Growing tensions between some Traverse City commissioners and the rest of the board and staff were on display Tuesday during combative discussions over two issues: the design of the next stretch of Grandview Parkway reconstruction in 2025 and the approval of the city’s new master plan. City Manager Liz Vogel said employee morale was suffering in the strained political environment, while City Commissioner Mi Stanley said some commissioners may be violating the city charter by going around the city manager to direct staff.

Commissioner Tim Werner requested a discussion on the design of the next phase of the Grandview Parkway construction, which will take place in 2025 between Division Street and Cherry Bend Road. In addition to a roundabout at the M-72/M-22/Bay Street intersection, the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) project calls for shifting Grandview Parkway five feet closer to Slabtown Neighborhood to create space for trails along the north and south sides of the highway and the 12-foot-wide medians. Citing concerns from neighbors, Werner questioned whether the medians could be narrowed or eliminated to provide more green space on either side of the road.

After meeting with MDOT in May, a design team of city department heads voted unanimously to recommend maintaining the 12-foot median width. Reasons for doing so included calming traffic, creating enough space for healthy landscaping and trees in the medians, installing light poles, and providing a safe crossing refuge for pedestrians and cyclists. Staff said the five feet of land on Bay Street required by the road shift is not parkland nor used for recreational purposes, and that its loss will be offset by the creation of more trailway. Commissioner Mitch Treadwell noted that city streets and parks staff have also advocated for 12-foot medians to address issues like irrigation and mowing, saying it “seems disrespectful of us as ultimately the bosses of the city employees to disregard what they say and their professional expertise as the literal boots on the ground that have to deal with this project.”

Werner, however, questioned the makeup and motives of the city design team, saying that none of the employees are “experts in traffic calming” and that the memo was “unprofessional.” He said creative solutions could easily be found outside of maintaining the median width, such as not installing lawn in the medians in the first place or putting light poles on the outside instead of the center of the highway. “This is pretty basic,” he said. “A first grader could come up with the answers.”

According to Werner, “this body, led by the city manager and staff, is willing to just follow MDOT because MDOT is powerful. They have the ear of important people, and they're going to get what they want unless the public speaks up.” Werner said that City Planning Director Shawn Winter had “inserted himself into the negotiations” between MDOT and the city, which he believed should’ve been the role of the city commission. Commissioner Jackie Anderson also found the memo from the city design team to be “rather unprofessional and certainly not respectful of the input that we have been channeling that's coming to us from neighborhoods and citizens.”

Other commissioners and staff strongly objected to those characterizations. City Manager Liz Vogel said she didn’t know where Werner’s claim about Winter originated, nor where “all of this vitriol is coming from.” The design team consists of department heads or their designees from public services, municipal utilities, engineering, planning, the fire department, park services, Traverse City Light & Power, and the Traverse City Downtown Development Authority. Its members cumulatively represent decades of public service, numerous master’s degrees, and the highest level of engineering licenses, Vogel said. “The design team is not some nameless, faceless, shape-shifting thug that lurks in the dark corners of 400 Boardman,” she said. She later added: “Implying that they're somehow not doing their jobs is just untrue, unhelpful, and it's hurting the morale not only of the members of the design team but the entire staff.”

City Attorney Lauren Trible-Laucht said all of the discussed design elements are within MDOT’s right-of-way and jurisdiction. Commissioners have already approved the construction project, so they would need to revisit that approval to change the project direction or design, Trible-Laucht said. No commissioners were willing to make that motion Tuesday. Commissioner Mi Stanley – a resident of Slabtown Neighborhood who said she personally didn’t love the design – believed nonetheless that commissioners were wasting staff’s time pushing them to focus on something outside of their control.

“No one up here is in MDOT's pocket,” she said. “No one up here is in a developer's pocket. We are not bussed in from a big city. We all are your neighbors. We live here.” Stanley expressed frustration over a “consistent redirection of staff’s focus and time and attention” to issues like the medians instead of more pressing areas where they could enact actual change, like short-term rental regulations or stormwater improvements. She also said repeated commission interference with staff activities and priorities could violate the city charter, which states that commissioners must work directly with the city manager and not “give orders to any subordinate of the city manager either publicly or privately.” Violating the charter is a misdemeanor that can lead to a commissioner being removed from office.

“When we’re talking about not directing or requesting things of staff, this is the language,” Stanley said. “This is the charter. This is the constitution of the City of Traverse City.” Mayor Amy Shamroe also reiterated that commissioners can only legally direct two employees: the city manager and city attorney. “That is not up for negotiation or debate,” she said. She called the commission discussion “very disappointing,” saying that “this insinuation that there's underlying lackeys and a secret one-world government out there within the city, that's where I draw the line.” While staff and commissioners can have disagreements and different perspectives, Shamroe said, all are working on behalf of a “city we are proud to represent.”

Divisions among commissioners and staff also arose during discussion of the city’s new master plan Tuesday. Planning commissioners voted 7-1 in August to approve the document after two years of public input and multiple drafts. In Michigan, only planning commissions are required to approve a master plan and must do so by a two-thirds majority vote. City commissions have the option to approve master plans but aren’t required to do so. Traverse City commissioners passed a resolution in 2008, however, asserting their right to vote on the document. Stanley made a motion Tuesday to rescind that resolution, saying that “asserting that right has understandably and undeniably muddied the waters” about the purpose of a master plan. Most communities leave the plan’s approval up to their planning commissions, she said, adding that any zoning or other changes recommended in the document would still have to come to city commissioners and go through an extensive public process before being approved.

Commissioners passed the motion by a 4-3 vote. The board therefore did not vote on approving the master plan itself, with the planning commission’s prior adoption of it standing. Commissioners Werner, Anderson, and Heather Shaw opposed both the master plan and the motion. Anderson said not weighing in on the document was an “unconscionable abdication of our responsibility,” while Shaw believed there was “very little in this proposed master plan that aligns with the vision of current residents.” But other leaders defended the extensive public engagement that led to its creation and reiterated that it’s a “guiding document, not a road map,” in Shamroe’s words. “In most communities, the city commission doesn’t even weigh in on it,” she said, adding that “checks and balances” were in place ensuring that commissioners still have final say over its recommendations.