Three village councilmen want to know why they aren’t receiving any reports on the activities of Lake Orion’s Downtown Development Authority Board.
The question came up at the council meeting on Jan. 27 during a discussion on whether an assistant should be hired for Becky Goodman, Downtown Lake Orion’s Director.
Village council president Tom Albert said there’s a problem with communication with the DDA. According to Albert, who is the council representative on the DDA, it wasn’t his job to report back to the council.
“The bylaws say we’re supposed to receive regular reports from the DDA,” he added.
“You don’t typically receive reports from other boards — the planning commission and the board of zoning appeals — either,” LO Village Manager JoAnn Van Tassel said.
Councilman Douglas Dendel said he’s looking for data about activities sponsored by the DDA. “Is it working or not working? We don’t know what’s going on and we okay the budget. I want to know what’s happening downtown.”
Brad Jacobsen, a board member of the DDA, told council members the board would be happy to provide them with minutes (past and future) of any DDA meeting or Main Street Program committee meetings.
“Dendel’s right. You need feedback and we need to improve our working relationship,” he added.
Jacobsen told council members Goodman needed an assistant to free her up to do higher level projects.
Councilman Bob Hollenbeck agreed. “We’re not paying the director for secretarial work,” he added.
Goodman said she needed an assistant because her workload had increased since the village became involved in the Main Street Program.
“I’m working with four committees, a task force that meets monthly, doing special events, a lot of clerical work, working on data bases, a newsletter, mailing lists, scrapbook required by Main Street,” she added.
According to Goodman, she hasn’t been available to work personally with the businesses downtown as much as she would like.
“If I had an assistant I would be freed up to do conceptual things. And I still need to go to seminars to bring back new ideas,” she added.
Goodman told the council she had looked into using volunteers from the high school, but she believes they would be unreliable as to how regular they would work.
Van Tassel said Goodman was hired for part-time work, for 30 hours a week, but really works 40 to 50 hours a week.
Council members agreed Goodman could hire an assistant. The employee would be part-time, up to 15 hours a week, and be paid up to $15/hour.
The position won’t cost taxpayers any money. The pedestrian lights at Broadway/Flint came in under the DDA’s budget and the extra monies left will be used to hire the assistant.