Introduction:
Links to the video recording and the council packet are at the bottom of this post. Please note any errors or omissions in the comments. Anything noted in brackets was inserted by Clarkston Sunshine.
Agenda Item #1, Call to Order (video time mark 0:00:01):
Sue Wylie said OK, 7:00. I’m going to call the meeting to order at 7:00.
Agenda Item #2, Pledge of Allegiance (video time mark 0:00:07):
Wylie said if everybody would please rise, we’ll say the Pledge of Allegiance.
(Pledge said.)
Wylie said thank you.
Agenda Item #3, Roll Call (video time mark 0:00:23):
Wylie said our third item on the agenda is a roll call. (To Angela Guillen, clerk), Wylie said if you would take the roll call please.
Sue Wylie, Laura Rodgers, Al Avery, Gary Casey, and Amanda Forte were present.
Erica Jones and Ted Quisenberry were absent.
Wylie said Quisenberry. Did you hear anything about him not coming? OK, maybe he’s running late. Smith said all the lights in his house are on. (To Smith), Forte said that’s creepy. (Laughter.) (An unidentified woman said I drove by it.) Avery said it’s right across the street from me and I didn’t even pay attention. Wylie said you don’t pay attention. Forte said you didn’t like peek through the curtains. Avery said no, you don’t have to. Usually you can tell.
Agenda Item #4, Approval of Agenda – Motion (video time mark 0:01:00):
Wylie said we need the agenda approved. Would somebody make a motion to approve the agenda please?
Motion by Rodgers; second Forte.
Wylie said any discussion from council members. That’s all that’s here.
No comments.
Motion to approve agenda passed by unanimous voice vote.
Wylie said we are approved.
Agenda Item #5, Public Comments (video time mark 0:01:19):
[Though public comments can sometimes irritate the city council, there is value to both the council and the public in hearing them. While they can’t eliminate public comments entirely without violating the Open Meetings Act, your city council has occasionally decided not to acknowledge public comments during a city council meeting unless the person submitting the comments also appears at the meeting (in-person or electronically) to personally read them. In the past, members of the public have been cut off for exceeding the city council’s arbitrary three-minute time limit (it’s arbitrary because no time limits are required by the Open Meetings Act).
If your public comments were submitted to the council but not read, or if you tried to make public comments but your comments were cut short, please email them to clarkstonsunshine@gmail.com and I will include them in my informal meeting summaries either under public comments or under the specific agenda item that you want to speak to.]
Wylie said Item #5 is public comments. Would anybody like to make public comments? I’ll read it.
(Wylie read the rules for public comments.)
Wylie said any public comments.
No comments.
Wylie said OK, that’s it for public comments.
Agenda Item #6 – FYI: (video time mark 0:01:49):
Wylie said FYI, there’s nothing for FYI.
Agenda Item #7 – City Manager’s Report (video time mark 0:01:54):
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- 02-09-2026 – City Manager Report (page 3/20 of the council packet)
Wylie said and Item #6, City Manager’s Report. And we have that included in our packet. (To Smith), Wylie said did you want to highlight anything? Smith said no.
Wylie said anybody have any questions about the City Manager’s Report.
No comments.
Wylie said OK.
Wylie said oh, yeah. Just so you know, Jimi’s [Jimi Turner, Department of Public Works (DPW) supervisor] not going to be here tonight. Forte said OK.
Forte said I’ve been getting a few complaints on Church and, what’s it called, the next parallel street – Rodgers said Washington – (continuing), Forte said Washington, about us not hitting the extra parking spots. Wylie said you’re talking about with the plow? Forte said yeah, with the plow on like the city easement spots, and I’ve noticed on Buffalo we’ve been having more people try to park because of the snow in other spots, like on our side of the street. And then, like, for example, from my house, there’s, I think, two spots, two or three spots. And, like, whatever the extra number would be, they would park, and they would park over the triangles because, A, there’s either snow on them, they can’t see, and that’s not Turner’s and Carson’s [Carson Danis, DPW laborer] fault. That’s just circumstantial. But if we can try to hit those spots on Church and whatever that other street is. Wylie said Washington. Forte said I can’t think of that one. Thank you. Wylie said it’ll come back to you in a month. Forte said I was about to call it Kennedy. Another president. But, anyway, I think maybe that will help, like, with what we’re having over here. And maybe the weather will break, and it’ll be nice, and we won’t have to worry about any of this.
