the-compact
Road Advisory Committee Tuesday, October 14, 2025 · 50 min

Road Advisory Committee Update on October 13, 2025

Summary

The city council meeting focused on fact-finding for road evaluation and potential solutions, discussing road conditions, funding, and maintenance with various stakeholders, including the Road Advisory Committee and the Michigan Department of Transportation.

  • Bloomfield Township's roads are in poor condition due to lack of financial aid.
  • The township has no authority over county-owned roads, which are in various conditions.
  • The city council is conducting fact-finding on the township's road situation, dividing into four subcommittees for presentations.
  • The Michigan Department of Transportation and Road Commission for Oakland County are responsible for road maintenance in Michigan and Oakland County.
  • The township faces challenges in funding road repairs due to limited millage and debt.

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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. All right, item number four, one of the finest road advisory committees there is in the township, right? Welcome, Jess Sahls, our chair of our road advisory committee. And I know we have many of our members with us tonight here. Thank you very much. I didn't expect to have to do this, too. I thought someone else was going to do this. All right, well, first of all, I wanted to thank you for devoting this time for us to present what we've been working on for the last six months. And as you'll see from tonight's report, it's a very, very complex issue. And it's also a very fluid issue. Things are changing all the time, especially now with the budget. So you'll see from the report how fluid and how complex this issue is. So, Mr. Sahls, by the way, if you do want assistance to move the slides, we can do it. Just say move slide. Would you? Sure. Thanks. Okay, go to the next slide. All right. If you remember last March. Can you move your microphone closer to you? Like this? Yeah, there you go. Yeah. Okay, there we are. It's a digital connection now, so sometimes it's hit or miss. Closer you get, sometimes the better chance we have of making the connection. Okay, if you remember last March, you asked that a new Citizens Advisory Committee be formed to look into the conditional. local roads in Bloomfield Township, which you all agree, the local roads are abominable, they're terrible. But also to look into the system that allows this to happen, the reasons for these conditions, and eventually some possible solutions that we could offer to get back on track. Next slide. So the first thing we did, well first we had a committee of nine members, it was formed. And except Mr. MacReady and myself, the members of Gary Asarian. Only two are not here tonight, everybody else is. John Servanak, Steve Harris, Jeff Hockman, Fred Nader, Mindy Richards, and Jay Shaw. Every one of these folks, they come from all over the township, different regions. All of them have demonstrated great leadership, whether at the township level, the HOA level, businesses, or other organizational roles. The committee has been meeting almost every other week since last April.

  2. It's a digital connection now, so sometimes it's hit or miss. Closer you get, sometimes the better chance we have of making the connection. Okay, if you remember last March, you asked that a new Citizens Advisory Committee be formed to look into the conditional. local roads in Bloomfield Township, which you all agree, the local roads are abominable, they're terrible. But also to look into the system that allows this to happen, the reasons for these conditions, and eventually some possible solutions that we could offer to get back on track. Next slide. So the first thing we did, well first we had a committee of nine members, it was formed. And except Mr. MacReady and myself, the members of Gary Asarian. Only two are not here tonight, everybody else is. John Servanak, Steve Harris, Jeff Hockman, Fred Nader, Mindy Richards, and Jay Shaw. Every one of these folks, they come from all over the township, different regions. All of them have demonstrated great leadership, whether at the township level, the HOA level, businesses, or other organizational roles. The committee has been meeting almost every other week since last April. And tonight we are going to report on the progress to this point, just to this point. Next slide. The first thing we did was we created a mission statement to remind us every meeting who we are, are what we're there to do, and to keep on track, and the Road Advisory Committee of Bloomfield Township is a volunteer group committed to supporting the community by reviewing current road conditions, identifying problem areas. discussing practical solutions for improvement and researching methods of promoting self autonomy of local roads. The committee works to explore feasible repair and maintenance strategies, research legislative funding opportunities, and develop creative cost effective recommendations. Acting as an advisory role, they will assist the Board of Trustees in making informed decisions about road related needs and priorities. And I just want to reiterate that except for Mr. McCready, none of the board, these members on this committee are paid and get nothing except the satisfaction of working for the community. The next, under the heading of a picture is worth a thousand words, this is called a PACER, P-A-S-E-R report.

  3. The committee has been meeting almost every other week since last April. And tonight we are going to report on the progress to this point, just to this point. Next slide. The first thing we did was we created a mission statement to remind us every meeting who we are, are what we're there to do, and to keep on track, and the Road Advisory Committee of Bloomfield Township is a volunteer group committed to supporting the community by reviewing current road conditions, identifying problem areas. discussing practical solutions for improvement and researching methods of promoting self autonomy of local roads. The committee works to explore feasible repair and maintenance strategies, research legislative funding opportunities, and develop creative cost effective recommendations. Acting as an advisory role, they will assist the Board of Trustees in making informed decisions about road related needs and priorities. And I just want to reiterate that except for Mr. McCready, none of the board, these members on this committee are paid and get nothing except the satisfaction of working for the community. The next, under the heading of a picture is worth a thousand words, this is called a PACER, P-A-S-E-R report. It is prepared, now it's being prepared by Hubbell, Roth, and Clark for the road commission of Oakland County. And that's who publishes it. So this is not something that was prepared by the township or any of us. This comes directly from the county who publishes and Hubbell, Roth, and Clark does the research. We'll have much more to discuss on all this later during the reports. But I wanted to introduce to this because this pretty much sums up where we are right now. And this report is published every three years. So this one, it says 2024. I'm not sure when the documentation was gotten or how old it is. It's changed since then, and it's going to change. But this is the most- recent one we have. The way this is on this report, these are all, by the way, these are the local roads. When we say local, what our committee says is local, our subdivision roads, the roads that your driveway empties out into, the roads you take a walk on, you ride your bike, whatever, those are the local roads. So what this shows here is that all the green roads, the green lines, this is every road

  4. The next, under the heading of a picture is worth a thousand words, this is called a PACER, P-A-S-E-R report. It is prepared, now it's being prepared by Hubbell, Roth, and Clark for the road commission of Oakland County. And that's who publishes it. So this is not something that was prepared by the township or any of us. This comes directly from the county who publishes and Hubbell, Roth, and Clark does the research. We'll have much more to discuss on all this later during the reports. But I wanted to introduce to this because this pretty much sums up where we are right now. And this report is published every three years. So this one, it says 2024. I'm not sure when the documentation was gotten or how old it is. It's changed since then, and it's going to change. But this is the most- recent one we have. The way this is on this report, these are all, by the way, these are the local roads. When we say local, what our committee says is local, our subdivision roads, the roads that your driveway empties out into, the roads you take a walk on, you ride your bike, whatever, those are the local roads. So what this shows here is that all the green roads, the green lines, this is every road in the township, every local road, all the green ones are in good condition. All the yellow ones are fair, and all the red ones are in poor condition, needing to be replaced. So there's a lot more to be talked about this later, but there's two big takeaways from this one picture. Number one is look at all the red. All those roads need to be replaced. Now, again, some of them may have been improved, for instance, Bluefield Village. They had a lot of work done at great expense to each homeowner, but some of those have been repaired. However, some of the yellow roads that are in there on yellow, some of them will probably fall into the red. We have no documentation on that. This is the report we have. That's all we've got right now. We'll get later ones as they come out. The second thing that comes out of these is that everyone of these roads, everyone, is owned by the county. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. Bloomfield Township has no ownership and has no authority over any of these roads. Now granted, the police department gives tickets or whatever, but we have no authority to do anything on any of these roads.

  5. what this shows here is that all the green roads, the green lines, this is every road in the township, every local road, all the green ones are in good condition. All the yellow ones are fair, and all the red ones are in poor condition, needing to be replaced. So there's a lot more to be talked about this later, but there's two big takeaways from this one picture. Number one is look at all the red. All those roads need to be replaced. Now, again, some of them may have been improved, for instance, Bluefield Village. They had a lot of work done at great expense to each homeowner, but some of those have been repaired. However, some of the yellow roads that are in there on yellow, some of them will probably fall into the red. We have no documentation on that. This is the report we have. That's all we've got right now. We'll get later ones as they come out. The second thing that comes out of these is that everyone of these roads, everyone, is owned by the county. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. Bloomfield Township has no ownership and has no authority over any of these roads. Now granted, the police department gives tickets or whatever, but we have no authority to do anything on any of these roads. And the position that the county has taken all these years has been, these are your roads, you drive on them, if you want to fix it, you pay for them. Well, can you imagine, I have a commercial building, I have a tenant in that commercial building. And imagine if you came to me and said, Mr. Sauls, your roof is leaking on the building. And I'd say, well, you're using it, you fix it. How long do you think that would last? Well, that's basically what the county has been telling us. But then after they tell us that, if we want to propose any sort of traffic mitigation or traffic calming or any, close off any streets to stop cut through traffic. Well, the county then says, no, these are public roads, they're open to the entire community. Everybody uses them. You can't do that. Okay, which is it? More on that later. Next slide. So what we did was, instead of going on the internet to look for all the statistics and figures we want, knowing, of course, that everything on the internet is absolutely true and factual, we decided that we wanted to go to primary sources. We went, so we started right here in Bloomfield Township with Noah Mahal.

