Council - Regular Meeting

Heat. Heat. Welcome everybody to this regular city council meeting for Monday, April 27, 2026. Marie, would you please call the role?

Fritz here. Calio here. Lion here. Dora here. Manza here. Uh we have no one for the invocation this evening. So would you please rise and join me in the 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. Thank you.

Tonight we have a couple of reappointments. Would you please read those? Item A, Tom Braciac to the Economic Development Corporation/B Brownfield Redevelopment Authority with a term ending of March 31st, 2031. And Bob Netza to the Economic Development Corporation/ Brownfield Redevelopment Authority with a term ending March 31st, 2031. Can I get a motion? So moved. court. Motion by Fitz, second by Dora. Comments or questions about either of these appointments?

I just want to say thank you for all your involvement in the city and then I also think that it'll be a good discussion about policy that we can continue on from our previous conversation. So, absolutely. Having that connection with council will be a good thing. Okay. Thank you. If there are no other questions, you please call the role. Britz, yes. Dora, yes. Calio, yes. Lion, yes. Manza, yes. That brings us to the approval of the consent and regular agendas. Can I get a motion? So moved. Second. Motion by Dora. Second by Lion. Any um changes to the either agenda by anyone?

No. Okay. Would you please call the role? Dora? Yes. Lion? Yes. Fritz? Yes. Calio, yes. Manza, yes.

That brings us to our first call to the audience. At this time, members of the audience may address council on any item, whether on the agenda or not. Those addressing council as to provide their name and address will be limited to 3 minutes of speaking time. Council will hear all comments for future consideration will not have a response at this time. Those not physically present who would like to call in may dial 616-935-3203. Who would like to address council? Good evening, council. Jim Hagen, 400 Lake. I'd like to uh thank council members from a few meetings ago. Uh the good dialogue on the floats project. And I just wanted to make a comment on it tonight. Also when we look at 120% of uh the AMI for two people it's like 106,200. Um so I checked on the zip how many people actually make more than that. What percentage of people in 49417? The answer is 37%. It seems to me that, you know, this this project is just it's not geared for the right people. It's geared for people who are going to be too I mean who can earn too much money. We we hear that we want, you know, people who work in Grand Haven to be able to live in Grand Haven. We want service places for service workers. This is not it. Um so anyway, uh that's just my comments. Thanks. Thank you. Who else would like to address council? We have no public hearings today, so there won't be an opportunity to comment during agenda items. But uh unless you are participant in that item, but um yeah, we'll get to yours, but for the

general public, now would be the time to address council before we take action. So, if there's no one else would like to address council, we'll move on. That brings us to our consent agenda. Rio, would you please read that? Item A, approve the special work session and regular city council meeting minutes for April 13, 2026 and the special budget work session meeting minutes for April 15, 2026. Item B, approve the bills memo in the amount of $428,5844. And that is it. Okay. Can I get a motion? So moved. Second. Motion by Fritz. Second by Calio. Any comments on the consent agenda? It's pretty short.

Please call the role. Fritz? Yes. Calio? Yes. Dora? Yes. Lion? Yes. Manza? Yes. All right. We have one item of unfinished business. Would you please read that? Item A. Consideration by city council of a resolution to approve and adopt the brownfield plan for Washington 123 LLC redevelopment project located at 123 Washington Avenue, Grand Haven, Michigan 49417 for a period of 25 years. The Brownfield Redevelopment Authority/economic Development Corporation recommends approval and the administration recommends approval. Can I get a motion? So moved.

Support second by Dora. Um Dana, would you like to start this?

Yes, I would. Uh good evening, council. So, in March, um the first March meeting, you considered a request, um by the owners of 123 Washington for an incentive, um or multiple incentives rather. One was for a brownfield tiff and the other was for an obsolete property rehabilitation abatement. Um at that time there was some dialogue and discussion uh with the developer and amongst council and ultimately that decision uh was tabled and the development team was asked to take another look at the project and uh reapproach city council with a revised request. Uh since that time uh the developer has uh decided not to include an OPRA request and instead is seeking a tax increment financing reimbursement for eligible activities only. Uh as a result of that uh request change, the reimbursement period will drop to 19 years or sooner um depending on the total cost of eligible activities being reimbursed um with receipts. Um so it'll be based on actual activities. The plan however you'll notice covers 25 years and that's because the uh reimbursement doesn't start till 2027 and there's also five years of LBRF capture in it which is subject of course to whether council wants to include that as well. Um we also um I believe there's although there's some provisions within our incentive policy to limit uh short-term rentals and a clawback within it that indicates that if that exists that we are able to resend the incentive. We are also able within the development agreement which is the next step in the process um and formalizes um how will the terms the eligible costs and provisions or clawbacks we can put those into that development agreement

and we could include stronger language to ensure that short-term rentals is in there outside of just our policy um because I know that's been something that identified by council and our EDCR as a priority. uh this did go back before our EDCR for discussion and consideration and ultimately they are recommending approval of the revised request which does reduce the number of years in the total ask for incentive from the city. We do have in the audience uh the developers um Marcy and Andy um so they are available should you wish um for some additional context and information as well as Jared uh their attorney can also answer questions from councel. Okay, thank you.

Yep. Uh would the applicants like to approach the podium, fill us in on where we're at?

