Road Commission Public Comment, Ingham Maintaining Lansing Parks

This the Board of Commissioners meeting was mostly about an item that was not on the agenda!

We spent an hour and a half hearing from folks about the road commission. About 70 people came to the Board meeting to complain about the Road Commission members and to support certain senior members of the staff. We clearly heard one side of the story, and the large number of people was set up by someone. At the end of the meeting, during Commissioner announcements, the issue came up again when a few Commissioners commented on their opinions.

I won’t go into the comments because there were a lot of accusations and innuendo made that don’t really need repeating. The one thing I do want to repeat are the comments that were made by Commissioner Carol Koenig. She said what I was thinking, which is that the County Board of Commissioners has ABSOLUTELY NO POWER in regards to the inner workings of the Road Commission. We appoint the Road Commissioners, and we don’t have appointments up again until the end of next year. We can also remove a road commissioner if there is malfeasance in office. If someone commits a crime or something egregious, we could take action to remove a commissioner. To date, no one has brought us any evidence of malfeasance. As such, under state law, there is nothing that we can do. Complaints can and should be made to the Road Commission members, who are the ones that govern the Road Commission operations. If people want a change in Road Commission members, they can make that request when Road Commission appointments are again considered next year. I honestly feel that all these 70 or so people were tricked a bit because they were told that they should come to the Board of Commissioners to make their comments. Unless it was a media ploy…which I guess is possible.

The actual Board meeting lasted about 20 minutes. There was one resolution that had dissenting votes – the resolution amending the agreement between Ingham County and the City of Lansing for the County to maintain certain City parks (and be compensated by the City). The vote was 12-3, with 3 of the Republicans opposing the resolution (and the 4^th being absent). There was no explanation given for the opposition votes. My only assumption, based on what was said in committee, is that the Republicans don’t want the County to assist the City of Lansing even though the County is being fully compensated for all its expenses. This was actually said in committee, when one of the Repubvlican Commissioners said that after the zoo and now this, he didn’t want to keep helping the City of Lansing. That is tremendously disappoinbting to me. This resolution is about regionalism and government efficiency, and the Republicans voted against it because they don’t want to help Lansing. They donb’t want to help the central city of the region, which is nothing but short-sighted. I would have voted for this resolution had it been for Lansing, East Lansing, Leslie or Mason. If we can help any of our local governments and get paid fully for our expenses, then that is just good government. I am disappointed that the Repiublicans didn’t explain themselves at the Board and that they have purposely voted against the resolution because it assists the City of Lansing. Very upsetting.

Well, that’s it for me. I hope everyone has a great week and weekend. And Happy New Year to those of the Jewish faith!

Housing Commission, Ingham County Takes Over Lansing Parks, CATA Special Millage, Campaign Update

This week I had both County Services and Finance committees. In both committees, we spent significant time talking about the Ingham County Housing Commission. For the first time, they were short for a year and requested general fund dollars ($40,000) to backfill the deficit. I had concerns about this, especially because the Housing Commission does projects in Grand Ledge and Eaton Rapids (both outside the county). We had a good discussion. The Director of the Housing Commission explained that in other counties, the county government puts in money to their Housing Commision in addition to the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) money that they receive from the Michigan State Housing and Development Authority (MSHDA). Apparently, Ingham County is one of the few Housing Commissions that is able to self-fund their staff – one full-time person and a half-time person. We are able to do this because we charge an administrative fee for all projects. The Housing Commisison expected to once again make enough through administrative fees, but had a last minute bank loan fall through for a housing project that they were assisting (due to an accident that happened to the individual that applied) and we were unable to recover the administrative fee for that project. They also explained that the projects in Grand Ledge and Eaton Rapids help to ensure that county general funds are not needed. If they don’t do those projects, the county would have to put in money. That explanation satisfied us, along with the commitment from the Housing Commission that they are wodking on a plan to ensure that this doesn’t happen again. Commissioner Grebner also suggested that they build contingencies into their budget. The resolution passed County Services and Finance unanimously.

We also passed several Parks resolutions. One resolution finalizes the deal between the City of Lansing and Ingham County for the county to take over mowing and plowing a series of city parks (as previously reported). We added Reola, Kimberly and Sunset parks to the list we will maintain, and removed Wentworth Park, the Gardens at Cooley and Parcel B from the list. The final number of parks is the same, and it will still be $236,000 that the City will pay the County for the maintenance. The contract will go from October 1, 2011 through September 30, 2011 and can be renewed yearly with new compensation amounts. We also created rental fees for the disc golf at Burchfield Park ($1 rental). Now residents can play horseshoes, volleyball, pedal boats, and disc golf in the summer. We also created discounted fees (half) for service dogs at the Soldan Dog Park at Hawk Island.