  6. And the position that the county has taken all these years has been, these are your roads, you drive on them, if you want to fix it, you pay for them. Well, can you imagine, I have a commercial building, I have a tenant in that commercial building. And imagine if you came to me and said, Mr. Sauls, your roof is leaking on the building. And I'd say, well, you're using it, you fix it. How long do you think that would last? Well, that's basically what the county has been telling us. But then after they tell us that, if we want to propose any sort of traffic mitigation or traffic calming or any, close off any streets to stop cut through traffic. Well, the county then says, no, these are public roads, they're open to the entire community. Everybody uses them. You can't do that. Okay, which is it? More on that later. Next slide. So what we did was, instead of going on the internet to look for all the statistics and figures we want, knowing, of course, that everything on the internet is absolutely true and factual, we decided that we wanted to go to primary sources. We went, so we started right here in Bloomfield Township with Noah Mahal. our Director of Public Works, and from there we went to the Road Commission for Oakland County, then we had finance from the township. And then we went to other places, we had MDOT, we had our engineering people. We even went outside to other communities that had the same problem that had been working on it before we got started, so that maybe we wouldn't have to reinvent the wheel. Let's see what they did, so we got them to come and talk to us. And we got our State Representative, Donny Steele, to come and talk to us and tell us about what's going on in Lansing. So, I think, is there a next, yeah, okay. So what we did is we divided into four subcommittees. We have the current situation in Bloomfield Township, no, don't go any further. The current situation in Bloomfield Township, the current situation county and state, the current situation financial, and then the current situation, the township roads, and financing. So what we have here tonight, we've broken into four subcommittees, and each one is going to do a presentation on this. But what I want to tell you is that this is just, we just fact found. This is where we are, just fact finding.

  7. our Director of Public Works, and from there we went to the Road Commission for Oakland County, then we had finance from the township. And then we went to other places, we had MDOT, we had our engineering people. We even went outside to other communities that had the same problem that had been working on it before we got started, so that maybe we wouldn't have to reinvent the wheel. Let's see what they did, so we got them to come and talk to us. And we got our State Representative, Donny Steele, to come and talk to us and tell us about what's going on in Lansing. So, I think, is there a next, yeah, okay. So what we did is we divided into four subcommittees. We have the current situation in Bloomfield Township, no, don't go any further. The current situation in Bloomfield Township, the current situation county and state, the current situation financial, and then the current situation, the township roads, and financing. So what we have here tonight, we've broken into four subcommittees, and each one is going to do a presentation on this. But what I want to tell you is that this is just, we just fact found. This is where we are, just fact finding. There's a very good quote from Winston Churchill that really sums up where we are here. And he said, this is not the end, it's not the beginning of the end, but it's the end of the beginning. So we're at that point right now. So I. I would say that if anybody's here or watching online that thinks we're going to come up with these wonderful solutions tonight, and here's some solutions to this problem, you'll be sorely disappointed because there are none, not yet. This is simply fact-finding. So what we'd like to do is have each one of the subcommittees report. And then have you folks on the board, if you have any questions, that is, after each section, rather wait until the end to do all of it, do each section at a time. So with that, I'm going to introduce the first one, current situation in the township, John Cervanac. Thank you, Jeff. First of all, good evening to the members of the board and the interested residents. My name is John Cervanac. I've been a township resident for over 23 years. I've been a computer scientist, a technical support manager, and a problem solver for over 46 years. I serve on the board of the Hampton Hills Homeowners Association as vice president.

  8. This is where we are, just fact finding. There's a very good quote from Winston Churchill that really sums up where we are here. And he said, this is not the end, it's not the beginning of the end, but it's the end of the beginning. So we're at that point right now. So I. I would say that if anybody's here or watching online that thinks we're going to come up with these wonderful solutions tonight, and here's some solutions to this problem, you'll be sorely disappointed because there are none, not yet. This is simply fact-finding. So what we'd like to do is have each one of the subcommittees report. And then have you folks on the board, if you have any questions, that is, after each section, rather wait until the end to do all of it, do each section at a time. So with that, I'm going to introduce the first one, current situation in the township, John Cervanac. Thank you, Jeff. First of all, good evening to the members of the board and the interested residents. My name is John Cervanac. I've been a township resident for over 23 years. I've been a computer scientist, a technical support manager, and a problem solver for over 46 years. I serve on the board of the Hampton Hills Homeowners Association as vice president. And I invited Supervisor McCready shortly after his election to one of our HOA meetings to meet some of his constituents, as well as talk about what his plans were for our township. One of his major concerns were that of the condition of the roads. He was in the process of forming an advisory committee to study the current situation, investigate options, and to address the issue. to provide recommendations for solutions I immediately accepted the opportunity to be on that committee and so here I am first step in problem solving is to fully understand the problem as you saw earlier over the past several months we brought in experts from township other municipalities and from the county and state to hear about their roles what they have done and the challenges we have so we're ready to we are not ready to recommend any solutions but with that let me describe the problems next slide please so as Jeff mentioned there's a sole situation of road evaluation that's based on this thing called PACER the Transportation Asset Management Council of Michigan

  9. I serve on the board of the Hampton Hills Homeowners Association as vice president. And I invited Supervisor McCready shortly after his election to one of our HOA meetings to meet some of his constituents, as well as talk about what his plans were for our township. One of his major concerns were that of the condition of the roads. He was in the process of forming an advisory committee to study the current situation, investigate options, and to address the issue. to provide recommendations for solutions I immediately accepted the opportunity to be on that committee and so here I am first step in problem solving is to fully understand the problem as you saw earlier over the past several months we brought in experts from township other municipalities and from the county and state to hear about their roles what they have done and the challenges we have so we're ready to we are not ready to recommend any solutions but with that let me describe the problems next slide please so as Jeff mentioned there's a sole situation of road evaluation that's based on this thing called PACER the Transportation Asset Management Council of Michigan coordinates over a hundred teams of trained people to assess the condition of the road statewide and this process is done every three years so the data that you see is one of the charts or diagrams that Jeff had brought up is during that three-year period you may see differences in your areas obviously if there's been improvements or in some cases if roadways have gotten worse but they're all based on using this PACER rating which is a scale of one meaning failed up to ten being good and listed in that chart there are also recommended recommended treatments by which how to bring it up to you So the charts that you'll see are going to be associated with good, fair, or poor. So it groups the bottom four categories of the PACER ratings into the poor, which will show up as red on the roadways. The next three would be rated as fair and the top three are rated as good. Next slide, please. So first of all, who's responsible for the conditions of the roadways? The Michigan Department of Transportation's responsibility is with major highways, which are the U.S. highways,

  10. thing called PACER the Transportation Asset Management Council of Michigan coordinates over a hundred teams of trained people to assess the condition of the road statewide and this process is done every three years so the data that you see is one of the charts or diagrams that Jeff had brought up is during that three-year period you may see differences in your areas obviously if there's been improvements or in some cases if roadways have gotten worse but they're all based on using this PACER rating which is a scale of one meaning failed up to ten being good and listed in that chart there are also recommended recommended treatments by which how to bring it up to you So the charts that you'll see are going to be associated with good, fair, or poor. So it groups the bottom four categories of the PACER ratings into the poor, which will show up as red on the roadways. The next three would be rated as fair and the top three are rated as good. Next slide, please. So first of all, who's responsible for the conditions of the roadways? The Michigan Department of Transportation's responsibility is with major highways, which are the U.S. highways, the ones that start with a U, like U.S. 24 telegraph. The interstate roads, we're all familiar with I-75, I-696. The M roads, which are things like M1 or Woodward Avenue, for instance. So the Michigan Department of Transportation is responsible for only those highways. As far as we're concerned for Oakland County, the Road Commission for Oakland County is responsible for the other main roads in Oakland County, as well as the subdivision streets in Oakland County's townships only. If it's a city or a village, the city or the village is responsible for those. Next slide, please. So obviously road maintenance takes money. So where does the Road Commission of Oakland County, who is responsible for our subdivision roads, get its money? Well, main roads are partially funded by federal and state aid, and the remainder of that is with their budget. For subdivision streets, there specifically is no federal or state aid, only the county budget. And you'll hear more about this Public Act 51, which is the law that was passed that imposes the restrictions on it, unless it's a city or a village.