Uh well, thank you for the opportunity. I know um Dana did a good job of summarizing it. I'm I'm not going to take time to, you know, repeat all of that, but um yes, you know, at the last meeting, we had a lot of back and forth dialogue and appreciated that. Um we took what was said to heart. uh went back and we did remove the OPRA. I certainly appreciate the opportunity to take another look at that. Um the I know it was it was mentioned 120% um while the program allows for 120% or less. The developer is actually proposing 100% AMI. U just wanted to to clarify that for the record. Um but happy to answer any questions. Do appreciate your uh reconsideration of this and the opportunity to to kind of go back and sharpen our pencils a bit. Um we're hopeful that uh with that adjustment uh that the city could support this request uh and and let the team uh move forward with the project. I'm going to step aside and I know Marcy had some stuff that she wanted to share with you. Uh I can answer any of the technical stuff, but I'm going to step to the side.

Okay. Let let the the minds behind the project. All right. Just please tell us your names.

Thank you. Uh Marcy Dere and this is Andy Totes. We're the owners of 123 Washington and 32 how I don't know how the LLC works with it. Um we're not going to talk illegal beagleies because we don't know how to do that his job. Um we just wanted to give some color on the project. Um just to be clear the the what we're asking for is not to not pay taxes. What we're asking for is just a pause on the increase in taxes because we're going to be putting so much money into the building. It's a re it's like a it's difficult to start paying the full burden of tax immediately after. Um the project has two goals primarily. The first is to provide a historic renovation that's high quality for the community to enjoy. The second is to provide for the safety of our guests while they're in the building. As you are all aware, um, FLOS has a lot of contamination issues and in all projects, there's the option for a good, a better, and a best remediation program. Each one comes with its own cost. What we want to do is the best out of good, better, or best. um spending on complete and quality remediation would unfortunately create a dollar fordoll forever tax to us on those efforts. That's why we're asking for the tiff. Um, the TIFF is a is an incentive to spend more money on this important remediation work to provide a clean and healthy environment to the community as it enters and interacts with our building. Now, we have to talk about the FIN. Um, as you may have seen, there was some discussion on Grand Haven informed um

about the Finn, which is an architectural um addition to the building. Um, the communities rallied around the preservation of the fin. A single post on Grand Haven informed netted 535 comments and 248 emoji reactions um unified in their love and desire to pro to preserve the Finn. We would like to preserve the Finn. That's our intent as well. However, if you look at it in terms of a business plan, it's not in our best interest. With the assistance of the TIFF, we would be able to include the Finn in our restoration plan as a gift to the community. We would preserve the building and the Finn to its mid-century architecture, as seen in historic photos of the building from the public library when it was renovated in the 50s. we feel like it's important to to to maintain that. Um, and I wanted to give just a quick overview of what we plan to do inside the space when it's finished. Um, according to the Grand Haven Main Street data, uh, market data report, there's an overwhelming desire by the community for more restaurant spaces. Beautification of downtown was extremely important as well. 78% of respondents said this was very important. 62% indicated that dining is the primary reason they visit downtown. Our goal is to provide a place that everyone can go. We want to have menu items where you can go and eat for five bucks or you can eat for, you know, you can bring your family and have a seafood boil. You can have um we kind of want to demystify seafood for the Grand Haven area where like right now if you want to have a crab dinner and a lobster dinner, you have to go to a casino or you have to make partner at your law firm and go to a really fancy

restaurant. We want to have a beach themed restaurant that's casual. Anyone just come as you are. Come from the campground, come from your homes, come directly from the beach and have a a quick plate of um shrimp or crab legs and enjoy yourself. And don't feel like you have to dress up for us because everybody's welcome. Beach themed. It's the first beach themed restaurant in our beach town. Uh we feel like that'll just be a real fun and interesting addition to the community. That's all. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Andy, do you have anything to say or did she say it all? She said it all for us.

Okay, fair enough. All right. Well, we've seen we've seen the proposal before. We've seen the detail before and we've had a chance to review it again. And um I guess I would open it up to council now unless there's something else from staff that we need to hear, but I think we've heard everything. So, who would like to ask questions or make comments? I'll start.

Go ahead. Um I don't I will say even though it's not going to sound like I am I am conflicted on this. It's not going to sound like I am but I am. Um primarily because I do believe in investment in this city. I do believe that historic preservation is important. Um I think the feedback that we gave all along was that the incentives were uh 25 years was too long of a period um for incentives on this project. Um I had a few specific questions and speak ask you um going through some of the numbers that we received. Um, it looks like we got a budget kind of layout of costs and correct me if I'm incorrect, but the original budget was 838570 on my glasses on the uh construction costs. Does that sound correct? in the overall budget. It was like a kind of a bucket cost in the original budget and then we got a breakdown that looks like those construction costs are now 88 86380.

Does that sound uh the construction costs were always around about a million dollars. Um well, I'm taking out the demolition and asbestous and things like that. So what I'm looking at is that the budget has actually gone up by I don't know 20 some grand. When you came and spoke to us prior I think you used the words that this was almost philanthropic philanthropic and it's from a return standpoint. Um, so taking out, so having the budget go up and taking out $252,000, what does that make it now?

