day. I said, "Okay, ours is obviously not working right." So, are we ready for a motion? I don't think he said we knew we don't need a new one. That's okay. Then move on to F, the lighting fixture purchase for the marina project.

This is another one I want you to be aware of. Uh, as you see, we obtained bids. This falls under the purchasing orders allows me to authorize this. Uh what I'm trying to uh convey to you is that I'm expending the remaining funds available that we've had from multiple different grant donors in regards to the Marina project. Um um that's over the normal course of duties you would do that. But uh in that once I exhausted that budget that allowed us to apply for another another grant. I had to show that the funds were were utilized in order to apply and there's a 30% cap thing that I had to to work with in terms to do that. So expenditure of these funds and ordering this equipment and getting this work done allowed for the grant process to go forward and be accepted. Uh I'm hopeful that going forward people will recognize and we asked for an additional 225,000. Uh the plan for that is to cover the restrooms. We talked about the restrooms. I gave you a little heads up on a little discount we get there. A fish grinder for the fishing pier. I'm told in their they're they cost in there 35 or $40,000 which kind of shocks me. It's a garbage disposal commercial maybe. But uh I'll wait and see. Maybe it's in gold plate. Um but we're working on that and then some boardwalk uh along the dock area and some refurbberation of that area and then we would uh use uh local labor or um reser or something of that nature. We try to have some inind uh assistance there. So we've made that pitch. Uh we'll have a a formal meeting here soon and I'm hopeful that uh they'll accept us. They've granted us money in this uh park area before. I don't want to put any pressure on them.

Ralph C. Wilson Jr. Foundation. Thank you. But uh I'm hopeful they'll listen again and uh we'll move forward on that and that will almost put the finishing touches on the Marina Park development. I've got a couple little things planned for there yet, but uh we're getting there. Thanks. Oh, additionally, I've asked for the match. I told you I received uh $14,000 from the community foundation for the ADA kayak uh ramp. I asked for the additional $12,268 in this grant as well. So, I'm trying to put all these grants together and match it up to knock all the projects out.

If you ever get a picture of what they look like, can you send them to us? I will. I apologize. It's uh um I did send an email message and I didn't get it. That's um one of the things that's nice is these are the the um uh dimmable lights, automatic dimmable. So you won't get that light pollution that other areas have where it's just a real bright light and that type of thing. But I will send it when I get it. Okay. But they're downward or Yes. They're downward. And then there'll be bothered lights, the same thing that are downward along the walkways. Okay. Okay. Excellent. Okay. Moving on then to G for the lighting fixture install at the Marina project.

And that one's already in progress as well in terms of uh a conduit wiring and that type of thing. um our our electrician uh we went over that and uh uh we received a bid that I felt was right in line with the work and it also meant this is also covered by the grant and uh he is uh completing the rest of the uh initial work that's needed not only for the installation of the five light poles but he's also doing the preparation for the PVC conduit for the restrooms and uh a new lighting pole uh for the future ballard lights as well. So, we're getting him to do all the lighting stuff right now while we're utilizing the grant money.

So, when we put the ballards in, the light poles in, the restroom in, it's all ready to go. It's just a plug and play. And moving on then to administrative reports, we have 11A, the city attorney report. I am good this evening. Thank you. Hey, the city manager report.

Uh, thank you. Unfortunately, I'll have a few items for you tonight. I know uh uh I want to talk about a couple things. One, the water main project continues its work in the northeast uh part of the town. This ongoing works is projected to last in that area until at least May. Um something we're doing a little bit different than we did in phase one and two is that we didn't mill and grind the entire areas of that those phases. Uh this time we divided it up into four additional phases and we're only milling and grinding in those areas that we're actually working in and then we'll go and start another area. So we're not leaving the entire area tore up. Uh not that it's in the greatest condition to start with, but uh the idea was to try to keep it confined. in addition to water man work and the private uh service line replacements that are ongoing meaning those people that have uh um galvanized or lead piping by state statute they have to be replaced we don't have any choice in that it's part of the project there's no cost to the residents those are being placed replaced as well the city is also undertaking multiple repairs of the city sanitary and storm systems at the same time within the same foot footprint of this project so the The streets are opened up. They're be doing they're doing the water main work. Next to it are sewer lines and storm lines. They may be compromised in some area or fashion. We're repairing those at the same time so that we don't if we didn't do it that way, we'd put it all back together, repay the state, it'd be very nice, and then six weeks later we'd tear it all up and have to do it all over again. It's it's a waste of resources. So that's the reason why it's doing that. It may prolong that area a little bit more. I will tell you, I've received the final saw uh oversight report.

