Mayor Landry called the meeting to order at 7:00 P.M.

ROLL CALL: Mayor Landry, Mayor Pro Tem Gatt, Council Members Burke, Crawford, Margolis, Mutch, Staudt

ALSO PRESENT: Rob Hayes, City Engineer

Tom Schultz, City Attorney

Ara Topouzian, Economic Development Director

Member Crawford added ICMA Study, NRPA Magazine, Wildlife on Eleven Mile and Showtime to Mayor and Council Issues.

Jean Meyer, President of Providence Park, was present to offer a first year update on Providence Park Hospital. Ms. Meyer said today there were 200 beds opened and licensed, 300 more staff members and 300 more physicians that worked at both Providence Park and Providence Southfield. She said patient safety, clinical quality and patient experience were the top priorities at the new hospital. She said satisfaction to a patient was what they thought was important and it could be very different from what she thought was high quality. It was important that they knew what every patient’s experience should be and what their expectations were in order to all be on the same page. They had over 7,000 admissions to the hospital and over 8,500 surgeries were done, 1,400 babies were added to the Novi population and over 37,000 people came into the Emergency Department this first year. She said they have a Heart Institute but do not do open heart surgeries yet, but do transport patients within minutes to Providence Southfield where a cardiac team would be ready. Providence Park also had an Assarian Cancer Center, Neurosciences Center, Orthopaedics, Women’s and Pediatric Services, ER, Surgical, Imaging and Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. They also have a quality primary care physician’s network, a Medical Home Model, and Acuity Adaptable Rooms where at any one time 200 ICU beds could be available, as every room was outfitted for the highest level of care possible. Ms. Meyer said with the economy, it was important for everyone to be very flexible to meet the economic challenges and their goal was to avoid duplication and waste while always focusing on improving the quality of the patient care they provide.

Member Burke commented his wife was in the hospital in February and he was just blown away with everything Ms. Meyer’s touched on in her presentation. He said there was food anytime she was hungry; the monitoring station was outside the room so they didn’t disturb her, etc. He said they were very pleased with the care his wife received.

Mayor Pro Tem Gatt said he also had occasion to use the hospital as his father was a patient in the ER and admitted. He said the nursing care, specialist and everyone there and especially the people on 4A and B was better than he could ever expect.

Member Crawford said, at separate times, she and her grandson had also been through the ER and they also had great experiences.

Lou Martin of Providence Park was present and said they were very happy to be at their one year anniversary. He thanked Council for being there with them throughout the years that it took to get the hospital approved and for the ribbon cutting. Mr. Martin said the hospital was a positive, tangible impact on the community and it was because of Council’s support that they were able to do what they do.

Mr. Hayes said there were several road agencies working on the roads in Novi. He said MDOT had opened north bound Novi Road to the east bound I-96 ramp as well as the Meadowbrook Road Bridge over I-96 and 696. The Novi Road bridge work over I-96 had been completed and the connector ramps between I-96, 696 and 275 were essentially done. Mr. Hayes said there was a new westbound lane on I-96 between M-5 and Novi Road, which would help a lot with mitigating congestion for people trying to get to the mall. Finally, MDOT had completed the east bound Eight Mile to south bound 275 on ramp.

Mr. Hayes said locally the City of Novi was essentially complete with its annual neighborhood road reconstruction rehabilitation project. He said it was approximately $1.2 million worth of construction work in various neighborhoods throughout the City.

Mr. Hayes said MDOT was still working on the east and west bound I-96 approaches to the CSX Railroad bridges, south bound Novi Road to east bound I-96 on ramp and north bound Novi Road to west bound I-96. He said completion was expected in early October.

Mr. Hayes said the RCOC had a major project that would affect everyone, which was the Novi Road resurfacing from Twelve Mile south to Grand River. He said this was expected to start any day now with a November 2nd completion date. He said it was a Federal stimulus project.

Finally, next year MDOT would be doing the railroad bridges on the I-96, east bound off ramp at Novi Road. The RCOC would be doing Novi Road from Main Street south to Ten Mile, which would be widened to five lanes and would include a bridge over the railroad tracks. He said that would begin in early spring and be completed by late fall.

Mr. Hayes said the City of Novi had two Federal stimulus projects that would begin this fall, which were Nine Mile Road, Meadowbrook to Haggerty and Meadowbrook Road, Eight Mile to Nine Mile. He expected these to be completed by mid November.

Mr. Hayes said the residents and businesses had been very patient and cooperative. He thanked those, on behalf of the DPS, who were affected by the calls that came in and said he was very appreciative.

