Ludington City Council Meeting, Sept 8, 2025: Cartier Catharsis

[XLFD]

The agenda packet for the September 8, 2025 meeting of the Ludington City Council was minimal in action, with the passing of three non-controversial ordinances that had their first reading at the last meeting, and three other actions involving a purchase of two columbariums for the Lakeview Cemetery, a rate increase for camping at Cartier Park, and a police union contract approval (see packet for details).  The only thing preventing unanimous 7-0 votes for each was that Councilor John Kreinbrink was absent.

But there was an enigma on the agenda with a presentation by Wayne Andersen.  This turned out to be the city recognizing him as the previously-anonymous benefactor that purchased the new gazebo (seen below) that is now sitting atop the foundation of the old gazebo, overlooking the scenic Lincoln Lake just north of Cartier Park.

Andersen for his part displayed an honorable amount of humility in describing why the Cartier Park area where this went up meant a lot to him and others, inspiring his generous act.  He wasn't the only one heaping praise on Cartier Park during his presentation, city officials echoed his sentiments.  The niceties of the park were further explored by officials when they discussed and justified the raising of camping rates there and at the end of the meeting.  

Yet they didn't bat an eye early in this meeting when I mentioned being unlawfully expelled from Cartier Park last year and then being charged with a crime just for walking down its pathway during the time of the city's illegal expulsion--a crime that was finally dismissed last Friday.  O, how they praised what this park had to offer after they had been admonished minutes earlier for illegally barring a tax-paying citizen from it.  

XLFD: (6:00 in) "This last Friday, I was occupied in a rare stint as a defendant in a criminal case against me, generated by the city and taken up by your contracted prosecuting attorney, Beth Hand.  A motion for dismissal was before the court on the basis of my due process rights being violated by the city invoking a Letter of Trespass against me, saying that I could not set foot on public property.  It seemed as if it was 2011 when the city tried the same stunt to prevent me from stepping foot on city hall and police station property under threat of charging me with a misdemeanor.  Mayor Barnett, Chief Barnett back then, helped draft a policy that this council passed and placed on me, and it eventually went to federal court before the city settled rather than see themselves lose a lot more money for their violation of my right to due process which prohibited me from voting and coming to council meetings without the threat of being arrested.

Tyrannical city governments do not learn easy; last year you bestowed me another letter of trespass this time for a city park that is open all day every day, and the only transgression I did was survive an ill-conceived and liability-rich deer cull, almost being shot due to this council's inability to hold it safely.  The city would never tell me why this sanction was imposed on me or how I could challenge the taking of my right to be at a park for a month, and of course they wouldn't apologize for endangering my life by not securing the park that afternoon or clearing out the area before the shooting started. 

How many park violations were committed that night by your armed visitors because this council was remiss in suspending park rules in the city code?   A lot, but your worst transgression was toeing the line that allowed a police captain to be judge jury and executioner of my right to walk through a public park and extend it for three weeks after the last planned deer cull.  This was a purely punitive measure and Judge Middlebrook's court saw it as such, and I was given nothing close to my constitutional due process rights.  Case dismissed.  Your trespassing charge against me is over, but don't worry, I'm coming back as a plaintiff for the next go-round. [END comment]

One of the saddest things about the continual pattern of city corruption manifesting itself with excluding me (and sometimes others) from public spaces and from public meetings absent any reasonable reason is that the city attorney, along with two councilors holding law licenses (Jack Bulger and John Terzano), justify it by not decrying the actions.  This topic gets brought up before the council regularly and rather than try to defend or rationalize the arbitrary acts of city officials violating basic civil rights they just sit there and ignore them every time.  

When we fast forward to the second comment period, I mention the latest lawfare practiced against me by the same police administrator that failed in his trespass attempt.  Here, it's even more preposterous, I am being charged with disturbing a meeting's peace just for standing outside city hall minding my own business, making zero noise and doing nothing other than checking my phone.

XLFD:  "On August 6th, I attended a special meeting of this city council, where this council opted to meet in closed session to discuss a legal opinion of an attorney who had never been formally hired as counsel by this city council.  For some reason, LPD Captain My Caveman [Mike Haveman] ushered the five people in the lobby who were waiting for the council to reconvene outside.  I stood outside that door right over there and was summarily harassed by the captain, telling me orally that I was trespassed off city hall property, suggesting that I was in position to eavesdrop on your secret meeting.  

Rather than give me another letter of trespass, barring me illegally once again for setting foot on public property, he called in four other officers to back up his threats of using force and government power to remove me from where I was at, also threatening not to allow me back into the meeting after it opened again.  Knowing how invested in violence the LPD has been during the Jones' regime, I eventually gave in to the threats and thug-power in order to move to an area that the captain approved of.  

