well good evening everyone welcome to the continuation of this meeting we technically began the meeting up stairs what we did is we went into session called the roll call vote mediately thereafter went into a closed session to discuss a matter of labor negotiations and to discuss in a legal opinion exempt communication from our council it's the only thing that we did upstairs and we exited that closed session came down here so we already have called for the roll call vote and now we will go ahead and open our meeting down here with a couple of items that we usually do and that would be first of all a prayer which i will lead this evening and then thereafter we will have the pledge of allegiance to the flag so if you would be so inclined to rise and join us in these items we would appreciate it pray to god almighty god send down upon those of us who hold office in this city the spirit of wisdom of charity and of justice but with steadfast purpose we may faithfully serve in these offices to promote the well being of all people in this community and beyond we pray this in your name amen i pledge allegiance to the united states of america right there are copies of this evening's agenda in the rack and the rear of the room also if you have an electronic device we do have a wireless signal in the room here if you don't have the password quite yet i'm sure you can talk with someone who does and you can also follow along then by going to the city of holland's website city hall and dot com and downloading not only the agenda for tonight's meeting but also the background material the packet as we call it for for this evening's meeting variety of items on that agenda that are marked with an asterisk these are what are currently on our consent agenda meaning that regardless of where they show up in the written agenda our intention is to handle them all with one motion and one vote at one  time we think that their routine and that's why they're on consent you however may not think they're routine in fact you might have attended tonight's meeting for the purpose of discussing one or more of these items and what we will do is first we'll have a reading of what is on the consent agenda will invite members of the audience to come forward and remove an item from consent if you'd like and any member of council can also remove items from the consent agenda in fact we're probably going to have some amendments to the agenda tonight outside of consent but we'll handle that as part of the seventeenth and november seventh two thousand and twelve a lot of envy to accept as information requests submitted by michigan liquor control commission for a transfer of ownership of a b hotel license liquor license business and a two thousand and twelve b hotel as d m license reviewed by city staff with no objections i had him or teen age two to approve the energy efficiency service committee agreement with michigan municipal power agency for key services of which include entering into agreements with third parties to perform and meet the energy optimization requirements of ph to ninety five confirm the accuracy of building statements and to maintain a working capital count to cover timing issues with making payments to the third parties and collecting payments from all parties fourteen a three to approve a conserve conservation program specialist staff member to the board of public works at a pay grade of forty two thousand one forty one to fifty four thousand and seven eighty seven item fourteen a five to approve a change order to the h d r general services contract in the amount of eighty five thousand six hundred nine dollars and eighty five cents for additional cost of engineering services item fourteen want to approve it except for first reading ordinance amendment to chapter thirty two streets and sidewalks and chapter thirty three subdivision for the estates of old evergreen at seven o three and seven twenty three old orchard road subject to conditions item fourteen the one to worry for a claim filed against the city to the city's insurance carrier and city attorney for consideration item fourteen one point one two approve the amended mechanical inspector contract with the city of zealand and authorized the mayor and deputy clerk to execute the contract on behalf of the city i had him fourteen eat three point one to declare a surplus various bicycles and donation to seventy times seven and also list on property room dot com i had import teenie three point two two except as information in file the october two thousand and twelve monthly financial reports as presented by the finance department i got him fourteen point three two adopt a resolution author zing summer tax collection of winter county milledge in two thousand and thirteen pending the approval of ottawa in allegan county commissioners item fourteen five point two to approve the title six nondiscrimination in the limited english proficiency proficiency plan to continue receiving transportation funding for highways and roads required by the michigan department of transportation i could import hundred eighty five point three to approve  revokable license agreement with the city delicatessen for a project sign in fifty two east eighth street and authorize the mayor and deputy clerk to execute such agreement i had import teenie five point four two approval revokable license agreement with downtown place at twenty nine east six three to extend an existing underground sprinkling system and authorized the mayor and deputy clerk to execute that agreement fourteen five point five to approve the fiscal year two thousand and thirteen contract with lake shore advantage for economic development services in the amount of forty seven thousand dollars but the set amount to be funded through the city's economic development budget and item fourteen east six point one the proposal submitted by tech bridge in the amount of three thousand dollars for an extensive audit of the general city's social media activities with the cost to be funded through the economic development marketing budget all right thank anyone in the audience would anyone in the audience care to remove an item from the consen case then i'd like to at least read so we know what we're up to the claim was that we can could remove an item from consent or make changes to the agenda as presented the busload generation options and i would like to add two items under fourteen he city managers  management in a ministry of services five six a labor agreement and five seven a one time payment adjustment ok just for the for the benefit of the audience the intention tonight is to remove the baseload generation action item but our intention and immediately following this business meeting is to sit in those tables over there and have a discussion a study session discussion on that recommendation obviously that it's a meeting that continued meeting that's open to the public you're invited to stay for if you'd like if you came here to to give comment to that to that item tonight we can do that will do two things one you can go to item twelve which is communication from the audience and state your comments there or if you would prefer prior to entering into that study session we will have a period of public comment at that part at that time as well so you may give your comment at that point we would ask however that since it is one meeting you pick one or the other item twelve during this meeting or the continued study session and give your comments at one of those two times on that item all right we know what is amended on the consent agenda as well as an amended regular agenda this evening is there a motion to first of all handle those amendments or supported by the mayor pro tem and a discussion on that we can do it amendments by voice vote correct all in favor of those amendments please say i i'm opposed same all right the agendas are amended now we need a motion to approve the amended consent agenda moved by two three supported by white in any discussion on the amended consent agenda and a place called the real trick the public hearing dealing with a substantial amendment to our consolidated plan for the community development block grant program i'm not sure if greg is handling the introduction of this item or who is handling the introduction of this pill are you going to be today is that the scheduled public hearing for a substantial amendment to the community development block grant our consolidated plan and a proposal to reuse dollars that went and spent in the in the last year and reallocate some dollars in the current plan what is before council tonight is simply holding a public hearing we will the public hearing itself for the comment period is actually open until approximately december tenth we will then come back to council with a request for your action on the consolidated plan amendment but tonight is the public hearing for that what is proposed is there are three categories of funding that were there were dollars left over as of june thirtieth one was the small park improvement project that was the demolition project there was nine thousand dollars left there center for women in transition children and family services twenty five hundred sixty five dollars there and city of harlem program administration one thousand five hundred ten dollars left there it was also determined that two projects that were planned for this year will not