Ludington City Council Meeting 3-09-2015: Public Satiety and Futilities

[XLFD]

The Agenda for the March 9th meeting was different than most in that the business of the city definitely had to do with one aspect of the city:  public safety and utilities.  The city council has five subcommittees that look at actionable items, and this particular committee had nine new items on the agenda, while the other four committees had just the annual assessors' office assessment.  There were also two public hearings dealing with grants the City of Ludington and the Ludington Jaycees were applying for. 

Though the amount of items was more than usual, a lot of the action was deferred for later.  Both grants are scheduled to be voted on at the next meeting, the two ordinances introduced just had their first readings. 

Three citizens spoke up in the public comments (beginning at 2:35 into the video below) to express their displeasure about the West End Project.  I was somewhat surprised that the mayor didn't advise them to wait until the public hearing on the West End Project, but I think he may have if any had spoken positively about the project.  Tom Tyron spoke about wondering whatever happened to the extra fee they used to assign on water bills for maintenance of the system, a question that was never answered, and I can only think it morphed into the readiness to serve fees charged to everyone.  Only I spoke during the public hearing, also against the project. 

March 9, 2015 Ludington City Council from Mason County District Library on Vimeo.

Later on, during the public official comments, the council remained mum on their thoughts of the project, while City Manager John Shay clarified that no buildings were to be erected at the end of Ludington Avenue contrary to what was brought up.  Shay failed to mention that the initial phase is setting the table for a semi-permanent tent to be placed on the West End, blocking the view of the lake as you drive up Ludington Avenue during the summer months, as reported in this 2013 MCP article.  He is entirely correct that no buildings are going to be there.

After this there was a hearing on another DNR grant being given to the Ludington Area Jaycees for their miniature golf course improvements which is located right near the west end of Ludington Avenue.  By the nature of the Jaycees' application, I had to add some constructive criticism to help them with their application, while the Jaycee's president orally clarified their position. 

I guess I'm just too dense to figure out why an organization of young business professionals who use the profits from the mini-golf course to donate to worthy causes aren't saving enough of their profits to maintain their facilities and so have to plead for free money from the state (which was taken from taxpayers and fee-payers in the first place).  I'm also too stupid to comprehend why they have detailed plans for doing $23,000 of work, but are requesting the maximum amount they can ask for, $45,000.  I love the things the Jaycees do, but I do not like greedy beggars.

A presentation of the City Assessor and Code Enforcement by Carol Ann Foote was then provided, with the enforcement actions highlighted.  Here is a chart of last years enforcement actions:

You will note that the enforcement actions gained significant momentum over this last year, and undoubtedly will gain more applications this year with the total revocation of basic civil rights in the amended junk and tall grass ordinance.  If the levels in 2015 are comparable, and the City uses minimal notification methods it approved this winter, it should be a busy year for the City of Ludington's 58 attorneys. 

The meeting then was set to finish with the public utility issues (see the council packet starting at p. 59).  The first order of business was to consent to an agreement with Strait's Steel and Wire to discharge into Lincoln Lake via the City's sewer pipes from a purge well that has been running clean for the last couple of years.  The purge well is up around Bryant Road and was used for many years to correct prior pollution.  If the well still has favorable testing in the next three months, it will be hooked up with the city system with an outflow in Lincoln Lake.  The councilors approved it unanimously.

The next three agenda items all had to do with a three-way agreement with PM Township and Michigan Power up on Sixth Street just east of the cemetery.  This business uses tons of water literally and I am told this agreement is desirable to both the City of Ludington and Michigan Power, which is always a great result.  They first approved a wholesale water selling agreement between the city and township, an addendum to that agreement, and then it was capped by a water supply agreement with covenants and duties each party was required to live with.  The end result is that the City can hold back increases in water costs easier because they have upped their selling volume dramatically. 