There's 47 different points of repairs I have to do in that phase three alone. That's significantly more than what I saw in phase one and two. 80% of those are storm related. 20% are sanitary related. And then we have um what I classify as other issues. Um meaning um things we can't explain yet. Um pipes that we thought by plan and everything else are free flowing and connected have been um abandoned or shut off or diverted or

combined. We're still trying to work on those one-offs, if you will. So, I want people to be aware although that prolongs the project a bit. Uh the it allows the streets to be reopened once we pave them and hopefully no work afterward. None of the restoration work is done at this time. It's done at the end of that phase. So, you may have to wait to have brick pavers or your lawn put back together or those type of things. Uh because they bring a company in, they do it by section. Um we have requests again that the contrary make attempts to take care of the potholes, the area water collection, the dropped offs. Uh we've asked them to do that on a daily basis. Um we have no control over the ways and means of this project, meaning by contract. I cannot tell the contractor how to do his job or or where he should do it. I'm not allowed by contract to do that. But if somebody's aware of there's an area that has a concern, call us and we'll jot it down and give it the contractor and then um um we'll double check to make sure that some type of action was taken. The phase three watering projects include significant renovations to the water plant and selfwater. In the future months, we will completely shut off our water production, meaning we will not produce any water for our community. We've got plans in place that we've tested already and we're going to basically turn on the interconnects between East China and um Marine City and they'll pump additional capacity in order to supply us. We'll also have some uh wet wells and our tower that'll be uh at a sufficient height and the fire chief has a plan in place in terms of uh any type of fire concerns for that period of time. It could take anywhere from a week to 14 days. We're still working on that. Uh we've also have

contingency plans if there's an issue in regards to water rain breaks or those type of things because while we're doing that the water man project doesn't stop. So um we'll keep doing that. Everybody should know that we follow state of Michigan guidelines for water quality, water clarity. The water is mandated to be tested daily multiple times. There's a state website that shows that testing process that shows the water quality. I know um a lot of times people hold up a glass of water in social media or other sets and show a a yellow water. Um possible uh water sometimes need to be flushed when they they disturb the pipes. Uh also could be water heater related. Could be a number of different reasons cause it. could have not taken it from our water source, but maybe a restroom facility source. Um, I can't tell, but obviously we'll investigate those complaints that that continue that where there's a lot of issues. Uh, I ask people when they find that um not to rush to judgment with the Facebook experts, but perhaps run the water a little bit, check it again, and if there is a problem, call us

and let us see if we can help you. Mike, we we've we've addressed some of that in the agreement too with the water quality carryover so that folks would know.

Yes. Yes. Many many times we've tried to point this out that those quality reports are also attached to our website. So a little bit of looking and it's there. the guy community center product. Uh again, we want to stress people, we told you it's totally funded through grant funds, state budget allocations, MEEDC grant awards, SEC community foundation awards, and the RC Wilson Junior Foundation grants. All that is gearing up. We received about $2.2 million in terms of different grants and awards and direct allocations. So, this is not city general fund money that's going for this project. It's not a taxpayerbased where we collected money and we're putting money into that for that specific purpose.

And to be fair, when you write the grant, you have to use you can't use that money for anything other than the guy. I did not. It was restricted for that purposes, project specific. So, as much as some people would like me to spend it on a road or on reducing water bills, legally, it's impossible. And I'm going to talk more about that later on as we get deeper into the budget season in terms of clarifying for people what we can and can't do, right, with the budget money.

