Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Oh, actually no, just it's hard then. Don't worry about it. But I don't think so. It's like one. I'll see what I can do. I got my Okay, we will start this regular city commission business meeting of Monday, August 18th. Uh called to order. All please rise for the pledge of

allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. We begin by acknowledging the land on which we gather as the territory of the Ottawa and Chipua peoples who have stewarded this land for generations. We thank them for their strength and resilience inspiring us to do the same. With that, we will now begin with the roll call from Sarah, please. Commissioner Shaw here. Commissioner Wernern here. Commissioner Treadwell here. Commissioner Anderson here. Commissioner Stanley here. Mayor here. I show a mayor prom absent.

Okay. And with that, I will go ahead and let you keep going with announcements. Oh, sorry, Deputy City Manager. I was reading as deputy clerk. I'm off by two weeks because we've everybody's more official now.

So, please go ahead. Deputy city manager Alan, mayor, city commissioners, city staff, and community members. Uh have just a few updates uh for you. The city has launched its second survey regarding the Brown Bridge Trust Fund initiative. Um that's is on the November uh 2025 ballot. So, based on community input, a draft park improvement um list has been developed. The survey is asking the public to prioritize these projects and the link can be found on the city's website. I took the survey earlier today. It was very easy to navigate. It's just a simple matter of moving um the items to prioritize them. The next item I want to share is that the FEMA port authority grant in support of the fire safety vote previously shared by the interim city manager uh in his email to the commission on August 8th has been successfully submitted. Just to confirm, there is no financial commitment required at this time. While there's a match for this grant, the commission will have the ability to assess the viability of the grant um if and when the grant is awarded. So, kudos to the city staff for their collective effort on this unique two-week window. Um this is something we're seeing more and more of that federal grants are really narrowing their window of application. So, it's creating some challenges, but we have navigated that again successfully. Hopefully, you've had the opportunity to see the impact of the um excuse me, my computer just did a little hookup here of the proof of concept test on the mill and pave on 14th Street eastbound lane between Cass and Union uh which was completed last week. This project is related to item number two under new business on the agenda. City staff has received several calls of support for this effort. So kudos to the streets division for researching and piloting a new product to increase efficiency and lower costs. That is all I have at this time.

Fantastic. And now interim city clerk, please go right ahead. Sarah,

meetings scheduled for this week are the arts commission will meet Wednesday, August 20th at 3:30 in the committee room. And a reminder that the city commission's next regular meeting will be on Tuesday, September 2nd because Monday is the holiday. And at this time, we are not planning a study session for the 25th. Fantastic. Okay. And with that, um, if you have our old list, there's three proclamations. There are actually only two right now. The monarch butterfly is on hold. So, um, we'll have the Coast Guard proclamation first and then Smart Week following it. So, if I could have our Coastg Guard representatives meet me up at the podium, please. to see a familiar face up here with us, too. So, first we'll have the proclamation declaring August as Coastg Guard appreciation month in Trevor City. Whereas in 1790, the Revenue Cutter Service was established under the jurisdiction of the Treasury Department, which later combined services with the United States Life-Saving Service to form the Coast Guard. And in March 2003, excuse me, the Coast Guard was transferred to the newly created Department of Homeland Security where it remains today. Whereas at all times, the Coast Guard is an armed force, a regulatory agency, a humanitarian service, a federal law enforcement agency, and a member of intelligence community, and respon is responsible for the safety, security, and stewardship of the nation's waters. Whereas each year the Coast Guard conducts on average more than 17,500 search and rescue missions, saving over 3,400 lives and 47 million in property, all while protecting our borders through its drug interdiction efforts, keeping more than three billion worth of illegal drugs out of the United States. Whereas the city of Traverse City is proud to continue its support for the men and women of the Coast Guard and for Air Station Traverse City. Founded in 1945, the air station has

undergone many changes. Today, the air station has over 115 active duty members and boasts two MH, sorry, I'm going to be slow on this one, MH60T J-Hawk helicopters that cover thousands of miles of coastline across the Great Lakes. And whereas the men and women of the air station embody a rich tradition of honor, respect, devotion to duty, and dedication to service. By maintaining a constant 247 ready status, the members of Air Station Trevor City remain poised to respond by supporting local local law enforcement, other military services and international, federal, state, and local partners to ensure the safety of our community. Whereas the members of the Coast Guard are friends and neighbors. Their families are teachers, leaders, and local businesses and engage in members of our engage as members of our community. They are coaches for our children, selfless volunteers, and the neighbors we have over for barbecues. Therefore, be it declared, I, Amy Shamro, mayor of the city of Trevor City, proclaim the month of August as Coastg Guard appreciation month in the city of Trevor City and urge my fellow citizens to join me in thanking all of those serving in the United States Coast Guard and recognizing the significance of their impact in our community. And so, I want to give you a second to speak, but I also wanted to add that's not covered in here. We also get a lot who retire back here. So, it's great to not just have you as active service members, but often as second second time citizens, too. So,

thank you so much. Uh thank you everybody. Uh thank you for having uh me up here. My my boss uh the commanding officer Ryan Han, he couldn't be here. He's on vacation up in Kodiak, Alaska, one of his previous uh tours. But uh so you get you get me. I just showed up. Um I will say in my 17 years of active duty service, uh and not my first Coastg Guard city, um when I moved here, I could really feel the love that Traverse City has for uh for the Coast Guard. So thank you. Um it's it's due to this relationship that the that the Coast Guard has with Traverse City that we can stay simparatus always ready. So so we thank you. Yeah. We got here 1945. We became a Coastg Guard city uh in 2010. We really look forward to continuing that relationship into the future. So thank you so much. Uh I appreciate that.

Okay. And we have a second one tonight. So I'll ask the group from Smart to come up please. that has is a two picture. Okay, this is uh proclaiming smart week August 25th through 29th, 2025. Whereas guns are the number one killer of children and teens in the United States. And whereas Trevor City is committed to creating a safe environment contributing to the safety and well-being of our children. And whereas almost every single day a child gets their hands on a gun and unintentionally kills or wounds themselves or someone else in the United States. And whereas research shows that the most effective way to prevent children from accessing uh firearms is by making sure all guns are stored unloaded, locked, and separate from ammunition. And whereas there are steps we can take all take, gun owners and non gun owners alike, to make sure kids can't access guns and put themselves and others in danger. And whereas more than half of gun owners don't lock all of their guns securely and an estimated 4.6 million children live in a home with at least one unlocked and loaded gun in the United States. And whereas when guns aren't properly stored, tragedy can strike. Whether it's a child finding a firearm or wounding or killing themselves or someone else or someone stealing it and using it to commit crimes in our community. And whereas protecting public safety in the community they serve is all of our highest responsibility. Everybody on that one. And whereas schools, hospitals, state agencies, and community organizations are committed to their crucial role in reducing injuries and deaths by promoting secure gun storage and safety. And whereas Smart Week raises awareness and promotes efforts to educate the public about their secure gun storage. Traverse City Commends Be Smart, a program developed by Every Town for Gun Safety Support Fund and all involved in their endeavor to keep communities safe. Now therefore, it be resolved Amy I, Amy Shamro, mayor of the

city of Trevor City, do hereby proclaim August 25th, 20 through 29th, 2025 to be Smart Week in Trevor City, Michigan. And I will thank you and let you all please speak a little bit more about this very important issue. Thank you so much, mayor and city commissioners. Uh my name is Kira Walkup and I am a uh presenter and state co-lead with the BS Smart program in Michigan. Uh, Be Smart is a nonpartisan a nonpartisan educational campaign created by Every Town for Gun Safety Support Fund focused on educating parents, caregivers, and adults regarding the critical importance of secure firearm storage in order to prevent injuries and deaths that occur when children gain unauthorized access to firearms. as well as normalizing these conversations about gun safety as the country and specifically Michigan heads back to school in just two weeks. Two weeks, right? Uh we are um marking the second annual smart week uh between August 25th and August 29th. So that's next week. uh as part of our broader campaign to spread the word about secure gun storage once again to prevent deaths and injuries that occur when children gain access to unsecured guns. Um, so, uh, I would ask everyone tonight, uh, you do have an action ask from us, and that is to be sure that you're taking these conversations out into the community. And we are so grateful to the city uh, for this proclamation and for helping us spread the word as Traverse City Public Schools and our surrounding

school districts um, return to school in two weeks. So, thank you. Oh, sure. Thank you so much. I just want to know while I'm getting situated here again that while the mayor does have the honor of reading proclamations, I know that our entire commission and our community very much take serious a lot of the messages that we uh we are sharing here. We we do have a lot of proclamations about gun safety and hope we can regulate that conversation a little bit more as is asked here. So Sarah, I will have you now continue with the consent calendar, please.

The purpose of the consent calendar is to expedite business by grouping non-controversial items together to be dealt with by one commission motion without discussion. Any member of the commission, staff, or the public may ask that any item on the consent calendar be removed there from and placed elsewhere on the agenda for individual consideration by the commission, and such requests will be automatically respected. If an item is not removed from the consent calendar, the action noted in parentheses on the agenda is approved by a single commission action adopting the consent calendar. One, consideration of approving the minutes of the August 4th, 2025 meeting of the city commission. Approval recommended. Two, consideration of authorizing a purchase order for the 2025 sidewalk maintenance program. Approval recommended. Three, consideration of authorizing purchase order for the front street lift station pump parts. Approval recommended. Four, consideration of waving the competitive bidding process and authorizing a purchase order for the disposal services for the street sweeping, storm filter cleaning, and catch basin debris. Approval recommended. Five, consideration of declaring a 2015 Ford Transit van held by the Department of Public Services as surplus so that it may be returned to the manufacturer. Approval recommended. Four, consideration of adopting the resolution authorizing the application to the AARP network of agefriendly states and communities. Approval recommended. Seven. Consideration of authorizing various documents in connection with settlement agreements related to opioids litigation. Approval recommended.

Thank you. Would any commissioner like any item pulled? Heather. Um three and six. Six. Jackie. Number seven, please. Okay. Any others? Would anybody from the public like any item other than three, six, or seven pulled from the consent calendar? Seeing none, I'll bring it back to the commission for a motion. Jackie, I move adoption of the consent calendar as amended. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioners Anderson and Warner. All in favor?