As Mr. Shay reminded us through the rest of the committee items, the raising of the water rates would have been a lot starker if they lost the deal with MP, because then they would need to get more money from the water system to pay back the (up to) $13 million in bonds being issued, which was the next item up for discussion, the councilors unanimously supporting the intent to issue up to $13 million in bonds to make the water treatment plant (WTP) compatible with DEQ mandates, and fix some of the older water conduits throughout the city.

They then voted to give Fishbeck, Thompson, Carr & Huber (FTCH) the $82,000 contract for the preliminary design engineering for the WTP, without much mention of the concerns I raised in my comments at the start of the meeting.  It seems that unless the state mandates competitive bids for projects in order for the City to be eligible for grants, City Manager Shay avoids the competitive bid process altogether, which is unlawful since the city charter mandates the process with only two exceptions, neither of which the city illustrated. 

The first presentation of two ordinances then were given and discussed more than usual.  The first would authorize an extra jump of about 5% to the water bills and the Readiness-to-serve fees.  Since the end of 2009, the water bills have increased 39% for residents, while our city has used those rate hikes to do nothing but allow both of our water and wastewater (WWTP) treatment plants to run afoul of the DEQ's standards, while our leadership focused its interests on painting water towers, marina and beach 'improvements', and multiplying downtown drinking events.

The second ordinance allowed the city manager the authority to restrict water usage, which likely will never go into effect, but is there primarily to cover the city's keister if one of the two filters goes down, especially during reconstruction of the WTP.  It can really only be enforced if you are caught watering your lawn on a day where the city says you can't.  With the level of code enforcement the city plans on having, I can see city officials paying code enforcers to go out at night and ticket citizens with automatic sprinkler systems.

Lastly, the city then amended the city's utility contract to install two extra lights at the Ludington and Washington intersection, so that it would be better illuminated with all the school pedestrian traffic that passes through it.  Whereas I like the intention, this intersection already seem to be well lit, with extra lights installed between the blocks of both streets already.  I hope to present where extra lights should be installed in a later article.

The entirety of my opening comments is reproduced here:

"Congratulations to Michigan Power and the City of Ludington for developing an agreement that seems to work for the betterment of both entities.  I do have some concerns about some of the other water related issues.

The city reportedly hired the engineering firm of Fishbeck and Thompson to conduct a Reliability study on the Water treatment plant and issued their results last February.  Tonight there is a proposal to enter into an $82,000 contract with Fishbeck and Thompson for design engineering services without entering into any competitive bidding process with the many other engineering firms able to do such work. 

Such competitive bidding is mandated by charter for any contract over $10,000, unless the council can show it is clearly to the city's advantage to contract without competitive bidding.  Saying that Fishbeck and Thompson have expertise and prior knowledge of our water system does not clearly make the case.

Not using the competitive bidding process and hiring the same firm that conducted the earlier study more clearly shows a pattern of cronyism that the city management uses against the city's advantage, and has done in the past, sometimes making those deliberations and decisions outside of a public meeting.  This charge is exacerbated by the October 2014 proposal made by Fishbeck in your packets, where any reference to RFPs or concerns about competitively bidding against other firms are not indicated.  Competitive bidding encourages efficient use of our tax dollars and decreases the likelihood of extraneous work being performed, and deflects any charge of alleged cronyism when performed properly. 

When I started the Ludington Torch in late 2009, the cost of city water was $1.20 per hundred cubic feet, it is proposed to be raised to $1.65 tonight.  This is a rate jump of 39% while the inflation rate between 2009 and now is under 9%.  This jump would have been over 40% if Michigan Power wasn't a new customer of the City. 

The city itself at about the same time it started jumping rates dramatically guaranteed that it would have a monopoly on water inside the city limits, making it unlawful to drill your own well or have it piped in from elsewhere.  We have our water and sewer rates automatically increased each year by the rate of inflation, or more and we will have this and another jump in our future to pay for the neglect of the infrastructure that our current leadership oversaw, when they were putting $1.5 million into unnecessary paintings of the water towers and committing more city and state funds towards nonessential projects.   Wasn't the inflationary adjustment to the water bills put in to quell such rate hikes?

