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MOUNT CLEMENS — After hearing from a number of community groups last month, Mount Clemens city commissioners made their annual Community Development Block Grant allocations at the commission’s Feb. 2 meeting.
With $13,700 at the city’s disposal, commissioners decided to grant all of the funds to the city’s senior recreation program. Commissioner Spencer Calhoun recommended splitting part of the funds with Interfaith Volunteer Caregivers, which asked for funding for its program to help homeowning seniors with chores, in the amount of $1,590 with the remainder going to senior recreation.
While the idea had appeal with some commissioners, all of which gave statements of support to the various organizations that vied for a cut of the funds at the Jan. 21 meeting, Commissioner Erik Rick and Mayor Laura Kropp argued in support of keeping the funds for senior recreation.
“All of these charities are amazing and do amazing work and I think it is in our best interests to find more ways to support them, but it feels like a drop in the bucket where providing recreation for seniors — our seniors, here in our city — is of an underappreciated importance,” Rick said. “Isolation is (the) No. 1 indication … for abuse and neglect of seniors, and recreation programs like this are the kinds of things that get seniors out and get them involved so they don’t have to rely on Interfaith (Volunteer) Caregivers as much.”
Up to two projects can be applied for under CDBG rules, and the city approved sending grant applications for the purchase of fire rescue equipment and for expanding the Cairns Community Center playground. Both projects are seeking the maximum grant allocation of $150,000.
Postal update
The Jan. 21 meeting was marked by an extended discussion about the city’s post office and how its postal vehicles were being parked in the neighborhood to the west of the building, causing much inconvenience to the residents.
Clarence Blaze, a letter carrier with the U.S. Postal Service and president of the National Association of Letter Carriers for the Mount Clemens post office, spoke during the Feb. 3 meeting’s public comment period about how he has been working with the postmaster to address those issues.
“Our stance is that the postal service should provide parking for their employees,” Blaze said. “There’s just about 200 employees that work out of that Mount Clemens location and we went so far as to initiate a grievance. We believe that the post office should assist with paying for parking. Most of the people pay for parking and it goes about $20-30 a month. We are trying to get off the residential streets.”
According to Blaze, the NALC is encouraging postal workers to pay for off-site parking and maintain a record for possible tax reimbursements as well as encouraging the USPS to provide about $10 a month per employee for off-site parking.
City Manager Gregg Shipman followed up on Blaze’s comments during the administrative responses segment of the meeting by sharing details of a conversation he had with the postmaster and saying the metered parking lot behind South Main Street could be used as employee parking for postal workers. Parking stickers are available for that lot and other green, yellow, orange and purple lots for $300 per year at a quarterly rate of $75.
Postal delivery issues involving a dog on Diehl Drive were addressed by Blaze and Shipman, with Blaze saying the residence involved no longer receives deliveries and Shipman saying deliveries for the rest of the Diehl Drive neighborhood should have resumed by Feb. 1.
