Nowhere to Go, Part III

So readers, if you've been following closely and taking notes, we've learned from various City Commissioners that the City has the cash to pay a consulting firm $50,000 to teach bureaucrats how to make do with less (but don't worry, they've pledged not to lean themselves out of a job) and also $74,000 to fund an information desk. (Where is this desk? Is this money going towards a salary and benefits? If so, why? Last time I looked, Google was free to anyone with internet access. Send Dell $500 for a desktop computer and pay SBC $15/month for DSL internet. There, I just saved the City $73,320 per year.)

Now, I'm no math major but I can add. That's $124,000 the City can ill afford to waste on boondoggles when children are being forced to urinate behind bushes due to lack of restroom facilities. That's no typo folks, that's what the mother of one of my athlete's told me at Thursday's match. She brought some children to the park to play, not realizing the restrooms were locked for the rest of the year. One boy couldn't hold it, so behind the bushes he went.

Now couple those items with the fact that the City has given Rich DeVos a $5,000,000,000 tax break on his newest hotel downtown, and you'll know why I sent this email to the Commissioners tonight:

From: Robert Harrison

To: rtormala@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us

Cc: tzelinsk@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jjendras@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rrosloni@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rschmidt@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jwhite@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, kkimball@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, smilanow@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, amooney@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jsteffen@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, vvasquez@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, mayor@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us

Date: Sep 16, 2005 12:23 AM

Subject: Re: Aberdeen Park

Commissioners:

I updated the parents of my athletes on the Aberdeen Park restroom status at today's match, and quite a few were upset. One mother runs a daycare from her home and brought the children to the park recently. She told me she was forced to let a child urinate in the bushes across the roadway from the tennis courts because she had not realized before arriving that the restrooms had been shut down. Frankly, that is disgusting.

I fully realize the impact the budget woes are causing, but I wonder if the Commission and administration grasp just how bad this makes the City look to outsiders. Today's match was against Cedar Springs, so the entire Cedar Spring tennis team, their coaching staff and the parents (about 8-10) that came to watch their daughters play now know that our town cannot afford to flush some toilets. This embarrassing spectacle has been or will be repeated with visitors from Wyoming Rogers HS, Wyoming Park HS, Byron Center, West Catholic HS, Catholic Central HS, GR Central, Union HS and Ottawa Hills.

Don't you folks realize that debacles like this only encourage people to flee the Grand Rapids Public Schools – currently at the rate of 800 students per year? I will be honest with you – I don't have any friends my age (I'm 29), married or single, who are contemplating putting their kids into GRPS past elementary age. If GRPS goes under, the city will follow. What stable family would buy a home in the GRPS district if they had options elsewhere? How will my elderly grandparents afford retirement? I'm sure they are counting on eventually selling their home in the North Park area and downsizing to an apartment/condo. Who would spend $160,000+ for GRPS when Northview is only a half-mile away?

Events like this apparent lack of fiscal foresight just add to the growing impression that Grand Rapids is falling behind and apart. How is it the City can afford to give Rich DeVos, a BILLIONAIRE, a $5 million tax break to build yet another hotel downtown but our children are being forced to pee in the underbrush at our public parks?

I (and a ton of other voters) would love to see some real courage downtown. Tell DeVos that if he wants to build a hotel, he can just take a bit more of his $2,000,000,000,000 fortune and do it himself – we need that money for the police, firefighters, roads and yes, the public park restrooms.

That, I dare say, would really make Grand Rapids a "Cool City."

Yours,
in anger, frustration and disgust,

Coach Robert Harrison
Creston Girls Tennis

 

Nowhere to Go, Part II

Below is the second email I sent to the City Commissioners, repeating my request for a key to the restrooms at Aberdeen Park.