Joseph LaFleur, 23889 Meadowbrook Road, stated he wanted to address the speed limit increase that was temporarily put up on Meadowbrook Road between Eight and Ten Mile Roads. He said a lot of the residents weren’t very happy with the increase and he had collected signed surveys to give to Council. He said there was a total of 65 residents that lived on Meadowbrook Road between Nine and Ten Mile Roads, which was the area of his survey. He said of the 65 residents, 54 signed the survey. He said 51 wanted the speed limit lowered back to 30 and 3 wanted it left at 35. He said it was very difficult backing out of their driveways when people were going a little faster down Meadowbrook Road. He said there were a lot of school buses on Meadowbrook Road and he didn’t think an increase in the speed limit was good for them trying to turn onto or off of Meadowbrook Road. Also, since the sidewalks were installed on the west side, there were a lot of kids crossing Meadowbrook Road to go to the 7-11. He said he had also noticed an increase in traffic on Meadowbrook Road because of the increased speed limit and today there was an accident on the corner of Borchart and Meadowbrook Road and he had the police report to show to Council.

Dik Ornekian, 23650 Meadowbrook Road, said he was also concerned with backing out of their driveways between 4:30 PM and 7:00 PM and people always drive a little faster than the speed limit. He said in Northville when going left on Sheldon Road from Eight Mile it was 25 MPH going into the City. He said maybe they cared more about their citizens. In Walled Lake on Decker Road starting at Maple going to Pontiac Trail it was 25 MPH. He said 95% of the residents between Nine Mile and Ten Mile Roads did not want the speed limit increased to 35 MPH. He said he did a trial drive and going five miles an hour more, they gained 15 seconds. Mr. Ornekian said he wanted Council, as their elected officials, to care about them and bring the speed limit back to 30 MPH.

James Karlavage, 41976 Quince Dr., President of Orchard Hills Homeowners Association, was present to support the residents who lived on Meadowbrook Road. He said he walked Meadowbrook Road every morning and there were speeders going up and down there. He said he talked to some Police Officers and the majority of people ticketed were commuters through Novi. He agreed with his fellow residents regarding backing out of the driveways and about the pedestrian traffic. He stated he was concerned that it would only take a minor accident for cars to careen off the street and hit someone. Mr. Karlavage said for the safety of the citizens, he believed the speed limit should remain at 30 MPH. He asked that Council protect the citizens and pedestrians of Meadowbrook Road.

Member Burke removed Item F and Member Mutch removed Item B.

A. Approve Minutes of:

August 24, 2009 – Regular meeting

C. Approval of Resolution to amend the Agreement between the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and the City of Novi for the Michigan Natural Resources Trust Fund Grant, TF07-017 Novi Core Habitat Reserve Property Acquisition, to extend the Project Agreement to March 31, 2010.

D. Approval of payment to Trinity Electric Inc. in the amount of $31,200 for street lighting repairs made to Crescent Boulevard lighting.

E. Approval to waive the Maintenance and Guarantee Bond requirement for water and sewer facilities at the Gateway Village of Novi project, located on Grand River Avenue west of Meadowbrook Road in Section 23.

H. Approval of the final balancing change order and final payment to Pro-Line Asphalt Paving Corporation for the Crowe-Ingersol Road Reconstruction in the amount of $13,024.64.

I. Approval to award an amendment to the engineering services contract for construction engineering services related to the 2009 Federally Funded Road Projects to Orchard, Hiltz & McCliment, Inc. (OHM), for a not-to-exceed fee of $80,900.

J. Approval of Claims and Accounts – Warrant No. 802

Mayor Pro Tem Gatt asked if there would be a notice sent out to all the businesses, if this were approved this evening. Mr. Hayes said yes, the Community Relations staff would be getting the word out to the businesses. Mr. Topouzian said they would put the message out through investnovi.org and through the e-biz e-mail blast, which had about 1,200 e-mail addresses. He said they would also let the Chamber of Commerce know as well and they would vet it through their system. Mayor Pro Tem Gatt said he knew a business that didn’t have e-mail and didn’t belong to the Chamber, so what would happen with that kind of a business. Mr. Topouzian said they had a mailing list and they could put it together and get it out. Mayor Pro Tem Gatt said he hoped they would, as he didn’t want any businesses to miss out on this opportunity. He thought this was a great idea, as it would help the businesses in these economic times and wouldn’t hurt or cost the residents. He suggested sending people out and sending the Ordinance staff out knocking on doors and handing out flyers and putting it on the new message sign.

Mayor Landry said he asked that this item be put on the agenda and thought that in conjunction with Fall for Novi it would be an opportunity to give some relief to the businesses. He said what was proposed was a 24" by 36" sign and he would like to see it a little bigger. He said he would like to make a friendly amendment to allow the signs to be 48" by 72" and the businesses would have to notify the City that they were going to put up a sign but would not have to pay a fee. The maker and seconder of the motion agreed.