Smith said there’s no question this has been an extreme winter – Forte said yeah – (continuing), Smith said and Turner is just running out of places to push the snow. We don’t typically plow the easements, and I know that that reduces parking where people then stay in the street. Forte said yeah. Smith said but it’s a challenge all around. Forte said I know. What do you do? Smith said and the guys are physically exhausted. Turner was going to be here tonight. Something came up, and he can’t, but he would have told you firsthand, he and Danis are just, like, on burnout. Forte said they’re always going. Smith said burnout watch, and I’m just trying to, you know, give them a neck massage or something. Whatever it takes.
Forte said and I don’t want to complain, because they’re doing so much. Like, I’m up at 6:00, and I hear them, like, I feel like every day. Like, not without fail. You know what I mean? Or weirder hours than that. You know what I mean? So, it’s like, I don’t want to complain. Smith said no. Forte said it’s just, we’re lucky to have them. You know what I mean? Smith said we need to know where the problem areas are. Forte said and maybe it’ll just flush out. You know what I mean? But I keep hearing from certain elderly neighbors, so I figured I would pass it on. If you haven’t already heard, which I’m sure maybe you have. But, so, yes. Wylie said OK. Forte said yeah.
Wylie said anything else before we move out of City Manager’s Report.
No comments.
Agenda Item #8 – Oakland County Sheriff’s Report for January (video time mark 0:05:04):
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- City of the Village of Clarkston Monthly Report (page 4/20 of the council packet)
Wylie said next item is Oakland County Sheriff’s Report. And nobody’s here, but does anybody have any questions? Maybe Smith could pass it on to Sergeant Ashley. Forte said are they not going to come to any more meetings? Smith said no. He was busy with a project, he tells me, for pretty much the month of December and January. I did expect him, he told me he’d be here tonight. So, I don’t know if something came up. Forte said it’s no issue, I’m just curious. Smith said yeah, no, they recognize that they need to be here to answer your questions. Forte said OK.
Wylie said anybody have anything specific.
No comments.
Wylie said great.
Agenda Item #9 – Consent Agenda (video time mark 0:05:49):
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- 01-12-2026 – Final Minutes, Regular City Council Meeting (page 5/20 of the council packet)
- 01-26-2026 – Draft Minutes, Regular City Council Meeting (page 7/20 of the council packet)
- 02-09-2026 – Treasurer’s Report (page 10/20 of the council packet)
- 02-04-2026 – Check Disbursement Report 01-01-2026 – 01-31-2026 (page 11/20 of the council packet)
Wylie said Item #9 is the consent agenda. This is the final minutes of the January 12, 2026, regular meeting; draft minutes of the January 26 regular meeting; and Treasurer’s Report from February 9. Anybody? I do need a motion to accept it.
Motion by Avery; second Casey.
Wylie said any discussion or comments from city council members.
No comments.
Motion to approve the consent agenda passed by unanimous voice vote.
Wylie said we approve the consent agenda.
Agenda Item #10, Unfinished Business (video time mark 0:06:19):
Wylie said Item #10 is unfinished business. There is no unfinished business.
Agenda Item #11, New Business (video time mark 0:06:23):
Item #11a – Discussion: DPW [Department of Public Works] Update with Jimi Turner (video time mark 0:06:26):
Wylie said Item #11A was supposed to be the Discussion, DPW Status Update with Jimi Turner. He was unable to attend, so we’ll have to put that off until probably to the first meeting in March. Smith said correct.