  11. The Michigan Department of Transportation's responsibility is with major highways, which are the U.S. highways, the ones that start with a U, like U.S. 24 telegraph. The interstate roads, we're all familiar with I-75, I-696. The M roads, which are things like M1 or Woodward Avenue, for instance. So the Michigan Department of Transportation is responsible for only those highways. As far as we're concerned for Oakland County, the Road Commission for Oakland County is responsible for the other main roads in Oakland County, as well as the subdivision streets in Oakland County's townships only. If it's a city or a village, the city or the village is responsible for those. Next slide, please. So obviously road maintenance takes money. So where does the Road Commission of Oakland County, who is responsible for our subdivision roads, get its money? Well, main roads are partially funded by federal and state aid, and the remainder of that is with their budget. For subdivision streets, there specifically is no federal or state aid, only the county budget. And you'll hear more about this Public Act 51, which is the law that was passed that imposes the restrictions on it, unless it's a city or a village. So with no financial aid for subdivision streets, obviously the improvements have to come from somewhere, and they come from something called a Special Assessment District or SAD. Next slide, please. So what's a Special Assessment District? It's a designated area where a majority of the property owners agree to allow a governmental agency to levy a special property tax in exchange for a specific service, such as the paving or repaving a residential street. So that governmental agency agrees to pay for the cost of the service upfront, and then the property owners agree to pay back their share over a period of years in the form of a special property tax. And some of the residents may be experiencing the SAD now, and we'll go into details of those later. Next slide, please. So this is a PACER diagram of the current conditions of the main roads in Oakland County. So you can see, once again, the good roads in the top three categories are rated green, so several of them are green. The next level of . The next level of . Oh .

  12. imposes the restrictions on it, unless it's a city or a village. So with no financial aid for subdivision streets, obviously the improvements have to come from somewhere, and they come from something called a Special Assessment District or SAD. Next slide, please. So what's a Special Assessment District? It's a designated area where a majority of the property owners agree to allow a governmental agency to levy a special property tax in exchange for a specific service, such as the paving or repaving a residential street. So that governmental agency agrees to pay for the cost of the service upfront, and then the property owners agree to pay back their share over a period of years in the form of a special property tax. And some of the residents may be experiencing the SAD now, and we'll go into details of those later. Next slide, please. So this is a PACER diagram of the current conditions of the main roads in Oakland County. So you can see, once again, the good roads in the top three categories are rated green, so several of them are green. The next level of . The next level of . Oh . Ratings are rated fair, and so a majority of our things are in fair condition. And then there's a few of them that are marked in red. And once again, those are all the responsibility of the road commission for Oakland County, and they do get financial aid to maintain those roads. Next slide, please. So this is another look at the township roads that are in the subdivisions where there is no financial aid. And obviously, as Jeff had mentioned before, the majority of them are in red, which are desperately in need of repair, which I don't need to tell residents that or even the board that. You're probably all familiar with that. And it's not just a problem with our township. Next slide, please. If you look at all of Oakland County for the roadways that are not maintained by MDOT, nor have any federal or state funding, in other words, local roads, the majority of those are also in poor condition with a bunch of sprinkled through fair ones, and you can barely find any green ones in there at all. So obviously, it's a problem not with Bloomfield Township, but with most of the county. In fact, if you bring up a chart, which I didn't bring, of all of southeastern Michigan,

  13. Ratings are rated fair, and so a majority of our things are in fair condition. And then there's a few of them that are marked in red. And once again, those are all the responsibility of the road commission for Oakland County, and they do get financial aid to maintain those roads. Next slide, please. So this is another look at the township roads that are in the subdivisions where there is no financial aid. And obviously, as Jeff had mentioned before, the majority of them are in red, which are desperately in need of repair, which I don't need to tell residents that or even the board that. You're probably all familiar with that. And it's not just a problem with our township. Next slide, please. If you look at all of Oakland County for the roadways that are not maintained by MDOT, nor have any federal or state funding, in other words, local roads, the majority of those are also in poor condition with a bunch of sprinkled through fair ones, and you can barely find any green ones in there at all. So obviously, it's a problem not with Bloomfield Township, but with most of the county. In fact, if you bring up a chart, which I didn't bring, of all of southeastern Michigan, it seems to mimic the same sort of symptoms. Next slide, please. So Bloomfield Township has their own road division. It's responsible for 213 miles. Thank you. of subdivision streets, which include 37 miles of unpaid gravel roads. So that means we can maintain those road surfaces, but we can't replace or reconstruct those surfaces. So they do the gravel replacement on the gravel roads. Obviously during the winter time, we've got the snow plows and the salt laying out there. We do do, or the department does do asphalt patching in areas, and then they also do what's called the asphalt overlay for minor repairs. It's not a reconstruction of the asphalt roads, but it's a thin layer of asphalt that does address some of the issues, but if you have deep potholes in it, those don't get fixed at all. That does require replacement. As Jeff mentioned, the township doesn't have ownership or jurisdiction over the roads. In other words, if you want a speed limit change, you can't do that. If you want to put signage up, you can't do that. If in your subdivision, you're concerned that cars

  14. In fact, if you bring up a chart, which I didn't bring, of all of southeastern Michigan, it seems to mimic the same sort of symptoms. Next slide, please. So Bloomfield Township has their own road division. It's responsible for 213 miles. Thank you. of subdivision streets, which include 37 miles of unpaid gravel roads. So that means we can maintain those road surfaces, but we can't replace or reconstruct those surfaces. So they do the gravel replacement on the gravel roads. Obviously during the winter time, we've got the snow plows and the salt laying out there. We do do, or the department does do asphalt patching in areas, and then they also do what's called the asphalt overlay for minor repairs. It's not a reconstruction of the asphalt roads, but it's a thin layer of asphalt that does address some of the issues, but if you have deep potholes in it, those don't get fixed at all. That does require replacement. As Jeff mentioned, the township doesn't have ownership or jurisdiction over the roads. In other words, if you want a speed limit change, you can't do that. If you want to put signage up, you can't do that. If in your subdivision, you're concerned that cars that are cutting through are going through at a high rate of speed and you want speed humps, you have to deal with the road commission for Oakland County on that. You can't deal with the township because they have no jurisdiction over the local roads. And again, the township is not responsible for repaving or replacing any of the roads. Next slide, please. So in summary, the subdivision streets in Bloomfield Township are mostly rated as poor, obviously. And then currently, the only option- And it's it's like this one of the brides Thank you. for those that recognize the poor condition of the street is to pay for it themselves through an SAD process. Next slide, please. So what does that mean? Property owners barely cost some upwards of $60,000 per lot to have the road repaved in front of your house. Doesn't seem to make any sense because residents are paying to replace roads that they don't own at all. It becomes a debt to your property. It's a significant financial burden, and it certainly is a sustainable solution to be told that you have to pay for having stuff fixed in front of your house that you don't even own. Next slide, please.