 

From: Robert Harrison

To: jjendras@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rschmidt@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rtormala@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, 2nd_ward@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jwhite@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, 3rd_ward@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us

Cc:vvasquez@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jsteffen@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, tzelinsk@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, kkimball@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, smilanow@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, amooney@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rrosloni@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, "Thompson, Arnetta"

Date: Sep 15, 2005 12:54 PM

Subject: Re: Aberdeen Park

Dear Commissioners:

I have not had a response – in two weeks – from either the Parks Department or the Commission on whether or not the Creston Girls Tennis team will be given access to the Aberdeen restroom facilities. For those of you unfamiliar with our request, I would like to sign out a key to open the restrooms only when an athlete requests it and I am willing to be responsible for cleaning the restrooms. I currently have no option but to send people to the Burger King at Plainfield and Eleanor.

Signs have now appeared on the restroom doors stating they have been closed for the season. A port-a-john was briefly on site but appears to have been relocated or removed. (Please do not waste money returning it – my team has made it clear that they will not make use of it.) We are beginning to run out of time since our season will conclude Oct. 6. As of Thursday, Sept. 15 we have only 15 more days where we will either be practicing or playing matches at Aberdeen.

I find it hard to believe that a city that can afford a $50,000 consultant fee to teach bureaucrats lean administrative practices is unable to afford to open one restroom and have it's toilet flushed forty or fifty more times. In addition, I cannot understand how Mr. Zelinski concludes just having the water activated costs the City $84 a month, with water usage costing more on top of that. I don't even pay $100 for my quarterly water bills – presumably the City isn't charging itself retail costs here. (Perhaps this is the combined cost of the restrooms and sprinkler park?) Does Mr. Zelinski know that the outdoor drinking fountain was still operating at Aberdeen as of last week? I see this as evidence that the water to the facility had not, in fact, been turned off. (However, Mr. Zelinski is correct that I am not one of the Creston coaches who has abused key-privileges at Aberdeen. I apologize on behalf of Creston HS and am embarrassed to admit that abuses have occurred in the past.)

Finally, the fact that other teams or groups may want restroom access as well dodges the real issue. Restroom facilities at all our parks should be open while the weather is nice enough to use the parks – from mid-April through at least early October. Our city has not been a wise steward of taxpayers' money if it is unable to keep bathrooms open so children and families have somewhere to answer nature's call. How many millions of tax dollars have been poured into the Van Andel Arena and De Vos Place? How much profit for the City are these facilities making? Does anyone profit besides the vendors, the teams and outside managing firms?

Please look again at our City's multi-million dollar budget and see if you can find the few pennies it would take to keep the Aberdeen Park restroom available for my team's use.

Thank you,

Coach Robert Harrison
Creston Girls Tennis

Parks Superintendent Tom Zelinski's reply:

From:tzelinsk@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us

To: jjendras@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rrosloni@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rschmidt@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rtormala@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jwhite@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us

Cc: kkimball@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, smilanow@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, amooney@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jsteffen@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, vvasquez@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us

Date: Sep 15, 2005 2:32 PM

Subject: RE: Aberdeen Park

Bob:

I thought my reply of August 31 indicated that it would not be feasible to open the Aberdeen restrooms for your team's desired use this fall. Upon review of my note perhaps it was too subtle. The following address the issues you raise in your last communication.

1. No the restroom will not be available for use this Fall by any group.
2. The porta jon that appeared was likely for last Saturday's youth soccer games that had been relocated to Aberdeen for one week because of the Indian Pow-Wow at Riverside Park. This one day rental was paid for by the soccer program (the porta jon may actually have been there for more than one day – depending upon when the vendor could deliver/ pick up, but the billable period was one day).
3. The choices our department – and ultimately the City Commission – made relative to where costs could be cut were difficult ones and I am sure any number of them could be second guessed, depending upon one's perspective. Relative to restroom closings and the use of porta jons, this is an area our staff will discuss and review as we approach the next fiscal year's budget preparations.
4. The "readiness to serve" charges are the actual amounts billed to us by the Water Department. They are based upon the size of the water service coming into the facility, and Aberdeen would have a considerably larger than typical service (park or residential) to accomodate the water playground and building. (The Water Department is prohibited from charging us a lesser rate than other customers – as much as I would like to see a discount).
5. The drinking fountain may have been operable for a short period after the water playground program ended August 6. Our staff begins the shut down process for buildings, pools and irrigation systems as soon as they are no longer needed for our programs. This can result in a lag time of a couple of weeks depending upon the site. I confirmed with staff that Aberdeen has been shut off.
6. The City – and our department – have been ardent supporters of the Grand Rapids Public Schools and there many programs. When it is feasible we make every effort to accomodate requests (as do the Schools with our programs). Please be assured this is not a "Creston" issue or a "Bob Harrison" issue but more simply a fiscal issue. I appreciate your expressed concerns and if it is feasible to alter the situation next year I would hope to do so.

