- I thought I'd brought this up a few weeks ago as there was a notice in the City Pulse, but the LSJ has a story this morning on the city wanting to unload Willoughby "Park", a dog-leg of a woodland south of Willoughby Road on the far southside. Most donated to the city the, the woodlands of around 50-acres (+22.8 acres of adjoining woodland which I guess technically isn't desginated parkland) is an undeveloped natural space that has no trails or any such public access. It's mostly wetlands and woods. The city says it has no buyers for it and Delhi Township isn't interested in it, so it'd likely remain woodlands. The change would be that the city wants to be able to have the ability to sell off parts of it to neighbors in the area if they want it to add to their own residential parcels. The city would get money from the initial sell, and then from taxes since it'd be taxable land. The Lansing Park Board meeting to recommend to sell or not is today.
Personally, since both the township and city say that because of its low elevation it's basically safe from commercial development, and since it's never been developed as an accessible public park, this is one I have no strong feeling either way about. If I have any opinion, I'd probably feel most comfortable with them not wholesale unloading the park, rather identifying specific parts of it that may make sense to sell off to surrounding property owners, so I guess on those grounds I'd oppose putting the sell of the full park from the voters. But it's nothing I'd complain too much about if they send it to the voter.
- In other news, a citizens advisory committee for the BWL to consider what replace the power from Eckert once its shutdown has proposed an "all the above" approach of wind, solar and natural gas. This would allow the BWL to get 33% of its energy from renewables and efficiencies by 2020 and 40% by 2030. The goal calls for 85 megawatts from wind by 2018, 120 megawatts from solar between 2020 and 2030, construction of a gas-fired power plant, and a reduction in energy use of 10% to mee the overall goal. Rates would increase, of course, but the goals are staggered to smooth out the increases so there aren't any sharp spikes.
I guess I missed this, but Bernero wrote in an editorial a few weeks ago that he was hoping the regional justice complex (the Lansing Police Department, Ingham County Jail, much of the Ingham County Sheriff's Office and 54A District Courts) could be located in the Seven Block area on the western edge of downtown. The Eyde's, of course, own 8-acres of land over in this area and this would solve their problem of what they'd like to do with the land. Another option would be to somehow fit it all at the existing Veterans Memorial Courthouse at Grady Porter Building, though, that seems like wishful thinking. The article also says that the Seven Block area could be done with room to spare for other development in the area.
This comes after the county put out a report the other day for a slightly different proposal that consolidate existing county law enforcement offices in Mason (Ingham County Jail, Sheriff's Office and 55th District Court). In another article this morning it says that the state constitution requires a sheriff's office to be located in a county seat, but not a jail. Bernero makes the point, however, that as the largest community in the county, the population center of Ingham County is way closer (or even in) the city of Lansing which reduces overall transportation costs to the jail since the majority of those jailed come from Lansing. The county sheriff makes the counter argument that it'd inconvenience people who live in places like Stockbridge.
This has always been the tension between Lansing and Mason. Lansing is crammed into the northwest corner of the county making it inconvenient as the county seat for the rest of the county...but Lansing and its suburbs in Ingham County are far-and-away the most populous part of the county.
I wonder how this is going to go. I think a downtown location would be more logical and would be a greater benefit to a greater number of people. The fact that county commissioners still seem open to exploring the downtown Lansing option is very good sign. Besides the 7 Block land, it also sounds as though expanding the Porter building is on the table, that may make the most financial sense of all (and it sounds like even if a new complex is built downtown or in Mason the Porter building will remain open).
It actually sounds more to me that the study done by the county didn't even include studying a Lansing option that that is the direction they are going in. That fewer than a handful of the of commissioners on the 14-member board seem to be open doesn't give me much hope. More to the point, the Sheriff is opposed; I believe he's retiring, but his son looks to be the frontrunner to get the office.
