Politics
Meeting with Jackie Walorski
On Tuesday April 30 I was invited to a meeting with Jackie Walorski at the Plymouth Chamber of Commerce. There was some interesting discussion (more than what was printed in the paper) but I was disappointed in the participation. I know that invitations were sent to the other Community Chambers and there were no other representatives there. Of those in attendance only three of us brought up issues for the congresswoman’s consideration, despite her obvious willingness to answer questions and work on issues. This was a follow up on a meeting she held at the Plymouth Chamber in January which I attended, and I have to say I was impressed that not only did she remember me, but she came back with answers to some of the questions I posed then.
There were only about four of us that put questions in front of the congresswoman and because of lulls where no one else asked anything, I actually put three in front of her. She was receptive and honest, when she didn’t know she said she would find out and get back to us. I don’t think we can ask for any more than that.
As much as I am disappointed in the goings on in Washington, I felt that the interest from Congresswoman Walorski was refreshing and was a counterpoint to the disinterest from those that bothered to come.
Excerpt from ABC Construction Economic Update 3-1-13
As further evidence that the nation’s construction industry continues to struggle, nonresidential construction spending fell 3.3 percent in January, with outlays decreasing to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $572.1 billion, according to the March 1 report by the U.S. Census Bureau. Year over year, total nonresidential construction spending is up only 0.8 percent (unadjusted for inflation).
Both private and public nonresidential construction spending were down for the month. Private nonresidential construction spending fell 5.1 percent on a monthly basis, but is 4 percent higher compared to one year ago. Public nonresidential construction spending declined 1 percent in January and is 2.7 percent lower than January 2012.
“January’s construction spending decline was particularly alarming because the loss in momentum spread deep into privately financed categories,” said Associated Builders and Contractors Chief Economist Anirban Basu. “In previous months, decreased spending in a number of public spending-oriented sectors like sewage and waste disposal and public safety was roughly counter-balanced by increased spending in intensely private segments, such as power and manufacturing.
“That changed in January, with privately financed segments like power and manufacturing reversing course and experiencing substantial monthly declines in construction spending” said Basu. “The upshot is that nonresidential construction spending is virtually unchanged over the past year.
Letter to the Editor
I shared some of my rants regarding the changes to the zoning boundary with Jeff Kenney of the Culver Citizen and he suggested that I send him a letter to the editor on the subject. I am a little freer with my writing here in the blog since I know my audience is different, so I wrote a separate Letter to the Editor and cleaned up my prose a bit. Hopefully it will encourage people to get involved and do some of the research themselves. My earlier piece included all of the links and drawings, so I’ve made it easy for anyone to follow my research. What do you think?
PS – If anyone can tell me why I lose my paragraph breaks on text I cut & paste into a post, let me know! Drives me nuts! It looks right in the editor and then loses the spaces between paragraphs when it posts… I guess I’ll go old-school and add indents…
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Two Mile Zoning Boundary (cont.)
I went home pretty frustrated last night. I had shared my previous post on the Two Mile Zoning Boundary with the Town Council and Plan Commission last week. I am also on the Steering Committee for the Plymouth Comprehensive Plan review and attended that meeting Monday evening. (6:00 until 9:45! Sheesh!) The topic of the Two Mile Zoning Boundary came up and there was a lively discussion. Yesterday I sent the following email to the Town Council and Plan Commission ahead of the Plan Commission meeting last night:
All,I attended last night’s Plymouth Comprehensive Plan review on behalf of MCEDC. One of the items that Jackie Turner with Ratio Architects had in the draft plan was ceding some extra territorial control back to the County. I questioned why this would ever be considered as the extended territorial control was there to allow the municipality to control its destiny. She replied that if Plymouth was looking at the plan as a 10 year document, then they might want to divest themselves of the burden of supervising areas that weren’t planned for annexation in the next 10 years. I asked why a municipality would EVER want to cede control to the county and shouldn’t our vision be for 50 years, not just 10? I then asked about problems with residential development surrounding industrial areas making expansion difficult, the problem with subdivisions just outside the territorial boundary which used services, but did not pay for them (fire, police, parks, etc.) and and the difficulties of leapfrogging areas that had been developed that resisted annexation to serve new development or other older developments that needed services. This started a rather spirited response from Plymouth departmental staff naming specific instances where this is already a problem.Ms. Turner agreed with my points for the most part, saying she was just giving that as an option to be considered as part of the comprehensive planning process. She said there still may be areas of no growth where Plymouth might want to consider this, but all the points I made need to be considered before making that decision.I’m paraphrasing the discussion above, but I double checked it with Brent Martin who was also in attendance. Ralph Booker was there also. One of the big points I think Culver should take from this is that determining the extended territorial boundary is a discussion that should be had as part of the Comprehensive Planning process. There is no reason that we can’t put this off until our planning process is complete.Kevin
After sending that out yesterday, I had a meeting with the representatives from Houseal Lavigne Associates who were here doing interviews to start our Comprehensive Plan project. I was there representing MCEDC. As part of our discussion, I laid out the scenario of the property swaps to Devin Lavigne and he agreed with me that it probably was not appropriate to give up any control since it was so hard fought to obtain. He also agreed that this should be part of the comprehensive planning process we were just beginning.
At the Plan Commission last night Ralph Booker, Marshall County Plan Director, presented the maps including a calculation of the acreage of the land that was swapped. Ralph Winters, Plan Commission Chairman, called for a vote without audience input and it was passed without discussion. My arguments were not mentioned. Our new planners, sitting in the audience, were not consulted. Opportunity missed. Do you like the Face Palm GIF? That was me last night!
Passing this last night puts it in front of the Town Council for approval. I’m not sure when that will happen or whether the Town Council will buck the Plan Commission on this again.