The Old Y and the New Conference Center

Two of the ongoing sagas of  the future development of downtown got new chapters today.  The Ann Arbor News reports today that efforts to snag one of the county-owned lots in the North Main area for very low income housing have failed.  This was not “affordable housing” as so many casual observers might understand it, but replacement for the 100 units lost when the YMCA moved to a new location and put the property on William at 5th Avenue up for sale.  As was explained at some length in an Ann Arbor Observer story four years ago, many of these single-room- occupancy housing units (which did not have kitchen facilities) were used by people who had once been at the Delonis shelter, or who needed very low-cost or nearly free housing because they had virtually no income.  Further, many (not all) of those former inhabitants needed “supportive housing” – in which they received a number of human services, including assistance with mental illness and substance abuse.  Efforts have been underway since 2000 to maintain or replace those 100 units with better quarters and to make them better adapted to the special-needs population that requires supportive housing, culminating with the city’s purchase of the site as the YMCA moved to a new location.  (A longer, more detailed history is available in the original draft of the 2005 Observer story.)  Council issued an RFP for a developer to construct the housing, together with a for-profit building.  The winner of that competition proposed to build the William Street Station .  But the financial arrangements for the project were always problematical, since the city hoped to avoid subsidizing it, but the developer expected to make a profit. Finally, the Council killed the project in late 2007.

Discussions of “what next?” were tossed into the lap of the newly formed Housing and Human Services Advisory Board (HHSAB).  As reviewed in the Ann Arbor Chronicle,  the HHSAB presented a recommendation in May 2008.  While favoring a re-issuance of an RFP to build 100 units of supportive housing on the old Y site, the report also opened up the possibility of using other sites, preferably those already in public ownership.  This would both make the project more affordable and allow an RFP process to go forward.  (The report, referenced in the Chronicle article, includes some cost estimations.)

The idea of using a different site began to receive a lot of unofficial encouragement at the same time that the idea of using the old Y site for a conference center suddenly emerged.  An Ann Arbor News account (April 2008) of a coffee meeting between the county administrator, Bob Guenzel, and Jesse Bernstein, Ann Arbor Chamber of Commerce President, related that “Guenzel said he’d like to see plans for an Ann Arbor conference center take shape. Bernstein agreed.”  By December 2008 (as detailed by the Chronicle), the Council was hearing about three parking lots, two owned by the county, where the 100 units could be placed.  Also in December 2008, city administrator Roger Fraser made a presentation to the Council in its  Budget Retreat which he said “a group of folks…have made some conceptual plans” “at their own risk” to place a small conference center on top of the current Library Lot, using a “partnership” with the city, the DDA, and the private sector.  The “folks” further suggested that their efforts might be useful for the city to prepare an RFQ, which they understood they might not win.  Fraser went on to mention the idea of moving Blake Transit Center off its current site, roofing over 4th Avenue, and making use of all the liberated real estate for these plans.  Mayor Hieftje enthusiastically chimed in, “it allows us to keep the old Y lot intact”.

Sure enough, now that Council has voted to spend public money to install a $38 million underground parking structure under the Library Lot, Councilmember Sandi Smith announced that she will bring a resolution for a RFQ for a “private development partner” for the space above the parking structure.  However, this was postponed to July 1, 2009 so that other councilmembers can weigh in.  One can hear the machinery moving, though some of the pieces carry a lot of inertia. Last I heard, no decision has been made on whether to renovate Blake where it stands.

All of this leads to several questions.

1. What will be the effect of the resignation of Jesse Bernstein, announced today, as the Chamber of Commerce President?  He has been central to these moves toward a convention center and supported the moving of Blake as an AATA board member.

2. Will the Council continue to move towards a convention center on the old Y site before the location (and, for goodness sakes, the funding) for replacement housing is settled on?

3. Where was the public impetus for a major transformation of south Fourth Avenue?  Where was the public process?  Where has been the detailed workup to indicate the need or desire for the center?  And has the effect on our downtown in general of placing such a use-intensive facility there been considered?  And is there any notion of how finances would work and will this be addressed before “qualifying” any private “partners”? Where is the planning?

Update:  Karen Sidney supplied the attached letter of denial for the conceptual drawings presented by City Administrator Fraser to the Council at the January retreat.  Apparently, though they are driving policy, they are private.

Second Update: The document showing the total cost for the underground parking structure at the Library Lot is attached here .

THIRD UPDATE: For all related stories, see the Library Lot Conference Center page, where new articles are linked.

