With poll: Ann Arbor Mayor John Hieftje questions Patricia Lesko's statement at mayoral candidate forum

Mayor John Hieftje argued Lesko made it sound as though the Ann Arbor City Council already had taken action on the issue, which it has not.

"If the voters of Ann Arbor on Aug. 3 put their trust in me, you will see some substantial changes in the way our city deals with small and medium-sized existing businesses," Lesko said. "I will work to roll back the extension of the parking meter hours. There are folks on Main Street who feel that was a slap in the face — that was a shake of the glass — and I agree."

Lesko left the meeting held at the Chop House after the next speaker, saying she needed to get back to her children, who were being watched by a sitter. She did not stay for the question and answer session that followed, nor was she present when Hieftje addressed her comment.

"I wanted to just briefly correct something that I thought I heard one of the previous speakers say," Hieftje told the crowd. "The meter extension has not been passed. And, in fact, I don't even expect that to be before council for a while. And when it is, it's going to be a fulsome discussion."

Lesko, who came under fire this week for inaccurate statements she made while door-to-door campaigning, did not return a phone call seeking comment.

In addition to Lesko and Hieftje, who will face off in the Democratic primary, two other mayoral candidates were in attendance Thursday: Steve Bean and William Bostic Jr., who plan to run independently in November.

Several people who attended the forum, which was open only to Main Street Area Association members and guests, said they wished Lesko had stayed for the question and answer session. That portion lasted about 25 minutes.

Tony Lupo, a downtown business manager and Main Street Area Association board member, said he wanted to ask Lesko about her blog, A2Politico.com, and in particular a piece she posted on Jan. 15 about Restaurant Week, an event put on by the association.

In her blog post, Lesko called Restaurant Week a joke on Main Street businesses that pay dues to the association. She suggested everyone should eat dinner at home instead of going downtown because the food wasn't worth the price.

She also wrote she was "painfully aware of exactly how over-priced and badly cooked meals in our local restaurants can actually be."

"I’m sorry if that sounds elitist or snotty, but think of it like sex," she wrote. "There’s satisfactory sex, and there’s phenomenal mind-blowing sex. Which would you rather have? I thought so."

Lupo said he enjoyed the pro-business message he heard during Lesko's speech on Thursday, but it didn't coincide with what he read on her blog.

"I was disappointed to read some of her takes on Restaurant Week and I wanted to ask her in this setting if her opinion had changed on it, because the original thoughts she had were troubling to me," he said. "In my opinion, what was written about Restaurant Week wasn't supportive of a lot of small businesses that actually invest a lot of time and resources and thought into creating a special event that brings a lot of business downtown."

Patricia Lesko

In her speech Thursday, Lesko vowed to work to defund the Local Development Financing Authority, which helps fund economic development group Ann Arbor SPARK. The LDFA captures more than $1 million a year in local taxes, which SPARK uses to assist startup companies. Lesko said she'd rather see that money help existing businesses.

Lesko spoke about her experiences running a home-based publishing company called Part-Time Press.

"The business that I head and have headed for the last 20 years unfortunately doesn't do much of its business in Ann Arbor. It's national," Lesko said. "It's a higher education publishing group, and we publish professional development materials. And one out of every two colleges in the United States uses our products when they train their college faculty."

Lesko said Ann Arbor could do a better job supporting local businesses. She said nurturing a business is a lot like nurturing a child, and right now many downtown merchants are "worried about their children."

"There are merchants who told me that doing business in Ann Arbor is like glass. It's fragile," she said. "And there are merchants in Ann Arbor who feel shaken. And you know what happens when you shake glass: It breaks."

Steve Bean

Bean, head of the city's Environmental Commission, told the crowd he's been a near-downtown resident of Ann Arbor for about 20 years and was married to a Main Street retailer for 17 years, up until a couple of years ago.

"I encourage any of you who know Jill Damon to talk to her to ask her about my candidacy and the type of person I am — the way I think about things," Bean said, noting Damon owns the 16 Hands fine crafts gallery.

Bean said he has a good understanding of the challenges of running a downtown business and appreciated Lesko's view on helping existing businesses versus those trying to relocate to Ann Arbor.

Bean spoke of his work on developing environmental goals for the city. He said he wants to expand those to a broader range of sustainability goals that take into account social equity and economic vitality.

Bean, a board member for Think Local First for the last year, said he also is interested in exploring the possibility of a local currency in Ann Arbor.

"I think having something like that in place can make us a more resilient community economically, can help keep the money in the local economy," he said.

Bean also expressed support for starting a PACE program in Ann Arbor, otherwise known as a Property Assessed Clean Energy program. He said the city has an opportunity to provide low-interest loans to residents and business leaders who want to make energy-efficient investments.

