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HomeMy WebLinkAboutPRDA MINUTES 1999-11-18 MINUTES OF THE 103RD REGULAR MEETING OF THE PLYMOUTH ROAD DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY OF THE CITY OF LIVONIA The 103rd Regular Meeting of the Plymouth Road Development Authority of the City of Livonia, Michigan was called to order at 3:15 p.m., Thursday, November 18, 1999 in the 3rd Floor Conference Room at City Hall. Members Present: Mr. Michael Polsinelli, Chairman Mr. Raby,Vice Chairman Mr. Stan Anderson Mr. Lowell Peterson Mr. Scott Grace Ms. Toni Mette Mr. Bill Pike Members Absent: Mayor Jack E. Kirksey Mr. Rod Crider Mr. Dennis Kujawa Mr. Marvin Walkon Mr. Duane Wolfgang Mr. Jerry Wordhouse Others Present : Mr. John J.Nagy,Director,P.R.D.A. Mrs. JoAnn Marshall,BRI Mr. Scott Reinholt, BRI Mr. Ralph Williams, Citizen Ms. Susan Annibal, Secretary 1. Roll was called. 2. Adoption of the November 4, 1999 Minutes: On a motion duly made, seconded and unanimously adopted, it was #99-57 RESOLVED, that the Minutes of the 102nd Regular Meeting held by the Plymouth Road Development Authority on November 4, 1999 are approved. Mr.Polsinelli,Chairman, declared the motion is carried and the foregoing resolution adopted. 3. Comments from Chairman: The Winter Wonderland Holiday Parade was to be held Saturday, November 20, 1999, which was coordinated by Mr. Nagy, who was commended on having done such a fine job in the planning and organization phase of the Parade. The Chairman has received SMART's design criteria for the Bus Stop Committee to look into along with where to place the shelters and how many. The Sub-Committee would make a recommendation to the full Board. 4. Beckett & Raeder — Construction Progress Report: The Phase II punch list for Irish is complete. Irrigation will be closed out in the spring. The underground storm drain at Mette Center is complete. Ms. Mette said quite a bit of rain had come down a couple of times and the drain seemed to be doing all right. Another drain was also planned to be put in at the Garden Market property. The situation was definitely better than it has been in the past. Grounds 1 Maintenance continues with fall clean-up. Sprinkler system work has been shut down for the summer. Bids would be put out before spring. Banners are on order and scheduled for installation before the Parade date of November 20th. Relating to Phase III, half of the sod has been installed. Installation is ongoing regarding light pole bases, light poles, fixtures and wiring. Foundations were installed over the last two weeks. A few light poles will be eliminated until after curb work in completed in the spring just west of Middlebelt. A portion of trees have been installed within Phase III, the remainder of which will be installed after Basile's work is finished. On the subject of trees, an arborist would be coming in to walk through the job to advise on maintaining and pruning existing trees and offer recommendations on any ailing or diseased trees and also to ensure that over planting does not occur. Orchard, Hiltz and McClimant curb work has been postponed until spring; the Construction Subcommittee decided not to do that work and re-bid it in the spring, hopefully some money would be saved. Only work at VW Mazda and Cockrum's Farm Market remains. This does hold up that series of light poles on that side of the street until that work is done. With regard to Phase IV, construction drawings are at 80%. Phase V drawings have been submitted to MDOT and Wayne County for their review. Naimola's will be more of a design issue, since that area of their property on Plymouth Road is all asphalt,which will eventually be gone. A schedule had been promised for that matter between the end of Fall and the first of December. There's a lot happening right not, but we couldn't just keep adding little pieces to the contract. Most of the work being done now is just putting in light poles. There are a lot of places where there are light poles in but there isn't any curb. We will start fixing any missed curb replacement work in the spring. Although it's somewhat brown, sod is being laid now, awarded as part of the contract. In the past, sod has been put in as late as December 15th. Even with the colder temperatures, roots will grow and continue to grow. In Spring, when it comes up, it will be somewhat uneven, though. It's far better to have it done in the Fall than in the Spring. It