Board - Regular Meeting

change. So they get the whole department. Yeah. Is that why they're here? Yeah. So it's for the swearing in. Okay. Let's go. Let's do it. When is it? I'll be there. [clears throat]

Call to order. Charter Township of Plymouth Board of Trustees regular meeting Tuesday, January 27, 2026, 6:31 p.m. Roll call. Trusty Buckley here. Trusty Clinton here. Supervisor Kermy here. Treasure Dorschitz here. Trusty Growth here. Trusty Stewart here. Clerk Vorba, we have a quorum. All right. 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. [clears throat]

Tonight we have um some recognition of promotions and uh uh in our police and fire department. So tonight we will start with uh the recognition of officer uh Jeff McParlland for his promotion to sergeant. So police chief uh Nitel will kick it off. Thank you, Mr. Supervisor. Jeff, you want to come on up here? [snorts] Sergeant Jeff McParland. Sergeant McParlland is a graduate of the Michigan State University. Go green, Bob. Sure.

And he go [applause] blue.

And he's also Thank you. And he's also a graduate of the Oakland uh county uh police academy. Sergeant McPartland has been an officer with Plymouth Township Police Department for the last 14 years. During his service, he's been a field training officer, evidence technician, firearms instructor, taser instructor, and OC, which is pepper spray instructor. During his career at Puma Township, Sergeant McParlland served as a detective assigned to the Western Wayne Community Response Team or CRT, which was part of the Michigan State Police Criminal Investigations Division. During his assignment with SRT or CRT, excuse me, Sergeant McParlland conducted and participated in over a 100 investigations involving violent criminals, acts against persons, property, narcotics investigations, and organized crimes investigations to include organized retail fraud. 2017, Sergeant McParlland was named our police officer of the year of Plymouth Township. for officer McParlland. Um I can tell you from being his chief for the last three and a half years, uh when times are tough, when we have our our most traumatic incidents, things that are happening in the uh in the township, he's a guy that I want there because he has experience. He makes great decisions. Uh and he's going to be a great leader here as a police sergeant. So, we're excited today. Uh today is a badge pinning ceremony in which uh we will ask Riley to come up to pin his badge. Come on up, Riley. This is his daughter. You give her a round of applause. [applause] Badge pinning ceremony is very significant. I come from a long line of police officers and pinning the badge is very important. Generally, it's a family member that comes and pins the badge. A badge is a sign of authority. A badge is a sign of integrity and professionalism and it's one of the most important

pieces of equipment that we wear. How do we get one of those? [laughter] We don't need no badges. I guess not. [laughter]

You can come closer if you want to get a picture. Okay, let's give Riley a round of applause. [applause] Great job, Riley. Fantastic. Uh, Sergeant McMarland, welcome to the command staff here. We're excited to have you. and uh you can have the mic and say a few words. Riley, you can come on and come up here, too. Please introduce your family as well. Yep. Thank you, Chief.

Thank you, Supervisor Ker and the board. I uh I greatly appreciate this. Uh it's certainly an honor to serve the uh citizens of Plymouth Township. Um I'd like to shine uh spotlight quickly on my family here. uh in the front row, my father John, my mother Barb, my uncle Sean, uh Emily, and the three kids Hank, Audrey, and Stella. Uh I can tell you without a doubt, um without them, this doesn't happen. Um and I think I can speak on behalf of everyone in the back of this room. Uh without a good support system, um we are not able to do what we do on a daily basis. So, um I'd like to take this opportunity to thank them. Um secondly, everyone, if you haven't already, if you take a look at the back of the room, um today you're surrounded by probably some of the highest trained, highest educated, and highest level professionals uh in first responders, police, and fire. Um I'm honored to be able to have this position and work with these guys and girls every day. So, uh, thank you again and, uh, everyone drive safe and, uh, God bless. Thank you. [applause]

Thank you, Mr. Supervisor. So, uh, we have a new firefighter that, uh, excuse me, we have a a firefighter, Mark Bonado, for a promotion to captain. and uh Chief Pat Connley will do the honors.

I shall have uh I always hate going behind my our our brethren at police department. They do such a fabulous job. And uh Chief Nitel is such a great speaker and and Sergeant McFarland. Congratulations. Great job. Um actually Chief, you want to come up too? I just kind of do both at the same time. Also have uh Battalion Chief uh Greg Mangan and as the supervisor said, Captain Mark Montadale. Um, so I just kind of talk, you've heard me talk before about the scramble on our badges, um, which we don't have anymore because we're officers, but the significance of the scramble. Um, after a firefighter becomes an officer, that scramble turns into a bugle. And we call them bugles, but they're actually speaking trumpets, and they're symbolized. Um, back in the old days before we had radios or anything, any electronics or anything, the fire officers would use a big long trumpet to talk to their people to tell them what to do. So, the the bugle uh symbolizes their authority. Um, our first promotion is to captain as as Mark's getting tonight. And that's two vertical bugles on a silver badge is basically symbolizes a company officer. He's in charge of a company or a station. Um, and then when you're promoted to a chief's rank, as Greg has been, next step after captain is battalion chief. Uh, it's two crossed gold bugles on a gold badge. Um, basically the the badge and the bugles, these are the badge is a symbol of the trust the community has placed in you. Um, not only the community, but the department [clears throat] and the personnel you uh, supervise. So, um, as and as my wife always says, I may have five bad five bugles on my collar. She has six. So, um, Mark's going to be pinned by, uh, Jessica Stamatus and, uh, Greg's going to be pinned by his wife Laura

Mangan and friend, I think, maybe. [laughter] You got to ram it in a little. So, I always say make sure they're not mad at you before you do this. No tears. [applause]

Thank you. All right. Congratulations. Now we move to approval of the agenda. Mr. Supervisor. I move for the approval of the agenda for Tuesday, January 27th, 2026. Second. A second by Treasure Dorschitz. All in favor? I. Motion carries.

Approval of the consent agenda. Uh we have these. We will have to vote on some of these resolutions. and some of the people that we're appointing and reappointing, if they are here, we can have them stand up and they can say something if they want. Um, so the zoning board of appeals, we're reappointing [snorts] three people. I think Joe Riley is here. Um, is Paul Fesler and let me turn up here. Schnettler as the John Schnettler as the alternate and then we have Mr. Bennett. Let me turn to the page. Steve Bennett, right?

Yes. Uh as a reappoint. So we already have the only one here is Joe Riley. Um so we need Do we need to vote on that separately or we do one resolution? Just one one vote. One vote for all of these things. Okay. Um, do I have to abstain since I'm one of those things? I don't I don't I don't know. Serriiatum. No, I don't think so. Okay. Just the word is seratum. Siri. Okay. In. Also, we have um an appointment to the planning commission, a new person, Ashley Krueger. Is Ashley here?

There she is. Good. All right. Good to meet you. Uh Ashley has served on the planning commission in Leavonia before and she moved to Plymouth 10 years ago and she wants to serve. She will be uh replacing Dave Ladawick who's done a stellar job and uh we're glad he helped us out. So you can say introduce yourself. Sure, Ashley. And uh take it away. Thank you, Supervisor. Good evening. My name is Ashley. Speak right into the We got to get close.

All right. Good evening. My name is Ashley Krueger and I'd like to thank you for uh the opportunity to be appointed to the planning commission in Plymouth Township. Uh as a brief introduction, as per uh Supervisor Kermy stated, uh my husband and I moved to Plymouth Township about 13 years ago. We came here to raise our family and we love the township. My family's here today in the back row there. Um I I should mention uh also as Supervisor Kermit said uh I lived in the city of Leavonia before coming to Plymouth and there I served on the planning commission for about six years. So I do have experience in this role. Um, from a professional standpoint, I'm a licensed attorney and I currently work for the University of Michigan Health System as their director of real estate and leasing. Real estate is a passion of mine and it's part of my everyday work. So, I bring a lot of experience um to this planning commission role with my legal background, my prior community involvement. Um, I have a lot of experience in real estate, land use, and site planning. Um, and now that my kids are getting older, I felt like it was the right time to get back involved in the community again. And in doing that, I'm committed to supporting the township's vision in a thoughtful and collaborative way. And unless there's any questions from the board, I just want to end by saying thank you uh for this opportunity. I appreciate your consideration and I'm excited to be part of the planning commission in Plymouth Township.

Right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So, did I hear you correctly? 12 years real estate, University of Michigan. Um, I have been with the University of Michigan for over six years. Have you met our friend Dennis Chabolski? 44 years with the University of Michigan. Yeah, it's a it's a large organization. There's a lot of people he's the chairman of the planning commission. Wonderful. He's chair of the planning commission. Excellent. Thank you. He bleeds made amazing blue. All right. Well, then we have a lot in common, a lot to talk about. [laughter]

Thank you. and [clears throat] Sandy Growth. [applause] Sandy Growth will be taking the spot that currently held by Bob Dorvitz as the representative from the township board to the planning commission which is required by law that we have somebody there. All right. So, go ahead. Do you want to say anything?

I I just want to say he just made me feel really important. and it's required by law for me to be here, but I'm [laughter] actually we have to have someone and guess who we have. But I'm actually looking forward to working with the planning commission as we uh there's work going on with the master plan. I'm looking forward to working with with you, Ashley, and I'm looking forward to working with everyone on the commission. I've been involved with the township since 1976, which tells you how old I am, and I'm hopeful that my background and experience and knowledge will help the township as we move forward. Thank you,

Mr. Supervisor. I move for the approval of the consent agenda for January 27th, 2026. This will require because of the uh um number of of uh resolutions that we have a roll call vote. Can I have a second? Second. Second for Trusty Growth. Yes. [clears throat] Trusty Buckley. Yes. Trusty Clinton. Yes. Supervisor Kermy. Yes. Treasure Dorch Shavitz. Yes. Trusty Growth. Yes. Trusty Stewart. Yes. Clerk Borba. Motion carries. Congratulations, everyone. [clears throat]

I I do want to say thank you to Treasurer Dors Chevitz, who's How many years have you been on the planning commission? Forever. How many? 10. Okay. It seems like it's been forever, doesn't it? Yeah. I just want to thank you for your commitment to the planning commission and know that I know how to get to your office, so if I have questions, I know where to go.

All right. Public comment limited to three minutes. Non-aggenda items. [clears throat]

Good evening. Um, first of all, thank you for the work that you all do for our community. Um, my name is Jill and I am a proud resident of Plymouth Township. This summer, I spoke at a township meeting and raised concerns about the increasing number of Airbnbs in our neighborhood, the negative impacts on them, and how Plymouth Township does not have specific laws or regulations governing short-term rentals, including limits to the number of properties, zoning regulations, or business registration requirements. Um, for context, we currently have two on our street with a potential third. Um, I am back today to see what has been done or what can be done. I have spoken to many residents, some of who are here tonight, um, who express my same concerns and hoping for your support and guidance. Um, please help keep Plymouth community wonderful. Thank you for your time. [clears throat]

Thank you. Thank you.

All right. Nobody else. Hi, this is someone. Ashley, is she still here? Yeah, way in the back. Oh, Ashley Krueger. I'm sorry. I was just curious. You You ran a triathlon five times. I have done it, too. Yeah. Me? Me, too. That's crazy. Well, no, actually, no. I just went up and down the stairs three times, so that's pretty good. I did six. [laughter] All right. That's a new record. What's going on?

All right. Next item is uh a new application for uh high-speed fiber optic uh cables running through the township and the service. It's a company called Easy Fiber and it's the Metro uh Jerry Vorva. Well, first of all, is the representative here uh from Sean Perry? Is he here? Oh, good. Okay, please. Great. [clears throat]

Good evening. Get close to that mic. There we go. So, tell us what you're doing, where you're from, where the company's located, and what the plan is.