Finally, we allocated the dollars to CATA from the special transportation millage. The County Board of Commissioners controls the allocation and distribution of the funds for CATA. The Ingham County Special Transportation Millage was reauthorized at 48/100 (.48) of one mill, $.48 per thousand dollars of state taxable valuation for a period of five years (2011-2015) in the August 3, 2010 election. Under the agreement, CATA will continue to utilize special transportation millage funds to operate service for persons with disabilities, known as CATA Spec-Tran. It will also provide CATA Rural Services (CRS), providing a minimum of 79 hours per day of service to the residents of Ingham County who reside outside of the boundaries of the urbanized area. A maximum of $2,590,451 will be used to pay the actual expenses of operating, administrating and marketing Spec-Tran. A maximum of $625,000 of the funds will be used to pay for the actual expenses of operating, administering and marketing CATA Rural Services. The amount of $108,436 will be retained by the County for the operation of a vehicle used to transport area veterans to VA Hospitals in the region in the County’s 2012 Fiscal Year.

On the Andy Schor for State Representative campaign trail, we are now over 600 doors knocked, several neighborhood associations attended where I have spoken with residents, and have raised over $40,000. I will be holding a fundraiser on Monday in Oak Park. If you are in the area, I hope you will be able to attend. You can see all the details, and sign up to contribute or volunteer, at www.andyschor.com!

2012 County Budget Passes Finance Committee

Happy Friday! Yes, I am writing this blog on a Friday night (which is a little sad)…but I am watching college football at the same time!

This week was a good one. We took an important step in finalizing the Ingham County budget for 2012. The Finance committee, which I Chair, received the budget recommendations from the four liaison committees (Human Services, County Services, Judiciary, Law Enforcement) and reviewed the budget in its entirety. We passed the Human Services, Judiciary, and Law Enforcement budgets on consent. Commissioner Bahar-Cook asked for the County Services budget to be reviewed separately.

Similar to what was reported last week, we had a conversation about the role of the Parks Director in relation to the zoo. Commissioner Bahar-Cook raised the issue that the zoo board was unhappy with 40% of the Director’s salary coming from the Zoo millage. The director pointed out that he has been spending more than 40% of his time on zoo things. There was a conversation about the time commitment moving forward, as we will have a new executive director and another staffer at the zoo. These two positions would do many of the things that the director is doing now during the 2012 year. The director pointed out, though, that the zoo will face AZA certification next year and that he will be doing a lot of work on that. The result was that we directed the Controller and county staff to evaluate the hours spent by the director on zoo activities throughout the year. This way, we will have a good accounting as we go into the budget next year. With that amendment, the County Services budget also passed unanimously.

After these were done, we moved on to the Strategic Planning Initiative funds (also called the z-list, which I have explained in the last two blogs). We had $255,000 in requests for $300,000, so all positions were funded. We were able to backfill a sheriff’s Metro Squad position, which currently has a grant that will end in October and will need $19,000 to get the position funded through the end of the year. We were also able to provide a detective, and a law enforcement deputy. The Sheriff indicated that these will be used for gang-related activity investigations, and to ensure that deputies doing emergency response will not have to respond alone.

The UAW again testified that they appreciated the openness of the County Controller and Budget Director, but also said they are disappointed with the 13 open positions eliminated. They said that these positions are all UAW employees and that other UAW employees will now have to do extra work. The Controller responded that over the last few years, there have been 106 positions eliminated and 46 of those are UAW. So the eliminations have been spread out over a series of employees. I can sympathize with the UAW, but it was much better to have openings eliminated than to layoff people.

At the end of the process, I thanked our staff for all their hard work, and for helping to solve a $5.5 million budget deficit without any layoffs. Commission Chairman Mark Grebner pointed out that we used funds from a few accounts which had reserves. We drew down about $1 million from various reserve accounts (capital improvements, etc) and that these reserves were there for just such a budget problem. We are all hopeful that property values will go back up and that we won’t have to do this again, but that we can take from reserves for another few years if needed.

All-in-all the process went very smoothly and just about everyone was happy. I am excited that one of the smoothest budget hearings happened under my watch, and I look forward to getting the 2012 budget passed on the Board floor!

