General Fund 1992-2014 700w
This graph is from the 2013-2014 Audit, page 7.   Click here to download the entire document

The Public Safety Building debt is the result of a 2001 meeting of the Board of Trustees and the Public Safety Building Authority.  At four o'clock on a wednesday afternoon, they doubled the size and cost of what we now call the Township Hall.  Voters had approved a $3,800,000 building and the millage to pay for a $3.8M bond.  This wasn't enough for the Township debt addicts.  They fired the architect.  They threw away $288,881.15 worth of completed plans.  They hired a new architect.  They staged the secret meeting to borrow $3,000,000 more to pay for the enlarged building.

The minutes of that meeting are here:  Page 1..... Page 2.....  Page 3.....  Page 4 

At that meeting, the Board and Building Authority ignored our Bond Counsel's advice regarding the amount of additional debt service we could carry.  He said we could afford a payment of $200,000 per year.  Instead the Board borrowed $3,000,000.  This required $270,000 annual payments out of the General Fund.  In 2003-3004, the fiscal chickens came home to roost.  The Board was forced to borrow $500,000 to stay afloat.  The citizen outrage reached the Ann Arbor News.

The final bill? The Board paid a total of $7,678,774.26 for our $6.8M Public Safety Building, double what voters had authorized.  That's $878,774.26 in cost overruns.

We are still paying off the original $3.8M PSB bond and the $3M board borrow.  In 2013, our Township Manager helped replace the PSB bond with a lower interest, $2,415,000 bond.  At the same time, we renegotiated the Board's $3M Building Authority bond (2.93M to be precise) into a $2,473,799 bond.   2004's $500,000 emergency borrow appears to have been paid off in 2014.

I'll do the addition.  Of $6.8 Million borrowed to build our half empty PSB, we still owe $4.9 Million.

Some want to dismiss this as old news or water under the bridge, but our Township is still crippled by this unnecessary debt.  The history is worth understanding.  Why?  Because players in this debacle, names you can read on page 2 of the secret meeting agenda, remain vocal in Township Politics today.  They deny gambling with tax dollars.  They will happily tell you that the consequences of that Board's fiscal recklessness are your Neighbors' fault.

If the lack of fiscal conservatism isn't enough to raise your hackles, consider this.  Six days after this secret Board decision, 9/11 happened.  It never occured to anyone on the Board or Building Authority that the world had just become a more uncertain place.  It never occured to any of them to revisit that decision.

NORTHFIELD TOWNSHIP                      
PSB CONSTRUCTION COSTS                      
YEARS ENDED JUNE 30, 2000, 2001, 2002 & 2003                      
                       
                       
                       
DESCRIPTION             2000             2001             2002           2003         TOTALS  
                       
AMERICAN INTERIORS                      68,631.39          68,631.39  
AMERICAN TITLE            5,000.00            552.00                    5,552.00  
ANN ARBOR ARCHITECTS        108,808.07      180,073.08                288,881.15  
BODMAN LONGLEY            5,029.65          9,465.70              29,163.70          43,659.05  
CDPA ARCHITECTS            62,724.36        306,005.53          61,320.91        430,050.80  
DTE ENERGY / UTILITIES                    1,391.47          12,597.78          13,989.25  
INSIGHT ENVIRONMENTAL            1,000.00          1,000.00                    2,000.00  
LAND PURCHASE          247,878.50                247,878.50  
MCM GROUP - INSURANCE                      33,571.00          33,571.00  
NEEDERMAN CONSTRUCTION                      54,473.91          54,473.91  
NFTS - TAX, SEWER PERMIT                579.96              10,500.00          11,079.96  
O'NEAL CONSTRUCTION - POLICE / FIRE BUILDING  
 
       26,076.30      2,840,733.62      3,170,274.58      6,037,084.50  
OTHER              640.00                3,638.20          29,103.17          33,381.37  
TETRA TECH - ENGINEERING                    1,653.83                1,653.83  
STATION #2 - O'NEAL & OTHERS            98,030.50            1,928.09              99,958.59  
TREE REMOVAL                    8,300.00                8,300.00  
VENTURE SPECIALTY PRODUCTS - FLOORING                      76,785.00          76,785.00  
WASHTENAW CO - INSPECTIONS                      427.10                  427.10  
WASHTENAW ENGINEERING              5,000.00                    5,000.00  
XFER INTERNATIONAL - PHONE SYS                      22,301.26          22,301.26  
                       
TOTAL CONSTRUCTION COSTS        120,477.72      631,380.40      3,164,077.84      3,568,722.70      7,484,658.66  
                       
PROFESSIONAL FEES                  92,917.60              92,917.60  
BOND DISCOUNTS                100,898.00            100,898.00  
AGENT FEES                      300.00                  300.00  
                       
TOTAL COST OF PUBLIC SAFETY BUILDING                      7,678,774.26  
                       
                       
                       
O'NEAL (Construction) BREAKDOWN               Architects' Fees:      
                 $718,931.95      
BILLINGS BEFORE CONTRACT          40,129.50                  
PUBLICATIONS            1,703.00                  
CONTRACT BILLINGS TO DATE      5,940,323.00                  
CONTINGENT BILLING          54,929.00                  
                       
TOTAL      6,037,084.50                  
                       
                Costs not including O'Neal.  
Cost overrun beyond $6.8 million bonded        878,774.26           1,447,574.16