Ludington City Council April 25, 2022: Siren Swan Song

[XLFD]

The agenda in the council packet for the April 25, 2022 meeting of the Ludington City Council was atypical in that a closed session in order to discuss the siren lawsuit was being held before the general business of the meeting was to be addressed.  The timing of that session signaled that they would probably take some sort of action on the issue, and thus it was not surprising when they came back into closed session and Councilor Jack Bulger almost immediately made a motion to accept the settlement terms presented to the City by the Roses (note: these terms were not shared with the public, even after the vote was held).  Councilor Wally Cain, who was one of the few councilors who indicated through his words that he was okay with silencing the noon and curfew siren located at Copeyon Park, seconded the motion.  

                Part 2 of the video, beginning just after the closed session, where a vote to silence the siren was made

Bulger prefaced the motion by indicating that the siren was deemed a nuisance by the plaintiffs and some others in the area, and that a long and costly lawsuit was not worth it.  Councilor Kathy (Moonbeam) Winczewski tried to take a middle point in her own comments, saying that what the City had was a losing battle, without any indication of why she thought that way.  The city council had considered the Rose's position since their last meeting in February in closed sessions, away from the public who have indicated in a couple of localized Facebook polls that over 4 in 5 locals said they wanted the siren to continue sounding.  

Having reviewed how the council works over the last dozen years, it was evident to me that they were planning to do something unpopular and using the secrecy for cover.  They did not disappoint in that appraisal, for after Councilor John Terzano explained that this was not an issue dealing with veterans per se, the council went on to pass the motion to settle the lawsuit, with Bulger, Cain, Winczewski and Les Johnson voting aye, and Councilors Terzano, Cheri Stibitz, and Ted May rejecting it.  City Manager Foster, at the end of the meeting when pressed, indicated that some of the terms of settlement were not available, by mutual consent of the two parties, but that the City would pay for the filing costs of the plaintiff and that the siren would be silenced except for sounding off at noon on Saturdays (an apparent bone thrown to the nostalgia of the vast majority of residents). 

Councilor Moonbeam would provide the proceedings with a giant dose of irony later in the meeting, when she would argue for the issue of marijuana rules for potential dispensaries to be decided by the people through initiative/referendum rather than by the council or through an ad hoc committee.  Without even blushing, she went from voting against the will of over 80% of the populace to silence the siren, to wanting to make the people decide a toss up vote many would say had already been decided in the 2018 election when the citizens of the city voted for recreational marijuana by nearly ten percentage points.  That's a losing battle.

Before all of the madness began, there was a public comment period, led off by Allison Helminski who was organizing the May 4th bicycle-to-school day being observed by LASD.  This annual event is meant to spur students bicycling to school, but I was critical of the event last year when the children rode to neighborhood schools.  I am even more critical of the event now that the new elementary school, built remotely in the armpit of two bicycle-unfriendly roads, lacks facilities needed for safe bicycling by kids and even adults.  As usual, I will present the facts in a later article, but I ask school officials to fix the problems, then have these events.  

The only other comment made was mine, a reminder for the public on what they should do in the May 3rd election:

                                       Part 1 of the video, before the closed session and regular business

XLFD: (4:00 in):  "On May 3rd, Ludington voters will go to their polling places and make three choices:  whether to renew the school sinking fund bond, whether to approve the formation of a charter revision committee, and who to place on that committee should it be approved.  Considering that the sinking fund budget is supposed to be used for construction or repair of school facilities, it's hard to justify that renewal at this point since the $101 million bond recently passed provided for construction of a new elementary facility and extensive reconstruction of the middle and high schools.  When one notices that some of the proposed uses of the sinking fund over the next dozen years is to do work that was originally planned for with the $101 million bond, one could argue that the school is defrauding the taxpayers.