receive this year so there is an additional fifty makes a total of eighty eight thousand seven hundred sixty two dollars and twenty six cents that's available to be reallocated the proposal that's before council the recommendation that has come from the community development committee is that forty five thousand dollars  that amount go towards the washington square rehab and reuse project city of holland park improvements for twenty five thousand seven hundred and downpayment assistance for homeowners at eight hundred thousand dollars microphone state your name and residential address for the record and you can't council rules allow for up to five minutes to address council in the eye so the microphone is open in the public hearing  seeing no one i will close the public hearing and at this point we are not being asked to take any action on this item correct so that is that then we move on to item ten we have no unfinished business item nine so item ten is the adoption of ordinances so filled don't go very far and we go to ten a which is the rezoning of certain properties along river avenue from the r t r end which is a traditional residential designation to the planned unit development as a nation earlier this year the planning commission took a look at properties along the river avenue as you see on the map they are the properties between fourteenth and fifteenth street on the west side of river avenue took a look at those properties two of the houses that were in that block have been demolished over the course of the early part of this year planning commission is concerned about encouraging additional development on those properties or acquisition of those properties and the area's master planned for neighborhood commercial which you see is is the and see color on this plan planning commission wanted to come up with a he zone designation for this property that showed an interest in being flexible about what could happen on this property that might encourage someone to come in and take a look at those properties and maybe make something more out of those than they are in the currently are that the change this proposed would not prohibit single family development on those properties would not prohibit single family development on the two vacant parcels but it but it broadens it and allows additional development here's in the context of the proposal is to resign this to a few d planned unit development zone district it's a broader classification of district it would allow townhouses it would allow commercial development it would allow a higher density than is currently on the property would allow the mix of uses ranging from ground floor retail or office to for floor office or residential so it's a it's a much more flexible zone district planning commission in reviewing a project that might be proposed for these properties i would have the ability to set the setbacks and establish a lot of the criteria and work with a developer might want to do something different with these properties as the planning commission looked at this they looked at what the context was around it they looked at some variations could you acquire several of the properties and respect the properties in the larger lot that has the potential if you look at commercial buildings or or higher density residential buildings at either end of the block is what the diagram on the left shows but you  remove a couple of the structures and put in a higher density building in the middle of the block this shows if you're familiar with the the town houses over by the seminary these essentially are footprints of those townhouse buildings superimposed on that block so there's an opportunity for that sort of construction on the block and whether that is ground floor commercial as i mentioned or all residential the potential is there for either of those all right this is again the time in the place for the public hearing same same deal if you want to talk on the side i'm open to the public hearing please step forward the podium the microphone and the microphone is open the public hearing is supported by birch is there discussion on developed here in there really isn't any program right now where anybody has a an idea and i think it's improved with the two houses that have been taken out of there and it seems to me believe it residential to see what happens just to change it for the sake of changing it unless we have a concrete buyer and an idea there seems to be not in our long term best interest them and i would rather see it has just left us  potentially seeing this strip improved in the next ten years a great addition to up to this part of motion passes yes one no ok thank you we have another adoption warden pub ordinance a public hearing tonight and that is with article eighteen expense recovery chapter two section two dash one twenty one through one twenty eight pertaining to o w i matters and mr city attorney drew the short straw so you could you know i intended that tonight what i want to do is spend a little bit of time with counsel we had a fairly extended this scutcheon at our last meeting when this was in her dues for the first time we did have the opportunity to have district judge read can all hear to really provide some background to the council in terms of the offenses that they have to deal with the day to day basis of the district court some of the fines and expenses that are addressing the types of fences that are before the council this evening but i think it's important to take a step back a minute and just talk a little bit about you know where we are tonight and what we're doing in conjunction with a number of other communities in the state of michigan the state of michigan has allowed local units of government to adopt a program called cost recovery there are a variety of offenses that this could apply to but the two predominant ones that this is applicable to would be a o w i offense and also providing a false report to a law enforcement officer those are the primary ones that we're going to see at this juncture at the district court and would be applicable to the city chief  department must devote substantial resources to and chief is here tonight to talk in greater detail about what is necessary to go through the processing of this again the state of michigan has allowed by statute local units of government to collect a recovery fee and essentially two areas one is the cost of law enforcement the other is for prosecution expenses that are related to the prosecution of these fences now a question is been raised well why doesn't this applies to other offenses why does this only apply to these i think there  essentially two rationales for this one is the substantial amount of time that it takes for law enforcement to process and o w i offense so that is certainly a consideration that was acknowledged by the state legislature the other is that i don't think that we're hiding anything to say that o w i offenses have had very severe social costs and our society with  death by motor vehicle by other types of impacts that they've had on families and again drunk driving is not a popular offense in lansing and i think that certainly a number of lobbying groups have taken a very position on that and have had an impact on this legislation before i talk about the what you have an ordinance language tonight i want to mention that holland is not a trailblazer in terms of what is before council tonight in ottawa county we have the county of ottawa that does cost recovery through all from that they do in the township areas we have the city of grand haven we have spring like we have city of zealand that have adopt similar programs in kent county the city of grand rapids  a number of the other east grand rapids and wood all of those communities are have adopted similar legislation and have applied costs over what council has tonight would be an amendment to section two of our ordinance code this deals with the traffic section to dealing with administrative cover recovery costs again there would be two categories there's an expense of prosecution the other is for law enforcement offenses included with your packets and i say resolution that would adopt a cost recovery fee  schedule let me just summarize what those costs would be if you had a o w i erast the law enforcement expense would be four hundred dollars if there was a blood draw that was involved in the offense that would be a hundred dollars again these are only lovely levied in the event of a conviction they are not levied in the event of someone being picked up  and the the charges dismissed either through trial or dismissal an accident investigation would be additional fifty costs a fifty dollar cost a false report arrest would be a fifty dollar prosecution expense if there was in a plea at an arraignment there would be a fifty dollars charge plea a pretrial would be seventy five dollars before a final free trial would be one hundred conviction after a bench trial one hundred fifty in conviction after a jury trial would be two hundred fifty dollars once again we should talk a little bit about what has been done to validate that these costs are in fact incurred by the city in two thousand and ten when the ottawa county went to their program they did a extensive cost study and turn only within that of a county to validate the charges certainly that type of study is translatable into the kind