The the the removal of the OPRA, that was the tax abatement. So that would have just reduced annual the tax bill. Uh, obviously it has an impact on the cash flow component. Uh, but we reduced the overall tiff reimbursement by six years. Uh, so the the term of the plan did come down. Um, as for the construction cost estimate, I I don't have that in front of me. I have a copy of of the most recent one. We have a member from the construction team here if you'd like to speak on that. But, uh, I don't

I'm just looking at as a balance sheet. So, if you're asking for less and you're going to be needing more, I think that that level of need sounds more perilous to me. Um, this I'll get to that in a second. Sorry. Um, and then I think the wording I find frustrating is in the um introduction um of this proposal from April 13th. The developer is seeking to utilize the housing tiff program and intends to designate all three of the units for tenants earning 100% area medium income AMI or less. The project will facilitate the development of housing projected to be rented to households earning 120% or less of AMI of which there is a demand for 688 units by 2029 as identified in the county housing needs assessment. The wording is is I think misleading because 427 of those units that the Ottawa County Housing Needs Assessment is saying will be needed is for a 50% AMI or less. So I'm assuming that you're not looking to make any of these 50% AMI.

No, no, we're 100% or less. I think the 688 is misleading on that. Um and then to Dana, where or whoever um where in the contract does it reference the stipulations of the economic development policy itself?

Uh it doesn't in the Brownfield plan, but if there are certain provisions from the economic incentive policy that want to be included, we can put them in the development agreement. But we within the economic incentive policy do say if certain provisions and mostly I'm thinking of the short-term rental that if we find that a a short-term rental is occurring then we have the right to resend the incentive. Um there are other provisions in it. I just don't have it in front of me. But do we have to link that in the actual the development agreement is what I referenced that we can put that language in there. So, it's not assumed that all of the economic policy

um incentives or or that document is just automatically part of that's what we follow or assume from a city staff perspective. But if we want an extra level of certainty, we can put some of those provisions in there. I mean, they applied on the basis of the economic incentive policy and following that. So, we can carry that over to the language. function in what they're bringing but not it's not in the contract that would be correct. So we can put that in there. Yep. But we can put that that's the next step is that development agreement and that really just finalizes and firms up what our understanding is um between all parties.

Okay. I think that's just a good thing to clarify moving forward that that's not just an assumed thing on our part that all of that's part of the negotiation. Um I think um this is just more of a comment the Finn um about speaking of the Grand Haven informed I actually did see that I try to stay off of social media but that one popped up for some reason. Um, I think it's really important on how we ask those questions because there was an overwhelming desire to keep that fin from a historic preservation standpoint, but there was no discussion of what that would mean for the city as far as there it wasn't posed as a question of would you want to keep the Finn if it meant that the developer was getting a 25-year tax incentive. And so I think that may or may not 19 years. Um I that may or may not persuade the comments on Facebook Marketplace. Um okay. Now here's my reverse UNO card or my UNO reverse card. I actually believe in economic incentives. I actually believe in TIFFs. I believe that our city in general needs investment and we want to make this happen. I'm concerned with the policy and so that's when I bring up um how we're handling that moving forward. I think it's really really important. Um we talk a lot about attracting largecale development and brownfield tiff is one way to do that. Um, but if we're looking at real broadbased growth, we should be asking bigger questions like who can actually access access these tools. I think for me this is not a good use of this but I think it's posed some really

good questions on are is our policy in some ways a workaround tool that requires high costs for the developer or homeowner or small business owner to be able to access any of these things and is that limiting who we're actually needing to target as a community. Um, so I would really, you know, moving forward like to talk about more citywide, um, potentially brownfield zones, neighborhood enterprise zones, um, trying to get away from any kind of special deals. I'd like to understand how we can do a tiered approach um, for smaller projects like a simple online form um, for small businesses. all of which are very clearly outlined and how many years we're willing to give. Um what those incentives would mean that they require everyone to adhere to all the e economic uh development policies that there wouldn't be short-term rentals. All of the the things that we're needing to hold them accountable for. And then potentially tier four would be really large incentives based on really great advantages for our city. Meaning we're actually trying to get down to some 80% lower AMI that we're really looking at incredibly contaminated areas or um accessing a tremendous amount of housing for our city. So, I would love to continue that discussion.

That's all I have. Okay. Thanks, Sarah.

Yeah. Thank you, Sarah, for those comments because a lot of them that you brought up were things that I had kind of kicked around a little bit on mine. And it seemed there was really no nothing that broke it down like you were saying that allows somebody who's at this level, you know, qualifies for this, somebody up here qualifies for that to where the most higher developments would qualify for the longer years in terms. So some guidelines for that would certainly I think be most constructive. Um but dealing with the subject at hand right now today um we asked the developer to go back and take a look at what they could do and come back to us. Um we kind of didn't get that the first go around but the next goound they came back and said we're going to take the Oprah off. We're going to go to 19 years instead of 25. We're going to you know here's what we're going to do. We're going to keep some of the historic features. um which all kind of lent a uh feeling of collaboration to me and a willingness to work with the city and make things come together. Um we need to work with developers that are willing to work with us uh to kind of help things come together to to get development in downtown so we have new things for people to come and see when they show up. Uh I I do think we need to put in there uh the 100% AMI. I think we need to have in the terms uh regarding subleasasing and things like that that people are, you know, no matter what they do, they're still subject to the the no short-term rentals. Um I did receive some conversation and emails about that that I went through and went over and I think those are some important issues that some of the residents are concerned about. Um, so that being said, I'm looking to support this um

to move ahead um to work together with the developers to get this new development going in downtown. Thank you. I think I said everything in the last few meetings and I don't think