To even get a Lansing location back into serious discussion Lansing would have to put out a dueling study, itself, and it'd have to show savings over the current plan. Seems like a long-shot. The minute I media revealed that the county had already done its own study, it was clear that Bernero had earlier mentioned his proposal to try and move a conversation that'd already happened.
I found it somewhat odd that part of the complaint was that a Lansing jail would be a hardship on police officers bringing people in from the SE side of the county - that's probably true, but I'm guessing a very large percentage of the people arrested are arrested in Lansing, right? If we're looking at a bunch of Lansing officers having to drive down to Mason, vs. the occcasional officer from SE Ingham having to drive up the Lansing, I think I'd pick the latter option.
It seems like there is always an anti-Lansing bias among officials outside of Lansing. Of course Lansing is the best place for a new jail. The same pattern of thought seems to come through when ever the state or county plan to build a new facility, it will always be cheaper to build in Dimondale ,or it's much closer to the highway in Dewitt. Now Mason is better because it's closer to Leslie and Dansville! The most recent example of this bias would be that legislator from Grand Ledge who thinks the new state police building is a total boondoggle and should be be named for the last governor as a testament to her poor job as governor. So it looks like some put politics before good sense, Lansing is the most reasonable place to put a new county correction facility and court building. Perhaps a small satellite station down in Mason could help the local officers.
The problem (at least from the view of Lansing) is that Mason is the county seat. Lansing is unique in being the only capital city in a state with county that is also not a county seat. The two cities were basically rivals from their settlement, both developed as a means to try and land the state capital which had long sought to be moved from Detroit. Mason ended up only as the county seat because of its more central location in the county, and the location of Lansing was picked in Ingham County apparently because of the water power the Grand River could provide (Sycamore Creek in Mason couldn't do this) to build a large settlement.
It's funny and ironic that both were chosen as their seats of government because of their relative centrality, but obviously for different reasons: Lansing closer to the center of Michigan, Mason closer to the center of Ingham County.
Interesting reading the discussions above on the county offices in Mason vs Lansing.
There are some country functions housed in Lansing, such as the Human Services Building on Cedar street. Also, the consolidated 911 operations is on Jolly Rd (I believe it includes Lansing, E Lansing, and the rest of Ingham County).
Regarding the location of county seats, looking at a Michigan map again, and I'd say most county seats are not near the center of the county, rather in the county's largest city/population center. In the UP in particular, most county seats are in cities along Lake Michigan or Superior. Even in the lower peninsula cities such as Ludington, Muskegon, St Joseph, Saginaw, Bay City, Midland, Detroit, Grand Rapids, are not near the center. Of course other counties have the seat near the center. Point being, IF Lansing were the county seat, it would not make Ingham County unusual among Michigan counties.
Few are literally wedged into a corner of a county, which places them as far from the rest of the county territory as possible, though. There's a difference between off-center and then a city whose boundaries that literally spill into neighboring counties because it's so far in the corner, which is the case with Lansing.
More to the point, for those that aren't near the center it's usually because the cities predated (either heavily settled if even not incorporated or incorporated) the organization of their county's government.
My argument revolves around the fact that better than 3/4 of the county would be better served by a downtown Lansing location, we'd be paying for a majority of this facility, it's not as though we have no say so in where it goes or how it's built. In my opinion pretty much everyone in Ingham County north of 96 would be as well or better served by a downtown Lansing location versus a Mason location, many of the residents immediately south of 96 would also fall into to that category, including a significant chunk of Holt. I do think that it would be great if they could make a sort of satellite court/office work in Mason that would serve at least the more basic day-to-day needs of the communities south of there, I can't imagine it would take that much.
The total population of Ingham County is 280,000, the combined population of Lansing, East Lansing, Williamston, Lansing Twp and Meridian Twp comes in at just over 217,000 (77% of the county's population); if you add in Delhi Twp the number rises to 243,000 (87% of the county's population). Twenty-something percent of the county should not dictate how the county spends it's money or where it provides it's services, I'd even be willing to bet that the center of tax income is further north west than the center of population. It'd be wise for Lansing and it's immediate suburbs to take a stand on this issue, as important as this is from a downtown development perspective it's even more significant for those who will work there, go to court there, do business there and visit incarcerated family members there.