  15. If in your subdivision, you're concerned that cars that are cutting through are going through at a high rate of speed and you want speed humps, you have to deal with the road commission for Oakland County on that. You can't deal with the township because they have no jurisdiction over the local roads. And again, the township is not responsible for repaving or replacing any of the roads. Next slide, please. So in summary, the subdivision streets in Bloomfield Township are mostly rated as poor, obviously. And then currently, the only option- And it's it's like this one of the brides Thank you. for those that recognize the poor condition of the street is to pay for it themselves through an SAD process. Next slide, please. So what does that mean? Property owners barely cost some upwards of $60,000 per lot to have the road repaved in front of your house. Doesn't seem to make any sense because residents are paying to replace roads that they don't own at all. It becomes a debt to your property. It's a significant financial burden, and it certainly is a sustainable solution to be told that you have to pay for having stuff fixed in front of your house that you don't even own. Next slide, please. So on the other side, you probably realize that most subdivisions in Bloomfield Township don't have sidewalks, which means that the roadways are carrying pedestrian traffic, bicyclists, as well as the motor vehicle traffic. And so the poor road conditions that we may have present themselves as a safety issue for those types of people on the road. The interesting thing about it is the road commission rates when to do stuff on roadways based on safety issues. It's not how bad stuff is, but how unsafe it is. So the fact that we're mixing pedestrian traffic and bicycle traffic and vehicular traffic should be more motivation. So the road we're looking at are spoiled unrespons diffé Shamit on campus. Save Crossing for the uh road county or road commission of oakland county to pay attention to it they just need money obviously are there any questions from the board okay thank you john i do have uh two questions um the date on your map and the date on ắp are different and they're offset by over a year correct i downloaded it on the in the september

  16. So on the other side, you probably realize that most subdivisions in Bloomfield Township don't have sidewalks, which means that the roadways are carrying pedestrian traffic, bicyclists, as well as the motor vehicle traffic. And so the poor road conditions that we may have present themselves as a safety issue for those types of people on the road. The interesting thing about it is the road commission rates when to do stuff on roadways based on safety issues. It's not how bad stuff is, but how unsafe it is. So the fact that we're mixing pedestrian traffic and bicycle traffic and vehicular traffic should be more motivation. So the road we're looking at are spoiled unrespons diffé Shamit on campus. Save Crossing for the uh road county or road commission of oakland county to pay attention to it they just need money obviously are there any questions from the board okay thank you john i do have uh two questions um the date on your map and the date on ắp are different and they're offset by over a year correct i downloaded it on the in the september date but the data in the database is based on the assessment that's made every three years that assessment that's in the database for semcog is from 2024. so if roads may have been improved since then roads may have gotten worse but if you were to go and look at what the data is that was collected from the actual over hundreds of groups that had gone out it's frozen in time until they do the next three-year cycle and based on the oakland county map it doesn't appear that the cities and villages are doing any better than the townships i've left out the cities and the villages because i want to focus only on the issue that the road commission doesn't get money for townships and for their local roads the local roads for townships and villages are managed by the city itself and they do get this uh public at pa 51 money i'm just localized are focusing on what the road commission can do for us with or without the funding as well as all of oakland county like that pontiac's all red on your map so that's a city

  17. are different and they're offset by over a year correct i downloaded it on the in the september date but the data in the database is based on the assessment that's made every three years that assessment that's in the database for semcog is from 2024. so if roads may have been improved since then roads may have gotten worse but if you were to go and look at what the data is that was collected from the actual over hundreds of groups that had gone out it's frozen in time until they do the next three-year cycle and based on the oakland county map it doesn't appear that the cities and villages are doing any better than the townships i've left out the cities and the villages because i want to focus only on the issue that the road commission doesn't get money for townships and for their local roads the local roads for townships and villages are managed by the city itself and they do get this uh public at pa 51 money i'm just localized are focusing on what the road commission can do for us with or without the funding as well as all of oakland county like that pontiac's all red on your map so that's a city that's you know which is kind of concerning if the cities are removed that there should be nothing there or if it's properly being managed because they have the additional funds then it should be green um so that's a concern and you can even look at boomfield hills again uh is boomfield hill city green or red so it's just kind of confusing that if there's not enough road money in uh to fund the city of pontiac how would we have access to additional funds if we were a village or if correct no yeah you have same concern i i did because i focused on there's a switch in simcog that says are they federally funded or not and that was the diagram was generated by saying it's not funded which means they don't get pa 51 funds i had the same concern mark when i looked at rochester hills where i used to live because the street i had lived on lived on also was reported out there and i would have assumed it was omitted from the chart but i'm getting the data from so you

  18. that's you know which is kind of concerning if the cities are removed that there should be nothing there or if it's properly being managed because they have the additional funds then it should be green um so that's a concern and you can even look at boomfield hills again uh is boomfield hill city green or red so it's just kind of confusing that if there's not enough road money in uh to fund the city of pontiac how would we have access to additional funds if we were a village or if correct no yeah you have same concern i i did because i focused on there's a switch in simcog that says are they federally funded or not and that was the diagram was generated by saying it's not funded which means they don't get pa 51 funds i had the same concern mark when i looked at rochester hills where i used to live because the street i had lived on lived on also was reported out there and i would have assumed it was omitted from the chart but i'm getting the data from so you COG. Okay. I understand your concern. Any other questions? Thank you. All right, next section for the county and state portion, Dr. Gary Asurian. Thank you. Good evening. Thank you for asking me to speak and being part of the organization that Jeff's put together, which it's been very eye opening and important that we actually establish why we are where we are and before we get into solutions. So I'm going to probably reiterate some of the things that you just heard, but it's important that we emphasize them and maybe get a better handle on sort of what we have to look at before. I'm Gary Asurian. I'm a retired pathologist informatics person. I've lived in Bloomfield Township since 88 and been on various committees with through the HOA in the area and did the pancake supper and all sorts of things. So I've been around for a while and I appreciate the opportunity to participate in this project because I am a person who tried to get a sad bill through my subdivision

  19. COG. Okay. I understand your concern. Any other questions? Thank you. All right, next section for the county and state portion, Dr. Gary Asurian. Thank you. Good evening. Thank you for asking me to speak and being part of the organization that Jeff's put together, which it's been very eye opening and important that we actually establish why we are where we are and before we get into solutions. So I'm going to probably reiterate some of the things that you just heard, but it's important that we emphasize them and maybe get a better handle on sort of what we have to look at before. I'm Gary Asurian. I'm a retired pathologist informatics person. I've lived in Bloomfield Township since 88 and been on various committees with through the HOA in the area and did the pancake supper and all sorts of things. So I've been around for a while and I appreciate the opportunity to participate in this project because I am a person who tried to get a sad bill through my subdivision and it failed. So I kind of know that the goods and the bads of the whole process. So next slide. We're all here because of Public Act 51, which was created in 1951, and it's established the Michigan Transportation Fund. The fees were based on motor vehicle registrations and fuel tax, and it was allocated to provide funding for roads and road maintenance. To date there are over 300 amendments to the Public Act 51. It's very difficult to wade through all the different rules and regulations and restrictions that evolve into it, and we'll get into some specific parts of it, which really put townships in a bad way. The current funding has really dried up. At one time we had a robust system here in Michigan. We were the top ten state in the country as far as road quality in the 50s and 60s, and now I think we're in the bottom ten of road quality because we've kind of neglected our roads.

  20. participate in this project because I am a person who tried to get a sad bill through my subdivision and it failed. So I kind of know that the goods and the bads of the whole process. So next slide. We're all here because of Public Act 51, which was created in 1951, and it's established the Michigan Transportation Fund. The fees were based on motor vehicle registrations and fuel tax, and it was allocated to provide funding for roads and road maintenance. To date there are over 300 amendments to the Public Act 51. It's very difficult to wade through all the different rules and regulations and restrictions that evolve into it, and we'll get into some specific parts of it, which really put townships in a bad way. The current funding has really dried up. At one time we had a robust system here in Michigan. We were the top ten state in the country as far as road quality in the 50s and 60s, and now I think we're in the bottom ten of road quality because we've kind of neglected our roads. Politicians have made a career out of saying to fix the roads or not fix the roads, and if you look at what we've done, it's been pretty feeble. The need remains high, the solutions are diverse, and it's caused local governments, as John mentioned, to various directions of self-funding and creating of these special assessment districts. which have all sorts of issues and problems associated with them. Thank you. Next slide. Within the, why is the issue of quality controlled? I mean, the road quality still remain. It's basically the allocation formula is unbalanced and it's not proper as far as, you know, I'm concerned and the committee is concerned. Sparsely populated areas and rural counties receive more funding per resident even though dense urban areas have the highest share of funding. So thus there's a need to evaluate the efficiencies of the funding system and how the unbalanced can be rebalanced.

