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November 2002 Status Report
It is my pleasure to submit my status report for your review and information. If you should have any questions about any of the items listed or would like information about something I did not cover, please do not hesitate to contact me.
1. Coffee, Talk and Tour Day
The day went very well. We estimate that we had about 250 visitors to the Public Safety Building and about 75 at the Wastewater Treatment Plant and Airport. My compliments to all involved in the program. I especially want to thank our PR Committee-Sarah Cuthbertson, Jana Ervin, Jeremy Howard, Karen Humbyrd, Jane Sundberg, Becky Swab, Eric VanHevel and Dave Walsh-and Kathie Grinzinger for the great job they did in putting it together. I especially want to thank Jana Ervin for her hard work with the logistics prior to the day and all her hard work on Saturday. There were also a number of volunteers including students from the Youth Academy. My thanks to all.
2. Skate Park
The skate park opened on Friday without a lot of fanfare but with a lot of enthusiasm and skaters. It seems to have been well-received, and I am sure it will get a lot of use. My compliments to Chris Bundy for all the hard work he put into this project.
3. Airport Fuel Tank
The tank was installed last week and is now operational. We will now be able to serve jet traffic much better with a tank three times the size of the one replaced.
4. Park Projects
The projects are winding down for this year. Some of the Commissioners had an opportunity to go on a tour with Greg Baderschneider a couple of weeks ago. I am sure they were impressed with what they saw. We could always be proud of our parks, but even much more so now with the new trail system, roads and parking lots. My compliments to Greg for the great job he did in steering this project from concept through construction.
5. State Shared Revenue
On a rather frequent basis I get e-mails from the MML expressing concern about the future of revenue sharing as a result of anticipated state budget deficits. The legislature will convene in a lame duck session beginning the week of November 11th. If some action is taken on revenue sharing, it should occur within the next couple of weeks.
6. Tribal Two Percent Allocations
The Tribe will announce its Fall two percent allocations on Friday, November 22. We will forward the allocation list to the Commission on Friday.
7. Fire Funding
As I mentioned in a previous status report, a group of managers will get together either in person or by phone to begin to plan our lobbying effort for more fire funding. A phone conference has been scheduled for the first week of December.
8. Borden Building
A subcommittee consisting of Economic Development Corporation members Joe Olivieri, Jeff Smith and Bob Joynt and the City's Property Committee met the week of November 4th to talk about the future of the Borden Building. After much discussion the Committee decided on a two-pronged approach to the possible redevelopment of the building.
The first was to put a price of $350,000 on the building if a private developer should want to purchase and renovate it. The second is to consider the possible use of the building for City Hall and offices of local non-profit organizations. It was decided that staff would put together a Request For Qualifications to mail to firms who have had experience in the design and renovation of historic buildings. We have about $30,000 left from the Honeggers demolition that could be used for design and engineering work on the Borden Building.
9. Charter Amendments
As you know, all three Charter amendments passed. State law requires that the City Clerk file the amendments with the state within 30 days after the election. Rob Flynn is working on that now. My thanks to Kathie Grinzinger for the job she did on the mailers and talking points book. I am sure it was instrumental in the successful vote.
10. CMU-City Liaison Committee
The Committee met on October 25th. A number of items were discussed. CMU reported that they have 19,400 students enrolled. They also mentioned a number of administrative changes have been made and reported on the status of searches for new deans. We also talked about preparations for the Western weekend football game. They reported on their project along Broomfield, including new pedestrian lighting and their new fence.
We then moved on to traffic and parking issues. They asked if it was possible to close Franklin Street from Bellows to Preston. City representatives expressed concern about doing this. With regard to parking issues, our Traffic Committee has agreed to issue a temporary traffic control order installing "No Parking" signs on the north side of Preston from East Campus to Franklin Street. As you know, we issue temporary traffic control orders to see if the order will meet our expectations prior to making it permanent. The signs will not be installed until about the first of January.
The upcoming deer hunt in Veit's Woods was discussed briefly. They also gave us an update on their various construction projects. The Health Professions building is on schedule for occupancy by fall term 2003 and new residence halls should be done by July.
The final item of business was discussion of a regularly-scheduled meeting of staff members from both the City and CMU to talk about and better coordinate upcoming City and CMU projects. The first meeting of this group was held on November 12.
11. City-CMU Student Liaison Meeting
The last meeting was held on October 17. We discussed the community reception held on October 2nd. The general consensus was that it was successful and should be held again next year. We also reviewed the neighborhood block party held in September. Again, the feeling was that it was a success and should be repeated next year.
Much discussion was held on the October 12th homecoming parade. Concerns were expressed that it was getting a little rowdy, especially with spectators crowding into the street, and some things were thrown at the parade participants. CMU representatives stated that this was not a "Greek" problem but a case of alcohol abuse. A variety of possible solutions was discussed, including alternative parade routes, parade monitors and additional law enforcement.
Discussion was also held regarding the overflow of parked cars during the weekdays and evenings along City streets just north of campus. No immediate solutions were reached.
12. Public Safety Building
Over the course of the construction of the building we ran into some design problems that caused us to have some unanticipated cost increases. We have incurred an additional $70,000 in costs. Some of the major cost items are:
$ 32,000 Unpainted fire doors that required painting
22,500 Construction of a permanent drainage structure to deal with subsurface water flow
18,000 Miscellaneous items including improper windows, fire dampers, speakers for internal paging, concrete slabs at doorways, and matching the existing brick to fill in openings of the original buildingWe are trying to resolve these issues at the present time, which may result in us getting all or a portion of the money back.
This has resulted in not having sufficient funds to purchase some of the furniture and office equipment we need for the building with a cost of approximately $60,000. Before we started the project we agreed with the Tribe that if we did not have sufficient funds to complete the project, we could tap into the containment team funds to cover the costs. Bill Yeagley has identified funds within his operational budget that he can reallocate to cover at least $25,400 of the furniture and equipment costs. Therefore, we will be using containment team funds to cover what remains of the $60,000 for furniture and office equipment. If we are successful in our efforts to recoup some of the expenses listed above, we will use that money to pay back the containment team fund.