Okay, Mike. Well, I'm glad to see you went back to the table and did took a good look at that's what we asked you to do and you did a very good job of it. Uh cutting duck as I don't want to echo Mike again, but the thing is I have to agree with Mike 100%. You came back to everything that we asked you to do. And uh only only question we have or answer I tell everybody is that only thing they're qualified for to get out of this is was regulated by the state. Is that not true? Yes, that's accurate. So, it's not it's nothing anything above and beyond that. So, that's good. I'm glad you're going to keep the Finn in there and that and everything else because it it goes back to my history

and like to see that. And also, I'd like to see some growth going on downtown. I mean, if we sit here and say we're not going to help, we're not helping our downtown either, then we need to be on that same on that same page. We need to have investment downtown. We need to promote that so we can keep it alive right now. It needs it needs help down there. So, I appreciate you guys coming in and taking a look at this and putting all your hard cash in there because it's what's going to end up being. It's going to be a lot of your money is going to be in besides the small amount that we're dishing out. We're really not dishing money out, which the only thing is you're just not paying the taxes on it right away. Um, a good example when I first got on here, we had Grand Landing and the mayor was sitting right where Bob is. His thing is called it was called patient money. Well, Granding is now coming to futation for us and we're collecting a lot more money than we would have if we would have just left it blank all these years. So, I'm I'm in support of it 100%. So, thank you. Thanks, Mike. Yeah, I uh appreciate particularly Mr. Fritz's comment about uh we want to invest in our downtown area. We want to invest in the city overall. And then if we take the position that we're just simply going to let market forces handle this and we're just simply going to let the the options or the lack of options for individual private investors to control where we go with our city and we sit back and do not offer any kind of help or pass on it, then we shouldn't be surprised if we get end up with the results we didn't want. tired buildings or bland corporate architecture or any number of things that don't necessarily fit our visions for the city. I think there's an opening to participate for the city with incentives when there's a demonstrated

need which is why we ask for a third party review to validate that need. um when there's a a structure which is well worth saving, you know, the architectural features, the mid-century look of that, not everybody's favorite, but it's certainly part of the landscape and has been for generations. Um the opportunity to provide a little more housing to upgrade that housing, make it good, and still restrict the income range for it. the 100% AMI just so people are clear about that 100% AMI means that everybody every income every household income below that point is in the bottom half of our income range and everybody with a with a dollar more is in the top half and so we are targeting the bottom half of people's income ranges and it' be nice to target lower definitely the need is there but this need this need exists also and the apartments that are there as far as are not habitable as far as I believe they were they were habit inhabited fairly recently but I wouldn't put anybody in there. So the idea of renovating that adding another unit preserving the look of the building using the housing tiff to help supplement that and here again this is a cash flow issue. It's not money up front. It's not money that's going to help them do this job. They have to do the work. They have to create the value. they have to make the taxes go up so they can get the tax some of the taxes back to help with their cash flow to help with the um before this thing starts to produce any return on investment. That's really what this is about. So I think this is a great tool. I think that these projects are all scalable. I appreciate the comment particularly Sarah's comment about we should be looking at how big these projects are, how much of a need they satisfy and al all that but every project is its own project at its own scale and can be looked at that way. This is asking for 589,000

some odd dollars of uh relief spread out over 19 years. Um, other projects, for example, Peerless Living, when we did that tiff, that was a much larger project with many more units, spread out over a similar amount of time, their property value went up so fast that they're going to pay that off earlier because their taxes went up. They aren't very happy about the fact their taxes went up, but it will shorten the tiff and that can happen here. All these things are estimates as to where will the taxes be, where will the property values be, where act where the actual eligible costs will be. We basically identified a cap on eligible costs. We've got kind of a rough breakdown on what those costs might be. Those are rather tentative estimates and all the stuff is based on estimations, but we're identifying a cap. It's not going to go over a certain number of dollars and we're identifying a number of years. It's not going to go beyond a certain number of years. If we pay that off sooner or run out of time, we can without having collected the money, it stops. So, we have those safeguards built into the tiff. This is what I like about a tiff. It does have specific costs. It's not just whatever you want. It's these things. The other thing I like about the TIFF, and people may not appreciate this, but there are certain mil there are certain millages we have which are debt millages. Those debt millages are not capturable. So, if they increase the value of this property through their project and those those um most of those millages are captured on the increase and returned to them to pay for their costs, our debt millages are not captured. So we can apply that additional tax base to uh pay down some of our debts. And I think that's an important thing to keep in mind. There is something in this for the city. Also, I think that in this particular case or anything downtown, the increase in tax dollars are already being captured by the DDA tiff and this is going to be a pass through for this project from the DDA tiff. So this money wouldn't have come back to the city