  21. and now I think we're in the bottom ten of road quality because we've kind of neglected our roads. Politicians have made a career out of saying to fix the roads or not fix the roads, and if you look at what we've done, it's been pretty feeble. The need remains high, the solutions are diverse, and it's caused local governments, as John mentioned, to various directions of self-funding and creating of these special assessment districts. which have all sorts of issues and problems associated with them. Thank you. Next slide. Within the, why is the issue of quality controlled? I mean, the road quality still remain. It's basically the allocation formula is unbalanced and it's not proper as far as, you know, I'm concerned and the committee is concerned. Sparsely populated areas and rural counties receive more funding per resident even though dense urban areas have the highest share of funding. So thus there's a need to evaluate the efficiencies of the funding system and how the unbalanced can be rebalanced. The Michigan Department of Transportation is primarily responsible for maintaining, constructing and improving the trunk line highways. And they receive all their funding from the Michigan Transportation Fund. Next. The county road commissions, there's a jurisdiction maintenance and construction. The jurisdiction for the roads commission, they're responsible for roads in the township that's at the county level. And maintenance and construction, the commissions are responsible for maintaining, constructing these roads. And in Public Act 51, however, the system does not include funding for townships. Why is this important? because townships are governed differently than other entities or institutions in cities and village institutions where we are kind of tapped out at a millage rate, I think is at 10, and if we were a different sort of a city charter, you could have a mill rate up to 20. So it's just a consideration to take into mind that some of these things you're kind of caught in like a Charlotte's Web.

  22. So thus there's a need to evaluate the efficiencies of the funding system and how the unbalanced can be rebalanced. The Michigan Department of Transportation is primarily responsible for maintaining, constructing and improving the trunk line highways. And they receive all their funding from the Michigan Transportation Fund. Next. The county road commissions, there's a jurisdiction maintenance and construction. The jurisdiction for the roads commission, they're responsible for roads in the township that's at the county level. And maintenance and construction, the commissions are responsible for maintaining, constructing these roads. And in Public Act 51, however, the system does not include funding for townships. Why is this important? because townships are governed differently than other entities or institutions in cities and village institutions where we are kind of tapped out at a millage rate, I think is at 10, and if we were a different sort of a city charter, you could have a mill rate up to 20. So it's just a consideration to take into mind that some of these things you're kind of caught in like a Charlotte's Web. Next one. Responsibilities are the key players. Sorry, I have to keep using my reading glasses here. The Road Commission, they maintain the roads, and I think to a person, people would say that they do a very good job on a daily basis. Especially in the winter, it's hard to get to say anything bad about the salting, and the snow removal, and some of the other things. And then the Road Commission is responsible for major roads, and the MDOT handles all the trunk lines and those sorts of things, which I think we're all aware of. Next slide. In Bloomfield Township, the local roads are deteriorating, as was mentioned. All you have to do is take a look around. The residents and roads are getting... The... The... The... residents report roads are getting bigger and bigger potholes patching has become a problem it's ongoing people call when the bike people on bikes have issues um and now they have these scooters that you have to go along and we all have to remember that our township doesn't require

  23. So it's just a consideration to take into mind that some of these things you're kind of caught in like a Charlotte's Web. Next one. Responsibilities are the key players. Sorry, I have to keep using my reading glasses here. The Road Commission, they maintain the roads, and I think to a person, people would say that they do a very good job on a daily basis. Especially in the winter, it's hard to get to say anything bad about the salting, and the snow removal, and some of the other things. And then the Road Commission is responsible for major roads, and the MDOT handles all the trunk lines and those sorts of things, which I think we're all aware of. Next slide. In Bloomfield Township, the local roads are deteriorating, as was mentioned. All you have to do is take a look around. The residents and roads are getting... The... The... The... residents report roads are getting bigger and bigger potholes patching has become a problem it's ongoing people call when the bike people on bikes have issues um and now they have these scooters that you have to go along and we all have to remember that our township doesn't require sidewalks to be built for um new new construction and so the the roads are really the the the most important means of not only for the transportation of the cars but the the uh the pedestrian and and the uh the playing uh areas for the kids um they may uh to the chagrin of the residents the maintenance programs have been non-existent and so they've kind of gone out to to um seek their own remedies the the degree of neglect as john showed is pretty universal within the townships and um that's pretty much all i have to say about about that except for the the thing that um it's not just uh an eyesore or your tires going we we actually had a young uh child um fall off their bike and break their arm um basically because of the roads uh recently within the last six or eight months and when you see the kids coming down it's really a safety issue issue that we're all facing and and something bad is going to will happen and then everyone you

  24. scooters that you have to go along and we all have to remember that our township doesn't require sidewalks to be built for um new new construction and so the the roads are really the the the most important means of not only for the transportation of the cars but the the uh the pedestrian and and the uh the playing uh areas for the kids um they may uh to the chagrin of the residents the maintenance programs have been non-existent and so they've kind of gone out to to um seek their own remedies the the degree of neglect as john showed is pretty universal within the townships and um that's pretty much all i have to say about about that except for the the thing that um it's not just uh an eyesore or your tires going we we actually had a young uh child um fall off their bike and break their arm um basically because of the roads uh recently within the last six or eight months and when you see the kids coming down it's really a safety issue issue that we're all facing and and something bad is going to will happen and then everyone you will just look at each other and say geez what happened so anyway that's why i'm kind of proud to be on the group i think the group is doing a pretty um comprehensive job so that you can do your job and if anyone has any questions i'd be glad to answer them thanks gary any questions for gary okay thank you thank you you want me to go through the financing that's you okay i guess i'm up okay thank you all right go to the next slide in yeah sure okay so this is what our revenue comes in at for our our road funding is through taxes and assessments uh road fund repayments from the county and transfers in next slide amber so the funding road mills for general fund and rcoc reimbursement state road bloomfield township does not receive any state funding specifically for roads it all comes from the road commission of oakland county we do have a maintenance agreement with the road commission we get reimbursed about eight hundred thousand dollars a year annually and it increases at a rate of two percent township road roads revenue we received 3.4 million dollars we transfer in from

  25. will just look at each other and say geez what happened so anyway that's why i'm kind of proud to be on the group i think the group is doing a pretty um comprehensive job so that you can do your job and if anyone has any questions i'd be glad to answer them thanks gary any questions for gary okay thank you thank you you want me to go through the financing that's you okay i guess i'm up okay thank you all right go to the next slide in yeah sure okay so this is what our revenue comes in at for our our road funding is through taxes and assessments uh road fund repayments from the county and transfers in next slide amber so the funding road mills for general fund and rcoc reimbursement state road bloomfield township does not receive any state funding specifically for roads it all comes from the road commission of oakland county we do have a maintenance agreement with the road commission we get reimbursed about eight hundred thousand dollars a year annually and it increases at a rate of two percent township road roads revenue we received 3.4 million dollars we transfer in from the general fund which was 1.9 million that's the highest we've ever had it this year year um most years were under a million dollars however with the new funding that just was passed trust the state budget uh we will lose some funding we will lose some funding uh out of our uh constitutional funding uh we received constitutional and statutory funding from the state of michigan our constitutional funding i believe michael was what about four four and a hundred some thousand four four hundred twenty some thousand dollars right and our statutory funding was in the eighty thousand dollar range uh with the removal of the uh constitutional funding that that has just occurred in the new budget we estimate we'll be uh receiving three hundred thousand dollars or now less and this is money we did put towards roads um and then the three main funding sources are millage transfers in from our general fund the road commission which is 1.5 million of contracted paving 200 000 of patching 200 000 for salt on local roads and then we also have in there our personnel for retiree costs as well it's a very expensive now to pay repave a road as we're finding out uh through this budget that we have we're able

  26. of two percent township road roads revenue we received 3.4 million dollars we transfer in from the general fund which was 1.9 million that's the highest we've ever had it this year year um most years were under a million dollars however with the new funding that just was passed trust the state budget uh we will lose some funding we will lose some funding uh out of our uh constitutional funding uh we received constitutional and statutory funding from the state of michigan our constitutional funding i believe michael was what about four four and a hundred some thousand four four hundred twenty some thousand dollars right and our statutory funding was in the eighty thousand dollar range uh with the removal of the uh constitutional funding that that has just occurred in the new budget we estimate we'll be uh receiving three hundred thousand dollars or now less and this is money we did put towards roads um and then the three main funding sources are millage transfers in from our general fund the road commission which is 1.5 million of contracted paving 200 000 of patching 200 000 for salt on local roads and then we also have in there our personnel for retiree costs as well it's a very expensive now to pay repave a road as we're finding out uh through this budget that we have we're able to fix and repair not replace but fix and repair about two miles of roads a year in the township where we have over 200 miles of roads so it's it's not even a bandage of what it takes and now with the change in the funding model that was just introduced by the state which we're still learning about we hope to receive more support from the road commission but we don't know exactly you what that looks like it's all under the microscope and we'll learn over the next month or so exactly what will be coming our way is that is there another i think that's it isn't it amber oh here we go okay this is our millage schedule if you if you look at it the following uh the road and that's highlighted there uh and it comes down to our millage is at nine point about 9.96 out of 10 mills possible so we're handicapped on being able to raise millage even if we could pass the millage in our township it'd be very difficult because we have over 20 special assessment districts right now which means they're paying why would they vote for a millage we have so many dirt roads that aren't going to get paved they wouldn't vote for millage and we also have