I opposed. Okay, motion passes and we will go to item number three, which is consideration of authorizing purchase for the lift station. And Heather, you had this pulled. I I did and I I plan to support this, but I um I feel like this needs to get into the public record and not just in notes that I send to the city man the deputy city manager. And thank you deputy city manager for your interest in this. And also thank you Joel Tapio and uh Frank Duturi for your forward thinking process in the in uh uh in streets and maintenance and um the Jacobs report which I I read this every time it comes out. It it's uh it does have preventative and predictive maintenance ongoing. However, the July report reads like a reactive maintenance log a whole bunch of unexpected component failures and postfailure repairs. This this July uh we had um a hugely unusual rainfall. We had 13 inches in July and our normal rainfall is between two and three inches. Um, so I I I think it's really important for us to think about how without some aggressive influ infiltration mitigation and broader pred predictive monitoring, you know, we're going to have failures and these failures will be sudden events and we we're not predicting anything. Um earlier this month, you may be aware that in Milwauke Milwaukee, Wisconsin, they were hit with a massive three-day rains rain event. Uh 7 to 11 inches over that period of time. And there are wildly different numbers out there about how much sewage went into Lake Michigan. Um Wisconsin Public Radio says it was

380 million gallons. Um the Google AI overview says it was five billion gallons. Uh either way, those quantities are mind-boggling and you know, we think we've got an E.coli problem. But poor infrastructure management and urban population increases and climate change are challenging even the rainiest places on earth at right right now. Um there was an article in the Guardian magazine yesterday or actually it's a newspaper yesterday Sunday saying that UK is running out of water. Oh my gosh. We our location on 21% of the world's fresh water requires us to prioritize the future of this resource. And I'd like the commission I'd like to ask commission to support a deep dive into the planned maintenance of our water infrastructure and assets. uh that was mentioned by uh the deputy city manager in the note that you received and I'd like to support that.

Okay. Uh I can make a recommendation now unless somebody else has something to say. Well, we can we can open up because you'll get that going, but I agree we can pick up also your request. So, yeah, if you want to make the motion, we'll just go ahead and do the whole discussion. I make the recommendation that the city commission approve, let's see, that's a funny way of wording this. I think it's above that. The interim city manager. I move that the interim city manager be authorized to issue a purchase order to professional pump for a rotating assembly in the amount not to exceed 54,164, which includes a 10% contingency with funds available in the sewer fund. 590

report. Thank you for that. And um I've unless anybody objects, I know the email was received by the deputy city manager and some um thought and reflection was already in that. Is that um you know, do do you feel like that's something you guys can start from or did you want some more instruction on potentially any updates or is Frank I know Frank keeps a lot of records that we don't always get to see. Is that a presentation that would people would be interested in? This is really more Art Krueger and yeah true art and yes

if I mayor just to um Andrew Waldron is here from Jacobs and is prepared to speak to the um the issue. Um this is of course as we have said part of a critical component of an ongoing maintenance program to make sure that we have those alternate pieces um for our operation of the sewer system and specifically the front street lift station. So, if there are specific questions, I do also know that Jacobs is planning on speaking to asset management when they do their um their program coming up in October to the commission. So, I think it'll be a good opportunity to talk about or to hear them speak about what are their plans going forward. Is that satisfactory for the October? Yes. I I don't have any specific questions. It just

Okay. It's capacity. That's the big problem is how do you handle storm water capacity and you know you can do it through there's a lot of different ways to do it. Uh so I I just want to make sure that we start really seriously thinking about implementing some of those different ways of handling our storm water capacity. Absolutely. And so if the October we got some notes now and the October presentation seems like a good tea up for you that's that's great. We'll move forward with that. Do we have other questions or comments on the motion? Great. Okay. Any public comment on this motion?

Seeing none, I'll bring it back. All in favor? I opposed. Motion passes. Okay. And then let me move around here. Sorry, not as quick on this, but it is a little easier. So, I'm learning curve here. Thank you all. Okay. So, next item is number six. This is the AARP um application. And you pulled this as well, Heather. Did you want to

I did and I also support this. Uh as long as the steering committee includes a significant representation from senior residents and not just leadership representing senior res residents, but actual seniors. Um, I'd also like to remind the commission that the planning department department is asking for $73,500 this year to administer the CDGB grant funding. That's up from $25,000 last year. In other words, I do think that this initiative would be of value to our community, but the value lies in finding and implementing shared be best practices and solutions without adding a lot of uh additional staff time. So, I'm hopeful that the future complete streets advisory board will eventually provide a kind of blueprint for these these kinds of resident focused initiatives. So, that's what I have to say about that.

Great. And I think that's some very fair comments to share with everybody. Did you want to make the motion or do you want I can make a motion that the resolution authorizing the city of Traverse City to apply to join the World Health Organization AARP network of agefriendly communities be adopted. Port. Okay. Thank you, Commissioner Warner. Okay. Um any comment, further comment or questions on this item? All right. Any public comment on this item? Seeing none, I'll bring it back. All in favor?

I opposed. Motion passes. So, excellent. We'll have that committee looking forward to get getting formed. Okay. And next, we had item number seven pulled and that was uh the connection of the settlement agreement to the opioids litigation. You had that pulled, Commissioner. Thank you. I just had a a question for staff regarding um the amount of our opioid settlement. Am I correct that the combined um two settlements together represent about $50,000 total that's paid out over a period of years? It it's yes and it's dependent on the different defendants pay out um within different some are in one year, some are in five, some are in nine.

They're they're all different. But it's just these defendants. The opioid um litigation has many many defendants and many many more than these. Um, so we've seen settlements come through and there will be more settlements coming through um as we go through. Okay. I I guess then my my follow-up question would be pertinent, which is do we have a policy? Do we need a policy? We don't need a policy because the settlement is uh all of these settlements require opioid settlement money to be used for certain things that combat opioid uh results in our communities. Um, and that's laid out in the settlements themselves. So, it's not just dumped into the general fund.

It's not. And the, um, the city treasurer is tracking all of that in a separate line item, and she's got a handle on all of that, so she can report out on it, too. Thank you. And that's also how we've been handling the ones from CVS and Walgreens and other settlements. Those are those are all opioid. Yep. Great. I appreciate the clarification. Thanks. Um, would anybody like to make a motion or are there other questions?

I'll make a motion. I recommend that the two resolutions authorizing entry of participation agreements in partial settlement of the national prescription opiate litigation and entry of state local government interstate agreement concerning allocation of settlement proceeds PNS the Sackler family/purdue settlement and the multiple manufacturer defendant settlements closed PNS be adopted and further that the interim city manager be authorized to execute any necessary documents in connection with the settlement agreements related to opioid litigation support.

Thank you, Commissioner Warner. Lots of assists tonight, Commissioner Warner. Thank you for that. Um, any other questions or com uh concerns about this one? Okay. Any public comment about this item? Seeing none, I'll bring it back for a vote. All in favor?

I opposed. Motion passes. Okay, everybody. Thank you for those really good questions to get us through that. So, now we'll move on to old business. And the first item is the implementation policy. We had this conversation a couple weeks ago um where we kind of had some pre some items up um for discussion and the consensus was pretty much that we wanted to see some more verbiage and from the majority of the commission and um Warren took that back to work on that. So um does anybody have any questions about what she brought back or any any discussion that they wanted to have about those items? Go ahead, Jackie.

Well um I I am first grateful. Thank you for including the um the amount of tax monies that are involved in any particular ballot item as well as the the time period. I think that's going to be really helpful to voters. Um one suggestion I had in in the specific verbiage, I think uh the word tax was left out. Let me see if I can can find the spot. But um oh goodness, hold on. I need to get to the uh verage itself.

Um it referred to um t it referred to capture without referring to it as tax capture. And I thought that inclusion of the of the term tax would be um important for for voter understanding. And And I did have a question about um the estimated uh value of of any particular um tiff proposal. And I'd like to suggest that we have um the support of city staff in in verifying estimates. You know, perhaps that's already part of the plan, but I would I would like to know, for example, that the city treasurer finance director has has reviewed the estimate and and supports the math and the and the um approach to to coming up with an estimated amount or value.

So that there is a a table in every tiff plan that uh is a projected tax capture. So that is that would be taken uh directly from the plan and that's why it would be um that's why I that's why I worded it that way because the table is labeled projected total capture by great and and how how are the numbers in that table created? That would be a really good question for the city treasurer and probably the assessor and maybe the DDA CEO or the brownfield CEO. Um okay who it's okay you're getting sort of close to math for me I am I am I knew sorry

but that is stat that is required by statute though that it be vetted and by the items in the projected plan or other parts of it so whether it's brownfield right and then that projection ends up in the and of course it's an estimate right and it ends up in the plan y okay all right thank you and then the t were the suggestion for the edit on tax is there any reason that we should or shouldn't add that no it just I just took it directly from the the plan. But I I think it would remove any ambiguity about what subject of the type of topic is. Um any other Heather, sorry, you had your hand up. So you So it's in the preamble where the tax part is missing for the capture. You got that right. Okay.

I wrote that down. Yeah.

Okay. All right. Um, so for the stated purpose language, I get that this is a conservative legal approach and it's meant to minimize risk of challenge and that you're recommending that by avoiding subjective and selective summaries. The ballot language maintains neutral neutrality and avoids accus accusations of bias. I get all that and it's a very defensible position under election law, but I I feel like it's going to be frustrating to voters who just want a plain English language summary of what they're voting for. Um, the first two examples included in the packet uh are are so opaque that I a voter without prior knowledge would not would I feel be very challenged to understand what's being asked of them. And I really don't think that avoiding bias um has to result in making something obscure or unclear or unintelligible. And I don't see why we can't find some neutral ground between providing nothing but numbers and a location and a very short description of what of the project's scope. I thought that um the last two examples you provided were a bit over the top, but what Judy Nelson sent later uh this afternoon just, you know, a corridor plan for the development of 14th Street or continued development of downtown. Just something in there. Can't Can't we agree to just add something in there that describes what the what the um what the project scope is? Um, also the unlimited unchanged proposals. Um, okay. So, I I'm still not happy with the same proposal coming back over and over again. Um, it may pro protect the commission from being pressured to

approve a plan after voters reject it, but at the same time, I feel like it opens a door to applicants to repeatedly resubmit the same old thing. And I think that that this undermines the charter's uh intent which in uh which included explicit language that the commission must not evade the petition rights and voting rights of the city residents. I think that unlimited resubmissions risk ballot fatigue and more importantly could be viewed as pressuring voters until the desired outcome is reached. Some m municipalities um place time place limits on you know identical submissions. It could be a year, it could be two years. But if the commission majority is determined to allow these identical submissions um you know a cool off time would strengthen the policy but it um and it would also align more closely I think with the charter's protective intent. So if if the commission majority wants to keep these these identical proposals coming back year after year or it doesn't even have to be year after year. It could be twice in one year at this point if it's a special election and a general election. Could we put a time limit on it? Those are my two um my two suggestions.

