Remarks by Mark Meadows
98 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 4 of 4
“What is it again? ICAP. ICAP. And, you know, I'm just wondering what sort of the genesis of that was. Is this something that LAPOC members have attended? and receive training in?”
“And we don't know whether they actually have gone through the training.”
“Okay, because I think that training is useful for members of a commission that are taking a look at whether the police department is doing the right thing anyway. So if there is some kind of estimation of the cost of sort of expanding our training opportunity, you know, I would like to see us to have a discussion with regard to it at some point in time. I guess, you know, and I'm not talking about Citizens Police Academy because everybody can apply and participate in that if they want to. As a graduate, I would say that it was very good training. And then, let me just make sure I got it all.…”
“And I wasn't being critical of the technology. I think it's good. But I wanted some information on when the body camera normally would expect to be on. So anyway, those are all my questions.”
“I want to follow up on what you were just talking about a little bit. Because when you look at the sequence of the population of the police department, I think I mentioned before, when I left for the legislature, we had 63 officers. When I came back, there were 43. And in the meantime, just before I left for the legislature, we doubled the size of the city. And now those neighborhoods in the northern area are built out. There's 448 new houses in northern East Lansing. And we have fewer officers. And one of the other things that was mentioned by you guys is the importance of experience. And it…”
“Mike? I say I don't have a problem with a quarterly update. No, it would take in the entire fall season, which is football season, and start a basketball season. So it would be good.”
“We are going to get a copy of the slides, right? Okay. Can we go back to the slides you were talking about where you started with the five sort of projects? Can we go back to the first one for one thing? I've got a question on that. There we are. Just keep going. I want to see the sort of little map of the first one there. Okay, yeah, and I think you mentioned this, or one of you did, but the, you know, we had a long dialogue with regard to what was happening at Michigan Avenue during the construction of the Red Cedar Project, which is all the apartments and restaurants and the senior housing…”
“Okay, so what we're talking about specifically is how we're going to hook up.”
“Is that it? Okay. Yep. Good. You've answered my question on that one then because I was about to call Pat to say what the hell. You know, we already paid for this, but can we go to number two now? And this is the Valley Court sort of storage piece and I know there's a, we have a project within Parks and Recreation that is sort of the redevelopment of Valley Court Park. I'm just not seeing how we can use that for stormwater retention. in any way. So I'm not sure whether that was part of the redevelopment discussion as that went through Parks and Rec. So I'm just trying to find out if that was.”
“Well, you know, given that one of those parts of that project is the construction of an amphitheater so that we have, I just don't want people sitting in water while they're, you know, listening to their music. So I want to make sure that's going to be part of it. Okay. Can we go to number two? I mean, the third little map that you have.”
“okay and that is the downtown neighborhoods this would hook into the existing giant i guess it isn't as giant as i thought it was when we put it in but the giant cso that we have going down grand river would we have to expand that expand the tunnel Yes.”
“No. Okay. That was my question when I was hearing this, is whether there's another sort of disruption at Grand River that we'd have to deal with.”
“And we've been talking about this for several years of improving those. And I think, I think we, did we do the work in Chesterfield Hills that needed to be done? Cause that's like a hundred years old, but. I don't know, but that's a different downtown area. And then the other question with regard to this, okay, the tunnel underground river, then Harrison, then the water treatment facility on the Red Cedar, is that where this water is going to end up?”
“I was talking about the water treatment facility at the Red Cedar and Harrison Road.”
“Yeah, we don't have to expand the capacity of the treatment facility in any way.”
“Can we go to the next one? Okay, you've got a couple of council members that live in this green area, I guess, or this area, but including myself. So I want to just mention that the neighborhood I live in, which is directly across from the green area on the right-hand side, discharges all our water into that green area on the right-hand side. We have a retention pond that overflows into that area. That area, at least over the last three or four super rain events that we've had, have also overflowed into the apartment complex that's directly next to it. There is a pond in White Park that is a…”
“The pond in White Park, right? Is that the one you're talking about? Yes, potentially. Okay.”
“Okay, and then you know there's a you know the I can't forget the name of the drain, but the drain that runs through Let's see, which park is it? Azacadiaca. The Sanderson Drain also runs right by Council Member Singh's property, basically. Is there an expansion of that drain proposed to deal with the Harrison Meadows proposal that you have?”
“The neighborhood I live in was designed to run water from every aspect of that neighborhood into the pond in the neighborhood, which overflows into this area. The streets that are adjacent to us are a little bit lower than us, and there are constant water problems within those neighborhoods. So, you know, I assume this is going to be a big boost for taking care of that problem. Can we go to the next one?”
“Okay, and then to follow along with your comment there, the area north of Bessemer is, you know, our recreational trail goes through there, but that is a big swamp in that area. There's no plan to sort of increase the capacity in there that's a protected swamp in some way?”
“Yeah, the two duplexes that are next to that generally are full of water any time we have a rainstorm that's significant, if I put it that way. Can we go to the next one? Which would be my last questions. So this is the White Hills drainage improvement and be your neighborhood. And that is White Park that you're targeting there, right? And that's that same pond that's sort of on the other side of the thing. So we're using that whole area for two full neighborhoods, I guess. That was my question. Okay. Then just a couple of comments. You talked about the authority over the drainage by Deer…”
“Okay, and one last thing. I just think it's better to have too much than too little. So if you're looking at your plan, you know, to the extent that we can make it a little bigger so that in 50 years somebody isn't sitting here talking about this all over again, I think it would be the way to go. And I know it's expensive, but I think this is extremely important.”
“I just want to point out that two years ago, the mayor really started to talk about this. And two years into this, we are in a better position to go forward than I thought we would be, for one thing. I think there is one element, it wouldn't be the plan here, but I don't think we've completed our development standards analysis and changes that need to be done that will support this all the way through. I know you're the liaison to the Planning Commission, but I think we need to get that done. When you mention mid-sized city, that's great, but we're also the third most educated community in…”