Fantastic. So, my name is Sean Perry. I uh work for Easy Fiber. Um, I'm our VP of market expansion. Basically, my job is to come to uh find areas like this and do this presentation. So, if you guys have any uh good questions, please stump me because uh I I love a good a good engaging uh board of trustees or city council or you know any city government. So, the more questions you guys can ask uh makes these uh fun for me. So, Easy Fiber is a high-speed internet provider, very similar to what's going on around the nation. Um, we have seen that there are communities across America that don't have access to adequate internet. Uh, we've got cable TV internet, we've got DSL all across the nation not meeting the federally mandated or federal definition of highspeed internet. uh as we look across the nation, we look at what communities could we go into and make a large impact for residents and you know density population centers that don't have access to highspeed internet and you know the suburbs of Detroit, Plymouth Township included, largely meet that definition of areas that have been somewhat neglected by previous internet providers over the last 20 years. And that's what we look to come in and solve by offering symmetrical high-speed internet well beyond the industry average today at a very affordable and attainable price.

What's that mean? [laughter] So while you look across uh companies like AT&T where their high-end products are $2, $300 a month, our highest paid internet package is 110 or 119, sorry. and we enter the market at a symmetrical gig uh at $69 a month which is well below the industry average. So why did you pick this market when there are actually a lot of choices and more coming?

So as we look in the suburbs and and out in this area there are pockets of fiber optic internet but the major provider is two cable companies in this area. Cable companies don't supply a symmetrical bandwidth. So they're they lack an upstream. And as we look to the next two to five years, projections are that people are going to need at least 500 meg upstream. Today that cable product caps out at about 120.

So for uh a consumer would uh use um uh what what am I trying to say here? Sorry, I lost my train of thought. If you're a consumer con, you'd provide content by subscribing to me to streaming services, right? You're not you don't provide content. Correct. We we do not provide the content. We simply provide the the pipeline to get to the internet. And your target [clears throat] is gamers who like high-speed up uploading.

I would tell you our our target audience is anyone and everyone who has an internet connection at home. Um, as the industry moves toward the internet of things and smart devices and photo frames, uh, you know, Alexexas and and Facebook devices where we video conference, you know, if you think back 5 years ago prior to co teams and and Zoom wasn't a thing for most people. And I'd be willing to bet that almost everyone in this room's probably been on a Zoom call or a team call of some sorts in the last two to three years. And that's really where that upstream is coming for the future is how do we make sure people stay connected for not just the technology they have in their homes today but what's coming in the next five to 10 years.

What kind of bandwidth are you looking at to the home? So our entry level product is a gigabit up and down and today we max at eight. We have a road map to go to 40. Uh but that's probably about another year maybe two down the line. Yeah, there was a time when somebody, you know, it just the numbers just keep going up and up. Absolutely. But my refrigerator will tell me when I'm low on beer. So, [laughter] uh, these are good things. And I want to give you the, uh, opportunity to safely Door Dash more to your house.

So, I I have two questions. Number one, what are you doing as backup power when we have a a system outage? So I'll I'll take that from two different ways. Uh one would be the actual system redundancy as far as network connectivity. So everything in our network up to a cabinet level is diverse through at least two or three paths. Meaning that we can take at least one fiber cut anywhere in the network and not lose more than a neighborhood. Um the power piece of that uh solely focusing on commercial power. All of our sites, we use a newer battery technology. It's lithium iron. And in a environment like this where we're not trying to put in an air conditioner, uh it'll keep power up for 24 to 36 hours. And if we start hitting that upper, you know, the power outage lasts longer than that. We have a fleet of portable generators that will go out and dispatch in the field to make sure outages are minimal to non-existent. In uh Houston last year, we had uh Hurricane Barrel, which was one of the uh it was a very low hurricane, but caused a lot of damage to the power company's electrical grid. We had 99% service restored the day of the storm because 90% of that was through power outages from the power company.

Back back when uh that area had a big ice storm a few years ago, how did you perform? We we did fantastic um in that market where most of our competitors are in the air. We focused on burying our product that way. We had reliability. You know, our biggest outage comes from back hose uh which are quickly fixable whereas during you know hurricanes or ice events or large scale outages like that you know they they can affect the entire network. So we we plan each market differently and you know with the uh with the challenges of those individual areas in consideration

during this last event here just over the past few days what was your experience? So to be honest with you we do not we are currently in the in the process of deploying across uh the Michigan area. Uh we do have homes in very similar situations throughout the Chicago suburbs and did not take any outages related to uh the cold events. So Jerry, were you referring to what went on in Texas couple days? Well, Texas was February of 2021. Yes. That's when the whole state pretty much went down. Went down. But are you referring to the most recent ice storm in Texas over the weekend? Yes. Right.

Yes. Luckily, we didn't get the freezing rain we were predicting, but it was definitely the fear. Um, aerial networks are very susceptible to to ice. Uh, and that's one of the biggest reasons that we focused on underground where we can. Um, again, we're going to focus in a market our our number one goal is is is speed and reliability. Because if I come into a market like this and I say, "Hey, I'm going to be different than your current provider." and I'm not different than your current provider, then all your constituents are going to leave me after they sign up and go back. And that's that's really what we want to avoid is we want to be different by providing a superior service.

So, these lithium ion batteries, where will they be mounted? So, those batteries are in our cabinets. Um, cabinets are about the size of an electrical transformer. They serve about 8,000 homes a piece. Uh, so they they they serve a pretty large area, but grade at ground level or on a pole. The cabinets are actually above ground. Um we'll put those in industrial areas or areas where there's already traffic c cabinets or something that that's large. Again, one per every 7500 to 8,000 homes. And we'll work with planning and zoning and rightaway departments to make sure those go in proper locations,

not somebody's front yard or something. There seems to be a a a resurrection or a uh a new push uh towards fiber networks. Um kind of like there was in the early 2000s. It seems to be uh uh a popular thing and obviously there's got to be money behind it. Why do uh why does the industry think that um fiber will be will be uh preferred to 5G wireless networks?

So great question. Uh 5G wireless works fantastic on your phone. Uh we we can't deny that it works great in areas where there's not congestion. But at the airport or at any sporting event, there are thousands of 5G transmitters in any NFL stadium because the congestion on wireless just doesn't work. Yes. Go into fairgrounds where you normally might have 10 people, you get great service, put 2,000 in there and that service really goes downhill. And where fiber excels with that is it's an individual line to each home. It's not shared bandwidth. What's yours is yours and what's your neighbors is your neighbors.

What are the health concerns? Really none. Um I mean fiber is a innate product. There's no electromagnetic interference. There's no radio frequency coming off of it. It is simply blinking lights. The worst thing that could happen with fiber is you go out in the front yard and cut the line in half and try to stick it in your eyeball. But as as long as you don't do that or, you know, don't don't eat it or something. Um, there's there's no innate uh health concerns with fiber optics. Will these be your lines or will you be using somebody else?

100 I shouldn't say 100%. 99.5%. We do lease upstream connectivity um back to data centers in Detroit back to data centers and Chicago. That way we're not trenching from here to Surerac in Chicago. But outside of that everything will be owned by us. Sure you have all your tees cross and it absolutely going through us and it's it's been a nightmare.

Yeah, that that's we've had a ve I'll just interject here. had a very bad experience with one of your competitors over the last year and it's cost us over $50,000 in staking requests because we're doing it over and over again. In fact, we're going to investigate charging that back and we hopefully if we can we'll do it to you too if you make us do it two and three times. You need to review with our take this back to our to your engineering people.

Just because you have a Wayne County rightaway permit does not mean you can operate you can dig up or trench or tunnel in Plymouth Township. It must be approved by Plymouth Township Engineering to ensure that we have at least 12 in away from our 10 ft. There's a specification for our sewer and water lines, right? AB:

Absolutely. And we I I know the company you're referring to. I I will tell you two things. My engineering department is 100% stateside. All of our engineering is done in America. All of my permitting is done in America. Um that might be the contrary with other providers in the area. Um, beyond that, each individual township in Michigan has a different set of permitting requirements. Um, we we spoke with the counties first and went through their Metro Act, which is more of just a a checkbox to your point because very very few roads in in this state are actually maintained by the county. They're all at least in this area maintained by by townships and that's exactly

ours are maintained by the county but I'm sorry the rideway not not the roads the rideway is maintained by the the townships. So the uh so your uh fiber optic cable is going to go in its own conduit. Yes sir. Um so how do so you do a lot of horizontal drilling? Yes sir. Um okay. And what uh um shoot I was going to ask you another question. Uh what why I'm just curious. It's it's synchronous up and down the service. Yes sir.

Why do you guys think that's important to have high bandwidth upstream? I I think as more and more people put simple devices, ring cameras in their house, um anything that requires communication with the outside. I I know my my house in uh Indiana, I could have a a whopping two Ring cameras on the house because if I had three, the video just didn't upload. And and that's small bandwidth. But as we look forward to the future, um the NFL is is test triing some technology where you're going to be able to put on a VR headset and watch the game sitting in your living room. You know, whatever game you want, sit down, look this way, look that way, see the field and and the bandwidth on that is going to be massive. When you're uh installing all this cable, I mean, we have and most communities have regulations about when construction can be done. Uh we certainly don't want construction done after a certain period at night or before a certain period in the morning. So to make sure that we don't have any kind of disturbance

absolutely to residents. You're aware of that. Yes. And and I I will tell you I cannot quote your exact rules, but as we work with your rightway and permitting department, all that gets clearly printed on the top of our construction drawings that go out to crews um on all of our permit drawings. you know, work regulated this time to this time and any special constraints or notifications that you guys have will be printed directly on all of those packets. [clears throat] Any more questions from the board? I asked you all those questions just because I was curious because I used to work in that business.

Oh, awesome. I would I would just like to verify with our attorney that the paperwork in terms of the insurance policies and have you reviewed all of those and ensured that they are in compliance with what our needs are or are we not at that point yet where we're

we are not at that point yet. Um I sent an email on December 16th to Don Trevino. I guess now she's known as Dawn Villa. And I told her of the deficiencies in the certificate of insurance, specifically the policies or the insurance policy that uh she sent to me expired on January 1, 2026. I asked her to change that to be current. Also, because they're going to be doing underground drilling, they have to provide what's called XCU coverage um an amount not less than $10 million. um XCU coverage has to be specifically listed on the certificate of insurance to be effective. Um and it basically pertains to underground drilling. Uh also the certificate of insurance has to provide um or provides that the additional insured are covered only when there's a written contract. This is not a contract per se. It's a permit. So I suggested language to put on the certificate insurance. Uh it was substantially more comprehensive than what they had and I also asked for uh certificates of insurance for the construction contractor which is GAC Enterprises. The other thing is the township could uh uh demand a performance bond or a letter of credit which is allowed under the Metro Act in case another issue that happens or like the prior one I think it was Ripley um they go rogue on us we can make a claim on the right

the uh performance bond or letter of credit. So when we get a administratively complete um certificate of insurance and insurance policies then the 41 45day approval period will begin to run. Right now they are not administratively complete and therefore the clock is not running. So so so this approval will be subject to that. Absolutely. Thank you very much. So you will take that message back?

Absolutely. Um, a point on that. I would highly encourage a performance bond in addition to COI to exactly what your council said that it it gives you better protections should a fiber company or any company go rogue. Um, we do performance bonds with probably 80% of the municipalities that we do work in. So, very very used to that. And take off my company hat for a second. I I would recommend it for any city for protection

from the audience. Any questions or comments from the people in the audience? You got to come to the [clears throat] podium and speak into the microphone clearly. Hello Mary McLaren. Uh Mark Trail. Um the question or the comment you made, Chuck, answers my question about the previous fiber company. What has happened to them? Um kind of question. I'm not sure. I was trying to overlay the maps. Is is the drawings they have here going to cover all residential in the township? Is it going to be doing any for business? Go ahead. You can answer that.