Okay. short the short description of the project of the scope to be added and if we're going to do this uh over and over again repeated identical submissions that we add a time frame to that. So for our last discussion, we did have the the consensus was about five of the seven commissioners uh go vote for the second bite at your own risk. And so that's why Lauren was instructed to bring us back the the language that we have here. And that's why that's what's before us right now. Um everybody has to vote how they see fit if this does come up for a vote. So I understand your request on that, but that's where that one sits. I think the um you know the statement was made of you were asking also about the um sorry my brain's a little fried tonight the tiff um having a little bit of a summary I you know I I think that's the question of is that too subjective and that's up to this commission to have that discussion if they want um or or take a motion as it is written. I'll make the motion that uh if uh the city of Traverse City implementation policy for charter section 28 tiff amendments be adopted

and we would say the amended imple implementation policy since Jackie had an edit suggestion or the tax. Okay. Um do we have a second for that? Okay then I'll second. Thank you Tim. Okay. Okay, so we've got Stanley and Warner and let's we can now open that up a little bit more. Go ahead to

Yeah, on the topic of bringing back the identical or nearly identical uh proposal, I guess a question for the city attorney u hypothetically this happens comes back and we'll say it's completely identical um 6 months 12 months later. Uh, does the city commission at that time have an obligation to approve putting it on the ballot? Uh, say it comes from the DDA. Uh, could the city commission kind of look at it and say, "No, this is the same thing that got voted down. We're not We don't Well, we don't care to move it forward.

The policy as it stands would not support that. The city commission can amend its policy. It's your policy. But this the policy as it stands right now does not support that. How does it not support it? It says that it that it can come back an unlimited number of times. It can come back. Does it say it will be on the ballot? It just says it can come back to the city commission, doesn't it? Um I guess I have to look and see where it says shall and where it says may. While you're checking on that, although this is another question, if I shall take any action, right, to submit the proposal to the folks. I'll take any action. So, it's open there. Okay.

Okay. Just curious on the practicalities of it. Um, can I ask a really quick piggyback on Tim's real quick? There is, um, I think the closest you could feasibly look at it without somebody paying for a special election and then I mean that's a real expensive roll of dice if you really wanted to push it, but would be maybe an August primary and then a November election. Would that then even though it was approved previously, would it still have to come back for a language approval to be on the ballot and everything else and go through that whole process? So in theory that would be too tight of a window almost to get it approved or it would be quite tight but it it would it the it's possible. Sarah's telling me and she knows it's very tight. She knows. Um it still has to go back to the AG's office.

No, it doesn't have to go to the AG. It's just there has to be a a resolution approved with the ballot language to go to the county clerk and then they they go through that process to print the ballots. So, so again it would take action by the commission and in that short period of time plus the county clerk acting on if they did the commission did decide to abort. Okay. Sorry. Go ahead. So I is in the city charter as it stands are there is there are there any sections where a time frame for action on a previously enacted ordinance already exists? Um,

is there somewhere that where the second bite at the apple is in some way regulated in our city charter currently? Uh, when there is a um an initiated ordinance, it can't be amended for a period of time by the city commission after it's initiated. And that's in the charter. I think it's two years. Um, and that's that's right in the charter language itself. But that language was not included in the ballot proposals that were approved. That kind of that was not part of these initi. No, this charter uh amendment did not include a time a time limit or time frame like that or something like that.

Okay. Jackie, just to say that I would support a cooling off period to be included in this implementation policy. I I share Commissioner Shaw's concerns about um fatigue of the voters and and also I think it's a matter of respect for their voices that um a cooling off period between the time that an an specific proposal is voted upon and when it can come back in an identical form um I think would be a a valuable tool. M Warner, did you have your hand up? And then

yeah, um, so to the some of the points that were being raised by Commissioner Shaw as far as more descriptive language so the the citizen filling out a ballot can better understand if they haven't done a bunch of homework to know what what this is about they're expected to vote on. Um, yes, I s I support that concept wholeheartedly, but to me if a typically, not all the time, but typically if a voter is unsure of what something says, they vote no. So, I would think that we'd have advocates for, you know, TIFF 97 and other advocates for TIFF asking for more descriptive language because it's only through descriptive language and an electorate that understands what they're being asked to vote for that things will get approved. And so if folks aren't feeling the need to for the citizens to really understand what they're voting on, um I'm I'm going back and forth whether to vote yes tonight and say you fine if that if everybody's not it's not everybody, but if folks are accepting of language that's not necessarily clear, then

maybe that's what we have for now. Mitch, you

uh I'd say that democracy is best served in this case by having more democracy and that when it comes to language as long as the applicant feels that language is sufficiently clear and it passes otherwise um standards that we have for say um charter amendment language for clarity then that should be sufficient. Also, we don't restrict um candidates uh running from for multiple terms in case they don't uh win an election. We've got an election coming up in November for which three of the five city commission candidates have run for an election in the last two years and they lost and we are not prohibiting them from running again. We had a situation in our last election where somebody had um applied for a city commission vacancy uh 10 months before we had an election and that didn't prohibit that candidate from or that person from being a candidate on the next ballot. So I do think it's consistent with our values and how we and other municipalities have done things to give um multiple chances Jack, you go ahead. Um, just to say that I think I think there's a fair amount of difference between a the complexity of a tax increment financing proposal and um an individual who may be running for office. Um to the to the point of um well, if they don't understand it, they'll vote no. I I think there is just as much the possibility of a a positive halo effect as a negative halo effect. You know, if if what's on the ballot is

insufficiently clear, then a person is going to make their decision based on prior experience and reputation and a general impression of the requesting organization. And I I I fear that lack of clarity and the ballot language is going to shift people in that direction and that the quality of the decisions will suffer as a result.

I I think that everybody's making uh really good arguments. I would kind of say though in this case I'm not the same reasoning but Commissioner Warner's reasoning is everything we're talking about as it is right now is frankly a disadvantage to TIFFs downtown tiffs or city tiffs that are non brownfield basically. Um, and you know, if somebody's going to resubmit in 3 months and have another bite at the apple, I can't imagine that's really great PR and public opinion because I, you know, the the wording the question I think we would get into and and very not just legally, but I think publicly as far as public trust, who's going to determine what that summary is? Is it the applicant? And then it's, you know, the DDA or the developer, whomever is trying to dictate what this is and might be falsely representing. If it's um, you know, a nonprofit organization doing something, they're going to put their their summary on it. Or is it staff or is it you know, who at the end of the day is doing that summary? And that's what the campaigns are for. And so I think we're trying to I think that that for that with having it available online before having the written the exact written uh tiff plan out there which is something we've already talked about having available um that gives voters a that want to be informed a lot of information available to them. Plus election spending doesn't seem to be going down for anything. So there's going to be a lot of of work out there and a lot of money out there. And we've seen that that doesn't always the most money spent doesn't always influence the voters the way they think it is. And so um I think we could try to regulate this as best as we can, but ultimately the implementation and the execution of something that would be a little bit more subjective. I think that would open us up to some I feel like that would be distrust from the public. Um that's my concern about this.

But I'm also that's I mean I waited till everybody waited a little bit for my concerns and thoughts here but not cutting you off the conversation. So if other people have other thoughts or comments please continue. Any others? Go ahead Jack. At least one other one other issue that I don't think we've addressed tonight had to do with um the benefits of having a a specific uh proposal confirmed by the city commission in the event that a tiff ballot issue is turned down by the electorate. And I I wondered if we could hear from the city attorney whether whether there are benefits to including that in our implementation policy.

Um this is the idea of having it come to the city commission once it's been rejected by the electorate and having the commission act. Um, I think it's very difficult to um, you know, it's been expressed that that would moot any type of a a um, a lawsuit that could be brought after that. I don't agree with that. Um, I think that uh, litigation is quite likely and I don't think that um, having the commission forced to take action um, after the electorate has um, taken action is going to protect the city or the city commission from that litigation. Um I think it's quite likely to muddy the waters um in the litigation. So um you know this is how it was handled for the tall building proposal um which implementation policy was ultimately upheld by the court of appeals and um so that's why I'm I'm recommending a consistent um approach on this implementation policy as well.

Thanks. Great question Heather.

Yeah, just one last thing. Um, so, so the the two issues I brought up, which is the frustration at not understanding what you're supposed to be voting on, who's going to get blamed? It's it's not going to be whoever brought the proposal to the city. It is going to be the city. The city will be blamed for asking something so untransparent that nobody knows what what it's about. Uh, and it's very much the same with the repeated uh proposals. who will be blamed when when never say never the same proposal comes back twice in a year or one year after the other. It's not going to be the person or the group that puts that proposal forward. They will the city will be blamed and the people the residents will ask why is the city bringing this back over and over again. So I I feel like better safe than sorry. Better be better to be more transparent than less transparent. Better to build trust rather than to create confusion.

I was double checking other. Go ahead.

