Podcast#3 - Valentine's Week

This week in Holly, there were two important meetings: a village council meeting and a township board of trustees meeting. In the council meeting, the speaker talked about her appointment to the planning commission and how some people tried to discredit her. She also mentioned her previous experience with the village parks commission and how it was dissolved unexpectedly. She declined to join the commission again. Despite the opposition, she was eventually approved for the planning commission. In the township meeting, the speaker's husband had concerns about holding meetings on the second floor, which is not easily accessible. The supervisor did not address these concerns and the speaker's husband was replaced on the board of review. The speaker criticized the supervisor's ego and lack of concern for citizen safety. She also mentioned attending an annual banquet and enjoying seeing old friends. Overall, the speaker expressed a desire for more transparency, respect, and better leadershi Hello friends, it is Friday, February 17th and this has been a pretty exciting week in holly politics. This is Sherilyn with your pearls from holly. And this is what I saw this week. It was a rare blue moon event. What do I mean by that? Well there was a second Tuesday and a third Thursday in the same week. So that means we got a double header of seeing holly's leadership at work. We had a village council meeting on Tuesday night and we had a holly township meeting on Wednesday night. If you missed them, and I'm quite sure that you did, you can watch both the council and the trustee meetings on YouTube. Just search villy of holly and holly township. They'll pop out, you can watch the latest meetings, you can even watch meetings from a while ago. So let's start with Tuesday night's council meeting on Valentine's night. Council President Ryan Delaney had previously recommended me to fill a vacancy on the planning commission and my appointment was on the agenda. I had already been vetted as qualified by village staff and in fact have no doubt that I might be one of the best candidates that they've seen in a long time, I'm just saying. And for the record, after his election, President Delaney had recommended me to fill his vacant seat on the council, but my appointment failed at that time in a three to three tie vote. So it really was no surprise that those three detractors from previous came out guns blazing to justify why I am not fit to serve on the planning commission. They went full bore and dug up the dirt on me, let me tell you. Here it is. I haven't served on many committees and in 2015, I was appointed to the village parks commission and I only attended two meetings and I quit, I quit, there you have it. That's it, I'm a quitter. But like a lot of things that happen around here, there is more to the story. And 2015 was the year that my mom died. I was kind of at a loss of what to do with myself and I was looking for something and I was approached by then village president Ryan Bladzik. He asked me if I would be interested in serving on the parks commission because he knew I had done a lot of works with parks during my time with the IMA up in Flint. I distinctly remember saying that I was interested, but only if there was little to no chance of drama or conflict in the foreseeable future because given my state of mind at that point of my life, that was not my cup of tea. He assured me everything was copacetic, so I accepted the appointment. I attended two meetings. And then the village council quite unexpectedly, out of the blue, voted to dissolve the park commission. Apparently, it was an attempt to, I think they either raised the number or lowered the number of people on the parks commission. But either way, did I mention Jerry Walker was our village manager at the time? Either way, I saw it as kind of a creepy ass way to go about restacking the people that you wanted on the commission. And abolishing a commission is something that, it just doesn't happen out of the blue. It's something that has to be planned and plotted. So it became clear to me that I had been led astray regarding the stability of the parks commission and the tactics that were used and just the bullshit that was pulled on people I found to be atrocious. Ryan did come back and ask me if I would resubmit my name to be on the parks commission, but yeah, you probably guessed it. My answer was, no thanks, I'll go find some other circus. As it was, I actually ended up down at the Livingston Gem and Mineral Society. And after a couple of years down there, I became their president. We increased their membership at least 100%. And we're growing great guns down there. So I did find something else to do of community service with my time. Bottom line, my appointment to the planning commission was approved on a 4-3 vote. Those counselors who know me or got to know me, thank you to new village council member Paul Harrington, were the rest votes. Thank you also to my friends who spoke up on my behalf or who spoke out on putting personal grievances aside and making decisions that move our village forward more important than whatever the other crap is. I also want to say congratulations to new park commissioner Shannon Cole. Good luck bringing new life to our parks. There's a whole town ready to help with park cleanups and programming. Now to the second game in town this last week, our doubleheader. This was the Holley Township Board of Trustee meeting held on Wednesday night. The background on that is that my husband, Jim Clark, has served on the Holley Township Board of Review for several years. The Board of Review is where Holley property owners go to contest the amount of their property tax assessment. That information is on your tax notice that you recently received and in the trifle brochure that came with it. That brochure was called the 2023 Guide to Property Taxes and Proposal A and it came from Oakland County Executive Dave Coulter. The times for the Board of Review hearings are scheduled twice a year and people make an appointment to appeal their case. For the last two years, Jim has objected to holding these meetings on the second floor of the township offices. While technically accessible because there is a lift elevator that is designated for wheelchair use, everyone else must climb 21 stairs to reach the meeting space. That's after you found a downtown parking spot, made your way to the correct one of the three outside entry doors to the building, and if you do need to use the lift, you'll have to find someone to help you because it cannot be operated independently. When the schedule for this year's Board of Review came out, Jim responded to Supervisor Cullis in an email that he would not participate in the hearings if they're held in this space as he considers it inaccessible, unsafe, and a bad idea. He was objecting to the location for solid reasons. Did Supervisor Cullis give any merit to these concerns or even the dignity of a conversation? No, just a thank you for service response to the email. I was pissed, so I posted on Facebook that Jim didn't resign his seat on the Board of Appeals. In fact, if George really wanted Jim off of the Board, and I suspect that Jim's term really was expired, then why didn't George just say that he wasn't going to reappoint him and move on? But instead, we've been subjected to a charade, a cornball video with a person pretending to be handicapped demonstrating that the elevator can indeed be used by someone in a wheelchair to get to the second floor. Let's just ignore all the other barriers to unrestricted access. That would be, again, having to find a place to park, having to wheel in, to say nothing of the dangers of being on the second floor of a historic unsprinkled building. In case of an emergency, well, let's just say, I'd rather not have to have my emergency responders come up 21 stairs to get to me if I'm having a heart attack. So when Jim and I spoke up, we showed up at the township meeting on Wednesday night, and we spoke up to the trustees, and I am just boggled to say that we were met with the same defendant deflect that seems to happen every time we go to a meeting. We have nothing to see here. What are you talking about? Everything's safe here. And even more worrisome still is that there was total silence from everyone on the board and in the audience. This is a space that the township won't use for offices, even though George Coolus is on record in the tri-county saying that they need more space. But yet, you citizens are supposed to accept that it is just perfectly fine for you to go and exercise your constitutional rights to protest your tax assessment. It is good enough for you. So the outcome, no surprise, was that Jim was replaced on the board of review, and the hearings are still slated for the second floor of the township hall. My takeaway is our township supervisor's ego is more important to him than the convenience and safety of our citizens. So to end this Valentine's week, here's a pearl from me to Angie Lemon and all of the folks from New Generation Seniors who showed up for the George Washington Club annual banquet. This banquet celebrated its 127th occasion, and it was held at the First Baptist Church of Holly. I'm not crazy about George Washington, but I sure do enjoy seeing all my old friends and classmates and churchmates and eating cherry pie. I did relent and wore the silly three-corner hat, and you know what? Next year, I'm bringing a can of Ready Whip just for that cherry pie. So you all have a good week. This is Cheryl Lynn and her pearls of wisdom. I hope you've enjoyed what you've heard today. Maybe joy isn't the right word, but bottom line is, folks, there's a lot of things going on in Holly. We deserve better. We deserve more transparency. We just deserve more respect as far as I'm concerned. So anyway, this is me signing over and out. Peace.