the-compact
Board Of Trustees Tuesday, February 10, 2026 · 121 min

Bloomfield Township Board of Trustees Meeting on February 9, 2026

Summary

The city council meeting discussed public comment, zoning ordinances, and road projects, with residents expressing concerns about noise, property values, and the cost of road repairs.

  • Residents expressed concerns about the proposed Bloomfield Hollow development and its potential impact on their community.
  • The city council discussed zoning ordinances for banquet halls and research parks, considering the impact on surrounding residences.
  • Residents discussed the need for road repairs in Bloomfield Village, citing safety concerns and the cost of maintenance.
  • The city council discussed the special assessment district process for road improvements and the potential for alternative funding methods.
  • Residents expressed concerns about the cost and bidding history of road projects, citing a 300% increase in costs.

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Topics

Transcript

Click any timestamp to jump the video to that moment. Auto-transcribed; expect occasional errors on proper nouns.

  1. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Welcome everyone. Tonight we'll open up with public comment. If you're here to comment on the SAD, we will be holding a public hearing on item number three, so if you'd like to hold your comments until that time, that would be helpful. And then also, I know there was an email and some comments going around about the Bloomfield Hollow development, that there would be some sort of an amphitheater in it, and that is not the case. And so we're making sure that's removed from any correspondence that we have, and I'm not sure where that came from, but I just want to make that clear tonight. And I'm sure you're here to comment on it, but I want to clarify that. That's not the intention of or would be allowed at Bloomfield Hollow. Okay? So, and a quick introduction. We have a new assistant to the clerk's office. Martin, do you want to introduce Hannah? Oh, sure. Happy to. So, with us tonight is Hannah Nassar. Hannah is a recent graduate from Michigan State University, James Madison College. For anyone else who went to James Madison College, like me. She comes to us. most recently from an internship in the clerks department of the city of Bloomfield city of Birmingham and was highly recommended and also did an internship with the city of Detroit so very civic minded Hannah has joined us to help us be perform the secretary of the board of trustees role and elections and other activities the clerk does so thanks Hannah for joining us we look forward to working with you. Thank you. So we'll open up for public comment if you're here to comment on any item in the on the agenda or above the township you can come up to the podium and if you want to just wait in line we ask you to keep your comments to three minutes and we will show your time up on the clock as well and if you'd introduce yourself and your address we'd appreciate it thank you. Good evening my name is Brett Northcutt township resident 310 North Berkshire so about nine years ago my wife and I purchased 1.7 acres of a wooded lot on the back of Berkshire which is a dirt road to build our home home for our four

  2. Happy to. So, with us tonight is Hannah Nassar. Hannah is a recent graduate from Michigan State University, James Madison College. For anyone else who went to James Madison College, like me. She comes to us. most recently from an internship in the clerks department of the city of Bloomfield city of Birmingham and was highly recommended and also did an internship with the city of Detroit so very civic minded Hannah has joined us to help us be perform the secretary of the board of trustees role and elections and other activities the clerk does so thanks Hannah for joining us we look forward to working with you. Thank you. So we'll open up for public comment if you're here to comment on any item in the on the agenda or above the township you can come up to the podium and if you want to just wait in line we ask you to keep your comments to three minutes and we will show your time up on the clock as well and if you'd introduce yourself and your address we'd appreciate it thank you. Good evening my name is Brett Northcutt township resident 310 North Berkshire so about nine years ago my wife and I purchased 1.7 acres of a wooded lot on the back of Berkshire which is a dirt road to build our home home for our four young kids and it was calm it was peaceful it had an up north feeling and that's exactly what we were looking for when you're going to build our house we did our homework we researched schools crime the sex offender registry and most importantly the zoning for the industrial park directly behind our house it's on two different sides of our property we found out was zoned RP1 which was very encouraging because we weren't worried about another research park building going in because they were quiet no nuisance regular hours no big deal so fast forward to a few weeks ago i was watching the video of the design review meeting from january 7th and it really made me sick how long was the developer working with the township with no zero none no attempt at all to work with myself or any of the residents in the neighborhood he mentioned 16 or 17 design iterations more importantly watching the reactions from a few of the folks that are up there now you were giddy you were so smug and it was sickening so my question is what lens were you using to be this

  3. the back of Berkshire which is a dirt road to build our home home for our four young kids and it was calm it was peaceful it had an up north feeling and that's exactly what we were looking for when you're going to build our house we did our homework we researched schools crime the sex offender registry and most importantly the zoning for the industrial park directly behind our house it's on two different sides of our property we found out was zoned RP1 which was very encouraging because we weren't worried about another research park building going in because they were quiet no nuisance regular hours no big deal so fast forward to a few weeks ago i was watching the video of the design review meeting from january 7th and it really made me sick how long was the developer working with the township with no zero none no attempt at all to work with myself or any of the residents in the neighborhood he mentioned 16 or 17 design iterations more importantly watching the reactions from a few of the folks that are up there now you were giddy you were so smug and it was sickening so my question is what lens were you using to be this excited it certainly wasn't through the lens of the township residents that are here what resident is going to celebrate a high-end party barn which at most we would visit once or twice in our lifetime which lens was used certainly not my family we designed and built our dream home dream home for four kids in our backyard if rezoning is approved if the variances are approved our yard will be in the shadows of a giant banquet hall and amphitheater which he has mentioned many many times especially in the meeting he set up with the homeowners he said how sick is this amphitheater going to be if the zoning is approved uh the headlights will be shining directly in our family room window which lens was used certainly not the shafers the reeds the dillons judy and ralph keith and debbie laponza anytime or day of night now there will be hundreds of strangers just feet from our door i guess my real question is which lens is going to be used to determine if this development

  4. were giddy you were so smug and it was sickening so my question is what lens were you using to be this excited it certainly wasn't through the lens of the township residents that are here what resident is going to celebrate a high-end party barn which at most we would visit once or twice in our lifetime which lens was used certainly not my family we designed and built our dream home dream home for four kids in our backyard if rezoning is approved if the variances are approved our yard will be in the shadows of a giant banquet hall and amphitheater which he has mentioned many many times especially in the meeting he set up with the homeowners he said how sick is this amphitheater going to be if the zoning is approved uh the headlights will be shining directly in our family room window which lens was used certainly not the shafers the reeds the dillons judy and ralph keith and debbie laponza anytime or day of night now there will be hundreds of strangers just feet from our door i guess my real question is which lens is going to be used to determine if this development gets what it's asking for we expect that you will not continue to use the lens of the developer or the long list of investors but of the children families and neighbors and taxpayers who are here today thank you that's a tough act to follow so my name is john shaffer i live at 300 north berkshire and i would be excuse me the next door neighbor of bloomfield hollow purchased our house about five years ago um next to a big open vacant lot did the same thing as brett did went to the township found as zone is research park research parks make great neighbors they're quiet you don't see them you don't hear them um this house we purchased it's a gem i'm sorry all right so january 20th we read in the there's a gem i'm sorry all right so it looked like there's a gem i don't see them a gem i don't see them We're going to have a banquet hall 100 feet from my garage. This banquet hall is going to have the capacity of 1,000 guests. Alcohol, advertises an indoor and outdoor venue. 1,000 guests every Friday, every Saturday, spring to fall, drunk right next to my garage.

  5. i guess my real question is which lens is going to be used to determine if this development gets what it's asking for we expect that you will not continue to use the lens of the developer or the long list of investors but of the children families and neighbors and taxpayers who are here today thank you that's a tough act to follow so my name is john shaffer i live at 300 north berkshire and i would be excuse me the next door neighbor of bloomfield hollow purchased our house about five years ago um next to a big open vacant lot did the same thing as brett did went to the township found as zone is research park research parks make great neighbors they're quiet you don't see them you don't hear them um this house we purchased it's a gem i'm sorry all right so january 20th we read in the there's a gem i'm sorry all right so it looked like there's a gem i don't see them a gem i don't see them We're going to have a banquet hall 100 feet from my garage. This banquet hall is going to have the capacity of 1,000 guests. Alcohol, advertises an indoor and outdoor venue. 1,000 guests every Friday, every Saturday, spring to fall, drunk right next to my garage. So if you come outside of my garage, there's going to be a strip of trees and then a dirt road and then the structure. If there's people going to be roaming around late at night drinking, smoking, doing whatever they do, drunk at night again, sorry, I just think it's an absolutely horrible idea. I think there's going to have so much noise in my property. I'm not going to want to live there. And if I'm not going to want to live there, that means other people aren't going to want to live there, which means my house is, the value of my house is going to go down dramatically. When I heard that this has been going on for, I think it was close to a year, I wish I had known. You know, I jumped another 40 grand into that house last summer. And why? So I could give it to Bloomfield Hollow, I'm not going to get that money back now. That's just going to go away. Obviously, I'm not for Bloomfield Hollow, and I'm not for the zoning changing to put a bank at all in a research park. Thank you. Thank you, John. Thank you.

  6. 1,000 guests every Friday, every Saturday, spring to fall, drunk right next to my garage. So if you come outside of my garage, there's going to be a strip of trees and then a dirt road and then the structure. If there's people going to be roaming around late at night drinking, smoking, doing whatever they do, drunk at night again, sorry, I just think it's an absolutely horrible idea. I think there's going to have so much noise in my property. I'm not going to want to live there. And if I'm not going to want to live there, that means other people aren't going to want to live there, which means my house is, the value of my house is going to go down dramatically. When I heard that this has been going on for, I think it was close to a year, I wish I had known. You know, I jumped another 40 grand into that house last summer. And why? So I could give it to Bloomfield Hollow, I'm not going to get that money back now. That's just going to go away. Obviously, I'm not for Bloomfield Hollow, and I'm not for the zoning changing to put a bank at all in a research park. Thank you. Thank you, John. Thank you. Evening. My name is Tim McGrain. I live at 163 North Berkshire Road talking with regards to the 350 Thremont Street Bloomfield Hallows Project. Firstly, the 56 residences that are on Berkshire Road are a close-knit community. Some of us may not be directly adjacent to this property but what affects one of them affects all of us. So we are going to hear from all 56 residences and the family members. We would prefer that nothing be developed there but we recognize the developer's desire to redevelop the property. In a recent Zoom call with the developer we indicated we want to work with you. We want to collectively be able to come to the township and say we agree on this. He said what do you want? It's really simple. We don't want to see it. We don't want to hear it. The project has been submitted and is being promoted as an event facility accommodating 650 to a thousand people. One observation is the plans are showing 106 regular parking spaces so they're very hopeful on ride sharing and carpooling. Develop a comment into the town in the township presentation. We have a lot of outdoor space for weddings, concerts, big callers and we'll do other stuff on property. And he also commented we've worked with the township for a year on building placement.

  7. Evening. My name is Tim McGrain. I live at 163 North Berkshire Road talking with regards to the 350 Thremont Street Bloomfield Hallows Project. Firstly, the 56 residences that are on Berkshire Road are a close-knit community. Some of us may not be directly adjacent to this property but what affects one of them affects all of us. So we are going to hear from all 56 residences and the family members. We would prefer that nothing be developed there but we recognize the developer's desire to redevelop the property. In a recent Zoom call with the developer we indicated we want to work with you. We want to collectively be able to come to the township and say we agree on this. He said what do you want? It's really simple. We don't want to see it. We don't want to hear it. The project has been submitted and is being promoted as an event facility accommodating 650 to a thousand people. One observation is the plans are showing 106 regular parking spaces so they're very hopeful on ride sharing and carpooling. Develop a comment into the town in the township presentation. We have a lot of outdoor space for weddings, concerts, big callers and we'll do other stuff on property. And he also commented we've worked with the township for a year on building placement. We've done sound reports and light reports. He also made a comment that the providing everything that is required by the township. We've accommodated wetlands consultant reports and fire safety concerns. and requirements. When we asked if we could see copies of the reports the response was you can look on Google. At a design review meeting with the township staff commented we've been working with the developer for a year. Any zoning ordinance amendments should account for the impact on adjacent property owners and also special land use conditions should be cohesive with surrounding areas. This project was announced in the press on January 20th following the January 19th meeting here. That was the first that we as residents heard about it just three weeks ago. The developer commented in the township that the township said we need to be sensitive to neighbors we're just not sure what neighbors he's talking about. The event center the current event center building with a planned amphitheater and those are showing up on the plans that have been presented in this room as noted on the plans could not be located closer to our property line. That along with a road right

  8. stuff on property. And he also commented we've worked with the township for a year on building placement. We've done sound reports and light reports. He also made a comment that the providing everything that is required by the township. We've accommodated wetlands consultant reports and fire safety concerns. and requirements. When we asked if we could see copies of the reports the response was you can look on Google. At a design review meeting with the township staff commented we've been working with the developer for a year. Any zoning ordinance amendments should account for the impact on adjacent property owners and also special land use conditions should be cohesive with surrounding areas. This project was announced in the press on January 20th following the January 19th meeting here. That was the first that we as residents heard about it just three weeks ago. The developer commented in the township that the township said we need to be sensitive to neighbors we're just not sure what neighbors he's talking about. The event center the current event center building with a planned amphitheater and those are showing up on the plans that have been presented in this room as noted on the plans could not be located closer to our property line. That along with a road right along our property line going to the east side of the property for some type of phase two and phase three project which I have no details about but obviously will increase the impact of the property. Although the developer did say on the call that he would take that road out if it helped. Given the overall layout of the 23 acres of the property could the building be positioned towards the east or north of the property further away from Berkshire residents? Thank you. Hello, my name is Michael Van Hoff at 3.30 North Berkshire. I just wanted to make a further couple of comments as a continuation of what I mentioned in the previous Board of Trustees meeting. It is regarding 350 Fremont Street and the proposed Bloomfield Hollow development. Mostly I'm focusing on the proposed zoning ordinance. And the nice thing about a research park zoning ordinance is that it's basically nine to five and there's almost no activity on the weekends. The biggest noise that I ever hear back there is one of those industrial garbage trucks coming in and picking up the hallway. But that's really about it.

  9. as noted on the plans could not be located closer to our property line. That along with a road right along our property line going to the east side of the property for some type of phase two and phase three project which I have no details about but obviously will increase the impact of the property. Although the developer did say on the call that he would take that road out if it helped. Given the overall layout of the 23 acres of the property could the building be positioned towards the east or north of the property further away from Berkshire residents? Thank you. Hello, my name is Michael Van Hoff at 3.30 North Berkshire. I just wanted to make a further couple of comments as a continuation of what I mentioned in the previous Board of Trustees meeting. It is regarding 350 Fremont Street and the proposed Bloomfield Hollow development. Mostly I'm focusing on the proposed zoning ordinance. And the nice thing about a research park zoning ordinance is that it's basically nine to five and there's almost no activity on the weekends. The biggest noise that I ever hear back there is one of those industrial garbage trucks coming in and picking up the hallway. But that's really about it. So when you consider the banquet hall zoning to be just included into a research park, it's a huge departure from what a research park zoning normally includes. And one of the things, there's a couple of things that I have to make sure that we take into account is that really the number one rule when considering a banquet hall, it's right in the statement of the ordinance, is you have to consider the impact on the surrounding residences. And obviously, as you've heard before, we do feel that that has not taken place up until this point in time. And we hope that going forward, there's big. I've got to consider this section and say, please. Thank you. changes in terms of how that's happening by rule here and and obviously you know as John mentioned the impact on residential home value is something that only we will bear right I mean nobody else will bear that and and that's not that's not acceptable so in conclusion really I want to make sure that we do not take the banquet hall zoning ordinance as written today and just X and adopt that into the research park zoning which is basically what the consultant offered up in their

  10. But that's really about it. So when you consider the banquet hall zoning to be just included into a research park, it's a huge departure from what a research park zoning normally includes. And one of the things, there's a couple of things that I have to make sure that we take into account is that really the number one rule when considering a banquet hall, it's right in the statement of the ordinance, is you have to consider the impact on the surrounding residences. And obviously, as you've heard before, we do feel that that has not taken place up until this point in time. And we hope that going forward, there's big. I've got to consider this section and say, please. Thank you. changes in terms of how that's happening by rule here and and obviously you know as John mentioned the impact on residential home value is something that only we will bear right I mean nobody else will bear that and and that's not that's not acceptable so in conclusion really I want to make sure that we do not take the banquet hall zoning ordinance as written today and just X and adopt that into the research park zoning which is basically what the consultant offered up in their letter because it is a huge departure and you know the noise and the light and those kind of things need to be accounted for and they need to be written into the ordinance so that we're not continuing to come in here and fight you know year after year over small changes they want to maybe impart into the facility or something so I think it's really important that we get these rules nailed down now and and come to an agreement because I mean the facility that they have designed is beautiful right as a facility it is however its location and the way in which the process has proceeded to this point is what I think we all typically find unacceptable you know from the from our neighborhood standpoint thank you Hi, Greg. How you doing? Greg Utuma, 127 South Berkshire. I'm obviously, I consider myself friends with some of you and some of you know who I am. I think it's the first time I've ever come before a city and spoke up against a development. As a developer myself, I empathize with their

  11. adopt that into the research park zoning which is basically what the consultant offered up in their letter because it is a huge departure and you know the noise and the light and those kind of things need to be accounted for and they need to be written into the ordinance so that we're not continuing to come in here and fight you know year after year over small changes they want to maybe impart into the facility or something so I think it's really important that we get these rules nailed down now and and come to an agreement because I mean the facility that they have designed is beautiful right as a facility it is however its location and the way in which the process has proceeded to this point is what I think we all typically find unacceptable you know from the from our neighborhood standpoint thank you Hi, Greg. How you doing? Greg Utuma, 127 South Berkshire. I'm obviously, I consider myself friends with some of you and some of you know who I am. I think it's the first time I've ever come before a city and spoke up against a development. As a developer myself, I empathize with their position. As Mr. McGrane so eloquently said in his English accent, I'm actually not directly affected. But I became more involved when I was on that developer's call on Friday. And I want to be judicious with my words here. I don't want to say that he lied to us. But I can I can adequately confirm that he grossly misrepresented things to us. First half of the call, I just had it on listening. The second half, I engaged and he kept talking about how he did all of these reports, both sound and light, confirming we would never see, never hear him. Again, candidly, I'm never going to see or hear him. I'm on the south side closest to Woodward. But but the Schafer's in the north cuts, he's literally in their backyard, even their schematic, they froze, they were drawing a line between the development and the Schafer's house. And they just drew right over the garage. So they could get 300 feet. And their logic was well, that's the living space. He doesn't live in his garage. And I respectfully told them that's not up to you. What Mr. Schafer does with this garage. If he doesn't want to if he doesn't want a banquet hall next to his garage, that's reasonable. You don't tell him well, you don't live there, you live in your in your in your home. But then he kept telling us you'll never