of cost the city has in terms of vehicles law enforcement personnel  so tonight we believe that there has been you know that they sion done to the amount that is being recommended to city council on the resolution so the recommendation of the city attorney's office would be that the council approved for final reading and passage the ordinance amendment for cost recovery if the council were to prove the ordinance we would then adopt the resolution that would adopt the fee schedule let me just point out that we we did make a couple of changes to the ordinance since it was on first reading let me just quickly summarize those there was a provision that the city manager was allowed to adjust the expense recovery schedule that has been changed so that that can only be done by city council and also that if these costs are not paid when billed by the city finance office there is the opportunity for the loving of and administrative late charge this is a very similar to what we have in the rental registration program for our rental properties where if registrations are not paid on time in the ministry of late charges is charged and vision for the permit so i'd be happy to answer questions of counsel is certainly  was i think important that we had a district court judge can all hear he provided i think an important perspective for the council but i think that holland is really proceeding and they are rather consistent manner with a lot of other communities that have seen the rising costs that it takes to handle these offenses and the need for additional  revenue for law enforcement and also i don't know if the chief has any other important this time we'd be happy dance or answer counsel questions or their questions in the audience will try to respond to those step so the recovery free or the expense recovery ordinance suggested fees here you could in theory total that up to about an additional one thousand two hundred twenty five dollars for the fees for someone who and it's an x value you have an unconscious driver you do a blood draw and you have an accident investigation that would be five fifty if you went through a jury trial on the matter there would be another two hundred dollars added on but if it were if it went that far you probably being there's probably more laws broken or other than just drunk driving it may could be other criminal charges at that juncture and well if there was death involved in the accident you probably would not have and i would have you i mean you'd have might have negligent homicide which is going to be a felony the negligent aside the felony matters that are covered under cost recovery those are not on your schedule and those would be handled through the county prosecutor's offices would not be handled so i think that the maximum amount that you would have in an o w i eros blood draw accident would be five for law enforcement expenses with another two fifty if there was a conviction so were scaife scenario so to speak would be to the tune of about eight hundred bucks and then is it up to the judge could a judge at any time have the discretion to say you know what  fees that we're asking you to pay are beyond your ability to pay no once endorsing it at all but could they is there always the ability of the judge to waive certain fees and say you know what because of your financial situation we want to get you beyond where you are now and fix this to the extent we can and maybe an indigent situation or you just don't have the income to pay let alone the eight hundred dollars fees we have here but all the other things are going to come their way with higher insurance rates fees fines all the other stuff to that does the judge have a right to waive these fees there are some mandatory fees that the judge is not allowed to waive i really don't want to go on record tonight as to you know what all of those costs are because in a typical o w i offense you have fees that are charged by the secretary of state's office you have fees and costs that are fines and costs that are charged through the district court proceeding this would allow a cost recovery component for the city of hound is the prosecuting officer involved here so i can certainly get that information for you but i know that some of the offense some of the fines and that the judges have to deal with are mandatory under the statute and other questions for staff but yes when i got a question we talked a little bit about false police reports and maybe you can or i don't i don't see that as a concern i think there's there's to be much more many more penalties posed on them through the court and those kind of things versus this fifty dollars fine this is this is basically to recoup our time as far as staff time everything invest the in that case i think that the bigger fines the bigger families are going to come from the court i don't see this is being a major concern of those if they're even aware of this fifty dollars civil fine that they would get when we were making this record so i don't see that a major other questions is that all right then this also requires a public hearing here to address this item the public hearing is now open please step forward to the microphone and state your name and residential address and we will close the public hearing on this item we have the request to approve this ordinance is there a motion placed so moved moved by support supported by de boer ok any discussion i quite frankly have a bit of a struggle with this one i understand that there are substantial costs involved with our public safety department in processing these kinds of  these kinds of things and i know that times are tough and financially we're looking to recoup as much as we can but it felt odd to keep another cost someone who is already being you know these kinds of levies really act that much as a turn that we talked about instances going up and down and you know i don't know if somebody really stops to think about well you know if i have one or two more drinks and i get caught by these fines are going to hit me hard only really think about that a lot so these are the things are rolling around in my head but rather through we made a comment who we wish happy birthday by the way made a comment below earlier in the evening that sort of suddenly brought all clarity to this for me  maybe twenty or thirty thousand dollars to the city to recoup the extra time it takes when someone gets arrested for these things you mention mr can all coming of the microphone and i don't think you  adequately expressed why he was at the microphone and i think he was there to express some concern and i think he also expressed some concern saying that if they had the any of the other judges were up here they'd probably be speaking louder than he was and having talked to one other judge about this issue and a parole officer there's a different side to this story and it's about well when they do this on a day to day basis one of the issues they have is their people's ability to dig themselves out of the hole in this terrible thing happens in lumping an additional eight seven six five or four hundred dollars on top of the fees that somebody has already determined there's a penalty and their insurance and losing their license and all of these other things that probation officer i think speaking for a lot of other probation officer deal with this a lot and help get people out of this position is very difficult many times it's a financial issue that they just can't deal so to david's point i think it's a good one is i don't think another eight hundred dollars wimping out is going to prevent anybody from getting behind the wheel of a car and driving driving while intoxicated so i feel like who are we to call into question the judicial system saying i hope you think about this because you make our lives kind of a little tougher on the other side because we have to deal with this and just kind of kicking the can do them just because we have the right maybe pile on another fee because their budgets will i think is deep i just to me it's deeper than that and i don't think it's it just doesn't seem like a good way for us to try and raise another twenty or thirty thousand dollars when the people who are dealing with this on a day to day basis are pretty much saying to us  don't disagree philosophically with judge and all but i think it's important to know that there's certainly a conflict between difference of opinion between district judges and the views that were expressed condition of sentencing that is levied in county ottawa county has not seen the judges adopt the condition of sentencing approach here but i can tell you throughout this state of michigan where there is oakland county troy those communities those district judges are imposing these costs so there is i would have to say there's a marked philosophical difference that doesn't mean that judge can all is wrong in the position that he's taking here but this is something that you know there's been there are very different approaches throughout the state on well all i heard was one judge and he did speak for the judges in ottawa county it's where we sit and you know i i don't know i am not too sure i buy the argument that well just because some judges think it's a good idea and what are we really trying to do here if we have fees for drunken drivers them you know what about meth labs and drugs in general and