Updated: 9/5/2008 10:51:18 AM
Mt. Pleasant rejects Hooters plan
• Remus man to face trial • Updating Reed Park
Plus: Tigers lose to Angels
Hooters rejected by planners
BY PATRICIA ECKER
Sun Staff Writer
Mt. Pleasant city planners rejected a site plan for a proposed Hooters Restaurant at their meeting Thursday night.
Planners also denied a site plan by James E. Johnson regarding property at 401 W. Broadway, next to the Borden Building, for construction of a state office building where are multiple story condominium was supposed to go.
Jane Butcher’s deck is 62 feet from the building where Art Dore, of Dore Enterprises in Bay City, wanted to open his fourth Hooter’s restaurant, and she said she was overcome by the planners’ decision.
“I am so close to the area,” Butcher said. “I’ve learned a lot, and I really felt like (the planning commission) were listening to us.”
Butcher, who begged planners to deny the site plan and permit, is a member of the Lynnwood Addition Neighborhood Association, which formed in response to the contingent special use permit granted Hooters in June by city planners.
“We were told that we could never win,” Butcher said. “Thank goodness, it’s turned out the way I wanted it to.”
Planners rejected Hooters site plan because of inadequacies with the sidewalk, screening, and signage.
Rich Morrison, director of Community Services and Economic Development, said the issue of screening, such as a masonry wall between commercial businesses and residential neighborhoods along the Mission Street corridor, needs to be addressed.
Planners said no to the site plan for state office building presented by Greg Saxton, project manager for J.E. Johnson, Inc., the developer which is renovating the Borden Building for the new City Hall.
“This has been before the commission twice,” Mark Stevens, director of the Isabella Department of Human Services said. “I hope you can come to a resolution soon.
“This is our preferred site because it is close to the people we serve.”
Stevens is concerned because the Department of Community Health in Isabella County’s lease is up at the end of the year.
“Our department serves the most vulnerable people in the county,” Stevens said. “This location is near the senior citizen high rise.
“And there will be less than 50 well paid, state employees, who will bring their money downtown.”
Stevens plea to “please resolve this tonight” was not answered.
Planners denied the site plan based on parking deficiencies.
The Mt. Pleasant City Commission denied Johnson’s request on June 30.
Jones pleads O'Kelly's beating
By SUSAN FIELD
Clare Managing Editor
After twice balking and needing private conferences with his attorney, a Mt. Pleasant man agreed to a plea arrangement Thursday in the James Williams beating case.
Raymond Demetrius Jones, 23, pleaded no contest to assault with intent to commit murder in Isabella County Chief Judge Paul Chamberlain’s courtroom – after having two holding cell discussions with defense attorney Gordon Bloem.
First, Jones, who with James Jerome Hunter was charged in the Jan. 1 beating of Williams, told the judge he thought he was pleading to an armed robbery charge, prompting a short conference with Bloem.
Shortly after that conference, Jones told the judge he needed more time to talk to Bloem before entering a plea.
After his second private conversation with Bloem, Jones pleaded, telling the judge he understood that the arrangement called for a minimum of 13 to 19 years with a maximum cap of 30 years.
Chamberlain set Jones’ sentencing for Oct. 17 at 9:15 a.m.
Under the plea agreement, Isabella County Proscutor Larry Burdick dropped assault with intent to commit great bodily harm less than murder and armed robbery charges.
Jones, who has four prior criminal convictions, also pleaded to a second offense habitual offender charge during the hearing.
Assault with intent to commit murder carries a maximum penalty of any number of years up to and including life; a no contest plea is not an admission of guilt but is treated as such for sentencing purposes.
In offering a factual basis for the plea, Burdick entered transcripts from Jones’ preliminary hearing, along with a report from a state police crime lab.
Technicians had processed the vehicle that Jones and Hunter were in the night of the assault that left Williams near death outside O’Kelly’s Pub and Grill early New Year’s Day and found Williams’ blood in the passenger seat of the vehicle, where Jones was sitting.
Jones is currently on parole for a previous conviction and will likely be charged with a parole violation, Burdick said.
Jones was convicted in June 2006 of delivery/manufacture of less than 50 grams of a controlled substance.
