Monday, August 16, 2021

Ann Arbor City Council Preview: August 16, 2021

 


Gentle readers, it's council night in Ann Arbor. Here's your agenda. Here's the Ann Arbor AF podcast episode about this council agenda. 

The evening kicks off with a moderate, 18-item consent agenda. Road closures are back. CA-2, CA-3, and CA-4 are all street closures. 

There are two public hearings on the docket this evening. PH-1/B-1 is for the fur ban ordinance. PH-2/B-2 is on the conversion therapy ban. 

There are 7 resolutions on the agenda this evening. One of the big items is DC-4. This is a resolution to approve the recommendations of the Council of the Commons regarding activation of the Library Lot. Check out Scott Trudeau's article on this. They also took a deep dive into this in the A2AF episode. But basically, this resolution would direct the administrator to develop programing for the Library Lot, among other things. . Personally, it feel like perhaps the multiple committees that are in charge of the Library Lot could handle this work load. There's a lot to get into here, and this could be the evening's spicy chili. 

As always, gentle reader, I am probably forgetting some very important items here. 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.


Monday, August 2, 2021

Ann Arbor City Council Preview: August 2, 2021

 


Gentle readers, tonight is the first August meeting of #a2Council. Here's the agenda. Also, make sure you check out the A2AF episode about tonight's meeting. 

The evening kicks off with a respectable, 19-item consent agenda. CA-1 is exciting. It's allocating money from the sidewalk gap millage to fill several sidewalk gaps. CA-6 and CA-7 are road closures for Taste of Ann Arbor and UM Football Games respectively. 

There's only one public hearing on the agenda. PH-1/B-1 is (hopefully) the final public hearing on the rental housing ordinance. 

There are are four ordinance first readings on the docket tonight. C-1 is on an streetlight ordinance that would implement dark sky friendly rules for street lights going forward. C-2 is on an update to home occupations. This is a liberalization of the current rules, but probably doesn't do enough. For a deep dive, check out Scott Trudeau's article. C-3 is a ban on conversion therapy in Ann Arbor. C-4 is a ban on selling fur in Ann Arbor. As I noted on twitter, there are a lot of antiquated scientific names in Ann Arbor's endangered species ordinance. 

DC-1 is an amendment to council rules that would allow public commenters to still call in once council returns to meeting in person. This is good. DC-2 is a super spicy chili. This is a motion to reconsider the motion to part ways with Administrator Crawford. I don't know what the utility of bringing this back is. It just seems like an opportunity for certain CMs to re-air the same grievances they aired last meeting. DC-3 is a resolution to make a charter amendment to allow ranked choice ballot on the November ballot. DC-4 and DC-5 are resolutions to order ballot questions for the charter amendments approved at the last meeting. 

As always, gentle reader, I am probably forgetting some very important items here. 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.