Arbor Update

Ann Arbor Area Community News

City Seeks Input on Plastic Shopping Bags

Posted by Nancy Shore on 21. March 2009

To ban or not to ban, that is the question.

The City of Ann Arbor is seeking community input on a potential policy that would discourage the use of plastic shopping bags and encourage the use of reusable bags.

There are a couple of ways you can give feedback about this issue:

Ann Arbor Residents and Consumers: Take this 3 min online survey

Ann Arbor Businesses: Attend a focus group and/or take a survey

There will be focus groups for businesspeople at

  • Tuesday, March 31, 2009 8:30-9:30 a.m. at Zingerman’s Road House, 2501 Jackson Road (at the Maple intersection); or on

  • Thursday, April 2, 2009 8:30-9:30 a.m. at the Downtown Development Authority (DDA) Office at 150 S. Fifth Ave., Suite 301, in downtown Ann Arbor between E. Huron and E. Washington.

The survey for business owners, managers and employees can be found here.

The City also encourages citizens and businesspeople (and citizens who are businesspeople) to send general comments on implementing possible shopping bag restrictions and promoting reusable bags to Katie at 734.794.6000 extension 4-3728 and via recycle@a2gov.org

local events mark the anniversary of the Iraq war

Posted by Chuck Warpehoski on 17. March 2009

The sixth anniversary of the Iraq War is coming up this weekend, and Michigan Peaceworks, Veterans for Peace, and the Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice are planning events to mark the event.

The main event is a rally Don’t backpedal on Iraq: Rally to Call for our Troops to in Iraq to be Sent Home now! event on Saturday, March 21 at 1:00 p.m. at the U of M Student Union, intersection of State St. and S. University St. in Ann Arbor. Speakers will include Retired Major Phillip Estes and University of Michigan Professor Tom Weisskopf, and there will be hot cocoa!

There will also be a film showing of Taxi to the Dark Side on Wednesday, March 18, at 7pm at 3437 Mason Hall, U of Michigan Campus, Ann Arbor, and a student art show on Friday, March 20 from 7pm – 10pm in the basement of Cafe Ambrosia, 326 Maynard, Ann Arbor.

A bit later this month is a showing of Why We Fight on March 31 at 7:00 at Memorial Christian Church, 730 Tappan.

Comment [38]

Public Art = Local Artists?

Posted by Nancy Shore on 13. March 2009

City Council recently approved a public art installation as part of the new City Municipal Center. This installation will integrate storm water mitigation into its design. The art is being designed by a German Artist. The decision to use a foreign rather than a local artist has prompted several letters to the editor

In an email to City Council, Margaret Parker (Chair of the Ann Arbor Public Art Commission) explained why the Commission chose a non-Michigan artist:

  • “Michigan artists were considered for this project and will be considered for all Percent for Art projects. But the technical aspects of the integration of storm water made it essential to chose an artist with proven experience in this specific area. Michigan artists participated in past public art projects at 4th and Washington and the Plymouth Road Water Tower. “
  • “For the first Percent for Art project, AAPAC looked for the very best public art available. That was our first priority. The artist is from Germany and does projects all around the world (one is in Portland and one in Chicago). Just as we love the Ann Arbor Symphony, we also appreciate the chance to hear the Berlin Symphony play. Reaching for the best public art from around the world puts our artists on the larger public stage and says loud and clear that Ann Arbor appreciates and wants all our people to live with great art in the public realm.”

You can read the full explanation in this document, which Ms. Parker will be providing to the media.

Thanks to Major Hieftje for providing this information

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DDA Blocks Parking Information via Phone Service

Posted by Matt Hampel on 13. March 2009

Back in January, a group of local hackers built a service that allowed people to call in and check on parking structure spot availability in realtime (MLive article). It as powered by freely available data from the Downtown Development Authority website.

However, several days ago, the DDA shut off the application’s access to the site, because:


1) no permission from the DDA was granted before this project got underway,

2) this project hopes to sell this software to other communities and thereby make a profit and is using DDA-generated information to accomplish this,

3) the DDA has no control over what is done with this information yet this information is attributed to the DDA,

4) persons interested in finding out about parking structure vacancies must make a toll-call out of state.

The developers of the system have responded in this open letter.

The realtime parking data site is still available online for individuals — but the DDA has emphatically said, “no reuse.”

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Public Forum organized to customize the Washtenaw County Cultural Master Plan for Ann Arbor

Posted by Angela Martin-Barcelona on 12. March 2009

The Arts Alliance will host a public forum discuss the Washtenaw County Cultural Master Plan and steps to customize the plan to meet the needs of our community. Anyone interested in the future of arts and culture in Ann Arbor is welcome to attend the forum which will take place on Thursday, March 26 from 6:30-8:00p.m. at the Kerrytown Concert House (415 North Fourth Avenue).

“There was a tremendous amount of community collaboration and engagement throughout the county-wide cultural plan process,” said John Weiss, Executive Director of the Neutral Zone and Ann Arbor Community Leader Co-Chair. “Now is the time for Ann Arbor to come together as a community and identify the key strategic areas that best match our needs from this plan. This forum and any subsequent meetings will be an excellent opportunity for our residents to be directly involved in the future of our community’s arts and cultural assets.”

