After a year dominated by contentious debate around proposed housing zoning changes and multiple board resignations, Traverse City planning commissioners and staff are ready for a reset. Four new members are joining the board – a near majority turnover – with more staff coming on board in city planning. Planning commissioners this week discussed 2024 goals and expectations, with Chair Debbie Hershey calling for a public move back toward civil discourse and away from “bullying behavior and name-calling.”

Former planning commissioners David Hassing and Heather Shaw resigned earlier this year in the wake of fierce community debate over housing zoning changes recommended by the planning commission. Hassing, then serving as chair, said the process “didn’t go well from my point of view.” Shaw, who quit the planning commission and then successfully ran for city commission, felt fellow planning commissioners “voted to rubber stamp the package of amendments” despite hearing significant negative public comment on parts or all of them. The amendments were later extensively reviewed and mostly approved by the city commission, allowing for greater housing density and flexibility in the city. Some proposed amendments, however, died at the city commission level – such as allowing duplexes and triplexes in the R-2 district and removing the owner-occupancy requirement for permitting an ADU.

Planning Commissioner Christopher Martin recently stepped down from the board – citing scheduling conflicts – and City Commissioner Linda Koebert, who served as a commission representative on the planning commission, finished her term this fall and did not seek reelection. Newly elected City Commissioner Jackie Anderson was recently appointed to replace Koebert, with Commissioner Mitch Treadwell returning as the second city commission representative on the board. On Tuesday, an ad hoc committee of city commissioners will interview eight citizen candidates for the three remaining vacancies on the planning commission.

Perhaps reflecting the heightened community interest in the board, the candidate list is stacked with former city commissioners and city commission candidates. Those scheduled to be interviewed include Merek Roman, Jeanine Easterday, Sam LaSusa, Douglas Dowdy, Brian McGillivary, Thomas Stevens, Shea O’Brien, and Mary Mills. The ad hoc committee will recommend three appointees from those interviews to the city commission; if approved, those appointees will likely join the planning commission in January, bringing the board up to its full size of nine members for the first time in months.

The board shakeup makes the new year an ideal time for the planning commission to review its “roles and responsibilities,” said Hershey, who has previous experience as a board trainer. She suggested planning commissioners plan a retreat for early 2024 – which would be publicly noticed and subject to the Open Meetings Act – for a facilitated in-depth review of how the planning commission will operate, public engagement, and how planning commissioners will work with staff. Planning Commissioner Jim Tuller – chief of the Traverse City Fire Department – supported the idea, noting how integral training is to his department. “That’s how you learn, is through training, and from that improve the process,” he said. “When we have those hard questions posed at us by the public, or by some decisions we have to make, I’m sure it’ll make us stronger.”

Hershey asked planning commissioners to respond to four questions in writing for group discussion about their expectations of themselves as planning commissioners, expectations of the board as a whole, expectations of staff, and objectives for the coming year. Staff compiled those answers and shared them with the entire board in this week’s meeting packet. Hershey said some members of the public appeared to misinterpret the packet and believed City Planning Director Shawn Winter had issued the questions or wrote the answers in an attempt to control the direction of the board or override planning commissioners. That led to a series of “appalling emails” sent to planning commissioners attacking planning staff and comparing Winter to a “Russian oligarch” in one email and “Putin” in another email, Hershey said. She reiterated that she herself asked the questions because “a better understanding of roles often leads to more robust, productive, and in-depth discussions” and asked for a cooling of rhetoric directed at staff and board members.

“I would like to make a plea to the public,” Hershey said. “Most of us sitting here are volunteers. We devote ourselves as a planning commission who was charged with looking at the city’s future and making the best possible decisions from information we receive from our staff professionals, from what we know of our community’s values, from the laws and policies that guide us, and from thoughtful deliberation.” Hershey said that the “very nature of planning is forward-thinking and demands that we be bold and brave and stand up for the city’s future,” actions that can often be met with questions and scrutiny. That scrutiny is understandable, according to Hershey, but she said civil discourse should be defined by logic, persuasion, and evidence – not personal attacks, bullying behavior, or name-calling.

“I am not only speaking about the planning commission, but also for other volunteers and staff members who work hard on a variety of issues that affect the lives of Traverse City citizens,” Hershey said. “Please stop these attacks. If you are unhappy about decisions being made, get involved yourself...and more importantly offer up possible solutions. This is a way you can help. Attacking is not.”

Planning commissioners shared some of their goals for 2024 at this week’s meeting, including working toward completing the city’s draft riparian ordinance, reviewing and learning the objectives of the city’s new master plan and mobility act plan (both being finalized), improving public engagement and outreach, and continuing to address housing (including looking at new housing tools available under recently passed state legislation). Those goals are expected to be hammered out in more depth once the three remaining new planning commissioners come on board.

Planning commissioners are also set to soon review the city’s capital improvement plan, a document that outlines infrastructure and other key projects in the city over a six-year period. That document has moved away “from its original purpose of being a staff-created plan that is used to inform the budget” to a catchall project list that doesn’t necessarily reflect financial constraints or staff capacity, Winter said. That is changing, however, with staff working toward streamlining the CIP to make sure it’s once again realistic and effective as a budgeting tool.

Finally, Winter said multiple new employees are joining the planning department who will help support planning commission efforts. Recent additions including Planning Assistant Katie Miller – who moved over from the city clerk’s office – and new incoming Deputy Planner Leslie Sickterman, who previously served as the planner for Long Lake Township. Sickterman starts with the city Monday. Having that additional expertise on board in the city planning department “is going to be a huge help to staff...at such a critical time,” Winter said.