If you would like to discuss this directly please contact me at 456-4233.

Tom Zelinski

Parks Superintendent

This was followed shortly by an email from Commissioner Tormala:

From: rtormala@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us

To: tzelinsk@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jjendras@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rrosloni@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rschmidt@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jwhite@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us

Cc: kkimball@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, smilanow@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, amooney@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, jsteffen@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, vvasquez@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us

Date: Sep 15, 2005 2:51 PM

Subject: RE: Aberdeen Park

I have made my views clear on this before when I supported opening the restrooms and I agree with Commissioner Jendrasiak. Because of the impact on services I joined him in opposing the current budget which was approved by the rest of the Commission. If we can lay out $74,000 for an information desk we should be able to find money for our kids. However the blame for this does not rest with Mr. Zelinski and our Parks Department, but with the City Commission that approved the policy. Our kids deserve better.

Rick

 

Nowhere to Go

I've posted some of my email correspondence with Grand Rapids City Commissioners and bureaucrats regarding the lack of restroom access at Aberdeen Park. Enjoy.

My original email:

From: Robert Harrison
To: 2nd_ward@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rtormala@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, stan.milanowski@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, manager@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, Al.Mooney@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us
Cc: "Thompson, Arnetta"
Tue, Aug 30, 2005 at 11:00 AM

Dear Commissioners and City Staff:

I'm the girls tennis coach at Creston HS and we need your help. The GR Parks Dept. has closed the restrooms at Aberdeen Park for the season and we no longer have restroom access. Our tennis season runs until Oct. 6 however. As it stands now, I have to tell my players and our opponents to go to the Burger King on Plainfield if they need to use the restroom.

My athletic director (Arnetta Thompson) and I asked Tom Zelinski in the GR Parks maintanence department if we could have a key to open the restrooms just for practice and on games days but he says he doesn't have the budget even for that little use. Looking at our schedule, we only have 21 more days of practice or games at Aberdeen and I estimate only one or two girls would use the facilities on each day. Is there anything you can do to help? I am willing to keep the restrooms cleaned if that will help with the budget.

Sincerely yours,
Coach Robert Harrison

Parks Dept. Director of Maintanence Tom Zelinski's response:

From: tzelinsk@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us
To: jsteffen@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us
Cc: jjendras@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, kkimball@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, smilanow@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, amooney@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rrosloni@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rschmidt@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, vvasquez@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us
Wed, Aug 31, 2005 at 8:51 AM

Jay, et al:

In response to this note, and several inquiries from City Commissioners, I can offer the following information. I have spoken with Mr. Harrison – Tennis Coach and Athletic Director Arnetta Thompson about this request. In fact, just prior to receiving the note I had spoken with Arnetta and she was going to arrange for a porta jon to be placed at Aberdeen for the team's use.

The restroom building at Aberdeen (and a number of other locations) was budgeted to be open only during the RRR playground program, which ended August 7. Following the end of the program the facility was shutdown. It costs our department $84 /month simply to have the water activated for the site – plus any water usage that might occur. A typical month that does not include water for the water playground, would see charges in the neighborhood of $200 – which does not include staff to clean and supplies. A porta jon can be rented for $60/month.

There are quite a number of sites where the public schools, and other user groups, have sports activities but do not have restroom building availability – Highland soccer, Richmond softball, Hillcrest baseball, etc. Additionally in the past I have had problems with Creston coaches having keys to the restroom building at Aberdeen and either using the facility before/after the water was activated or not locking doors and the restrooms being trashed. (Note: I am not aware of Mr. Harrison being among these individuals).

