Stewart Nelson

I am an announced candidate for City Council for Ward 2 on a platform of fiscal responsibility and community involvement. Toward that end, I have spent much time analyzing the arguments for and against the proposed $47,000,000 renovation of the Guy Larcom Jr. Municipal Building objectively.  I have personally interviewed the Police and Fire Chiefs, Planning and Zoning officials, the County Administrator , County Treasurer and a County Commissioner, current and former City Council members, Waste Water Treatment officials, DDA, Main Street Area Association, The Ann Arbor Chamber, The State Street Area Association, University of Michigan officials, business and community leaders and hundreds of residents in my Ward. I also have exchanged e-mails with Tom Crawford the City Chief Financial Officer. I thank everyone for their input.

My conclusion is that the Mayor and a group of City Council members and City Administration have already decided that they are willing to spend $47M of our money unnecessarily to correct a $4M problem while they ignore a $100M problem to fix our crumbling waste treatment infrastructure and an even greater $140M financial and moral obligation to our city worker’s retiree medical benefits.  Both of these obligations will have to be dealt with in the next two to three years, at a time when our City will be facing other significant financial obligations related to core services. 

Therefore, I believe the City should permanently table the current plans for the police-court building financing and place the decision to fund this project to the voters in the form of a referendum on the next ballot.   

In light of an economy that saw 2200 homeowners go into foreclosure in 2007and more on the way, shelving the $47 million plans to renovate Larcom is the only logical decision we can make now.  We can finish drawing the plans for the complete renovation so we will have them on hand if the economy starts to show signs of improvement in 2009 or 2010 and other more cost effective solutions cannot be found. 

What do we do in the interim?

• One, we should proceed with the much needed but more modest renovation to the police space.
• Two, start negotiations with the County to build a combined Court Facility that would accommodate all City and County Courts.  There is a substantial cost saving available to us in construction and operational costs if we can accomplish that. 
• Let the citizens of Ann Arbor decide on a ballot initiative if there is support to invest a substantial portion of our current “rainy day” funds and bond capacity in a flashy display of civic pride. 

I would hope that as a City we will recognize our moral obligations to our public retirees and invest our money in the only “real assets” the City has, its employees,  then core infrastructure before we invest in bricks and mortar that really is only a superficial display for visitors to our city.