Michigan Messenger’s Todd Heywood has been combing through stimulus project “wish lists” submitted by interest groups representing Michigan’s local governments to see which projects are “shovel-ready” and which are “shovel-worthy.”
 
In the lists, Heywood found a proposal submitted by the the Michigan Municipal League (MML ) to build a $10 million centralized library in Meridian Township. Meridian, just east of Lansing, is an upper-middle-class area broken into two school districts and two ZIP codes. Currently each district, Okemos and Haslett, has its own library branch of the Capital Area District Library.

Voters have not once but twice rejected proposals to create a centralized library.

Winifred Motherwell of Haslett has worked against each of the ballot proposals to create a central library. When she was informed of the MML proposal to build one, she said she was not surprised.

“They are absolutely convinced they need to get it,” she told Michigan Messenger.

Motherwell said the Haslett and Okemos branches act as community centers and are important safe places for the kids of the area.

Meridian Township, Ingham County, Mich.

“Maybe you would prefer [your children] shooting up on the corner; we prefer ours in a library,” she said.

Under past proposals, the central library had been suggested for the middle of the commercial district of the township, which includes the Meridian Mall.

Motherwell said the location would make it impossible for schoolchildren to access the library as they do now, noting that when her children were growing up, the library was one of the few places she would let them go on their bikes.

Meridian Township Manager Jerry Richards said the library proposal is no longer on the table, because the interest groups are now pushing for projects that are ready to go in 90 days. Richards’ disclosure that the library was off the table came only after Michigan Messenger began asking questions about the project. And while the township official says the list off the table, the library project remains on the MML list published on line.

In a new proposal that he sent to the Michigan Township Association, Richards mapped out millions of dollars in projects to fix the township’s sewer systems and create a paved road in a park.

Arnold Weinfeld, director of public policy and federal affairs for the Michigan Municipal League, said he did not disapprove of Meridian Township’s proposal, although the library project isn’t a part of the new proposal.

“I am not going to begrudge our communities for trying to find funds for public buildings,” Weinfeld said.

In other words, keep your eyes peeled for more shovel-ready pork in the form of unwanted or unnecessary public projects.