TRAVERSE CITY – Shocked. Surprised. Disappointed.
That’s how Traverse City Mayor Amy Shamroe described her reactions when she learned that Grand Traverse County Board of Commissioners voted Wednesday to recommend that voters reject a local tax proposal on the Nov. 3 ballot.
The tax increment financing – called TIF-97 – proposal is an issue on the ballot for voters who live in Traverse City.
Shamroe said the county commissioners chose to put this resolution on the agenda for consideration during their regular meeting Wednesday without giving any indication of what they were discussing to city leaders or administrators — or to any elected officials, for that matter.
“It could have been a good discussion for us to have,” Shamroe said, pointing out that there had been about a year of public meetings that took place leading up to the county’s action Wednesday.
“At no point [during that time] did anybody from the county commission or county administration speak out publicly at the meetings or even approach staff about desired alternatives or other resources that they’d be willing to offer up,” she said.
Shamroe said she is shocked that, in the county’s resolution, they “encouraged city voters how to vote on an issue that is being brought forward to city voters alone.”
Not only that, she said, but county commissioners closed their meeting “by asking city commissioners to ignore the vote of the people — if they do happen to pass TIF — and to vote the way that [the county] would like them to” vote.
That, Shamroe said is “major overreach” when it comes to the actions and votes of an independent body.
While the mayor said she believed the city and the county have been on better grounds than they had been in the past, this action by the county is liable to cause city concerns moving forward “as far as where that relationship is going.”
Shamroe said that the county’s choice to make major decisions without having conversations with the city — whether between elected officials or mutual administrations — is “not a great way to start a partnership.”
See Thursday’s newspaper or come back to Record-Eagle.com or the Record-Eagle mobile app for more on this story.