While it is unfortunate that we cannot afford to operate and maintain as many public restrooms as we have in the past, we have tried to work with user groups to find reasonable solutions within the confines of our budget. Should there be further questions please contact me.

Victor Vasquez, Asst. City Manager – Planning & Community Development gives his input:

From: vvasquez@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us
To: jsteffen@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, tzelinsk@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us
Cc: jjendras@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, kkimball@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, smilanow@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, amooney@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rrosloni@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us, rschmidt@ci.grand-rapids.mi.us
Wed, Aug 31, 2005 at 3:06 PM

As we can all see, the number of complaints and requests for continued services that were eliminated in the FY 2006 budget is increasing as the lack of services cause inconveniences and worse. Parks staff is being challenged just to do the services that remained in the budget. Attempting to somehow add some of these requests onto the workload will ultimately result in complaints when we fail to provide the services that the City committed to continuing.

 

Grand Rapids Budget Cuts Get Ridiculous

Today it became clear to me that the City's management team hasn't a clue. As I mentioned earlier, I'm the tennis coach at a local high school. Now that our season has started, we are spending a lot of time at the local park where our home courts are located. The fall tennis season here in Michigan is very short however and even though we're only two weeks into the season, we only have 20 more days of competition or practice at our courts.

Unfortunately, we do not have any access to restrooms, even though there are facilities there onsite. It seems that the GR Parks and Rec Dept.'s budget has gone dry and they no longer can afford to keep the restrooms open so that we, the taxpaying public, have somewhere nearby to answer nature's call. For right now, I'm forced to tell my team and our opponents to use the nearby fastfood restaurant's restrooms. Luckily we've been rained out twice, but starting next week I'll be hosting at least one and sometimes as many as three matches a week.

It's not just my tennis team that's affected. Already I have seen Hope Network vans come by and unload their charges, only to discover that the restrooms are locked. Instead of a fun day at the park, they apparently have no choice but to reload the vans and look elsewhere. Every day we've had morning practice, I've seen the swings and slides full of young families with babies and toddlers – they've been forced to go without as well.

I've been told by Tom Zelinski, the head of Parks and Rec's maintenance, that keeping a restroom open "for the season costs approximately $1200." That is for the water bill alone, the cleaning services cost the city more on top of that. He offered to see if his budget had room for a Port-A-Potty but wasn't sure he'd be able to come up with that even. According to an email my athletic director sent me on Tuesday, he no longer has the budget for that luxury (cost = $60/month), but he could give us the number to a business that'd rent one to us if we wanted to pay ourselves.

I have emailed the Second Ward Commissioners plus the City Manager, Comptroller and Treasurer, trying to get some help from downtown. I received a call from First Ward Commissioner Jendrasiak Tuesday afternoon, again offering a Port-A-Potty. I politely turned him down, reasoning that it'd be unlikely that the girls would be much interested in using it and the City would just be wasting money. He promised to look into this further, said he had raised the subject at the City Commission meeting and would ask the management at the Parks Dept. to see if there was anything that could be done.

The most mindboggling, utterly astounding thing I've learned: while the City does not have the wherewithal to open these restrooms for 20 more afternoons (I've even offered to sign out a key and open them only when someone requests access, plus clean them myself), according to Commissioner Jendrasiak, the City has just approved another $50,000 study. I wish I could report just what he told me the study will delve into but my brain was too busy trying to grasp how a city that can't afford to let 16 and 17 year old girls flush the toilet 40 or 50 more times this fall can afford $50,000 for a study probably no one will ever read outside some overpaid, underworked bureaucrats. From looking at the Commission meeting agenda for Tues. Aug. 30, I think it's probably Resolution Four, under the Committee of the Whole, "authorizing the engagement of Lean Concepts, LLC for the purpose of implementing Administrative Lean practices."

I'm no highly paid business consultant, but here's my free advice to the City regarding Lean Administrative practices: Slash the bloated administrative staff downtown, stop loading more public safety work onto fewer firefighter's shoulders, privatize anything that can be and KEEP THE RESTROOMS OPEN FOR THE KIDS.

Should you want to make your views known, your Commissioner's email addresses can all be found at this City website.

