Ludington City Council Meeting, January 23, 2023: The Ultra Secret Charter

[XLFD]

The agenda packet for the January 23, 2023 meeting of the Ludington City Council didn't have a hint of what the most controversial decision they would make on the night would be.  When you look at the video, you may also notice a conspicuous absence-- no not Councilor Ted May who's away on winter vacation-- but yours truly who was down in Scottville sharing wisdom and court papers with the city clowncil there and was missing the action in Ludington.

That didn't stop me from participating, however, as I did submit a comment to be read during the second comment period which City Manager Mitch Foster read.  I also managed to return during the scheduled closed session and caught the controversial decision made without public knowledge.  I also managed to review the video of the rest of the meeting at my convenience later on.

A congested part of the agenda was just the rote approval of annual events that the Ludington/Scottville chamber, Ludington CVB, and Ludington DDA put out each year.  One of the public noticed that Friday Night Lives were not listed and wondered why this was left out (the observation was not answered).

They passed one ordinance to have a five-year contractual agreement with a new concessionaire.  This could become controversial at a later date, as they were thinking at some point to serve alcoholic beverages-- but that should come up later at these meetings if they do.  

A public hearing was set to establish an OPRA district at the school, which passed without comment by the public or any meaningful comment by the councilors.  They set a hearing for the next step in the process, to apply for the OPRA which will happen at the next meeting. 

 

The last items on the agenda had to do with getting financial help from the MI DNR for making seawall repairs at the Harbor View City Marina.  The other effectively dealt with giving financial help to the development at 106 Laura Street in terms of a $2.1 million TIF Plan.  A large amount of taxpayer money drained mainly from Ludington's poor and middle class being used by a wealthy private developer and a marina exclusively meant for recreational watercraft most can't afford.  This redistribution of wealth from the poor to the rich should be controversial, but doesn't seem to be.

The last item of business was to go into closed session, purportedly under section 8(h) of the Open Meetings Act, which allows them to consider materials exempt from disclosure.  In true Ludington form, they failed to announce what they were actually looking at or why it was exempt to disclosure.  One has to believe it was a letter from their attorney on a pressing legal issue; I anticipated that in my comment that Foster read:

XLFD (in Foster's voice):  "I see from the Finance Committee notes that the city attorney is planning to submit an appeal of the ruling of Judge Wickens in the quo warranto action I filed against the city and won, so I won't be surprised if that's the council's action after coming out of closed session tonight.  While I welcome that appeal since I believe that the appeal's court will affirm that this council did indeed neglect the full extent of its duties under the Home Rule Cities Act which were errors that materially affected the May 3rd election, I would be remiss if I didn't point out the simpler, cheaper, and likely quicker solution to the problem is to hold another election, this time being more careful in following your duties so the results do not get voided.  

If that option is not to your liking, then maybe you believe as I do that if the public was informed as to how much this charter revision exercise would cost rather than be misled to believe that it was to be done without costs by unpaid commissioners, that the vote would fail.  The only way you can proceed without costing the citizens even more money than you've already wasted by your material mistakes, is not appealing or not holding what would be a special election in this odd year, and instead put that money towards useful public purposes."[END] 

And apparently it was the topic of the session, after they spent an hour of 'considering' they came out of the meeting and started talking about what they should be doing after their loss in Judge Wickens courtroom on December 16th.  Before that, some were interested in what happened down in Scottville, I told them it was a little crazy, and gave them more of an update later on after the meeting.  

A motion was made to appeal the judge's decision in the Michigan Court of Appeals, I'll let Kate Watkins from the 1-24-23 Daily News tell you the rest, and my statement the next day:

The people of Ludington should be livid that their city leaders would not involve them in any aspect of making this costly decision in the 38 days after the judge's decision.  Unfortunately, they know that there is zero public interest in revising the charter, meaning that they figure they can get away with dramatically changing the charter so it is less restrictive to them and use another deceptive election to get it passed.  

They additionally should be upset that two councilors failed to make known their own conflict of interest before voting on this appeal.  Councilor Kathy Winczewski's husband is on the Charter Revision Commission, making money every time they meet, so is Councilor Cheri Stibitz's father.  If they voted no, their family member would not only miss out on future earnings from the meetings, they would also all lose out on seeing their family name forever linked to the city charter.

Nobody from the general public attended these Charter Revision Committee meetings, nobody from the general public argued for revising the charter in the first place.  Nobody from the general public came to the last three city council meetings dismayed that the charter might not be revised, and nobody from the general public I know has said they are happy because of this appeal, where the City is likely to lose and be out of a considerable amount of money.  

Should the City want to hold another election with their errors fixed next year when they have other items on the ballot, they can save themselves a lot of money over taking this to the appeals court and stand a lot better chances of winning.  Of course, had they actually been less negligent they could have avoided all of these issues, and had they admitted their error was material when it was pointed out, they could have had the issue back on the November 2022 ballot.  They suffer from Neglogance, being negligent and arrogant.

[Willy]

From what has transpired from the time the Charter revision fiasco was set into motion until now has clearly shown that Ludington's ruling class is hell bent on changing  how business is done around town. The changes are not intended to help the public but will definitely benefit those who seek to gain more power and influence and add $$ to their bank accounts. The Council actually thinks that continuing to hire expensive attorney's using taxpayers money to promote their corruption is the right thing to do but in truth it only shows just how little they have in common with hardworking citizens and how twisted their logic can be.

X, thanks for all your work and time. It may be my computer but I can't view the video. It says that it is unavailable.

[XLFD]

Willy, you probably have issues because the link is from Facebook, and I know you don't have an account there so it probably doesn't come up when you press 'watch on Facebook'.  The nice thing about the Facebook link is that it's available just after the meeting, sometimes it takes a while for the video to be loaded on the library's website, this meeting wasn't available until yesterday, but I provide it below for those who either can't access that or prefer it.

I concur with your assessment of what's happening with the charter; my feelings would be different if there was actually any desire from the general public to do what the CRC has proposed in their half-year of existence or if there was any desire to change what's already in the charter in order to make it serve the public better.

January 23rd, 2023 Ludington City Council meeting from Mason County District Library on Vimeo.