If you're lucky enough to have had your income increase at the rate of inflation over the last six years, you're still having to devote a larger portion of it to cover your water bills that have increased over four times that rate, and a so-called fixed readiness to serve charge which will increase 7% when this council passes this rate hike.  

As if to guarantee that our soon-to-be radically hiked bills won't pay for better service, we are also getting water restriction ordinances at the same time.  As always, I thank the city council for their conscientious customer oriented services which always puts us first-- to foot the bills they make."

[shinblind]

As I understand it X, the minimum fix for the water plant that is required  by the SOM would cost $3.7 M. (page173) and the additional $9.3 M is to supply water to Michigan Power.  

Michigan Power would  be paying a fixed amount (wholesale price) which would be locked in at a fixed rate for 40 years )minus increases for inflation).  The Ludingtonians would be on the hook for paying for any other cost over-runs along with paying the current increase to pay for the bond.

What this amount to is a gifting of $9.3M from the taxpayers of Ludington to Michigan Power. Shinblind sez Fek Michigan Power let them pony up their own $10M for water.

Of course there is a remedy to this getting enough signatures on a petition and putting this to a vote of the people. But I have no faith in the sheeple of Ludington not to pass a bond increase even if it is against their best interest and pocketbook. 

To sum it up the taxpayer of Ludington will be gifting $10M to Michigan Power to produce electricty  who will then be sell power to Consumers Energy who will then furnish the power to the Water Treatment Plant to pump the water to Michigan Power.  Sounds scammy to me.

I have a dream that someday the citizens of Ludington will go all Manistee on the City Manager and the City Councilors. But I am not betting on them.  

[XLFD]

The city manager's explanation is rather confusing and he leaves quite a bit out (as I know it) in the discussion of things.  If you could trust this city manager, which you shouldn't, you may take his word for it when he says the DEQ's additions would cost the citizens just as much even without the addition of a big-time customer like Michigan Power.   The council packets contents fail to include any correspondence and edicts made by the DEQ, so I'm inclined to believe that you are very close to the truth, shinblind, in that we will be subsidizing MP in some degree to meet their demands, particularly before the improvements.

If we sometimes go over the maximal amount of water to be used during the summer by lawn watering, I can foresee us going above that limit a lot more often before the capacity of the water plant increases due to the high demand of MP.  We will likely see the water restrictions take place this summer accordingly, which will be embarrassing considering all that fresh water we have to the west of us.

[shinblind]

Not only that X, but the way I read it the current capacity of the Water Plant is 6.4 Million Gallons per Day.

The Water Plant is designed for a maximum capacity of 8 MGD.

The contract with Michigan Power is that they are going to require 6.76 MGD.

Therefore the Water Plant will be inadequate to meet the demands of the City of Ludington after the upgrades.

Guess What? The taxpayers of Ludington will again in the near future be asked to once more bend over and grab their ankles. Michigan Power is locked in to a sweetheart contract as to the price they will pay for water and are not liable for any inadequacies in the capacity of the Water Plant.

40 years,the taxpayers, your children and your grandchildren will be subsidizing Michigan Power. 

Sounds like a bullshit deal to me. 

[XLFD]

Shinblind, could you provide your mathematical calculations?  I figured that if the city supplies the contracted maximal 1500 GPM (gallons per minute) to Michigan Power for a full 24 hours, that would only amount to 2.16 MGD (million gallons a day).  Which is highly significant when dealing with a system that has a 6.4 MGD capacity-- more than a third of current regular capacity. 

[Willy]

Well done X. As far as the housing violations it appears the City is starting to hammer a lot of the folks who pay for the City's expenses. Over 100% increases in all categories with a 300% increase in City Code violations. The City is either doing a service to neighborhoods or they're just poking the hive and making the bees angry. I hope most of the violations are legitimate and not nitpicking by an overzealous inspector and City Manager. Has there ever been an understandable explanation as to why the City water users bills have risen  so high in such a short amount of time when compared to the rate of inflation?

[shinblind]

Well Willy it does make one wonder where the money went.