shootings and gang violence and running red lights running stop signs from ethnic violence to go on you know we're going to have these all of these things and this is an easy one to target and i'm not saying we should be hard on it but i think we have to look at a larger view on this particular that it's not helping the victims really there's no proof to show that it really changes behavior it's a way of collecting more money away like in deed and it's not putting more officers on the road limits i do struggle with this one jay you make a lot of good points on whether it's four fifty or eight hundred in the end i don't know i don't think people set a bar and say hey one more it might cost me yes but i think when the full weight of two hundred head for fifty a pop that's about one hundred thousand dollars i will say this you know if this was fifteen thousand dollars that the city was going for in a lot of these other point shared as the judges in the court system i do believe they're likely recovery is much expense possible on there and they're not walking away from there and they're recovering any other common mike unfortunately i didn't have the luxury of being here the last meeting to listen to brett i do respect what he has to say i just and it's not going to be a surprise with what i have to say because of my voting record on the subject i can't believe we're having this discussion the should be a slam dunk i think you said it the best we have a lot of fees a lot of taxes out there we've had a lot of special around this table that says the users are the one that  ones that should pay well if you're stupid enough to drive drunk you should be willing to pay the piper there was an argument out a little bit ago from a respected colleague that what about the famil i sympathize with that but what better peer pressure than from your family if they know they're going to get hit with a pretty heavy fine if you're out there drinking and driving i will not apologize for being unsympathetic to drunk drivers i have seen too many aftermath of what they caused families being broken up and don't tell me it's a victimless crime and before i get much further i will be supporting this one hundred fifty percent i wish we had done it a while ago again i respect judge canal's opinion i respect where he's coming from and as i said to dave if this saves one person's life it's going to be a win all the way around this is an opportunistic type of offense if you will nobody goes as somebody said earlier nobody goes to the bar and say i'm going to get drunk out of my head unless he's a professional drunk obviously which there are some out there you're never going to deter them that i'm going to get so hammered and then try to drive home but if these fees out there before he orders that he she i'm sorry they order that last drink think you know have i had enough maybe i ought to take a self analysis or ask buddy what do you think or before he has that last ring tape make sure i've got a ride home folks to me this is commonsense i will be supporting this law in october two thousand and regionally this offense which is commonly known as the super drunk law was then enhanced o w i offense if you had a blood alcohol level of point one seven or municipalities were not able when this law was adopted the state level to charge this offense because the penalties exceeded those that are limited for minas in the state of michigan recently in february of two thousand and twelve the state approved a act that would allow a city to adapt these super drunk driving laws for the prosecution of higher blood alcohol content level offenders at the local level so at the present time all  offenses that are above a point one seven were previously done through the ottawa county prosecutor's office they would charge them under state law although the city council is doing tonight is adopting a parallel super drunk driving offense as a local ordinance so that these will be prosecuted at the local level rather than through the prosecutor's office what this is going to mean essentially is that all of these offenses and the approximately sixty five percent of our o w i cases have blood alcohol levels in excess of a point one seven those were all being prosecuted through the county prosecutor's office all the fines were going to the county because of that so we are proposing to the city council and i had to adopt the super drunk driving offense that will allow those prosecutions to be done at city level with the city collecting fines and costs from those questions for  it's really hard for somebody that's intoxicated to make a good decision and every time that's what we are assuming that something will deter them from making a bad decision even though there are already in hopefully when everything clears and they will have faced the penalties for these things that they will try to make some life changes i guess that's the only hope of a deterrent with these kind of thing so i would support it to any other come all right ana please call that roll white text amendments for the planned unit development zone district just when you're getting comfortable and you come on back up and introduce this item to us which comes to us from the planning  commission as the mayor just indicated this is a recommendation from a planning commission this is the second reading first meeting was held a few weeks ago a couple of study sessions have been held on this item with city council this is a recommendation to amend the p if you just some background on this on the screen in front of you there are some drawings that originated in a master plan update that was conducted in the early two thousand after property was into the city went through a fairly exhaustive process with property owners down in that area with the planning commission and with city council looking at the potential uses and i'm focused at the northern end of that portion of m forty transitioning into in what would be a neighborhood center and residential development as you get off the west and residential develop again this is a c two highway commercial zone this area in lighter pink here is the p u d zone that i'm speaking of and then on the back sides of this this area is a planned residential development as is this area over here the item that's before council tonight is a look at within four hundred feet which is this dimension on the edge of the road back to this line if you just draw a line down like that it's a recommendation from the planning commission that the area within four hundred feet on both sides of m forty be allowed to contain automotive and machinery sales and service that is a use that's currently permitted in the c to zone but is not permitted in the zone of the recommendation from the planning commission is that those uses be allowed on both sides of of the road within that four hundred  feet through councils first reading and then subsequent study sessions council indicated a desire to look at some possible amendments to that possible revisions to that language that would attempt to adopted one significant development began to take place and sink in place which is the property as i'm outlining here as well as the property that brings you out to m forty began i believe construction began in two thousand and five or two thousand and six and part of that construction involves infrastructure improvements that bring you in along this portion of the u d's own back to what is now a road system and some some lots and some home in this area since that time we all know the economy hasn't done so well and there he really hasn't been much major development occurring anywhere but during that time or since that time planning commission received a visit from two property owners one from the express equipment property sitting here and one from the owners of these two parcels sitting here on the west side of the street slightly different situations on both properties the first express equipment property they desired to put in addition they are currently in a non conforming have a non conforming use on the property and they had attempted to put in addition on the rear of the property but did not were not allowed to because of the non conforming nature of the use so they were looking for some change in this area that would allow that addition at the same time the property owners here  reaching a point they'd like to be selling the property but have have seen no interest in the property other than for automotive sales and service and she resells and service so they also expressed an interest in some  revision to the to the zoning that would accommodate their use at the same time now this development is is slowly picking up steam again now as as some housing starts are beginning again so there is the residential development here to date there has been no proposal for residential development in this in this area on the west side of property or up in forty on the east side of in forty what is has been proposed then developed as some alternative language to what the planning commission has recommended to you into what you had first reading on the proposed changes would make automotive sales and machinery sales and service a conditional use conditionally approved permitted  own and it would as it's written now it would allow it within that four hundred foot dimension but only allow it on the east side of m forty and