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September 2004 Status Report
It is my pleasure to once again provide you with my monthly status report. If you have any questions about any of the items listed here, please do not hesitate to contact me.
1. Construction Projects
Most of the City's projects have been completed for the year. High Street was finished just this past week, with landscaping restoration completed on Friday. As I may have mentioned earlier, the Road Commission did pave the remaining portion of High Street out to Isabella Road. This was simply a repaving and no reconstruction. The road is a little wider as they paved a portion of the shoulder. According to Jim Miller of the Road Commission, even though they would like to eventually rebuild the road, he does not anticipate that happening for a number of years due to lack of funding.
Washington Street was completed approximately two and a half weeks ago. That contract was completed on time and according to Duane they were pleased with their work. We have also completed our overlay projects, as well as our sewer line projects. All of our sidewalk projects are completed as well. The water line replacement project is still ongoing but should be completed soon.
All in all we had a very good construction season. My compliments to Duane Ellis and his staff for all the hard work they put in from design and engineering to construction supervision on all of these projects.
2. Family Recreation Center
Within the next couple of weeks the consultant will present its final recommendations to the Task Force, which will then make a recommendation to the Liaison Committee. Once this is done the City, County and Task Force will hold a joint meeting with a presentation by the consultant. They are finalizing budget information now, as well as possible locations, so within the next 30 to 45 days a report should be presented to you and the County Board of Commissioners for further discussion and possible action.
3. Central Business District
A number of things have occurred since the last status report. The Downtown Development Director, Michelle Sponseller, began work on September 13 and had her first meeting with the Principal Shopping District Management Board on the 17th. They began to lay out the work expectations for Michelle, but I must say that she has already hit the ground running and has a feel for what is expected of her. Starting some time in October her office will be in Dave McGuire's building on Broadway Street. Dave has offered to provide office space to Michelle at no charge. As you will recall, you have awarded contracts for both the parking and landscape consultant. The parking consultant will begin their work next month with a focus group meeting of property owners and merchants to get their input on parking issues facing the downtown. Both of the consultants' contracts are rather short-term in nature and should be done by the end of this year.
4. Fire Chief Selection Process
As you know from an earlier e-mail, our prime candidate chose not to accept the position. While disappointed we were not successful in this process, we remain committed to the hiring of a Fire Chief and will once again begin the search and review process.
5. Project 2000 Tax Case
This past week we received the Attorney General's brief on this matter. Both our attorney Dick Figura and I have had a chance to review it. We have also received in the past month a recent Supreme Court decision dealing with the Poletown case in Detroit. As you may recall, this is a case where Wayne County condemned hundreds of parcels that were needed to facilitate the construction of a new auto plant. The affected property owners have been disputing the governments' right to take their land under eminent domain ever since. It finally worked its way up to the Supreme Court a few months ago. The Supreme Court has ruled that the governments did not have the right under the constitution to condemn the property for private purposes. What is interesting in the case though is the fact that we feel the Supreme Court more broadly defined what constitutes a public purpose. We are hoping that the Appeals Court will look at this decision, since we feel it bolsters our position in this matter. Our attorney is now preparing a rebuttal brief that is due within the next two weeks. We still anticipate a hearing in Lansing some time before the end of the year.
6. In-House Health Committee
As you may recall, we hired a consultant to help us look at our health care program to see if we can make any changes in the program to help us better control costs. The final report was submitted to the committee two weeks ago, and we have a wrap-up meeting scheduled with the committee next week. The report indicated that the City has done a good job over the years of developing programs that have helped us control some of our costs; however, they did come up with a number of suggestions including a number of changes to our prescription program that may help to both reduce and control our costs. They also suggested some long-term programs that we may want to look at to help us once again control our costs. After we meet with the in-house committee in a week or so I will provide you with more details on their recommendations.
7. City-County Liaison Committee Meeting
The last couple of meetings with the City and County have focused on discussions regarding the status of the Family Center Task Force analysis and Tribal two percent requests. We have also talked about various road issues, particularly reconstruction of the Old Mission bridge and the proposed detour route down Deerfield and Crawford back to Broomfield. As you may recall, we asked the Road Commission to install a traffic signal at the corner of Broomfield and Crawford prior to the detour being put in place. They have indicated that they will put the light in; however, funding is still an issue. In this Tribal two percent cycle there is money requested for the traffic signal; however, the City did indicate that if outside money was not available we would consider contributing money toward the project. It is important that this light be installed prior to the detour because otherwise we are going to have real traffic problems at this intersection.
8. Traffic Control Signal At Tallgrass
As you will recall, in the last two percent funding cycle we requested money for the installation of a traffic light at this intersection. You may also remember that the reason we requested the light was because of the number of accidents at that intersection, some very serious, and we thought that immediate action was needed. The Tribe did fund the installation of the light, and the Road Commission got it installed prior to the students' return to campus.
9. City-CMU Liaison Committee
The most recent meeting of the Committee was just this past week. At that time we talked about a number of issues, including the University's decision to build additional residence halls on campus. In fact, I have received some information from the University regarding that decision, and I have attached it to this report for your information. During the meeting the University shared information with us regarding a number of different activities. They reported that they intend to build a new substation and a satellite generating facility on campus to meet their ever-increasing demands for electricity, heating and air conditioning. It is anticipated that the project will begin in 2005. They also indicated that the number of parking permits was up slightly from last year. They also told us about the proposed tailgating policy change, which I am sure you have read about in the newspaper.
We also had a presentation by Dr. Maureen Eke, who is the Associate Vice President for Institutional Diversity. She was present to advise us of the upcoming forum to be held on the Supreme Court decision regarding the Brown v Board of Education case. She indicated there would be some nationally-recognized speakers who would be on a panel along with some local officials to discuss in more detail the decision and its implications. She asked if the City would be willing to welcome the presenters to the campus and the community, and the Mayor indicated he would be happy to do so. She also mentioned that there will be no classes on Martin Luther King Day even though the University will be open on that day. She indicated there would be a peace march during the day and asked for our help. I said we would assist them in logistics for holding a march through the City.
The City provided a status report on its ongoing construction projects, the family recreation center, the Borden Building and other projects. These meetings continue to be fruitful, and we will hold our next one in early winter. If there are any subjects you would like us to discuss with CMU, please do not hesitate to contact either me, the Mayor or Vice Mayor to let us know what you would like us to share with the University.
10. State Shared Revenue
As you know from an e-mail, the Governor has signed a budget which calls for the shift in collection dates for County taxes as a way of off-setting state budget deficits. On Wednesday the 15th the House failed to pass the necessary legislation to implement that tax shift. The Governor went ahead and signed the budget anyway, and now the House is faced with another vote on the 22nd trying to implement the tax shift. Mayor Showalter, Commissioner Bradley and I went to Lansing to lobby for protection of revenue sharing. We spent some time with Representative Caul. You probably know by now that our efforts were successful as they passed the tax shift which protects our revenue sharing.
11. Island And Nelson Parks
Over the past couple of years a number of trees have fallen into the river. This past week we had a contractor come in and clear out the trees. It has not only cleaned up the river at those two locations, but it also really improved the looks of the parks.