Absolutely. B. The question is whether it's business and residential. It is both. Step up. Get up there close. It is both. Uh we intend to cover both residential and commercial as well as small business locations. So then this map isn't really accurate. Where's that map? Is that map was in the board packet? It was part of the packet board packet. Yes, it was part of the packet. So I was just curious where it looks like you go through every neighborhood in the packet. Here's industrial, but then there's spots here. You You're running past every house. Thank you.

Right here, Mary Tavverzi, Arboritum Circle. Um, your application indicates you're a Texas-based company and your closest office, I believe, is Chicago. So once um the fiber optics have been installed, uh what local um contractors will you have in place to provide immediate service and maintenance? So for example, if a semitr runs into one of your boxes and blows it out, um where is that where where is that coming from and what is the turnaround guarantee on that?

Absolutely. So, we are a Texas-based company. Um, Michigan will be the sixth state that we are deploying into. Uh, we currently have active operations in um, Texas, New Mexico, Washington, Oregon, and Illinois. Michigan is number six. Uh, at the moment, we are Metroact approved in I want to say about 25 areas of 25 of your neighbors. We have active design going on uh throughout that area and have begun permitting and received multiple permits across a few municipalities. When the ground thaws in uh who knows this year,

I was going to say April, but you know, between March and April when we start seeing thaw this year, then that's when we intend to hit the ground running with with construction. Right in front of that, uh we're in the process of negotiating a lease on uh three different locations in uh on the west side or the north side of Detroit. Um they're they're trying to finalize exactly where that's going to be. Uh we officially have three employees uh in the suburbs right now. We have a construction manager, sorry, a director of construction, a field op supervisor, and an operations manager. And that team is being tasked with um building up that infrastructure so that by the time we do start construction and go live there is a uh full crew stationed you know within 30 miles of any given place uh that we'll have customers. Our expectation is from time of order to time of install is never more than two days and from any trouble ticket we aim for same day resolution. Of course there is a cut off for that. you know, if you call at 9:00 at night, it might be in the morning. But, you know, for outages, we dispatch 24/7. And for single customer issues, um, we always aim for same day.

So, when do you expect [clears throat] to go live? We expect to break ground, maybe not in this township, but we expect to break ground in the area March or April, uh, with first customers in Michigan coming online late April or early May. By by May, um, by the time we go live, we should have about 45 to 55 employees um, in this area. Well, you'll be putting signing up customers that quick, huh? AB:

Absolutely. We we toy back and forth with do we prolong construction or do we get in a neighborhood and get out? And [music] we have found that for the most part doing smaller batches of construction quicker is less intrusive and and while it may be a little bit more intrusive for one or two days, it's better than prolonging the period for plus you generate cash flow. There's there's the financial piece of it as well. Yeah. [snorts] Thank you. Absolutely. All right. So, we're are we ready for a motion? And the motion has the contingency on the attorney and the certificate of insurance.

Yes, Mr. Supervisor. I move to approve resolution 2026-01-27-9 to grant the Metro Act permit application submitted by EZ Fiber for the term of 5 years subject to final approval of the township attorney of the certificate of insurance and performance bond. Second for Clinton. Okay. Clerk Vorbetta, yes. [clears throat] Supervisor Kermy, yes. Trusty Stewart, yes. Trusty Clinton, yes. Trusty Growth, yes. Trusty [clears throat] Buckley, yes. Treasure Dorchez, yes. Motion carries. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you.

All right. Next item is uh the fire department purchasing medical equipment. And that'll be explained by uh Chief Connley, our [snorts] fire chief. Okay. Bob define the file for me here. This is uh good evening board. Um coming to seeking approval for the EMS plus program. Could you get that a little bit closer to you?

Yeah. Looking for the approval for the EMS plus program that we uh placed in the budget last year for this year. Um Bob can find a PowerPoint here. Just a very brief PowerPoint. I can talk through it, but I wanted to give you a visual. Also, tonight we have with us uh Jamie Smith from Striker. She's our representative. So, if there's any questions I can't handle, I'm handing them to her.

What do you want? The PowerPoint should be a PowerPoint loaded on the laptop, but I don't know what that means when they say loaded. I have two PowerPoints tonight. the one for the EMS plus and then uh 1,117,000 uh looks like I got it five years. Nope, that's the budget. Um that's the goal. Yeah, it's a it would be it says page it's page 125 in your packet if you want to follow. That's the annual report. That's my annual report.

We'll need that later. So the other ones striker stuff. Yeah, yeah, it should say EMS plus. I can't right here. Yeah.

Close. I think it's a Lori says it's after the resolutions and stuff. I think 125. She said this 121 right there. Two, three, four. There. Here we go. Okay, I got a little bit sideways. [laughter] Everybody needs to lean left. Rotate her now without messing everything up.

Okay, I'll just uh go from the the hip here. uh you should all have it in your packets in front of you. Um we're looking to uh with this this is a program from Striker that allows you to purchase um several pieces of equipment in in mass. Oh, thank you, Bob. Um so with the purchasing program, we're going to be replacing 22 pieces of equipment of EMS equipment. Um that's the LifePack 35 defibrillator. We're actually upgrading from a Lifepack 15 to Life 35. This is the state-of-the-art defibrillator uh monitor defibrillator that's out there now. Um, we will be replacing our Lucas devices, which is our our manual or mechanical CPR devices, and we actually will be adding two to the fleet, which I'm I'm really happy for that. Um, we also will be uh upgrading our stair chairs, which are 24 years old, I believe. Um, they've been around as long as I've been on the department, so they need to be replaced. Um and we're upgrading those to a power chair which is significant about that is um not if if you have someone in a basement for instance you can power them up the stairs on the chair rather than carrying them which can be really precarious and rather dangerous for our personnel. [snorts] Um then in addition we're going to have two uh three power pro two stretchers and the power load uh loading device. That's what secures the stretcher in the ambulance and actually lifts the the ambulance um the stretcher into the ambulance and secures it as well. Um these have been a game changer changer in our industry. Not just the power load or the uh power CS but the power loads. Um they reduce injuries significantly because we're not a lot of times you have to kind of do a like a a squat and a not a good motion to get that caught into the into the truck. with the power load, it eliminated that. Um, so I say it's 22 pieces of equipment. Currently, we have 11 pieces of equipment that are at the end of their service life. Um, it's going to

standardize our equipment across the fleet. So, we won't have one monitor on one truck, a different one on another, a different chair here, a different stretcher. Everything's going to be the same. Um, it's also really big for me. It streamlines maintenance. I have all sorts of different contracts with them now that is different. Like, you know, if something breaks, I don't know what's under contract. I have to go digging it. this everything's going to be under contract while we own it and and quite frankly it's going to improve patient care. Um maybe you can go to the next one please. So now is some of this replacement of existing similar equipment or some of this brand new?

It's all brand new. Um but yes it is it is replacing some of it's yes and yes. Um the monitors are totally new. Um everything else is basically the latest generation of that item. We've had power loads for five more than that, probably seven years now. Okay. Um we've had power CS for 20 plus. We've had stair chairs for 20 plus, but the power the power power chair is an improvement. Um we're adding two Lucases to the fleet from we have three now. We're adding two. And actually one of our Lucases was down today being serviced. And we're That's the CPR machine, correct? Yeah.

So, just to clarify, some of this is replacement and some of it is incremental. Yes. And we're only we have four ambulances, but we're only purchasing three CS and three power loads because Rescue 3 is only two years old and it has a new a new unit in it. So, that's why we're only doing three. I'm sorry, I didn't understand it. So these these 22 pieces Yep. they're going to be all brand new. Yes. So nothing will be old. Everything will be brand new except for the cat and the power load system in rescue 3 which is 2 years old.

Okay. All right. I know we understand. I mean for the budget in this year I understand it but do we have to do it all this year or I mean to get all this brand new acquainted we have to do it all. They have this the purchasing program that they have. It's it's going to be a million dollars essentially up by the end of the we have to approve the million dollars tonight because of the way the budget the finance department says it has to be done. And then we're going to make five payments of it's on the next slide there. Bob, if you can get it this 200 218 I think it is. Yeah. But the equipment is all being taken delivered in 2026.

Right. We get all the stuff at once but we're pay it's a payment plan. We're paying it off over five years. So over by the end of the the term, so we initially um budgeted $1,117,100 and we actually came in um $24,210.95 under that at um19 $1,92,8895. Um so it' be five year five payments of 21857781. Um, and the principal of the loan will be uh uh1,27,676.34. So the the total the 1,92,000 that's interest included. That's what we will be paying over the term.

About when do you expect the first payment due? Jamie, you're here. Um, well, you guys will tell me when you want it shipped and then we'll ship it and then 30 days from the day that the final piece of equipment delivers. So, if you want it all showing up, let's say in March and April, you want it all showing up in February, we're shipping probably within the 30day window right now. So, you'll have a little bit of once you've signed and agreed to this, you guys have some flexibility of when you want to choose to take delivery, but we have kind of fall on right now. So, I would say sooner than later, sooner than later. Um, but probably our April time frame, I would say do standard delivery.

So, this math didn't quite work for me. The 65,000 is the annual interest payment or that's the total amount of interest paid over the life of the installment purchase. That is I have it right in front of me here. Hang on one second. Looks like that would be the 65 is the total total over the five years. So at the end of five years when this is all paid for where what is going to be the condition of the equipment? I mean what is what is the plan? What are you thinking in terms of So the the vision would be we we we own it in 5 years, we replace it in seven. Okay.

So we'll have two years of owning it free and clear, but it will still be under warranty, which is huge. That's the biggest part of this. Um and then you would hopefully this program is still around in seven years. You enter back into the program again and replace. It's going to be a cycle you're going to be place, but we own it free and clear for two years. Okay. Striker is a Michigan company based in Kalamazoo. So that's a positive home. Oh god. Yes. Do you Are you the representative from Striker? I am. Did you come over from Kalamazoo? I did not. [laughter] I Okay. Would you explain the macro picture here of Striker?

Yeah. Like who we are or You got to come up here. I'm a west I have some roots on the west side of the state so I'm well acquainted with how striker how wonderful Striker is. Yeah. I mean efficient and quality stuff.

Yeah. That's great. Well, I am also from the other side of state originally. I am interestingly enough a township resident. So I live here now. Yep. So I am a resident. So I uh um everybody gets great deals for me. Plymouth probably gets a little bit better deals cuz I live right in town. So, I will say when it comes to EMS plus, you guys have ran one of the I have 25 of these departments in the state of Michigan that have done this program and you guys probably have the most fiscally responsible one that I've done. So, um with the help of working with a few of you on this project, but Striker is a Michigan-based company out of Koo, Michigan. We were started in the basement of I think it has a new name today but what was Borges Hospital uh family ran by a doctor who wanted to make medical equipment better and today we bridge we're a global company um so I am I'm obviously the most probably recognizable area of Striker because we sell hips and knees and beds and all sorts of equipment and I sell the yellow stretcher that you see at Lions football games. So that's typically what everyone knows of Striker. So I grew up in Kazoo. I've worked for the company for about 13 years and I've been here in Plymouth for the last nine taking care of the fire EMS space. So, a little bit about Striker, great company. They've been involved in the Kazoo promise. A lot of great projects here in Michigan and it's pretty awesome. Every yellow stretcher you see in the world, here's your random note I'll give for you for the day about Striker is made in Kazoo, Michigan. So, everyone in the world comes out of Kazoo. I

I'm acquainted with Spike Striker and I think this is a positive story. How How did this come together? the this project that we're doing. Did you approach the chief? Did the chief come to you? Yeah. So, I take care of the current equipment you guys have today. So, the equipment that broke. I am the rep that covers Wayne County in the bottom quarter of Oakland.