As for the charter revision issue, and as someone who has brought up perceived charter violations over the last dozen years in front of this council, I can vouch that the city charter could use crisper and clearer language to become a better document.  Unfortunately, the changes envisioned by city leaders over the past and recently shared with the media seem to indicate that they want to make city officials less accountable to the citizens.  These proposed changes would, for instance, take the decision away from the people to choose the city clerk and treasurer, they would give administrators the ability to make more purchases and enter into contracts outside the purview of this council and the people.  Those are not improvements.  As the revision process will likely cost around $100,000 and more than likely lead to less transparency and accountability at city hall, we should reject the charter revision proposal.  

The ballot will have four names of prospective revision committee members and prompt the voter to select up to nine members, allowing one to put down five to nine write-in candidates.  Even though I strongly encourage voters to vote no on the revision, I have filed the necessary papers to be a 'write-in' candidate.  I have made this potential sacrifice because I worry that if the revision is passed, there will be nobody among the other candidates who will recognize some of the deficiencies in the existing charter and move to change them for the better.  The charter language meant to protect our parks from development and to codify the city's purchasing procedure has been subverted by the city for years, I will endeavor to make these sections clear, unequivocal, and a resource for other cities looking to improve their own charters.  On May 3rd, vote no twice but write in the eight characters T-O-M-R-O-T-T-A in the proper spot.  Thank you."

After approval of a normal consent agenda, the council went into their closed session to discuss strategies, and after their vote to settle the issue, stunning several in the audience, they went into a public hearing over the adoption of a Brownfield Redevelopment Authority (BRA) for the City.  

There has been a minor revolution by local governments in the county to the rules that the County BRA imposes so as to moderate the amount of money developers get from local taxing authorities.  BRA's get their funding for projects primarily through Tax Increment Financing (TIF), which effectively 'taxes' the speculative growth that would come about from a project involving a brownfield, which often comes in the form of obsolete buildings or property that has existing environmental hazards that need to be mitigated through rehab, demolition or otherwise neutralizing the environmental damage present.  

This can be a lot more costly than building on a 'clean' lot, so the BRA offers TIF as an incentive because they see a public purpose in having less brownfields and more productive land uses in their jurisdiction.  When used wisely, it can serve a valid purpose, but governments rarely use corporate giveaways wisely, as politics and greed rear their heads.  County policies were adopted that regulate using their BRA so that it would be less likely to invest in losing propositions.  The City of Ludington, City of Scottville, and Pere Marquette Township are joining together to clear the way for stalled projects and prospective marijuana facilities to get subsidies from local taxpayers via their taxes paid into other taxing authorities.  

Citizen Tom Tyron came out against the BRA, saying that the county's BRA was sufficient and that the City had no need for their own.  I concurred with him, and added some further justification in my comment to the council:

XLFD: (11:15 in 2nd video) "The council should avoid the temptation of creating a Brownfield Redevelopment Authority and seek a reasonable and fiscally responsible alternative if they want the Laura Street development and others to go forward.  In funding $2.3 million for the bowling alley block project and $4.3 million for the Lofts on Rowe project, the city has already used tax increment financing (TIF) to drain the coffers of local taxing authorities of nearly $7 million for housing projects.  This is one of several reasons why Chuck Marohn and Strong Towns philosophy reject most every project involving TIF.

Money doesn't magically appear in those coffers, they come from citizens paying their taxes to those authorities.  Instead of going to public services, public infrastructure, or even to the ever-growing salaries of public officials, that $7 million went to private developers as a subsidy for building more residential units in Ludington with a hope that it would spur future growth.  Yet with one project finished and the other funded and under construction during the 2020 census, the city population decreased by over 5% or more than 400 people since 2010.  The 2020 census also reminds us that we have a housing vacancy rate of 26.4% which is nearly three times the average rate for the rest of the US.

The public doesn't know much of the particulars about the Laura Street Project but throwing up 70 more residential units in a City that is losing population and has a vacancy rate greater than 92% of other cities, doesn't sound like a great idea even if the City wasn't looking hard to subsidize the project a lot more than the county is willing.   One wonders if our tax money is going to a truly necessary, value-creating project that can’t happen any other way, and not to subsidize development that would happen anyway because it is such a premium building site.

