Hartford’s three newly-elected city commissioners take their seats
On Monday, Nov. 27, 2023, the Hartford City Commissioners held their business meeting for the month. The city officials in attendance were; Mayor Richard Hall, Mayor Pro Tem John Miller, Commissioner Frank Dockter, Commissioner Jane Danger, and newcomers; Commissioner Charles Weeden, Commissioner Lindsy Morsaw, and Commissioner Nancy Spoula were present. RoxAnn Rodney-Isbrecht, the City Clerk, Rebecca Senard, the new Deputy City Clerk, and Pam Shultz, the City Treasurer were also in attendance.
Following Roll Call, the approval for the agenda was granted and the meeting continued with the following topics:
Communications
The communications reviewed were the Hartford Lions Club setting the date of the 22nd annual Christmas in Hartford’s lighted parade for Saturday, Dec. 9, 2023, notice of public hearing from AEP, a communication from Comcast for a notice of programming changes as they currently have fallen out of contract with ShopHQ, they received a “thank you” from MDHHS - MiChEM Mobile Unit that was be in the area in October.
Hartford Council for Recreation
In the agenda packet for Monday’s meeting were the meeting notes from the Hartford Council for Recreation’s meeting that was held on Tuesday, Oct. 17.
In the report, it was announced that the League of Miracles requests to be removed from the council. They will become their own entity; because of this there is the need for clear documentation of the split, a list of inventory, as well as, a final check be drawn up for their funds raised for their program.
Additionally, because of the League of Miracles’ decision to leave, the Hartford Council for Recreation bylaws must be changed, as well as the new 501(c)(3) paperwork that was just filed must be amended.
Police activity
The city of Hartford’s Police Chief, Mike Prince, submitted the October Police Report to the board. The report reflected 940 hours worked with nine arrests, seven arrest warrants issued, 16 traffic citations written, three assaults, two traffic crashes, and three drug investigations.
Fire Department Report
Hartford Fire Chief, Rob Harding submitted the October statistics from the fire department report. The report reflected 59 calls for the month. The breakdown of the calls was for one fire, one over pressure rupture/explosion/overheat without fire, 41 rescue and emergency medical services, four hazardous conditions without fire, eight service calls, and four good intent calls for the month.
The chief thanked the community for a great Spooktacular event, along with fire prevention week held at Redwood Elementary.
The chief also reminded the board that they are still in possession of smoke detectors, and wanted to make sure that everyone knew that any Hartford resident could have them installed for free by calling the Hartford Fire Department.
Hartford Township Supervisor, Ron Sefcik addressed the board as the Chairman of the Hartford Fire Board telling the audience that their board will finalize the 2024 budget at the December board meeting.
Sefcik also announced that the Fire Board is still working on its application for the 501(c)(3) status and hopes to have things finalized by December.
Treasurer’s Report
The board approved the paying of bills totaling $520,342.30, for Nov. 27, 2023; a detailed list was included in the agenda packet.
City Manager Updates and
Recommendations
The Interim City Manager, Linnea Rader, had the following recommendations and updates for the Council:
Rader recommended that whenever the make-up of a team changes the entire team should review important procedures and policies and perform workshops to ensure everyone is on the same page regarding expectations and plans. With that, she made the following recommendations to Council to begin that process.
December Council Meeting – Review Rules of Conduct, Ethics, and the City Charter
January Council Meeting – Perform an Expectations Workshop where everyone can get on the same page regarding their expectations of each other and set ground rules for the team
February Council Meeting – Begin the Strategic Planning process beginning with a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis for the city
Rader also addressed the topic of City Promotion. She recommends that the City Council, along with the current Hartford city employees and the incoming City Manager review opportunities that exist for interactions with the city residents in a positive manner. As the city gets back to full staffing, she thinks it’s a good idea to begin planning for the sharing of additional information about city services, employees, and events through social media, open houses, newsletters, and Meet and Greets.
Additionally, the interim city manager spoke of the hot topic of the striping of the city streets that was improperly completed this fall. She reported that she has been working with the contractor to rectify the problem and the striping will be corrected. She also has worked with Wightman to provide an assessment of the City Hall roof project. The project has been completed, however, it is believed that the work was done incorrectly, and therefore the City Hall has experienced issues with leaking.
Because of this, she will be working with the contractor, who installed the new roof system, in hopes that they will too stand behind their work and fix the current problems identified by the assessment done by Wightman.
She also announced that on Nov. 10 she along with the contractor and Wightman and Associates did a walk-through on the Clark and Linden project. Despite a few punch list items, the project is nearing completion.
Another project that is near completion is the burnt house on Shepherd Street. That home is scheduled to be demolished on Dec. 11; however, the second home within the city to be demolished does not have set demolition date at this time.
Finally Rader reported that she is working on a performance appraisal process for all members of the city and expects to have the draft completed for the December council meeting.
All reports and commission minutes from both Oct. 23 and Nov. 10 were approved as presented.
Old business
The Council will move forward with the candidate selection for the City Manager, as each of the commissioners along with the mayor were given copies of each of the 22 resumes that were submitted. From the candidates, each board member was then instructed to select their top five. From that list, the top six receiving the most votes will then be scheduled for one hour interviews. Interviews will potentially be scheduled for the first or second week of December.
Also, under old business, they passed the motion to have an evidence audit take place from a third-party auditing firm after the repeated request from the insurance company to do so.
Meadowbrook, the insurance agent that provides coverage for the city provided the following recommendation to the City of Hartford back in January of 2023:
“A full audit of evidence should be conducted by a third party as soon as possible. The focus should be to determine what evidence is currently being held and if there are any missing items. A final report should be placed on file and a copy provided to the City Manager. If discrepancies are found between what property reports say you have verses what you actually have then a plan should be developed to track down missing items. This plan should also be presented to the City Manager.”
Though the Michigan State Police (MSP) provided an audit during an investigation into the former police chief, further discussion detailed that the MSP matched evidence present in the evidence room to police reports. Every item that was present was documented. However, the MSP did not do the other side of the audit that would ensure that every item indicated on a police report was present and accounted for therefore creating a need to have a complete investigation done.
New business
The Council approved the appointment of Pam Bench to the Library Board as she was the only candidate to express interest in the open position.
In other new business, the board passed Personnel Manual Holiday Amendment, a travel policy, a workplace injuries policy, a vehicle lockouts policy for the Hartford Police Department, field training program for the Hartford Police Department, and a Hartford Police Department reserve program policy.
The board also heard the first reading of Proposed Ordinance Amendment No. 340–2023 amendment to code of ordinance, chapter 30, 30.01, through 30.99 and tabled both Proposed Ordinance Amendment No. 335–2023 establish planning commission and Proposed Ordinance Amendment No. 336–2023 Designate Zoning Board of Appeals until the December meeting.
Finally, the board considered and discussed the proposed zoning ordinance and marijuana ordinance revisions.
Having no further business, Mayor Hall adjourned the meeting at 6:45 p.m.
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