general fund for many years anyway. So, I think there's a lot of pieces to this one which makes this a a good project, a good one to offer an incentive and accept an incentive for. Um, I think that um what else I got here? I think that's pretty much covers my points. The as far as preserving the fin, the architectural features, those are great, but this tiff is really about the housing piece, the renovation, rehabilitation of the housing and providing it at that discounted rate. So that's really what this is about. But the rest of it is really good stuff to do and it it shows good face to the community. I think that the people of the community will appreciate the project that you're going to do and I think that if the city can help enable that and make it successful by making your cash flow better. It's a small price to pay for the city. Eventually this will be on the tax roll fully so that we have the full project paying the city's the city's business. you know, as far as the taxes, it just takes it a little bit of time. As former mayor Bergman said, this is patient capital. The city's in this for the long haul. We're playing the long game. We just want this place to be a better place than where we started. So, for all those reasons, I would support this one. I think we still have to look at every project individually, and I think that our policy can use some work. I think some of the thing it was Mr. Hagen that brought it up to me about the u potential for sublitting a short-term rental. Well, that's not going to happen. We're going to make sure that that language is explicit. Plus, there's zoning in place says you have to have parking spaces, all this kind of stuff would make it virtually impossible in this case. But I think all those things need to be clarified and we can make it clear that that's our will that these things be clarified in the reimbursement agreement. But I think that uh I think there's a lot to be said for this. I appreciate you taking the Oprah out. I think the Oprah is too much of a blank

check. it doesn't really identify what's what's going on. Um, I think the TIFF is a very good tool. So, I guess I've rambled long enough, but that's how I feel about this particular one. Other comments, questions. Thank you all for your thoughtful comments. So, appreciate it. Um, if there's no other comments, are we ready to vote? Please call the role. Fritz, yes. Dora, yes. Calio, no. Lion, no. Manza, yes. This motion passes. All right, that brings us to our first item of item of new business.

Item A, consideration by city council of a resolution to approve the 2026 Coast Guard Festival that will take place July 24 through August 1, 2026. Administration recommends approval. Can I get a motion for this? So moved. in support. Um motion by Lions and I heard a couple of seconds, but I'll give it to Fruits. Um we have Mr. Brian explain this to us.

Good evening, council. Brian Drew, waterfront events manager for the city. Uh before you tonight is the annual approval of the Coastg Guard Festival. The Grand Haven Coast Guard Festival is an annual community celebration honoring the men and women of the United States Coast Guard and their families and it remains one of the largest and most recognized events in our region. The 2026 festival is proposed to run from July 24th through August 1st with no major changes from prior years. Throughout the week, the festival includes a wide range of activities designed for all ages. parades, community events like kids day and senior day, the carnival, live waterfront concerts at Lyn Sherwood Waterfront Stadium, and signature events like the cardboard boat race, street dance, grand parade, and the car show. The festival also features a drone show on Friday, July 31st, and concludes the traditional fireworks show on Saturday, August 1st. Operationally, the request includes the use of key city spaces such as the waterfront stadium, Mulligan's Hollow, Harbor Island, and portions of downtown for vendor areas, parades, and traffic. Public services include coordinated street closures, parking restrictions, and safety measures to support the large number of attendees. The festival's success is dependent on festival and city staff, volunteers, and especially the efforts from public safety and public works departments. The Department of Public Safety is recommending closure of the social district at 6 PM on Saturday, August 1st to assist with enforcement. Earlier closure during a street dance will not occur this year as part of a trial approach. Overall, this is a continuation of a long-standing well-managed event that brings in significant community engagement and regional tourism. Staff is recommending approval of the request as presented. Executive Director Tracy Riley is present to help answer any questions you may have. All right, Tracy, do would you like to make a comment? No,

I appreciate your consideration and uh we're all ready to go for 2026. Plans are going well. Okay. Thank you. Questions, comments? I really want to say thank you for um the consideration of letting the Tuesday night social district go ahead. I want to say thank you to public safety, too. So, they're not here tonight, but pass it on. Um, I really am hoping that our residents and our tourists um let that go this year and give us a good showing and uh that we we can continue to do that in the future. I know the businesses will be very very very thankful for the opportunity um to let that go and I'm hoping that that'll be a good a good Tuesday night.

Thank you. So, thank you for that. Anyone else? No. No, I'm good. Appreciate everything that you've done and the excellent presentation that was provided to us that laid it all out. So, I looks good to go to me. Thank you. Okay. Yeah, I think that uh it's very much like last year's, but last year's was very good. So, this one will be as well. Appreciate that. Thanks. There are no other comments or questions, please call the role. Lion, yes. Fritz, yes. Calio, yes. Dora, yes. Manza, yes. Thank you. Thank you.

Next item, please. Item B, consideration by city council of resolution to approve a contract with GEI for the Duncan Park hemlock survey and treatment project in an amount not to exceed $114,000 to be reimbursed by the Duncan Park Fund at the Grand Haven Area Community Foundation. The Duck and Park Commission recommends approval. Can I get a motion? So moved. Second. Motion by Doris. Second by Calio. Um Mike, Mr. England,

how you doing? I'm also the city liaison for Duncan Park. Um Geette and the group worked hard at this. They put an RFP out and got four bids for what they saw fit for Duncan Park and they're happy to present to you tonight. The GEI um Duncan Park um HWA remediation project. So um but yeah, if you have any questions, feel free to ask. Geette is here to answer any questions also. So okay, Geette, would you like to say something? Uh sure, I will. Give us your name.