I view the county Brownfield authority serving as a necessary check and balance against our city's reflexive lunge at the prospect of growth without a thought of the cost to our citizens and urge the council not to heavily subsidize yet another housing complex that will do little more than add to our housing vacancy rate."

In the discussion afterwards, Mitch Foster tried to explain why they needed the additional BRA, suggesting the County's BRA has too many restrictions that would not allow smaller projects and several additional incentives that could be given away to developers.  He was asked to describe how a TIF works, but showed that neither he nor Councilor Terzano could explain it without lying:

Terzano: (22:00 in):  "Would you please explain how a TIF actually works, it's not city-wide taxpayer dollars going into that."

Foster:  "Easiest way to think about it is a bar graph.  You have what the current property pays in taxes here (motions), they come to the City brownfield (if this goes forward) and says we have some expenses having to do with the cleanup of the site-- demo of properties, infrastructure improvements, whatever it may be-- that's eligible.  Then, if that's approved, say it's $200,000, whatever their new tax revenue off that site is, that difference, is the tax increment, the increase.  You pay for a period of time, up to 30 years, you pay, the City, or the Brownfield Authority, all of the eligible expenses out of that increased gap, off of that one property only.  

So it is not a tax increase on another property, it's not a collection off those other properties, it is simply off a single property that is impacted when the development plan is approved for."

No other city official said or did anything than nod their head in approval of these incorrect statements.  The TIF process is complicated in order to fool the unwary that you are basically using borrowed tax revenue to pay off a private project.  When I looked at another TIF project in White Lies on a Brown Field, it showed a chart of where the $215,000 subsidy to Bob Manglitz (effectively) would be coming from. 

When you add the amount 'captured' from the city operating ($80K), City refuse $19K) and Police Pension ($8K) budgets, you have more than half of the $215K accounted for-- paid by the taxpayers of Ludington solely.  The rest of that subsidy is paid for by other taxing authorities through their taxation powers.  So Terzano's assertion that city wide taxes are not going into these projects is a total lie, and Foster's assertions that indicate this does not impact other property taxes or that the money comes from a bar graph is equally fanciful.  The taxes captured from other taxing authorities create deficits in their budgets that can be very impactful over time; cities that have used TIF extensively have found this out to their detriment.  If they can't find other ways to raise that lost revenue through more taxation and/or raising of fees, their services lapse.

This is a gigantic reason why the City shouldn't be in this business, they just don't get that every single penny of that money given away to private companies come from 'taxing' their own taxes and those of other local authorities.  Either they are ignorant, or willfully passing along false information.  All under the prospect that the property will grow just like the optimistic business model that's presented to them and the growth will eventually pay off the short term debt incurred in the corporate welfare scheme plotted on a prospective bar graph.

In other uncontroversial business the city council:

- passed a 5 year contract extension for assessing services with Dan Kirwin.

- approved a change order on work on C-docks at the city marina, using funds from the F-dock project

- approved Ludington Pub as a new entity in the social district

- approved signage on James St. for an electrical charging facility at Ludington Bay Brewery

- set two public hearings for vacating the alley to the north of Lakeview School, and for the East Ludington Avenue Historic District (one that supposedly preserves property owner's rights) for the May 9th meeting

- Sold a half lot of vacant property at 803 S Madison to an adjacent homeowner

- awarded the contract to design and create the new Cartier bathroom facility to the Spicer Group

- approved an easement for EGLE to erect a small shed for water testing at Waterfront Park

- adopted an Arbor Day proclamation

- had first reading of an ordinance to create an ad hoc Marijuana Regulation Board

- revealed they would allow the two city lots on Monona to revert back to the Cartier family

[Willy]

Thanks for the report X. Very informative.

[XLFD]

I appreciate your feedback.