Neighborhood Planning Council 2 - North Central

Monday, the 10th of February, 2025 Meeting Minutes NORTHCENTRAL NEIGHBORHOOD PLANNING COUNCIL #2 Washington Heights – Hub of Hope, 153 N. Wood St. 1. Call to Order & Welcome: 6:07 pm Pastor French calls to order. Welcomes. Introductions. What makes you smile. 2. Attendance: NPC 2 Members (E = Excused - notified an officer/member, X = Present, O = Absent): O Mary Bourgeois X Church of Scientology (Jeff Breedlove – Secretary) O Frank Drury O Faith Temple COGIC (Joe Hooper) X Dr. Monique French - Chair O Grace Health (Eric Gestring ) O Samuel Gray X Larz Martin-Bey - Vice Chair O Neighborhoods Inc. of Battle Creek/NIBC (Whitney Wardell) X Bettie Robertson O Gary McKinley O Ron Sweet O Prentice Thompson O Karen Todd O Cynthia Wyatt O Andre Robinson O Debra Evans X Shanay Settles Guests: X Derrick Clayton City Representation: X Cpl. O’Bryant X Helen Guzzo X Yoland Johnson X Mariah Bell. BC public Schools X Herbert Love X Perry Hart X Jennifer Bentley X Franklin Ballard 3. Adoption of the Agenda: No Quorum 4. Approval / Amendment of Minutes: No Quorum 5. Correspondence (sent/received) & Announcements: Pastor French: Soul food dinner this Sunday at 1pm at Washington Heights 16th. Feb 23rd chicken and fixings dinner at the Arena. Village Network. Urban League is sponsoring a gala Helen Guzzo. Came last month said something that wasn’t true when giving out information. NPC 2 has experienced a higher level of tax foreclosures. Apologize for saying the black people do not pay their taxes. Want to be a trusted partner. Advocate for housing and development in Washington heights. I apologize, I am not a racist and I represent the city of BC. Any questions? Bettie: black people pay the most in taxes. It’s systematic that black people pay more taxes that is the reason for foreclosures. Discussion. Helen: want to be part of the solution. Apologize (Please submit all correspondence/announcements in writing whenever possible). Mailing Address: City Hall, 10 N. Division St., Room 104, Battle Creek, MI 49014 Phone: (269) 966-3315 Fax: (269) 441-0380 Web: www.battlecreekmi.gov  Monday, the 10th of February, 2025 Meeting Minutes NORTHCENTRAL NEIGHBORHOOD PLANNING COUNCIL #2 Washington Heights – Hub of Hope, 153 N. Wood St. 6. Committee & City Staff Reports: a. Police Department/Fire Department: 1.O’Bryant: Goes over report. 24 arrests for month of January. 17 business checks. 2.Problem house on w Michigan. Dangerous building. Vacant and abandoned for years. Someone bought it at tax auction. Citizen moved in. arrested him today. He had an outstanding warrant. 3.Continuing to enforce parking. We don’t know when we are going to get snow. People are getting used to me giving them tickets. 4. Holland and Parkway. Cars parked there. Moved the signs. Why did they move signs. Good question for DPW. Maybe the disabled person no longer lives there. Discussion. Direct to Steve Kalsie. 5. Couple houses. Treating houses like night club. I can’t be complainant. Need residents to complaint. b. Elected Officials: French. Resolution for black history month. Resolution for Heart awareness. Discussion around tax authority. Working on getting transportation for area. c. Neighborhood Services: Yoland Johnson. Goes over report. Had been away for family medical issues. Higher number of snow and ice enforcement. Megan Root. Transitioning to NPC3. Still transitioning in personal. Higher number of land lords not getting permit. Fined of $500 when found. Even if a relative and owner not residing in property would be considered fall under enforcement. Another increase is vacant and abandoned. Give owner 72 hours to secure. These buildings should be boarded on basement and first floor. Homeless person living in doc area. 450 W Michigan. Had building secured before. We don’t want them to be hurt. A lot of buildings marked for demolition. 84 summerset. Many residents in property. In drug house. Stealing electricity. Jumber cables from power line. Shut house down. Condemned. Has been marked for demolition. A lot of exciting things. Sad we have these issues going on. Another issue is front yard parking. Against ordinance. Can write an ADM parking enforcement ticket. We make sure it is safe for consumers to power up. Bettie: Rental increase, tax increase. Extortion. Watching youtube. Worst city in Michigan, battle creek falls number 2. Difficult to believe. Benton Harbor number 1. Discussion. Son lives in house. Doesn’t pay rent. Yolanda: Need to register it. Corp O’Bryant: working with code enforcement. Allowed to get an administrative search warrant. Did a house on Wabash last week. After we are done, then code compliance will condemn it if needed. 52 Wabash. 20 people and 20 dogs. Mailing Address: City Hall, 10 N. Division St., Room 104, Battle Creek, MI 49014 Phone: (269) 966-3315 Fax: (269) 441-0380 Web: www.battlecreekmi.gov  Monday, the 10th of February, 2025 Meeting Minutes NORTHCENTRAL NEIGHBORHOOD PLANNING COUNCIL #2 Washington Heights – Hub of Hope, 153 N. Wood St. Trade permit expiration. Permits that have expired. Don Wilkenson building inspection. d. Beautiful battle creek awards. No nominations e. Membership: Names to nominate: f. Committees: none. g. Battle Creek Public Schools Bell: Dir of ext learning. Love to hang out with kids and bring resources. Have something really big. Ann J is part of NPC2. 