Geette Sass. I I live on Ottawa Avenue and I'm on the Duncan Park Commission. So, um we worked to look at the best most efficacious way that we could afford to treat the hemlocks in Duncan Park. And we are really happy with this contract from GEI. They're restoration ecology specialists and they've worked on projects across West Michigan. They um have a plan that will um treat both um with imoprid and as needed dinphron. And this dual approach is really important because it provides for sort of maintaining the ecology of the park without using too much neonicotenoids which can be bad and it really takes care of HWA and can address some of the elongate scale that's going on in the park. And so uh we're going to start that whole process again where we'll have six years following metropid treatment and then we'll kind of reassess at that point. So this is a good um approach to the 40 acres and sort of maintaining our hemlocks there.

So okay, thank you. Yep. Comments, questions? The the quotes just looked like they were all over the place. uh that or like I just didn't understand because some of it was like a price and then a something per inch or something and some of it just like like somebody came and just like really lowballed something which obviously seemed like they weren't going to be able to do the job well. I just couldn't really tell what those quotes were. So um I didn't have any um I I knew what I wanted. I knew the

the actual treatment plan was really critical. I'd worked with Deb McCulla at MSU to determine what we needed to do. So we knew that we needed um to use emito for long-term control, dinotphrine as needed for like rapid treatments. Um I think um that perhaps is my fault for not being um good at writing a request for proposal perhaps, but we tried to we could look at the proposals we did get and we could look at the unit price of the treatments

and really kind of understand where was the best place to go. Um yeah, three bids came through with surveys. Um two did not. So, you know, we have to think about um also having somebody that's really um going to look out for our best interests and having the survey was really important for us and having those sort of um eyes on the forest. Yeah, this team's background looks fantastic. Reading over their resumes was super impressive. Yeah, I'm grateful. Yeah, super impressive. They um actually said they'd like to apply for more things in Grand Haven. So that there anything else? No,

it's great. Look like a very comprehensive plan. I mean in detail plus other areas they've already treated in in the area as well. So I think I've attended Duncan Park Commission meetings in in the past and they are very passionate about what they do and I I appreciate that very much. So thank you. just like total curiosity. How many inches I mean per inch is well fascinating to me.

So in 2019 uh Dr. Locker at GBSU did a survey in the park and she mapped she has every tree mapped there and so we measure DBH diameter breast height. That's how we know how much systemic insecticide or treatment to use. We have 21,900 DPH in 2019. Um, hemlocks grow very very slow and we've had a drought for the last three years. So, I don't anticipate that we have a huge increase in our DBH. Um, we probably actually have a decrease in our DBH in the park because we've had some loss of trees. We've had a number of beaches take out some of our hemlocks. Um, as the beaches are aging, they're more fragile. So probably 21,900 and some DBH in 2019. Pretty close to that. So that's how you that's how you measure how much

treatment you put into a tree. Thank you. That's really interesting. Um and then just again I don't know is this coming out of whose budget? It'll be reimbursed by the fund. That's all I had. Okay. No, I'm all set.

Okay. Well, I Yeah, like Erin, I'm very impressed with the with the write off the resumes, the background, the um accomplishments of this company. Not familiar with them otherwise, but they look good and they've done a lot of local work, so they understand the local ecology. So, that's good. Was uh now this deals strictly with the adelgate. Is is there you can come up if you don't mind. And so so I mean we we've also in our other forest we've been treating the oak wilt and the beach tree disease and this one is specific to the to the hemlocks.

This is just the hemlock. Um I don't we don't have beach bark disease or oak wilt right now in the park. Um so um it's nice to establish this relationship in case that should happen. So okay so so you don't see a need for further treatment of the other diseases at this point in time.

Uh we don't have oak welt currently. Um and there is no beach bark disease currently. There's scale and there are things you can do for scale. scale is the predecessor for beach bark disease, but at this point um we don't have beach bark disease per se and we don't have any of the other kind of things that are coming into the area that affect beach. So, but this group would definitely be have the expertise to address that. Okay. Well, maybe they can keep an eye out for it just in case. Well, yeah, we're gonna We always have our boots on the ground in there.

I bet you do. All right. Thank you. And just as a as a side note, you know, the Duncan Park Commission is charged with management of the park um based on the trusted from Martha Duncan and the uh ordinance that we had adopted and readopted and modified over the years. And so this is their this is their area to take care of. And so they're working on that and they have to answer the budget question, they do have some funds that are available to them. So I think this is uh this is their response. Great. So and our role here is to ratify this and facilitate the process. Correct. Correct. Okay. Any other questions?

Call the role. Dora, yes. Calio, yes. Lion, yes. Fritz, yes. Manza, yes. Leave the trees. Okay. Next, next item, please. Item C, consideration by city council of a resolution to approve a contract with GFL Plumbers Environmental to pothole remaining water services in the budget in the budgeted not to exceed amount of $559,250 administration. Can I get a motion? So moved. Second. Motion by second by Calio. Mr. England, would you like to explain this?

Good evening. Yes, this is part two from last council where we approved Aban Marsh to oversee the contract for us. This is what we came back with from the bids that were received back from GFL, former plumbers environmental and waste recovery. Um, waste or plumbers is actually honoring their price from three years ago, which is huge. Hasn't gone up any. Um, this will help finish up the lead remaining possible lead services and identify them so we can start a big project and start spending some of the money that we have saved and get these replaced for the people as soon as possible. Okay, thank you. Any questions?