then there are some requirements that would go along amendments would allow if this is just a typical parcel within that area this line is forty feet the second line is eighty feet and then it's allowed within the first four hundred feet so this is a four hundred foot line that the  intention of the proposed alternative language is to be sure that there is no outside it would allow within the buildings automobile sales and service machinery sales and service within buildings that wouldn't be affected wouldn't be prohibited by this or are impacted by this but for outside display and sales and service of those those items the first first forty feet is required under an overlay zone to be landscape that would continue then it proposes that that that presence of vehicles or machinery or whatever happens to be sold on that property in this category would only be able to occupy fifty percent of the frontage within that first eighty feet so it then introduces some additional buffering for a portion of that property and i guess the best way to describe it is if i just go back to well use this just as an example if if this were under the under the current ordinance this was a grandfathered a non conforming permitted non conforming use prior prior to this discussion with and with the ordinance change and a new development on this property that first forty feet which in this case is occupied by vehicles and equipment at first forty feet would be landscape and then on half of the property an additional forty feet so you could have a portion of the property you could have vehicles machinery etc lined up across the frontage but then it would set back behind additional landscaping all of this is intended to try to soften the impact of those kinds of uses in this portion of p d which is in vision and as having residential uses and neighborhood support of commercial uses if i go back to this diagram that takes care of the frontage issue  outside sales and service would be allowed in in the remainder of this portion of that first four hundred feet the only caveat to that is that the planning commission establishes setbacks so would establish setbacks for the separation before you a for second reading is the allowance of these uses on both sides of him forty without these kinds of constraints so we presented you with and if we were act on that alternative we need a substitute motion or an amendment or something along the what the council would have to do the ordinance language which has been drafted it's been presented to council there would have to be a motion by city council to amend the ordinance that was placed we asked you to step for the microphone name and residential address for the record and the public hearing it thank you thank you very much public hearing is still open that if there is going to be any compromise certainly we appreciate that recommendation of going to the east side only and just like going with the same thank you but we will close the public hearing and remember we have a certain ordinance on first reading and if we wanted to alter it to be what phil described in his introduction of the site and we would need an amended motion to be offered other day i would move that we amend or would you offer the amended ordinance ended ordinance language all rights is there support for the amended ordinance all right he supports hoekstra offers now any debate replacing or amending what was on the floor current what is on the floor currently with be amended ordinance all right we're going to vote i think the master plan was a great idea and but things change in time changed and i guess you know we have to go with what's happening there and what and how they can develop it and we have to listen to all the different parties involved so i i'm glad that staff came up with some amenable way to think about this and still have commercial with residential and just have each be a good neighbor to the other and i guess as as you get more urban development and moral development and residential development you have to figure out how to make it work with more for riot and help each other that way so it's i think it's a good c little bit maybe nobody got exactly what they wanted it i will i support this as well you know the best laid plans i guess it would have been nice if the existing master plan would have panned out and it may still pan out in the future but for right now at least you know that the past decade has taught us something in the current market conditions while better are not really where we would like them to be to see something like this develop precisely as it had been laid out a decade ago i would say for mr dyke ice that the planning commission talked about this issue last night and there is some degree of interest among planning commissioners to have a further discussion about this whole master plan an m forty you know we want to strike some degree of balance in this and we certainly recognize that the kensington development has expended many dollars in their development and did so under the good faith belief of a certain master planning designation but we're trying to do justice to all involved with that you item twelve communications from the audience we got out of the world of ten and it gets us to item twelve and as i mentioned earlier for those who are here to discuss the issue of the  power generation issue you may either address comments at this point in the meeting or when we break into the study session of the business meeting is done will have a public comment period ahead of time but we are going to say either or in one of the sessions so item twelve communications for the audience anything that's not on the agenda can be evening thank you very much my name is susan harley i'm the michigan policy director for clean water action i'm here representing our over four thousand holland members first off i would like to thank you for  moving this topic of electric generation out of the agenda tonight it does mean more discussion however i would like to state for the record that i do believe that a study session has a distinct meeting from a city council meeting that is typically a regular regularly scheduled meeting and therefore whatever acquired an eighteen hour public meetings notice under the open meeting at but that's just for the record so i will go forward nonetheless offering comments at this point in time first off i would just like to reiterate the fact that decision on electric generation is very important to their there are many many things that must be thoroughly evaluated and i have raised issues with the border public works recommendations that they are not necessarily the best route forward for holland at this time in specific the helen board of public works recommendations do have some elements that are a step in the right direction for example the fact that you are no longer officially looking at new coal is great it is something that clean water action our members have been pushing for for a really long time however what has been put forward by the  public works is not specific on rather a notch the permit to expand the james to young player would now be withdrawn that would obviously need to be included in any resolution that there is firm commitment to move forward with a new call secondly prior to the recommendations that you may vote on coming coming up here shortly  not tonight but i'm sure in coming weeks does not specifically say that the existing coal unit should be retired prior border public works documents including the as are all i report did suggest that retirement was the best and most economical decision for the city they are now having their bats in the federal clean air act and other regulators sions and we don't believe that that the right decision for holland there needs to be a full commitment to move away from coal and so any resolution that you vote on really needs to include that commitment on the subject of natural gas we do believe that this is the wrong time to make that decision one of the primary reasons for that is that your lector generation i'm sorry your community energy plan task forces have just begun their  work several of those task forces will be looking at energy efficiency putting in place those upgrades in those changes will reduce the energy demand that the city has we also have seen recent data that the energy demand overall in the state in the nation continues to decline so it's unclear why holland would buck that state wide a national trend and therefore need such a huge generation resource here in the  city we've also continually raese issues of fracking natural gas extraction the environmental impacts that are possible from that type of extraction process we realize that the public works chose to not include those considerations feeling that they were outside of their control we believe that fracking regulations are very akin to federal clean air act requirements in fact some fracking regulations that are going to be coming forward are under the clean air act we'll consider to see continue to see not only federal but also state increased regulations and more stringent requirements around natural gas which would mean we should hold off on such a decision until it's clear what the costs associated with natural gas will be over the long run book that he said it will great again that we really believe that this is a discussion that needs the