  12. before a city and spoke up against a development. As a developer myself, I empathize with their position. As Mr. McGrane so eloquently said in his English accent, I'm actually not directly affected. But I became more involved when I was on that developer's call on Friday. And I want to be judicious with my words here. I don't want to say that he lied to us. But I can I can adequately confirm that he grossly misrepresented things to us. First half of the call, I just had it on listening. The second half, I engaged and he kept talking about how he did all of these reports, both sound and light, confirming we would never see, never hear him. Again, candidly, I'm never going to see or hear him. I'm on the south side closest to Woodward. But but the Schafer's in the north cuts, he's literally in their backyard, even their schematic, they froze, they were drawing a line between the development and the Schafer's house. And they just drew right over the garage. So they could get 300 feet. And their logic was well, that's the living space. He doesn't live in his garage. And I respectfully told them that's not up to you. What Mr. Schafer does with this garage. If he doesn't want to if he doesn't want a banquet hall next to his garage, that's reasonable. You don't tell him well, you don't live there, you live in your in your in your home. But then he kept telling us you'll never see us you never that was our narrative just we don't want to hear you want to see you god bless you we know you're doing this for money go get it but just please leave our family leave our neighborhood alone five six seven times you'll never hear you'll never see us we've done countless reports thousands of pages i had asked him for a copy of the report they went silent i then reiterated my request for a copy of the report he then said well we did internal music and sound we did our own acoustics report internally we did our own light sound like to make sure that their interior is well lit and well acoustic and he said but greg google it you can confirm we're 300 feet from his from his living room he'll never see or hear us and then we asked he continually talked about how it was going to be an outdoor venue during the call and then said but you're never going to hear or see us and then we proposed we said exactly mr grain said because we want to work with you we want to go in the words i use her we want to celebrate you to the planning commission let's work together to come up with something where you can move it north and east just away from our property lines he said that's a great idea i said okay what's next steps his words to me and i quote talk to the planning commission the township will be our liaison in this in this instance he never contacted us we gave him his email or i see you prove it to him because we gave tim and i both

  13. see us you never that was our narrative just we don't want to hear you want to see you god bless you we know you're doing this for money go get it but just please leave our family leave our neighborhood alone five six seven times you'll never hear you'll never see us we've done countless reports thousands of pages i had asked him for a copy of the report they went silent i then reiterated my request for a copy of the report he then said well we did internal music and sound we did our own acoustics report internally we did our own light sound like to make sure that their interior is well lit and well acoustic and he said but greg google it you can confirm we're 300 feet from his from his living room he'll never see or hear us and then we asked he continually talked about how it was going to be an outdoor venue during the call and then said but you're never going to hear or see us and then we proposed we said exactly mr grain said because we want to work with you we want to go in the words i use her we want to celebrate you to the planning commission let's work together to come up with something where you can move it north and east just away from our property lines he said that's a great idea i said okay what's next steps his words to me and i quote talk to the planning commission the township will be our liaison in this in this instance he never contacted us we gave him his email or i see you prove it to him because we gave tim and i both gave our emails our cell numbers never heard from him he wants the township to be our liaison with us as far as what we should or should not advocate for in our neighborhood i don't think any of this how this is moving forward seems appropriate Thank you Hello, I Spoke two weeks ago said who I was my name my address. Could you repeat it? I'm Judy Wendler 194 North Berkshire have lived in my home 49 years and I was a little taken aback because after the public meeting that we held here Two days later day later. Can't remember. I received a gift bag with the window address to the Wendler's Inside two sheets of tissue paper and two sheets of information about Bloomfield Hollows Nobody else had spoke got that the Wendler's got singled out That spooked me a little bit that I spoke up and then I received

  14. he never contacted us we gave him his email or i see you prove it to him because we gave tim and i both gave our emails our cell numbers never heard from him he wants the township to be our liaison with us as far as what we should or should not advocate for in our neighborhood i don't think any of this how this is moving forward seems appropriate Thank you Hello, I Spoke two weeks ago said who I was my name my address. Could you repeat it? I'm Judy Wendler 194 North Berkshire have lived in my home 49 years and I was a little taken aback because after the public meeting that we held here Two days later day later. Can't remember. I received a gift bag with the window address to the Wendler's Inside two sheets of tissue paper and two sheets of information about Bloomfield Hollows Nobody else had spoke got that the Wendler's got singled out That spooked me a little bit that I spoke up and then I received Something from the development Sure, it wasn't the township so That was a little spooky. I Think you know how we feel many people will come up and speak, but that alone Made me a little upset. Thank you Thanks, Judy Thank you my name is ralph wendler i'm 194 north berkshire you've heard how my wife was upset by the contact that way but i'm not going to address that i'm going to address the noise there is no way that anybody's hand waving is going to be able to impress me that they will contain the noise when the design that is shown is one that opens the interior to the outside so that the the events flow back and forth living where we have for 49 years and living as far away as the football field

  15. That spooked me a little bit that I spoke up and then I received Something from the development Sure, it wasn't the township so That was a little spooky. I Think you know how we feel many people will come up and speak, but that alone Made me a little upset. Thank you Thanks, Judy Thank you my name is ralph wendler i'm 194 north berkshire you've heard how my wife was upset by the contact that way but i'm not going to address that i'm going to address the noise there is no way that anybody's hand waving is going to be able to impress me that they will contain the noise when the design that is shown is one that opens the interior to the outside so that the the events flow back and forth living where we have for 49 years and living as far away as the football field at the once launcher high school we could hear the band practicing they said we will have no amplified music at at the hollows at bloomfield hollows it doesn't have to be amplified music to hear people i i'm more than a mile away and i can hear an event going on and now that i'm not that far away at at this proposal there's no way unless it's an enclosed building that i'm not going to hear them this is going to be a disruption just straight out disruption i will not have my afternoons i will not have my summer days. I will not have my evenings to myself, my family, if this goes through the way it has been presented. I thank you for your considerations of those things for not only for my own neighborhood, my own self, but for even the people in Pontiac who don't seem to care about the noise that comes from the M1, which isn't amplified, and it is street legal sound supposedly, but it is heard everywhere, everywhere. You can hear it at the town center. You can hear

  16. flow back and forth living where we have for 49 years and living as far away as the football field at the once launcher high school we could hear the band practicing they said we will have no amplified music at at the hollows at bloomfield hollows it doesn't have to be amplified music to hear people i i'm more than a mile away and i can hear an event going on and now that i'm not that far away at at this proposal there's no way unless it's an enclosed building that i'm not going to hear them this is going to be a disruption just straight out disruption i will not have my afternoons i will not have my summer days. I will not have my evenings to myself, my family, if this goes through the way it has been presented. I thank you for your considerations of those things for not only for my own neighborhood, my own self, but for even the people in Pontiac who don't seem to care about the noise that comes from the M1, which isn't amplified, and it is street legal sound supposedly, but it is heard everywhere, everywhere. You can hear it at the town center. You can hear it well within distance, and now you're going to do 1,000 people in a building like that so close to our neighborhood. It isn't fair. It isn't right. Please take that into consideration. Thank you, Rob. Hello. My name is Stefan Bagney. I'm from the law firm of Clark Hill. I sent correspondence on Friday afternoon. Mr. Chubb was kind enough to reach out to me. I want to focus on the process that's happening here. When courts are asked whether they should remain in a case, the standard that that court follows is avoidance of the appearance of impropriety because the ideal that decisions being made that impact people's lives are being done and in a neutral and fair way requires that strict to standard it isn't whether there is an impropriety it's whether

  17. supposedly, but it is heard everywhere, everywhere. You can hear it at the town center. You can hear it well within distance, and now you're going to do 1,000 people in a building like that so close to our neighborhood. It isn't fair. It isn't right. Please take that into consideration. Thank you, Rob. Hello. My name is Stefan Bagney. I'm from the law firm of Clark Hill. I sent correspondence on Friday afternoon. Mr. Chubb was kind enough to reach out to me. I want to focus on the process that's happening here. When courts are asked whether they should remain in a case, the standard that that court follows is avoidance of the appearance of impropriety because the ideal that decisions being made that impact people's lives are being done and in a neutral and fair way requires that strict to standard it isn't whether there is an impropriety it's whether there's even the appearance of an impropriety and the process that the township has been implementing for the Bloomfield Hollows development has a massive appearance of impropriety the notion as stated in the zoo meetings that the township has been working for a year with the developer and as giving initial approvals in an empty room because the citizens who are being impacted didn't even know that the meeting was happening and that the township is following a process to allow additional approvals by its various boards to be done before there's even a legal basis for this use to be implemented is just flat-out wrong it smacks of a done deal and a fix and I'm not here I'm not fast to accuse people I'm not accusing that of being the case but it certainly looks of it and I see when I speak to my clients sort of that frustration and anger radiating off of them because they don't feel like they're actually going to have a voice if the Planning Commission for example

  18. strict to standard it isn't whether there is an impropriety it's whether there's even the appearance of an impropriety and the process that the township has been implementing for the Bloomfield Hollows development has a massive appearance of impropriety the notion as stated in the zoo meetings that the township has been working for a year with the developer and as giving initial approvals in an empty room because the citizens who are being impacted didn't even know that the meeting was happening and that the township is following a process to allow additional approvals by its various boards to be done before there's even a legal basis for this use to be implemented is just flat-out wrong it smacks of a done deal and a fix and I'm not here I'm not fast to accuse people I'm not accusing that of being the case but it certainly looks of it and I see when I speak to my clients sort of that frustration and anger radiating off of them because they don't feel like they're actually going to have a voice if the Planning Commission for example is going to be reviewing whether to grant a special use approval at the same time as it's reviewing the zoning language necessary to allow that to happen. So it is my strong suggestion that the township board direct the other boards to pause, have the zoning language process completed, establish what if any language will be applied and then let those boards apply that language. I reached out to a municipal zoning attorney from another county and asked about this type of process and whether that attorney had seen it happen. And that attorney told me that they haven't really researched that process because it's a bad practice and they don't do it. Because it triggers all of the type of fears and frustrations that the people are experiencing with the process as it's being implemented. Thank you. Thanks, Stephen.

  19. is going to be reviewing whether to grant a special use approval at the same time as it's reviewing the zoning language necessary to allow that to happen. So it is my strong suggestion that the township board direct the other boards to pause, have the zoning language process completed, establish what if any language will be applied and then let those boards apply that language. I reached out to a municipal zoning attorney from another county and asked about this type of process and whether that attorney had seen it happen. And that attorney told me that they haven't really researched that process because it's a bad practice and they don't do it. Because it triggers all of the type of fears and frustrations that the people are experiencing with the process as it's being implemented. Thank you. Thanks, Stephen. Any more public comment? If not, I'll close public comment. And I asked just from Stephen's comment to have our attorney address a couple of comments that Stephen just made. And so I did receive the communication. And so I did receive the communication. from Mr. Bagney and so I appreciate that. What I did want to confirm is that everything, you know, we did review everything. Everything is done consistent with the Open Meetings Act and this is not a done deal in any way. You know, because this is a change to the zoning ordinance, including a change, anytime that you change the zoning map is a textual change to the zoning ordinance. It implicates several different procedural steps which we are following so all of them will go along to the Planning Commission for review. The Planning Commission will then make a recommendation to this board and this board will consider it at this time. There are several requests being made by the developer regarding different special use permits and that would only come into play if the zoning ordinance is amended to change the zoning of the property. It's very common that we do all of them at the same time but regardless, if any piece fails then the project won't move forward. And so, you know, we will ensure moving forward that we

  20. Any more public comment? If not, I'll close public comment. And I asked just from Stephen's comment to have our attorney address a couple of comments that Stephen just made. And so I did receive the communication. And so I did receive the communication. from Mr. Bagney and so I appreciate that. What I did want to confirm is that everything, you know, we did review everything. Everything is done consistent with the Open Meetings Act and this is not a done deal in any way. You know, because this is a change to the zoning ordinance, including a change, anytime that you change the zoning map is a textual change to the zoning ordinance. It implicates several different procedural steps which we are following so all of them will go along to the Planning Commission for review. The Planning Commission will then make a recommendation to this board and this board will consider it at this time. There are several requests being made by the developer regarding different special use permits and that would only come into play if the zoning ordinance is amended to change the zoning of the property. It's very common that we do all of them at the same time but regardless, if any piece fails then the project won't move forward. And so, you know, we will ensure moving forward that we continue to follow all the steps. Everything is on the website so everyone should be made aware of any time that any of these items will be before the Planning Commission or this board or another board. Okay, thanks, Tony. All right. Okay, so we've closed public comment and so I won't answer any questions but it'll be an open and fair process and that's all we've allowed the developer is an open and fair process to go through our Planning Board. board and through our Zoning Board of Appeals. And there's been no pre-judgment, there's no pre-decision made here. We'll have to see how it goes through the system. Okay, thank you. So item number two, consider a consent agenda. I'll look for a motion to approve the consent agenda. Any changes? I would like to remove items A and B from the consent agenda. A and B? Yes. Okay, which pretty much takes out the consent agenda. So we can move those marked to, we'll call those 7A and B. Okay? So that takes item number two, and we'll move to item number three, which is a public hearing of necessity for Bloomfield Village Special Assessment District, SAD number 430, green section, presented by our Deputy Assessor, Jennifer Werthmann.

  21. the project won't move forward. And so, you know, we will ensure moving forward that we continue to follow all the steps. Everything is on the website so everyone should be made aware of any time that any of these items will be before the Planning Commission or this board or another board. Okay, thanks, Tony. All right. Okay, so we've closed public comment and so I won't answer any questions but it'll be an open and fair process and that's all we've allowed the developer is an open and fair process to go through our Planning Board. board and through our Zoning Board of Appeals. And there's been no pre-judgment, there's no pre-decision made here. We'll have to see how it goes through the system. Okay, thank you. So item number two, consider a consent agenda. I'll look for a motion to approve the consent agenda. Any changes? I would like to remove items A and B from the consent agenda. A and B? Yes. Okay, which pretty much takes out the consent agenda. So we can move those marked to, we'll call those 7A and B. Okay? So that takes item number two, and we'll move to item number three, which is a public hearing of necessity for Bloomfield Village Special Assessment District, SAD number 430, green section, presented by our Deputy Assessor, Jennifer Werthmann. Welcome, Jennifer. Thank you. Okay, so tonight we are here for our public hearing of necessity on the Bloomfield Village Phase 5, also known as the Green Phase Road SAD program. Here we're going to review a map. It kind of shows how the Green District straddles the different areas that we've already completed the paving on. This is the largest project of the five. Phase 5. includes part of Judson-Bradway-Bloomfield Village, part of Judson-Bradway-Bloomfield Village number 1, 2, 4, and 7. We're looking at 3.02 miles of public road, which includes South Bradway Boulevard, Covington Place, Overhill Road, Morningview Terrace, Sunnydale Road, North Glengarry Road, Ensley Drive, Amberley Road, Hupp Cross Road, Tuckahoe Road, Drury Lane, and North Cranbrook Cross. The project consists of pulverizing the existing road

  22. District, SAD number 430, green section, presented by our Deputy Assessor, Jennifer Werthmann. Welcome, Jennifer. Thank you. Okay, so tonight we are here for our public hearing of necessity on the Bloomfield Village Phase 5, also known as the Green Phase Road SAD program. Here we're going to review a map. It kind of shows how the Green District straddles the different areas that we've already completed the paving on. This is the largest project of the five. Phase 5. includes part of Judson-Bradway-Bloomfield Village, part of Judson-Bradway-Bloomfield Village number 1, 2, 4, and 7. We're looking at 3.02 miles of public road, which includes South Bradway Boulevard, Covington Place, Overhill Road, Morningview Terrace, Sunnydale Road, North Glengarry Road, Ensley Drive, Amberley Road, Hupp Cross Road, Tuckahoe Road, Drury Lane, and North Cranbrook Cross. The project consists of pulverizing the existing road and four inches of asphalt pavement will be placed over aggregate base with full-depth cold milling asphalt removal. Total curb and gutter removal and replacement, total under-drain installation with sodded shoulders and minor drainage improvements to reasonably assure drainage of the pavement surface. There will be a maximum five-foot approach constructed to each existing driveway to provide a smooth transition from the newly paved road where necessary. I've included a few pictures of the current roads in Phase 5. And then there's a few pictures of the newly paved sections as well. The petition has been confirmed by the Township Assessor. It was supported by 51.28% of the homeowners, which represents 52.77% of the road frontage within the project. Estimated project cost is $9,751,000. There are 199 parcels within this district, and there are 195 parcels with a full unit of benefit. That gives us a total assessment of $50,005.60 per full unit of benefit. The assessments can be financed over 15 years, and the interest is to be determined after

  23. The project consists of pulverizing the existing road and four inches of asphalt pavement will be placed over aggregate base with full-depth cold milling asphalt removal. Total curb and gutter removal and replacement, total under-drain installation with sodded shoulders and minor drainage improvements to reasonably assure drainage of the pavement surface. There will be a maximum five-foot approach constructed to each existing driveway to provide a smooth transition from the newly paved road where necessary. I've included a few pictures of the current roads in Phase 5. And then there's a few pictures of the newly paved sections as well. The petition has been confirmed by the Township Assessor. It was supported by 51.28% of the homeowners, which represents 52.77% of the road frontage within the project. Estimated project cost is $9,751,000. There are 199 parcels within this district, and there are 195 parcels with a full unit of benefit. That gives us a total assessment of $50,005.60 per full unit of benefit. The assessments can be financed over 15 years, and the interest is to be determined after bonds are sold, and that would be at 1% over our bond rate. Tonight we're asking that you approve resolution number two and schedule the public hearing for final assessment for April 27th of 2026. We're also asking that you approve our agreement with the Road Commission of Oakland County, which allows them to finalize the plans and bid the project. Any questions? Any questions for Jennifer? If not, I'll open up for public hearing. Okay, so we'll move to public hearing, and if you're here to comment on the SAD, the green section, you can come up to the microphone, and again, we'll give you three minutes, and if you would introduce your name and address, we'd appreciate it. Thank you. Good evening. I'm Greg DiCenzo, and my wife Joy DiCenzo, address 2636 Covington Place. We've been to a number of the meetings, and I think the young lady forgot to mention that apparently there's gold sprinkled throughout the road because the cost is outrageous. The cost is outrageous. The number of... ...of... ...of...