  27. expensive now to pay repave a road as we're finding out uh through this budget that we have we're able to fix and repair not replace but fix and repair about two miles of roads a year in the township where we have over 200 miles of roads so it's it's not even a bandage of what it takes and now with the change in the funding model that was just introduced by the state which we're still learning about we hope to receive more support from the road commission but we don't know exactly you what that looks like it's all under the microscope and we'll learn over the next month or so exactly what will be coming our way is that is there another i think that's it isn't it amber oh here we go okay this is our millage schedule if you if you look at it the following uh the road and that's highlighted there uh and it comes down to our millage is at nine point about 9.96 out of 10 mills possible so we're handicapped on being able to raise millage even if we could pass the millage in our township it'd be very difficult because we have over 20 special assessment districts right now which means they're paying why would they vote for a millage we have so many dirt roads that aren't going to get paved they wouldn't vote for millage and we also have many private communities and that take care of their own roads they wouldn't so we're challenged even if we tried to pass the millage in five years when we start getting some of our bonds and millages off our books starting in 2030 and then 2032 to get something passed when we're capped like this is that another one okay millages may be used to fund debt but for the most voted to approve residents campus uh construction bonds uh state statute says that townships are limited to 10 10 mills even though that can be debated cities can go to 20 mills which means they have the ability to raise uh that millages to pay for their roads, as well as they're going to get direct funding from the state where the township doesn't. It goes through the Road Commission of Oakland County. And then we have what's called the Special Assessment District, which the acronym is SAD, which couldn't fit the description any better. The townships are well below a legal limit. Credit rating is important. We're carrying right now, I believe it's about $40 million, $43 million in debt on SADs, which can have an effect on our credit rating, which is another subject we have to take into

  28. so many dirt roads that aren't going to get paved they wouldn't vote for millage and we also have many private communities and that take care of their own roads they wouldn't so we're challenged even if we tried to pass the millage in five years when we start getting some of our bonds and millages off our books starting in 2030 and then 2032 to get something passed when we're capped like this is that another one okay millages may be used to fund debt but for the most voted to approve residents campus uh construction bonds uh state statute says that townships are limited to 10 10 mills even though that can be debated cities can go to 20 mills which means they have the ability to raise uh that millages to pay for their roads, as well as they're going to get direct funding from the state where the township doesn't. It goes through the Road Commission of Oakland County. And then we have what's called the Special Assessment District, which the acronym is SAD, which couldn't fit the description any better. The townships are well below a legal limit. Credit rating is important. We're carrying right now, I believe it's about $40 million, $43 million in debt on SADs, which can have an effect on our credit rating, which is another subject we have to take into account. Do we want to continue to do, carry the weight of Special Assessment Districts, even though there's a revenue source, it is looked at on our S&P rating as debt to the township. And then if you look at expenditures by classification, you can see where we are for salary and wages, active benefits, supplies, contracted services, retiree benefits, capital outlay, and other. And we are very efficient at what we have to work with, but we have, we are working with 40-year-old roads. The Road Fund and the Public Safety Fund rely on significant transfers from the General Fund. Road Fund transfers fluctuate year to year based on capital outlay, major costs, and our investments. Amounts also fluctuate based on available resources. Over the past 10 years, the General Fund has supported the Road Fund with transferring $11.4 million, and 2025 was $1.9 million. And in fiscal year 2026, we expect to be at $2.7 million. And again, this amount only allows us with what we transfer in, the millages that we collect, and the money we get from the Road Commission of Oakland County is to plow our roads, salt our roads,

  29. which can have an effect on our credit rating, which is another subject we have to take into account. Do we want to continue to do, carry the weight of Special Assessment Districts, even though there's a revenue source, it is looked at on our S&P rating as debt to the township. And then if you look at expenditures by classification, you can see where we are for salary and wages, active benefits, supplies, contracted services, retiree benefits, capital outlay, and other. And we are very efficient at what we have to work with, but we have, we are working with 40-year-old roads. The Road Fund and the Public Safety Fund rely on significant transfers from the General Fund. Road Fund transfers fluctuate year to year based on capital outlay, major costs, and our investments. Amounts also fluctuate based on available resources. Over the past 10 years, the General Fund has supported the Road Fund with transferring $11.4 million, and 2025 was $1.9 million. And in fiscal year 2026, we expect to be at $2.7 million. And again, this amount only allows us with what we transfer in, the millages that we collect, and the money we get from the Road Commission of Oakland County is to plow our roads, salt our roads, and repair and not replace but fix two miles of roads in a township that has over 200 miles of roads. Is that the last one, Amber? Yeah. Okay. Any questions? Yes, I have a question about the payments from the county. I'd like to know, address why those are not increasing at the same rate as our property taxes. It's all in the Act 51. It's all been negotiated, so it's a fixed number for us. Every year? Yeah, every year, I think it's a 2% increase. So even if they, like we got over a 7% increase, they just get to pocket it, and then the county says, we don't have enough money to help you. Yes, but the good thing about the Road Commission is, and I give them credit, they've taken care of our main roads for us, the Lone Pine, Long Lake. They did overlays. They've kept the main roads in good condition. It's interior roads, they just haven't had the money to put into it, and the state hasn't been able to invest in it, and we can't raise our millage rates, so we're kind of handcuffed.

  30. and the money we get from the Road Commission of Oakland County is to plow our roads, salt our roads, and repair and not replace but fix two miles of roads in a township that has over 200 miles of roads. Is that the last one, Amber? Yeah. Okay. Any questions? Yes, I have a question about the payments from the county. I'd like to know, address why those are not increasing at the same rate as our property taxes. It's all in the Act 51. It's all been negotiated, so it's a fixed number for us. Every year? Yeah, every year, I think it's a 2% increase. So even if they, like we got over a 7% increase, they just get to pocket it, and then the county says, we don't have enough money to help you. Yes, but the good thing about the Road Commission is, and I give them credit, they've taken care of our main roads for us, the Lone Pine, Long Lake. They did overlays. They've kept the main roads in good condition. It's interior roads, they just haven't had the money to put into it, and the state hasn't been able to invest in it, and we can't raise our millage rates, so we're kind of handcuffed. Yes, but we do have a second general fund millage, and the township has been able to accrue since 2021, $22 million in our capital improvement fund. That's right. So that's funds that are available to help us out. Mark, we're looking at building a new police department. We have to put a new fire station, and we have to fix our roads. And those will probably be our priority, and I'd like to pay for a new police station, a fire station, internally. If we could, go ahead, Michael. Since we don't own the roads, we can't use those funds to replace them. But we could do annual transfers to support the road fund, not from the capital fund. Yeah, the capital fund, I think we're a little restricted. From the general fund, we did $7 million transfer last year to the capital improvement fund from the general fund. Those resources could be used for the road fund as well. Yeah, I don't think they could, but we could take a look at it, Mark. But we're, we'd like to, our police department, as I don't know how familiar you are, but in that study, Redstone, did you read the Redstone report that came, that was done about, I don't know, eight, ten months ago? And just showed our police department, if you've walked down through there, our dispatch, for instance,