Blogging in Ann Arbor and the Comment Question

Some vigorous discussion has been going on lately here and there about “rules” for comments on blogs.   I found the recent post on MarkMaynard.com quite amusing.  According to his post, AnnArbor.com plans to moderate comments.  I’ll let you read Mark’s take on it for yourself.  Meanwhile, “Murph” posted an essay on moderation on Arbor Update (and comments were not enabled) after a particularly contentious run of discussions about policy on deleting comments.  Arbor Update also has a current discussion about the use of pseudonymous commentors.  And Edward Vielmetti, whose thoughts are never vacuous, provides a whole series of discussions from blogs and news sites around the world on this subject.  Ann Arbor Chronicle, which of course is not a blog, handled a recent run of troublesome off-topic comments neatly by simply excising them and making them available in an orphan section.

I won’t try to add to the chorus on this subject but I thought it a good opportunity to lay out rules for commenting on this blog.

1. Most comments will be published immediately, without prior review.

2. WordPress sends suspect comments into a spam folder.  It hasn’t caught any local comments yet.

3. Though you are asked for your email address in filling out comments, it will never be published and I will not send you any messages unless necessary for some administrative reason (can’t think of any right now).

4. Filling in a URL in the comment page will mean that people can go to your website, but this is optional – just leave it out if you don’t want to be linked to.

5. If you must use a pseudonym, I will reluctantly permit it.  Best if you have a well-known one used elsewhere also.  Personally, I’d rather see you stand behind your opinions with your real name.

6. I will delete your comment only if it is abusive, seriously off-topic, or otherwise totally unacceptable.  I won’t publish personal attacks against me or anyone else, and if the comment contains obvious falsehoods I’ll address that in a reply.  What is totally unacceptable?  It follows Justice Stewart’s rule. (Offensive language falls under the “abusive” label, again using the J.S. rule.)  But differences of opinion and especially corrections of fact are welcomed.

All that said, here’s hoping for more comments!

City Place and Council Connections

With all the changes and contortions that City Place has gone through since 2007 when it was first mentioned, you would expect some pretty heavy politics.  The most affected councilmembers would naturally be those who represent the residents. During my council campaign in 2008 (I opposed Carsten Hohnke for the Fifth Ward seat on the City Council), I do not remember that it was much of an issue, though I stated whenever possible that I was in favor of retaining the historic buildings on South Fifth.

I recall that later that year, Mike Anglin spent many hours meeting with “the neighbors” who live in the area, now being called Germantown.  He was joined by Hohnke after he was elected, though I don’t know details of those meetings.  However, on December 15, 2008, a proposal to form a historic district study committee was defeated on Council, with only three votes (Councilmembers Anglin, Briere, and Teall) in favor of it.  The other newly minted Fifth Ward councilmember, Hohnke, voted against it.  Establishment of a historic study district would not in itself have prohibited the development, but would have been the first step in recognizing the value of the buildings in the area and their history.

After the failure of the second version of the PUD at Council on January 5 (the only votes in favor of the plan were Councilmembers Rapundalo, Taylor, and Greden), there seems to have been an acceleration of activity, with many hours of meetings. The new neighborhood association, the Germantown Neighborhood Association, began to exert much more influence and to bring more facts and arguments to the table.

Since the second postponement of consideration of the site plan (see the previous post in this series), negotiations have reportedly picked up all round.  The political winds have brought the news that Hohnke has been actively promoting the passage of the site plan when it comes back to the council agenda, with the thought that further negotiations with neighbors and other interested parties could continue after that.  An interesting tidbit was brought forth in the discussion at the June 15 Council meeting, when, as reported by the Ann Arbor Chronicle, “Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) began deliberations on the City Place site plan approval by indicating to his colleagues that he had brought information to the city attorney’s office concerning a possible conflict of interest on his part with respect to the City Place project. He stated that councilmembers had the analysis provided by the city attorney’s office and indicated he was prepared to accept their recommendation, if any, on the topic.”

Clearly, considering Hohnke’s key role at this point, any conflict of interest is worth examining.  From what I have been able to glean, the information given to council members was merely that the city attorney did not consider the circumstances to be sufficient to cause concern.  I wondered whether the information that I learned last summer connecting Hohnke with Daniel Pampreen might be involved, so I took some trouble to substantiate it. I have attached several documents indicating that the business (Kinetic Energy, Inc., under the assumed name of Vie Fit) operated by Hohnke’s wife, Heather Dupuis, is either owned by Pampreen or he has a substantial share in it. His (Pampreen’s ) is the only name appearing in the assumed name application , where he names himself as “owner/director”.  In the 2005 report , he is the President, Secretary, Treasurer, Vice President and Director (with two other directors).  Heather Dupuis is not yet listed.  In 2007, Heather Dupuis is now the registered agent, but Pampreen is still the President and only Director. (The box indicating “no changes” is checked in 2008, not attached.)  Finally, in 2009, Dupuis is shown as the President, Pampreen is the Secretary and Carsten Hohnke is the Treasurer.  All three are directors, together with the two others first listed in 2005.