  24. The assessments can be financed over 15 years, and the interest is to be determined after bonds are sold, and that would be at 1% over our bond rate. Tonight we're asking that you approve resolution number two and schedule the public hearing for final assessment for April 27th of 2026. We're also asking that you approve our agreement with the Road Commission of Oakland County, which allows them to finalize the plans and bid the project. Any questions? Any questions for Jennifer? If not, I'll open up for public hearing. Okay, so we'll move to public hearing, and if you're here to comment on the SAD, the green section, you can come up to the microphone, and again, we'll give you three minutes, and if you would introduce your name and address, we'd appreciate it. Thank you. Good evening. I'm Greg DiCenzo, and my wife Joy DiCenzo, address 2636 Covington Place. We've been to a number of the meetings, and I think the young lady forgot to mention that apparently there's gold sprinkled throughout the road because the cost is outrageous. The cost is outrageous. The number of... ...of... ...of... The reasons we want, number two, a proposal to not go through is it's just too expensive. Sometimes you've got to just say no when it gets that expensive, and it's too expensive. If you put a blacktop cover over it, that might do just fine. It might get another 10 years of use, just like we've got 30 years on this last one. But we also, so besides too expensive, the voting process itself, I use voting very loosely because it was intended to get a result, not really to get what the people wanted. The vote was defeated, the roads were defeated about seven or ten years ago when it was done a fairly process of including all the homeowners. Because it didn't go through the second time they're doing it, they wanted to divide and conquer and have these six different groups where they could approve one at a time. And the voting process doesn't, I think it's still open. They didn't have a closing date on a voting process. Did you ever hear of such an election that didn't have a closing date?

  25. The reasons we want, number two, a proposal to not go through is it's just too expensive. Sometimes you've got to just say no when it gets that expensive, and it's too expensive. If you put a blacktop cover over it, that might do just fine. It might get another 10 years of use, just like we've got 30 years on this last one. But we also, so besides too expensive, the voting process itself, I use voting very loosely because it was intended to get a result, not really to get what the people wanted. The vote was defeated, the roads were defeated about seven or ten years ago when it was done a fairly process of including all the homeowners. Because it didn't go through the second time they're doing it, they wanted to divide and conquer and have these six different groups where they could approve one at a time. And the voting process doesn't, I think it's still open. They didn't have a closing date on a voting process. Did you ever hear of such an election that didn't have a closing date? I know we're hearing in the national elections or, you know, two months before and, but this isn't supposed to be like that. So, and you could only vote yes, you couldn't vote no. I know. I know. You So it was very confusing, especially to the elderly homeowners, which are a lot of in our district. And we heard that there were multiple visits from the people getting signatures. And we also know, I didn't hear that there's any voter ID. It's supposed to be the illegal homeowner. And I've never heard one that said, show me your deed or show me your proof that you live there. Could be a renter, could be owned by a trustee and the family is at the house. So voter ID was not used. And I think that you could agree with that. So the voting process was flawed. There's 30 seconds remaining. The, the, the, I think that the, the, the whole project would go through if you maybe split the cost,

  26. Did you ever hear of such an election that didn't have a closing date? I know we're hearing in the national elections or, you know, two months before and, but this isn't supposed to be like that. So, and you could only vote yes, you couldn't vote no. I know. I know. You So it was very confusing, especially to the elderly homeowners, which are a lot of in our district. And we heard that there were multiple visits from the people getting signatures. And we also know, I didn't hear that there's any voter ID. It's supposed to be the illegal homeowner. And I've never heard one that said, show me your deed or show me your proof that you live there. Could be a renter, could be owned by a trustee and the family is at the house. So voter ID was not used. And I think that you could agree with that. So the voting process was flawed. There's 30 seconds remaining. The, the, the, I think that the, the, the whole project would go through if you maybe split the cost, 50-50 with the township and 50-50 with the, with the village or 30, 30, 30, 30, 30 piece with the county and the township and the village. There are a lot of ways to make this happen, but otherwise it's just too much. And, and the, and the benefit does not, the benefit does not outweigh the, the burden of that cost. You won't get it back when you sell your. in three minutes is that I think that's all I I think if it were to go through I I would like that the you to consider the splitting of the cost with the with the township and the county and the village okay thank you for your time okay hi hello my name is Casey Christensen I'm at 2517 Bradway Boulevard I'd like to start off by saying I've been in this process way longer than I wanted to since 2022 when it kind of started getting rolling we had a large group of individuals that were big no on the roads we went

  27. The, the, the, I think that the, the, the whole project would go through if you maybe split the cost, 50-50 with the township and 50-50 with the, with the village or 30, 30, 30, 30, 30 piece with the county and the township and the village. There are a lot of ways to make this happen, but otherwise it's just too much. And, and the, and the benefit does not, the benefit does not outweigh the, the burden of that cost. You won't get it back when you sell your. in three minutes is that I think that's all I I think if it were to go through I I would like that the you to consider the splitting of the cost with the with the township and the county and the village okay thank you for your time okay hi hello my name is Casey Christensen I'm at 2517 Bradway Boulevard I'd like to start off by saying I've been in this process way longer than I wanted to since 2022 when it kind of started getting rolling we had a large group of individuals that were big no on the roads we went through hiring attorneys we FOIA'd all the documents we've proven that there's miscalculated signatures in the SAD in the rules it says that there has to be a if a wife and a husband live at the same address they have to vote we prove that by mass percentages across blue pink gold yellow and you know it just continues to move on without any investigation work we brought stacks of files here and said just pause it give us you know just take a look at it I mean it's just it's beyond me why that wasn't taken in consideration the cost and bidding history so back in 2004 between 2004 2013 the cost was around 18K per lot. In 2022, there was no inflation between 2004 to 2013, just as a heads up, and that's listed on the website. In 2022, now we're being charged the $50,000 to $60,000 per home. That's a 300% increase. If you go historically based off of inflation rates, we should be a max of $32,000 per home. And interesting enough, when you look on the township website, it talks about road work and what the budget should be, and it takes into consideration the parcel size, the amount of lots, so on and so forth. It actually states on your

  28. started getting rolling we had a large group of individuals that were big no on the roads we went through hiring attorneys we FOIA'd all the documents we've proven that there's miscalculated signatures in the SAD in the rules it says that there has to be a if a wife and a husband live at the same address they have to vote we prove that by mass percentages across blue pink gold yellow and you know it just continues to move on without any investigation work we brought stacks of files here and said just pause it give us you know just take a look at it I mean it's just it's beyond me why that wasn't taken in consideration the cost and bidding history so back in 2004 between 2004 2013 the cost was around 18K per lot. In 2022, there was no inflation between 2004 to 2013, just as a heads up, and that's listed on the website. In 2022, now we're being charged the $50,000 to $60,000 per home. That's a 300% increase. If you go historically based off of inflation rates, we should be a max of $32,000 per home. And interesting enough, when you look on the township website, it talks about road work and what the budget should be, and it takes into consideration the parcel size, the amount of lots, so on and so forth. It actually states on your website $11,000 to $35,000 per home based off of what the township is saying we should account for. So one, that's vastly different. Some other very interesting facts that I found around the SADs from 2022 to 2024. The threshold was 51% you had to pass by. It moved in 2024 to 50%. The extended window from voting went from 3% to 6%. The amount that the admin fee that the township could take was 0.5% in 2022 to 1.5% in 2024. So you took enough time to look at how much money you could get out of the process and to increase the amount of voting because every section took over six months and that was a big issue, where 10 years ago, or a little bit longer than that, it was a yes-no vote. Very plain and simple. So why did it change? Why was there no kind of checks and balances on it? it and i mean i could go on there's a list that i won't be able to get through in this this amount of time but the other last thing is we were told that it was going to be taken down 18 inches because they were going to completely rip everything up and now we're i'm seeing on like actual documented proof that it's four inches where four inches shouldn't cost the amount of 18

  29. consideration the parcel size, the amount of lots, so on and so forth. It actually states on your website $11,000 to $35,000 per home based off of what the township is saying we should account for. So one, that's vastly different. Some other very interesting facts that I found around the SADs from 2022 to 2024. The threshold was 51% you had to pass by. It moved in 2024 to 50%. The extended window from voting went from 3% to 6%. The amount that the admin fee that the township could take was 0.5% in 2022 to 1.5% in 2024. So you took enough time to look at how much money you could get out of the process and to increase the amount of voting because every section took over six months and that was a big issue, where 10 years ago, or a little bit longer than that, it was a yes-no vote. Very plain and simple. So why did it change? Why was there no kind of checks and balances on it? it and i mean i could go on there's a list that i won't be able to get through in this this amount of time but the other last thing is we were told that it was going to be taken down 18 inches because they were going to completely rip everything up and now we're i'm seeing on like actual documented proof that it's four inches where four inches shouldn't cost the amount of 18 inches right so it's like fifty thousand dollars your own website says it should be between eleven thousand and thirty five thousand and a lot of this doesn't make sense and the last thing i'll add with is you have a road advisory committee board to do better none of this is going to make any difference if you don't stop at what we're doing right now and actually evaluate what we're telling you because the process has been skewed from the very beginning to now so thanks for your time hello i'm sonja lenik i'm a resident of the green section i live at 2645 covington place and i'm in favor of redoing the roads i was one of the volunteers who helped collect the signatures on the petition and there's no question that the roads need to be done no one is saying the roads don't need any improvements no one is saying that and no one has come up with any alternative to this process that we have here in fact i don't think there's any way to do this without going through the special assessment district process um and over the years there have been many groups looking at the roads you know periodically every few years someone looks at it and they all come to the same conclusion that we need a complete redo of the roads to make them up to the standard

  30. like actual documented proof that it's four inches where four inches shouldn't cost the amount of 18 inches right so it's like fifty thousand dollars your own website says it should be between eleven thousand and thirty five thousand and a lot of this doesn't make sense and the last thing i'll add with is you have a road advisory committee board to do better none of this is going to make any difference if you don't stop at what we're doing right now and actually evaluate what we're telling you because the process has been skewed from the very beginning to now so thanks for your time hello i'm sonja lenik i'm a resident of the green section i live at 2645 covington place and i'm in favor of redoing the roads i was one of the volunteers who helped collect the signatures on the petition and there's no question that the roads need to be done no one is saying the roads don't need any improvements no one is saying that and no one has come up with any alternative to this process that we have here in fact i don't think there's any way to do this without going through the special assessment district process um and over the years there have been many groups looking at the roads you know periodically every few years someone looks at it and they all come to the same conclusion that we need a complete redo of the roads to make them up to the standard of the Oakland County Road Commission I don't think anyone is questioning that the thing that I keep hearing is it costs so much it costs so much and and I agree and I love my neighbor Greg's idea of the township or the county kicking in more money that would be great I don't think that's realistic but I've lived in the village since 2004 and and one thing I heard when we moved in was the taxes are so much cheaper here than in Birmingham and I was told by a realtor there were 40% cheaper I didn't look into that but they are significantly less but we still benefit from fire we have Bloomfield Township Fire Department we have our own volunteer fire department we have Bloomfield Township Police we have the village police we have our roads cleared but the one thing that that is not paid for because our taxes are lower at least partially is the roads and we have to pay for that ourselves we haven't collected money to do that in the village I don't know if there's a way to do that they might look at that in the future but right now we're stuck with paying the whole bill and it is astronomical it's it's ridiculous but it's been consistent every single section where we're the fifth and last section the bids have been a public bidding process that's available on bid Express everyone can look at it and the bits have been

  31. of the Oakland County Road Commission I don't think anyone is questioning that the thing that I keep hearing is it costs so much it costs so much and and I agree and I love my neighbor Greg's idea of the township or the county kicking in more money that would be great I don't think that's realistic but I've lived in the village since 2004 and and one thing I heard when we moved in was the taxes are so much cheaper here than in Birmingham and I was told by a realtor there were 40% cheaper I didn't look into that but they are significantly less but we still benefit from fire we have Bloomfield Township Fire Department we have our own volunteer fire department we have Bloomfield Township Police we have the village police we have our roads cleared but the one thing that that is not paid for because our taxes are lower at least partially is the roads and we have to pay for that ourselves we haven't collected money to do that in the village I don't know if there's a way to do that they might look at that in the future but right now we're stuck with paying the whole bill and it is astronomical it's it's ridiculous but it's been consistent every single section where we're the fifth and last section the bids have been a public bidding process that's available on bid Express everyone can look at it and the bits have been approximately consistent I mean there's a little bit variation section to section but there's no way anyone would say the bidding process is rigged if we're gonna do the roads the right way the way that they are being done in the special assessment district proposal that Jennifer talked about, it's gonna cost a lot of money. And I don't wanna pay it, but I've been paying less in taxes, at least $5,000 less every year for 22 years. That's over $100,000. That's more than the $50,000 we're being asked to pay right now. If there's not another solution in my book, the roads need to be done. There's gravel flying up. I have to clean up gravel every fall before the snow plows come in and they spray it onto the yard and it's impossible to get it out of your yard. So every fall, I sweep up all the gravel that's in the street from the disintegrating roads. And in front of our house, it's particularly bad. I know not every single section is that bad, but on our road and the next road over, it's particularly bad. There's no question this needs to be done and I'm fully in support of it. Thank you, Sonia. My name is Steven Burke. I live at 3340 Bradway Boulevard.

  32. available on bid Express everyone can look at it and the bits have been approximately consistent I mean there's a little bit variation section to section but there's no way anyone would say the bidding process is rigged if we're gonna do the roads the right way the way that they are being done in the special assessment district proposal that Jennifer talked about, it's gonna cost a lot of money. And I don't wanna pay it, but I've been paying less in taxes, at least $5,000 less every year for 22 years. That's over $100,000. That's more than the $50,000 we're being asked to pay right now. If there's not another solution in my book, the roads need to be done. There's gravel flying up. I have to clean up gravel every fall before the snow plows come in and they spray it onto the yard and it's impossible to get it out of your yard. So every fall, I sweep up all the gravel that's in the street from the disintegrating roads. And in front of our house, it's particularly bad. I know not every single section is that bad, but on our road and the next road over, it's particularly bad. There's no question this needs to be done and I'm fully in support of it. Thank you, Sonia. My name is Steven Burke. I live at 3340 Bradway Boulevard. I was the president of the Bloomfield Village Association in 1992 and 93. At that time, a major issue was the roads. When are we going to repair the roads? This is 92 and 93. This is a long time ago. I'm just shocked that this is still coming before the board. And yes, the cost has gone up a lot. And yes, we have found a way where instead of paying... And for like 60% increase. If we're pretty much, then we've got thousands actually just And it can be done a trabalho for small things. being required to pay off if you simply sold your home at a certain point as you all know I'm sure, you'd have to pay off that bill. Now it could be paid over time and the new owner can carry that cost going forward. Person can pay it up front or they can pay it over time or the new owner would carry it with them. And that was a big deal over time and we made that change and I think it was a very sensible change and people are pleased about that. Bloomfield Village is a very prestigious and esteemed area. I am very proud to live in that neighborhood. Very proud the way the homes look. I've been fortunate, I've done pretty well, I can live in Bloomfield Village.

  33. I was the president of the Bloomfield Village Association in 1992 and 93. At that time, a major issue was the roads. When are we going to repair the roads? This is 92 and 93. This is a long time ago. I'm just shocked that this is still coming before the board. And yes, the cost has gone up a lot. And yes, we have found a way where instead of paying... And for like 60% increase. If we're pretty much, then we've got thousands actually just And it can be done a trabalho for small things. being required to pay off if you simply sold your home at a certain point as you all know I'm sure, you'd have to pay off that bill. Now it could be paid over time and the new owner can carry that cost going forward. Person can pay it up front or they can pay it over time or the new owner would carry it with them. And that was a big deal over time and we made that change and I think it was a very sensible change and people are pleased about that. Bloomfield Village is a very prestigious and esteemed area. I am very proud to live in that neighborhood. Very proud the way the homes look. I've been fortunate, I've done pretty well, I can live in Bloomfield Village. I have a sister that has not done so well and she has a large family and she has a more modest income and a more modest home. She drives into our neighborhood and drives down Bradway Boulevard and she's just shot. I mean the car is rattling. Try to ride your bicycle down Bradway Boulevard. It's downright dangerous. Stephen, talk to us. Talk to us, Stephen. We're your audience. Pardon? Talk to us please. We're your audience. Okay. Sorry. Drive your bike. Try to drive a bicycle down Bradway Boulevard. It's dangerous. And it's just an embarrassment. And I'm sorry, some people say. if well if we fix the roads I mean I would be embarrassed to buy a home on Bradway Boulevard at this point I'm not sure I would buy a home on Bradway Boulevard at this point I have to believe that if we fix the roads that you can't be assured but I absolutely believe it would increase the value of our home and I do believe it has a very negative influence on the value of the homes in that whole green section it's been 92 93 and we were talking about it

  34. I've been fortunate, I've done pretty well, I can live in Bloomfield Village. I have a sister that has not done so well and she has a large family and she has a more modest income and a more modest home. She drives into our neighborhood and drives down Bradway Boulevard and she's just shot. I mean the car is rattling. Try to ride your bicycle down Bradway Boulevard. It's downright dangerous. Stephen, talk to us. Talk to us, Stephen. We're your audience. Pardon? Talk to us please. We're your audience. Okay. Sorry. Drive your bike. Try to drive a bicycle down Bradway Boulevard. It's dangerous. And it's just an embarrassment. And I'm sorry, some people say. if well if we fix the roads I mean I would be embarrassed to buy a home on Bradway Boulevard at this point I'm not sure I would buy a home on Bradway Boulevard at this point I have to believe that if we fix the roads that you can't be assured but I absolutely believe it would increase the value of our home and I do believe it has a very negative influence on the value of the homes in that whole green section it's been 92 93 and we were talking about it then it's been a long time and the costs have gone up and it is expensive but we live in a wonderful beautiful community there's a cost to it thank you for your time good evening board my name is Patrick McCarthy I reside at 2532 Covington place in Bloomfield Hills our family really enjoys living at our residence and we yes we think fondly of this community and thank you all for serving as you do to help our community I would submit sometimes two things can be true it sounds like those in favor of the roads feel that the price is ridiculous and I also you feel the sentiment that there's a pushback from our community that yes, the cost, the cost, the cost. So two things can be true. Again, my wife and I, we love this community, but I would ask this board, and hopefully I've been to a previous meeting too, it sounds like it

  35. homes in that whole green section it's been 92 93 and we were talking about it then it's been a long time and the costs have gone up and it is expensive but we live in a wonderful beautiful community there's a cost to it thank you for your time good evening board my name is Patrick McCarthy I reside at 2532 Covington place in Bloomfield Hills our family really enjoys living at our residence and we yes we think fondly of this community and thank you all for serving as you do to help our community I would submit sometimes two things can be true it sounds like those in favor of the roads feel that the price is ridiculous and I also you feel the sentiment that there's a pushback from our community that yes, the cost, the cost, the cost. So two things can be true. Again, my wife and I, we love this community, but I would ask this board, and hopefully I've been to a previous meeting too, it sounds like it just passed through. I would implore you to dive deeper. I think Mr. DiCenzo and other residents of our community are thoughtful, caring people. And is there a way for this to go through that would meet the approval of all sides? I believe Ms. Weisenbord works hard on behalf of this village, yes. Sometimes we would like more answers, more information. I asked, what are other, I understand we're not a city, so we have to absorb some more costs. But is there a creative way to figure out how we can work through this? I don't think our residents want the Taj Mahal of roads. Maybe they want it fixed, but there is a breaking point too for our residents in our community. Yeah, I would like to see new roads too, but is it going to make sense? Is it going to be livable? Is it a workable solution? So the concerns that have been raised today, I think, are valid concerns that hopefully this board can dive deep into and find out how we could work through this to get to the end?

