It's Your Money

Who is the Michigan Municipal League (MML)
working for with your money?

Michigan Statute MCL 247.64(2) used to say:

“A village or city, or a township having a population
of more than 5,000, may, whether or not provided in
its charter, provide by ordinance enacted for the
purpose of controlling and eradicating noxious weeds
in subdivided land that if the owner, agent, or occupant
of subdivided land in a subdivision in which buildings
have been erected on 60% of the lots, or the owner,
agent, or occupant of a lot along an improved street
in common usage, has failed, after 10 days' notice as
provided in this section, to destroy the weeds, for a
depth of 10 rods or the depth of the lot, whichever is
less, then an agent authorized by the governing body
of the township, village, or city may enter upon the
lot and destroy noxious weeds by cutting.”

In 2010, under pressure from the Michigan Municipal
League, that law was changed and now reads:

“A village, city, or township may, whether or not provided
in its charter, provide by ordinance enacted for the purpose
of controlling and eradicating noxious weeds in subdivided
land that if the owner, agent, or occupant of subdivided
land in a subdivision in which buildings have been erected
on 60% of the lots, or the owner, agent, or occupant of a
lot along an improved street in common usage, has failed,
after 10 days' notice as provided in this section, to destroy
the weeds, for a depth of 10 rods or the depth of the lot,
whichever is less, then an agent authorized by the
governing body of the township, village, or city may enter
upon the lot and destroy noxious weeds by cutting.”

Then in MCL 247.63a they do away with the notice requirement.

Is this what the MML means when they say their purpose is to
“make better cities?” It looks more as though they're all for
acquiring more power and control over “free citizens” than
anything else. Little by little the cities impinge on freedoms
we've come to take for granted. They have time, after all,
they've already been around for 110 years. Initially the
purpose was to assist undereducated elected officials.
Any more they're really about power grabs, because nobody
is watching and they've gotten themselves exempt from FOIA.

There will be more on this topic in the months to come.

Bill Vajk

Committee on Veterans’ Affairs Field Hearing

On Monday, 20 June 2011, our Congressman Dr. Dan
Benishek and Congresswoman Ann Marie Buerkle
held a hearing in Iron Mountain related to the
accessibility and quality of healthcare for veterans
residing in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

Our reporter Ben Smith attended in his official capacity
as well as because of his personal interests.

Ben delivered a note from me to Dr. Benishek's people
containing information as follows:

------------------------------------------------------

Dear Dr. Benishek:

As much as is possible, please try to get the following
changes passed by the federal government.


1) Remove ethanol from gasoline in order to reduce
food prices and federal subsidies.

2) Change the regulations that mandate more than
one blend of gasoline for the continental US.

3) Change the "cost of living index" (COL) used to
determine Social Security increases to reflect the
realities that seniors living in the US today face.
It appears that the COL presently used eliminates
cost of fuel and food, thus for the past 2 years our
SS payments have effectively declined while the
gross amount has remained constant and Medicare
deductions have increased. That SS is a problem
isn't the fault of the recipients, but of bad planning
by those who have been in charge of administering
the system for the past several decades. It needs
to be made right for everyone.


Thank you for your attention.

Bill Vajk

Publisher of Ironcountydoings.blogspot.com
a publication registered with the Library of Congress

Bill Vajk

One Year Ago

Today marks a full year since we filed the complaint
with the Federal District Court at Marquette, MI.,
against the ordinances and practices of the City of
Iron River, Iron County, and the Michigan Municipal
League.

By an large we have avoided publishing documents as
the case progressed through the District Court and into
the Federal Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit at
Cincinnati, Ohio. There were, before today, two
exceptions. The first was the original complaint which
we published. The second document had to do with the
dirty pool being played by the City of Iron River.

Today, the anniversary date for this litigation, I am
publishing the principal brief in the appeal. To conserve
some space I dropped it to single spacing. You will need
a word processor of some sort to read it properly. The
footnotes are critical to understanding the contents.

The file containing the brief may be found at:

www.angelfire.com/planet/iron-river/shrink-brief.doc

Bill Vajk

Who Knew?

So there's a senior voucher system in place here
in Michigan funded by the Federal Government and
the State of Michigan with some spotty
participation by townships and counties.

Who knew?

I made the acquaintance of Michelle, the owner of
Strong's Restaurant on US 45 in Watersmeet. I
signed up for the senior voucher program and had
tonight's dinner there at the standard reduced price
of $3.75.

Here's their voucher program menu:



I had #7. It was a good feed.

Ordinarily I don't advertize for places of business,
but the senior voucher program is something I'd never
heard about and wouldn't have known about were it not
for the entrepreneurial spirit demonstrated by this
restaurant. The question arises "Why don't any of the
restaurants in Iron County participate?"

I asked Michelle how much paperwork was involved, and
she said it wasn't nothing, but was not extensive or
difficult. I can immediately think of a handful of
restaurants here in Iron County that, given our rapidly
aging population, could do very well with a program
like this, and in my opinion SHOULD be participating.

I can't think of any reason why participation has fallen
to zero in Iron County!

Let's spread the word and start applying pressure on
our local restauranteurs to get this program working
for us in Iron County. I'm thrilled that Strong's
Restaurant is busily doing it and wish the ownership
every success. But an even greater success could be had
if the program had more participants and our local
townships promoted and participated in the program.

Bill Vajk

Northstar (Iron River) Hospital Report

The first quarter Northstar Hospital
report is out.

The Hospital shows a financial
improvement over last year with an
advance to an income from operations
of some $182,000. Huge positive jumps
like bear close scrutiny.

For example, the total operating
expenses have dropped, on a pro
rata basis, some $964,000 compared to
2010. Interest expense has dropped by
some $141,000 pro rated when compared
to 2010.

All the numbers are looking much better
than last year, so something is being
done differently. We are hopeful that
this level of progress can be sustained
indefinitely.

Bill Vajk