He was also convicted of conspiracy to commit delivery of marijuana, and resisting and obstructing police, in June 2006.
In March 2004, Hones was convicted of attempted resisting and obstructing police, according to court records.
Hunter, 19, also pleaded no contest to assault with intent to commit murder, was sentenced Aug. 28 to 25 to 37 years for his role in Williams’ beating.
Williams, who was left for dead in a service alley between the bar and a veterinary clinic, is recuperating at home after lengthy stays at hospitals and rehabilitation facilities.
Detroit Mayor Kilpatrick pleads guilty, resigns
By COREY WILLIAMS and ED WHITE
Associated Press Writers
DETROIT (AP) _ Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick pleaded guilty to a pair of felony obstruction charges in a sex-and-misconduct scandal and resigned from office after months of defiantly holding on to his job leading the 11th-largest U.S. city.
The plea deal on Thursday brings to an end a seven-month-long sex scandal that led to felony charges against Kilpatrick and plunged the city, region and state into political chaos.
As part of the deal, the 38-year-old Democrat is to serve four months in jail, five years of probation and pay $1 million in restitution over the probationary period. Payments from his state pension must be assigned to the city of Detroit toward the restitution.
He also cannot run for any elected office for five years and loses his law license.
During a separate hearing moments after Wayne County Circuit Court Judge David Groner accepted the mayor's plea, Kilpatrick offered a "no contest" plea in an assault case.
The judge also accepted that plea, which called for Kilpatrick to serve a four-month jail sentence that would run at the same time.
The married mayor and former top aide Christine Beatty were charged in March with perjury, misconduct and obstruction of justice. They're accused of lying under oath about an affair and their roles in the firing of a deputy police chief.
Kilpatrick had faced 10 felony counts in the two separate criminal cases and could have been sentenced to 15 years in prison had he been convicted of perjury.
Beatty did not plead guilty and next will appear in court on Sept. 11. Groner said a plea deal in Beatty's case appeared likely.
When the hearing was completed Thursday, Kilpatrick got up, motioned to his wife, Carlita, to come forward. They then embraced, and he kissed her forehead and cheek.
Groner asked Kilpatrick if he understood he was giving up the right to be innocent until proven guilty.
"I gave that up a long time ago," Kilpatrick replied.
A one-sentence letter signed by Kilpatrick and filed with the court states his resignation will take place Sept. 18.
The mayor will be sentenced on Oct. 28. He will report to jail that day, said Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy.
Obama called on Kilpatrick to quit
But senior state capitol correspondent Tim Skubick says the Democratic nominee was late to the party.
Greenpeace founder now promotes nuclear
BY PATRICIA ECKER
Sun Staff Writer
One of the co-founders of arguably the most renowned environmental organizations in the world and a protester, at the last testing of a hydrogen bomb off the coast of Alaska by the United States, is now a proponent for nuclear energy.
Dr. Patrick Moore, co-chair for the CASEnergy (Clean and safe energy) Coalition and one of the co-founders of Greenpeace, spoke about the benefits of nuclear energy at several venues in the central Michigan Thursday.
“We (Greenpeace) made the simple mistake of lumping nuclear energy in with nuclear weapons, in the early years,” Moore said. “Even when I left Greenpeace, I was still not convinced on nuclear energy.
“Some people think maybe I left Greenpeace because of that issue.”
Moore told community members at a luncheon at Buck’s Run Golf Club that the reason he left Greenpeace was because of the “lack of science education by the directors.”
“I did decide to leave after 15 years, among other things, I looked around and realized that I was against these three or four things for the last 15 years.” Moore said. “I became interested in figuring out what I was in favor of instead.
“The last 20 years, I have been focused on sustainability and how we can move forward in key areas of energy, agriculture, forestry, fisheries, mining, ... and trying to develop a logical science based focus on environmentalism,” he said.
Moore’s suggestion to fossil fuel junkies would be to purchase smaller cars and invest the savings on the less expensive vehicles into a ground source heat pump.
“Instead of putting in a dark room or basement where you furnace used to be, put it in a nice and light place,” Moore said. “Paint your heat pump a really bright color and put racing stripes on it.
“And when your friends come over, take them down to your basement and show them your heat pump, forget about your car.”