This program really took off. Let's see. At the summer of 2024 is when it started. And what's awesome about this for you guys and for communities, like I said, most of my departments are changing to purchase this way is because instead of you trying to have the ups and downs of budgeting and price increases happening in that time period, we've found in partnership and me learning a lot about how fire departments and townships like to work in cities that we um can basically lock in price with minimal interest, get you guys best-in-class products for the community, which I live here, so I care extra about CPR devices that he's getting that today you guys don't have enough that would probably get to my town. Um, so Chief and I met, we we uh spent some time kind of coming up with what made the most sense for you guys and and now we're presenting it to you today.

I'm curious to know, do you you just deal with municipal uh fire EMS or do you also deal with private? I deal So I'm Wayne County and Oakland and I deal with both. So, depends on the customer and what they need. There's a bunch of reps in Michigan. Um, but yeah, I'll take care of both. So, PrivateMS, I like your guys' private MS locally with HVA. I was their rep. Now, we have somebody based out of Ann Arbor that's taking care of them, but I covered them for a long time. So, they have the same type of equipment. They do. You guys will have a few pieces of equipment that are a bit more advanced than what they have. Um, which is a good thing. H but all of this will have compatibility with the equipment that they're running and they will be familiar with it.

And and I just want to reiterate that because it's really important. We have three fire stations, different squads and having the same type of equipment universally is huge because staff goes from one station to another. They're assigned on different days and for everyone to be familiar and comfortable with with what is there is very very important. You don't want to be figuring out that, oh shoot, it's this monitor I haven't seen in two years. Oh, what do we do with this

in the middle of the night? Yeah. And and to Jamie's point though, the one device that we have is the the Lucas device is an absolutely amazing machine. I've been in this business for 35 years, over 35 years now. And the CPR saves we are seeing now are astronomical. And I 100% attribute it to the Lucas device. um that unfortunately with a company like HVA, they just their fleet is so huge, it's hard for them to put a $15,000 device on every unit. They don't have them, right? So, they rely on on the municipalities to to provide them. Um but that is that is a it has literally been a game changer.

And I just have one more question. Um, and and I don't expect you to know the answer to this, and I'm not sure anyone here knows the answer, but uh, like the police department has their forfeite funds, the federal and state and that type of thing, and then it's specified as to how they can spend it. Do does the amount of money that we collect from um, transport, is that earmarked to go towards these type of things or where does it go? General fund. fund. It goes to the general fund because the township the township funds some of the police and fire department budgets from the general fund.

Right. Their millages do not pay for the their entire operation. They're earmarked millages. Right. I understood that. I just wondered. And this has been the case for probably 35 40 years. It's not a new thing. I I was just wondering because I was thinking that because we know this is a constant um being able to set aside portions of money for this in future years might be helpful and one is attributable to the other and that's why I asked the question though indirectly we're doing that by doing a loan and that the interest rate is pretty favorable at 3%.

Yes. So that's about that's more than what we excuse me that's less than what we earn in the bank for our uh fund balances. Okay. Ready for a motion? Yeah. Well, wait a minute. We have some question. You got to come up front here. Well, I still just before you go. What is there an option to buy versus lease? Oh, this isn't a lease. We are buying. Is there an option?

There's an option to lease. Yes. We as a municipality, the supervisor and the finance director and I discussed it and we decided that purchasing is a better um the lease option is a lease where there's like a dollar buyout at the end, but for the finance side, it's the finance director really didn't like that. Well, there's some residual value to owning it. Um and also the interest rate being so cheap relatively low compared with Yeah, that's why we chose cost of capital. So,

hi, I'm Vicki Denhouse. I'm a resident in Lakeland. Is that right? Anyhow, so the equipment, all of it wears out in seven years. The Yes. The useful the useful life is seven years. And basically, this is all medical grade equipment. And that's why the the FDA basically warranties it for that amount of time. Once you get out of that lifespan, it's it's it shouldn't be be really used. Well, that that's what I that's a good point. Is the equipment our existing equipment which will be taken out of service? Yes.

Where does it go and can it be redeployed to places, foreign countries or whatever that something's better than nothing?

Yeah. Yeah, that's a great question. So, some of it depends on the age of the equipment, what we do with it. You guys have some pretty old stuff that you've been running. So, if we feel like to to um to township supervisor Kermy's point, if we are um sending them to places where we don't see it would be safe for them to have it, we're not going to do that. If we think there's still safety and use in it, that makes sense. Then then we'll be able to use it. So, it's like a very like my great answer for you because a 20some year old stair chair, we don't want to run the risk that we send it somewhere and then it falls apart on somebody and now they've got a worse issue, right? we drop somebody going down the stairs. But we do have donation programs that we'll do for certain equipment should it be deemed safe if that makes sense.

20 years old. Yes. Yeah. I think you 20 20 22 years old. So those right away will be great to get out of there. More questions on that? We try to milk the last penny out of our capital. Yeah. Yeah. So the old ones lasted 20 years even though they're in bad shape and the new ones are only going to last seven. Yeah. So realistically, I mean,

you shouldn't have kept in 20 years. They've been being ran at risk and I guess it's a bet that has turned out okay. However, it's not a great idea because if you run the risk of whether it's liability, injury, a lot of things that can happen. So, actually, the FDA will tell you that you should replace things in five years. We've pushed it and done testing to that seven-year mark to be able to help you guys out and to help our customers out. So, it's more realistic for them. It it's a I this is my judgment. It's a little bit like the food that you buy where it says sell by Best Buy. It [clears throat] It's not going to kill you to eat it when it's past that date. Who's that? You're not tested. [laughter] Wait. Yeah, but I don't want the expired pass by date. [laughter] [clears throat]

Oddly enough, eggs are never dated. I don't see dates on eggs. Eggs are dated. Yeah, they're code. I buy mine from the farmer. [clears throat] Okay, you ready to

ready for a motion? Go ahead. I Mr. Supervisor, I move that the board of trustees does hereby adopt resolution number 2026-01-27-10 to utilize the Striker EMS plus program to purchase EMS CS, power load C restraint systems, cardiac monitors, Lucas CPR devices, and stair chairs through the Striker EMS plus purchase program from Striker Incorporated. ated for a cost not to exceed $1,117,100.

Second. Second for growth. Clerk Vorva. Yes. Supervisor Kermy. Yes. Trusty Growth. Yes. Treasure Dorchez. Yes. Trustee Stewart. Yes. Trusty Clinton. Yes. Trusty Buckley. Yes. Motion carries. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. Go ahead. Um, one more question. We don't really have an economic development director. Um, in Plymouth Township, somebody um, if this is the first I'm acquainted with Striker, okay, with Westside Roots and Medical Family Roots.

Okay. [clears throat] Um, welcome. [snorts] Would you be willing to host a healthc care forum here? Would you be willing to be involved in the community and have it something that Plymouth Township puts on? Yeah. Um, I want to welcome you. Thank you. Because I know what the capacity is of outreach from Striker of Kazoo. Yeah. I mean, I go way back. Well, we'd love to talk to you more about it. Actually, myself. So, there's three striker reps at least that I know of that live in the town. Hang on a minute. You came out of Kalazoo. You've been here 9 years and you are the Wayne County rep for striking.

I am the Wayne County rep. Okay. Will you go to lunch with Supervisor Kermy? Yes. Go ahead. And and let's let's put on a healthcare form. I'd love to do that. Yeah. And and and I mean we have a fire chief and a police chief or who are educated guys and and and uh we got Henry Ford right across the street. But I I want to welcome Striker. Oh, that sounds great. Thank you. Like I said, there's quite a few of us living in the township, so that'd be great. Okay, cool. Thank you.

Now, we're going to move on to the annual reports of three departments, and we're going to take the building Oh, I thought he wanted to go first. We'll take the building department first. So, go ahead. Let's get started. Ten McDonald, our chief building official, uh will give his and then we'll go to we'll take them a little out of order. We'll go to fire. Well, that's order. Fire is next. Go ahead. All right. Real quick, thank you board for having me here today. Just want to give a brief summary of uh uh our building department, what we do, and where we've been in the uh 2025. Uh my name is Ken McDonald. Pull that a little bit closer.

Yep. Uh my name is uh Ken McDonald. I've been with the uh building department now for uh little over 10 years. Um six years as a building official or sorry, six years as a building inspector, plan reviewer. Uh four last four years as the uh building official. Uh just a little brief thing, I've lived in Plymouth for 61 of my 62 years. Um so this community is home and uh uh that perspective of being here for 61 years kind of helps me guide my decisions and what I do here. So, uh, I definitely have the best interest, uh, when things, uh, for Plymouth Township and and what what goes on here. Uh, I want to give a little brief summary of of of my staff here. Um, real fortunate. Uh, we have a small but exceptional team and I'd like to recognize the people who make our department uh, function as effectively as it does. Uh, Carolyn and Jenny are my uh, uh, truly my engines of our office. Uh they process every uh building permit and every inspection request that we have here in the township. Uh they organize and prepare all materials for the zoning board of appeals. Uh they coordinate the workflow for every construction project here in the township. Uh they track timelines, they communicate with contractors and residents. Uh and they keep the department on schedule and running smoothly. Uh they manage an extraordinary extraordinarily uh large volume of work with professionalism, accuracy, calm demeanor, and they set the tone for our whole building department. Uh my building inspector, in-house building inspector is Brett. Uh he does all of our commercial, I'm sorry, our residential plan reviews and does all of our residential inspections. Uh he has over 30 years building experience. He's built over 800 homes in his career.

Um, so construction from the ground up. He's invaluable. Uh, he is now expanding his expertise into the commercial side of this. Uh, hopefully one day to transition into this position hopefully as building official down the road when I tend to when I step when I step out. Um, our trade inspectors, our mechanical, our heating, uh, our plumbing, uh, they're all very experienced people in their fields. They are outside contractors for us. Uh they have a deep knowledge in every aspect of all their trades. Uh all of them have been business owners uh for many many years and uh like I said they uh they know everything uh regarding their trade and uh there's no questions out there in the field of uh the quality of work that they're going to do. Um a little brief thing, our our building department also handles ordinance. Uh uh Dan Atkins is our ordinance officer. Uh Dan is a retired firefighter here from Plymouth Township. He has the exact temperament that you need to be a ordinance officer because uh uh he runs across a lot of situations out there where people aren't real happy to uh see him coming and and and and talking about issues they may have here in the township. Uh he handles every job with professionalism, grace, and our community is better because of it. Uh in addition to uh uh running the building department, I assist because of my knowledge uh in in building. I assist with uh uh with the facilities here. Uh I help with the senior center, I help with township here. Uh anytime we have projects throughout, whether it be at our fire stations, um they always ask for my assistance when it comes to the construction projects uh throughout the township and our facilities. um stepping into some of the activities and accompl accomplishments from our uh