  36. ask this board, and hopefully I've been to a previous meeting too, it sounds like it just passed through. I would implore you to dive deeper. I think Mr. DiCenzo and other residents of our community are thoughtful, caring people. And is there a way for this to go through that would meet the approval of all sides? I believe Ms. Weisenbord works hard on behalf of this village, yes. Sometimes we would like more answers, more information. I asked, what are other, I understand we're not a city, so we have to absorb some more costs. But is there a creative way to figure out how we can work through this? I don't think our residents want the Taj Mahal of roads. Maybe they want it fixed, but there is a breaking point too for our residents in our community. Yeah, I would like to see new roads too, but is it going to make sense? Is it going to be livable? Is it a workable solution? So the concerns that have been raised today, I think, are valid concerns that hopefully this board can dive deep into and find out how we could work through this to get to the end? result. It is interesting to note that, for instance, Beverly Hills, I don't know the answer of, you know, what are they, I've seen roads being fixed in my former residents community there. Are they paying $50,000? I tried to get a firm answer on that, I couldn't. I know it's not, you want to compare apples to apples, but what is the consensus among other villages and how do we work through that? It is interesting that the county or one of the road commissions came up with $500,000. That's great. That helps us, you know, pitch in and absorb some of that cost, make it more workable for all. That's what I would like to see, a solution that will be workable, maybe not for 100% of our community, but to just graze by with 50% and there's questions about that 50%, I don't think that sits well with me or quite frankly many others in our neighborhood that are caring, thoughtful people that want our village to thrive. So it's not like we're saying no outright, but please help us get to the right answer, given our concerns. Thank you. And I am filing or I'd like to preserve my right to any tax protest that may be associated with this if this goes through. Thank you, Patrick. Hi, my name is Wendy Schwartz. I live at 2580 Bradway Boulevard in the village.

  37. result. It is interesting to note that, for instance, Beverly Hills, I don't know the answer of, you know, what are they, I've seen roads being fixed in my former residents community there. Are they paying $50,000? I tried to get a firm answer on that, I couldn't. I know it's not, you want to compare apples to apples, but what is the consensus among other villages and how do we work through that? It is interesting that the county or one of the road commissions came up with $500,000. That's great. That helps us, you know, pitch in and absorb some of that cost, make it more workable for all. That's what I would like to see, a solution that will be workable, maybe not for 100% of our community, but to just graze by with 50% and there's questions about that 50%, I don't think that sits well with me or quite frankly many others in our neighborhood that are caring, thoughtful people that want our village to thrive. So it's not like we're saying no outright, but please help us get to the right answer, given our concerns. Thank you. And I am filing or I'd like to preserve my right to any tax protest that may be associated with this if this goes through. Thank you, Patrick. Hi, my name is Wendy Schwartz. I live at 2580 Bradway Boulevard in the village. I just have a few comments. like to make first of all i have some opposition to how the vote was held and how it was processed because we were told that initially the vote in the green section failed to win approval we were away off and on all summer but we got several letters saying that the vote had failed and then we got several letters from the the village association or members of the village association they weren't harassing letters but they were telling us that we should have voted yes and all the issues with the roads if we don't vote yes and that will be the only section with bad roads and there were a couple of those letters and then we got we were canvassed we had people knocking on our doors asking us questioning our vote why didn't we vote yes um so i have some real questions with the vote and then all of the sudden miraculously the vote we got a letter saying that the the

  38. Thank you, Patrick. Hi, my name is Wendy Schwartz. I live at 2580 Bradway Boulevard in the village. I just have a few comments. like to make first of all i have some opposition to how the vote was held and how it was processed because we were told that initially the vote in the green section failed to win approval we were away off and on all summer but we got several letters saying that the vote had failed and then we got several letters from the the village association or members of the village association they weren't harassing letters but they were telling us that we should have voted yes and all the issues with the roads if we don't vote yes and that will be the only section with bad roads and there were a couple of those letters and then we got we were canvassed we had people knocking on our doors asking us questioning our vote why didn't we vote yes um so i have some real questions with the vote and then all of the sudden miraculously the vote we got a letter saying that the the green section did go through i have i have a problem with the fact that there was no time limit on the voting process and i think that should be addressed um i also still have a problem i spoke once before when you were assessing a different section we have a big problem with the drains in front of our house we got a flood every single time there's a big rain oakland county never comes out we have to call them several times my husband you us to put on knee-high rubber boots and go out and clear the drains. We've had no assurance that before we spent $50,000 to repave this road, that somebody's going to look at the drainage. And I've been told that the drainage in the village is old. And I don't have any great confidence that we're going to spend all this money and that the drains aren't going to have big problems down the road. And finally, I'd like to know if the space in front of the village parks and where Kroger is, if the village is going to chip in and pay for that. We have more parks areas on Bradway and we have that whole section where the shopping center sides on Bradway.

  39. the vote and then all of the sudden miraculously the vote we got a letter saying that the the green section did go through i have i have a problem with the fact that there was no time limit on the voting process and i think that should be addressed um i also still have a problem i spoke once before when you were assessing a different section we have a big problem with the drains in front of our house we got a flood every single time there's a big rain oakland county never comes out we have to call them several times my husband you us to put on knee-high rubber boots and go out and clear the drains. We've had no assurance that before we spent $50,000 to repave this road, that somebody's going to look at the drainage. And I've been told that the drainage in the village is old. And I don't have any great confidence that we're going to spend all this money and that the drains aren't going to have big problems down the road. And finally, I'd like to know if the space in front of the village parks and where Kroger is, if the village is going to chip in and pay for that. We have more parks areas on Bradway and we have that whole section where the shopping center sides on Bradway. I want to know if there's going to be any participation from anybody else, the village, the Kroger, the people who own that shopping center. And also, I don't believe that this will increase the value of our house. I think it's going to make it harder to sell our houses because property values and housing values are high. People can't afford to move into the village and now they're going to be assessed with this huge assessment. So I'm still a no on this and I have a lot of issues with it. Thank you for your time. Thank you Wendy. Hi there, my name is Amy Charters, I live at three. 85 bradway boulevard in the green section i'm currently on the bloomfield village board of trustees when i joined the board two years ago i joined in large part because i was very concerned about this process the roads process in general i had a lot of questions i'd heard a lot of rumors and accusations and i wanted to get an inside look probably much as some of you like to know what's going on in your community same for me um throughout the past

  40. we have that whole section where the shopping center sides on Bradway. I want to know if there's going to be any participation from anybody else, the village, the Kroger, the people who own that shopping center. And also, I don't believe that this will increase the value of our house. I think it's going to make it harder to sell our houses because property values and housing values are high. People can't afford to move into the village and now they're going to be assessed with this huge assessment. So I'm still a no on this and I have a lot of issues with it. Thank you for your time. Thank you Wendy. Hi there, my name is Amy Charters, I live at three. 85 bradway boulevard in the green section i'm currently on the bloomfield village board of trustees when i joined the board two years ago i joined in large part because i was very concerned about this process the roads process in general i had a lot of questions i'd heard a lot of rumors and accusations and i wanted to get an inside look probably much as some of you like to know what's going on in your community same for me um throughout the past couple years i've asked a lot of questions as the board can attest um i've attended small group meetings which were held to answer a lot of the questions about the sad process particularly who owns the roads who takes care of the roads all that stuff that i don't think people really understand um when they move into a township we i know i didn't um and i learned as much as i could about this project i'm very glad i took the time to truly understand how the special assessment works while i still feel that the overall sad process leaves a lot to be desired especially as construction costs consist consistently increase i strongly feel that the bloomfield village sad has been conducted by the book our manager kathy has followed the guidelines for the sad meticulously as some of you know if you if you look on the township website there is no deadline for the petition process all the volunteers that canvas that went out and talked to people that answered questions were given factual information that came directly from the township and from the

  41. some of you like to know what's going on in your community same for me um throughout the past couple years i've asked a lot of questions as the board can attest um i've attended small group meetings which were held to answer a lot of the questions about the sad process particularly who owns the roads who takes care of the roads all that stuff that i don't think people really understand um when they move into a township we i know i didn't um and i learned as much as i could about this project i'm very glad i took the time to truly understand how the special assessment works while i still feel that the overall sad process leaves a lot to be desired especially as construction costs consist consistently increase i strongly feel that the bloomfield village sad has been conducted by the book our manager kathy has followed the guidelines for the sad meticulously as some of you know if you if you look on the township website there is no deadline for the petition process all the volunteers that canvas that went out and talked to people that answered questions were given factual information that came directly from the township and from the Road Commission neighbors have been well informed these small group meetings a website emails letters we we knew what was going on throughout the petition process and signatures have been checked and double-checked getting to this point has been a long road no pun intended the green sections the last section of the village roads project and I hope that the Bloomfield Township Board of Trustees will approve the motion for this to proceed thank you tell me your name and address yeah Annie charters 3485 Bradway Boulevard thank you my name is Brian Kott K O T T I live at 138 Hup Cross Road I've been involved in this process for five years and we spent a I've been an officer of the the Bloomfield the Bloomfield village board we spent and oh and and and

  42. were given factual information that came directly from the township and from the Road Commission neighbors have been well informed these small group meetings a website emails letters we we knew what was going on throughout the petition process and signatures have been checked and double-checked getting to this point has been a long road no pun intended the green sections the last section of the village roads project and I hope that the Bloomfield Township Board of Trustees will approve the motion for this to proceed thank you tell me your name and address yeah Annie charters 3485 Bradway Boulevard thank you my name is Brian Kott K O T T I live at 138 Hup Cross Road I've been involved in this process for five years and we spent a I've been an officer of the the Bloomfield the Bloomfield village board we spent and oh and and and over a year working with the road commission, the township and all of the appropriate governmental agencies to determine the best way to do this and the only way to do this. And we have followed those procedures. We have agreed that the cost is higher than we'd like. But if you look at the increase in road construction costs since 2013, we would come out right at these numbers. And as to the question of whether the numbers are accurate or not, we have four sections that have been completed that have been done with numbers that are consistent with the current costs. The residents of the village have complied with the statutory requirements. They've complied with the administrative requirements. Your administrators have validated the signatures. We've met the requirements. And this process should be continued and should be approved by this board simply because we've

  43. over a year working with the road commission, the township and all of the appropriate governmental agencies to determine the best way to do this and the only way to do this. And we have followed those procedures. We have agreed that the cost is higher than we'd like. But if you look at the increase in road construction costs since 2013, we would come out right at these numbers. And as to the question of whether the numbers are accurate or not, we have four sections that have been completed that have been done with numbers that are consistent with the current costs. The residents of the village have complied with the statutory requirements. They've complied with the administrative requirements. Your administrators have validated the signatures. We've met the requirements. And this process should be continued and should be approved by this board simply because we've done what we had to do. Thank you. Thank you, Brian. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. I, too, my name is Patrick Bielman, 2655 Amberley. Thank you for your service. I, too, have been on the village board at one point. All the points today are valid. There is no doubt that the roads, I think somebody's term was an embarrassment. The roads are not good. There is no question. I don't build homes. I don't build roads. I build cars. What I don't understand is we're tearing up a road to put four inches of asphalt down, along with the ag grid and everything the young lady here said. Somebody in the township and the Oakland County Road Commission knows exactly when the sewers were replaced last in the village.

  44. And this process should be continued and should be approved by this board simply because we've done what we had to do. Thank you. Thank you, Brian. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. I, too, my name is Patrick Bielman, 2655 Amberley. Thank you for your service. I, too, have been on the village board at one point. All the points today are valid. There is no doubt that the roads, I think somebody's term was an embarrassment. The roads are not good. There is no question. I don't build homes. I don't build roads. I build cars. What I don't understand is we're tearing up a road to put four inches of asphalt down, along with the ag grid and everything the young lady here said. Somebody in the township and the Oakland County Road Commission knows exactly when the sewers were replaced last in the village. I do not. I've asked that question. I cannot get an answer to that. At some point, those sewers need to be replaced. My question is a very pragmatic question. When was the last time the sewers were replaced? What is the expected lifetime of a sewer? And where does that put us? I don't know how to get that answer. I've asked that question. I would like an answer on that. I think that's a very important point the board needs to look at. Are we simply spending money of the taxpayers, my money, that we're going to re-spend in a short period of time? That is all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you, Patrick. Good evening. I'm Kathy Weisenborn. I'm the manager in Bloomfield Village, 3595 Bradway Boulevard. I am speaking in support of moving forward with the green section roads this evening.

  45. Somebody in the township and the Oakland County Road Commission knows exactly when the sewers were replaced last in the village. I do not. I've asked that question. I cannot get an answer to that. At some point, those sewers need to be replaced. My question is a very pragmatic question. When was the last time the sewers were replaced? What is the expected lifetime of a sewer? And where does that put us? I don't know how to get that answer. I've asked that question. I would like an answer on that. I think that's a very important point the board needs to look at. Are we simply spending money of the taxpayers, my money, that we're going to re-spend in a short period of time? That is all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you, Patrick. Good evening. I'm Kathy Weisenborn. I'm the manager in Bloomfield Village, 3595 Bradway Boulevard. I am speaking in support of moving forward with the green section roads this evening. This is the fifth and final section of our neighborhood. The last four sections are fabulous. The roads are beautiful. The construction process was well conducted, and I can't wait to get this fifth and final section done. The majority of the residents in the green section voted, signed the petition in support of this. Your staff have checked the signatures and validated them. Where there was a married couple living in a house, we obtained both signatures of both spouses, or we did not count the signature. There are situations where there's a single signature on a house. You know, that's the nice. Thank you. Some of those are situations where there's a single person, a divorced person, a widow, widower, or there's a trust, and a sole person can sign for the trust. We checked all that, and that's all validated by your staff. We spent a lot of time informing our residents. Annie mentioned the 25 small group meetings we had. We also had a separate website. We've held multiple forums at the board, our annual meetings.

  46. I am speaking in support of moving forward with the green section roads this evening. This is the fifth and final section of our neighborhood. The last four sections are fabulous. The roads are beautiful. The construction process was well conducted, and I can't wait to get this fifth and final section done. The majority of the residents in the green section voted, signed the petition in support of this. Your staff have checked the signatures and validated them. Where there was a married couple living in a house, we obtained both signatures of both spouses, or we did not count the signature. There are situations where there's a single signature on a house. You know, that's the nice. Thank you. Some of those are situations where there's a single person, a divorced person, a widow, widower, or there's a trust, and a sole person can sign for the trust. We checked all that, and that's all validated by your staff. We spent a lot of time informing our residents. Annie mentioned the 25 small group meetings we had. We also had a separate website. We've held multiple forums at the board, our annual meetings. So people get their questions answered. And the whole point of that was to provide factual information so our residents could make informed decisions on this. I understand that people are opposed. The cost is expensive. I live in the village, too, and I'm paying it as well. But our roads are terrible, and this is the way we have to get it done. What I would request is that you listen to the majority of residents. Some of those speaking tonight had asked for a delay in the process. The reality is a delay in this process would serve to allow a vocal minority to veto the opinion of the majority who have asked to get their roads fixed and get them fixed this summer. Before I close, I do want to thank you, the trustees, and the township staff for their support of us, the village, as we've gone through this process. process to fix our roads. With your support of this SAD tonight in the green section, we're one step closer to beautiful, smooth new roads in the entire village. Thank you. Thank you, Kathy.

  47. So people get their questions answered. And the whole point of that was to provide factual information so our residents could make informed decisions on this. I understand that people are opposed. The cost is expensive. I live in the village, too, and I'm paying it as well. But our roads are terrible, and this is the way we have to get it done. What I would request is that you listen to the majority of residents. Some of those speaking tonight had asked for a delay in the process. The reality is a delay in this process would serve to allow a vocal minority to veto the opinion of the majority who have asked to get their roads fixed and get them fixed this summer. Before I close, I do want to thank you, the trustees, and the township staff for their support of us, the village, as we've gone through this process. process to fix our roads. With your support of this SAD tonight in the green section, we're one step closer to beautiful, smooth new roads in the entire village. Thank you. Thank you, Kathy. We still have public comment. Thanks. Clay Phillips, 247 North Williamsbury. I'm in the goals section, but I'd like to make a comment, if that's allowed. It'll be short. I've been thinking, having gone through the whole thing for our section, the prior section in green, is there one thing, if I could have waved a magic wand, that would have made the whole thing better? Less argumentative, less frustrating, less anger, less lack of trust that has built up in the village, in the community about this. And I recently came to this thought that if we had been presented with a good, better, best set of options, with pros and cons, with associated costs, I think that would have generated a different discussion, a different debate, and could have generated some different outcomes. What I think some of us feel is that it was one way, one recommendation, one dollar figure, that's it. And a slim, slim majority took it over the goal. With other comments that have been said here.