Well, I'll just point out that enhanced transparency doesn't always increase trust uh knowledge or confidence. We have uh at the present the most transparent, open and secure election system that we all ever have. And yet there's still people that think that elections are rigged. And those concerns seemingly are reinforced the more steps are put in place to um improve the security of our election system. Uh so transparency can be a goal but does it actually achieve the result? If the result is um tiff plans don't get approved then I can see that but I don't see think that that is um our role as a city commission to uh make it theoretically harder for a test plan to come into existence. Any other thoughts right now? Okay, with that, I'm going to go ahead and open this for public comment. And Sarah, if you want to read the rules, and anybody who's interested, please approach the podium. We'd ask that you state your name and address. Indicate if you're a city resident, non- city resident, and or city business owner. We have a threeminut time aotment per speaker. When your time is elapsed, the timer will beep. And finally, we request that all language be respectful to all parties. Fred Bimber, 1223 Randolph Street, city resident. The comments tonight made by commissioners Anderson and Shaw are well taken. The first principle that's stated in the Michigan statute regulating ballot language is that the ballot language should inform voters of what they're

voting on. A simple idea, a very important one and one that should be part of this policy not adequately expressed so far. Secondly, to this is a policy decision the city commission should make about what it considers to be good policy for treating proposals like this. If you think it's good policy to allow somebody to endlessly bring back the same proposal and present it to voters, ignoring what the voters have already said at an earlier election, then that's what you should decide. But if that's what you as any individual member of the city commission think, I really don't think you belong there. Finally, and actually they're going to have two further comments. There is merit and advantage and protection to the city in presenting to the city commission a matter that has been voted down by the voters. The city commissioners might all on their own decide, "No, we don't we we declined to adopt this tiff proposal." If you do that, the city commission has acted. You have withdrawn from the quiver of from the arsenal of the litigant that wants to sue the city one of the bases that they could try to state to try to challenge what the city has done. And um anyway, I will conclude my remarks with that. But I do believe that this is an inadequate implementation policy and I

hope it does not reflect what city commissioners think would be good policy to establish for these proposals. Thank you. Thank you. Other public comment on this item

Raymond Mini with the Menini Group. Um I said uh something earlier uh this evening to the commission as it relates to um a repeat voting um rather than extrapolated to endless return uh proposals coming before voters just the fact that it could happen once is sounds like that's the preference for prohibition by some people. So I don't think we should restrict the opportunities for public benefit which has to be clearly articulated in a a tiff plan. Why should we restrict the opportunity for the voters to consider something? The voters change the times change the uh perceptions of what people think is accurate or appropriate for um a a good tiff plan especially as it relates to brownfield or brownfield housing. um we shouldn't deny voters the opportunity or applicants the opportunity to see something good happen and if it's going to be substantially similar or exactly the same let that let the chips fall where they may. Um and because there's not been discussion if there's a minor modification what's justified to be a significant change or adequate change to not count as coming back and biting the apple twice. So, um, and as it relates to the summaries of the of a TIFF plan, I'm all for it if the applicant can be part of the drafting process, uh, for the description of the TIF, uh, plan. Um, and since most of the effort is on that applicant, why not? So, thanks.

Thank you. Any other public comment on this item?

Just read 63, Kai Drive, permit 1B. Um, state Michigan. I'd say that the if the tiff plan would um would get um knocked down for any reason. Um at least you couldn't be sued. I mean, you know, wouldn't be sued like Old Mission Pissa Township where uh they went ahead and they got sued over a group. Um so yeah, $50 million really big. So thank you Thank you, Justin. Any other public comment? Okay, seeing none, I'm gonna bring it back to the commission. Jim, go ahead. Get back to my uh one of my earlier questions to the city attorney and I apologize if I apparently I've missed this. Um I guess I was thinking in this policy for implementation that it was an added step that it wasn't is it taking away the city commission's right to have an opinion on moving a tiff forward or not. In the instance that the electorate votes no, then the city commission would not under the charter be allowed to vote yes. In the instance that the electorate votes yes, then the city commission could still vote no.

But they can't they could vote yes or no. But that but with the shell that you referenced earlier, the city commission at the time must put it on the ballot. Yes.

Guess where does where does that where does the shell come from? I think that you're going to run into a due process issue if you get an application from a TIFF agency. that they want to have something on the ballot and the city commission says no, we're not even going to put it to the electorate. But that's what that's what existed prior to last November. I No, I think you would still have that issue prior to last November. It could come it would never go to the electorate. It would come to directly to the city commission. Right. And if the city commission said no, then that's that, right? But you wouldn't just sit on it. Correct. Correct.

But you're saying now the city commission in the future can't look at something and say, "Well, this is ridiculous. It's a waste of time to even put it in front of the electorate and vote no." They the city commission cannot take action until after the electorate has taken action under the current charter based on what was approved last November. Thank you.

Do we have other last questions or comments? Clarification. And so just I mean just because I think Tim I'm not saying Tim understands and everybody here but just to clarify for the viewers at home I guess um is what Lauren is saying here is that because the charter amendment came and says that a tiff must be voted on the public before the city commission can take action. It must be voted on the public first and then excuse me this I I will

I understand please let me finish and then I will consider some requests. But that was the bot the bot as the ballot amendment read is the tiff a tiff plan goes to the voters before the commission gets to make any decision so that this the will of the people can be heard first. Is that essentially what was being put forward? The tiff plans have to go to the vote of the people first before the city commission can consider them and then if it's a no, it's just dead in the water. If it's a yes, then they could come back to the commission and still be turned down. Yes. Because at the end of the day, previously if it was voted yes, it it came to the commission. If it was voted yes, voters could appeal through referendum, right? Can't an ordinance.

Yes. And if it was voted no, then it was dead in the water. Yes. Okay. That was the process before and that's the process now. I'm going to make a one minute exception to Fred Bimber because I as the and this is unusual. I don't usually do this, but this is something that I know everybody up here is wanting to make sure we have all the voices heard. So, one minute on the clock.

Okay. Thank you. I appreciate this time. What Lauren Tribble has just said in response to Commissioner Wernern's question is false. the the our ballot proposals do not require that it be put to a vote before city commission action. What they state is that the city commission may not approve or amend or modify a tiff unless the voters have first approved it. It does not prevent the city commission from saying we will not approve this extension of tiff 97 or this other amendment of a tiff plan or this adoption of a new tiff plan without it having yet gone to the voters. Mr. Werner was exactly correct in that the city commission had that power before November and it still has that power now. Thank you.

Thank you. I guess in response to that, and I don't usually respond, but I would just say how can the city commission realistically take up that question with the charter amendment as it is now when they would take it up and the only answer could be no. So it I guess you know it's it's uncharted waters what we have but it certainly is a question of can there realistically be that discussion before it has gone to the voters

and and that I thank Mr. Member for getting up and clarifying that and I thank uh Lauren here because that's been something that I've been troubled by is you could bring it to commission and then they either have to vote no or if they vote yes they've now violated the charter and so that does leave it a bit of a you know, you're talking about, you know, what what would be the action of bringing that forward to vote no on it and and then bringing it before for the charter amendment. So, I guess that's the quandry that we're in right now. So, do we have other clarifying questions right now? Oh, I have a confusing question.

Fair enough. Ask any questions at all. Fair enough. But hypothetically, a proposal could come, a ballot proposal could come to the city commission and the city commission. It's not that they would vote on anything, but they could discuss the merits of the proposal. I mean, that could be part of any discussion when it comes forward to be put on the ballot, too, right? So, that's where the commission could weigh in as as part of that discussion. Um but wouldn't be and if the commission were to for example there was consensus that the the proposal was ridiculous or as Tim Warner said that would be in the public record but it would still go on on the ballot. Yes, it would definitely be on the public record. Yeah. Right. I mean

I mean you'd have to have that discussion in a public meeting. All right. Well, clear as mud, I think, for some up here. So, um I'm going to call the question. Um is this an item that if there is a if it's voted down, it can't come back for six months or if we edit it, is there a change or how does this how would this work? Uh it's a vote of four. So, it depends on the number of votes. It dep We'd have to we'll have to tally and um and look at the rules. Okay. And back to you. I'll call the question right now. All in favor? Opposed? No. No. No.

Okay. I don't think we need a roll call on that. Actually, it's unanimous. No. Um, so that leaves us with it not passing right now. Minimally, and we'll get consensus from Sarah later. Someone who voted no could bring it back later or it can be brought back with amendments. Correct. Let's just say anybody who voted no can bring it back. And that might be bring it back with ask for an amendment. I'm going to give us a quick fivem minute recess so that this answer can be on the record during the meeting. But I ask that people not go on too much of a walkabout if they more than maybe a quick drink or a quick bathroom break

here. Two of them can bring it back. Oh, it's absolutely There's not a pronounced two commissioners, at least one concluded on the prevailing side of

Okay, we are bringing this meeting back to order. Um, so we're going to go to Sarah for an official answer on the order of operation if this item comes back so that we are being very clear and transparent with the public about what's happening and or Lauren if you're prepared to answer whichever one of you two would like to. So it can come back if two commissioners request it come back. One of whom was on the prevailing side which was all of you. So any two commissioners can request it come back. Okay. And that request can be an email to me. Yep.

Okay. Great. So, I just wanted to clarify that if it comes back, that's two commissioners requesting. That would also be on any thing that comes forward. Um, and that's where that is at right now. So, um, next we're going to move into our um, amendment to the code of ordinances uh, which would address uh, consumption in public. And this was something that Chief Richmond brought to us before. There were some questions and needing some clarification. So, that's been done and that is now being brought back to us. So, Lauren, do you want to introduce that? Uh, sure. So, um this was one of the and my computer's not pulling memo now, but um this was one of the ordinances that came in a package and uh the other two fell away. The the question on this one was

Thank you, Sarah. Oh, maybe not using it either. Um the question on this one uh when the commission discussed it was how it might um affect certain uh Oh, here we go. It finally came off. Thank you. to county Wi-Fi um how it would affect certain events like men's night and ladies night. And so um the chief and I talked about it and um determined that uh if we took out the language that is crossed out that that would um still allow for those events to go on. you uh you couldn't carry your little sample glass of wine out in the on the sidewalk. Um but you could still have in the businesses like they currently do and chief seemed to think that that wouldn't be the worst thing that ever happened for men's night and ladies night. Um so on that uh discussion and recommendation uh he has to bring this back to you. in a clarifying question because it brought brought up during um agenda review was this is for public rightaways like sidewalks, streets, our parks policies have their own policies based on the park those are notwithstanding of this. So this is just for the public right ofway spaces. Um the policies in any given park are still going to be remain intact whichever ones they are. Some prohibit some allow. Right.

So we just wanted to clarify I wanted to kind of ask and clarify that. Yeah. Exactly. So um rights of way public sidewalks which are usually in the rightway parking structures and parking lots um and then uh any other restrictions to times and dates that the commission um approves. So, it's it's really those public spaces, you know, the the parking decks and the lots and the parking system and the streets and sidewalks. Great. Uh do you have a question, Mitch?