The Washtenaw County Cultural Master Plan provides a vision for cultural development throughout the county over the next five years. Its recommendations fall into six strategic areas that were identified from the direct input of nearly 5,000 Washtenaw County residents through an online survey, an artists’ census, a study of the area’s creative economy, and in 29 interviews and community forums. The six strategic areas include Lifelong Arts & Education; Creative Economic Development; Capacity Building, Funding, and Investment; Communications, Audience Development, and Advocacy; Cultural Facilities; and Diversity and Access. Participants at the March 26 public forum will prioritize these six strategic areas and will begin brainstorming the next steps involved for developing a plan specific to Ann Arbor. A final customized report will be available in June 2009.

If you plan to attend this public forum, please RSVP to Angela Martín-Barcelona, Marketing Director at the Arts Alliance.

For more information about the cultural plan, click here.

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A2 Spending Priorities

Posted by Nancy Shore on 8. March 2009

In a recent column in the Ann Arbor News, Judy McGovern highlights four recent City budget decisions and the tension surrounding those decisions.

  1. Police Layoffs: As part of cutting costs at the City, the police department may cut as many at 20 jobs, including 14 officers and 6 civilians.
  2. East Stadium Boulevard Bridges: This bridge project has been delayed because of lack of federal funds. Because of safety concerns, the bridge has now been reduced to one lane in each direction.
  3. Police-Court Building: The Police-Court Building project is now underway and will be paid through borrowed bonds, cash on hand, and money from the DDA.
  4. Public Art: The City Council recent ok’d the Ann Arbor Public Art Commission’s plan to pay a German Artist to develop a proposal for an installation as part of the new City Hall. This funding for this art comes from a City Council Program that sets aside 1% of public building projects for public art.

Discuss.

Comment [30]

Ann Arbor Film Festival March 24-29, 2009

Posted by Nancy Shore on 7. March 2009

The 47th Ann Arbor Film Festival will be at the Michigan Theater March 24-29, 2009.

Highlights of this year’s Festival include

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If I could change one thing about the City of Ann Arbor it would be . . .

Posted by Nancy Shore on 4. March 2009

Two years ago around this time, Arbor Update reported on a City Council Meeting that presented information from the Citizen Survey.

This Citizen Survey got information from 3,000 City residents in January 2007. Apparently the results of the 2008 survey are going to be presented soon.

One of the most interesting parts of the survey is the open ended question component, which asked the question “If I could change one thing about the City of Ann Arbor it would be . . .”

Among the thousands of responses

If I could change one thing about the City of Ann Arbor it would be . . .

  • Public transportation. We need a frequent affordable rail service, from
    Dexter/Chelsea to Detroit to cut automobile traffic/pollution. I agree with the
    mayor on this one. Check out public transportation in Portland, Oregon &
    emulate.
  • Improve parking downtown. I wanted to go to Seyfrieds Jewelers but I know that parking would be questionable so I went to Lewis Jewelers. I have patronized Seyfrieds for years but I can’t trust the parking anymore. My son lived in the Maynard apartments and that is another difficult place to park. Someone stole my neighbor’s car Friday night-January 12, 2007.
  • Preventing the expansion of Ann Arbor city limits. The city works better if it is
    kept small & contained where land use is. Have green space surrounding the city, separating from the out-lying districts.
  • Better vision for downtown including use, transportation and building design to include height of building codes. Stop using water rates to fund programs such as trash bins and building programs. Add highly useable (i.e. irresistible) public transportation. Get the city out of the business of owning vacant property including the YMCA.

This is just the tip of the iceburg. Read all about it here

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Washtenaw Community College's new Packard campus?

Posted by Murph on 22. February 2009

Recently, Washtenaw Community College has been considering the acquisition of the Washtenaw Country Club, at Packard and Golfside. The club’s 122 acres, a little over a mile from WCC’s existing campus, would likely continue to be operated as a golf course for the near future, but WCC is more interested in the land for expansion of their academic programs:

To [WCC Trustee Richard] Landau, the offer to take over Washtenaw Country Club is a once-in-a-lifetime growth opportunity for the college to obtain a huge parcel of land at what he calls a “fire sale” price.

Although preliminary discussions call for WCC to continue operating the golf course for at least five years, Landau says that’s only an initial step to redeveloping the property for new academic initiatives – an expansion of the WCC culinary arts curriculum, possibly a new turf management program and future academic programs that no one can envision today.

The college would be assuming the golf course’s $1.9m debts and future operating costs in exchange for a parcel of land assessed at over $6 million.

While some see the move as a win for WCC even if it does not locate new campus facilities there, for the investment value of future real estate development alone, others have questioned whether the college should be making such an investment now: doubting both the wisdom of taking on the near term operating costs of the golf course and the idea of such a bold expansionist move in the current economy. A study of the existing campus has shown that facility space can be increased by 45% within the existing land.

Comment [2]

Pros and Cons: Underground Parking Structure

Posted by Nancy Shore on 20. February 2009

At the City Council’s Tuesday meeting, the Council voted to approve the site plan for the new underground parking structure at Fifth Avenue (also known as the Library Lot). This structure will add 670 spaces and will cost about $55 million to construct.

In an effort to facilitate some discussion about the recently approved underground parking structure, I’ve put together a list of pros and cons.

This list is compiled from emails I have received, arguments I have heard, and comments at the Council Meeting, which I attended. Since the Ann Arbor Chronicle did a wonderful job capturing the comments at the City Council Meeting, I pulled a lot of these pros and cons from their recent article.

Underground Parking Structure Pros and Cons

Comment [74] • Read More »

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