was suggested that Val Vandersloot and Bill Craig (Tree City USA) be invited when the arborist comes. Regarding Phase IV, Mr. Reinholt said that about 75-80% of the construction drawings for Plymouth and Middlebelt are in. The biggest item remaining is at Farmington Road: three of the four corners are for sale. We haven't been able to go any farther with easements and can't until that's resolved. All four corners are involved at this point. Ford has signed that easement agreement. We would have a larger decorative area on the North and East corners. George Burns is a little bit bigger, but not too bad. It's similar for Merriman and Farmington both, proto-typical. Though not yet finalized Phoenix project at George Burns is still a bit of an issue on green space. Perhaps P.R.D.A. could write a letter to Planning and City Council advising that we have this coordination issue and that, as part of our action, that easement is needed. We could possibly get that from Lou George; it's possibly obtainable. If the City Council approves the site plan without it, we could even attend and, before the vote, voice our concern that we need to have an easement. Council and ZBA should take that into consideration and make that a condition of the approval. Another idea, if we couldn't find out any more about these pending sales,we definitely want to get Middlebelt in the ground. Mr. Nagy had met with the Redford people and they want to establish their own Downtown Development Authority on Plymouth Road. They want to start implementing a banner program like ours and want to contact our banner company and are also looking at the bus stops. A city can have more than one DDA, but only one TIFA district for financing. In a test mile, there are 39 bus stops. It wasn't thought that we need bus plazas at all the stops — perhaps half of them, dependent on customer count. We have had all of that information now. On the topic of bus stops, we are just waiting for a full committee to come back together. Pertaining to the subject of light poles, it has been determined to discard the idea of fluted poles and just paint standard poles black to match our fixtures and banner arms. The thought now was to take a standard steel MDOT pole and paint it black and not deal with the fluted poles. A sleeve couldn't be placed on the pole. It was suggested just to paint the poles, put a shroud 2 around the base and go with it. A letter has been received from the contractor. Probably, we'd tre have to allow him to take on some inflation. Another sticky part from a lighting standpoint was that we couldn't meet the lighting standards with just the light poles. The only option is to put some kind of fixture on top of the light heads, which would give us the light we need. The codes won't let us put a light on the pole. The City has told us to look at the very best design criteria, and they will show it to the DPW. A rendering or sketch was requested showing the fixture on top to be submitted to the Authority. It would still be the typical MDOT pole, but painted black instead of the galvanized silver. BRI had met with Holophane and were continuing to resolve issues with them. Hopefully, there won't be any other problems. A letter would be written to the utility companies. Mich Con is underway at Peregrine. 5. Reports from Committees Public Relations: The P.R.D.A. summer Newsletter was distributed to Board members and lauded a"big success." This publication headlined"Local Business Owners Take the Initiative". Features in the Fall issue highlighted three Corridor businesses were: Legacy of Livonia, Zerbo's Health Foods, and Quality Inn and Suites. 1)Legacy of Livonia, 34100 Plymouth Road, Kole Zekaj proprietor, is a newly-constructed restaurant replacing an empty franchise fast-food location and what had become an"eyesore"with an attractive building with white brick exterior and wide windows, already some buzz of further expansion. 