Yes. Uh aside from organized events like Wednesday night a night if say there's a neighborhood block party that involves closing off um a alley or a street or section of sidewalk question um it's still a public rightway even though vehicles are not traversing it um and alcohol is served. Is that currently a violation of law and does this change um how it violates law? H I you know in the right of way where the cars are I shouldn't go off the cuff but my recollection is that that is the main um issue where there is a statute that covers it but I don't know

chief's on his way up to well it has to do with what I don't know what is in the um street closure permits when they close them for for black parties and so forth. So maybe chief knows that's what I was going to bring up. Most of those are governed by special permits given by the city and those are approved by us. So those that could be something that's put in into those permits as well that so the permits would would the permits then just come with the suspends while this permit is in effect it suspends this or would they have to ask for a special secondary permit? I think that would have to go through Lauren but I think that's something that could be worked into a permit that okay suspends that portion for that. Go ahead, Jackie.

And just to clarify how this relates to our one and only social district at 8 and Garfield, does it impact that at all? That is permitted by the liquor control commission. Um, and so that would be the part about the business um organization having permission from the liquor control commission can continue. Thank you.

Go ahead, Heather. Um, the ordinance explicitly allows only businesses that are licensed by the Liquor Control Commission and approved by the city commission. Do you think this sounds like commission approval could be discretionary and we could get attacked for um arbitrary or politically motivated decisions? Is there anything we can do? Is there some kind of quick evaluation we could add into that to make it or um the as you know there many of the liquor licenses come to you for your approval. So that's what's wrapped into this. So when a liquor it's exempting liquor licenses that come to the commission and are approved by you.

So you're not seeing Okay. I guess we have more questions or a motion. Go ahead, Jack. I'll make the motion that amendments to the Traverse City Code of Ordinances, Chapter 670, Personal Conduct Offenses, Section 670.04, Consumption in Public, be introduced and scheduled for possible enactment on September 2nd, 2025. Report. Thank you, Commissioner Anderson and Commissioner Stanley. Any other discussion or questions? Go ahead.

Yeah. Uh it was late just in the past couple hours, but I did submit questions uh to the city attorney and the deputy city manager uh mostly as a heads up as far as asking and really for the for the public just to be aware like we're talking about right ofways and I plan to support this but there are plenty of public and non-public property that are not covered by this. Uh we have a very large parking lot uh you know just a block down on 8th Street there that's a private parking lot so it's not covered by this. We have uh the M dot rail corridor that's not covered by this. We have Boardman Lake Trail that's currently not covered by this. Um there's lots of city properties that are not parks that are not covered by this. Um, so it doesn't mean that we as a community can't start with this and see how it goes and work with the chief. Um, but I just want people to be kind of well aware that it's not like, oh, we did that thing. Things should be great now. Um,

there's there's, as the chief knows, a lot of work to be done. Um, and we have to be kind of cleareyed on uh, this may be a first step and then we've got to see where we are and re-evaluate and move move forward. I I would agree. Um, really quick clarification actually based on Commissioner Warner's comments, not not to nitpick, but because this popped in my head, currently Hall Park it does not allow drinking, right? So the part of the tart trail that crosses through there is prohibited, right? But not the majority of the tart trail. Absolutely correct. But I wanted to say that lest it get out that that part of Hall Park is not is not subject to the rules and it is. Go ahead, Jackie.

Um I just wanted in terms of of followup um I'm sensitive to the fact that this was originally part of a package of three uh proposed amendments. And I wondered if there is any appetite among others on the commission for um again bringing up the issues on prowling and loitering ordinances and what that process would look like to get another conversation on the topic.

That is something that I'm willing to uh explore. Again, this was the one that we thought we could bring to you right now and get implemented. Um, to Commissioner Werner's um question on the the city- owned property, we do have an administrative order that can be enacted by the city manager. Uh, so if we deem city property uh become becoming problem areas, we can put those on there. We just did that for um technically the address is 871 Lake Ridge, but there's a gazebo down there on the tart trail that is becoming an issue. So, we placed that on the prohibited alcohol. We posted signs so that we can address that area there. Part of the tart trail I believe is parkland considered 850 wood I believe is some park but we could have again address that through administrative orders if we deem those

but commissioner I would be interested in bringing those back as well with you and I think what I would ask if you're okay with it is that we bring them back one by one and have chief work with us and so we can I think before we got them as a big bulky thing and maybe if we take them one at a time and and examine them I'm open to that conversation unless there are some u operational benefits to combining them. Yeah. And we'll we'll uh have chief get back with us on that. But great, thank you.

And just for clarity for the public, I think um there are signs in the parks and the public property that where it's prohibited, there will always be a sign. So it's not just an administrative order that's signed in the manager's office and nobody ever knows about it. Has to be signed to be enforced. So you'll see signs if if that's the case. Great. Other questions or comments? Okay. I'm going to open this up for public comment then. Please feel free to approach the podium. Seeing none, then I'll bring it back. All in favor? I opposed. Nay. Roll call, please. Commissioner Anderson, yes. Commissioner Shaw, yes.

Commissioner Stanley, yes. Commissioner Treadwell, no. Commissioner Werner, yes. Mayor, yes. Motion passes. Um, thank you all for that. And now we'll move on to the CDBG. Thank you for spelling that out literally for me. So, I got the initials right. Uh, subreients request. And I will have our deputy city manager put this on. So, this particular request has to do with the um the copy shop um that's located at Woodmare and 8th Street. Um to request um No, no, it's I'm sorry. Oh, I'm so sorry. We skipped agenda.

I I do that at least once a month. No worries.

Consideration of allocations for fiscal year 2526 CDBG funds. Um we have with us the deputy um planning director Leslie Stikman, sorry Stikerman. Uh Leslie um and she has been um working diligently to compile the list of all of the allocations for this year and I will turn it over to Leslie. Uh I'm not gonna Good evening. I'm not going to go through um all of the dollars unless you want me to. But uh we received uh requests from uh Goodwill, um Homestretch, uh uh Jubilee House, and I think that is it. And um the and staff has recommended that we uh make those allocations um and set aside a larger amount as was mentioned before for um administration of this um of this program. We have found um over the last year or two since uh this program has come into existence that administering this program is a heavier lift than we thought. And there is a lot of expertise that we need to rely on. For instance, we had to hire a um archaeological um historian to review a site as part of the due diligence for the um environmental reviews required by HUD. We also found out kind of midway through that we had obliga obligations um uh relative to fair housing that required us to um enter into an agreement with the fair housing center of West Michigan

to help do some training and to um uh help us get up to speed with fair housing rules and laws and also to field complaints from uh people in our community. Um so there is a larger amount that we we feel is necessary in order to do our full um to fully meet our obligations under HUD rules. Also given the fact that HUD um has lost a lot of personnel. So, uh, we're kind of more reliant on our, um, consultants and their expertise to make sure that we're meeting all of the myriad requirements, regulations, reporting, and it it is a little bit more than we had expected. Um, so that, uh, speaks to that element. Um and another part that um kind of did a little shifting near the end was in regards to the request from Goodwill in discussions with them. it became apparent that their biggest need right now is for um emergency rental vouchers to help get folks into housing um and pay a portion of their rent who um in many cases have are coming out of um being unhoused and need to get into East Bay flats. Um that's an immediate need that they have right now. There will be funding coming that will help to um uh bridge the gap for people who have um need for rental assistance, but that won't be available for several months. So that became kind of a high priority. Um and then uh Jubilee House uh you know it was clear that there's a commitment on the part of the city to support

Jubilee House this year. Uh there was another allocation made to them. Um but they had asked for the um the public service or staffing um uh allocation for this year. So the recommendation is to give them the full allotted amount which would be 15% of our full budget. Um and that then leaves uh the remainder uh to go toward homestretch for the project um at lot O. Um I I want to caution you that this does not fill their gap in financing. Um our full allocation for this year I don't think could have filled that gap for them. Um, but I do want to um kind of let you know that I I intend to do a little more research and find out if we can do a multi-year um allocation to that um project and make a commitment over more than one year that could fill their funding gap and still meet their timing requirements and fit within our calendar. So, I think that could be a possibility and uh doesn't leave a lot of uh funding sitting on the table untapped for those who need rental assistance right now. So, that might be a solution that might work for everybody. And again, this has been a big learning curve and uh trying to uh figure everything out and uh determine what's going to best meet our the needs of the community and meet all the federal requirements. Um you know, we're still working on that, but uh I guess I'll leave it at that and find out if you have any questions.

Sure. Do we have questions to start with, Heather? Um, so the funding for Jubilee House, um, does that come out of the does our promised allocation then get reduced because of that $55,000 coming from the CD? No, we have, uh, the full allocation we can spend up to 15%. They're talking about what we approved at our commission meeting two weeks. No, no, it's quite all right. um that this as far as I know and we can um you know after general questions we could ask I know Derek from uh Jubilee House is here but this was one of the funding sources they were applying to to offset that cost so for the full for the end of the year it was my understanding and I see a head nod back there that that is the case

so that we allocated reduced by yes by 55,000 yeah okay uh that was question number one okay the other question is that um the are there actually 33, not to mention 51 rentals in the city of Traverse City that are available as East Bay Flats, correct? Temporary housing. There are that many. They're not going out of the city. These are for incity temporary emergency rental vouchers. And uh it's not that they're only going to be staying there temporarily. It's that they have a temporary need for emergency assistance assistance with their rent

to get them into that unit and we have enough units to How is that many? That's East Bay Flats. So that is the specific Yeah. purpose there. Yep. Okay. Great. Thank you. Yeah.

Um I had a quick question. the 143,000. I appreciate that you're taking a different t look of long-term, but if that's not available, and I know we just went through this a couple months ago, but that was a very quick speedy process, and I'm not great on a pop quiz right now, apparently. So, if that isn't going to be spent and allocated throughout before this funding window expires, is there a way for us to reallocate that or is that um is this a set in stone? And I I apologize to everybody because I know we've gone over this but I just can't remember right now. I I'm not 100% sure of the question but if it's

it's 143,000 being allocated to lot but there's a bigger gap than that. So in the the time period that we have to allocate this money and I know these have very this funding in particular has a very tight deadline or has deadlines on it. If it is not spent in that time and it's getting close and it's not uh going to be spent, is that something we can reopen or is this a user to lose it and we're stick sitting with that much on the table? So, it's my understanding that uh in the first instance that we can actually um allocate that like we allocate it now we have a total of five years to

Okay, five years. Okay, thank you. Um but there are um checkpoints along the way and we have to have a certain amount of our draw downs of our full allotments um committed or drawn down and if we haven't gotten there because we're holding some funding up because of some something happening in the background then we could start to get into trouble. Um but um so I think that answers your question.