So why is this connection with Daniel Pampreen of relevance to City Place?  For one thing, he owns 437 S. Fifth, a property included in the proposed City Place project.  For another, he is a well-known property owner,  student landlord (Dan’s Houses) and developer.  According to one account, he owns at least 50 properties.  He has recently (again according to the cited account) become interested in development of student housing and was involved in the deal that replaced the lamented Anberay Apartments with the high-rise, high-cost Zaragon Place.  Whether Pampreen is involved at any level in the City Place project other than as the owner of an included property, I don’t know.  But he clearly has an interest.

City Place and the Vision Thing

Good news for those of us who care about the Germantown neighborhood, historic preservation, and neighborhoods in general.  The City Place site plan for a significant part of South Fifth Avenue that was on Council’s June 15 agenda has been sent back to the Planning Commission for re-review.  According to the Ann Arbor News report, the reconsideration by the commission will be on July 7, and there will also be a new public hearing at that time.  The City Council could receive the new recommendation as early as July 20, and again according to the News, a fresh public hearing will be held.  That is an important detail, because when the vote at council was postponed previously, the public hearing was held over, so that speakers would not be able to appear a second time.

This project has been around in some form for a couple of years now and was rejected by Council as a Planned Unit Development for the second time in January (2009).  The developer was unable to carry the day on convincing Council that the public benefit from the plan met the requirements for rezoning to a PUD.  At the time, the developer, Alex de Parry,  displayed an overtly unattractive conceptual sketch for a “by right” alternative plan – one that would supposedly meet the standards for its current zoning of R4C. The implication was “here is what you’ll get if you don’t approve the PUD”.

A by-right site plan was indeed promptly produced and recommended for approval by the Planning Commission on April 21 as reported earlier.  It was consideration of that site plan that has been postponed once by Council, then sent back to the Planning Commission.

The City Place project in all its configurations has proved to be a capsule lesson in the development issues facing Ann Arbor.  So many of the technical details, legal considerations, and most of all, the hopes and aspirations of different members of our community are embodied in this one project.  Of course, there are several other pressing projects and policy decisions in process, including a couple of major plan revisions and zoning changes.  But City Place draws the thumbnail.

Future posts will explore the rapidly moving history of this project further, and the underlying issues and perceptions that it embodies.

Ann Arbor Gets a NEWspaper

Breaking news – Heritage Newspapers, the operator of the Chelsea Standard and Dexter Leader, has announced a newspaper (right, the kind on newsprint) to be published weekly starting July 9, according to the Business Review.

The new weekly, to be called A2Journal, is to be  “A free weekly, home-delivered newspaper launching July 9 covering the people, traditions and institutions that make Ann Arbor unique.”

As mentioned earlier, the Ann Arbor News will be closing in July.  Its successor, AnnArbor.com, is said to be planning two print versions a week – Thursday and Sunday.  This was presumably meant to capture the supermarket sale ad market and the government notices market.  It ‘ll be interesting to see whether the new weekly can be a worthy competitor.

The Council Emails and Political Culture

I have not always found myself agreeing with the editorial stance of the Ann Arbor News, but their recent editorial about the council emails was right on course.

The editorial, paired with not one but two articles about the revelation that some council members were sending each other truly nasty emails about other council members – as well as discussing council business in an apparent violation of the letter (and certainly the spirit) of the Open Meetings Act – was a source of considerable satisfaction to one (me) who is still dismayed, though no longer shocked, about the inherent nastiness of politics.

Here are the actual council emails that the article seems to be discussing.

The emails surfaced with discussion of a potential lawsuit in a letter from the Great Lakes Environmental Law Center against the city, with reference to the approval of the underground parking garage under the “library lot”.  As reported earlier, the letter alleges that the parking garage will cause environmental damage.  (The Ann Arbor Chronicle story linked to in the previous sentence explains all the details.)  But the significance to local politics is that for once, someone with sufficient institutional backing has chosen to challenge the way business is being done at the City of Ann Arbor.  This brought about a FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) request to the City for emails during council meetings during a certain period.  The City has formerly made this sort of request very hard to pursue (by imposing outlandish charges, for example), but in this case they were successful.

Others will parse and argue the Open Meetings Act violations. Briefly, the question is likely to be whether email communication to a group smaller than a quorum, in the midst of a public meeting where there is a quorum, and deliberation is taking place, is a violation of the act.  (A quorum is a majority of the body, in this case six.) I say that this is a side discussion within a meeting and should have been subject to public scrutiny.