Budget Update: Human Services, Law Enforcement, Judiciary Committees

I hope everyone had a great Labor Day and enjoyed the long weekend. 

Last week, I reported on the initial budget proposal. I also reported what happened in the County Services committee, on which I serve.  I thought that this week, I would report on the other three liaison committees and their budget hearings. Or, more appropriately, I thought I would ask the Chairs of those committees to report (as I wasn’t there!).

Commissioner Todd Tennis, Chair of the Human Services Committee, reports the following:

At the Human Services Budget hearing, we reviewed the Controller’s recommended budgets for the Health Department, Department of Human Services, Cooperative Extension, Mid-South Substance Abuse, the Ingham Medical Care Facility, Legal Aid, and Veteran’s Affairs.  Although cuts were made to each area, department heads hope to continue providing quality services.  Of course, by eliminating 13 full-time positions from these various agencies, maintaining good service while not overburdening county employees will be a tough balancing act. 

The committee also discussed how best to perform the responsibility of County Medical Examiner.  Currently, autopsies are being performed by Sparrow Hospital with Dr. Dean Sienko filling the role of County Medical Examiner (a role he has filled for many years).  With his imminent departure, the Human Services Committee will be taking another look at how best to complete the tasks of Medical Examiner and how to full Dr. Sienko’s very large shoes.

Commissioner Victor Celentino, Chair of the Law Enforcement Committee, reports the following:

The Law Enforcement Committee met on Thursday, September 1, 2010 at 5:30pm.  The following departments were satisfied with the controller's recommended budget as it relates to their respective departments:  Animal Conrtrol, Prosecuting Attorney, Tri-County Metro Narcotics Squad, Office of Homeland Security & Emergency Management, Emergency Telephone-911 millage, and Community Corrections.

The Sheriff requested $19,210.00 be put on the Z-list (officially called the Strategic Initiatives List, which contains $300,000 for priority initiatives) to replace a Deputy position which is funded through a Michigan State Police three year grant.  The grant is set to expire on September 30, 2012, and this Z-list money will continue the position through the 2012 calendar year.  It is the Sheriff's intention to request this position in his 2012 budget. Commissioner Randy Schafer then motioned (which was approved) restoration of the positions by adding them to the Z-list: $100,000 for a Detective and $90,000 for an additional Deputy.  The committee approved the following motion when ranking the Z-list requests: 

   1.  $19,210.00 request to restore the grant funding Deputy position.

   2.  $100,000.00 to restore the Detective position.

   3.  $90,000.00 request to restore a Deputy position.

The committee's recommendations were forwarded to the September 14th Finance Committee meeting.

Commissioner Rebecca Bahar Cook, Chair of the Judiciary Committee, reports the following:

My fellow Commissioners and I have set the following priorities regarding Ingham County's Judiciary to help us guide the development of the 2012 Budget:
 • Provide appropriate sanctions for adult offenders
 • Provide appropriate treatment and sanctions for at risk juveniles
 • Assuring Judicial Processing

Due to the loss of tax revenue cause by the housing crisis, the courts initially requested more money than was available in the county’s General Fund. Members of the courts, after reviewing the Controller’s budget agreed to most of the cuts recommended. The only additional request was from the Circuit Court asking for an additional $50,000 for image scanning of various court files. By allowing this technological update, records can be pulled quickly, allowing the court employees to acquire requested information much more quickly. Members of the Judiciary Committee agreed to put this item on the Z-list for further consideration by the Finance Committee.

Commissioners feel that we are able to maintain the priorities listed above with the approved budget, despite additional cuts to the county’s budget.

I’d like this opportunity to thank the Ingham County Controllers office, our Judges in District, Circuit and Probate Court and court administrative staff for their hard work on helping develop the newly approved 2012 Proposed Budget for Ingham County’s Judiciary Committee. Now, on to the Finance Committee . . .
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These committees, along with the County Services committee (chaired by Commissioner Deb DeLeon), have finalized their individual budgets. The Finance Committee will meet on Wednesday and will consider these four budgets together as one and make any necessary changes. Finance will also consider the requests on the Strategic Initiatives List (called the Z-List) and rank them in the appropriate order. The requests this year are less than the $300,000 budgeted, so it would seem that we will be ableto fund all the necessities…but there are always some surprises.   Check in next week to see the result!

Thanks to Commissioners Celentino, Tennis, and Bahar-Cook for pitching in to help with the blog this week and update readers on these committees!