Absolutely. That was my basically that helps me because that's the timeline and the allocation request. So that was that was what I was curious about. So do you have other questions? Okay. Um then does anybody want to make the motion or go ahead? I'll make a motion that the mayor and interim city clerk be authorized to execute contracts with Goodwill Northern Michigan, Grace Episcopal Church, Jubilee House, and Homestretch Nonprofit Housing Corporation in the not to exceed total of $294,289 from CDBG funds as outlined in deputy planning director sustainability coordinator Sikman's communication dated August 8, 2025. such contracts subject as to its substance by this interim city manager and its form by the city attorney and further that the 2024 2025 CDBG allocation to Goodwill Northern Michigan in the amount of $21,493 be recategorized from bike racks to additional HVAC units

okay thank you commissioner Stanley and Commissioner Treadwell further discussion on this item go ahead I just want to say that thank you very much Leslie for your explanation of why the admin costs went up so much. I found it very reasonable. Yes. And I I I was going to comment on that as well that the 73,000 in admin I think when people read that can think that's just a salary or something and we know I appreciated that insight of archaeological digs and federal assistance drying up and things like that. That's very important for us to and the public to have as contact. So yeah, thank you Heather. Any other comments or questions? Okay. Um any public comment on this item? Seeing none, I'll bring it back to the commission. All in favor?

I opposed. Motion passes. All right. And now we will move on to 14th Street project. Um, we're just underway but needing a little more money. So, I'll let you lead on that. Deb. So, this is in regards to the purchase order for the ashvault for the in-house mill and um I have on here Milan Page, but that's I don't know project on 14th Street. and Frank Duri is with us this evening. As me was mentioned earlier in my comments, this is part of the project that you saw a sample of um on 14th Street. So Frank, do you want to come up and speak to or to answer any questions that anyone may have?

Sure. Frank Dutur, director of public services. I'd like to uh extend the invitation to Chris Weber because he's really done a line chair of the work uh arranging this. his innovative approaches uh on how to come up with ways to maximize the efficiency uh of some of the work we've been doing in town was realized when we saw essentially a a demo Chris arrange a timing of a demo that allowed us to repave 600 ft of a uh welltraveled piece of 14th Street that might not have gotten fixed uh as efficiently And so I' I'd really like to have uh Chris come up and answer those questions. And super proud of the fact that the the streets division has has been doing a great job trying to stay ahead of uh that that uh continually backwardsly spiraling curve with degrading roads and they really are doing a great job. So come on up Chris. Hello everyone. Chris Weber, street superintendent. Um, as Frank mentioned, um, in the last week we had the opportunity to demo a piece of equipment that we had seen at trade shows and training venues throughout the past few years. Um, and it was able to be lined up where the vendor agreed to bring it to the city of Traverse City um, and also show it to a couple surrounding municipalities that had interest in it as well. Um we uh in the past few years the skill set of the streets department um has expanded. We have several employees from the private sector that have worked in paving from Elmer's to Molan um and other areas. Um so we've really been advancing our game and stepping up. Um and I believe that this will actually pay dividends to the city

and the taxpayers because we're able to offer some of these services at a cost savings. um not only a cost savings but a timeline that may be more reasonable. Um 14th Street is scheduled as an MO project which is a municipal planning organization which is some federal funding I believe for 2028. Um if anybody has driven 14th Street recently uh not even recently in the past few years it's not great. This winter uh this past winter was very very hard on 14th Street. Um we had more pothole patching we and uh damaged tire claims than we've seen in recent years combined. Um and honestly I don't believe that this is something that we'll be able to maintain until the realization of this project. So we had this opportunity uh we have funding in our uh annual um budget for maintenance. So we uh had money uh already set aside or allocated for the maintenance of major streets which 14th Street falls under major. Um we had the opportunity to de demo this equipment and we took that opportunity to kind of showcase not only uh what we're capable of but a taste of what uh the project could be uh if it was voted by the commission to approve this. Um, so basically the stretch from Union to Cass eastbound, so the south side of the road. We went in on a Tuesday with this demo piece of equipment along with uh instruction explanations of how it works, training our staff, um, and the, uh, the vendor showing us, uh, the equipment. We were able to mill 650 ft by 12t wide. So basically from the curb to the center turn lane uh in under an hour.

That's amazing. So it was pretty cool.

And then following that up uh we came in with the equipment we have which are front end loaders and front brooms. We were able to clean the area that we had mil. So we basically chewed up about 2 in of asphalt at the surface of the roadway. Uh allowing that surface to be lowered which then we were able to put back 2 in of fresh asphalt with our in-house PA. Um, we did have to rent a larger style road roller um because that really gives you the compaction that you need and provides you that smooth surface. Um, I hope some of you the citizens and uh the commissioners alike have been able to drive it. I kind of strategically chose that area because it was evil a easily able to separate it and have a simple detour. Um, and you have to drive the entire stretch of 14th Street and, you know, rattle your teeth out and then you get to this nice smooth section at the end. So, um, I think that this is a project that we could easily do with staff. Uh, yet this year, um, we have been working with one of our vendors that does provide some my deal pricing, which is a government cooperative, which is AIS, uh, for a similar type of equipment. Um, it's a Wartkin ride-on mill. Basically, it's a little bit smaller, so it might uh take a little bit longer, but we would mill out the section of roadway just like we did and then pave back with fresh asphalt. So, basically, we would be improving the serviceability, extending the life until this project could be realized in 2028. Um, and giving people, the citizens, the commuters the the smooth travel that they so desire uh for the next three to four years until that project could be done. Um but uh basically uh this project was also a test uh because I'm new at kind of estimating uh of my skills of how close are we on

time and material costs and and that type of thing. And we actually were under what I was anticipating. Um and then we did get some pricing from uh there's really only two asphalt vendors in the area which is Elmer's and Molan. Uh we were able to get a pretty competitive price from Elmer's uh which was a pretty significant savings to what we were currently paying uh for this project alone. Um it's a pretty significant savings, but their uh local close proximity to the city um would give us the opportunity to either truck the material ourself or they did provide a price for them to provide the trucking. Um so that stretch from Cast to Union just on the south side of the road 650 ft. It was approximately 135 tons of asphalt. We can haul about 10 to 15 tons in one of our trucks. One of the big Red River trucks that Elmer's have, uh, those hold about 50 tons. So, that could save us five trips with our truck and they could do it with one. But, um, it didn't hold us up with us trucking the material ourselves with four trucks. We have the availability of more trucks. Um, so we could uh possibly do that ourselves, but the scope of the project would be from Cass to just west of Maple Street. So kind of where the bank is and then the new urgent care. Um, we would just be milling 12 feet. So basically from the edge of curb just into the center lane, uh, and mill that asphalt out and then repave back with new. So it would be both directions, just the travel lanes, not the center turn lane. And we would be excluding the intersection of Veterans Drive. Uh because it does still to appear to be in relatively good shape and then it would minimize the impacts on traffic. Um I

know a lot of times when we see projects, they'll close the entire street down. It's a complicated detour. Our plan is to do one block at a time, one direction of travel at a time to minimize the impacts on traffic and uh citizens and people traveling in our community. So, we would, let's say we're working eastbound, we would maintain westbound traffic. That way, we only have to detour one block around and they can get right back to where they were. Um, with this pilot project, um, I believe that we could probably do the entirety of 14th Street if the weather allowed, um, in approximately three to four weeks max. Um, and uh, at a pretty significant cost savings compared to if you were to have a private contractor when a lot of times when they bid on stuff, they include mobilization fees. but we don't have to charge yet because we're already here and the staff is already here. They're already working and we already have most of the equipment. So, um just with that project alone, our costs were approximately $17,000. Um and conferring with the engineering department, a conservative estimate if that would have went to bid would have been ex in excess of 40,000 uh for a similar project. They might have got it done in a day. uh we did it in two, but um I think just uh being able to utilize our staff and our equipment and have the outcome that we had um I think and the cost savings is is they're all benefits. So, what we are proposing uh is that the city commission authorize a purchase order uh for the asphalt which is estimated with a little bit of wiggle room um not to exceed $100,000 to Elmer's. Um and I think that's about it. I had created a little slideshow, but I pretty much covered everything. Uh, I do have

some maps that I could provide after the fact that our GIS asset management department created which shows the entirety of the scope, linear feet, square yards, all that stuff, which is kind of what we use for estimating. So, thank you for your enthusiasm and innovation. That's awesome. So, um, do we have any questions? Go ahead, Mitch. Yeah, you answered my questions about how it would logistically happen and approximate time frames. Uh, but you say 3 to four weeks. When are you looking at this happening?

Uh, as soon as reasonably possible. Um, we have some flexibility in our schedule. Um, we do have some other maintenance items that we have to complete prior to the end of the season. However, I think within the next month realistically, we're getting close to the end of that construction season. Uh but I believe if we were able to get started within the next couple of weeks, we could realistically see this through uh mid September.

And this could be a block versus block call and depending on what direction, but uh if you are doing construction, I presume that you'll have much less uh turning actions. So would it be possible in at least some places to maintain birectional traffic uh using the center lane as the counterflow?

Um after evaluating it just with the width of the street and having the room for us to be able to negotiate our equipment, we don't believe that it's feasible or safe for our employees. Um I had originally thought about that, but that would also take additional traffic control. um you'd have to have tall cones for the lane delineation. Um this way it's just a oneb block detour. We're still maintaining the one direction of travel. We feel that this would be uh provide us the safest work zone possible um while also having the you know minimal minimal impact. Got it. Sounds good. Great. Jackie, I know you had your hand up.

Just congratulations. Thank you. And you should know that we're already getting letters about which one gets this treatment next. So, well, Seventh Street has come up already.