  31. Yes, but we do have a second general fund millage, and the township has been able to accrue since 2021, $22 million in our capital improvement fund. That's right. So that's funds that are available to help us out. Mark, we're looking at building a new police department. We have to put a new fire station, and we have to fix our roads. And those will probably be our priority, and I'd like to pay for a new police station, a fire station, internally. If we could, go ahead, Michael. Since we don't own the roads, we can't use those funds to replace them. But we could do annual transfers to support the road fund, not from the capital fund. Yeah, the capital fund, I think we're a little restricted. From the general fund, we did $7 million transfer last year to the capital improvement fund from the general fund. Those resources could be used for the road fund as well. Yeah, I don't think they could, but we could take a look at it, Mark. But we're, we'd like to, our police department, as I don't know how familiar you are, but in that study, Redstone, did you read the Redstone report that came, that was done about, I don't know, eight, ten months ago? And just showed our police department, if you've walked down through there, our dispatch, for instance, sits in a room about half this size, four walls. They look at the jail cells. There's no windows, and the dispatchers are on 12-hour shifts, and they're crammed in. We don't have lockers for male and females because when the building was built, starting in 1938, we've added on to three times, didn't accommodate these things. We're short about 50% of the space we need. We need about 36,000 square feet for our police department, and we're working in a space under 18,000. Our fire department, luckily, central station's in good shape. Station 2 and 4 are in pretty good shape, but it's our station 3 that's at Maple and Telegraph. That is extremely outdated. We can't put a proper ladder truck in there, and that's one of the main hubs that services many of our local neighborhoods, as in Birmingham Farms, Westchester Village, Bloomfield Village, Foxcroft, and they have to have backup. We were fortunate. We went to the state. We were able to negotiate through the budget to get about, I think it was one, how much did we get, a million and a half in the state's budget this year to help go towards our fire station. We asked for 12 million. We're going to go back to the state and try and get some more money to help pay for these things. But I'd like to talk about financing the new police department and fire station internally,

  32. And just showed our police department, if you've walked down through there, our dispatch, for instance, sits in a room about half this size, four walls. They look at the jail cells. There's no windows, and the dispatchers are on 12-hour shifts, and they're crammed in. We don't have lockers for male and females because when the building was built, starting in 1938, we've added on to three times, didn't accommodate these things. We're short about 50% of the space we need. We need about 36,000 square feet for our police department, and we're working in a space under 18,000. Our fire department, luckily, central station's in good shape. Station 2 and 4 are in pretty good shape, but it's our station 3 that's at Maple and Telegraph. That is extremely outdated. We can't put a proper ladder truck in there, and that's one of the main hubs that services many of our local neighborhoods, as in Birmingham Farms, Westchester Village, Bloomfield Village, Foxcroft, and they have to have backup. We were fortunate. We went to the state. We were able to negotiate through the budget to get about, I think it was one, how much did we get, a million and a half in the state's budget this year to help go towards our fire station. We asked for 12 million. We're going to go back to the state and try and get some more money to help pay for these things. But I'd like to talk about financing the new police department and fire station internally, and we have that money set aside in our capital fund, as you indicated, to pay for those things so that then we can focus on how to pay for roads, whether it's through a millage, through the road commission, or some other funding one way or another. But we have our work cut out for us on this issue. And what about the, in the actuaries for the pension, those are dropping. And what about the pension? And what about the pension? And what about the pension? And what about the pension? And what about the pension? off, I believe, around 2029, those payments will start dropping in the pension. I think we start, is it, Michael? I don't know what that means, drop off. So the actuaries, the Milliman reports show expected payouts, and over the last five years, around 2028, 2029, the actuaries are showing that the actual determined contributions would be falling off. What about those funds coming available at that time frame? We're not going to see a decrease in the ADC until the early part of the next decade. Yeah, about 2029, that's about five years off. No, the middle part of the next decade.

  33. But I'd like to talk about financing the new police department and fire station internally, and we have that money set aside in our capital fund, as you indicated, to pay for those things so that then we can focus on how to pay for roads, whether it's through a millage, through the road commission, or some other funding one way or another. But we have our work cut out for us on this issue. And what about the, in the actuaries for the pension, those are dropping. And what about the pension? And what about the pension? And what about the pension? And what about the pension? And what about the pension? off, I believe, around 2029, those payments will start dropping in the pension. I think we start, is it, Michael? I don't know what that means, drop off. So the actuaries, the Milliman reports show expected payouts, and over the last five years, around 2028, 2029, the actuaries are showing that the actual determined contributions would be falling off. What about those funds coming available at that time frame? We're not going to see a decrease in the ADC until the early part of the next decade. Yeah, about 2029, that's about five years off. No, the middle part of the next decade. Which would be 2035. 334. Yeah, what will happen is we'll have some millage and bonds that come off in 2030 and 2032 that we could look at at that time. Okay. Yeah, and we're 80, I think we're at 89% funded in our pensions, and we're 28% funded in our OPEB, which are our health care benefits. The state wants to see all communities at 40%, so we're constantly trying to put money aside, and there's also fluctuation in the market that affect that as well. And that was passed back in 2013 under the Grand Bargain when Detroit went bankrupt. And there was state guaranteed the pensions. I think they ended up guaranteeing them at 90%, but as for the... the OPEB, which is the health care benefit, most of the employees were left with, I forget the number, but it was very low, and that's what instituted the 40% to bring everybody up to speed so we can cover some of the costs, and every community, many of the communities are still working to try and get that number up to the 40%. It's a challenge because you always have retirees. Someone retires, it only adds to that number. Any other questions? Not a question, but a point I wanted to make just briefly, which is the township

  34. No, the middle part of the next decade. Which would be 2035. 334. Yeah, what will happen is we'll have some millage and bonds that come off in 2030 and 2032 that we could look at at that time. Okay. Yeah, and we're 80, I think we're at 89% funded in our pensions, and we're 28% funded in our OPEB, which are our health care benefits. The state wants to see all communities at 40%, so we're constantly trying to put money aside, and there's also fluctuation in the market that affect that as well. And that was passed back in 2013 under the Grand Bargain when Detroit went bankrupt. And there was state guaranteed the pensions. I think they ended up guaranteeing them at 90%, but as for the... the OPEB, which is the health care benefit, most of the employees were left with, I forget the number, but it was very low, and that's what instituted the 40% to bring everybody up to speed so we can cover some of the costs, and every community, many of the communities are still working to try and get that number up to the 40%. It's a challenge because you always have retirees. Someone retires, it only adds to that number. Any other questions? Not a question, but a point I wanted to make just briefly, which is the township has, just sort of add this to maybe another bullet point, it was 1950s when the township first created a road fund, and the community members voted in a road fund in the 1950s, and it's been providing support for weather, gravel, patching, for a very long time, the community has provided some support for that. So those, it's not like just a late, recent idea that we've been thinking about roads and trying to help them elongate their lifespan. Those investments over the time, over the long period of time the community has made has helped them live longer. They're really, really past their prime now, but they have actually survived much longer than anticipated and much longer than would have been expected from the roads when they were built, and some of that's because of the contributions the community has made since the 50s to do things, the preventative maintenance like the patching and so forth. Yeah, we're very fortunate to have a DPW department that we can send out and do some things, even though it's a small amount, every little bit helps at this point. Okay. Any other questions? Is there another? Jeff Hockman. Come on up, Jeff. Good evening. I'm Jeff Hockman. I've been a resident of the township for over nine years. And I'm going to kind of do the wrap-up of what you've heard tonight, and then we'll get into any questions you may have.

  35. Not a question, but a point I wanted to make just briefly, which is the township has, just sort of add this to maybe another bullet point, it was 1950s when the township first created a road fund, and the community members voted in a road fund in the 1950s, and it's been providing support for weather, gravel, patching, for a very long time, the community has provided some support for that. So those, it's not like just a late, recent idea that we've been thinking about roads and trying to help them elongate their lifespan. Those investments over the time, over the long period of time the community has made has helped them live longer. They're really, really past their prime now, but they have actually survived much longer than anticipated and much longer than would have been expected from the roads when they were built, and some of that's because of the contributions the community has made since the 50s to do things, the preventative maintenance like the patching and so forth. Yeah, we're very fortunate to have a DPW department that we can send out and do some things, even though it's a small amount, every little bit helps at this point. Okay. Any other questions? Is there another? Jeff Hockman. Come on up, Jeff. Good evening. I'm Jeff Hockman. I've been a resident of the township for over nine years. And I'm going to kind of do the wrap-up of what you've heard tonight, and then we'll get into any questions you may have. So the first slide, please. This is just stating what we've talked about in the past. The key is we're at our max millage. And we really have no capacity to continue to do any funding where we sit today. And so that is our only option, has been the SADs, which we've talked about. Next slide, please. And this talks about the road division. We have the 213 miles of paved road 37, and that lists the services that we're providing. The key here is we're not doing any replacement of the roads, the reconstruction of the local neighborhood roads. You know, it's just a kind of a patching and keeping crack sealing and doing salt removal. It's not getting at the fundamental issue, as all these maps have shown in the deterioration. Next slide, please. This just summarizes the SADs, which you're familiar with. There's 23 of them, and the last ones we've just done for the village, they're now coming in at over $4 million per mile. So the cost to move these roads go up every year, and they're significant, and they're a significant burden on the whole...