Three weeks later, I found out that I was going to be arraigned for a charge of disturbing the peace, subsection four that says no person shall disturb without lawful authority any peaceful and lawful assembly or meeting of persons.  Standing quietly outside this building having my own peace disturbed by a police captain threatening me with unlawful authority has no elements of disturbing the peace, at least for me.  [END comment].

And just as I reported the day after, I selected that spot just in order to trigger a potential response from the crazy captain, being that he thought I was too close to the council chambers for comfort while inside.  His little caveman brain would assume the same outside.  In full disclosure, I never heard a word of what was going on inside while standing near that exterior door, even before he started threatening me with governmental power coming down upon me again.

Two other controversies not on the city agenda reared their ugly heads in the initial comments by Jeff Henry and Daniel Jensen, with the former reminding the councilors about PM Lake serving as a gigantic mixing zone of contaminants from chemical plant holding ponds and how the name of Budde Reed keeps popping up in the batches of records, the latter introducing scripture Luke 8:17 and how it will lead to a revelation of bad actions made by the city over the past and even in the present, with the AndyS issue. 

These warnings about our environment and past corruption would duly be ignored by city officials; one has to believe it's because they have no good answers.  Councilor John Terzano would weigh in on the AndyS controversy heavily, and while there are rational arguments against the construction and their expedience throughout, Terzano indicated that the City's position is to keep the business from opening up based upon column bricks and the building's western facade being too far into the city's right-of-way by mere inches more than they would like, and those need to be corrected.  That is irrational, considering the cost it would take at this stage to do that.

More rational was the AndyS representative (59:00 in) that invited city officials to sit down with them and discuss a resolution of the curb issue and left it at that.  This simple unresolved issue will cost both parties a lot of money, and it illustrates the belligerence of a city who could have prevented this controversy by just denying Dr. Reimer from building over the right-of-way in the first place rather than giving them an option that others in the city can't get.

While the city manager would tell us that accused construction fraudster (and LFD firefighter) Scot Latimer has been suspended pending resolution of the serious charges against him, our mayor would use his time to thank all of those who make Ludington a great place to live by volunteering their time, mentioning a few examples like Wayne Andersen and other officials.

During the ensuing public comment, Jeff Henry would talk about uncovering motivations and intent that led to us having contaminated waters and public marinas that can't support themselves, amending the mayor's list to include your humble reporter, XLFD.  Jensen would amend that to include all other people that come forward to bring the truth to the council, wondering why the AndyS issues of controversy were never caught early on by city officials that were continually addressing the road closures throughout.  It's a good question, but it was never answered.

The city council is aware of its crumbling image; they no longer publish their meeting videos on the city's Facebook page, a policy starting last month.  This follows actions shortly after Mayor Marx Barnett came into power that disabled all comments on all city social media pages.  This all signals that they are planning on working against the people even more than they have been.  But they figured they needed some support with their loss in the local court, and so we saw two citizens intimately connected with city politics speak up for them.  It was so flagrant, that it could only have been staged.

First, Chuck "City Cuck" Sobanski introduced himself, left an attaboy for officials then sat down again: "Chuck Sobanski, honorary mayor of Fourth Ward.  Mr. Mayor, city manager, city attorney, chief of police, council members:  thank you for what you're doing.  You do a good job."

The bromance between the mayor and City Cuck is often on display before and/or after meetings, broken only on occasion when City Cuck goes after blight or begs for more deer culls (effectively doing the mayor's bidding).  But he wasn't the only one who went full Baghdad Bob for this meeting, there was also Jeanne "Hoax" Oakes who served as Third Ward councilor until she resigned and was immediately made the city manager, in violation of the city charter, however way you read it. She made tens of thousands of dollars by the switch in titles, wielding unlawful authority for months, thousands during a vacation she went on during that time.

She couldn't gush any more without exploding about the community's loving and giving people and how great it is to live here, the cameraman took the effort during her time at the podium to pan through their section, and these officials were so happy to hear what a great job they were doing.  I was actually crestfallen when I heard this part:  "I love going down to Cartier Park and just walking through there and watching all of those people have fun..."

And yet, she was the faux city manager at the time when I was charged for a crime just for walking through Cartier Park pathways and she enjoyed the feel of it as much as her fellow officials back then, and she's surely disappointed that I'm not serving time for what amounts to almost being offed by the city's contracted killers. 

As if on cue, Councilor Jack Bulger would follow her, talking about his recent experiences while walking through Cartier Park.  Councilor Winczewski would finish the night with her one good thing, telling us about the changing of the season to fall, it's surprising she didn't mention that everyone should do a color tour in Cartier Park.