It's been talked about. If this proves effective, uh, we are happy to showcase our skills and what we could do because that potentially could be five to six years before that project is realized. So, it's something we've been speaking with the engineering department. I really want to thank the engineering department for their cooperation and their insight. Um, and I really have to give it to the staff. Um, people might have the uh the idea that city workers are, you know, just leaning on the shovel like come out here when it's 90 degrees and we're standing on top of 350°ree asphalt. But they're they're hungry. Uh, they want to work and it just makes they're having fun. It makes the day go by faster and I really have to give it to the crew because they're the ones that are actually the ones making this possible. So,

go ahead, Heather. Um, yeah. Hallelujah. Thank you. Um, excuse me. Um, and I hope that having a nice smooth 14th street will deter some residents, some motorists from using Seventh Street as the west corridor to division. That would be fantastic. and really happy to see new tech uh cutting costs and um cutting time. So now I hope maybe please we can get those crosswalks painted by the end of the month. It's really dangerous out there with those invisible crosswalks. So dangerous.

We completely understand. Um that's something that we have a contractor for currently. Um there's a lot of legends in this town is what we call them legends crosswalks and parking is one contractor and there is a lot of them. So well there are parents with their kids in on bikes and they're standing on the sides of the road on the sidewalks at the crosswalks waiting and the cars don't see them because they don't see the crosswalks. So, it's dangerous. And that may be something we plan on bringing to you in the near future is the feasibility of moving work in house. Exactly. That would be great. Thank you.

Well, and that was um I was just going to say that's a great part of you guys doing this and showing what we can do in house. And I know we already started the conversations about um bringing more in house. And I think not only is this innovative and great, I loved I was coming down Cass and all of a sudden part of 14th Street was closed off and got to see that all kind of starting to work. It was great to see and I think uh it's a great way to showcase how good you all are and so how much more we can trust you guys with more pro not not that we didn't trust you with more projects before but that you are all that you're as you said the team's excited to get going and hungry so I think that's really awesome for offer to hear too so we have to earn it we have to prove it so we're willing to do that so

so far so good and to Christopher's credit we also do have a study session that is coming up next month on in-house painting right stay tuned So, I think we've been going without a motion. So, if someone would like to make a motion, please. I'll make a motion that the interim city manager be authorized to issue a purchase order to Elmer's in the amount not to exceed $100,000 for asphalt in connection with the 14th Street in-house mill and pave project with funds therefore available in the road millillage fund. Okay, that to you got us so excited we had our questions and then just kept going. So, had to bring it back to the business, but great job. Thank you.

So, any other comments or questions? I think we did a good job there. Any public comment on this item? I heard a yippy from the crowd for the record. Justin Reed, um but if uh 2028 comes around and 14th Street gets reconstructed, uh where do you think the traffic's going to go? Yeah, I think it's going to be on the side streets. So, but there's nothing you do about it. Um, unless there's some sort of portal that you can show traffic through that voids on the street, but you know, thank you.

Thank you, Justin. Um, any other public comment on this item? Okay, seeing none, I'll bring it back. All in favor? I opposed. Motion passes. Thank you everybody for that and uh thank you for streets and the whole crew over there. All right, now we will move on to the discussion of the um Commissioner Shaw brought this forward. I agreed to second with it on the copy shop's request for um their their land. Did you want to make a couple comments or do we want to just staff other? Yes, please. Staff, please proceed. I didn't want to cut you off. Is is Dan Dan's here? Dan is here. Um but yeah, Deb, if you want to introduce that or

uh you caught me off guard on that one, so I don't think I have that up on my screen. So, let me just give you a second here. So this um obviously is being brought forward a request for a portion of city property um to be um sold for I believe a price of $1 to the property so that they can expand that enhance some of the assets at the crosswalks. And with that, I will defer to um Dan to be able to offer any addition. If you want to come on up to the um podium, we'll let you present with your copies.

I got

Thank you very much. Dan Rickard, the copy shop. I am actually a Leo County resident, but I own the business at 713 East 8th Street. um to I'm old enough now it's time to figure out how to retire. So, I'm trying to figure out how to put the property and the business up for sale. I've taken care of a small sliver of land between my asphalt parking lot alleyway and the wooden fence since I moved in there in 2007. When I first approached this idea, I thought, well, I'll have find a developer and the developer will want to start. I can put a building next door and we can move move east as it goes on and haven't been able to find a developer. I've had a couple of tire kickers and I thought, well, I'm going to find out if we can make this little deal so that maybe it's more appealing to find somebody to take on the development. Um, my two neighbors to my east were tire kicking the idea over the last several years, but um, one of them is a fair bit younger than I am and not quite ready to retire or relocate as a business. Um, so I'm kind of on my own there. So with the just that expanded little piece, um, I feel like it's there's enough there that somebody might bite. Um, I've read the city disposal and of miscellaneous property and I can't think of any reason in there that would preclude the city commission from disposing of it. Part of the other part is the original development plans done I think was 2012 have a four-story building which couldn't happen anymore because of the height restriction. But it went from railroad all the way down past the dry cleaners.

Um growing up here we need some green space. I would like to see as part of this the city commission take that other piece which the tart trail passes through and make that call it a pocket park, call it designated city property, park land or whatever because I think 83 needs some green space. Um, and if you and if somebody actually did development, the tar trail would have would get pushed right to the edge of Railroad Street. And I'm not sure that's a great idea for the tart trail because it separates it from the traffic. So that's what I'm hoping. Um it puts it on the city tax roles. Obviously for a dollar you're not making any money. But if it ever if and when that piece of property ever does get two, three, four stories, whatever somebody can put on it, the amount of tax revenue would be substantial. And if you have any questions, I'd be more than happy to answer them. Well, and Dan, I I did want to say first of all, as a you as a customer, we've had this conversation about your vision for many years now. So, this is something you've consistently wanted to see that green space and things. But also, I just wanted to bring it to the attention of the public as we're having this conversation. And um before we get into the questions that this is to direct staff to review the request and recommendations that gives staff and Dan chances to discuss there might be tweaks to the trade-off and and other advantages. So, this isn't a straightup sale for a dollar tonight. It's um dis and the you know, prices may change, things like that. This is um the initial proposal, but staff is going to be directed to engage and then bring it back to the city commission. So, nothing is going to be committed to tonight other than just exploring the idea and having the conversation. So, I just wanted to set the table with that. So, with that, does anybody have any questions? Go ahead, Mitch.

Yes. Uh I noticed that there is in addition to the fence and grass some utilities along that uh parcel especially there's a box um along 8th Street. Uh how much of that equipment could be moved or would that effectively the box is on the other side of the fence? Yeah. So I'm not I'm not not proposing that. Mhm.

So, and and to answer your question, um, Commissioner Treadwell, four years ago when I kind of got all hot on this when interest rates were down and everything else, I did contact all the utilities and they said, "Yeah, if you put a building there, you can do that. You can move that. You can move the power poles." The key word in that is you. it would be it would be all to um the developer or myself to pay for all the relocation costs. So that has been explored

because yeah I can see them the current infrastructure impinging upon the development potential but depending on what gets moved where it can also help preserve a little more of the viewshed coming down 8th street to see what could be created as a pocket park with say some picnic tables. Yeah. Other questions could I just like to make sure or I'd like to suggest that we add the idea of that pocket park to this to exploring the idea of that pocket park to this whole because that that's not I mean they were separate items. So we've got the idea of the the $1 donation. So would we be interest

would we be interested in the idea that the inter city manager be directed to have staff review this request and the exploration of city green owned green space and make a recommendation to the city commission that was a great motion commissioner very much any do we have a second for that okay thank you Sean treadwell and I just want to be careful before we commit to parkland specifically because that has some certain rules and sometimes we can some protections that don't have the restrictions on it and that'll be all part of the conversation that gets brought back to us. So, could be park, might not be specifically uh Jackie and then Tim.

Love the idea of a pocket park, whatever the title ended up being, but um can you give us any history on the fence that's on the city-owned property there? No, it it predates to be to be real honest. It's been there since it was the bread store. I remember that. Remember the bread store? Yeah. I mean, the whole reason I wound up buying this without going in is I I've been looking for a piece of property for years and I drove out. There was two places I had to go out on South Airport in Woodmir. And when I drove by, my mom had said, "The bread store is gone."

And when I by the time I came back on those little short errands, there was a for sale sign on it. So, I've been going to the bread store since I got back here in 1993 and my mom's been going there since probably 1979 when it opened and it I've always remember that fence there. So, I don't know why or how or who decided that. Thank you. Mhm. Um Tim, yeah, I'm not sure what the final motion was and it the only thing I'm asking for is if the plural of recommendation can be included. So it's recommendations. So there's maybe multiple ideas that come back to the city commission for discussion.

Yes. Thank you. And it is m multiple or plural in the here. I just verbalized. I don't know how it came across. I didn't change that part. I just added the green space. Mitch. Yeah. In answer to Jackie's question, I pulled open aerial imagery from 1954. It shows the railroad bed running parallel to railroad street. And that fence would have uh kept people from jumping onto the tracks. Oh, there we go. Oh, fence. Part of part of the history there. Um, yeah. We won't ask you to test that. Any other questions or comments from the commission right now? Any public comment on this item?

Justin Reed. Um the chart trail that runs right there um on that corner um of a woodmeir is so right where the coffee shop is at cop copy shop is at um it's narrow in that section. So, if that ever became a pocket park and the intersection could be um more or less modernized with a little more of a wider sidewalk going up to the chart trail, um I think it'd be a good investment. So, if you had moved the signal box or doing anything with it, um that would be a advantage. Thank you.

Great. Thank you. Any other public comment on this item? Seeing none, I'll bring it back. All in favor? I opposed. Thank you to staff and Dan for picking up this conversation and we're excited to see what comes next. So with that, we'll move on to appointments. This is a one that formally has to be voted on. Um it's technically my appointment of the interim city manager Benjamin Maritet to the Grand Traverse County Department of Public Works Board and have it be approved with confirmation by the Grand Traverse County Board of Commissioners. If anyone wants to make that motion. Heather, great job. You You just read it. Yes. Good job. Good job. Second.

Okay. Thank you, Commissioner Stanley. Um, and just for the record, I don't make these recommendations. Usually staff comes to us and says, "This is who we'd like to have represent us on these boards." So, um, it's just a legal legal formality for the cities that have strong governments. Yeah, this is a really important board. So, it it's I'm glad that we've got good representation on it. It's a really important board because it's where everyone in the whole county talks to each other about what they're doing. Absolutely. Any other questions or comments there? If I may.