Mr. Hayes commented this was a replacement dump truck that would augment the winter maintenance fleet with state of the art equipment.

Mayor Pro Tem Gatt asked if this was a part of the monies that were set aside at budget time, and not to be spent until the second half of the year. Mr. Hayes said there were two dump trucks approved in the budget but later one was deferred; so they were asking that this one be procured now.

Member Mutch said it was indicated in the memo provided to Council that because the truck came in under the budgeted amount that the savings would be used for units that would be attached to other trucks. Mr. Hayes said that would be a separate issue to come before Council at a later date. He said they had learned that putting down dry salt was not that effective and that they needed something to wet it and get it going so it actually melted the snow and ice. He said the industry standard now was to pre-wet the salt as it came off the spinner, which would activate the salt and prevent a lot of it from bouncing off the road, because it didn’t have as much energy once it hit the pavement.

Mr. Hayes said this was the Cost Share Agreement they were required to enter into with the State of Michigan as the agent for the Federal Government to use the Federal stimulus money on those projects.

Member Mutch asked Mr. Hayes to address the question that the resident had about the nature of the work to be done on Meadowbrook Road. Mr. Hayes said Meadowbrook Road would be a mill and overlay of the existing width of the section. He said they would not be widening it, so it would remain a two lane section from Eight Mile to Nine Mile Roads.

Mayor Pro Tem Gatt asked what the PASER rating was on Meadowbrook Road between Eight Mile and Nine Mile Roads. Mr. Hayes said on Meadowbrook Road it varied from 4 to 5, so it was below average to average with some sections being pretty bad that brought the average down to the 4 range. He said the majority of it was closer to a four.

Mr. Hayes said this was just utilizing Federal Forfeiture Funds to purchase vehicles for the Police Department.

1. ICMA Study – Crawford

Member Crawford said they received the two booklets from the ICMA Study within days of the study delivery; then Council received the Administration’s plan for the recommendations that were made in the study. She said she was beyond pleased with the immediate attention to the recommendations. She said in every single packet that Council had received this summer it seemed that there was news of something new being implemented. She said she particularly wanted to highlight the Novi Police Department who had implemented another one this week regarding shift changes. She applauded staff for looking at the department with new eyes. She knew it was really difficult sometimes when Council got the studies and recommendations and sometimes it was hard to get everyone on board. However, she really was delighted that it was a team effort and that staff was really looking at the study data. She said they didn’t usually think of the Police Department and the Fire Department as being creative but they were looking at creative solutions to solve problems in the community. She said in addition, the Police and Fire Departments were looking for creative ways to partner with neighbors by renting space, the ladder truck and the gun range. Member Crawford said all of the taxpayers should appreciate the efforts that were being made to cut costs and become more efficient. Member Crawford said for those who had come to believe that the wheels of government grind slowly or not at all, it’s a different story here in Novi and she applauded staff.

Member Crawford said people driving on Eleven Mile thought they were in an urban environment. She said there was Parkview Elementary and the Middle School, which brought a lot of bus traffic and a lot of people dropping their kids off. She said this summer and now this fall there were a lot of deer and people didn’t expect to see deer. She said she saw two bicyclists stop traffic last week for a doe and two fawns. She said she wanted to alert people that there were a lot of deer in Novi and they had learned to live in small strips of woods and cross from one little bit of woods to another. Member Crawford said they weren’t afraid and stood close to the road and she cautioned everyone and hoped that no one got hurt.

Member Crawford said she was pleased to receive information from NRPA with a spotlight on Novi. She thought that was really wonderful and knew that Director Auler had some input. She said there were six pages in a national publication featuring Novi. She said the beauty of it was that it discussed Council implementation and research they had conducted on older adults and they were taking part in Parks and Recreation planning. She said the study indicated that people could call the City of Novi and she understood that a few calls had already been received. Member Crawford said one thing it said was "the correct survey research brings in the voice of older adults and the correct analysis of results amplifies and clarifies that voice." She thought that was really important and was what they were trying to do with the survey that was done by Novi. She applauded the department for taking the time to make sure that there was a focus on Novi on a national level because she thought it really highlighted all the good things about the City.

Member Crawford said there was a big senior show going on here in the theatre portion of the Civic Center. She said it was a production that would be amazing enough had it been young people but there were 47 members of the cast with an average age of 75.2. She said it was an amazing show and there was still time to get tickets and she could guarantee there was nothing like this in the state or probably on a national level. Member Crawford said there were still tickets available for Thursday, Friday and Sunday. She said this was Lauren Sorrentino’s debut year as director of the show and she was only months into being Novi’s performing arts coordinator and she couldn’t complement her enough for all she had done.