  36. And I'm going to kind of do the wrap-up of what you've heard tonight, and then we'll get into any questions you may have. So the first slide, please. This is just stating what we've talked about in the past. The key is we're at our max millage. And we really have no capacity to continue to do any funding where we sit today. And so that is our only option, has been the SADs, which we've talked about. Next slide, please. And this talks about the road division. We have the 213 miles of paved road 37, and that lists the services that we're providing. The key here is we're not doing any replacement of the roads, the reconstruction of the local neighborhood roads. You know, it's just a kind of a patching and keeping crack sealing and doing salt removal. It's not getting at the fundamental issue, as all these maps have shown in the deterioration. Next slide, please. This just summarizes the SADs, which you're familiar with. There's 23 of them, and the last ones we've just done for the village, they're now coming in at over $4 million per mile. So the cost to move these roads go up every year, and they're significant, and they're a significant burden on the whole... homeowners. Next slide. The one thing the township has done is really help on this is to provide the SAD funding through the bond issues that we talked about. And those have run 10 to 15 years, which helps the obviously the payment, but still is the obligation in the payment of the homeowner. The other thing, just a little sidelight. However, SAD monies are not deductible from their taxes. So you pay on the tax bill, but you cannot deduct it, which seems editorializing very unfair. The current outstanding balance of that for the township is $56 million. And you have to start wondering at what point can the township continue to fund the SADs to the extent they want to do it, and how it affects your bond rating, your credit rating. So all those have to come into consideration, and it's not just an unlimited future to continue to have the township do that. So, you know, the other thing is the SADs are reaching such a high price per property or per homeowner at a 50 to $60,000 of the recent ones at the village that this is not continuing and viable to do, and it's not realistic. Next slide, please. And so what the Road Commission has been funding, has been funded

  37. homeowners. Next slide. The one thing the township has done is really help on this is to provide the SAD funding through the bond issues that we talked about. And those have run 10 to 15 years, which helps the obviously the payment, but still is the obligation in the payment of the homeowner. The other thing, just a little sidelight. However, SAD monies are not deductible from their taxes. So you pay on the tax bill, but you cannot deduct it, which seems editorializing very unfair. The current outstanding balance of that for the township is $56 million. And you have to start wondering at what point can the township continue to fund the SADs to the extent they want to do it, and how it affects your bond rating, your credit rating. So all those have to come into consideration, and it's not just an unlimited future to continue to have the township do that. So, you know, the other thing is the SADs are reaching such a high price per property or per homeowner at a 50 to $60,000 of the recent ones at the village that this is not continuing and viable to do, and it's not realistic. Next slide, please. And so what the Road Commission has been funding, has been funded through Act 51 that we talked about for over 74 years, and they're receiving the state gas and registration fees that we've talked about. Where does that money go? We've been talking about it, but I think, to summarize, those funds- 39% go to the state, 39% go to the road commissions throughout the state, and 22% go to city and village. The key is townships are excluded and receive no funding from the PA 51s, which is as we as people who use our vehicles think about we're paying gas tax at the pump, we're paying our registration fees, we drive over here in the township and we receive absolutely zero money, it's going elsewhere. So that's, you know, it's something we need to talk about. So that's just kind of the wrap up I wanted to do, and Jeff Saltz will now talk about the next steps. Are there any questions on that? Thank you. Thank you, John. Thank you. So you've heard a lot of it, there's a lot of information here, that's why it's taken six months to collect it. There's a lot here, as I said, it's very complex and it's still moving, it's a moving target, actually. But before I wrap this up, we're almost done, I just want to add something, there's no slide for it, I want to thank the members of this committee for putting in the hard work that they've done up to this point.

  38. realistic. Next slide, please. And so what the Road Commission has been funding, has been funded through Act 51 that we talked about for over 74 years, and they're receiving the state gas and registration fees that we've talked about. Where does that money go? We've been talking about it, but I think, to summarize, those funds- 39% go to the state, 39% go to the road commissions throughout the state, and 22% go to city and village. The key is townships are excluded and receive no funding from the PA 51s, which is as we as people who use our vehicles think about we're paying gas tax at the pump, we're paying our registration fees, we drive over here in the township and we receive absolutely zero money, it's going elsewhere. So that's, you know, it's something we need to talk about. So that's just kind of the wrap up I wanted to do, and Jeff Saltz will now talk about the next steps. Are there any questions on that? Thank you. Thank you, John. Thank you. So you've heard a lot of it, there's a lot of information here, that's why it's taken six months to collect it. There's a lot here, as I said, it's very complex and it's still moving, it's a moving target, actually. But before I wrap this up, we're almost done, I just want to add something, there's no slide for it, I want to thank the members of this committee for putting in the hard work that they've done up to this point. For that, for the hours they've spent, and also for the commitment to see this through to the end, which we don't know what the end is going to be and when it will be, but they've committed to that. And for them, I want to thank everybody. So this is where we are today. As you can see, as I said earlier, it's very complicated. We still don't know exactly how the new state budget. And frankly, here we are going, in the three years, some of the new state budgetry, this will only use a new state budget, that we have understood through the new state budget, yet we are going to pick up $100 on more transparency budget, The changes in the funding will shake out. There are no easy solutions, so what's next? Okay, so the next thing we have to do, the next phase, is we need to analyze the information that we've collected. Analyze the impact of the new state budget. We'll meet again with the Royal County, the Road Commission for Oakland County. And we'll meet again with the impacted Bloomfield Township departments to see how this new budget, this new funding is going to affect everything. Then we'll consider options available to the township. I'm not going to go into any of those now, because we have no idea, but we'll talk about it. And we talked about a blank sheet of paper, so nothing's off the table for us to discuss. And so we'll consider those options. And then the next, the last thing we have to do, we'll develop recommendations for the Board of Trustees with the hopes of presenting these in early 2026.

  39. there's no slide for it, I want to thank the members of this committee for putting in the hard work that they've done up to this point. For that, for the hours they've spent, and also for the commitment to see this through to the end, which we don't know what the end is going to be and when it will be, but they've committed to that. And for them, I want to thank everybody. So this is where we are today. As you can see, as I said earlier, it's very complicated. We still don't know exactly how the new state budget. And frankly, here we are going, in the three years, some of the new state budgetry, this will only use a new state budget, that we have understood through the new state budget, yet we are going to pick up $100 on more transparency budget, The changes in the funding will shake out. There are no easy solutions, so what's next? Okay, so the next thing we have to do, the next phase, is we need to analyze the information that we've collected. Analyze the impact of the new state budget. We'll meet again with the Royal County, the Road Commission for Oakland County. And we'll meet again with the impacted Bloomfield Township departments to see how this new budget, this new funding is going to affect everything. Then we'll consider options available to the township. I'm not going to go into any of those now, because we have no idea, but we'll talk about it. And we talked about a blank sheet of paper, so nothing's off the table for us to discuss. And so we'll consider those options. And then the next, the last thing we have to do, we'll develop recommendations for the Board of Trustees with the hopes of presenting these in early 2026. So we'll come up with some of these, come up with some suggestions perhaps, some ways of mitigating this problem, then we're going to put it in your lap. Then you are the ones that are going to decide what to do with it. We're just, as an advisory committee, we're just going to bring those things to you. So hopefully, we haven't got a timetable yet for when we'll finish this. As I said, early 2026, so I would just say, you got to stay tuned. We'll report back to you again when we're ready with more information. And I thank you very much. Thank you, Jeff. Thank you, Jeff. Thank all of them. All right. Yeah. Thank you, Jeff, John, Jeff, Steve, Mindy, Gary. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thanks a lot. We'll look forward to the next presentation. This is a presentation. Thank you. One other thing I want to mention, too, which is the Commission, in a spirit of transparency and openness, the Commission meets publicly in this room. The meetings are noticed and posted on our website. Anyone who wants to come, there's public comment, and you're welcome to come and communicate with the Commission when they have their meetings. So I just want to thank you all again for the effort and the transparency in your work. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Martin.