from our department. Uh this past year we uh we issued more than 3,500 permits here in Plymouth Township. Uh we did over 7600 uh inspections. Uh and we're on track this year to meet or exceed that uh uh uh those numbers. Um, when it comes to new construction, in this past year, we had 287 new homes begin here in the township. Uh, we had six new commercial buildings uh, break ground here in 2025. Uh, some of the visible growth that you're seeing through here is, uh, the new Meyer project out on, uh, out on Five Mile and Beck. Uh, we got the Plymouth Walk, which is going on right next door here. The St. John Town Homes on uh on Sheldon Road are breaking ground, getting ready to go. Uh over on Schoolcraft Road, we have Virginia Tile uh which just got occupancy here within the last month. Uh we have the new Plymouth Flex Space, which is going to be going next to them, which is going to be a a unique industrial flex space. Uh it's going to be kind of unique, especially to Michigan. It'll be the first one of its kind here in Michigan. Um, a little less visible is throughout the township we have had, I want to say it's $28 million last year in renovations in our industrial and our commercial properties throughout the township. Uh, some of the notables are uh, uh, uh, Freudenberg, AVL, Delta, Adiant, Orlicon over on Concept Drive has got a big renovation going right now. Uh the Burrows project has been a project since I've been here uh going on for almost 10 years. It's absolutely beautiful inside. There's many different companies running out of the Burrows project. Um we also have, you probably don't know, we have a Plymouth pickle ball which opened up in our industrial parks. We

have a youth soccer training facility which opened up in one of our industrial facilities. We have a baseball and softball training facility which opened up uh in the township. Uh like I said, there's the visible ones that you're seeing, but uh there's a lot going on in the industrial and the in the commercial areas which is bringing uh uh they're bringing the employees back. I'm seeing it every day. Uh this hybrid thing and everybody working from home, which is is still going to be here for a long time. Uh but these companies are all investing a lot of money to bring p people back to work and make actually the work atmosphere. They're adding gyms. They're adding uh not not typical just lunch rooms that you have to go eat your lunch. They're actually putting kitchens and everything inside these things for the for the uh employees to come back to. Um just uh I said we've been very very busy. I I have a uh there's Bob's got a small little PowerPoint up there which um it just kind of reflects some of the numbers of that I that I threw out there for the new homes being built for the uh I want to say we did $2.4 million last year in permit fees for building. Um so there's a lot going on here in Plymouth Township. There's a lot of changes happening. Um my opinion all for the good so far. uh as long as it's controlled. And uh uh like I said, I've been here for 61 years. I started off when Beck Road was a dirt road. Hilltop Golf Course was nine holes. Um seen many many changes here over the years and nothing is telling me that I'm moving because of these changes. So

So how are the apartments over in the Elks uh coming along? They're coming along great. Uh they are going really fast. Uh we're on our first rough inspection of the uh the first building they call building number eight. It's 36 units. Um, we're just starting our first rough inspection. Are any of the town houses occupied yet?

Yes, there are. I think we got probably close to 24 of them sold so far, if I'm not mistaken. Uh, as far as occupied, I want to say at least 10 or 15 are probably occupied. Um, but yeah, both kicking out, putting out a very nice product. The town homes by uh uh the builder there is it's is building a nice product. They've actually uh they started off a little uh a higher end like with basements finished and all that kind of thing and that brought that price point up to like say the 600 range.

They're kind of down the road a little bit further when they're getting further down in some of these units. I won't say they're cheapening them up. They're just not doing the finished basement or or cabinets, you know, to the ceiling in the kitchen. They're shortening them down. They're kind of making them a little bit better price point and getting them like the 450 500 range, I think. But yeah, they're uh the project's coming along well. Right. Uh open any questions? Anything? There's some one one comment is the permit fees. Yes. Stay. We can't use it to hire policemen or firemen.

No, it stays all monies generated from from uh from building permit revenue has to stay within the building department. It's self-sustaining. Yes. So in in a sense you get a little creative. I know our accounting companies you know so say uh uh the treasury department handles a lot of our processing of of you know permit fees and that kind of stuff. So they handle the cash flow uh through ours. The the supervisor do I get doing that? Uh you we we pay some of your guys salaries through our through our department. Uh you know any anybody that touches it assessing we help with assessing.

It's an allocation. and uh it's just it's it's just a way to use some of the funds, but technically the monies generated within the building department support the building department only and they're not can't be used elsewhere. And I was working here when you were doing part-time, you were working for us part-time and doing inspections and I just want to comment on um your your knowledge and and what a great job you do and how nice it's been to watch you grow into your position and in the work that you do for the township. We appreciate it. I tell you, I learned every day. I I enjoy learning something new every day. Um, I've been a licensed builder for 40 years.

I wasn't the big, you know, developer or anything. We just did a lot of remodelings for friends, families, and and and all, uh, word of mouth customers. My brother and I did it for many, many years. I took a little hiatus in a retail business for almost nine years, but I knew I had this trade to fall back on, and I did. When the times got bad, I jumped right back into it. Well, you do a good job. Thank you. Well, I appreciate it. Thank you. Do we have any questions from the board or the audience? Board first. No audience. Thank you very much. Okay, guys. Thank you. Thank you. Hey, Jen left because she's sick.

She left at 7:35. You can record her as ex excused at that time. So, now we will have uh Chief Connley give the annual report for the fire department. I'm back. The most time I've ever spent at this podium in one meeting, I think. Get my presentation presentation straight here. Put away. Oh, and something u Jamie and I neglected to mention um with this Striker program, any business in the community that buys an AED gets it at a discount if they buy it from Striker because we are in an EMS plus program. So, that's an excellent benefit to any business and we strongly encourage uh the ads and businesses. Um, in fact, just across the street, we had a save last year where the um the co-workers saved their their coworker by using a defibrillator. So, um, okay. Uh, so a 2025 annual report for the fire department. Um, as I say, uh, this is our 78th year of, uh, serving the community. Um, we were founded in 1947. Something I actually made sure I put on our new ambulance and our new unit vehicles from now on will say since 1947 as long as I'm at the helm. Um, we in 2025 we ran 365 emergency calls. Uh, which is an average of 10 a day. Um we uh that's actually so when I started in 2001 we covered the city of Plymouth as well and we were running 3,000 calls then we have far exceeded or or we're even now with what we ran with two communities with just the one community.

uh in 2012 when we lost the city of Plymouth um we dropped about a thousand calls and then every year it's just been ticking up and ticking up and ticking up and we're back to the number um that we were running 3600 calls with two communities in 2012. We're right back up to that number again. Um, and of note, we were running that we ran the city of Plymouth with 27 firefighters between the city and the township, and now we're running with 24. And we also had two additional people in administrative roles. Our response data, we had 57 fires in 2025. There was 13 structure fires in the township. Uh, of note, six of them were cooking fires. So, um, maybe we can be a little more careful cooking. I know it can get away from us pretty easy. Uh we had 13 mutual aid structure fires, [cough] 21 vehicle fires. We have been seeing a little bit of an uptick in the next one, the trash and compactor and garbage truck fires. Um part of that I think is from I was talking we have a a large facility on the west side. Actually I was in a a township board meeting one night. They had a fire there and they they shred um documents and what they're telling me is that people are throwing the lithium ion batteries away in recycle bins. it's going through and it's causing a spark and causing these fires. So, I'm not sure if that's the cause of these or just careless smokers or what, but we are seeing an uptick in that.

Chief of the of the 13 mutual uh aid, where were those at? Do you do you have a division on that? Um I don't have it readily available for you right now, but I just kind of clumped everybody everything together for the report. But,

uh majority would be the city of Plymouth. We have automatic aid with the city of Plymouth. Uh Northville Township, Canton Township. We are going to Canton Township for fires a lot more now. And um we did actually have one mutual aid fire that we went to work at in um uh Salem Township last year. They called us. Now we will we will fire mutual aid to Salem Township. We will not medical mutual aid. Um but if they call, we will go and I'll sort it out later as a chief. But u because they can't reciprocate the medical side for us because they're not licensed the same way we are. So you said lithium batteries will cause fire. Can cause fire if they're damaged. Yes. If you put it in like a shredder or So what are people supposed to do with their lithium batteries? They should be recycling them.

Yeah. We accept them. Puma Township does not take lithium ion their batteries back. Only alkaline. Yeah. Um county takes. What's the uh the place that we contract with? PRG on Marman Road. We'll take them. Yeah. And then we often times will have a voucher where hopefully you will take up to 100 pounds to ERG and the county is the one that pays the bill. Yeah. And and of note, if if anyone has lithium-ion batteries, be very careful with them. Um don't don't use your drill battery as a hammer. Um as anyone in construction does, um if it's damaged, get rid of it. I believe Home Depot actually takes them, too. Yes, they do take them.

They take um but these are a big problem for us. We've had a couple fires. We had fire last year. Um the f in the middle of summer, the folks uh snowblower battery just flamed out and and caught fire. So don't leave them plugged in. Once they're done charging, take them off the charger. Um don't that goes for your phones, too. Your phones are have them have them in it as well. So just be very careful with them. Um on the EMS side, we responded to 2369 EMS calls in 2025. Uh 1760 of those patients were transported. Um, HVA did the majority at,28. Uh, we did 532. Um, and then the remainder would have been um cancel or um refusals where people didn't weren't transported by us or HVA. Um, and then we also had 183 motor vehicle accidents last year. Uh, we had 89 hazardous conditions calls. These are your gas leaks, your wires down, um, fuel spills. um that that number is actually down a little bit from before. We run about a 100 calls a year for that, but uh we didn't as I don't remember I don't think we had any major storms in in 2025 like we did in 24 and 23. Um those those 50 call nights will really put that number up when we have a lot of wire downs calls. Um we responded 276 fire alarms. Um

and then on that one well I guess we can talk about it later. just keep going.

Our other calls are they're canceled. Good intent calls. Um that was 396. Kind of a a catch-all uh category that you know, anything we don't can't really categorize well ends up in that good intent call. Um someone smells smoke in a community and we find it to be a campfire or something, you know, open burn that someone shouldn't be having. Um and then 418 service calls. Um they say we have a robust proactive prevention and training program. Our fire prevention division under uh fire marshal Jeff Randall conducted 549 inspections of businesses in the community last year. Um which is he he runs an excellent he does an excellent job running that division of the department. Um he's a oneperson division but he does an excellent job. He has a very good program set up that he hits all the de the businesses on a reoccurring cycle and has them categorized of what gets hit yearly, what gets hit, you know, every other years depending on the business type. As far as training, uh firefighters completed 2015 hours of training in 2025. Um some of the training of note, we did our pediatric advanced life support in 20 uh 25. Um just this week we were completing our advanced life support, our cardiac advanced cardiac life support. We rotate these two courses. So in odd years we do pediatric life advanced life support or PALS and in even years we do advanced life advanced cardiac life support. Uh we did our yearly icewater rescue training. Uh threw a little curve at guys last year and we had some fun with it and we did it at night for a change as opposed to doing the daytime. So we got had a little bit of fun with that one out at Township Park. Uh we participated in University of Michigan survival flight landing zone training which was a very informative class. Uh changing a lot of the ways we're going to um operate landing zones. We don't land a lot of helicopters here but we'll be prepared for it when they do. Uh we also did the emergency vehicle driving program. Uh you may have seen all the cones set up

at Township Park where we set up a few hundred cones and uh we all the um members of the department went through it uh with a ladder truck and then uh also Northville Township partnered with us on that one as well and they brought their new ladder truck up for it. Turned out to be an excellent place to do it. Uh we also had high fidelity EMS training with the Oakland Community College uh trailer they have. Um, that was something that was set up by one of our firefighters who's EMSIC, Richie Yinman. Um, we also did uh electric vehicle extrication training as well. We got three brand new electric vehicles or hybrid vehicles from Ford Motor Company to cut apart and uh look at them and see how they're different from regular vehicles. Um, the smoke detector program seems to be tapering off a little bit. Was really he heavy in the first part of the year. We're doing about six a month now, but we installed 200 almost 250 smoke detectors in homes through the township last year. It's a free program through the uh state fire marshall office. They provide us the smoke detectors. We come out and we install them in your home for you. Um on the public education side, we had 37 uh classes provided uh ranging from CPR um fire extinguisher training. We do a lot of those for our businesses in the community. They need it for different certifications. and roughly 3,800 almost 3,900 participants. And our our annual uh fire safety openhouse, we estimated probably about 300 people this year. Um partnered with Trinity Health Leavonia, which was great to have them come out. Um Matt Zamuda, um our firefighter who's in charge of our PR program. He runs the open house now and he uh reached out to St. Mary. They came out. Sorry, Trinity Leavonia. they came out and uh provided 25 bicycle helmets, fitted the kids with for them right there and everything and also 13 gun locks. So, I thought that was a a excellent success. And finally, um I developed the after the fire booklet. I believe I handed those out to you at one

of the previous meetings. If not, I'll get them to you. It's just a book. I've seen this before. It used to come out from the NFPA. Um and basically after anyone who's had a house fire, I hope no one here has ever had one. It's a very traumatic event. And this is just a little handbook about yay thick that just guides you through what you're going to go through what you need to do after a fire. And we I keep a couple of those in in my vehicle. We keep them on the engines. Um as well as we also have a partnership with uh Hilton Garden in to provide lodging for folks who are displaced for at least two nights after a fire. You know, try to get folks on their feet. Um and and this book is designed to help with that as well. Uh the grants uh we still utilizing the turnout grant that's that's um suns setting and then the radio grant. We're still using that waiting for our radios. We're hoping by the end of February. I know it's killing me. And then unfortunately we weren't we weren't granted the safer grant.