  48. We still have public comment. Thanks. Clay Phillips, 247 North Williamsbury. I'm in the goals section, but I'd like to make a comment, if that's allowed. It'll be short. I've been thinking, having gone through the whole thing for our section, the prior section in green, is there one thing, if I could have waved a magic wand, that would have made the whole thing better? Less argumentative, less frustrating, less anger, less lack of trust that has built up in the village, in the community about this. And I recently came to this thought that if we had been presented with a good, better, best set of options, with pros and cons, with associated costs, I think that would have generated a different discussion, a different debate, and could have generated some different outcomes. What I think some of us feel is that it was one way, one recommendation, one dollar figure, that's it. And a slim, slim majority took it over the goal. With other comments that have been said here. tonight about was the process fair, was it good? I'm not gonna say anything about that. But I just suggest going forward for other future SAD funded roads, if it would be possible for the road commission or whatever road commission is involved to be required to present the residents who are paying for this with a good, better, best set of options. And if they choose good and not best, so be it. Some of us don't need 40 year roads. Some of us might have been very comfortable with a 10 year road. And you do a 10 year road every 10 years, it might have been a lot cheaper. And you have resident turnover, you have different people, different opinions, different age groups, different demographics, decisions could change over time. So I'm trying to be constructive. Is there one thing that could have been done in the past? It doesn't matter because the past is the past. But thinking forward and thinking about future policy, thinking about this, this community, the state, and how do you bridge the gap between the roads? And the governor said she wanted to fix the damn roads. She didn't say she wanted to replace the damn roads. But like, is there a better way where residents could take a vote for their pocketbook and get the roads that they want or need,

  49. tonight about was the process fair, was it good? I'm not gonna say anything about that. But I just suggest going forward for other future SAD funded roads, if it would be possible for the road commission or whatever road commission is involved to be required to present the residents who are paying for this with a good, better, best set of options. And if they choose good and not best, so be it. Some of us don't need 40 year roads. Some of us might have been very comfortable with a 10 year road. And you do a 10 year road every 10 years, it might have been a lot cheaper. And you have resident turnover, you have different people, different opinions, different age groups, different demographics, decisions could change over time. So I'm trying to be constructive. Is there one thing that could have been done in the past? It doesn't matter because the past is the past. But thinking forward and thinking about future policy, thinking about this, this community, the state, and how do you bridge the gap between the roads? And the governor said she wanted to fix the damn roads. She didn't say she wanted to replace the damn roads. But like, is there a better way where residents could take a vote for their pocketbook and get the roads that they want or need, not the ones that are just said, here, this is it. You got to have best. Thank you for all your work. Thank you. Thank you, Clay. Good evening. My name is Brendan Robinson. I'm at 3335 Bradway Boulevard. I do not disagree that the roads need to be done. They are absolutely horrible in front of my home. And the saving grace to that is my young children are a little bit safer because the roads are so bad and people don't speed down the section of Bradway in front of my house. In five years of living at Bradway, I have not seen a single traffic stop on Bradway for speeding. That's a concern of mine. Not just for me, but for my neighbors and their young children. And I find that new and smoother roads would increase speeding, especially because Bradway is a through fare from Losser Road to Cranbrook. I find that very concerning. I also have thought about, should

  50. and get the roads that they want or need, not the ones that are just said, here, this is it. You got to have best. Thank you for all your work. Thank you. Thank you, Clay. Good evening. My name is Brendan Robinson. I'm at 3335 Bradway Boulevard. I do not disagree that the roads need to be done. They are absolutely horrible in front of my home. And the saving grace to that is my young children are a little bit safer because the roads are so bad and people don't speed down the section of Bradway in front of my house. In five years of living at Bradway, I have not seen a single traffic stop on Bradway for speeding. That's a concern of mine. Not just for me, but for my neighbors and their young children. And I find that new and smoother roads would increase speeding, especially because Bradway is a through fare from Losser Road to Cranbrook. I find that very concerning. I also have thought about, should this pass, what does it do to me 40 years from now? At $50,000 with this rate of inflation, what does that look like then? Half a million? I don't know. But that's not feasible for somebody in the neighborhood. Half a million dollars for a small chunk of road in front of there. home. I would propose that in other private neighborhoods with private roads, they have requirements for private road insurance riders. We do not have that requirement in the village and perhaps that would be something that we could look into. Another thing that I would propose should this pass is perhaps a way to increase the annual association dues with some of that money going into an investment device to help offset the costs in the future that would make it easier for everybody in the neighborhood. Again, I don't disagree that the roads do not

  51. from Losser Road to Cranbrook. I find that very concerning. I also have thought about, should this pass, what does it do to me 40 years from now? At $50,000 with this rate of inflation, what does that look like then? Half a million? I don't know. But that's not feasible for somebody in the neighborhood. Half a million dollars for a small chunk of road in front of there. home. I would propose that in other private neighborhoods with private roads, they have requirements for private road insurance riders. We do not have that requirement in the village and perhaps that would be something that we could look into. Another thing that I would propose should this pass is perhaps a way to increase the annual association dues with some of that money going into an investment device to help offset the costs in the future that would make it easier for everybody in the neighborhood. Again, I don't disagree that the roads do not need to be done. I am opposed to this current plan. Again, I did not feel that there was a transparency for this process. And also, I appreciate the neighbors canvassing and all that. But when one of the volunteers came to my home, I was entertaining. He walked into my backyard to ask me about it. And that was uncalled for. Come back another time. That's borderline harassment in my book. I thank you for your time, your efforts in the community. Have a good evening. Thank you. Hi. Good evening. Elizabeth Jenks, 2572 Covington Place. I agree with a lot of my neighbors with everything that's been said. But I think saying something different about how can we keep the cost down or adding to some of the discussion around that, I would implore us to explore those options. I like the idea of the three options, right, but we're a little late now. Probably for that. I don't know.

  52. it easier for everybody in the neighborhood. Again, I don't disagree that the roads do not need to be done. I am opposed to this current plan. Again, I did not feel that there was a transparency for this process. And also, I appreciate the neighbors canvassing and all that. But when one of the volunteers came to my home, I was entertaining. He walked into my backyard to ask me about it. And that was uncalled for. Come back another time. That's borderline harassment in my book. I thank you for your time, your efforts in the community. Have a good evening. Thank you. Hi. Good evening. Elizabeth Jenks, 2572 Covington Place. I agree with a lot of my neighbors with everything that's been said. But I think saying something different about how can we keep the cost down or adding to some of the discussion around that, I would implore us to explore those options. I like the idea of the three options, right, but we're a little late now. Probably for that. I don't know. But recently, state dollars have been allocated into road and road construction in our state. I think we should definitely tap into that and advocate for more dollars. I know some of that has been done, and we were given a few extra dollars. Not a few, but we were given some additional dollars to keep our costs down. I think a case can be made for Bradway being taken care of by the Road Commission in Oakland County. Anybody who drives down Bradway between, like, 7 and 9 a.m. in the morning and 4 and 6, we'll see what happens, 3 and 6. Maple backs up. We get a lot of traffic. People are like, I've got to get to school. We've got several schools in that area, businesses. Traffic picks up. We can make a case that there's a lot of additional traffic that goes on that road that is not from our neighborhood. That goes from Lasser to Cromwell. and also a case should be made that the shopping center down at the corner, which I know another neighbor mentioned earlier, they should also, I think, be assessed an additional fee because we do get a lot of additional traffic down there

  53. Probably for that. I don't know. But recently, state dollars have been allocated into road and road construction in our state. I think we should definitely tap into that and advocate for more dollars. I know some of that has been done, and we were given a few extra dollars. Not a few, but we were given some additional dollars to keep our costs down. I think a case can be made for Bradway being taken care of by the Road Commission in Oakland County. Anybody who drives down Bradway between, like, 7 and 9 a.m. in the morning and 4 and 6, we'll see what happens, 3 and 6. Maple backs up. We get a lot of traffic. People are like, I've got to get to school. We've got several schools in that area, businesses. Traffic picks up. We can make a case that there's a lot of additional traffic that goes on that road that is not from our neighborhood. That goes from Lasser to Cromwell. and also a case should be made that the shopping center down at the corner, which I know another neighbor mentioned earlier, they should also, I think, be assessed an additional fee because we do get a lot of additional traffic down there because we have the Kroger complex. So in closing, I'd just like to say, you know, did I agree with how the petition process went, people kind of sending letters and, you know, it did feel a little bit like pressure at times. I think maybe that's late to address at this point. I would hope that in future petitions with other neighborhoods, you'd consider changing, leaving that petition open in an indefinite amount of time, taking another look at the voting process. But right now, let's try to focus on how can we keep our costs down, what can you all do to help us in that endeavor, or what can we do to help you do that? So thank you. Thank you, Elizabeth. Hi, my name is Brandy Bayman. I live at 2559 Bradway Boulevard. I live right across from the Triangle Park, right at Bradway and Cranbrook. So I have had the unfortunate luck of going through this process three times already. All the trucks for the other sections park in front of my house. My road in front of my house is...

  54. a lot of additional traffic down there because we have the Kroger complex. So in closing, I'd just like to say, you know, did I agree with how the petition process went, people kind of sending letters and, you know, it did feel a little bit like pressure at times. I think maybe that's late to address at this point. I would hope that in future petitions with other neighborhoods, you'd consider changing, leaving that petition open in an indefinite amount of time, taking another look at the voting process. But right now, let's try to focus on how can we keep our costs down, what can you all do to help us in that endeavor, or what can we do to help you do that? So thank you. Thank you, Elizabeth. Hi, my name is Brandy Bayman. I live at 2559 Bradway Boulevard. I live right across from the Triangle Park, right at Bradway and Cranbrook. So I have had the unfortunate luck of going through this process three times already. All the trucks for the other sections park in front of my house. My road in front of my house is... exponentially worse than it was before these projects started it is people talk about the roads being so embarrassing what's embarrassing also is the the barrels and the construction equipment that is still piled at the intersection of cranberry cross and Bradway so I take issue with in the woman who spoke just before me I take issue that Bradway is a major thoroughfare the traffic is horrendous during the early morning and the evening times I would propose I agree the roads need to be done I don't agree at the price and I do think there should be some funds set towards Bradway which would even out among all the rest I'm not saying that the people who live on Bradway pay less but I'm saying that the section pays less I also take issue with the way the signatures were obtained I personally received an email in my inbox my I don't know how my personal information was given to these people I think that is irresponsible and and a

  55. exponentially worse than it was before these projects started it is people talk about the roads being so embarrassing what's embarrassing also is the the barrels and the construction equipment that is still piled at the intersection of cranberry cross and Bradway so I take issue with in the woman who spoke just before me I take issue that Bradway is a major thoroughfare the traffic is horrendous during the early morning and the evening times I would propose I agree the roads need to be done I don't agree at the price and I do think there should be some funds set towards Bradway which would even out among all the rest I'm not saying that the people who live on Bradway pay less but I'm saying that the section pays less I also take issue with the way the signatures were obtained I personally received an email in my inbox my I don't know how my personal information was given to these people I think that is irresponsible and and a terrible thing I made it known that I don't want my personal information given out but we I shouldn't have had to say that in the first place number one number two the people who We just passed by the slimmest of margins. Do we really want to move forward with a project that we literally, we're 50-50. And it has caused so much animosity in our neighborhood, which is very sad. I've lived there for 21 years. I've raised my children there. It's really sad what's happened through this whole process. People say there's not transparent. The other side says it is transparent. But the, if I'm, and I use this word carefully, but there was some coercion on getting the signatures. And with the open-ended time period with which to get these, it just doesn't smell very good. So I really would consider, or ask, excuse me, ask that you consider the way that these signatures were obtained. Thank you. Thank you, Randy.

  56. information was given to these people I think that is irresponsible and and a terrible thing I made it known that I don't want my personal information given out but we I shouldn't have had to say that in the first place number one number two the people who We just passed by the slimmest of margins. Do we really want to move forward with a project that we literally, we're 50-50. And it has caused so much animosity in our neighborhood, which is very sad. I've lived there for 21 years. I've raised my children there. It's really sad what's happened through this whole process. People say there's not transparent. The other side says it is transparent. But the, if I'm, and I use this word carefully, but there was some coercion on getting the signatures. And with the open-ended time period with which to get these, it just doesn't smell very good. So I really would consider, or ask, excuse me, ask that you consider the way that these signatures were obtained. Thank you. Thank you, Randy. Good evening. My name is Lisa Finateri. I live at 1250 West Indian Mound Road, which is actually in the yellow section. So I won't take up too much of your time. But I did want to address you all today and share my support for the Roads Project. I was actually one of the volunteers that went door-to-door trying to find out if our residents were for or against the Roads Project. Bye-bye. and if they were for it then wonderful they signed the petition that I had with me and if they were against it then I just made a note and moved on I had a lot of wonderful conversations with residents who asked all kinds of great questions that I tried my best to answer or pointed them toward those who could I think that this project has caused a lot of divisiveness in our neighborhood and it's really sad I've lived here for six years and I'm just very much looking forward to being able to move on together and wrap up this project together and enjoy these beautiful new roads that a lot of people have worked incredibly hard to make happen there have been no other options brought

  57. Good evening. My name is Lisa Finateri. I live at 1250 West Indian Mound Road, which is actually in the yellow section. So I won't take up too much of your time. But I did want to address you all today and share my support for the Roads Project. I was actually one of the volunteers that went door-to-door trying to find out if our residents were for or against the Roads Project. Bye-bye. and if they were for it then wonderful they signed the petition that I had with me and if they were against it then I just made a note and moved on I had a lot of wonderful conversations with residents who asked all kinds of great questions that I tried my best to answer or pointed them toward those who could I think that this project has caused a lot of divisiveness in our neighborhood and it's really sad I've lived here for six years and I'm just very much looking forward to being able to move on together and wrap up this project together and enjoy these beautiful new roads that a lot of people have worked incredibly hard to make happen there have been no other options brought forward for how we can fix these roads this is it and you know it is expensive yes but it's an investment in our community and I'm really happy that a majority of those in the green section have also agreed that they'd like to make that investment thank you very much for your time Carolyn Andre I live at 3124 Bradway Well, unlike some of the people here, I have lived here for over 40 years. We love the village. My husband, unfortunately, passed away a couple years ago. But he had written letters. He said, I was at the first board meeting when we moved in, and what the first thing was, what about the roads? We have to do something. We know something needs to be done. But we're both very opposed to how it was being divided up, how it was being talked about, the lack of transparency. And I do want to mention something, how the one woman said all that she's near the park.

  58. incredibly hard to make happen there have been no other options brought forward for how we can fix these roads this is it and you know it is expensive yes but it's an investment in our community and I'm really happy that a majority of those in the green section have also agreed that they'd like to make that investment thank you very much for your time Carolyn Andre I live at 3124 Bradway Well, unlike some of the people here, I have lived here for over 40 years. We love the village. My husband, unfortunately, passed away a couple years ago. But he had written letters. He said, I was at the first board meeting when we moved in, and what the first thing was, what about the roads? We have to do something. We know something needs to be done. But we're both very opposed to how it was being divided up, how it was being talked about, the lack of transparency. And I do want to mention something, how the one woman said all that she's near the park. There had been so many trucks and so much construction parked there. And my daughter was driving east on Bradway around 8 in the morning with that sun in her face going 25 miles an hour. And she hit the back of one of those giant construction things with the extra piece on the back. Totaled the car. And interesting enough, a few hours later, a bunch of orange barrels went up around it. And then a little later, they also put one of the orange fences around it. Now, I don't think that would have happened had that been up. I don't know. It might have. But, I mean, it's horrible. But thank you for your time. Thank you, Carol. I'm Mark Schwartz, 2580. I'm Mark Schwartz, 2580. I'm Mark Schwartz, 2580. I'm Mark Schwartz, 2580. Thank you. bradway boulevard i've lived in my home 43 years um i love a bloomfield village my biggest problem with this whole thing is is the process not the fact that the roads need to

  59. And I do want to mention something, how the one woman said all that she's near the park. There had been so many trucks and so much construction parked there. And my daughter was driving east on Bradway around 8 in the morning with that sun in her face going 25 miles an hour. And she hit the back of one of those giant construction things with the extra piece on the back. Totaled the car. And interesting enough, a few hours later, a bunch of orange barrels went up around it. And then a little later, they also put one of the orange fences around it. Now, I don't think that would have happened had that been up. I don't know. It might have. But, I mean, it's horrible. But thank you for your time. Thank you, Carol. I'm Mark Schwartz, 2580. I'm Mark Schwartz, 2580. I'm Mark Schwartz, 2580. I'm Mark Schwartz, 2580. Thank you. bradway boulevard i've lived in my home 43 years um i love a bloomfield village my biggest problem with this whole thing is is the process not the fact that the roads need to be done now i'm going to be 75 so i've been there since i was 32 um i think i'm done the math right and really to get a fifty thousand dollar bill at 75 when i'm retired you know that smarts a little bit and i can say that i'm fortunate enough i can pay that bill but it makes us it makes us not feel when i say us my wife and i great about having to make that decision do we want to stay here do we want to pay that bill do we not want to that that's bothersome and we're paying a lot of money in taxes to live in our home we've redone it twice because we like the village so much but um our taxes are like a mortgage payment we pay three thousand dollars a month or thirty six thousand dollars a year to live in bloomfield village and to be taxed with a fifty thousand dollar assessment uh i think it's it's huge and i guess i'd like to say that if i knew when we bought our house in 1983 that if something happens to the roads we have to read

  60. my biggest problem with this whole thing is is the process not the fact that the roads need to be done now i'm going to be 75 so i've been there since i was 32 um i think i'm done the math right and really to get a fifty thousand dollar bill at 75 when i'm retired you know that smarts a little bit and i can say that i'm fortunate enough i can pay that bill but it makes us it makes us not feel when i say us my wife and i great about having to make that decision do we want to stay here do we want to pay that bill do we not want to that that's bothersome and we're paying a lot of money in taxes to live in our home we've redone it twice because we like the village so much but um our taxes are like a mortgage payment we pay three thousand dollars a month or thirty six thousand dollars a year to live in bloomfield village and to be taxed with a fifty thousand dollar assessment uh i think it's it's huge and i guess i'd like to say that if i knew when we bought our house in 1983 that if something happens to the roads we have to read as the homeowner and our taxes don't go to that. Relative to the amount of taxes we were paying, I might have not wanted to move to Bloomfield Village because with $36,000 a year in taxes, I must say that should hopefully pay for some road repairs. I also want to say that the process where I feel like it was only a one-way vote, you can only vote yes, but you can't vote no, that really sticks me in the gut, and I think that's a terrible process. I think you should have a yes or a no. You should have a timeline, not just it hasn't passed yet, there's just an unending timeline, and I think there should be a timeline and a time limit to things, whether they're decided. And if it passed 51 percent to 50, it's pretty close. That means to me that maybe people had their arms twisted a little bit and maybe they didn't and I'll never know the answer, but I think there should be limits of time and there should be yes and no votes and things should be done cleanly with transparency. And this felt like a one-way ticket. Yes or we don't want to hear no, just yes or just no vote. I just think it's a bad process. Thank you.

