Notes from the March 24th  Board of Trustees Workshop

Click to watch the Meeting on Livestream

Click here to read our partial transcription of the Sewer Report Discussion

Click to download Meeting Agenda

Click to download Meeting Packet

Click to download Meeting Minutes

Highlights:

The Big Story: Tetra Tech delivered its long awaited $25,000 Sewer System Capacity report.  We were officially notified of what most of us already knew.  We do not have the wastewater treatment capacity to handle our current obligations, let alone any new development. Our in depth story on the Tetra Tech Presentation and Discussion is Here.

 

The Washtenaw Road Commission held its annual meeting on the state of our roads and asked us to choose from a list of optional Road improvement projects for the coming year.  Each project requires a Township Co-Pay.  Northfield Township will contribute $130,000, barely covering the cost of two miles of dirt road repair.  You can view the Road Commission report here.

The Wastewater Treatment Plant is asking for $150,000 to rebuild two filters.

Township Manager Howard Fink is seeking authority to hire a Construction Manager, on a cost-plus basis, to supervise construction of a $150,000-$200,000 Board Meeting Room in the empty upstairs of the Township Hall.

What is wrong with this picture?

 

Early in the meeting Howard delivered a backgrounder on the process MDOT navigates to get approval of Federally funded projects like the US-23 Corridor improvements.  MDOT's $60M ATM (Automatic Traffic Management) 3rd lane project must be approved by the policy committee of WATS, the Washtenaw Area Transit Study, made up of local officials and politicos.  The constituencies comprising this body are responsible for a TIP (Transportation Improvement Program) and a LRP (Long Range Transportation Plan).  MDOT's plans have to mesh with these two plans.  If WATS votes down the project at their April 15th meeting, MDOT says the $60M ATM testbed will probably be located in Lansing.  The 3 local bridge projects will proceed without WATS approval.

Download the WATS brochure, What is WATS?.  Download the WATS Long Range Plan (17MB) 

If that isn't complicated enough, drive by the SEMCOG, (Southeast Michigan Council of Governments) website.  They've got a $36 Billion collection of RTPs, TIPs, and TAPs.