Um the board of public works is currently reviewing its bylaws and we may see some um requests from um that entity to appoint a commissioner as part of the bylaws request. So, um, just just mentioning that, but it certainly is the city commission's option to continue to appoint whoever they so choose.

And yes, good point. We can always put anybody in. Um, I agree with Heather's sentiment that it's important to have our leadership there, but if they open this up to elected people officially, I think that's great, too. And we have some good people up here who can represent us well. So, um, that any other further discussion here? Okay. Any public comment on this item? Seeing none, I'll bring it back. All in favor? I opposed. Motion passes. We're moving on to reports and correspondence. Does anybody have any um updates from their respective boards? Mitch and then we had

a continuing discussion about what is going to happen with our conditional resoning process. So that may eventually get to the city commission and we'll have more discussion there. And uh we also discussed uh or did the preliminary review of a proposed hotel next to the Record Eagle building. So in the time I've been in the city, uh there have been four or five development proposals for that same location. So we'll see what actually happens there.

Now that's a good reminder of the public to engage. Go ahead, Jackie. Just to expand a little detail on that, it was a a site plan that was um approved on a 4-3 vote uh on August the 5th. Um because it is a by use by right use um it will not be coming to the city commission for approval. Um the concerns that were raised and I think the reason that the vote was rather close was that um there was a discussion about the exterior cladding um which they're going with a a petroleum based synthetic stucco product

um within our zoning code uh their specifications for brick and stone exterior cladding. So that's going to be a topic coming up for for further discussion uh on the planning commission meeting on September the 3. So if you have any uh points of view on that, please contact Mitch or me. We can relay those. Um and then also we received notice that on Monday, September the 8th, there's a joint city commission planning commission meeting um on this topic of fair housing training. And um so that will be a don't miss meeting. Yep. And now we are regular time here. So, we are the we're hosting

Monday at 7 p.m. Um, and just a clarification, um, Jackie, because I appreciate you mentioning that the policy discussion of materials required or not required, will that eventually that part eventually come to the commission or is that a internal only? Okay, I'll have to check that. Depends on how much we decide to change it. Yeah. And so, go ahead, Heather. Yeah. I have a question for Jackie Mitch. I I bumped into Brian McGillivary last week and he who voted against this. He characterized the stucco as styrofoam. Would you Is that a fair definition?

That was also the way it was described by the architect on the planning commission. It's styrofoam with a plastic exterior layer that apparently is somewhat fragile in use. It's uh similar to what is was on the former Taco Bell if you want a local example.

Okay. Well, there we go. those are architectural. But I appreciate I wanted to say that I appreciate and look forward to hearing the answer one way or another. But I appreciate you all are picking up the conversation about um materials because as we know brick and some of the traditional have been replaced in some cases by more environmentally friendly or easier to source, but in some cases it's more petroleum and other things. So I appreciate that we're we're picking up some of that conversation and going to have an in-depth conversation or an indepth discussion on it one way or another. So thank you for that. Any other reports? All right, everybody. On um as wait, sorry, a report.

Sure. Uh just an update uh that since we didn't have a meeting last week, I went to East Bay Township who which also had a discussion about creating tiffs. Okay, great. Um then, so thank you for that. I just wanted to point out because it was pointed out by Commissioner uh Sha, we do have the Jacobs Monthly report in there and that does always have some interesting things for our our water and treatment because I know it's of interest to people. So, appreciate her for giving that the shout out, too. Um, so now with that all said, we will move on to public comment. So, this is general public comment. It can be about anything under the sun, whether we talked about it tonight or not.

Um, just this has to do with the TC Housing Authority. Um, to my understanding there's only one person that is working there um as far as their office goes. Um I had somebody who applied there and um so far as one person is there eventually going to be a point in time where there might be some more um hiring for to feeling like I'm betting it's very hard for one person to run office. So thank you. Thank you. Other public comment.

Hello. Um, my name is Paul Maxower. I'm u I live at 409 West 12th Street, Trevor City. And I'm also serve on the Brownbridge Advisory Committee. I'm currently the chair of the committee. Um, want to call call your attention to the um back It was dated June 28th, the letter that the Brown Bridge Advisory Committee sent to the city manager's office and city commissioners and with a request that it be circulated around, forwarded to county officials and officials of East Bay Township. And I'm using this um public comment time just to um give you an update a little bit. Um, I've been to a couple uh Grand Traverse County Board of Parks and Recreation study sessions and meetings where I spoke briefly during public comment there. And as you are probably all well aware, there's we're we're in this ongoing um developing discussion with the county about the the new acquisition of land that they made from Rotary that's going to um border on the new property that went to Brambridge quiet area. and we're having some, you know, back and forth about uses of the county property that might allow for uh rentals of some of their facilities for large groups. Um possibly large groups that have an open bar. Uh but in in particular for the Brambridge Advisory Committee, one of the things we're really concerned about

is if they have the Braum if they allow uses like that and they're and they're going to allow um u amplified music, it really impacts, we feel the use of the Brambridge Quiet Area for its stated purpose, which is a wildlife sanctuary. and um uh devoted to quiet passive recreation. And um I wanted to share with you, I thought you'd be interested in this. Um and I used this uh last time when I spoke at the county parks uh commission. Um, our latest figures, we get figures from uh through our trail counters at the property. And as many of you know and probably have hiked it, there's there's a bridge on the on the west side of the property and a bridge on the east side of the property. The westside bridge at Brown Bridge is called Brown's Landing.

And the Westside Bridge bridge is averaging 142 hikers a day that's walking across that bridge. Now, some of them are repeats. They walk across and they go somewhere and then they come back and walk back. But it's getting very, very regular use. Paul, I'm going to give you like an extra minute and a half or so because you're I feel like this kind of falls under a report too for us. So you can take a little more time.

Thank you very much. Um the the bridge on the east side is much more remote from parking areas. Uh it's really the heart of the the core area uh wildlife area. It's called Grasshopper Creek and that's receiving 43 hikers daily according to the our our measurements there. And for the year, uh, Grasshopper Creek had the most recent year 16,000 people on foot walking across the bridge there. Uh, Brown's Landing, 51,000 people

use that bridge crossing there. And the whole loop itself is 5 miles. So people are really really enjoying and using the quiet area for what many people think is a great experience of hiking in quiet and solitude and enjoying uh the beautiful landscape, the river um and enjoying quiet which is very important in our world today. I want to call your attention to a lot of what we talk about at these meetings is development and construction and all the growth that's going on the area. I think our children and grandchildren are going to benefit from having these quiet spaces in nature and we're very concerned on our committee that the the county is getting a little off off target on some of the uses they're cons they're considering which that noise is going to travel

and impact the people that are walking the trails and use floating down the river who don't appreciate all that noise, that amplified music. Thank you, Paul. And just a quick thing again, I'm being a first of all, I've been a little loose tonight anyways, but I'm also because you are a board member here to discuss um an appointed board member. Uh do you know the next time the counties bring that up or if not, can you share it with us so we can share it at a future meeting? Um so people if they want to come and express they they know when to show up in front of the county. Yeah, that's

Wednesday at 9. Okay. Okay. So, if people want to chime in and the county, just to let everybody know because it might actually be convenient in this case, does opening and closing public comment, not by the agenda item. So, if you can come in at 9:00, you can present right away and stick around for the discussion or not. So, thank you for that, Paul. Thank you for the opportunity. Yes. Any other public comment? Okay, great. May I close this? Yes. I have to read.

Um, good evening commissioners. I'm Jacqueline Andress, 1847 East Arbuta Lake Road, uh, non city resident and a East Bay Township um, member and I, too proudly serve as a member of the Brownbridge um, uh, advisory committee and soon I'll start my second term. Thank you for that appointment or reappoint. So, um, I I'm sure you recognize my name from all the emails I've been sending you regarding the quiet area, and I apologize for being such a nuisance, but I have to tell you, these are very precarious times for our beloved quiet area. Why? Well, the very essence of the quiet area is being threatened by this new county park that sits adjacent to the new $3.2 2 million expansion that was supported and voted for by an overwhelming 87% of the city voters. Was thought to be 80, but Glenn Chow said it was 87%. Um, if pled, I'd be willing to bet that every one of these voters would be opposed to loud, professionally ampl amplified music ringing out into the quiet area while they're trying to enjoy a peaceful walk in what is quiet and tranquil now, but is soon to be not. Unless, of course, that's if you wait till after 7:30 and you want to walk in the dark. That's what the county's plan is proposing now. Um, uh, the source of the music, a wedding reception, or any public or private event that books a DJ for amplified music at one of two venues that will allow for amplified music on that property. All DJs own professional sound systems with the huge speakers and stands that effort effortlessly pump out volumes well over a 100red dB decibels into the area. And I forgot to

mention, one of these two venues is outdoors and holds 200 people. One might say, "Oh, it won't reach that far. It won't be that loud." Well, to the contrary, there has been a sound demonstration done that proves without a doubt that this sound will carry far and deep into the quiet area. I'll gladly gladly share you the link to that demonstration if you're interested. Um, trail counter data has recorded that 51,000 visitors came through the area last year alone. Wow. So, this is far greater than just a few lake residents complaining about noise. This affects the thousands that voted for the expansion because they love the quiet. In the future, it stands to impact more than 51,000 because the park popularity grows every day. On September 2nd, we reached Defcon 1 at the township. That's where the planning commission votes on on the county's proposed plan. And as of last Thursday, the county is steamrolling ahead with these very

Let's have you wrap it up. I did give Paul Spure time, but I'll give you just a brief moment. Um so in end I'll just quote end with a quote from you um Mayor Shamro when the when the trust fund was granted and that's we are thrilled to have been awarded this grant the quiet area has stood as a testament to our commitment to preserving natural beauty and fostering a haven for quiet rep recreation and that's all I have to say so and we are going to reach out and see if we can get if you think it's beneficial get on your agenda for the next meeting to answer questions and have a conversation about Fantastic. We'd love that. And in the meantime, we do know that the county is meeting on Wednesday morning. What time is the um East Bay meeting on the 2nd? Uh 6:30.

Thank you very much. Any other public comment? Okay, seeing none, any final comments from commissioners? I will adjourn. Thank you all for your leniency tonight and for the good discussions.