most thorough evaluation so again i appreciate you taking special time to study session and look forward to hear what you have to say that welcome thank you for this opportunity to comment on the proposals of the b p w for holland's energy plan my name is carol mcgee and i'll be representing holland area league of women voters tonight speaking for our presidents who could not be here so i will read their letter to you and ask for your consideration of these comments again in the study session island area a league of women voters has been participating in the ongoing process of the highland community decision about holland's energy future we supported the guy fourth study scenario b because it had the best mix of sustainable energy sources energy efficiency and conservation it also used greenhouse gas emissions as its benchmark with the goal of reducing harmful emissions these components reflected the energy positions of the league of women voters of the united states which opposes coal power plants due to concerns about climate change from carbon emissions on nov twelfth tw continue to operate james de young power plant its units two three and five without pollution upgrades and bearing either gas or coal if proposed stricter e p a regulations are not put into law this latter part of the plan would contribute to carbon emissions and global warming air pollutants from coal power plants are the major source of contaminants in lake michigan resulting in harm to water quality wildlife and human health the league had been asked to be part of the energy decision process and we voiced our concerns about coal as did many other stakeholders we were surprised to see the last minute change in the energy plan to include the option of burning coal in the to young units which do not have firm retirement date that has been left open how dare you league of women voters opposes this part of the plan based on our energy positions and our concerns about climate change currently world leaders are meeting to discuss ways to reduce greenhouse gases holland can be a leader in the use of renewable energy if we take this opportunity to make our area a cleaner healthier place for our citizens by moving to a sustainable energy policy that emphasizes conservation efficiency and renewable sources thank you for this opportunity to come and it's signed by her to co microphone is still open and it's on as well and welcome good evening my name is jan o'connell and i also saw want to thank you thank you for the opportunity to be able to speak tonight and also for you are thinking about having a thorough discussion on this important issue regarding the building of the national gas plant i am with the sierra club michigan chapter and i'm also west michigan of public works recommendation and play and to build a large one hundred fourteen megawatt natural gas plant it's putting the cart before the horse without fully factoring in and maximizing energy efficiency residential and commercial as well as renewable energy the commercial task force was just voted going to be established it has even met yet so i think this is very important seeing that eighty percent of holland's energy is used by the commercial sector in governor such snyder's special message this morning on energy in the environment we've been waiting for this for about a year it took place this morning governor snyder talked about the three pillars of energy reliability affordability and protecting the environment after things that have been discussed here he went on to say that these pillars will be used to guide energy decisions and a great example is energy efficiency governor snyder stated that energy efficiency doesn't mean doing less it means doing as much or more but using less energy to get it done energy efficiency he says is about how to do it better by not needing baseload energy he went on to state that energy efficiency is the best example of a no regrets policy michigan can have it makes us more reliable affordable and protects our environment the city of holland needs to think of energy efficiency as baseload energy every megawatt of energy saved takes the place of megawatts of energy that would need to be provided per the how onboard a public works two thousand and eleven energy optimization plan their cost to conserve energy is very low one cent per kilowatt hour this is only a fraction of the projected cost of a new conventional natural gas combined cycle plant which would be six point six cents per kilowatt hour by spending one hundred eighty two million to build this large one hundred fourteen megawatt natural gas plant this big investment would make it impossible to maximize clean energy because all the money unfortunately will be spent instead on this large natural gas plant despite the economics across the u s showing specifically that renewables are now very competitive totally beating out coal as well as natural gas with an investment this large holland would be strapped for years to come even when natural gas becomes financially noncompetitive how about a public works is also recommending to invest heavily in natural gas at a time across the nation and the world we are looking at it and president and i and certainty in the energy sector with historic pattern suggesting we'll be due for a significant natural gas price increases in the next few years hydro fracking as well as carbon regulations absolutely on the near horizon the price of natural gas is very volatile the spot price this is based on a million to use hit a high of thirteen dollars thirty one dollars in july of two thousand and eight it dropped to a low just this april of a dollar eighty two and have cents doubled in only seven months to three dollars and sixty six cents and that was on november sixteenth ever how in city charter states holland is in the energy business only to produce its own energy power and not to be sellers of energy outside their territory so why is how and now so quick to get tied into more energy than helen needs how aboard a public works shouldn't count and future demand for their excess electricity well an adequate selling price in spite of a better economy and record high temperatures electric demand in two thousand while has actually declined in michigan it's in august it was minus three percent at about twenty six and in the midwest also down two percent besides the house on board requesting to overbuild this last large one hundred fourteen megawatt plant there also talk about converting to current the current james d young three coal burning units to  peaking natural gas fired units and just as recently as two thousand holland made an investment in seventy three megawatts of natural gas at the forty eighth street location thank you with all this gas we are really talking about placing pretty much all of holland's energy eggs in the gas basket thank you all right we will move on then and i'm sure we'll have more comments from those of us on council in a bit when we go into that study session but we go then to fourteen a one a board of public yeah right move by the mayor pro tem supported by truth is there discussion or comment from the audience on th yesterday and i'm a little bit surprised that we haven't been able to find some kind of middle ground i'm looking at the sticky points and look at the stumbling blocks as a city council we're trying to develop our relationship with townships  possibly looking at fire and police kinds of issues and you know the big thing when we look at washington d c you know we're going to go over this financial cliff if the people in power though don't get together and it's got to be a give give kind of thing here and i guess i'm disappointed that we have to find that particular thing and the reality is this world in this environment is change change change and you know i look thirty years in the future and we're going to have the same problem then and is one member of the board going to be that significant  change in the dynamics or maybe the board of public works should increase from five to seven maybe they should be elected maybe we need to look at city council government differently we live in a changing environment and we can always lock into where we've been in the last forty years of the last thirty years as bean rubber stamped again and i guess i would talk to both parties and say you know this is this is silliness this is a waste of time and money and effort there's got to be a middle ground and find much of what we do both at the in the city council is governed by city charter and that is not changed easily nor lightly it requires a vote of the people common i think we want to do things is economically and reliably as we can and it seems as though even though this is the way we have done it for thirty years it's amazingly effective we have the best of any organization in this state in the best rates twenty percent less i mean why would we why would he mess that up why don't we take the principles of success in how we have governed and how we have worked through things and keep our thirty year commitment so that we can buy and for new projects and we have credibility as an organization we have the buy in of the region it's a much more powerful stance for the company and therefore everyone's service so i don't know why we would disrupt something that is working so well and so efficiently and the gift of having a utility owned by