Monday, June 15, 2020

Ann Arbor City Council Preview: June 15, 2020

It's #a2council night. Here's the agenda.

The evening kicks off with a 22 item consent agenda. Here are some of the items that stand out to me. CA-9 is an update to the city's tree inventory. This is always fun. At last night's Council Caucus meeting CM Ramlawi indicated he was interested in pulling CA-2, CA-5, and CA-10 from the consent agenda. CA-2 is allocation for human services non-profits. CA-5 is the SPARK contract. CA-10 is an employment extension agreement with Cresson Slotten. We will see if those or other items get pulled off the agenda.

There is one public hearing tonight. PH-1/DS-1 would fill the sidewalk gap between Parklake and Wagner on Jackson Road near Weber's.

Moving down the agenda, there are a ton more items, and I will probably leave off some important ones. Nevertheless, here we go. C-1 is the first reading of an ordinance to rezone 3621 Plymouth Road from PUD (Planned Unit Development) to C3 (Fringe Commercial district). There is a plan here for a 5 story hotel. This seems pretty reasonable.

DC-2 is a resolution to override the Mayor's veto of Lumm's budget ammendment that would have taken a funding gaurentee away from affordable housing, climate change, and pedestrian safety. To quote Cabinet Battle #1, "You don't have the votes." This is a pretty pointless waste of time in a meeting with a pretty stacked agenda. It will allow for CMs upset with the mayor's veto to bloviate and it will ultimately fail.

DC-3 is a resolution to support more substantial civilian review of the AAPD. I have not read this but the title sounds good. DC-5 is to support shelter expansion in light of COVID-19. Seems like the humane thing to do. DC-6 is a resolution to allow outdoor alcohol sales. DC-7 is a motion to waive council rules and reconsider an item from May 4th, the Nixon and Traver sidewalk special assessment district. This is from CM Bannister and it seems like she would like to maybe kill these sidewalk projects. DC-9 is a resolution directing evaluation of Ann Arbor's pedestrian and cycling infrastructure by a "Professional Engineer with Vision Zero Experience." It will be interesting to see what "Vision Zero Experience" means and whether our city's engineers meet that standard. DC-15 is interesting. It would create a pilot program that would allow businesses to occupy adjacent parking spaces. I like this I think. DC-16 is a request for the Independent Police Oversight Commission to lead a review of public safety services the city provides.

Gentle reader, what agenda items are you most looking forward to seeing. I am guessing that tonight will be another late night around the virtual council table. Hopefully we will see you there. The CTN stream starts at 7 pm. Make sure you follow the action on the #a2council hashtag.

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