Uh, I know you've been working really hard on grants and things like that. Um, and you've been very successful in that. Do we have grant money for this or is this not we're right now the money that we have set aside comes out of the water bills. Um there's a certain amount per gallon of water thousand gallons of water that we take out. I'm sorry for not knowing the exact but uh yes we do have money set aside for this. Um back in 2022 I think uh we started setting money aside and start planning ahead for this because we have until 2035. Back then we had till 2045 to get them replaced. Now the timeline has been bumped down 10 years.

And just to reiterate, I think we touched on it last time, but the identification, if I remember correctly, was not something that was eligible for a lot of the grant funding. So, we're looking to do that with currently budgeted funds. That way, we're positioned and eligible for grant funding that'll be coming out here in the next couple years. Correct. I think I read something about like if you don't have them identified, we can't ask for the grant money or something. Yeah, you have to you have to have the identification important process done. Yes, it's very logical. But I just want Yeah, I guess if you don't know what's under there, you can't ask for the money to fix it. Yeah, I just want to thank you for how much you worked on this and trying to get the grants so that when we do identify them all, we can fix them. So, I know how much effort this has been. So,

we are currently in the running for a DWSRF DWSRF drinking water um recovery fund. So, revolving safe revolving fund. Thank you. There's there's so many acronyms out there that you got to remember, but as long as the last word is fund. Yep. Yep. So, we're looking at that. That has 50% forgiveness right now. So, if we can if we can get that, that'll help huge make up that 10 years of money that we won't be able to bring in in order to get these replaced. Yep. Thank you. Okay. Unfortunately, one of those unnecessary evils we have to go through. So, no way around it.

Yep. It'll be really good to know what's underneath there, too, because right now we're sending out letters saying we don't know what's out there. Unfortunately, recordkeeping and just assuming what is underneath the ground isn't the best approach. So, now we'll have a good good baseline and know how to budget and get these get these replaced as soon as possible.

Any comments? I would just like to say too that uh just to reassure people that in our water system using Lake Michigan water which is a little more alkaline that u it hasn't been a problem here with lead dissolved in our drinking water simply because the lines have been passivated with calcium deposits on the pipes and not the sort of thing had in other communities. So while we do have left, we do have lead service lines which do need to be gotten rid of and replaced. It's not urgent. It's not a acute problem for us. It's not threatening our community's health unless you have a broken line or something that might expose the pipe. But um we will take care of this. We will take care of it properly in time and utilize the money that we can get. But in the meantime, while we're working on it, it's uh it's just a work in progress.

Yes. Correct. Thank you for that. Yep. Please call the RO. Fritz, yes. Calio, yes. Dora, yes. Lion, yes. Vanetsza, yes. That is all of our new business for the evening. That brings us to our report by city council. I'd like to make a report. Just wanted to say it was really nice to plant a tree with you guys the other day. That was lovely.

I have to agree 100%. I went to my bank today and as I walked in Huntington Bank, they go, "Oh, we seen you guys out there planting a tree." I go, "Yes, it was Arbor Day. It was really good." So, I want to say thank you for everyone that was attended. It was such a nice thing. And want to say thank you to our anonymous donor for another tree there. So, that's really good. It's uh it's nice that someone in town is stepping up and donates trees for us. So, thank him very much. I think it's most appreciative. Yeah, it was great. We won't um mention which former mayor donated that tree, but we thank him very much for it. Um yeah, I I attended the first annual art galla that they held at Four Points, which was very well attended. Um lots of art, lots of great things to look at. They're hoping to have it for many more years to come. They had excellent food that was catered in. Um was, like I said, a very, very great event. So, that was good. I'd like to thank the DPW crew for the extra effort that uh they put in here over the weekend to fix another infrastructure issue that we had on Franklin that I'm sure a lot of people are glad is up and going now. So, if you would thank the rest of the crew for me for doing that extra effort. It's so late at night as well. Um, and I I've been getting a lot of emails of folks who are uh upset about the de, you know, the demo of the bank not saving all of the the old pillars and everything else. You know, there was a lot of opportunities for folks to come before the planning commission and city council and and share their concerns about, you know, what they would have liked to seen or not seen, but they really didn't do

that. Instead, once it's all tore down, everybody says, "Gee, we really need to save that." Well, the time to do that is upfront, not after it's all being tore down. So, I encourage folks to attend planning commission meetings, attend city council meetings. If you're passionate about something and you want your opinion to be known, you need to come and share it with us. Uh, reach out, send emails before the fact, not after. Um, we do read them. We do listen regardless of what you may hear or think. Um, we're here for you and your comments do mean a lot. So, please reach out. let us know what you think, you know, beforehand. I appreciate it very much. Thanks.

I just want to second to Mike uh Michael and DPW. It affected us specifically on Franklin. So, I want to thank you very much um for all that hard work and that emergency effort that you put in. Um kind of to piggyback off of what Mike was mentioning about historic preservation, I've attended a couple of the historic council meetings. um they're doing some interesting uh work on how we can um potentially get more grants and things um associated with historic preservation. So, I appreciate their efforts and I look forward to seeing what what they uh bring uh to council. And then um attended a jigsaw puzzle competition on Sunday at the library. The library is offering just a lot of great programs and I appreciate that a lot. um my team won and so uh I think it's that says that you don't have to have talent, you just have to be a member of a good team. So because I was definitely not the person that won it. So um yeah, so just lots of interesting good activities happening.