a city in this age of disruption in energy production i think is is just an amazing gift and we need to really protect it in order for us to address the future and to have the independence that we need as a region with power but i'll only say that i am frankly at a loss to understand what the stumbling block is with the arrangement i have heard on repeated occasions from customers and officials from outside the jurisdiction of this city that they appreciate the b p w they understand the rate savings in and the the reliability enhancements from having b p w power and yet we're still at this impasse if there are other topics that need addressing i would encourage conversations to happen very soon you've got my number you know how to get ahold of me and i will happily sit down and talk about what these issues are but for the life of me i'm having a difficult time understanding what is the hang up with the the organizational structure of the board of public works that have resulted in twenty percent cost savings to rate payers and you know an extra eight hundred thousand dollars alone going into the for example area of park township i just don't understand it to be quite frank and we're going to get to a point where we're either going to have to as the old saying goes fish or cut bait and my hope is that the cutting bait will not happen and that we will continue to fish together for a long time like we have done in the past and i've been very successful in doing so in the past but i guess i would like somebody to arrange a meeting because i've tried to do it and it has not been fruitful i'd like somebody arrange a meeting sit down and figure out what is really the impediment to continuing this relationship because i can't figure out ana please call the roll yes we yes eaters us not all that far the way down because we took the planning commission item off the agenda that takes us to be one the ordinance amendments or the issue on chapter thirty two with streets and sidewalks and phil makes his walk back to the  mayor the item that's before council from the planning commission this time around is a request for some variances on a project that was approved by the planning commission on november thirteenth the commission looked at its proposed site condominium development proposed by john and jane arnold and for seven and a little over seven point three four acres to develop to be developed a single family residential will have eight lots at seven o three and seven twenty three old orchard on the land here old orchard runs through here and heather drive is actually up in here there are some lots separating this development from from heather drive the the request before you the planning commission did approve  this but had a series of conditions attached to their approval most of the conditions were are fairly standard conditions but there are a few that in the context of site condominiums that have come up in the past on other projects as well surfaced here again specifically that is a variance to chapter thirty two which is streets and sidewalks and chapter thirty three which is the subdivision code of the  city i will review what was requested but i will also give you some context we've done a little a little research in terms of what other projects have been approved with similar sorts of variances and all i those as i go through this the first variance that's being requested is to allow a private rather than a public street right of way in order to provide access to those lives we looked at for other projects meadows hunters run myrtle court and wilshire states each one of those was approved with a private private drive private street and this project the second variances request is a forty foot right of way instead of the standard sixty six foot right of way forty feet was approved and three of those other four projects a twenty four foot wide right of way was approved for th ird variances to allow a twenty foot wide paved street section instead of the standard thirty foot paved section those other projects this one request twenty feet stored meadows was twenty  feet wilshire states was twenty two feet one is run was twenty four feet and myrtle court was twenty five feet so some similar in terms of stewart meadows slightly larger in the other cases to allow no sidewalks hundreds run with five parcels required a four foot sidewalk on one side of the street myrtle court with seven parcels required a five foot sidewalk on one side of the street and wilshire states had a five foot on one side of the street and that's twenty parcels so there are precedents for for the request before you some of these variances more more consistent than others but there are precedents for those that see lasley and i should say the sidewalk variance is a variance in both two different chapters of the ordinance so you see some repetition here and then number five to allow a hammerhead type called a sack that was not previously approved because the fire code did not permit it previously the fire code does now allow a hammerhead turnaround and that is what's being requested here again the planning commission has approved the plan they've approved it with with these variances subject to their being approved by city council mr mayor i think the reason for the confusion tonight was that this was captioned as an ordinance and that it is not an ordinance amendment under chapter thirty two and chapter thirty three sidewalks anything kind of raise the here on the back of my neck we're going to put a restrictive covenants on this whole thing that says that this shall never be turned into a public street we do not have that as proposed at this point i know hundreds run for example has come in requesting that and we have refused them on that because of the construction of the street not meeting city specs for public streets it's a decision that's made you know in the future as ordinarily as as those projects decide they want to go a different course just as long as it's understood rex from the get go i guess is what i'm saying if there's some language that we can put in there that says because it is non conforming it shall never become a public street i think we can do that well you any effort to create a public street would require formal council action of  acceptance but i don't think we can bind a future contract i saying it can never do if that request was made many municipalities when a private road is requested to be turned into a public road the requirement is that they have to bring that private road to all right just want to know just for clarity that was the reason why the planning commission said well it would wouldn't make sense in this instance in this location to have sidewalks put in and in that case what we've done is we've offered a variance until some time that sidewalks connected and they were required in the future to put those in this is saying no forever and ever from what i'm reading but it because it's a private street we can't mandate it i don't like the idea of the hammerhead i really don't  imagine that the fire departments allow that to happen because it's a plus the fact that we're allowing twelve twelve foot less twelve or thirteen foot less width for to be able to turn those trucks around  it has been reviewed by the fire department and i fully understand that i just and the steam that they refuted i don't understand their thinking ok you shot me down all the way around i'll show you know i did no such thing the by the way well you have the last you would need about engineering and here with john all drink property owner on a sunday yes at the end of that turnaround there is a fire hydrant thank you would certainly expect that given the occupation of the developer many years apart paid fire to firemen for the city holiday any other questions or comments then please we do won yes we have the claims filed against the city which was not in the package and i'm going to read that for us we can act on it mayor and council my apologies for that sorry for a claim filed by janet courtis in the amount of four thousand dollars for an even sidewalk she had an injury and this was thirteenth in college it is recommended that we refer the claim to the city's insurance carrier and city attorney for consideration recommend her of safety department police division received a donation eight hundred dollars donation has been received from john bouvier in support of the city's public safety police division honor guard it is recommended that the said donation and generosity be accepted with appreciation and an expression of gratitude be forwarded to the donor pleasure of counsel please motion to accept with appreciation moved by supported by de boer any discussion at all in favor please say i post the same that passes then that takes us to one of the newly added items forty five point six the review of a review and approval of a labor agreement amendment mr city attorney or mr city manager you guys can arm wrestle for this mayor members of council this is an item that was requested by city staff civically says the city manager robinson and the human resources director chanda the point  was given the priority health rates need to have cost containment as well as provide for greater standardization between health rates and this is something that the two unions police and fire union  position to make a one time contribution towards employee