John Hieftje

Hieftje spent a large part of his speech comparing the condition of Ann Arbor's economy to the rest of Michigan.

"We've just come through a very tough budget year, just like other cities in Michigan. What I would say about that is I wouldn't trade places with any of them," he said. "As we look around the state, things are really doing quite well in Ann Arbor in comparison, and one of the reasons I think is the anchor that we have in the downtown."

Hieftje gave credit to the University of Michigan, which he said — although it does not pay taxes — hires hundreds of people per year. Between the university and the downtown, he said it's no wonder Ann Arbor continues to win awards for being one of the greatest places to live.

"Most recently I think it was Forbes' fourth most livable city," he said. "Recently just this week a well-known author who writes about cities said Ann Arbor was one of the top places for college graduates to come to — so those things are in place and moving along."

Hiefjte, whose professional background is in real estate, predicts a turnaround in Michigan's economy in the next year or so and said Ann Arbor will be at the lead as Michigan bounces back.

He expressed optimism that a surface parking lot bound by Huron, Ashley, Washington and First will be developed in the coming years.

He noted that multiple projects are under way downtown, which he said is an effort to "make Ann Arbor a better place." He cited improvements along Fifth and Division that will enhance the pedestrian experience. A new underground parking structure also is going in.

"The underground parking structure, I think you all understand, is going to bring us something that we've needed for a very long time," he said. "We lost a parking structure that was built in the 1940s that had to be taken down."

Hieftje, who serves on the DDA, said the motivation for pushing to expand parking meter enforcement hours is to see more turnover in on-street parking spaces and get more people using off-street parking. He noted there is a program that allows downtown employees to park anytime after 4 p.m. in the structures for $30 a month.

William Bostic Jr.

Bostic, a recent University of Michigan graduate, took a stance against extending parking meter enforcement hours to 10 p.m., saying it could unfairly burden low-paid downtown workers. He suggested a one-hour extension to 7 p.m. would be a better idea.

Bostic also differentiated himself from Hieftje by telling the crowd he would have supported the Moravian, a 62-unit apartment complex proposed for construction at 201 E. Madison St. Hieftje and enough council members came out in opposition to the project in April that it failed to get the eight votes needed for approval.

"I was in favor of that because that was actually going to bring revenue," Bostic said. "That's something that we need to do. We need to make Ann Arbor a self-sustaining city. We can't continue to run deficits."

Bostic said he would like to find new ways to create revenue to maintain basic city services. He also said he wants to find ways to make Ann Arbor more attractive to startup companies and young entrepreneurs.

Questions and answers

During the question and answer session, a man who said he was hit by a truck while bicycling asked about bike safety and the condition of bike lanes.

Hieftje acknowledged a lack of road funding in Michigan has resulted in more bumpy and pothole-ridden roads than many would like, and bicyclists experience that in a more personal way than the average motorist.

"They are right under you and it tends to be that the shoulder of the road is not kept up," he said. "And I think that the city needs to do a better job of that."

Bean said the Environmental Commission's Transportation Committee, of which he is a member, is looking at bicycle lane design right now.

"We've added bike lanes where possible," he said. "A lot of those are narrow. They're not actually adequate. So we're looking at what's the next step for the city to develop a more robust system of bike lanes."

A downtown shop owner said she was deeply concerned about safety issues. She said in the past eight years, her shop has been burglarized, she was threatened with sexual assault in the 300 block of South Main Street and received a death threat inside her store from a homeless person who receives services from the Delonis Center.

"It's seems like there's a very small community, or a very small population, of people who are committing a significant amount of crime in this town," she said. "And specifically they target Main Street. They target our neighborhood, my neighborhood."

Bean agreed security is a concern downtown. He suggested measures such as installing camera systems could be included as part of a newly created self-assessment district.

"I don't know that those folks are necessarily targeting the area as much as they live in the area and situations arise because of that," he said, adding the city needs to have talks with nonprofit agencies that serve those populations.

Bostic threw out the idea of bringing back beat cops. He also suggested emergency call boxes similar to the ones on the University of Michigan's campus.

Hiefjte said Ann Arbor is still a safe community and reports show crime is going down, though that doesn't mean there aren't pockets where there are problems.

"One of the things that I know from long experience is that there are certain individuals who are often called engines of crime. Those individuals can cause a whole lot of problems," he said. "One of the problems that we have is some of these people have been repeatedly arrested and locked up and they are not held in the jail for very long at all. The jail space is being reserved these days for violent criminals."

One of the audience members asked Hieftje how many registered sex offenders stay at the Delonis Center, which is close to the YMCA where children go. Hieftje said he didn't know, but would look into the issue.

Ryan J. Stanton covers government for AnnArbor.com. Reach him at ryanstanton@annarbor.com or 734-623-2529.