Neighborhood Planning Council 11 - Lakeview east

Minges Brook/Riverside Neighborhood Planning Council (NPC) #11 Riverside Elementary School Library 650 Riverside Drive Battle Creek, MI 49015 Wednesday, September 23, 2015 1. 7:00 PM – Welcome and opening – Randall Champlin 2. Attendance sheet: Rudy Barda, Jan Barry, Randall Champlin, Talia Champlin, Frank Egland, Sally Goss, Dave Hawks, Laura Herzing, Tim Martinovich, Norma Mayo, City Rep: Jason Francisco, Battle Creek Police Department Rep: Officer Wirebaugh, City Commissioner Mike Sherzer, Dave Walters, Jim Owen of Lakeview School District, Jim Hopkins, Lori Hopkins, Linn Kracht, Karen Schook, Tina Yost, Ken Long 3. Additions or deletions to this agenda: None 4. Approval of the previous month’s meeting’s minutes. Dave Hawks moved to approve and Rudy Barda supported the motion. Motion passed unanimously. 5. Correspondence sent/received Tentative: NPC 11 Master Plan Workshop: Wed, November 4th, at 7pm at Riverside Elementary - Christine M. Zuzga, AICP Planning Manager 6. City staff reports: City staff reports and Commissioner Comments:  City Commissioners’ reports: Dave Walters, At-Large Commissioner will be running unopposed for Ward 5. Dave reported that the City Manager will be in place one year at October 1, and she will be evaluated under a new process. The process was developed to be more fair and more effective for giving our manager input and feedback. Commission Mike Sherzer will also be running unopposed. He announced a workshop coming up on a new priority-based budget on October 20, 5:30pm at City Hall. This year’s budget will be developed based on input from citizens’ priorities. Bids are going out for garbage pickup contract. Unlike the last contract, this will be a competitive process. BCVision is moving forward and Mike feels strongly that this process has to work and the city needs to be cooperative to help ensure its success. Suggestion was made that recycling be picked up every two weeks. Support was voiced for unlimited pickup, which seems to help to keep the community clean. Comment was made that city will bring a second recycle bin if requested.  County Commissioners’ reports: None Police Department Report: Office Wirebaugh introduced himself and although he is not always in this district, but he has familiarity with our area. Reports were shared and questions were fielded. When a call is not “random access”, there is less worry that neighboring properties will be robbed. Car break-ins in the Country Club Hills seem to be kids and the problem seems to be resolved. Question regarding motorcycles at a bike night on a Columbia location was posed to make sure all activity is wholesome. Question regarding people walking up to doors and asking for money and causing some discomfort. Officer encouraged people to call when someone comes to the door if you don’t feel comfortable. There may not be any enforcement issues, but at least the people can be asked to move along. Comment regarding a party at a home that was later robbed, and frustration over knowing who did the robbery, but there didn’t seem that follow up was quick enough to keep the stolen property from being disposed of. The police do have a database showing every call categorized by address. Question about where to get the reports that were handed out at the meeting. The officer was not aware of how to get the information online. There may be new crime mapping personnel who may be responsible for providing this information. New computer system does not have the same capabilities to share. [NOTE: Kaytee Faris provided the following: The following is a link to the new BCPD crime lookup portal. http://p2c.battlecreekmi.gov/Summary_Disclaimer.aspx.]  City Representative Report: Jason Francisco is now Code Compliance Manager and will be our rep for the foreseeable future. He encouraged us to call in concerns regarding properties that look unkempt before they get out of hand. There are only 5 code compliance personnel and 17,000 residential properties, and they need our help. Question posed about whether reflectors would be allowed on a Riverside church driveway. Answer: These can’t be put in a right-of-way. Question regarding who is responsible for cutting trees away from power lines – the trimming seems random rather than methodical. Particular concern voiced about the area along the east side of Capital from Golden to Weeks. Answer is that Consumer’s is responsible unless the tree is a hazard, and then the city is responsible. Question regarding how citizens could come together to help with cleanup concerns and what guidelines have to be followed. Jason said we have to be careful about private property rights, but the Post/Franklin neighborhood has volunteer work teams to do community clean-up projects. Suggestions regarding compiling a list of problem areas and organizing work teams to address these areas. 