Item 11b – Motion: City Hall Office Hours (video time mark 0:06:35):
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- Motion – City Hall Office Hours (page 20/20 of the council packet)
Wylie said and then Item #11B is Motion, City Hall Office Hours. And this is at the very end of the packet. And this is a motion.
(Wylie read the motion.)
Wylie said so, we’ll need a motion and support to authorize the city office hours to return to a Monday through Thursday, 9:00 a.m. to 5:00. p.m. effective February 23rd, 2026. And even after we have a motion and support, we can obviously discuss this. And is there a motion?
Motion by Rodgers; second Casey.
Wylie said and now we’re open for discussion. (To Smith), Wylie said maybe you want to talk about it a little bit, maybe flush this out?
Smith said well, I just want to, I guess, reemphasize what happens on Friday. First of all, we stayed at 32 hours a week. So, everybody works four days. So, we have the three office staff, myself, Greg [Coté, treasurer], and Guillen. So, what we were doing is to cover Fridays. One of us would take a day off during the week and work Fridays. We didn’t increase the number of hours we were authorized to work, just covering another day. So, that means on Monday through Thursday, one of the days, there will only be two people here. And so, and then on Friday, there’s only one person here. And so, if somebody comes in on Friday with a tax question, and let’s say Coté is not working that Friday, we can’t answer it. Conversely, if somebody came in on Tuesday and Coté was working Friday and he took Tuesday off, then he’s not there to answer that question. So, what we’re finding is we’ve just watered down our three-member staff so low that we’re not being efficient. And then the next day, they come in and say, “So what happened yesterday?” We spend the first hour kind of updating them on everything that transpired yesterday. It’s just causing a lot of headache. And if we were getting a lot of traffic on Friday, a lot of people coming in and saying, oh, I’m so glad you’re open on Fridays, I can get this done because I’m usually around town on Fridays. No, that hasn’t been the case. As I said, we’re getting on average two city-related calls. We get a lot of calls for the township, as we do every day, but it doesn’t warrant being open to support that. So, we just don’t think it’s, looking at cost-benefit, if there was a lot of people coming in on Friday benefiting from the Friday, we would keep doing it. But we’re just not seeing it, and it’s causing heartburn in other areas. So that’s the reason for the rationale.
Wylie said OK. To me, we tried it. We were operating four days a week, tried five, and didn’t see the need to continue that way. So, I’m perfectly fine with going back to four days, Monday through Thursday.
Forte said does it ever heat up around elections? Like, should we keep – would we shift around elections, do you think? Guillen said so, I’m in the office anyway, because I’m required by law to be here. Forte said OK. Smith said yeah. Guillen said in case, at 5:00 on that Friday, if somebody wants a ballot, 5:00 is the cutoff to actually mail out. Forte said OK. Wylie said that’s good to know. Forte said yeah, because my only hesitation was about, like, election time. Smith said definitely, there are some unique requirements to elections. And then, of course, for the nine days of early voting, you know, we would have to be here, be wherever the early voting is taking place. So, we support that. Forte said yeah.
Wylie said anybody else, questions, comments.
No comments.
Wylie said OK.
Wylie said let’s do a roll call on this.
Rodgers, Wylie, Avery, Casey, and Forte voted yes.
Wylie said and the motion is adopted. Thank you. Let’s see, we’ve got Jones is absent, and Quisenberry is absent.
Agenda Item #12, Adjourn Meeting (video time mark 0:11:45):
Wylie said Item #12 is a motion to adjourn the meeting. Anybody make a motion?
Motion by Forte; second Rodgers.
Wylie said any discussion.
No discussion.
Motion to adjourn passed by unanimous voice vote.
Wylie said we are adjourned. Tthis may be a record. 7:12 [p.m.]
Resources:
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- Link to video recording here
- 20260209 – city council packet