More said that homes and cars are the country’s two main fossil fuel burners
“You don’t need the government to intervene to decide what kind of car to drive or what sort of heating system you have for you house,” Moore said. “Theses are private decisions that you can make yourself. You are in control of your own carbon footprint,” he said.
Lint bound over in July death
By MARK RANZENBERGER
Sun Online Editor
A Remus man will face trial on a charge of driving while intoxicated causing death in the death of a Mt. Pleasant woman in late July.
Travis Stanford Lint, 33, was bound over to circuit court after a preliminary examination Thursday before Isabella County Trial Court Judge William Rush on the felony charge.
He is charged with the death of Valerie Lynn Booth, 33, a sales coordinator for Bandit Industries, where Lint also worked. She died when she fell out of Lint’s Ford F-350 pickup truck on an isolated stretch of South Woodruff Road near Millbrook Road July 31.
Witness Donald Lee Stack of Blanchard, who was riding in the rear seat of the pickup, testified that Booth climbed out of the front-seat passenger-side window of the truck and had her body, from the waist up, outside the truck.
“It all happened quick,” Stack said. “The next thing I saw were her feet going out the window.”
He testified that he then felt what he described as “a bump” when the truck apparently ran over the woman.
Stack testified that he, Lint and Booth had been at the Greenside Tavern in Lake Isabella before the accident, and they were headed back to Bandit Industries.
Isabella County sheriff’s deputy Bill Russell testified that the truck appeared to have stopped with about 40 feet of where Booth fell. Stack said Lint called 911 for help, and attempted to give Booth CPR.
The woman was pronounced dead at Central Michigan Community Hospital in Mt. Pleasant after being taken there by Mobile Medical Response Ambulance. Lint was arrested on a charge of drunken driving.
Russell said that Lint was able to pass several roadside sobriety tests, but had a “moderate” smell of intoxicants and refused a breath test. A blood test revealed a blood-alcohol content of 0.15 percent, nearly twice the legal limit.
Lint’s attorney, Dan O’Neil of Mt. Pleasant, argued that despite the fact Lint was drunk, his driving had nothing to do with Booth’s death. But Isabella County Principal Trial Attorney Robert Holmes argued that a driver must, if nothing else, ensure that passengers wear seat belts, and Booth clearly was not wearing a seat belt.
No trial date was set. Operating while intoxicated causing death carries a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison.
Clare County man to be charged in death
By SUSAN FIELD
Clare Managing Editor
A 59-year-old Clare County man is expected to be charged Friday in the hit-and-run death of a Lake man Wednesday night.
Clare County Prosecutor Norm Gage issued a two-count warrant Thursday afternoon for driving with a suspended license causing death and failing to stop at the scene of an accident when at fault causing the death of Anthony Dionise, 51.
Both charges are 15-year felonies.
A passerby discovered Dionise’s body on Lake Station Avenue about a half mile north of U.S. 10 in Garfield Township at about 8:35 p.m. Wednesday, Clare County Sheriff’s Detective Lt. Mark McClellan said.
Deputies and first responders found that Dionise was riding his bicycle south on Lake Station Avenue and was hit by a southbound vehicle, McClellan said.
A witness, who was riding a motorcycle north on Lake Station Avenue, told police that the car and bicycle were in the same area, then saw a cloud of dust and went to the site, finding Dionise's body along the roadway.
Clare County Medical Examiner Elmer Shurlow pronounced Dionise dead at the scene, McClellan said.
With a description of the vehicle, a large white Cadillac, detectives, working on a tip, found the car parked at a home at the corner of Hemlock and Cherry strets in Lake at 10:05 p.m. Wednesday.
Detectives noted there was damage to the passenger side windshield and front bumper of the car, McClellan said.
Gage was called to the scene of the accident and issued a search warrant to seize the car, and police questioned the 59-year-old man, who was arrested and taken to the Clare County Jail Wednesday night on unrelated charges from Ionia County, McClellan said.
Gage issued the warrant after technicians from the state police Crime Lab in Grayling processed the car for evidence Thursday afternoon.
The accident remains under investigation.
State police, Mobile Medical Response Ambulance, the Garfield Township Fire Department and Clare County Sheriff’s Reserves assisted at the scene.