7. Committee reports:  Beautiful Battle Creek Award Nominations –. Dave Hawks – Nominated Adam and Tonya Metzger at 110 Chapel Hill Drive (at corner of Chapel Hill and Riverside) and Travis Beuchler at 364 South Hills Drive (extensive inside and outside work.) Dave tried to talk to the owners at 100 Country Club Drive, but has not been able to catch them at home.  Neighborhoods and Land Use – Jim Hopkins reporting for John Godfrey - The parcel at Capital and Columbia will be a CVS in 2016. Our planning supervisor, Christine Zuzga, is outstanding. Jim explained the difference between strategic planning (BC Vision, for instance, that is looking at community-wide economic strategies for the next 3 years) and master planning (which projects and plans land use for the next 20 years,) and encouraged citizens to get involved in the master planning process. There is an online tool called s-map which allows residents to identify areas of concern. The Planning Commission approved a zoning change for a small-scale food manufacturer to locate at 166 E. Goodale.  NPC 11 Programs – 8. Old business: None 9. New business:  September Program: Jim Owen, Lakeview School District Assistant Superintendent of Instruction, covering for Superintendent David Peterson discussed the facilities planning process. Last spring, a series of community meetings were held to get input. There is an upcoming meeting at Minges Brook Elementary, October 12, 6pm. Bonds for elementary school improvements have failed in past. Our newest building, Westlake, was built in the 1960’s, and our oldest, Prairieview, was built in the 1920’s. All four elementary buildings have steam heat systems that have out-lived their useful lives. No cooling is available except for windows and fans. All four buildings were designed with minimal attention to safety and security access. All four have driveways with entries and exits not designed for today’s traffic levels. The district knows something must be done, and the plan will be chosen at the November school board meeting for a May vote. A lesson learned from previous failed votes is that voters want all four buildings retained. One option is to just do maintenance – heating/cooling, safety and driveway access. A second option adds handicap accessibility and code issues to the list of intended upgrades. The final option would bring everything to code, plus some additions such as adding cafeterias separate from gyms. New buildings are significantly more expensive than retrofitting older buildings so new buildings will not be considered. Question was posed regarding the fact that a majority of voters do not have kids in elementary schools and what the schools are offering those voters. Answer: pride of offering top- notch facilities keeps property values high and helps attract new people to the community. Suggestion that the breakdown of costs be available to anyone who is a decision makers. Suggestion that BCVision district mergers would make the expansion of elementary schools irrelevant. Concern voiced that Lakeview residents pay for the facilities but school-of-choice kids get the advantages of the facilities without paying for facilities. 900 kids or 25% of school attendance are school of choice. Question regarding the problem with the grass of the football field. Answer: grass can only allow a certain amount of usage, whereas turf allows all activities to be held there. How much wear and tear can a grass field take? Question regarding strategies to be pursued by the district if facilities millages are not supported. Answer: the school district must find ways to pay with finite money, so when heating plants must be replaced, other programs have to suffer. Question regarding budget allocations for capital improvements. Question regarding getting federal grants for energy efficiency, putting together alternate funding sources and strategies for accumulating resources to fund future facilities. A survey was presented for voters to complete, and will be on the front page of the district website: www.LakeviewSpartans.org.  Brainstorming Topics for future presentations – The following topics were suggested: Would like to hear how the city plans the snow plowing (Todd Gerber); In spring – somebody from the Bombers; Would like to meet the City Manager and Chief of Police, Fire Chief. Would like to hear from the Southwest Regional Planning Commission regarding what is going on regionally. Would like to hear from Jeremy Andrews, Sprout Urban Farms. 10. Public comments: Kaytee Faris running for one of the City Commission At-Large seats. She left for school and returned to the city 5 years ago. Her daughter just started at Fremont Elementary. Broad community involvement including the Planning Commission Advisory Committee and the Fremont PTA. More information is available at www.KayteeFaris.com. 11. Member Comments: None 12. Next Month’s Meeting: 7:00PM Wednesday, October 28, 2015 at Riverside Elementary School Library. Program: Community Development Supervisor, Chris Lussier 13. Adjournment: There being no further business, Randall Champlin adjourned the meeting at 8:24pm.