So, u you're going to see a lot of construction activity going on at that building. Uh in addition to a very large four seasons pavilion which is approved tonight, a fire pit, walkways, a brand new splash pad for the kids, an outdoor restroom uh area building, a park new parking areas, a park area, entrance improvements on both sides of the building, paying a mural amongst a bunch of other improvements. I hope to turn this into a little community gym for our residents uh and their families to utilize. The building's still open for rental. Uh uh Jason is is working around or working in conjunction with the construction schedule. This is uh going to go into 2027. It's a very robust um process, but it's full steam ahead. So besides the water main project, besides the water plant renovation, besides our repairs, we're also doing this project as well. And then I want to also talk about fiscal year 26 wastewater treatment plant. You'll be hearing more about that at the next meeting. We'll be kicking off that project as well where we received an 8.310 million uh uh grant loan for uh emerging issues at the wastewater treatment plant. And I've talked a number of times on some of the issues we have at the wastewater treatment plant that uh require immediate attention. Last, I want to let everybody know um the city is working on our 2627 budget process. It is my hope that uh we will be having public presentations. I invite the public to uh participate and listen. We'll have a work session with our commissioners. We invite them in. The uh board of commissioner meetings are televised. You can watch this live. I I

I try to put this information out to people. It's readily available. Uh I'm available via uh uh email in person. I'll be happy to meet with different uh city uh groups and and try to explain the budget process. In addition, we'll schedule public hearings and a potential town hall in regards to the budget process. I hope to um in the near future be able to put on a couple scenarios that explain the city budget process, explain the different areas of the budget where the money is held and why water and sewer funds are an enterprise funds and they have to support themselves versus major roads and local roads and what does the general fund support and why I can't take water and sewer money to here or road money over to here or parks and wreck millillage money over to here. Um I didn't want to spend the remaining of my days in a jail. So that's that's not permissible. So I I I don't want to do that. But that's coming forth. And I uh plan uh in the near future to announce and I'll just give a heads up. It hasn't rolled out yet. Uh putting on a uh Monday morning coffee with the city manager. Uh come in, let me hear your your concerns. Let's have a cup of coffee. Let me let me uh let's talk about uh what's going on in the city. You got to have questions. Uh you have concerns. You want to ask about projects, the budget, you want to talk about the water rates, you want to talk about the weather, uh come in. We'll we'll spend a little bit, but I want to make myself available so they know they can come in. There's a personal answer questions. Uh you may not always like the answer, but I'll try to provide an answer. And that's my report for tonight.

Try to get you some special coffee. Thank you. None to see reports from department heads, the fire chief. All right, Jason.

Uh, just a few things, Madam Mayor. Uh, kind of piggyback off of uh, city manager Reeves on the water and sewer rates. Uh, the office staff has been inundated with calls lately on the increases in water bills. Um, we understand the frustrations. We get it. Um, we try to explain it the best that we can, but I just wanted to let residents know that the entire water rate study, sewer rate study is available online on our website under the public notices section. I updated it yesterday to remove the public hearing portion of it. Um, and everything is on there, the approved ordinance. And I also want to remind people too that that we do have assistance programs available throughout the county as well as a payment arrangement plan here at the city. So, if you're struggling, we understand the frustrations, but reach out. Uh Michelle is great with the assistance programs. She'll she'll guide you in the right direction and get you the help and assistance that you need on on that portion. Uh also wanted to remind city hall is closed tomorrow in observance of the Good Friday holiday. And a reminder that Saturday, April 18th, is the community shred day here at city hall. 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. That's tax time. get all those old tax returns up, get them shredded. Uh they take them to the recycling plant. And we're also collecting gently used children's books and craft items for the Maritime Days uh children's activities.

Oh, very nice. That is it. Okay. Thank you. Okay. On to commissioner privilege and leazison reports. We'll start with Commissioner Clawson.

Well, they don't have much with the planning commission. We're working on the same projects. Um, just want to thank everybody that they uh look at what's going on with the water system here. It'll all take its time. I was having breakfast and I was the on Sunday morning and somebody addressed me about the water rates and I tried to explain it to them and uh they just didn't want to listen to anything you said. So, we try to listen. We try to tell you it's it's there for a reason. The other thing is it's a holiday. People will be getting ready for dinner and going to church. Just watch out the roads. We get wet roads, slippery roads, cold weather. Be safe.