 

Supporting Our Troops Overseas

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I have a brother and sister, both Army MP's, serving overseas. I'm also the head coach of my high school alma mater's girl's tennis team. I've been thinking of ways to combine the two and recently I decided what I'd do.

Blackfive.net (a great mil-blog) has for a long time been pointing out an awesome website, called Anysoldier.com, dedicated to making sure our men and women in the armed forces get the support they deserve. Most of them are young and more than you'd think don't have anyone back home sending letters, emails and care packages. Anysoldier.com has stepped to fill that need. You can browse their list of over 3,000 soldiers who have requested care packages, either for themselves or to hand out to the lonely or forgotten troops with whom they serve. If you want, you can even go to their sister-site, Treatanysoldier.com, and purchase pre-packaged care packages. Heck, Treatanysoldier.com will even choose a deserving soldier for you, so if you're really pressed for time you don't even have to search Anysoldier.com for one.

I've decided to see if my tennis team would like to do the same for my sister, currently serving in Afghanistan. I've emailed my sister and got her APO address, so the next step is to present this to the girls. I'll post updates here as this project advances.

 

FOIA and Me

For the last several months, I have been reading a Grand Rapids blog called Local Area Watch. LAW deals with the various underhanded deals and shenanigans going on here in River City. Recently, I have taken a more active role than just reading LAW.

One of LAW's ongoing endevours (and primary reason it exists) is the under(non?)-reported scandal involving the Boardwalk Building. The Boardwalk Building was the site of the Berkey & Gay manufacturing plant for many years, which was itself built on top of urban fill – both recipes for pollution and toxic waste. (What kind of toxic waste? Nothing too serious, just 26,000 tons of soil contaminated with toxic levels of lead, arsenic and mercury, along with phenanthrene, which leaches out into the air we breathe if contaminated soil is disturbed.) LAW has filed lawsuits alleging that we, the citizens of River City, have been exposed to these toxins. The City of Grand Rapids is party to this suit, and that's where I (and FOIA) come in.

An attorney for the City, Daniel Ophoff, had been stalling LAW's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request regarding the value of Boardwalk Building. (It's a further complication: the Boardwalk Building developers appear to have either committed bank fraud and/or tax fraud in declaring its value.) LAW asked its readers to try filing a FOIA request of our own, to see if we got any farther. I and two other readers filed the requests. City Attorney Ophoff, after about a month's delay, finally sent me the requested documents, which I turned over to LAW this Tuesday afternoon.

Case closed, right?

Wrong. City Attorney Ophoff (who works for us taxpayers, remember) came up with the lame excuse that my request was not specific enough (requested items #2 and #3) and claimed he was unable to locate the (damning) letters.

So, where we do we now stand? LAW has decided to force the issue into the open by filing yet another lawsuit in Kent County Circuit Court. I will post updates on the progress of this situation as it unfolds.

 

Walter Kirn Slurs Troops

Walter Kirn slurs US troops

GQ magazine ran an article by Walter Kirn in the August 2005 issue reviewing the top ten books about war. Writing about Caesar's "The Gallic War," Kirn had this to say about the men and women in today's military:

"These incentives [loot & women-OPC] attracted society's ablest men, not just the cheapskate oddballs of today who want their college educations paid for in exchange for wearing uniforms as teenagers."

Wow.

While I don't pretend to know the reasoning behind their decisions, I do know that my stepbrother and stepsister (both are MP's in the Army and have served overseas, he in Iraq and she in Afghanistan) are not "cheapskate oddballs" nor are they solely wearing uniforms in exchange for their college education. And after reading a lot of mil-blogs, I've come to the conclusion that most of our soldiers do not fall within these catagories.

I've since cancelled my subscription to GQ and have posted about this idiot Kirn elsewhere on the internet, with apparently no effect. If you find this as offensive as I did, you can email GQ here.

 

Long Lunch I

My first walkthrough set for Flickr.

 

Brassworks

My first ever panoramic, it's also the home of my favorite bar: Founders!

Their Pale Ale and IPA is the best. And don't miss the Breakfast Stout if you like your beer thick and dark.