Have we received a letter on that yet or it's still still anything? Like I say, one place I see they say they're going to give me a letter and another place I don't. So little disappointed in the whole FEMA system. We paid a professional to do that.

Yeah. And the the the numbers were on track with normal years. In fact, I think they actually had granted a few more this year in Michigan than they they normally do. So, um infrastructure, equipment, vehicle uh improvements. So, we have the uh fire suppression replacement at station 3 that is almost done. Uh the fire alarm system is going handinhand with that. uh fire chief vehicle replacement. Um we also have the new washing machine installation at station one. The supervisor and I work closely on that together. Uh what that was for, we have um what's called an extractor at station one. It's a giant commercial washing machine, but we wash our fire gear in that and it's our fire gear is full of carcinogens and really bad stuff you don't want to wash your uniform clothes in afterwards. So the new standard is to have a standalone just a close washing machine in addition to the extractor. So we installed that at station one. Uh the [clears throat] four new chainsaws that were budgeted last year as [snorts] well as two additional SCBA which um makes sure every vehicle in the fleet now has SCBA in it. That's self-contained self-contained breathing apparatus. That's the bottles we put on our back when we go into fire. [snorts] Um then finally our bricks radio system. uh the the additional bricks box that lets us broadcast our dispatch information over the radio from the bricks computer system. Um special events uh live golf was a riot this year. Um extensive preparation and developed a 13page uh emergency operations plan. It was very educational um but event went very very well. Um the uh we did obviously we did an afteraction review on it and we identified a couple areas of improvement um some some minor tweaks. We're going to do some things but uh make it flow a

little smoother next year. But overall the event was very successful. Uh then last is some miscellaneous notable items. Battalion Chief Jim Harrell retired after almost 30 years in October. Um we thank him for his his dedication and service to the community over that time. And then uh the big one which uh trusty growth pointed out for me last month was the uh we transfer transitioned after almost I think it's been over 50 years the fire service in the United States has been using NFRS as a reporting system and they transitioned to the new system which is nearest um so NFR is the national fire incident reporting system nearest is national emergency response information system

are they managed by the same same people It's just uh one thing Nerus is doing is it's pulling real-time data. So as soon as we're done with the the report, it goes to them as opposed to NFRS. Um once a month, I would have to download a report and send it to them. So now it's automatic and I don't have to do that anymore. So it's a little more real time on what's going on in the fire service in the United States. That's one of the better thing. And they did clean up some of the codes and added more things and subtracted some things that aren't aren't there. So overall, I think in in the long run, it's going to be a good thing. So, uh, open to questions. Yes, sir.

Uh, thank you. Please extend my thanks and our thanks to Matt Zamura for adding exhibits and beefing up the October openhouse. I attended a meeting on Friday statewide on police and firefighter morale. Is that good or bad? I hope it's good. It's not good. No,

it's not good. On December 15, I had a really enjoyable afternoon at the retirement of Jim Herrell at the Elks Club. I'd like to see more of those camaraderie type things. I had my annual beer and I went home and took a nap. But it seemed like most everybody Jim Jury walked up and said, "The first round is on me for everybody." That was the attitude that day. Now, I haven't seen that with the police. I'm sure this chief engenders that kind of spirit, but I I would like to see a little more of that. Yeah. No, no, no. If I have to answer the question, last Friday, the forum on police and fire morale was that they're they're not feeling supported. Their attitudes are not terribly popular. Their attitudes are not up. Okay, I won't say anymore. I I I want to do from a personnel from my background as a personnel I I want to see us I I wish we could do you know a semianual December 15. Now trustee Growth likes to say that he was the perfect male specimen to quote him and and he was a great guy and he's replaced tonight. Uh so um I I think those those things are important.

Thank you, Chief. you you did uh this was very thorough and I appreciate that. It explains a lot of things that people really don't understand anything about. And I was just exposed to something recently where they talked about a Knoxbox and everybody said, "What the heck is a Knox box?" So, I was just wondering if you could tell us that.

Yeah. So, a Knoxbox is um we typically have them in commercial structures and it's a it's a small you'll see it look on next time you go into business. It's a little black box about yay big. Sits on the outside of the business. A lot of time they have a little piece of red reflective tape on them. And what that is is it's a key for that business is locked inside that box and only we have a key for it and it's the key is locked in our trucks and it's it takes it's in a a safe in the truck and it's always secure. And that allows us to um if there's if there's um a fire alarm at a business and we're not seeing anything, we can get in there and see if there's a problem quickly without damaging the building or or causing harm to the building.

It's just it's just another tool that the general public is not aware of things that are any business owner, I strongly recommend getting an Oxbox. Um if I had a business site, I would I would definitely do it. Um they're they're very valuable and they it will prevent damage to your property in the long run. Thank you for the report. Very good. Thank you. So I have a couple of questions. If you look on page 136, there was canceled good intent calls 396 and then service calls 418. Oh boy. And then you have the false alarms was at 276. Is that what that was? I think so. So if you add that up, is that those are fire alarms, not false alarms?

It's fire alarms. Fire alarms. Okay. So let's just take the the intent calls, good intent calls and the service calls. Are they a subset of the 3,65 emergency calls? Yes. Okay. So all these numbers will add up into 3,605. So those calls are about a quarter of the total 36005. the assistant calls. Uh, one of that is um the lift assist that we go on. We go on several lift assists every day. That's not Is that in the service calls? That's in the service calls. Yeah. Okay. So, someone that can't get out of bed or get in bed or or someone who's fall uninjured. Okay.

And a lot of those unfortunately turn into medical calls because the person actually is injured. And this is going to we're really um my office manager Jennifer Bono and I are working on tweaking the new system. the reports aren't we think we've got them lined up so hopefully next month San Die will be there good numbers because they change like the numbers like used to be 300 was medicals

and so like the way the system works is it's 100's are fires 200s are hazardous conditions uh 300 was medical um so they changed all those around and scrambled so now 400 is medical well it was throwing the 400s and the 300s and the 100s together and it was a mess but hopefully we're good Yeah. And the whis the the the bad wisdom of the they didn't change at the beginning December instead of waiting till the end to a new year. That made it not very logical. So it just created a bunch of work especially with our uh office staff and and our consulting group. Can I can I ask another question?

Um something else for clarification purposes. I hear citizens say, "Well, I saw the um ambulance at Home Depot or I saw them stop at a grocery store." And people assume that those are included in your numbers when you're talking about your responses. So, could you explain what justifies an actual run? Absolutely. Um, basically, anything that goes through our 911 dispatch center. Okay.

Um, now some of those may be calls to us directly in the station. Do not do that. Please, please, please, if you think you need us, just call 911. It's it if And the other most important thing, I say this, I said this before and chief will agree with me. If you do accidentally dial 911, stay on the line, say, "Oh, sorry, pocket dialed you. No emergency here." Cuz otherwise, we're going to call you back. And if we can't get a hold of you, they'll probably send a police car and then we'll probably send a fire truck. So, it's easier just to stay on the line and say, "Oh, my mistake. Sorry." So, but please just call 911. Please do not call my fire stations. So, how do you recall record a call today? Let's say my pipes are frozen and and my house is flooding.

That'd be a service call. We we would respond and we we'd evaluate it and that would be a service call. We don't I don't know if I've ever run on a frozen pipe call like that. Yeah. So, but yep.

Any questions from the audience? Yeah, my name is Dwayne Zanto and my question is I was in the police dispatch room one day and I gave them the code for my garage and it's also the code on my locks on my door. I'm just wondering if the fire department has those access to those codes. Absolutely. Y it's in the it's in the CAD system they give to us.

It might be a good idea for everybody to give the give the codes to the fire to the police department for dispatch so they can get in your house without breaking the door down. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Anttop. If I could just add to that it's also beneficial to us if folks want to voluntarily give medical information if there's a diabetic if there's things like that. All that information will be relayed to the not only the police but the fire on our way there. So, we already have that information before we get to your house. So, any of that information we can plug right in the computer and we have it as soon as the phone calls made. And to Mr. Zanto's point that we won't have to break your door down. We can just punch in your garage door code and we can be right in by locks.

Yeah. Or or some people like even put in a note that the the key is hidden in the garage here, you know. So, that's that's very very useful for us. Any more? In reference to that, a lot of cities, police departments, they provide a form that you can fill out, you know, like they do in senior apartments, you can put on the side of your fridge. Does Plymouth do that? Yes. Okay. Okay. Anyone else? Anyone else on the board? No. Well, thank thank you for doing this tonight. Thank you.

Now, we will have uh Chief Nitel give the annual report for the police department.

Last but certainly not least, so uh I'm I'm a talker. I'll be as brief as I can. Uh inside your packets, you have our uh annual uh police report. I have hard copies as well if anybody needed them. uh to start uh my presentation on behalf of all of the police officers and civilians and staff at the Plymouth Township Police Department. We appreciate the support of this board, board of trustees. We appreciate the support of our citizens. I can tell you that uh during holidays and over Christmas time, I can't tell you the amount of businesses and residents that called us and offered to drop off uh food for the police and the fire. So, it's really great to see. It's something in my career. I work for some great communities, but this is really it's special here and uh it's one of the reasons why I live here. So, uh, so thank you. Uh, when we start, uh, my presentation, you're not going to see a PowerPoint. Uh, we're going to we're going to talk about what, uh, what you have in front of you, which is a breakdown of our police department. And what I always start with is what do we value? What are the what are the cornerstones of the police department? And the cornerstones of the police department were built out by the officers, by the staff in the police department. And it always starts with integrity. Integrity, professionalism, and community service. Those are the building blocks of the Plymouth Township Police Department. Next, I want to talk about our culture. What is our culture? Uh, of course, uh, our families always come first, but we have our work families, too. And one of our goals every single day, I'm a a student of the Ross Business School of Michigan, uh professional in uh uh leadership, positive leadership, and positive leadership is coming into work every single day and enjoying what you do, enjoying coming to your workplace. to your comment about morale. Um John, uh it's very important and it's important to us the um and and what is our mentality uh of our officers that are out on the street every night when you see them driving on an Arbor Road or you see them driving on Hagerty is not on my watch. Uh they take the crime that

