Sumpter board gives 30 days for new contract for contract workers

Sumpter Township Clerk Clarence Hoffman, Jr., said contracted employees are worrying about their jobs and, “We’ve been playing around with this for one, two, three months,” referring to new contracts.
At the board’s work/study meeting on Feb. 28, Clerk Hoffman said contracted personnel in the water, fire, and police departments will be getting one percent raises like the union employees, so the board should just approve their contracts for four years at one percent pay increase now. He had put the item on the agenda for action as Item M.
But township attorney Rob Young said he doesn’t have independent authority on what he should put in the contracts and he can’t write these contracts until he gets information – and he doesn’t have the information.
“Rob has made contracts since 2000,” Hoffman said and Young said he actually has been doing it for 29 years.
Trustee Don LaPorte said he couldn’t approve contracts that aren’t written. Trustee Esther Hurst suggested continuing the present contracts until new ones are written.
Trustee Matt Oddy said they should add Item N to the agenda that continues the present contracts for 30 days.
“They haven’t been updated in some time,” Trustee LaPorte said. “We have to dot the i’s and cross the t’s.”
At the regular meeting, Treasurer Peggy Morgan seconded Hoffman’s motion to renew all the contracts for four years at the same pay increase as the union.
In a roll-call vote Treasurer Morgan and Clerk Hoffman voted yes and Trustees Hurst, LaPorte, Oddy, and Don Swinson voted no. The motion failed, 4-2.
Supervisor John Morgan was on vacation and absent from the meeting, so Trustee Swinson was presiding after a unanimous vote of the board. Usually the clerk or treasurer presides when the supervisor is absent.
Then Item N came up and Trustee Hurst made a motion to extend all contracts for 30 days. Hoffman was the only one voting no. The 5-1 vote passed the motion.
In other business at the Feb. 28 meeting, the board:
• Heard Melissa Gaynier of the Senior Alliance give a report on the alliance and its work to help seniors in the township;
•Approved an agreement with Browntown Township for animal control services. Police Chief Eric Luke said one of the townships had to approve it first and now it can go before the Brownstown board;
• Set a public hearing for the 2017-18 budget for 6 p.m., March 28;
• Approved holding Sumpter Township Country Festival May 26-29 using Parks and Recreation funds;
• Approved fireworks on Sunday, May 28, at the Sumpter Township fairgrounds, with a rain date of Monday, May 29;
• Approved Sharon Pokerwinski as grant administrator for the Parks and Recreation Commission;
• Approved Jennifer Price to the position of secretary to the Parks and Recreation Commission;
• Approved a $500 check from the Parks and Recreation account for Holly Swinson to get supplies for the beer tent for the festival;
• Approved Resolution 2017-04 that establishes an amended fee structure for business licenses. The Home Based Business License fee is $50 and the Commercial Based Business License Fee is $200;
• Approved designating the Supervisor’s office as the American Disabilities Act (ADA) coordinator;
• Approved public notice about Rights to the Public in regards to ADA;
• Removed from the agenda an item to go out for bids for an automatic ADA door opener to be paid out of federal Community Development Block Grant funds. It was explained the CDBG money comes in July and it is too early to get bids now because they will expire in 30 days. It will be put back on the agenda in July;
• Heard Water and Sewer Department Director Ken Kunka give a report on activities in the Water Department;
• Heard Clerk Hoffman report the township has a couple of hundred thousand dollars in the account for the library and the township owns the property next door to the south and next door on the north. He said a brand-new building would look “friendlier” instead of taking the old DPW building and using it. “Why not build a new building?” Hoffman asked;
• Heard Ronald Barrington Robinson say, “A lie is a lie no matter who tells it.” He said for years he has been an independent producer of programs that have run on cable TV in Flint and Detroit and he was considering doing a program on the business of marijuana. He said that is why he has been following the Nelson Po case and attending court sessions. He said he was in Judge Boykin’s court in Detroit recently and Sumpter Township Officer Toth told him to get out of the courtroom. “Only Judge Boykin has the power to remove me,” Robinson said. He said he commented, “I’ll be a son of a b—-,” and Judge Boykin admonished him. He said the removal was not legal and if Toth had not lied he wouldn’t have been removed. He said Toth told the judge that Robinson was a possible witness in the case, but he said he knows nothing about the case except what he has read in newspapers. “That lie has kept me out of that courtroom,” Robinson said. [Later that evening, Chief Luke emailed an explanation to the Independent: “He was sequestered by order of Judge Boykins along with two other individuals who could possibly be called as witnesses in the case. He then called D/Sgt. Toth a name while walking out and was immediately reprimanded by the judge”;
• Heard Robinson also tell the board that when he was running for township office in 2016 two of his horses were poisoned and one died. He asked anyone who knows about this to call the FBI office in Detroit because he believes it to be a hate crime. There is a $5,000 reward;
• Heard Sharon Pokerwinski say if she was Mary Sherwood she would be complaining about the blight on the north side of Willis Road across from Mary’s Sherwood Road home. Police Chief Luke said that is in the courts right now and the property owner was ticketed five weeks ago; and
• Heard Pokerwinski tell Treasurer Morgan that while Morgan thinks it is a mistake that the late Alan Bates name is on the Parks and Recreation Master Plan, his name should not be removed. She said Mr. Bates is one of those who worked on the plan and his name should not be removed. “It is not a mistake,” she said.