compensation and in this way saves money in doing so so with that the originals are i believe with the city clerk and i'd be happy to answer any payments by our two unions in the general city which save approximately what's on an annual basis thirty thousand dollars and in exchange for that we've agreed to a two percent one time payment to them correct any staff just so that the action is clear tonight it would also authorize the mayor and deputy city clerk to sign the agreement with the professional firefighters union and the how police officers association thank you motion parent yes de boer yes peters mayor dykstra yes motion passes and then the other newly added added item forty five point seven the one time payment to city employees mr city manager will let you handle the introduction of that please thank you mr mayor i introduced it briefly during the last comment this is something that the city is in a position to do given a improvement in the finances at the end of last fiscal year you're going to receive a full audit on this audit report in several weeks from the auditors nevertheless it does exist and other communities are seeing economic improvements the city is seeing economic improvements and this is something that the city employees would certainly value given that it's been four point five years since there's been any adjustment however we're recommending a one time adjustment given that we continue to work on ways to make our community as efficient as possible in terms of the services and yet we recognize that we need to be fair and consider all variables in the fact that we are also seeing these cost savings on the health insurance to make this recommendation at this time once again other staff are here who work on this matter and my gratitude is talk to them any comments or discussion at this point mr mayor i guess clarify that this is for full time part time b and paid on call it would not applied to seasonal  nor the manager given that there are other criteria involving those individuals nor the mayor council for the city attorney just briefly say that you know i think that given it's been nearly five years since there have been any wage adjustments this is something that you know we are pleased to do understanding that  you know we're not out of the woods yet but we certainly feel as though we have turned a fiscal corner in this city and this was brought home to me just again today i received a message from our finance director who indicated that from one nine hundred ninety nine all the way to two thousand and thirteen while we've seen roughly a twenty percent drop in our residential tax base a substantial amount of our funding source for four city services basic city services so that's gone down by roughly twenty percent from its peak our fund balances have actually increased by more than more than a million dollars so what we have done is we have tried to redefine how we do what we do we've asked the hard questions about what should we do how should we do it we've quite frankly asked our employees to sacrifice when things were incredibly difficult in this organization and now that we have seen kind of basically a half million dollar turnaround from what we had in to support at the end of the last fiscal year i think it is certainly appropriate that we express our appreciation to the job that has always been well done by our employees and as the city manager noted neighboring communities are seeing increased wages mts of anywhere from one to two and a half almost three percent so we need to be competitive with what some of our neighbors are doing because we want not only  to you know make our employees satisfied and enjoy continue enjoy coming to work but want to make sure they stay with us because we have very excellent employees and we have told them on many occasions we value them and now we're trying to do things that will show them that we value dykstra yes motion passes thank you that takes us to item fifteen communications from the city manager are there any for the evening very briefly i think i might have left out part time a and what i just said but that's in the written record so anyone watching two things one about town relations and the other about the home energy retrofit program that council should know a whole college  town relationship is very strong we're grateful for the fraternities and sororities who provided fifty individuals that volunteered several weeks ago for the community did eight different projects my special compliments to jody science debate department manager and also andy and his staff ray who helped coordinate that relationship virginia beard in our class is hosting a series of policy forums tomorrow night in moscow all three of those policy forums deal with issues involving the city and to related to energy of my related to our social networking so i will be attending those to see what i can learn second item the home energy retrofit was task force was funded via the funds that you had budgeted for the purpose of looking at some home energy audit and eventual restorations of energy improvements  right now there in the planning phase they have determined the best way to proceed and i plan is to do an r f q requests for qualification subject to the budget limit for professionals in the community in the greater region who can be the planner and professionally put together something for council to consider in march for your next budget so you may see that advertised and i want to give you some background on it and they are accused to be opened i think on december thirteenth thank you to questions for the city manager good communications for me this evening only the usual stuff that you can find information about us how to reach out to us how to communicate with us information about the city and some of the things that are going on we try and stick as much as we possibly can on to the website city of holland dot com and we invite you to visit that early and often we actually approve something tonight to look at some of our social marketing and also included in that is continued looks at how we have our web presence and how we can make that more effective for people wanting to understand and communicate with people here in city hall and in the city organization generally a couple of upcoming events now next week wednesday night will b here in another business meeting so the two things i'm going to mention actually happen after the business meeting on the fifth but will advertise early and often on these and that is that next week friday there are two events kind of back to back one that is most commonly known as the center class parade and that happens at six thirty where center claassen beats come down and not not not support pete's here but just beats and ask about the distinction sometimes because we've actually had communications from some dutch television stations on that very point but anyway i digress next week wednesday night or next week friday night the seventh at six thirty we will have the annual sinterklaas spread a very fun thing which you know follows shortly after last night's incredibly successful holiday lighted parade and this year immediately preceding the center class parade we will have and i are pleased to host the what has become known as the mayor's holiday a reception now as opposed to the holiday because it's going to be in the afternoon instead of in the morning we thought it might be a fun thing to do to have city hall opened up for a couple of hours prior to the parade allowing the community inviting the community in to  hello to enjoy some time together as a community and enjoy some light refreshments as well and then head out to the bitter cold to see the jolly old guy so that will be next week friday late afternoon the time i think is something like four o'clock ish but check the city's website eventually and it runs from about four four thirty til roughly six or six thirty we won't kick you out if if it stops at six and you're here at six fifty but those two things we certainly invite you to come to city hall enjoy them and enjoy the festivities that are happening around town that evening or other communications or resolutions from coun oh yeah i'm an appointment for you boy and you got me all messed up here and i'm just kidding it's not your fault i can't even find it for right now i've got so many windows open  post same that passes as well any other communications from council this evening mr mayor i just want to make sure procedurally where we are at this point i understand that what the house would like to do  it relates to item forty four on the baseline generation rather than taking an action that would adjourn this meeting i think what would be appropriate this as a part of this meeting noticed under the open meetings that there be a motion to conduct the study session and i don't fourteen a four and then we will then and there after going to a closed session on a different b p w related matter right so you will have to then come back n support the board by devor and for that we only need a voice vote i suspect all in favor please say i and i oppose the same very good and we're going to take a few minutes to stretch our legs and also to get that area set up with some microphone so people can hear what's going on get started hopefully you can kind of hear what we're saying dave is right here he's got a mouse with