Okay. Right. I just already said what I needed to say. Oh, I thought Okay. Do you want me to say more? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm just going around here. Yeah. Well, I can tell I can You didn't say anything about the Tigers, so I figured you hadn't spoken yet. Well, they need some hitting yet and they also need some kind of relief a little bit. So, okay.

Other than that, I mean, when you lose a game one to nothing, sometimes it's very disappointing. Nobody scored a run. You know, when you pitch a good game and nobody helps you, it's really, really difficult. I did watch banana ball last night. That's always fun. It was at Yankee Stadium. If you ever want to see something funny, that was really hilarious. a guy on stills batting at a baseball and running to the first base and actually making it. But anyways, other than that, I would say reiterate the same thing. I noticed the guys there early with the lights flashing on the corner by us and I'm going, man, that's the same place that was they destroyed before. I don't know what happened again, but it probably the same issue. But now it's in the storm sewer, I think it was, if I remember correct. But I'm glad to see our guys out there. They work so diligently. I tell you what, when it comes to emergency work, I am so happy that we have the people that we have in in line here to do the job that we need to have done here. They step up and they do their job. And it's I mean, you can stand there and I can go over there and stand there, but they're very busy. They don't even care talking to me. They're too busy focused on getting their job done. And I appreciate that so very much. So, I want to say thank you also.

Okay. Thanks. Yeah, these our DPW workers, they're out there in the worst of times and the worst of weather doing the hardest work. So, um, we need to appreciate how, as Mike Crow would say, they make civilized life possible for the rest of us and it's very true. Um, I spent the weekend in East Lancing with our science Olympia teams. We are state tournament. We, um, you always start the season with high goals. You want to make it to the national tournament. You want to win all the state um, events. you wanted to do all that. We didn't quite make that. You know, we fell a little bit short of those goals, but the kids worked really hard. They worked as a came together as a team, as teams. They learned a lot of things. They learned how to how to compete, how to behave, how to deal with both success and failure. And that's really what this program is about. Well, no matter whether it's athletics or science competitions or band, orchestra, all the different things that kids learn how to do where they work together, they perform, they do the best they can. You just I really appreciate the opportunity to be involved in that. And so that's where my weekend was. So, so I'll turn it over to Ashley. All I have tonight is just a reminder for you as well as um the public that we in addition to our council meeting next week, we have our joint meeting with the board of light and power that is on Thursday, May 7th at 6:00 p.m. at city hall. So just wanted to put that reminder out there for the benefit of everyone. And that is all I have this evening.

All right. Thank you. All right. Well then that brings us to our second call to the audience. If anyone would like to address council, please give us your name, address, limit your comments to three minutes of speaking time and tell us what you think.

You promised.

Back by popular demand. Uh my name is Jeffrey Miller. I live at 1120 South Harbor Drive and I have three short items uh for council's consideration. Um, first is perhaps I've been away so I haven't heard all the discussion, but having worked in public safety for the city of Columbus, I always found it reassuring to have a police officer here um at council meetings. And in light of what happened at the White House press correspondents dinner the other night. Not that anything bad would ever happen here, but I would find it reassuring if perhaps in the future there could be a sworn officer in attendance. Just a thought. And again, I don't know the reason for there being the absence of or perhaps they're somewhere else currently, but I think it would be nice to have law enforcement here just in case. Uh second, there's been a lot of controversy throughout the country with regard to data centers. And part of the problem with data centers is that agreements or arrangements have come up through conversations that were not as public or as transparent as they could have been. and not that the BLP is considering supporting or uh soliciting a data center to come to Grand Haven. I was just wondering if in the future council could explain to the public how staff operates with non-disclosure agreements. Um because you there are occasions when you have entrepreneurs who are wanting to invest in the city but for proprietary reasons don't want everybody in the world including their competitors to know what's going on. But on the other hand, we don't want the city to

overextend their um obligations or interests in something that needs a full vetting uh by council and by the citizenry. So, if in the future perhaps council could have a conversation for the public's benefit to explain how non-disclosure agreements are managed and um instituted here in Grand Haven. That would be great. And then lastly, uh today just at 5:55 p.m. on Wood TV, there was a really nice feature story about hostellers and they they just celebrated their 100th anniversary. So, for those of you who didn't see the show, I would encourage people to go to woodtv.com and look up the very nice human interest story about the hundred years that Hostettler has been servicing our community. And with that in mind and the 250th anniversary of our country coming up on the 4th, again, didn't know what kind of protocols the city has to recognize um establishments that make the centennial mark or even greater.

That's it. Are you working on that, Mark? Okay. Okay. Thank Thank you, Jeff. Who else would like to address council Jim Hagen 400 Lake? I I would just like to thank everybody who worked so hard on the uh Earth Day celebration. I got a nice little tree from the Ottawa County Conservation District, a little uh I think it was an American hazelnut. So anyway, it's been planted up on the on the dune and uh hopefully I'll get to see some animals enjoy it over the next couple decades. Thanks.

Okay. Thank you. Anyone else? If no one else would like to address council and if there's no further business then we are adjourned. Thank you.