happens in this community serious. They do everything they can to be proactive and prevent crime. They're out there every single day. Um we don't talk about employees at the police department. We talk about the team. Um, my daughter's a Spartan, but I'm a I'm a Michigan man. And and Bo Shampooker always said, "The team, the team, the team." And that's what we built over at the Plymouth Township Police Department. We believe in that and we show that every single day. Uh, statistics, uh, 2025, uh, some of the statistics that I felt were important. Our part one crimes, serious crimes reported to the FBI were down 850%. So, we saw a decrease. Our traffic stops. We had 6,399 traffic stops over 2025, which is a 25% increase in production. In proactive uh our enforcement actions, we had significant increases in felony arrests, misdemeanors, and citations. We have what we call our directed patrols, and um some agencies call them extra patrols. We call them directed patrols here where we identify with data that is given to us from our citizens areas in the township whether it be a traffic complaint, cars being broken into um whatever the complaint may be, we take that information and then our officers document that. So we have data. So our decisions on patrol, a lot of folks think when officers are out on patrol that they're they're just driving around. Our officers have specific districts and they're giving specific directed patrol area. So we try to focus on the areas where we have the biggest problems. Um and Clement Township is one of the safest communities around. So I wouldn't say we have a lot of big problems. When we have problems, we identify them and we put the resources towards the problems. Uh our numbers for director patrol tripled from 24 2024 to 2025. So we saw a significant where the officers were documenting uh and making those checks to make sure that we were uh collecting that data. Overall police responses, we had an

increase of 9.86% for calls of service. Uh this year we uh with approval from the board, we had the additional traffic safety officer position which we rolled out in May 2025. That's officer Jeff Federer. Uh Jeff is a member of the Western Way Crash Team. He's a trained commercial motor vehicle uh inspector. Uh Jeff has done a great job. He also handles the majority of the accidents that happen uh out on the streets. And we have seen decreases in both accidents and in injury accidents. uh between 2024 and 2025. Uh also, and I'm sure the supervisor has seen this as well, is we we do not get the calls. Uh since we rolled out this traffic officer position, uh prior to that, I was getting calls every week myself, Lieutenant Krebs, and the patrol division was almost getting calls every day about the trucks that were in certain areas of the township, Ridge Road, Hagerty Road, Ann Arbor Road. Uh with the construction on the freeways, we saw a lot of increases. uh since Jeff has been out there and he's been being very visible in all those areas, we we're not getting the amount of calls which is in my eyes is telling us that we're doing a good thing there. So, we're not getting those um personnel change. We had significant personnel change this year. Uh we were short staffed at the beginning of the year. We were down officers. Uh we made some uh strategic moves with recruiting uh supported by the board of trustees. One of those uh that was vital to us was lateral transfers. we were able and what a lateral transfer is, we take officers uh that have experience in other agencies and then they come to our agency and then they come in at the at the top level. Uh seniority wise they start at the bottom but pay-wise we can bring them in at a at a uh level that they're accustomed to from the agency they left um by adding uh those officers. So, we added um well, I'll start with we are uh fully staffed for the first time uh in probably six years

uh prior to um me coming here. And um we do have we have one officer uh officer Tyler Cannon who is uh uh on leave right now and receiving treatment for brain cancer. So, keep uh Tyler Cannon and his his wife Julie and his and her and their kids in your prayers. Uh so, uh he is uh uh receiving treatment. Um but otherwise we are fully staffed. Our field training officer program and that's a program that any officer that comes to this department whether they have 25 years experience from one department uh or no experience at all. They have to go through an FTO program, field training officer program. We have seven field training officers um and they had a busy year. They had uh 4,116 hours of training which included 343 daily observation reports. So, a daily observation report, they have to list everything that they covered that day with their trainee. Uh, our officers did just absolute uh outstanding job. We added uh six police officers this year. Now, not six police officer positions, but we filled six positions and three of those were lateral transfers. We had an officer that retired from Oak Park Police Department of over 25 years experience. We had officer uh that left the Dearborn Police Department, 25 years experience that we added. Then we had an officer from Taylor that we added. Uh we sponsored two candidates to go through the uh school craft uh college police academy which is the first time we've done that uh with um grants from the state of Michigan to cover the expenses for that a majority of the expenses. And then we had one uh our last hire the uh was a graduate from community college. He graduated. We hired him the week he graduated. So uh those were the six our dispatchers PSAs. Uh we hired two during 2025 and we had two promotions in 2025. Uh early in January we promoted Joe Smitherman who was our our first uh school resource officer to sergeant. He's currently on the night shift and

then uh Sergeant Tom Champagne was promoted in March uh of 2025. Uh Tom uh started as one of our swing shift sergeants. He was also instrumental in the point of contact for live golf in the communications that we had throughout that process pro process and did a phenomenal job. 2025 goals and objectives. At the beginning of every year, we identify goals and objectives as a department. We meet with all the command staff. The command staff gets input from the officers. We establish our goals and objectives. Uh mental health issues uh are continue to be an issue for police responses. Uh so that was uh the mental health critical response. We partnered with the Detroit Wayne Integrated Health Network, DWIN. We also uh partnered with uh Face Addiction Now, uh Hope Not Handcuffs program. Uh both of these, uh programs offer resources to our officers that can assist folks that have addiction problems or are having mental health problems. The second goal and objective um was internal. We started a peer support team and uh that peer support team is led by Jeff Federer who's our also our traffic officer [snorts] and he's very passionate about that. uh a peer support team. Um we have three additional officers. We have two in the dispatch center that are peer support. And um throughout uh my career and what I've seen over the years, a lot of times uh with critical incidents, folks don't necessarily want to hear from the chief of police how they're doing, but they really like to talk to their buddy or their partner on the shift on how they're doing. These peer support officers are have special training on resources that they can provide officers who might be struggling after a traumatic incident. So, our peer support officers follow up with the officers after the incident, not only day of, but 2 days later, 4 days later, and they check to see how they're doing, and if they need additional support, they work very closely and they're trained with the uh employee assistance plan, our EAP here at Plymouth Township. Um, unfortunately, for first responders,

police officers, average folks, average citizens see two to four traumatic incidents in their lifetime. death of a loved one, um traumatic a car accident, uh something horrific. Uh police officers, uh on an average in a in a career, in a 25-y year career, uh see anywhere from 600 to 800 tragic incidents. So seeing that uh amount of tragedy, death uh can be significant weigh in our officers and uh having that peer support is one one more way that we can find out uh if they need assistance or if they're doing okay following those type of incidents. Um a goal objective, our third uh was the uh Michigan Law Enforcement Accreditation Commission uh reacreditation. We were accredited three and a half years ago and um part of that process is we met 115 standards that had 534 requirements for each of those standards. Our accreditation team collected over 1,602 proofs of compliance or best practices in law enforcement. Um to give you an idea, Michigan in the state of Michigan, only 16% uh of all police agencies are accredited. So, uh, that was a significant, uh, lift for us this year. Um, Assistant Chief Dan Kudra, uh, led that. He's our accreditation manager. Uh, assistant chief Kudra also, uh, conducts mock assessments and helps other agencies throughout the state of Michigan. And he is actually a full-fledged this in 2025, uh, we sent him to a school and he's a full-fledged assessor now. So he can go and conduct uh assess uh can assess other departments for Emily act which is the commission community outreach community outreach um program strengthen transparency and trust in the community. Uh we have quarterly um out uh outreach events including coffee with a cop, our senior

fraud seminar. Uh we have free active asalent training for all businesses or any business uh or house of worship in Plymouth Township. Bianually we have our houses of worship committee that meet in this room twice a year and we talk about uh safety and security issues that are going on in the community. We talk about um what problems they're having at their houses of worship. We have Homeland Security comes in and talks about grants that are uh open for houses of worship. The um we also by annually have operation takeback where we partner with DEA at Township Paul and Kroger's where we have uh takeback centers from 10 in the morning to 2 in the afternoon on Saturdays. Once in the spring, once in the fall they take back any uh pills that folks want to uh properly dispose of. Never [snorts] throw them down your uh toilets. That's not good for the environment. And uh you bring them in, no questions asked. We put them in. DEA destroys them. So it's a great program. Uh annually um in the spring we have a police day at the ballpark, the Miracle League. It's just a great event that we partner with the city of Plymouth. Uh all of our police officers volunteer and we're buddies with the kids there at the miracle league for a game. We partner with Belffor and they uh they bring out hot dogs and chips and drinks for the kids. Uh in the fall and October, we have a faith and blue event where we partner with the Department of Justice uh cops program, community orientated police, and we have that. It's a kind of similar to a touch a truck type of uh situation. And u uh we invite all of our local uh partners in the community. Northville Township comes out, can Leavonia, we have Wayne County comes out. This past year was really nice. They brought their horses. So they had uh four horses there that uh uh the kids really like that. And that's at Northridge Church. Uh this year we had our second annual uh shop with a cop um and we partnered with the school district on that. We identified six students in the Plymouth uh Township School District uh that uh otherwise uh just because of their situation might not not have a good Christmas and we had them come uh with their parents uh and

then we went to Walmart and they were able to buy not only presents for themselves but they were able to buy presents for their siblings and their parents. So it was really a nice event. All volunteer. None of that was done while officers were working. and it was all on their volunteer time. Um March is reading month. Uh we offer in the school districts uh and the daycare centers if they want to have a police officer come in and read to their class. This past year we had 70 requests um to read in the class. U I think I did eight or nine myself. So it's a uh it's a team event. Um the officers number one they're in the schools visible in the school. The police car parked in front of the school which is great. Then they go out and have a positive interaction with the with the kids. Um Halloween, we have operation uh pumpkin patrol. We have extra uh officers on the road for Halloween because of all the kids are out on the streets. Uh this year, I think we had close to 50 pounds of uh candy that was donated from residents uh for our officers to pass out to the kids. We passed out all 50 pounds. Um probably not good for their dental work, but uh it's Halloween, right? So let it go. uh Citizens Police Academy. Uh this was our inaugural year with that program. Uh it was a resounding success. We had 14 residents uh that came in to Citizens Police Academy for 8 weeks, 3 hours every Thursday night and we talked about every aspect very very similar to what what you saw in the presentation. Um we had presentations from every part of the police department so that our citizens could see exactly what uh what they get for their tax dollar. So that was a a very positive event. Um, our community outreach programs were highlighted when we went for our accreditation. When Assistant Chief Kudger and I sat in front of the accreditation committee, what they comment on was they said, "You have one of the strongest community outreach programs that we've ever seen." So, we're very uh very very proud of that. And our last uh goal objective was something that was somewhat dropped on us in January of last year. That was live golf. So, uh live golf was an event

that uh international golf event at St. John's. We had 10 to 14,000 people per day at that event. over 60 uh law enforcement officers from 15 different uh local, state, and federal agencies contributed to the safety and security of that event. Um we had uh some minor injuries at the event. Uh mostly were from ball strikes. Uh but we had no significant um incidents uh or problems at the event. Uh we did follow up with some residents that weren't happy about the noise. That was the one issue that we dealt with after the fact. the the supervisor and I have already spoken with the planners about that and that's something that we'll continue to uh discuss. But it's very similar to the fire department. We have an afteraction this coming year 2026. Uh we're going to have a uh we're going to host a tabletop exercise in this room where we'll have all the entities that are involved with that event. Uh it will be a good experience for us uh to practice our incident command uh both with police, fire, uh emergency management. Uh we'll also have folks from township hall in there as well. finance. Uh DPW, um Ken will be there from building. Uh so it'll be a it'll be a really u good training experience. Not spec it'll it'll be based around live golf, but it could be for any traumatic event. So it's a it's a good I've done tabletops throughout my career and they're uh they're a fantastic learning experience and every time you do one, you you learn from that. Um that concludes my presentation. Uh again, speaking for all the officers uh at our department, uh I can tell you like I said, when we uh our goal every single day is when our officers, John, you touched touched upon it with morale. We want our officers to enjoy coming to work every day. Uh our uh all of our units on on that side of the building have contracts. Uh they come and work hard every single day providing the type of service that we should expect. And uh I'm very proud of their efforts. Any questions or questions? Yes, sir. Oh,

I want to clarify one thing. Um, I was at a statewide forum in Lancing and the issue came up about morale of police and fire and how that needed to be. Now, it was not relevant relevant to Plymouth Township. Mhm. [clears throat] So that's what I was talking about when I said statewide morale of police and fire is uh there's room for improvement. So it wasn't Plymouth Township. Okay. Yes, sir. Secondly, Yes, sir. We are one of the 16% of all police departments across the state that are accredited. Yes. Through Emily Act. Yes, sir. Only 16%.