Member Mutch stated his concern about the Appreciation Dinner in light of the current economy and as they had scaled back and put a memo out to the public that staffing had been reduced by 14 people since 2007-2008. He said they had gone to the employees and asked them to work with fewer resources and asked, in terms of benefits, to scale some of those back. He felt that in this day and age, this size of an event got harder to justify and the reality was that most communities no longer did these kinds of events. Member Mutch said the local government he worked for used to have an employee lunch but because of the reductions in revenues, that no longer happened. He asked City Administration to consider, in the long term, looking at some lower cost alternatives to this event. He thought, as revenues fell, this would be something they would not be able to sustain.

Member Margolis said this was approved unanimously by Council in the budget and as part of the balanced budget. She thought this event was a huge part of the morale of the City and was what made Novi unique. This was an opportunity for the employees, Boards and Commissions and Council to spend some time together and celebrate the volunteer spirit that was part of this community. Member Margolis said there was just a comment about the way the employees approached studies and work and this happened to be how she made her living and how they got people to do more with less. She said they didn’t do it by cutting out every single possible enjoyable aspect of their job. She said the fact that this was so well attended by both employees and by Boards and Commissions told her it was worth the investment they made and she would not want to see them redo this. She said she would not support cancelling the appreciation dinner.

Mayor Pro Tem Gatt said this event was approved unanimously during the budget time by Council. He said the City Council was more or less a voluntary organization and the Council members were paid $15 per meeting and the Mayor was paid $20. He said they met twice a month and several Saturdays for budget sessions, goals, etc. He noted the other Boards and Commissions worked tirelessly and prepared for hours and hours and hours for their meetings and received nothing for what they did, as it was strictly voluntary. He said the event in question was a once a year Appreciation Dinner for all the volunteers in the City of Novi for the work that they did that made the City great. He said other cities didn’t do this but Novi was not a lot of cities; this was a very unique, different City and better than the rest. Mayor Pro Tem Gatt said they were fortunate to live and work in Novi and it was events like this that made them stand out and that said thank you to those who did so much for nothing. He felt it was certainly the least the City could do. He said he could never support a motion to stop this event.

Member Crawford echoed the previous two speakers. She said there was very few times they could collectively thank the hundreds of people that help make the City what it was. She said they depended more on the volunteers now, because of the economic times, and the volunteers were critical to the operation of the City. She said it was the one time that they could all get together and thank them. She said it was great when all the Boards and Commissions got together and communicated at that dinner; it’s a highlight, inspiring for the employees to see the many volunteers that come to the City and work for hours and hours without being paid. She felt it was also good for the employees and she would not want to be a part of cancelling this one opportunity every year to thank the people involved in the City.

Mayor Landry agreed with the three previous speakers. He said times were never too bad to say thank you. He said it had been said there were countless volunteers; there were countless numbers of employees that they made very high demands on everyday. He said they asked them to be a part of a team; they had studies and asked someone in one department to work with someone in another department. Parks and Recreation pitched in when there was snow on the ground to plow snow off sidewalks and streets and people in the DPW cut grass in parks and it was all hands on deck when things happened. He said the Fire Department worked with the Police Department during times of emergencies and you don’t just forge a team like that overnight. He said the other aspect that couldn’t be lost was that spouses came to these dinners. He felt that was very important for a spouse to know where an employee worked and who they worked with and to see what kind of esteem they were held in and what kind of organization they worked in. Mayor Landry said for $30 a person, he didn’t know any employee or volunteer that wasn’t worth $30 a year. He said, in these times, they were saying they couldn’t give raises like they had in the past but he thought they could still say thank you.

Member Burke said he didn’t disapprove of using Forfeiture Funds for the vehicles but did have a question relative to the use of the Dodge in the mix. He said he noticed that superficially it looked like they just spread the love around and gave one each to the Big Three. He said he didn’t know if that was done on purpose or if there was some thought process behind the inclusion of the Dodge. He asked if they had any Dodge Chargers in service now. Chief Molloy said they had two Dodge Chargers in service now but these would be for investigators. He said the diversity of the fleet was for when they did surveillances in the neighborhoods as they didn’t want everybody in a Taurus or Impala. He said it was basically for the diversity of the fleet. Member Burke asked if the cars were usually just used in the City and Chief Molloy said the only time they would spend any time on the roads was traversing back and forth to different courts in Pontiac or for surveillance that took them outside of the City. However, for the most part, they would be in Novi.

AUDIENCE COMMENT – None

There being no further business to come before Council, the meeting was adjourned at 7:58 P.M.

__________________________________ ________________________________
David Landry, Mayor                                          Maryanne Cornelius, City Clerk

__________________________________ Date approved: September 28, 2009

Transcribed by Charlene McLean