  61. as the homeowner and our taxes don't go to that. Relative to the amount of taxes we were paying, I might have not wanted to move to Bloomfield Village because with $36,000 a year in taxes, I must say that should hopefully pay for some road repairs. I also want to say that the process where I feel like it was only a one-way vote, you can only vote yes, but you can't vote no, that really sticks me in the gut, and I think that's a terrible process. I think you should have a yes or a no. You should have a timeline, not just it hasn't passed yet, there's just an unending timeline, and I think there should be a timeline and a time limit to things, whether they're decided. And if it passed 51 percent to 50, it's pretty close. That means to me that maybe people had their arms twisted a little bit and maybe they didn't and I'll never know the answer, but I think there should be limits of time and there should be yes and no votes and things should be done cleanly with transparency. And this felt like a one-way ticket. Yes or we don't want to hear no, just yes or just no vote. I just think it's a bad process. Thank you. Thank you Mark. Hi, I'm Joy DeCenso, 2636 Covington Place. Just a thought. All of this is predicated on the outdated, I should say, deed restrictions that Judson-Bradway put into our little community. And is it time for us to give back the roads to the township? I don't know if you all need to facilitate that conversation or not, but the prospect of looking down the road, 10, 15, I think that's hopeful, years to redoing these roads, also digging them up to perhaps replace the sewers, is it time that we consider giving back the roads? Thank you. Thank you. Hi, my name is Katie Gates. I live at 2573 Covington Place. I really just have a couple of questions.

  62. Thank you Mark. Hi, I'm Joy DeCenso, 2636 Covington Place. Just a thought. All of this is predicated on the outdated, I should say, deed restrictions that Judson-Bradway put into our little community. And is it time for us to give back the roads to the township? I don't know if you all need to facilitate that conversation or not, but the prospect of looking down the road, 10, 15, I think that's hopeful, years to redoing these roads, also digging them up to perhaps replace the sewers, is it time that we consider giving back the roads? Thank you. Thank you. Hi, my name is Katie Gates. I live at 2573 Covington Place. I really just have a couple of questions. I, too, am very concerned about the sewers. I don't feel like I have an answer. I did get a verbal answer one time that said, well, if the sewers do need to get replaced and the roads get torn up, someone else will cover that cost. I don't have anything evidence-wise to say that that's true, and I have a concern about that. So I'd like to know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I also have a concern, like others have mentioned, about Bradway Boulevard. I do feel that it's a thoroughfare for lots of people in the community when things are happening on other roads, unfortunate things, car accidents, whatever, just busy times of the day. Bradway has an exorbitant amount of people, and I do feel that that needs to be pursued in finding financing somewhere else for some of those costs. I wonder what happened to, you know, the dollars that Detroit Country Day was probably paying for having that space on Bradway, all that parking on Bradway, and it doesn't seem that that section of Bradway was maintained. And, you know, just I think we should do whatever we can to try to alleviate the cost of Bradway in this section.

  63. I really just have a couple of questions. I, too, am very concerned about the sewers. I don't feel like I have an answer. I did get a verbal answer one time that said, well, if the sewers do need to get replaced and the roads get torn up, someone else will cover that cost. I don't have anything evidence-wise to say that that's true, and I have a concern about that. So I'd like to know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I don't know how I can resolve my concern about the sewers. I also have a concern, like others have mentioned, about Bradway Boulevard. I do feel that it's a thoroughfare for lots of people in the community when things are happening on other roads, unfortunate things, car accidents, whatever, just busy times of the day. Bradway has an exorbitant amount of people, and I do feel that that needs to be pursued in finding financing somewhere else for some of those costs. I wonder what happened to, you know, the dollars that Detroit Country Day was probably paying for having that space on Bradway, all that parking on Bradway, and it doesn't seem that that section of Bradway was maintained. And, you know, just I think we should do whatever we can to try to alleviate the cost of Bradway in this section. Thanks. Thank you, Kate. I have a question. I still have a minute, maybe. How do I get the answer about the sewers? Well, I'll talk to our DPW department this week, and we'll get back to you. Okay. Thank you. And tell me your address one more time. 2573 Covington Place. Okay. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks. Hello. My name is Maria Helmlinger-Pratt. I'm at... Hi, I love you one of those folks. Thank you. Thank you, Tom. 26 29 amberley just want to say a couple things um when we first started the process we had those small group meetings and we were told that we'd get billed on our frontage so that's one thing and that never heard anything about that again um because there's a lot of people that have a lot bigger frontage than other people have there's pretty pretty uh irregular lots there but um also i lived um in birmingham on henrietta and they redid our roads completely

  64. And, you know, just I think we should do whatever we can to try to alleviate the cost of Bradway in this section. Thanks. Thank you, Kate. I have a question. I still have a minute, maybe. How do I get the answer about the sewers? Well, I'll talk to our DPW department this week, and we'll get back to you. Okay. Thank you. And tell me your address one more time. 2573 Covington Place. Okay. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks. Hello. My name is Maria Helmlinger-Pratt. I'm at... Hi, I love you one of those folks. Thank you. Thank you, Tom. 26 29 amberley just want to say a couple things um when we first started the process we had those small group meetings and we were told that we'd get billed on our frontage so that's one thing and that never heard anything about that again um because there's a lot of people that have a lot bigger frontage than other people have there's pretty pretty uh irregular lots there but um also i lived um in birmingham on henrietta and they redid our roads completely and the first thing they did was the sewers because they knew the sewers were just as old if not older than what the road was that they ripped up and i we didn't have to pay anything because we paid our birmingham taxes if i would have known that our bloomfield texas in the village wasn't going to cover roads i'm not so sure i would have bought the house i just wanted to be you know in the birmingham school district so my kids could finish out their school years so i'm obviously against it um i think the options if we had more options on the table you know good better best that would have been more of a a fair vote maybe and i also agree that uh holding this open for so long it was like it's being held open until we all comply it's kind of the feeling i got from it i'm so sorry i'm so sorry i'm so sorry Thank you. So that's just all I have. Thank you. Thank you, Maria. Is there any more public comment? If not, I'll close public comment and turn it back over

  65. lots there but um also i lived um in birmingham on henrietta and they redid our roads completely and the first thing they did was the sewers because they knew the sewers were just as old if not older than what the road was that they ripped up and i we didn't have to pay anything because we paid our birmingham taxes if i would have known that our bloomfield texas in the village wasn't going to cover roads i'm not so sure i would have bought the house i just wanted to be you know in the birmingham school district so my kids could finish out their school years so i'm obviously against it um i think the options if we had more options on the table you know good better best that would have been more of a a fair vote maybe and i also agree that uh holding this open for so long it was like it's being held open until we all comply it's kind of the feeling i got from it i'm so sorry i'm so sorry i'm so sorry Thank you. So that's just all I have. Thank you. Thank you, Maria. Is there any more public comment? If not, I'll close public comment and turn it back over to the board and to Jennifer. Any questions for Jennifer or any comments? Yeah, Jennifer, we've talked about this before. The increase of this special assessment compared to some of the other ones in our township, not just with the villages. Can we talk about why the cost is so much different in the village versus Kirkway or some other ones? Sure. I will kind of dig into it a little more. And if you need extra explanation, Mark Metzler is here as well, and he can help me out. Bloomfield Village is a little different in that it has been built road upon road upon road upon road for 60 plus years. So there is a lot of layers that has to come up. So while the presentation talked about four inches of asphalt being laid, there is still a lot that is being pulled up. They are going, in fact, roughly 18 inches down. They are digging up all those layers of roads. Everybody has curbs. There is curbs throughout the entire village, and they're just not, they're buried that far underneath. So part of the cost of the construction is digging up road upon road upon road upon road, and then having to build that base back up, because obviously the yards are where they are. So.

  66. If not, I'll close public comment and turn it back over to the board and to Jennifer. Any questions for Jennifer or any comments? Yeah, Jennifer, we've talked about this before. The increase of this special assessment compared to some of the other ones in our township, not just with the villages. Can we talk about why the cost is so much different in the village versus Kirkway or some other ones? Sure. I will kind of dig into it a little more. And if you need extra explanation, Mark Metzler is here as well, and he can help me out. Bloomfield Village is a little different in that it has been built road upon road upon road upon road for 60 plus years. So there is a lot of layers that has to come up. So while the presentation talked about four inches of asphalt being laid, there is still a lot that is being pulled up. They are going, in fact, roughly 18 inches down. They are digging up all those layers of roads. Everybody has curbs. There is curbs throughout the entire village, and they're just not, they're buried that far underneath. So part of the cost of the construction is digging up road upon road upon road upon road, and then having to build that base back up, because obviously the yards are where they are. So. we can't dig your road up and then just put four inches of asphalt back down so the road has to be built back up to where the yards are and it all incurs a large cost jennifer can you talk about the concern about the sewers sure before we go into any of these sad processes our dpw is intricately involved um constantly monitoring we you know have communication with the water resource commission the dpw is involved hrc is involved it is something that they are inspected they are um they're gone through from the entire project so that we try and avoid any sort of issues anything that's antiquated anything that needs to be fixed or lined or anything to that effect is addressed at that time capacity i guess everything is looked at neil yeah um thank you i did have a question about the bradway and the number are is it and is the shopping center being assessed yeah and what's the how much what's the value of the parcels

  67. we can't dig your road up and then just put four inches of asphalt back down so the road has to be built back up to where the yards are and it all incurs a large cost jennifer can you talk about the concern about the sewers sure before we go into any of these sad processes our dpw is intricately involved um constantly monitoring we you know have communication with the water resource commission the dpw is involved hrc is involved it is something that they are inspected they are um they're gone through from the entire project so that we try and avoid any sort of issues anything that's antiquated anything that needs to be fixed or lined or anything to that effect is addressed at that time capacity i guess everything is looked at neil yeah um thank you i did have a question about the bradway and the number are is it and is the shopping center being assessed yeah and what's the how much what's the value of the parcels well the value we don't look at it's assessed one unit of benefit it's one single parcel i believe they might actually have i'd have to go back and look at my assessment rule but i think that they come out you they might come out on both Tuckahoe and on Bradway I would have to go back and check that for their parcels but they are in fact being assessed so the Kroger is being assessed but technically do they have an exit on to Bradway or Tuckahoe no they just have frontage just frontage so in some capacity we've done that before where if you don't actually have access to it they wouldn't be assessed unit benefit so in this case we are correct any sort of frontage is giving them that our quarter lots on Bradway assess larger amounts or is it the same no it's one unit of benefit per parcel number any other questions or comments I'll I'll just add a couple of comments for the

  68. shopping center being assessed yeah and what's the how much what's the value of the parcels well the value we don't look at it's assessed one unit of benefit it's one single parcel i believe they might actually have i'd have to go back and look at my assessment rule but i think that they come out you they might come out on both Tuckahoe and on Bradway I would have to go back and check that for their parcels but they are in fact being assessed so the Kroger is being assessed but technically do they have an exit on to Bradway or Tuckahoe no they just have frontage just frontage so in some capacity we've done that before where if you don't actually have access to it they wouldn't be assessed unit benefit so in this case we are correct any sort of frontage is giving them that our quarter lots on Bradway assess larger amounts or is it the same no it's one unit of benefit per parcel number any other questions or comments I'll I'll just add a couple of comments for the board's refresher so last year we introduced the special assessment deferment program which allows for residents who need certain income requirements to have their assessments deferred until they sell their house so they wouldn't have to make those payments every year last year you the first year and we had uh four three sorry three um um and two were from one of the village side two two were from the village and one was from south bluefield um so that is an option um that's available um also um anyone like a disabled vet who qualifies for exemption anyway gets an exemption from this through the special assessment deferment program um so i would encourage residents who are watching this or here um to go to the website um bloomfieldtwpmi.gov sadp special assessment deferment program uh to get all the particulars or to call my office at 248

  69. any other questions or comments I'll I'll just add a couple of comments for the board's refresher so last year we introduced the special assessment deferment program which allows for residents who need certain income requirements to have their assessments deferred until they sell their house so they wouldn't have to make those payments every year last year you the first year and we had uh four three sorry three um um and two were from one of the village side two two were from the village and one was from south bluefield um so that is an option um that's available um also um anyone like a disabled vet who qualifies for exemption anyway gets an exemption from this through the special assessment deferment program um so i would encourage residents who are watching this or here um to go to the website um bloomfieldtwpmi.gov sadp special assessment deferment program uh to get all the particulars or to call my office at 248 433-7705 and we'll be happy to walk you through it and talk about the process the second thing i just wanted to add is a little bit of empirical evidence so my office gets called from title companies every time a property is going to transfer so they call and they want to know are there any outstanding bills water bills tax bills assessments lawn cutting invoices which doesn't happen very often um so we give the title companies the information that they can put into their closing statements and and transfers so So after a year, after the red and blue sections were completed, I asked my team to go back and check all of the transfers that we got in the red and blue section after the assessment was approved by the board so that it was on, it was a lien to the property. And how many of those transferred, how many of them got paid off at closing, and how many of them transferred to the new owner?

  70. sadp special assessment deferment program uh to get all the particulars or to call my office at 248 433-7705 and we'll be happy to walk you through it and talk about the process the second thing i just wanted to add is a little bit of empirical evidence so my office gets called from title companies every time a property is going to transfer so they call and they want to know are there any outstanding bills water bills tax bills assessments lawn cutting invoices which doesn't happen very often um so we give the title companies the information that they can put into their closing statements and and transfers so So after a year, after the red and blue sections were completed, I asked my team to go back and check all of the transfers that we got in the red and blue section after the assessment was approved by the board so that it was on, it was a lien to the property. And how many of those transferred, how many of them got paid off at closing, and how many of them transferred to the new owner? And in all cases except for one, the assessments transferred to the new owner. So again, we're not a part of that transaction. We have no idea what they agree to when they sell the property and buy the property. That's between them. I just know empirically only one assessment was actually paid off at the closing. We got the check from the title company. All the others, since they didn't get paid off, got transferred to the new owners. So I just wanted to put that out there. That was some data that we collected last year. And I wanted to remind everybody about the SADP. So those are my comments. Okay, thank you, Michael. Any other comments? Otherwise, entertain them. Go ahead, Mark. I have a follow-up question for Michael. Did you check to see if the house is sold above or below the SEV? the state equalized value the sev yeah um because there's concerns raised yeah i i did not check what the house is sold for um so i i can't i i would imagine that they sold for more than the

  71. And how many of those transferred, how many of them got paid off at closing, and how many of them transferred to the new owner? And in all cases except for one, the assessments transferred to the new owner. So again, we're not a part of that transaction. We have no idea what they agree to when they sell the property and buy the property. That's between them. I just know empirically only one assessment was actually paid off at the closing. We got the check from the title company. All the others, since they didn't get paid off, got transferred to the new owners. So I just wanted to put that out there. That was some data that we collected last year. And I wanted to remind everybody about the SADP. So those are my comments. Okay, thank you, Michael. Any other comments? Otherwise, entertain them. Go ahead, Mark. I have a follow-up question for Michael. Did you check to see if the house is sold above or below the SEV? the state equalized value the sev yeah um because there's concerns raised yeah i i did not check what the house is sold for um so i i can't i i would imagine that they sold for more than the sev because the sev typically underestimates value a little bit but um we could certainly go back and check i mean it would it would alleviate concerns regarding yeah does the value of the property um yeah you could do that is is it going up by it well yeah i mean i i can't tell you what you know whether it goes up or goes down because ultimately the only measure of value of property is when the transaction occurs right otherwise you can look on zillow and say my properties were x today but tomorrow it might be something else that's why the transfers would be appropriate right so uh yeah i can i can go back and get that data and um i believe mr mccarthy mentioned something about tax exempt status or i wanted to get some more information on what he was asking about regarding uh his tax protest tax protest so through the tax tribunals yeah everybody that spoke tonight is registered as preserving their right to appeal to the michigan tax tribunal that is anybody who sends in an email a letter or speaks at either of the public hearings you you