Reed Park update set to begin
By GREG NELSON
Sun Staff Writer
A $680,000 upgrade at Reed Park in Gratiot County’s North Star Township is due to begin next month.
Final plans were revealed by Scott DeKorte, vice president of M.C. Smith and Associates Architectural Group Inc., during a meeting Thursday at the 100-acre facility.
The East Grand Rapids firm was hired by the county’s parks and recreation commission to design the project.
Money for the work is coming from a $495,000 state Department of Natural Resources Trust Fund grant and a $185,000 match from the county.
Parks Director Harold Sanderson was scheduled to meet today with DNR officials “to see if we overlooked anything.”
Bids for the project will go out next Wednesday and are due back by Sept. 25.
If everything goes as planned work should begin by Oct. 9.
Although DeKorte estimated it would likely take only about three months to finish construction, the completion date has been set for April 29 to allow for work stoppages during the winter.
It won’t take long because not “much ground will have to be disturbed,” he added.
The project will include building a modern 35-by-50-foot concrete block beach house with eight unisex restrooms and a “special needs” room. Each will feature flush toilets, urinals and wash basins, and two will have infant changing tables.
It will be built just north of the lake near where the vault toilets are now located.
Three 20-by-40-foot pavilions will also be constructed, one near where a new playground will be built in the north side of the lake and the two others, which could be used at the same time for large gatherings, near the west shore. All will include electrical outlets.
The entrance road will be reconfigured slightly to slow down traffic and free up other areas, DeKorte said.
It will lead to a new paved parking lot that will be constructed north of the baseball field.
Concrete walkways will run throughout the park making the entire facility handicapped accessible and ADA compliant.
A well, septic system and drain field will also be installed.
Presently the park does not have running water or electricity.
Although the parks commission has preliminary estimates for the work, actual costs won’t be known until the bids come back, which could result in making some minor tweaks to the design such as building one or more of the pavilions out of wood rather than tubular steel as presently planned.
The upgrades were designed to accommodate 500 people at a time.
Parks officials hope to have the project completed a couple of weeks prior to the Memorial Day weekend, which is when both county parks traditionally open for the season.
Pickard bridge construction set
Traffic will be reduced to one lane in each direction on the Arnold and Margaret Sowmick Bridge on Pickard Street in Mt. Pleasant Monday.
Repair work is scheduled to being about 7 a.m. and last until about 11 p.m., according to a statement from the city of Mt. Pleasant. The bridge carries West Pickard Street across the Chippewa River west of Main Street.
Alma set for Lucky McDuck celebration
By LINDA GITTLEMAN
Gratiot Managing Editor
Beginning at 10 a.m. Saturday, Alma’s Lucky MacDuck and Community Day will get under way.
Music, dancers, pony rides, and a host of activities will take place throughout the city during the day and into the evening in the first-ever combined celebration.
While city wide garage sales are sure to attract visitors, the community center amphitheater will serve as the main staging area for a number of events. Pony rides, pig roast, Mid-Michigan Pedal Pullers contest, and the duck race will all take place there.
Two sets of inflatables - one at the amphitheater and another on the Alma College campus from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. - will offer fun for the kids, said Jeff Naessens, one of the event’s organizers.
Alma College is also hosting its own community day and visitors are invited to tour the campus.
Hunter, Santana lead Angels over Tigers 7-1 DETROIT (AP) _ Torii Hunter homered to back Ervin Santana, and the Los Angeles Angels beat the Detroit Tigers 7-1 Thursday to cut their magic number to six for clinching their fourth AL West title in five seasons.
Santana (15-5) struck out eight in 7 1-3 innings, allowing one run and six hits. He is 4-0 in seven starts since July 27.
Detroit advanced just two runners past first base before Curtis Granderson's homer in the eighth.Mark Teixiera and Juan Rivera each drove in a pair of runs for the Angels, who broke open the game with a four-run third inning off Kenny Rogers (9-13).
A little bit of sunshine - maybe
A few breaks in the clouds could show up this afternoon, forecasters say, with dry weather anticipated tonight.
Isolated to scattered showers are expected this weekend as several upper-level disturbances over the northern Plains move east.
CHECK THE RADAR
UPDATE: 3