City Council allocates $2,500 to start work on deteriorating seawall

After a discussion on the precarious condition of the 200’ of city seawall at Doane’s Landing, the Belleville City Council allocated up to $2,500 to get topographic work done to take the first steps towards a solution.
DPW Director Rick Rutherford said his crew has been checking on the deteriorating seawall daily. He said this topographic study by Hennessey Engineers and McDowell Associates is the first step for him in getting engineering specifications and bids.
He said they need elevations shot and surveying completed to find how far the seawall has separated.
Rutherford said this 19-year-old seawall should have had a 50-year life.
“It is deteriorating almost daily,” said City Manager Diana Kollmeyer.
Mayor Kerreen Conley asked for a timeline and Rutherford said the time involved is for him to go back and forth between the engineers and the council. He is following the spending guidelines laid out by the city, he said.
“The longer we wait, the more expensive it gets,” Mayor Conley said.
City Manager Kollmeyer said she hopes to bring back information for the first meeting in May.
“We’re looking at it as an emergency,” Kollmeyer said. “We’re concerned for the city’s seawall, as well as the condo next door.”
Rutherford said the condo association has had its engineer look at it. He said the 200’ of seawall on the city side is not all in jeopardy.
“We might be able to save it without doing the entire 200’,” Rutherford said, adding they have to figure out how much it’s pulling apart, but it is progressing daily or weekly.
Kollmeyer said they have already checked and federal Community Development Block Grant funds can’t be used for a seawall, but it’s possible some CDBG funds could be used for the parts of the park that are ADA-accessible.
“Soon, that seawall will be floating down Belleville Lake,” Kollmeyer said.
The seawall had been added to the agenda at the beginning of the meeting and further discussion was delayed until Rutherford could go into his office and review information that had come in after he had left for the day.
Rutherford returned to the meeting room and distributed copies of the email he received from the engineers that discussed shooting the benchmark and the seawall, with one or two people monitoring. He said he thought the city could do some monitoring in-house.
“We have to start documenting how fast this thing is going and start getting bids to do the work,” Rutherford said.
He said a representative from the condo association has been coming in daily to see him and now is the time for them to sign on and get real figures.
The engineers gave a cost of $2,450 for a couple of site visits.
“It is important to get the work done,” Mayor Conley said.
“I could suggest bi-weekly monitoring by them, since my crew is down there daily,” Rutherford said.
“Once the survey is done we’ll get an estimate,” Conley said.
“The last thing we want is to do repairs that won’t be permanent,” he said.
“This is the very first step we had to take,” Rutherford said, noting he has soil borings that were done a year ago. He said after the topographic work is done, the engineers can estimate the cost.
After the motion passed to allocate up to $2,500 for the preliminary work, Kollmeyer said she would bring a budget amendment for this cost.
The council also will be looking into where the money would come for the expensive repairs.
At the end of the discussion, Councilman Jesse Marcotte said he’d like the city to be known as Downtown on the Lake, instead of Downtown in the Lake.
The park at Doane’s Landing, at the corner of North Liberty and Main Street, has been closed off with yellow caution tape for more than a year, with no work done thus far to remedy the situation.
There is a loss of soil threatening the rear porch of the condo next door to the park. The condo association reportedly has offered a sum of money to the city to help with the repairs.
At a city meeting in March, Rutherford said proper engineering was not done on the present seawall and it would not be good to repair what is there because it isn’t engineered right.
In other business at Monday’s meeting, the council:
• Approved a street closing for the annual Memorial Day ceremony on High Street at 2 p.m. May 29. Cornell Anton, of the local VFW, said since Kathy Steigerwald left Brown Funeral Home, sponsor of the event, the VFW is now planning the speakers. Anton and Councilman Tom Fielder will be giving biographies of two fallen soldiers named on the Veterans Memorial. Also, there will be no motorcyclists this year, he said;
• Approved the four-year appointment of Nathaniel Oregon to the Parks and Recreation Committee. Oregon is the pastor for the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Belleville;
• Approved a schedule of budget meetings, beginning with 6 p.m. Monday, May 8, and ending with adoption of the 2017-18 budget on Monday, June 5;
• Was introduced to new city employees: Karen Tyler, who replaced Marilyn in the front office; full-time Police Officer Sarah Dzagulones; and part-time Police Officer Ahmed Kassem;
• Applauded the Life Saving Award presented to Officer Dzagulones by Police Chief Hal Berriman. She is credited with saving the life of a Harbour Pointe subdivision man around midnight on March 10. The man was in full cardiac arrest with skin a blueish-grey color when she began cardio-pulmonary resuscitation and brought him back to life;
• Approved accounts payable of $104,734.64 and the following departmental expenditures in excess of $500: To Northline Twp. FD, $2,866.50 for turnout gear replacement (10% grant match); to West Shore Fire, $1,645 for fire turnout gear add-ons; to Washtenaw Area Mutual Aid Assn., $1,000 for annual dues; and to Wise Technologies, $698.74 for computer/network support, General Fund/Police;
• Heard Councilman Fielder announce a report he has just received said there are 300 marijuana dispensaries in Wayne County, including five in Canton and three in Van Buren Township. Mayor Conley said, “This is not one of those items we’re asking you to shop local on”;
• Heard Jeff Vernon complain that he saw city workers out that day cleaning up after the Central Business Community’s Flop E Bunny event on Saturday and the CBC sign was still up. He suggested they be fined, unless they are exempt from the ordinance regarding cleanup. Kollmeyer said the city crew picks up the straw because the city reuses it. Rutherford said straw from the park is now on a seeded grave in the cemetery. Mayor Conley said there should be no fine as long as it’s clear between the applicant and the city why the event wasn’t cleaned up;
• Heard Kollmeyer announce that on April 13 the 2009 Dodge Charger police car caught on fire while officers were in it and they expect it to be totaled by the insurance company. She said luckily the officers – Jeff Wickham and Reserve Jason Prince – were safe. She said the fuel line harness was singed and could have exploded. “That was the last Charger we had,” Kollmeyer said, adding this was the vehicle they put a new engine in. She said the fire department put out the fire and then it started up again. “I’m glad nobody was hurt,” said Mayor Conley. “We’ve had problems with those Chargers”;
• Discussed the upcoming meetings with Harbour Pointe residents concerning a special assessment district for upgrades to the roadways in the subdivision. The meetings are at 6:30 p.m. on April 25 and 27 in the Belleville High School Commons area. Mike Renaud said the price went up from $1.2 million to $1.75 million now and he can’t believe it’s because of an engineering cost of 50%. He said the city has $200,000 each in two road funds and over a million dollars in its fund balance for the general fund. He thinks the public shouldn’t have to pay for all of the road upgrades while the city holds onto its money for a rainy day; and
• Heard Rutherford say he is getting estimates for re-striping of Main Street this year.