1932. Have been able to continue to restore. That is from the taxes NPC 2 pays for. In May a bond vote. Is not going to be a tax increase. More info in next NPC meeting. May 6th. Please vote. What those funds will do is increase security at schools. Locks, key fobs, upgrading playgrounds. Outside of some of the buildings, redoing c post area. Concession stands, bleachers, actual exterior. No tax increase. Questions? Bettie: happy no tax increase. Some people need work done on house. h. Landbank. None i. Grace Health no 7. Presentation: Mr. Hart: Letter with lead count. City of BC has a corrosion control treatment process that protects the water from corroding metals. The Lead and copper testing takes 30 samples per year, 90% would have to be under the level of 15 parts per billion (ppb) for lead. The highest level of 6 ppb and lowest of 0.0 were the results in the city. The City has sent out 3 letters north of Columbia Ave. EPA asked the City to identify all service lines going into peoples homes. Pipe from main to shut off valve in front yard, shut off to house and inside house. Working on 18k homes. Letters that went out are 3 types defining various configurations of service line materials. Galvanized previously connected to lead is one type that needs to be replaced. Particulate lead may be in galvanized line and needs to be replace within 10 years. We are aggressively getting that done. Working along Piper park and post addition. Replacement of all service lines requiring replacement is to be completed in the next 10 years. One of the letters we sent out was a notification that service line is made of lead or likely contains lead. If you don’t know what your service line is made of, then run water till cold. This will flush out lines and provide you with better water. We take samples from the most likely spots that contain lead and we are still low. The 3rd letter was for addresses where we are still attempting to identify the material type. We can’t consider a service line in home categorized until we have record of it. If you are curious, send an email or call and we can tell you what the service line in the street is made of. Mailing Address: City Hall, 10 N. Division St., Room 104, Battle Creek, MI 49014 Phone: (269) 966-3315 Fax: (269) 441-0380 Web: www.battlecreekmi.gov  Monday, the 10th of February, 2025 Meeting Minutes NORTHCENTRAL NEIGHBORHOOD PLANNING COUNCIL #2 Washington Heights – Hub of Hope, 153 N. Wood St. In 2015 we started taking pictures of the meter replacements and that has helped significantly in identifying service line materials in homes. Share with neighbors. Go to city website and search for our Get the Lead Out program. Going to survey helps us identify pipes. We are getting a lot of surveys but we need 100 times more. Here is the link to the survey. https://www.battlecreekmi.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=1954 We are well below maximum containment level for lead. The City is confident of the water we are serving you. Bettie: 3 years ago, water was tested and city never came out to test. 39 West Roosevelt Ave. Mr. Perry looks in records. Who informed you? Bettie: People who want to sell water softener. Mr. Perry: We do not sell water softeners. Discussion. The City often hears of companies stating they are selling water softeners or filtration systems. The City does not support these activities. Helen: is Washington heights on the schedule to get service lines replaced? Mr. Perry: The City has identified over 370 homes in the entire area of BC. Analyzed what area. Post addition became obvious for lead service line replacements I don’t know if we have been thoroughly through the area of Washington Heights. Copper to galvanize is a good service line as it does not contain lead. Do not have records of service lines for Bettie on the private side of the shutoff. The public side in the street is identified as copper in our records. 8. Old Business: ☐ French share with everyone. Radon air quality test. I have some available if anyone wants one. They have them available at health department for 10 dollars. ☐ Did go online range from 10 – 200 dollars. 9. New Business. 10. Public Comments/Member Comments: Obryant: None Franklin: appreciate seeing lights around here. 11. Next Meeting: Monday, March 10th. 6 PM @ Washington Heights UMC. 12. Adjournment: 7:06pm PM Minutes recorded and submitted by: Jeff Breedlove NPC2 Secretary Mailing Address: City Hall, 10 N. Division St., Room 104, Battle Creek, MI 49014 Phone: (269) 966-3315 Fax: (269) 441-0380 Web: www.battlecreekmi.gov  Monday, the 10th of February, 2025 Meeting Minutes NORTHCENTRAL NEIGHBORHOOD PLANNING COUNCIL #2 Washington Heights – Hub of Hope, 153 N. Wood St. NPC 2 Mission: To improve the quality of life by listening and engaging residents. NPC 2 Vision: A safe, friendly, family-driven neighborhood where everyone wants to live. The City of Battle Creek will provide necessary reasonable auxiliary aids and services, such as signers for the hearing impaired and audiotapes of printed materials being considered in the meeting upon reasonable notice to the City of Battle Creek. Individuals with disabilities requiring auxiliary aids or services should contact the City of Battle Creek by writing or calling the following: City Clerk Office (269) 966-3348/TDD Mailing Address: City Hall, 10 N. Division St., Room 104, Battle Creek, MI 49014 Phone: (269) 966-3315 Fax: (269) 441-0380 Web: www.battlecreekmi.gov  Monday, the 10th of February, 2025 Meeting Minutes NORTHCENTRAL NEIGHBORHOOD PLANNING COUNCIL #2 Washington Heights – Hub of Hope, 153 N. Wood St. Mailing Address: City Hall, 10 N. Division St., Room 104, Battle Creek, MI 49014 Phone: (269) 966-3315 Fax: (269) 441-0380 Web: www.battlecreekmi.gov