  72. what the house is sold for um so i i can't i i would imagine that they sold for more than the sev because the sev typically underestimates value a little bit but um we could certainly go back and check i mean it would it would alleviate concerns regarding yeah does the value of the property um yeah you could do that is is it going up by it well yeah i mean i i can't tell you what you know whether it goes up or goes down because ultimately the only measure of value of property is when the transaction occurs right otherwise you can look on zillow and say my properties were x today but tomorrow it might be something else that's why the transfers would be appropriate right so uh yeah i can i can go back and get that data and um i believe mr mccarthy mentioned something about tax exempt status or i wanted to get some more information on what he was asking about regarding uh his tax protest tax protest so through the tax tribunals yeah everybody that spoke tonight is registered as preserving their right to appeal to the michigan tax tribunal that is anybody who sends in an email a letter or speaks at either of the public hearings you you you have another comment mark no okay thank you one I want to address the questions about the the petition and the percentages and you know of course I've been voting on these for a while and in my position is that the best way to figure this out is through a majority vote and I'll vote the way the majority goes some have raised questions about the propriety of the process it's been open too long or the or the signatures are improper can you address the duration of the time this has been opened in your your review process for the signatures absolutely all of the petitions state that it is a suggested six-month timeline for the petition process to work out the township is completely hands-off once the petition is passed over to the circulators we have nothing else to do with the process but again like I said the petition gives a recommended timeline of six months there is in fact not a defined timeline this specific petition I believe came to me before the six-month time period was up we do work really closely to try and ensure that that's the case but

  73. you have another comment mark no okay thank you one I want to address the questions about the the petition and the percentages and you know of course I've been voting on these for a while and in my position is that the best way to figure this out is through a majority vote and I'll vote the way the majority goes some have raised questions about the propriety of the process it's been open too long or the or the signatures are improper can you address the duration of the time this has been opened in your your review process for the signatures absolutely all of the petitions state that it is a suggested six-month timeline for the petition process to work out the township is completely hands-off once the petition is passed over to the circulators we have nothing else to do with the process but again like I said the petition gives a recommended timeline of six months there is in fact not a defined timeline this specific petition I believe came to me before the six-month time period was up we do work really closely to try and ensure that that's the case but again once the petition leaves us we're not micromanaging the process we can't have any sort of any sort of involvement with it so you know when the petition goes out it a recommended deadline and again that is six months once the petitions come back to me i then work through a register of deeds we work on voters registration cards and when we're unable to obtain signatures from either of those two options we will request like a driver's license or something else to in fact verify signatures if we're unable to validate a signature then it's thrown out okay thank you any other comments or questions if not i'll entertain a motion on the on the public hearing of necessity item number three thank you martin and jen for bringing that up because that's very important about the propriety of the process and that's all we can go by is what's presented to us long as the process is according to statute which it was um so with that said all we can go by is what's presented to us since what 51.28 percent or so in favor and with that said i

  74. the six-month time period was up we do work really closely to try and ensure that that's the case but again once the petition leaves us we're not micromanaging the process we can't have any sort of any sort of involvement with it so you know when the petition goes out it a recommended deadline and again that is six months once the petitions come back to me i then work through a register of deeds we work on voters registration cards and when we're unable to obtain signatures from either of those two options we will request like a driver's license or something else to in fact verify signatures if we're unable to validate a signature then it's thrown out okay thank you any other comments or questions if not i'll entertain a motion on the on the public hearing of necessity item number three thank you martin and jen for bringing that up because that's very important about the propriety of the process and that's all we can go by is what's presented to us long as the process is according to statute which it was um so with that said all we can go by is what's presented to us since what 51.28 percent or so in favor and with that said i make a motion that we um we move forward with what has been presented to us for uh um the special district sad district uh number 430 the green district for bloomfield village is there support support all in favor say aye aye any opposed passes seven to nothing thank you thank you everybody for your comments item number four consider appointment of an alternative member of the Zoning Board of Appeals vacancy presented by myself. And so we had a gentleman. We'll just take a little pause while the room empties out. We'll see the one for the ZB there.

  75. we can go by is what's presented to us since what 51.28 percent or so in favor and with that said i make a motion that we um we move forward with what has been presented to us for uh um the special district sad district uh number 430 the green district for bloomfield village is there support support all in favor say aye aye any opposed passes seven to nothing thank you thank you everybody for your comments item number four consider appointment of an alternative member of the Zoning Board of Appeals vacancy presented by myself. And so we had a gentleman. We'll just take a little pause while the room empties out. We'll see the one for the ZB there. Yeah. Okay. So we had an opening for the ZBA and we interviewed and talked to a couple of the applicants. And we had a few different board positions to fill. And we interviewed a Bryant Patrick Zakowitz, if I pronounce it correctly. And I think you all saw a copy of his resume. And that is the one I am recommending that we put on as the ZBA alternate, forward. Any comments or questions? My comments are he has an outstanding background. Certainly what he's doing with Great Lakes Water Authority and he's been involved in that position with zoning, ordinances, property rights, and certainly as a background we're looking forward for that position. Is there just your recommendation? There's no other vote or discussion? Yeah, discussion for sure.

  76. We'll see the one for the ZB there. Yeah. Okay. So we had an opening for the ZBA and we interviewed and talked to a couple of the applicants. And we had a few different board positions to fill. And we interviewed a Bryant Patrick Zakowitz, if I pronounce it correctly. And I think you all saw a copy of his resume. And that is the one I am recommending that we put on as the ZBA alternate, forward. Any comments or questions? My comments are he has an outstanding background. Certainly what he's doing with Great Lakes Water Authority and he's been involved in that position with zoning, ordinances, property rights, and certainly as a background we're looking forward for that position. Is there just your recommendation? There's no other vote or discussion? Yeah, discussion for sure. Anything else you'd like to add, Val? Just that we did have other candidates, so there had not been any discussion. I don't know this candidate, I don't know the other candidate. We had initially three great candidates that applied. One has withdrawn his name from consideration and is looking at another board. He may apply for that. And the other candidate who's here tonight, Oscar Gardner, is another great qualified candidate and we have another position that's open on the Board of Review for an alternate position there. My hope after we make this resolution will be to ask the board to amend the agenda to add an appointment to the Board of Review alternate position. And I would request that we point Oscar to that position. So there's essentially two people, two present openings, and they'll both be, if the board agrees, the board agrees. both would be applied to a position. Is that something we're going to vote on tonight? Yep. On both of them. And we spoke to all the candidates, and they kind of agreed to the positions that we've presented tonight. Okay, that part wasn't, I wasn't aware of, so I was just looking for,

  77. your recommendation? There's no other vote or discussion? Yeah, discussion for sure. Anything else you'd like to add, Val? Just that we did have other candidates, so there had not been any discussion. I don't know this candidate, I don't know the other candidate. We had initially three great candidates that applied. One has withdrawn his name from consideration and is looking at another board. He may apply for that. And the other candidate who's here tonight, Oscar Gardner, is another great qualified candidate and we have another position that's open on the Board of Review for an alternate position there. My hope after we make this resolution will be to ask the board to amend the agenda to add an appointment to the Board of Review alternate position. And I would request that we point Oscar to that position. So there's essentially two people, two present openings, and they'll both be, if the board agrees, the board agrees. both would be applied to a position. Is that something we're going to vote on tonight? Yep. On both of them. And we spoke to all the candidates, and they kind of agreed to the positions that we've presented tonight. Okay, that part wasn't, I wasn't aware of, so I was just looking for, because I know the last time when we had more candidates than positions, we did like a voting, and we had more discussions, so I was surprised to just kind of see it jump. Yeah. Okay, so the candidates are aware. And they were very supportive and agreeing to the roles and the positions. It kind of worked itself out. Okay. That helps. Chris? Yeah, so I had the pleasure of meeting Bryant to kind of review and kind of get to know him. I think it would be an excellent addition to the ZBA, which, again, I'm on. I also think Oscar was a great candidate, and with his real estate background, I think he would be a great fit for the Board of Review because he has a little bit more background specifically in that. It would be a great addition to that Board as well. So I'm glad we'll be able to, based on the amendment for the meeting, if that happens, I think that works out to get some pretty good people involved in our township. All right. So with it, I'd like to make a motion that we would accept the appointment, as Supervisor McCready has said, for the alternate member for the ZBA. Support. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? And then if I could make an amendment or adjustment to the... So I'll just make a motion to amend the agenda to add consideration of a...

  78. because I know the last time when we had more candidates than positions, we did like a voting, and we had more discussions, so I was surprised to just kind of see it jump. Yeah. Okay, so the candidates are aware. And they were very supportive and agreeing to the roles and the positions. It kind of worked itself out. Okay. That helps. Chris? Yeah, so I had the pleasure of meeting Bryant to kind of review and kind of get to know him. I think it would be an excellent addition to the ZBA, which, again, I'm on. I also think Oscar was a great candidate, and with his real estate background, I think he would be a great fit for the Board of Review because he has a little bit more background specifically in that. It would be a great addition to that Board as well. So I'm glad we'll be able to, based on the amendment for the meeting, if that happens, I think that works out to get some pretty good people involved in our township. All right. So with it, I'd like to make a motion that we would accept the appointment, as Supervisor McCready has said, for the alternate member for the ZBA. Support. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? And then if I could make an amendment or adjustment to the... So I'll just make a motion to amend the agenda to add consideration of a... of appointment of a candidate to the alternate position for border review. Support. Support. All in favor say aye. Aye. Okay, so now I'd like to appoint Oscar Garner as the alternate member of the March border review. Any comments or questions? No, we all have known Oscar over the years, and I know he certainly wants to provide service to the township, and we appreciate that, and I know he will be a very good, beyond, he is a good candidate. He has a good background, and he will provide a very good addition to the border review. Support. Support. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Passes. Congratulations, Oscar Wilkins. And thank you for spending time and volunteering to the community. Okay. Item number five, consider temporary relocation of Precinct 4 polling location from Bowers Farm to Township Hall for the May 5, 2026 Avondale School District special election. Presented by Martin Bruch. Martin. Okay. Good evening. The Avondale School District has petitioned the county to hold an election for members of, for residents that live in the Avondale School District.

  79. of appointment of a candidate to the alternate position for border review. Support. Support. All in favor say aye. Aye. Okay, so now I'd like to appoint Oscar Garner as the alternate member of the March border review. Any comments or questions? No, we all have known Oscar over the years, and I know he certainly wants to provide service to the township, and we appreciate that, and I know he will be a very good, beyond, he is a good candidate. He has a good background, and he will provide a very good addition to the border review. Support. Support. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Passes. Congratulations, Oscar Wilkins. And thank you for spending time and volunteering to the community. Okay. Item number five, consider temporary relocation of Precinct 4 polling location from Bowers Farm to Township Hall for the May 5, 2026 Avondale School District special election. Presented by Martin Bruch. Martin. Okay. Good evening. The Avondale School District has petitioned the county to hold an election for members of, for residents that live in the Avondale School District. For Bluefield Township, that's Precinct number four, and only that precinct. It's located in the far northern and eastern portion of the township. and in the past often my predecessors have consolidated for school elections and or relocated precincts for school elections, which is what I'm proposing we do tonight and what I'm asking the board to do tonight. There are a couple of things. There are several moving parts with regard to this. So first, the county operates the early voting sites. And that will be adjusted if the county board agrees to move the early voting site to the Rochester Hills City Hall from the Bloomfield Township Library. I looked at the distance and it's essentially equidistant. This afternoon, according to Google, it was a 15-minute drive to go from South Boulevard to the Rochester City Hall or a 15-minute drive to drive to Bloomfield Township Library. And so that's really about the same.

  80. The Avondale School District has petitioned the county to hold an election for members of, for residents that live in the Avondale School District. For Bluefield Township, that's Precinct number four, and only that precinct. It's located in the far northern and eastern portion of the township. and in the past often my predecessors have consolidated for school elections and or relocated precincts for school elections, which is what I'm proposing we do tonight and what I'm asking the board to do tonight. There are a couple of things. There are several moving parts with regard to this. So first, the county operates the early voting sites. And that will be adjusted if the county board agrees to move the early voting site to the Rochester Hills City Hall from the Bloomfield Township Library. I looked at the distance and it's essentially equidistant. This afternoon, according to Google, it was a 15-minute drive to go from South Boulevard to the Rochester City Hall or a 15-minute drive to drive to Bloomfield Township Library. And so that's really about the same. We're not addressing that tonight, but that's just some background information. So relocating the precinct from Bowers Farm to the township, again, is consistent with past practice. It's going to be more affordable. And one of the important factors that I'm considering and thinking about is the depth of knowledge and training within my department. By relocating it to the township here, we are going to operate the... the precinct with the regular staff, we're going to operate the receiving board with regular staff, we're going to operate the absentee vote and counting board with the regular staff, and we're all going to get a chance to see, you know, that normally we have a large number of checklists that we prepare, we have a large number of training materials that are prepared, we train people who work in these precincts or work on these boards, but in this instance we're going to use our training materials on ourselves and do that work ourselves, and I think therefore help to check and double check the thoroughness of these, the training and checklists, and make us a better team and make our materials even better. So, those are the two main reasons why I suggest it. In the past, when elections have occurred in Avondale, they're getting about a 21% turnout

  81. And so that's really about the same. We're not addressing that tonight, but that's just some background information. So relocating the precinct from Bowers Farm to the township, again, is consistent with past practice. It's going to be more affordable. And one of the important factors that I'm considering and thinking about is the depth of knowledge and training within my department. By relocating it to the township here, we are going to operate the... the precinct with the regular staff, we're going to operate the receiving board with regular staff, we're going to operate the absentee vote and counting board with the regular staff, and we're all going to get a chance to see, you know, that normally we have a large number of checklists that we prepare, we have a large number of training materials that are prepared, we train people who work in these precincts or work on these boards, but in this instance we're going to use our training materials on ourselves and do that work ourselves, and I think therefore help to check and double check the thoroughness of these, the training and checklists, and make us a better team and make our materials even better. So, those are the two main reasons why I suggest it. In the past, when elections have occurred in Avondale, they're getting about a 21% turnout rate, and if we have a 21% turnout rate, based on current registration of precinct 4, there would be about 84 people that would come here versus driving to the farm, and it is farther to come here than to go to the farm, no doubt. We're planning to have a full court press concerning this temporary change to communicate that via email, via mail, via social media, via postings on our website. We also are considering sending, I mean, of the 1,500 people who are registered, 830 of them are on an AV list, so they're going to get materials, either an application or an actual ballot. automatically and for the remaining 700 and so people my intention is to send them not only the communication about the change but an application for an AV ballot as well so they could submit it that way lastly there is an absentee ballot drop box that's on Westview which is about a seven minute drive from from West from South Boulevard so with all of that you know we've looked through a lot of detail about it and I recommend that the board consider and adopt the

  82. In the past, when elections have occurred in Avondale, they're getting about a 21% turnout rate, and if we have a 21% turnout rate, based on current registration of precinct 4, there would be about 84 people that would come here versus driving to the farm, and it is farther to come here than to go to the farm, no doubt. We're planning to have a full court press concerning this temporary change to communicate that via email, via mail, via social media, via postings on our website. We also are considering sending, I mean, of the 1,500 people who are registered, 830 of them are on an AV list, so they're going to get materials, either an application or an actual ballot. automatically and for the remaining 700 and so people my intention is to send them not only the communication about the change but an application for an AV ballot as well so they could submit it that way lastly there is an absentee ballot drop box that's on Westview which is about a seven minute drive from from West from South Boulevard so with all of that you know we've looked through a lot of detail about it and I recommend that the board consider and adopt the resolutions in the in the packet for this temporary location any comments or questions that'll entertain a motion so moved support all in favor say aye aye any opposed passes seven nothing nice job Martin item number six consider amendment to a pension policy trust investment policy Michael yep thank you so board this is a following up to the investment study session that we held last week I'm asking the board to revise the defined benefit pension plan trust investment policy which is a document that prescribes how I as the chief investment officer can invest the funds in the pension plan there are no changes to any of the authorized investments or statement of purpose scope the only thing that's changing is the target allocations by asset class as we discussed in the pension plan we will now be needing to have a allocation to fixed income so that we can better have liquidity to meet

  83. of detail about it and I recommend that the board consider and adopt the resolutions in the in the packet for this temporary location any comments or questions that'll entertain a motion so moved support all in favor say aye aye any opposed passes seven nothing nice job Martin item number six consider amendment to a pension policy trust investment policy Michael yep thank you so board this is a following up to the investment study session that we held last week I'm asking the board to revise the defined benefit pension plan trust investment policy which is a document that prescribes how I as the chief investment officer can invest the funds in the pension plan there are no changes to any of the authorized investments or statement of purpose scope the only thing that's changing is the target allocations by asset class as we discussed in the pension plan we will now be needing to have a allocation to fixed income so that we can better have liquidity to meet the requirements of funding the pension payments every month now that the non-guaranteed pension payments have increased they've gotten to a point where we can no longer absorb them out of the gda so we're going to have to pay them out of our equities portfolio so in order to accommodate that i'm asking for an allocation of eight percent to fixed income uh and that and in order to get that eight percent i want to reduce uh the allocation to real estate from ten to five percent uh u.s large cap equities from 35 to 34 percent u.s small and mid-cap equities from 25 to 24 percent and international equities from 25 to 24 percent i'm also asking to increase the maximum allocation for alternative investments from 10 to 20 and the cash allocation from 5 to 10. so that gives me flexibility to keep cash in fixed income and then as a payment uh gets closer and i need to make sure that we protect it i can move it from fixed income into cash and then i can use that cash to make the pension payments

  84. needing to have a allocation to fixed income so that we can better have liquidity to meet the requirements of funding the pension payments every month now that the non-guaranteed pension payments have increased they've gotten to a point where we can no longer absorb them out of the gda so we're going to have to pay them out of our equities portfolio so in order to accommodate that i'm asking for an allocation of eight percent to fixed income uh and that and in order to get that eight percent i want to reduce uh the allocation to real estate from ten to five percent uh u.s large cap equities from 35 to 34 percent u.s small and mid-cap equities from 25 to 24 percent and international equities from 25 to 24 percent i'm also asking to increase the maximum allocation for alternative investments from 10 to 20 and the cash allocation from 5 to 10. so that gives me flexibility to keep cash in fixed income and then as a payment uh gets closer and i need to make sure that we protect it i can move it from fixed income into cash and then i can use that cash to make the pension payments So this is, again, as we discussed at our study session, and I would ask the board to modify the statement as I present. Thank you, Malik. And these were all conversations that we worked through on our meeting in the last financial sustainability meeting that went on for, what, two hours? Yep. Thursday morning? Yep. Joint township board meeting. Joint township board meeting, yep. So if there's any comment, any comment anybody would like to make? I'd just like to say that I think that based on the presentation we saw before, the material is here today, it's well thought through. It's a good idea. It will, you know, preserve the options that we need and ensure security and good returns, and I appreciate the recommendation and support it. And certainly gives you the flexibility that you need, unforeseen circumstances, so well thought out, and I know it's an in-depth discussion at our study session, so thank you. So I've already said that. I'll make a motion. Support. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. Anybody opposed? Pass to 7-0. Item number 7. Thank you. Thank you. Consider the amendment of Retired Employees Healthcare Benefits Trust Policy. Michael. Okay, so similar to what we just discussed, so the Retired Employees Healthcare Benefits Trust, which is the trust that we put money into for future OPEB payments.