Thank you, Commissioner Bryson. I'd just like to wish everyone a happy Easter. Thank you. Commissioner B.

Um, I want to give my gratitude and uh, shock that we've been able to pull off the Guy Center through so many grants. That's incredibly hard work. Mike, you and your team really fantastic on that. Props and and thank you for it. Um, DPW got out there and repaired the roof of the uh, city museum that happened with, you know, the shingle damage that came in with all the winds and everything that we had. this team, the amount of different projects they take on, the the speed and quality of it is always so wonderful and really impressed with this. Want to acknowledge that and also uh echo the encouragement here during the upcoming budget work that we're doing, the town halls, the the sessions here. Please come. I encourage you to watch it online, but uh if you have questions, if you have thoughts on this, it's best to be here in the room and give them to us at that time where we can engage with them. Um, you know, it's what we always tell the students in our classrooms, right? That if you have a question, someone else has the question. Uh, so please come here, let us hear you out will be the the most efficient way of having the conversation. That's it.

Commission. I am also uh just happy Easter to everyone.

Thanks, Commissioner. Um, I'm going to reiterate too, you know, we the city did a lot of work and time trying to put all the information on the water rate increases together. I know people find some of these meetings boring. Um, and they don't want to make time to come. I know it's hard, but the way you learn about how your government works is to attend these meetings so that you can see it firsthand. You can ask questions. Um, we're going to do the same thing with the budget. I know again it's, you know, people think it's a snoozefest, but it's so important because the local your local government is what impacts you the most. So, it's so important to come in and understand how everything works. Everybody always thinks, oh, everybody's on the take and it's there's all this money. There isn't. We have auditors. We have people that watch over this money, um, that look at every single thing we do. It's very difficult to get people to understand how the funds work. So, I'm glad um all that's going to be included in here and I just hope that everybody takes the time, just a little bit of time to either watch it or come and listen because it's it it impacts you every day. So, hopefully um hopefully we can do better with getting people to come. The last time with the water um I think our town hall we had one gentleman come and we had about seven people watch live on TV. We need more participation. Don't wait till the bill comes and then you know it it it all hits you. You got to understand it upfront. Um nobody on this board wants to do it. Nobody on this board wants to raise anybody's rates. I know I don't. I don't want to pay more. It's just that things have been happening for so many years that it's just come to a head and unfortunately now we're all stuck with it. So, please take the time to come to these budget

meetings so that you can listen and see what how this all works. Please, Commissioner Henry, could I just echo that, you know, we're going to try this time to spend a little time explaining where does a tax dollar go? Correct. And the misconceptions about about that process. You know, when you take $1 and you look at all the different directions where that dollar goes and what we're left with to deal with. Yes. We don't get it all. Well, we know that, but but I think that people if they would come, they could get an understanding. Yes.

Just like they did with the water system. Where where does the money go? And I I think it would be it's going to be very educational. Um it's a great thing the community is going to do by explaining all this in a in a series of meetings. And I would encourage your public to come listen. Yeah. Or watch them. Even if we can come and watch just learn because it's not as simple. It's not as simple as it appears. It's very complicated. Yes. Thank you.

Thank you. I just kind of piggy back off that. I know when and rechecking my tax bills. I think it was at 52 mills that I'm being taxed and 15 of the 52 actually go to to the city. So yeah, veryformational when you look at that. Um just a couple more things is um March 24th we have we had SAMCOG meeting in Marine City and that's the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments. We met over at the new guy community center. We had the Slair County representatives um in SAMCOG as well as um their members their people. We had the economic development member there the government rep several people from their agency. They were familiar with Marine City um wanted to be very helpful for things that we needed their assistance on and to help us. they're uh more than willing to help us with what we need. And the community economic development uh committee met on March 25th and um I'm happy to say that the board approved um paying for some of the bathroom fixtures for the beach pavilion. Um through their funds, they've agreed to purchase a new toilet, sink, and mirror for our beach pavilion bathrooms that we were in need of replacing. So I thank you again to the community economic development board. Okay. And with that, can I get a motion to

I'll make a motion to adjurnn. Support. All in favor? I do want him. Never do when I'm working.