But the other point the emails highlight is the toxic nature of current Ann Arbor politics.  For some years now, a coalition that we could call the power circle, the In Group, or the council majority, have been in command.  When I first moved to Ann Arbor, the council was divided between Democrats and Republicans.  The Republicans could reliably be expected to take up the causes supporting business and the Democrats, all the traditional liberal causes (except for parks, which required a citizen initiative).  Then gradually all the people on council bore the label of Democrat (including a couple of former Republicans).  Since the local Democratic party was mostly organized to support Democrats against Republicans in the general election, this put a monopoly in power, and they were able to enjoy several years unchallenged except by token and easily vanquished Republicans.  (The last serious Republican candidate for Mayor, Jane Lumm, had no chance against the tide of Democratic votes for Kerry in 2004.)  Once in place, a Democratic incumbent was seldom challenged, and usually there was no contest even in a first election. This was made even smoother by a practice of appointing chosen candidates to fill vacated seats, so that there was an instant incumbent.

But a few wavelets began to appear in this smooth sea.  The chosen candidates of the ruling coalition began to encounter challenges.  In the troublesome First Ward in particular, first Kim Groome (2002) and then Ron Suarez (2006) were elected. They weren’t with the program (which I will characterize loosely as pro-development without arguing all the points).  As a result, they were treated badly.  Although I’ve never heard this directly from her, it is thought in some circles that Kim Groome was driven out of town by nastiness.

How does a group control unruly members?  By the classic methods: shunning, nasty comments, and body language.  In the case of an elected body, this is called “marginalization”.  When the target speaks, everyone’s attention is elsewhere.  Nasty comments are applied directly or to others.  Smirks behind not-too-well held hands.  Meetings are held without the target’s being informed.  Appointments are made only to unconsequential committees.  Emails and other messages are either not returned or are given short or nasty twists.   Note the references to pandering (actually paying attention to one group or another) and the “Golden Vomit Award” given to Sabra Briere (I’m sure that whatever comments she was making at the time were considered and well-spoken).  If this were a gang of chimpanzees, similar methods would be used, perhaps using more fruit and fewer electronics. Some commenters on Arbor Update have defended this behavior as “juvenile” but essentially trivial. But should our government be run by a bunch of schoolyard bullies?  We’d like to think that issues are deliberated and decided rationally and with the public good in mind, not by intimidation.

When I lost the primary for the 5th Ward seat last summer, I asked for a recount (the final tally showed that I lost by 53 votes out of over 3,000).  As reported at the time, my observers for the process were campaign supporters: my opponent Carsten Hohnke brought mostly city council members from the ruling circle.  Only the newly elected ones (Tony Derezinski and Christopher Taylor) acknowledged that I existed and spoke to me.  Carsten and the others were stony-faced and ignored me.  It was sadly indicative.

UPDATE:  The Ann Arbor Chronicle has posted a very thoughtful analysis of the deeper policy implications of the council email revelations.

Hyper Ann Arbor

Edward Vielmetti, whose ecletic blog Vacuum is global in reach but local in focus, calls attention to new tools to “aggregate, curate, and publish” local news via Outside.in for Publishers.  As I noted in an earlier post, a growing trend toward “hyperlocal” news sites is helping to fill the gap being left by the demise of traditional newspapers.  These pull together numerous online news sources, including some blogs, and sometimes supplement them with governmental notices.  The result is not the same as a traditional newspaper but can help people keep a good information flow about their own locality.

Ed’s post made me take a second look at the Ann Arbor version of Outside.in and it will now appear on our blogroll.  It does a very decent job of pulling news stories from a number of sources, including some I am not familiar with, and giving a brief headline/summary/link in a very timely way. The link to neighborhoods was a little less successful. Using my own neighborhood (they appear to use the Ann Arbor Observer City Guide classifications, which I find less than satisfactory since my humble neighborhood is lumped with the big houses up Newport), I found that some stories were highly relevant and others (like movie reviews!) more general.

Of course, the Ann Arbor Chronicle is moving right along with this hyperlocal reporting (and is very frequently the source for Outside.in).  They do some curating and aggregation themselves (the plural noun is because it is a partnership) and I find their “New Media” and “Old Media” items very helpful, where they pull news and comment from nationwide publications and local blogs.

Yet to be revealed is how effective the new mostly online news from AnnArbor.com will be.  A very good piece of news is that they have hired Edward Vielmetti to be the “blogging leader”.  They’ve been making a number of announcements and appointments and their apparent openness is fairly impressive.  I only recently signed up on their site and took their poll, and this morning I got several updates on decisions on policy.  Apparently they took all the items I gave high points to and are sending me instantaneous status updates.  (I am able to turn off this feature.) If this is not all hype/marketing, it could be good.