Yes, sir.

Next. you have previously testified that she had about 62 requests for officers. I mean, it was it was exemplified yesterday morning with with uh Kuseno, the the new firefighter. You got some quality guys. I'm asking them to go into elementary schools and read. Yes, sir. Maybe each officer could do one reading. I've secured the state superintendent to read at Smith Elementary. Then I have to report to the state board of education on March 10th. if if you can focus in the next um 60 days asking the quality guy. I mean, nobody you're you're admired. If you go into a school with your uniform on and you read to those early elementary school kids, take a picture and post it. Give me the data. I want to know about it.

Yes, sir. I want to brag about it.

Yes, sir. Every sir, just so you're aware, every teacher that of a school in Plymouth Township was offered to have a a police officer read in our class. Everyone, we had 70 that said yes. So, in 70 we went out there and we read in the class. Uh, today I just got an email less than an hour ago from Christy Burgess from Pioneer and she sent a request. We don't say no. She sent a request and said, "Do you think Officer Andy could come and talk about the US Constitution to my class?" And and we said, "Absolutely." So Andy went there today, and I'm going to read you right from the email because I just think it's fantastic. She said, "Give me just a second so I can pull it." I'm sorry. [clears throat] Um, I just wanted to tell you how cool it was that a student saw officer Andy in my class and asked, "What are we learning today?" In the past, if an officer was in school, everyone would say, "Who's in trouble?" I thought is such a cool shift in overall connection between Plymouth Township Police Department and the community schools. Have a great day, Christie. That is a a significant impact of a whole classroom of students. That officer went in there and talked about the US Constitution and and how it impacts our daily uh you know duties and uh it was just a great experience and u so like I said I I got that email an hour ago. He was there this afternoon at 1:00. Please give me some facts,

sir. Because I'm on the agenda at 1:00 on Tuesday afternoon, March 10th, in Lancing and the State Board of Education, sir. And I want to, for lack of a better word, I want to brag about Plymouth Township. Sir, and our quality officers that are going into the schools and provide pictures to pro to prove same. Yes, sir. I I have all that. Yes, sir. I'll have that for you, John. [snorts] Any other board comments or questions? Thank you. Good job. I appreciate that. Anyone in the audience? Don't go away. Yes. Okay.

I think it's so cool. Thank you so much for your work. Um my question is I know um you mentioned the rising mental health. Get close to the mic. Sorry. You mentioned the rising um mental health needs in our community. Um I know some neighboring communities have um social workers employed in their police force. Just wondering if that's something that we have in the township or it's been or if it's been considered.

That's a great question. Um we have uh what come into our department and uh the other communities uh opioid funds. what other agencies, K Township, Leavonia, what they've used is uh the opioid funds go out by the percentage of overdoses in your community. So, you get X amount of dollars. Um we don't have um we don't get enough money to hire on a full-time social worker. Uh Canton has done that, Leavonia has done that because they're getting more money. Uh we have looked at um other areas of if we needed a social worker to come out um that we could um you know kind of peacemail to use that funding uh to support that too. Uh we looked at DWIN uh which they had theirs. It was a um offered through Wayne County. It was free for us. So that that was the route that we took. But certainly and we do have opioid money uh if we find the right organization that we could partner with on that. Yeah.

Yeah. I know North has one. Yes. And um I didn't know if they got the funding through that as well. Yeah. So u she asked if uh she said Northville has one as well. Uh township there was a grant that was written. Uh Northville Township, the city of Plymouth, and Northville City were all on that grant. Uh that was prior to to me getting here. Uh we were not uh a part of that. Um um you know, and I can't really comment what happened before I was here, but uh but I tell you that that's where they get u a lot where they got their funding for that. So, I have inquired with all three of those chiefs, with Chief Macak, with Chief Cox, and with Chief Hilden, that if that grant opens back up, we would like to be a part of it. Uh, but I haven't heard back on that. So,

I'll just say I've heard I've seen firsthand how um how important that is and how much um how great it's been for that community. So, if there's anything that you guys can do, I would fully support that. So, thank you. Thank you.

Any more from the audience? All right. Um, thank you. These, uh, three great departments and the great people, we are forever grateful for what you're doing and we're thanks that you had to, I know, go through the administrative hassle of making a report and pulling it together is a lot of work, but I hope it was worth it and I hope we do this on an annual basis. Chuck, and I forgot to mention this, uh, you know, we we tackled this as a team effort at my side of the house. The first draft was 65 pages. Okay. Um, and I know you you would probably have uh thrown something at me if I gave you that. So, we brought it down. But my point to saying that is, you know, and I know Pat shops the same thing. These these officers are so proud of what they did. When I ask them, tell me about your uh honor guard. Tell me about your honor guards. I need one page to give me four pages, you know. So, they're they're very proud of what they do. So, I just want to make that comment. Thank you.

Editing skills, right? [clears throat] [snorts]

All right. Um, now we have comments on anything for three minutes. You can tell me anything you want. Tell us anything you want. Nobody. No takers. All right. So, just 8. Let's just pass 8:30. So, uh, any board comments? Start here with Bob. Um, I just saw an article today that uh Amazon is pulling the plug on Amazon Fresh and um they're going to turn some of the stores into Whole Foods, but uh it doesn't look like we're going to have a hammer.

You're going to have to stand up closer. Oh, sorry about that. I said I just read an article today that Amazon is pulling the plug on its Amazon Fresh uh brand. So, they're shutting down all the stores that are in existence and some of them they're going to convert to Whole Foods, but the rest are just going to go away. So, I don't anticipate seeing anything uh here unless they have unless they convert it to a Whole Foods.

So, what he's referring to is next to LA Fitness in that mall along Anna Road. Yeah. There was a a prototype shell built with the anticipation that Amazon Prime was going to move in there. It's the first time I've seen anything in writing definitively saying no, they're not going to continue with actual comments from company officials that they're they're redirecting their efforts looks like away from brick and mortar at least for food. Yeah. So, that building will be there and hopefully the owners of that mall will find an alternative tenant. It's had a I think there's a four lease sign on there for a while. So,

it's not like we're surprised uh because there hasn't been much movement in [clears throat] almost three years. It's been a while. Um, second thing is we have taxes will be due on February the 17th. Uh, normally they're due on the 14th, but the 14th is Saturday, the 15th is Sunday, and the 16th is a holiday. Uh, so people have one extra day this year. Um, so they're due close of business on the 17th, which will be here soon. And, uh, that's it.

Mark, uh, just one comment. I think u going forward I would like to see a leased option versus buy like like we looked at today like for the the fireman's or for the for the fireman's it cost over a million dollars where you had an option to to lease versus buy. Um like for example um when I did the golf course I you know I got a lease all the computers are all on lease. I think it's a good option, especially when you're talking about a million dollars because now and if you look at a million dollars is gone, right? Where if you had a where if you have a a lease, it can go on for years and years and years and you can obviously save the money, especially now when you know we're the money is starting to get low. So, it's I think an option is moving forward. We should always look at an option of buy versus lease. There should always be a second option.

Always do the We we had a calculation for lease. Yeah. And the lease actually wasn't any cheaper than I believe we figured out when we bought it end up being the cheapest probably. Yeah. I I don't know. I think but but the the right we should bring it side by side. I agree. And um one advantage of what we're doing here is since we own it afterwards,

if we have to, we can press them into service for another year or two depending on our finances. gives us flex with those last two years plus. Um, so that was part of the decision, but the lease was not considered favorable based on the initial calculation, but I agree we'll do it side by side. Um, and if we, you know, we've had some short staff in the finance, so that was probably a little bit of that's oversight, so I should do more of that. Agreed.

All right, Jerry. Um, thank you, Mr. Supervisor. We had uh we we issued our um new precinct map. It's on the website and uh please pay attention to that. Let your neighbors know. People who are in homeowners associations, make sure you tell your neighbors. Also, uh sometime next month, we'll be sending out new um uh registration cards. It's required by by law that we do that. And that will tell you what your precinct is. It would tell you who what district the representative is, the district that is the Senate and county commissioner and also for the US uh the US uh congressperson. So pay attention to that. So you'll familiarize yourself because there are some changes. So please pay attention to that. Don't throw it away. Um and uh and so we'll be sending out, you know, almost 25,000 of those uh later on in the month of February. Jerry, those are required to be sent in February. What I'm talking about is No, people are going to forget or throw it away between then and August.

Uh I I I'm I'm trying to get that out there and then of course contact the um you know the magazines and other use our social u um internet to to talk about it. Um we we've got to get people to it's not required for February. I just want to get it out there now that we've got the map out there and just kind of build on that. Um, it can be it can wait, but then again, I figure that the sooner we get it out there, get more people talking about it, get the association, homeowners associations talking to their residents about it, the the there's going to be a little bit of chaos when you make these changes. People will show up at the old precinct saying, "How come how come I can't vote?" Just this past year, we had no elections. We still had people showing up at their precinct saying the precinct was closed. Well, that's there were no elections. So, you can never have enough Mr. Leblanc knows this. You you can never have enough information getting out there frequently. So there may be a need to even send out a second notice of some some type whether it's in uh our e-news whether it's in our newsletter uh just to have that out there and have people to really talk about that because half of the people are going to be voting at a different place. Half of you will be voting at your regular place. The other half are going to be someplace else. So it's important to get that to get that information out. Dandy.

Um, I just want to say thank you for the copy of the purchasing policy. As we discussed at the last meeting, we talked about the reason for the foyer report. And as trustees, we're responsible for reviewing the bills. And I think it's important to have this so that people understand really what they're looking for, irregularities in the purchasing policy, uh, the different things that show up on the list of bills. We're not just looking at bills. We need to make sure that our policies are being complied with. So, I appreciate having that, John.

Yes. Um, I really like it that Trustee Growth has emphasized that how we are out in the community. We're a reflection of Plymouth Township. Wednesday, February 4th, I'll be helping to moderate something that seems to be all important right now in society. Civility. I'll be in Lancing moderating with four panelists. They've decided that this is all important. The panelists are Jim Blanchard, John Angler, Jennifer Granholm, and Rick Snder. Last Friday, I had a guest in my office for two hours, probably one of the most respected men in Plymouth Township, Jack Dempsey. He was unaware the $10 million lawsuit of my Cox had been dismissed. He has been watching our meetings and praying for us. So [snorts] Jack's coming back this next week a couple times and he has a collegial relationship with uh another lawyer in my office of 28 years, WDE Myers. So we're trying to help with self-respect and civility. And by the way, if former governors Blanchard, Dangler, Grant, and Snyder use one word of vulgarity, I will censure them as the moderator of that panel on February 4th in Lancing. So, we need to go onward and forward. If these four governors representing different political parties can come together and say we got to do something about civility,

then that starts right here at these board meetings and even in our homes with a kindness in our voice and our vocabularies. Thank you very much and good night. All right, we have a motion for adjournment. Mr. Supervisor, I move for adjournment. Second. Second. All in favor? I thank you.