Did it ever occur to you why the Water Tower was painted early?

Did you ever wonder why the Dowland Street was redone including the water mains? Then stopping at abruptly at Washington Avenue?

Did you ever wonder why the bridge on Washington was replaced and the water main extended to 1st street?

Now they are going to redo Washington from 1st street to 6th street and then redo 6th street stopping once they reach Michigan Power.

Somebody had to pay for this. The 40% increase in your water bills and the depletion of funds  from $2.6 million to $600,000 in the Water Fund went somewhere didn't it.

Add in to the mix an incompetent City Council. A "doe-eyed yes man" mayor. And an unethical city manager and you will wonder why you didn't get bent over even further.

Sounds like the fix is in.

[Willy]

shinblind

I must have missed something. Did the City say specifically that the increase in water rates was used for the projects you have mentioned? It would seem to me that repair, maintenance and replacement of City water supply system should have been covered in the rates that were being charged prior to the increases.

[XLFD]

A compelling route of preparation for this, shinblind; can you work in the fact that they did major work on the east end of Fifth Street in 2013?  One may think that this was part of the preparation as well. 

I have uncovered an interesting chink in the City's overall scheme to drain the money of our citizens absent any real progress; I'm going to bring it up at the next meeting.  I am going to have to contain myself before that time, because it's a game changer.

[AQUAMAN]

Thanks again to XLFD for several great comments for the public. Well, I guess the old saying applies here again: "if you live long enough, you will get to see/hear everything" (Shay can muster up for lies to cya). He's doing it again and again at the last minutes of this meeting. I too again wonder if the comments at the beginning about the west end project are bouncing off deaf ears, and perhaps won't carry over to the specific comment section it was supposed to be heard in. And no one again addressed why all the west end project's drawings aren't available to the public as requested by many already. I do know the plan now calls for closing up Lud. Ave. in the last block going west. In that area will be, as X stated, a promenade/tent unit, and also some cement grandstand for folks to sit in. Those WILL block the view, as Shay lied about. They WILL be higher than 3', not less as Shay stated. The sand dune WILL be plowed down, or leveled if that's the wording. The parking Shay says is not interrupted, by parking to the south, is also wrong. We will be losing about 30 parking spaces, and replacing them with 6 spaces. That sound like progress? I also don't like the $13 Million bond proposal. The COL has reserves in excess of $10 Million now, and won't spend ANY OF IT, on infrastructure. WHY? This rainy day fund sits and rots, while citizens are told to ante up even more tax money to pay for these new bonds. I noticed two suits sitting up front too. Was this Fishbeck and Thompson themselves, or their representatives if something went wrong? Methinks it was! Since Shay did another outstanding job in their favor to cover for inexplicable non-bid contracts, I guess they didn't have to say anything this meeting. Then we also have the questionable toxic waste generated by the old Ludington Plating Co. and Straits Steel Co.. These supposed clean wastes have been, and are going to continue to be dumped into Lincoln River. For another 40 years? This sounds fishy at best, and also asks the question of how it can continue unabated, even though they claim the DNR has a clean docket on them of recent. Who knows what the DNR was shown and what they tested? I worked at the Lud. Plating Co. for about a month. Had to quit because the toxic fumes were making me choke up black flem all night long after the 2nd shift. Workers whom had been there for years had alligator skin: face, arms, and chests. It was a horrific sight to witness, and those people hacked and spit all night long with extreme congestion. Mr. Shay of course, wasn't around or worked there like many around town did. He was busy elsewhere down-state getting lessons and practicing in being a professional shyster. Yes, the COL is FINALLY talking about infrastructure issues, and as Krauch stated, the citizenry are watching, and asking specifics. Good for them. Or is it? It appears that IF we need and demand the very things that the COL is duty-bound to provide, we are still going to have to ante up more tax monies. Meanwhile, the "tourists projects" don't seem to be put on hold, on the back burner, nor terminated. They WILL be the main priority far into the future, at least if Shay and several council cronies get their ways.