  85. So this is, again, as we discussed at our study session, and I would ask the board to modify the statement as I present. Thank you, Malik. And these were all conversations that we worked through on our meeting in the last financial sustainability meeting that went on for, what, two hours? Yep. Thursday morning? Yep. Joint township board meeting. Joint township board meeting, yep. So if there's any comment, any comment anybody would like to make? I'd just like to say that I think that based on the presentation we saw before, the material is here today, it's well thought through. It's a good idea. It will, you know, preserve the options that we need and ensure security and good returns, and I appreciate the recommendation and support it. And certainly gives you the flexibility that you need, unforeseen circumstances, so well thought out, and I know it's an in-depth discussion at our study session, so thank you. So I've already said that. I'll make a motion. Support. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. Anybody opposed? Pass to 7-0. Item number 7. Thank you. Thank you. Consider the amendment of Retired Employees Healthcare Benefits Trust Policy. Michael. Okay, so similar to what we just discussed, so the Retired Employees Healthcare Benefits Trust, which is the trust that we put money into for future OPEB payments. Thank you. for the first time. retiree health care we are currently not taking any money out of that trust to make benefit payments we're making benefit payments out of our operating budget so this trust is really meant for really long-term asset growth and so to be able to conservatively say at least 10 years from now uh before we start uh pulling out um uh benefit payments but you know obviously we can see how things go uh so the x uh the ask here is to increase the alternative investments allocation from 10 to 15 percent uh alternative investments like private equity uh typically generate a higher annual rate of return uh though they are less liquid um but again since we're looking long term here five ten years and beyond these investments are perfectly um logical um for this portfolio

  86. Okay, so similar to what we just discussed, so the Retired Employees Healthcare Benefits Trust, which is the trust that we put money into for future OPEB payments. Thank you. for the first time. retiree health care we are currently not taking any money out of that trust to make benefit payments we're making benefit payments out of our operating budget so this trust is really meant for really long-term asset growth and so to be able to conservatively say at least 10 years from now uh before we start uh pulling out um uh benefit payments but you know obviously we can see how things go uh so the x uh the ask here is to increase the alternative investments allocation from 10 to 15 percent uh alternative investments like private equity uh typically generate a higher annual rate of return uh though they are less liquid um but again since we're looking long term here five ten years and beyond these investments are perfectly um logical um for this portfolio uh in order to increase the allocation to 15 i'm recommending that we remove or reduce the fixed income allocation from 10 to 7.5 and the real estate allocation from 10 to 7.5 and that makes up the 5 so uh none of the uh equities uh meaning our stocks none of those allocations are changing so otherwise there were no other changes to the document um in terms of um uh eligible investments investment objectives financial institutions etc etc none of that is changing so I would ask for you to approve the document as I presented thank you Michael I do have some questions sure let's see I'm taking some numbers out of the room field township open benefits program Gatsby 74 75 disclosure and page 19 for cable studio it says the liabilities are a little over a million dollars and the fiduciary net position of that account is 1.9 million so it's definitely overfunded and I'm not saying we should pull money

  87. here five ten years and beyond these investments are perfectly um logical um for this portfolio uh in order to increase the allocation to 15 i'm recommending that we remove or reduce the fixed income allocation from 10 to 7.5 and the real estate allocation from 10 to 7.5 and that makes up the 5 so uh none of the uh equities uh meaning our stocks none of those allocations are changing so otherwise there were no other changes to the document um in terms of um uh eligible investments investment objectives financial institutions etc etc none of that is changing so I would ask for you to approve the document as I presented thank you Michael I do have some questions sure let's see I'm taking some numbers out of the room field township open benefits program Gatsby 74 75 disclosure and page 19 for cable studio it says the liabilities are a little over a million dollars and the fiduciary net position of that account is 1.9 million so it's definitely overfunded and I'm not saying we should pull money out but I don't think contributions should still be made based on that funding level and based on Brian Greene's comments that if it is overfunded that he would have a different strategy than if something was underfunded we also have the building inspection it has 1.1 million in OPEB liabilities and as 2.6 million in that position that's significantly overfunded again I don't see why we should have the bulk of that money and inequities and then lastly we have water and sewer which is had a liability of 5.4 and the net position of 6.9 and again it's properly funded it's overfunded I don't know why we're still paying for those benefit payouts when it's overfunded and the milliman reports that we have online say that no benefit no ADC is required from those three sub accounts I'd also like to note over the last several years they've paid in more than the ADC calculations by milliman while the town fund and public safety fund have paid

  88. million so it's definitely overfunded and I'm not saying we should pull money out but I don't think contributions should still be made based on that funding level and based on Brian Greene's comments that if it is overfunded that he would have a different strategy than if something was underfunded we also have the building inspection it has 1.1 million in OPEB liabilities and as 2.6 million in that position that's significantly overfunded again I don't see why we should have the bulk of that money and inequities and then lastly we have water and sewer which is had a liability of 5.4 and the net position of 6.9 and again it's properly funded it's overfunded I don't know why we're still paying for those benefit payouts when it's overfunded and the milliman reports that we have online say that no benefit no ADC is required from those three sub accounts I'd also like to note over the last several years they've paid in more than the ADC calculations by milliman while the town fund and public safety fund have paid in less than the ADC's that imbalance I think is inappropriate especially for the fee-based companies like water and sewer and buildings inspection which is 100 percent fee-based and I think we should consider covering those assets so they don't decline as recommended by Brian Greene I know it's a consolidated group but they are properly funded and I don't think we should be those groups should be paying in benefits if it is properly funded as stand-alones it would not be required and the difference should be made up from the general fund and public safety okay great I'm just gonna respond a couple meetings ago clerk Brooke brought up some things I thought we're pretty spot-on and that's just up-on the company of a year and that's from the general fund. I think that that would be the first time so let's go to the general fund don't believe we should ever do pension holidays or not put money in for long-term liabilities this is a liability of the township and we have seen other communities that do not put money in whether they decide to call it a pension holiday or put the minimum payment in we have done a pretty good

  89. calculations by milliman while the town fund and public safety fund have paid in less than the ADC's that imbalance I think is inappropriate especially for the fee-based companies like water and sewer and buildings inspection which is 100 percent fee-based and I think we should consider covering those assets so they don't decline as recommended by Brian Greene I know it's a consolidated group but they are properly funded and I don't think we should be those groups should be paying in benefits if it is properly funded as stand-alones it would not be required and the difference should be made up from the general fund and public safety okay great I'm just gonna respond a couple meetings ago clerk Brooke brought up some things I thought we're pretty spot-on and that's just up-on the company of a year and that's from the general fund. I think that that would be the first time so let's go to the general fund don't believe we should ever do pension holidays or not put money in for long-term liabilities this is a liability of the township and we have seen other communities that do not put money in whether they decide to call it a pension holiday or put the minimum payment in we have done a pretty good job here of trying to fund those long-term assets whether it is putting extra payments in to our opeb or putting extra money into our pension when we can we have these surpluses i feel pretty proud of that because again these are things that took 50 years to cause and it may take us a while to get out of that hole but we're focusing on that i think it would be a problem and it would be kicking the can down the road again if we stopped doing that so while i understand you're saying they're 100 funded um i still think that we should be putting in money from those accounts but we're also talking about how we're going to invest this pool money not just little sections so that's accounting and how we account for it versus pooled investment right and we agreed as a board to pull that investment to reduce our costs for taxpayers and get us more opportunity for some of those investments so that's why i continue to agree and support the treasurer on those decisions because he brought it to us to ask and we backed it so that's why we do those things well um let's see the um public safety has 10 million 10.7 million town has seven five water and sewer has six nine

  90. they decide to call it a pension holiday or put the minimum payment in we have done a pretty good job here of trying to fund those long-term assets whether it is putting extra payments in to our opeb or putting extra money into our pension when we can we have these surpluses i feel pretty proud of that because again these are things that took 50 years to cause and it may take us a while to get out of that hole but we're focusing on that i think it would be a problem and it would be kicking the can down the road again if we stopped doing that so while i understand you're saying they're 100 funded um i still think that we should be putting in money from those accounts but we're also talking about how we're going to invest this pool money not just little sections so that's accounting and how we account for it versus pooled investment right and we agreed as a board to pull that investment to reduce our costs for taxpayers and get us more opportunity for some of those investments so that's why i continue to agree and support the treasurer on those decisions because he brought it to us to ask and we backed it so that's why we do those things well um let's see the um public safety has 10 million 10.7 million town has seven five water and sewer has six nine one nine in cable studio and almost two seven in building inspection that's about one-third of the assets and when we have residents complaining about their water and sewer rates and they are putting in more than the adc while public safety is 7.3 million plus they're putting in less the town is 1.7 almost they're putting in less than the adc i think that balance imbalance needs to be recognized and if we're going to say that the taxpayer funded are less than the adc but we are requiring the fee base to be more than the adc i think that's inappropriate so um and it's not fair to those fee-based individuals especially for the renters who are paying water and sewer um okay uh from what i can hear mark everything you have said so far is accurate um and i understand what you're saying uh i just think that this discussion needs to happen at our budget study session when we talk about how we're going to allocate allocate our money in our budget

  91. one nine in cable studio and almost two seven in building inspection that's about one-third of the assets and when we have residents complaining about their water and sewer rates and they are putting in more than the adc while public safety is 7.3 million plus they're putting in less the town is 1.7 almost they're putting in less than the adc i think that balance imbalance needs to be recognized and if we're going to say that the taxpayer funded are less than the adc but we are requiring the fee base to be more than the adc i think that's inappropriate so um and it's not fair to those fee-based individuals especially for the renters who are paying water and sewer um okay uh from what i can hear mark everything you have said so far is accurate um and i understand what you're saying uh i just think that this discussion needs to happen at our budget study session when we talk about how we're going to allocate allocate our money in our budget budget um in the patent there are no uh contributions going from the building inspection fund or the cable studio fund into the trust uh The water and sewer fund two years ago, we put in $50,000, which wasn't a lot of money compared, you know, to the size of the position, but we could certainly address that. And again, the public safety and the township sub accounts, we do put money in every year as required as we, you know, we don't put in the full ADC. We are not required to put in the full ADC. We don't have the money to put in the full ADC. But we are contributing to it. And as part of our contribution, we are paying the benefits out of the operating budget, not out of this trust. So the pension trust, we are paying the benefits, all the benefits, 100% of the benefits are being paid out of the pension trust. The move that we just made to reallocate the equities fund is to allow us to make those cash payments to our pensioners every month out of the trust's funds.

  92. budget study session when we talk about how we're going to allocate allocate our money in our budget budget um in the patent there are no uh contributions going from the building inspection fund or the cable studio fund into the trust uh The water and sewer fund two years ago, we put in $50,000, which wasn't a lot of money compared, you know, to the size of the position, but we could certainly address that. And again, the public safety and the township sub accounts, we do put money in every year as required as we, you know, we don't put in the full ADC. We are not required to put in the full ADC. We don't have the money to put in the full ADC. But we are contributing to it. And as part of our contribution, we are paying the benefits out of the operating budget, not out of this trust. So the pension trust, we are paying the benefits, all the benefits, 100% of the benefits are being paid out of the pension trust. The move that we just made to reallocate the equities fund is to allow us to make those cash payments to our pensioners every month out of the trust's funds. For the OPEB trust, we don't have enough money in there to be making the payments to the beneficiaries, I guess. They're not pensioners. They're beneficiaries, the health care recipients. And so we pay for the costs of the retiree health care in our operating budget, as we'll discuss, when is it, next week, the 23rd, that we have the budget study session? So we'll go through the budget. we can address it then so I think your your comments are better suited to the budget study session when we talk about payments and ADC's and benefits and such what we're discussing tonight is once the money is in the trust we have to invest it act 314 or is it 345 314 yeah 314 accurate Ford specifies how these trusts can be invested and it relies on the board to set the allocation levels among the various asset classes and so I'm here tonight asking for a modification to the allocation levels for the various asset classes so that we

  93. The move that we just made to reallocate the equities fund is to allow us to make those cash payments to our pensioners every month out of the trust's funds. For the OPEB trust, we don't have enough money in there to be making the payments to the beneficiaries, I guess. They're not pensioners. They're beneficiaries, the health care recipients. And so we pay for the costs of the retiree health care in our operating budget, as we'll discuss, when is it, next week, the 23rd, that we have the budget study session? So we'll go through the budget. we can address it then so I think your your comments are better suited to the budget study session when we talk about payments and ADC's and benefits and such what we're discussing tonight is once the money is in the trust we have to invest it act 314 or is it 345 314 yeah 314 accurate Ford specifies how these trusts can be invested and it relies on the board to set the allocation levels among the various asset classes and so I'm here tonight asking for a modification to the allocation levels for the various asset classes so that we can continue to invest the trust for the benefit of the long-term beneficiaries of the retiree health care so I just got one question about okay a comment you made sure I'm looking here at the report and if you want like to take a look at it it says which report the Gatsby disclosure okay what page page 12 it says that employer contributions are five point eight eight million and benefit payments are 4.5 so Milliman is that I'm sorry show where we're in what in 2025 yeah okay employer contributions 5.877 and benefit payments 4.5 right so the benefit payments are showing us cash going out even if it's paid direct and those payments are considered contributions going in well the employer contributions yes the the payments are made are considered a contribution and the difference there um is roughly 1.25 million which is the amount that we transfer into the trust every year uh no it's uh 1.3 million okay because in fiscal year 2025 we paid 50 000

  94. modification to the allocation levels for the various asset classes so that we can continue to invest the trust for the benefit of the long-term beneficiaries of the retiree health care so I just got one question about okay a comment you made sure I'm looking here at the report and if you want like to take a look at it it says which report the Gatsby disclosure okay what page page 12 it says that employer contributions are five point eight eight million and benefit payments are 4.5 so Milliman is that I'm sorry show where we're in what in 2025 yeah okay employer contributions 5.877 and benefit payments 4.5 right so the benefit payments are showing us cash going out even if it's paid direct and those payments are considered contributions going in well the employer contributions yes the the payments are made are considered a contribution and the difference there um is roughly 1.25 million which is the amount that we transfer into the trust every year uh no it's uh 1.3 million okay because in fiscal year 2025 we paid 50 000 into the water and sewer 250 000 into the town fund and 1 million into public safety that's the 1.3 million yes so not only did they pay above the adc they paid an extra 50 000 from water and sewer well the adc is not on this page um we did not pay more than the adc um for water and sewer it's on the township website it's a negative number i don't think that we get the adc reported to us by um sub account i'm looking on page five and it's on the township website where on the township website um it is under the opeb actuarial calculations okay we'll be sure to go back and check that so having said that these are issues that we will definitely work with in the budget meetings on the 23rd so can i have a moment motion to approve item number seven so moved support all in favor say aye aye any opposed nay okay six to one thank you mark let's go with 7a approve the board minutes you had a question you pulled that off the consent agenda board minutes from January 26th yes I sent Martin the complete text of my

  95. into the trust every year uh no it's uh 1.3 million okay because in fiscal year 2025 we paid 50 000 into the water and sewer 250 000 into the town fund and 1 million into public safety that's the 1.3 million yes so not only did they pay above the adc they paid an extra 50 000 from water and sewer well the adc is not on this page um we did not pay more than the adc um for water and sewer it's on the township website it's a negative number i don't think that we get the adc reported to us by um sub account i'm looking on page five and it's on the township website where on the township website um it is under the opeb actuarial calculations okay we'll be sure to go back and check that so having said that these are issues that we will definitely work with in the budget meetings on the 23rd so can i have a moment motion to approve item number seven so moved support all in favor say aye aye any opposed nay okay six to one thank you mark let's go with 7a approve the board minutes you had a question you pulled that off the consent agenda board minutes from January 26th yes I sent Martin the complete text of my motion and the complete text was not included all the other motions are either included in the packet or in the minutes of every meeting that I've been in so I'd like to know why it wasn't included in the minutes so I can speak yeah go ahead so yeah so I did speak with the clerk on this issue as you recall that motion was made and not seconded so it died on the floor the minutes are governed by 15 MCL 15.269 within the open meetings act and what's required is a full publication of those resolutions that were passed because it wasn't we did a summary as you may recall it was quite lengthy but it is fully consistent with the open meetings act as summarized in the proposed minutes okay any further comments or questions if not I'll take a motion to approve the board minutes so moved support support all in favor say aye aye aye any opposed nay six to one okay item number we'll call 7b approval of payroll and vouchers mark my no vote still stands the I still don't know which fund was used to pay for public safety in the road fund

  96. board minutes from January 26th yes I sent Martin the complete text of my motion and the complete text was not included all the other motions are either included in the packet or in the minutes of every meeting that I've been in so I'd like to know why it wasn't included in the minutes so I can speak yeah go ahead so yeah so I did speak with the clerk on this issue as you recall that motion was made and not seconded so it died on the floor the minutes are governed by 15 MCL 15.269 within the open meetings act and what's required is a full publication of those resolutions that were passed because it wasn't we did a summary as you may recall it was quite lengthy but it is fully consistent with the open meetings act as summarized in the proposed minutes okay any further comments or questions if not I'll take a motion to approve the board minutes so moved support support all in favor say aye aye aye any opposed nay six to one okay item number we'll call 7b approval of payroll and vouchers mark my no vote still stands the I still don't know which fund was used to pay for public safety in the road fund public safety had a negative balance from September through December until we started receiving taxes according to the audit we have there's only one unrestricted fund and that's the general fund so I would like to know where the funds came from which what was the source of the funds to pay those bills okay is there support for the a motion to approve item B so move support all in favor say aye aye any opposed nay six to one thank you and having said that we are adjourned right we are adjourned oh yeah support support all in favor say aye