Comments
Personally, since both the township and city say that because of its low elevation it's basically safe from commercial development, and since it's never been developed as an accessible public park, this is one I have no strong feeling either way about. If I have any opinion, I'd probably feel most comfortable with them not wholesale unloading the park, rather identifying specific parts of it that may make sense to sell off to surrounding property owners, so I guess on those grounds I'd oppose putting the sell of the full park from the voters. But it's nothing I'd complain too much about if they send it to the voter.
- In other news, a citizens advisory committee for the BWL to consider what replace the power from Eckert once its shutdown has proposed an "all the above" approach of wind, solar and natural gas. This would allow the BWL to get 33% of its energy from renewables and efficiencies by 2020 and 40% by 2030. The goal calls for 85 megawatts from wind by 2018, 120 megawatts from solar between 2020 and 2030, construction of a gas-fired power plant, and a reduction in energy use of 10% to mee the overall goal. Rates would increase, of course, but the goals are staggered to smooth out the increases so there aren't any sharp spikes.
This comes after the county put out a report the other day for a slightly different proposal that consolidate existing county law enforcement offices in Mason (Ingham County Jail, Sheriff's Office and 55th District Court). In another article this morning it says that the state constitution requires a sheriff's office to be located in a county seat, but not a jail. Bernero makes the point, however, that as the largest community in the county, the population center of Ingham County is way closer (or even in) the city of Lansing which reduces overall transportation costs to the jail since the majority of those jailed come from Lansing. The county sheriff makes the counter argument that it'd inconvenience people who live in places like Stockbridge.
This has always been the tension between Lansing and Mason. Lansing is crammed into the northwest corner of the county making it inconvenient as the county seat for the rest of the county...but Lansing and its suburbs in Ingham County are far-and-away the most populous part of the county.
To even get a Lansing location back into serious discussion Lansing would have to put out a dueling study, itself, and it'd have to show savings over the current plan. Seems like a long-shot. The minute I media revealed that the county had already done its own study, it was clear that Bernero had earlier mentioned his proposal to try and move a conversation that'd already happened.
It's funny and ironic that both were chosen as their seats of government because of their relative centrality, but obviously for different reasons: Lansing closer to the center of Michigan, Mason closer to the center of Ingham County.
There are some country functions housed in Lansing, such as the Human Services Building on Cedar street. Also, the consolidated 911 operations is on Jolly Rd (I believe it includes Lansing, E Lansing, and the rest of Ingham County).
Regarding the location of county seats, looking at a Michigan map again, and I'd say most county seats are not near the center of the county, rather in the county's largest city/population center. In the UP in particular, most county seats are in cities along Lake Michigan or Superior. Even in the lower peninsula cities such as Ludington, Muskegon, St Joseph, Saginaw, Bay City, Midland, Detroit, Grand Rapids, are not near the center. Of course other counties have the seat near the center. Point being, IF Lansing were the county seat, it would not make Ingham County unusual among Michigan counties.
More to the point, for those that aren't near the center it's usually because the cities predated (either heavily settled if even not incorporated or incorporated) the organization of their county's government.
The total population of Ingham County is 280,000, the combined population of Lansing, East Lansing, Williamston, Lansing Twp and Meridian Twp comes in at just over 217,000 (77% of the county's population); if you add in Delhi Twp the number rises to 243,000 (87% of the county's population). Twenty-something percent of the county should not dictate how the county spends it's money or where it provides it's services, I'd even be willing to bet that the center of tax income is further north west than the center of population. It'd be wise for Lansing and it's immediate suburbs to take a stand on this issue, as important as this is from a downtown development perspective it's even more significant for those who will work there, go to court there, do business there and visit incarcerated family members there.