2) Zerbo's Health Foods, 34164 Plymouth Road, Clara Adams, owner, is the resulting expansion and renovation of the 40-year old vitamin and nutrition center east of Stark Road, which now offers an organic produce section and juice bar; 3) Quality Inn and Suites, 30375 Plymouth Road, John Glasnak, part- owner/spokesperson, now exhibits a modern attractive entrance drive adding "extensive (kw landscaping"with shrubs, flowers and a fountain, an expanded meeting room and future business center with amenities such as fax machines, computers, printers, copiers and Internet access. Mette's Printery has done a fine job in delivering another product of quality. Illustrations of the four seasonal banners along the Corridor were included and to be displayed adjacent to main intersections. Our first summer banner would appear in time for the Winter Wonderland Holiday Parade,November 20th. Another topic was the ongoing problem of signs and banners at business properties at the corner of Plymouth and Middlebelt, and it was suggested that the 8' x 10' "For Lease"billboard be removed, since it clutters up the corner. Vacant Buildings:. Nothing to report. Construction Committee: Nothing to report. Inspection: None of the sandwich board type signs were seen on the East side from Merriman to Middlebelt. The lights looked nice with their uniformity, and it might be a good idea to get a picture for the Newsletter. Development Assistance Committee: Nothing to report. Mr. Peterson nominated Mr. Polsinelli as Chairman for the next election (after the first of the year.) 6. Director's Report: Our proposal with Cockrum's was now signed, sealed and delivered; we now have the easement documents. Basile is trying to get all the improvements and ajustments made by Thanksgiving, so when Cockrum's handles Christmas trees merchandise, Basile will be out of there. Regarding the Holiday Parade, it was Mr. Nagy's first venture in its leadership. In 3 1998 we had 87 units; this year we have 93 including eight(8)bands, 27 marching units, antique cars. Streets will be closed Saturday the 20th at 8:30 a.m. The march will start at Merriman and Plymouth and go east on Plymouth and enter Wonderland Mall at the second lot entrance just East of where the Merchandise Mart was. The judges stand will be across the sidewalk where the MediaPlay is on the north side. The group from Channel 8 will be there. There would be traffic direction provided at the middle driveway to Wonderland. Among contributors were Turowski Funeral Home providing a tent to protect and give comfort to the judges Mayor Kirksey would be speaking. We had a lot of contributions from at least six contributors, including the Observer Newspapers, City Channel 8, Schostak Brothers and Company, Livonia Chamber of Commerce and Wonderland Mall. Mr. Nagy, Mr. Polsinelli and Butch Raby would be riding in one of the parade vehicles. Special parade guests would be Dino Cicerelli, retired Red Wings Hockey star and the current Miss Michigan, Audrie Ann Chernauckas, who was especially making time to include the Livonia parade in her busy schedule, appearing immediately after the Color Guard at the beginning of the march and then leaving for another annual parade commitment in Wyandotte. There was a suggestion for a future P.R.D.A. promotional event. i.e., a 5K run on Plymouth Road 7. Polling of Board Members: Scott Grace revisited the matter of signage on Plymouth Road. A friend had reported the dire need of help at the Taco Bell on Merriman Road at Plymouth, citing 11 people in line and only one employee on hand as well as a regional manager of the chain. Perhaps a small "Help Wanted" sign in the ground on the outside might help. There had been such a sign at one time, but an inspector from the City stopped in then to ask them to , ". . . Pull that sign out, now!" If outside the Ordinance, perhaps the Ordinance could be changed so that fairness could prevail. He has personally called the City. He has seen 4' x 8' panels on the sides of buildings advertising for help wanted. It seemed the City has a policy of overlooking help wanted signage, but it shouldn't be overlooking an Ordinance. We should change the Ordinance through the Council or through the Council referral to the Planning Commission to change the Ordinance regarding such signage on Plymouth Road. The City had an unwritten rule to overlook those signs. A 4' x 8' would technically be in violation because the Ordinance doesn't distinguish between types of signs. Mr. Peterson recommended the Breadbasket deli on the southeast corner of Plymouth and Middlebelt as having the No. 1 corned beef sandwich by the Metro Times. 8. Adjournment: On a motion duly made, seconded and unanimously adopted, the 103rd Regular Meeting held by the Plymouth Road Development Authority on November 18, 1999 was adjourned at 4:25 p.m. The next meeting of the Plymouth Road Development Authority will be held on December 2, 1999 . Susan Annibal, Secretary C 4