State of the City

Good evening. It is my privilege to welcome you to

Tonight’s Show - the Rochester Hills State of the

City Address.

Look at this crowd! Wow. Hot Crowd. Very Hot

Crowd tonight. Well Ladies and gentleman we have

a great show for you this evening and we are so glad

you have chosen to join us here in Theater 9 tonight

in the heart of RH!!. Are you guys ready to have a

good time tonight?

I think this is probably the first SOTC anywhere

with a live band! Thank you guys….Darell is the

man over there…you guys ready to have some fun

tonight. Give it up for one of Metro Detroit’s hottest

bands “Hotsauce” ladies and gentleman!

Mayor’s Monolague

Ladies and gentleman we have a great show for you

tonight. She’s a graduate from the University of

Carrolton in Toronto with a Degree in Law. She a

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mother, wife, and CEO who just opened her second

business in RH this year. If you want Timbits in this

town, you have to go through her Ladies and

gentlemen RH Tim Horton’s franchise owner Anita

Saini (san-eye) is on the program tonight!

He was elected last fall to serve in the United States

Senate. He has served as a US Congressman, lottery

commissioner and most importantly…..as a city

councilman in the City of Rochester Hills. Senator

Gary Peters is on the show tonight.

Now we are absolutely thrilled to have on the stage

tonight and performing for you, a former Rochester

Community Schools student and resident and the

current 2014 WDIV Super Singer Champion and

recording artist, Kenny Nelson as our musical guest

tonight.

We also have some special guest appearances by

TruTV’s Les and Seth Gold and many other

surprises along the way so get ready for an amazing

night.

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You picked a great night as we have an absolutely

hot show for you. Ladies and gentleman….give it up

for Hotsauce! (return to desk)

Well to put on a great show like this you need a

great team and let me tell you we couldn’t do it

without some fantastic partners. You know it’s

already Wednesday…and on Wednesday I like to

catch up on my mail, return some emails and write

out some Thank You notes.

Since I’m a little bit behind this week, I hope it’s all

right, but I went ahead and wrote out some of my

Thank You notes in a little segment we call, well, we

call it “Thank you Notes”. Take a look.

Now there are certainly some other folks that need

to be mentioned tonight and a thank you note just

won’t due.

I am so very blessed to be joined by many members

of my amazing family tonight including the city’s

most incredible grandparents, Duane and Darlene

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Justin who just recently celebrated their 62 wedding

anniversary (Grab pic from FB). Love you guys.

My sister Andrea and brothers (Chris and Matthew)

are my closest friends and I love you guys dearly.

Lately we have been hitting the trivia circuit and I

don’t want to brag….but “The Barnett Bunch”

finally broke through in dramatic come from behind

fashion and won our first trivia contest and with it

split the $25 gift card three ways. I am grateful for

my siblings love and support.

I am also very blessed to have the incredible support

of my mom who encourages, critiques, prays for and

loves me endlessly. And the awesome support of my

step dad and in-laws are all so very important in my

life.

However, there are three people I adore most--who

have been a part of every day of the last 9 incredible

years I have been blessed to be your Mayor. My

beautiful wife Corrin, and our two sons, 5th grader

Kenneth and 4th grader Tristan. These three are the

reason I love getting up every morning. We have

had many amazing adventures as a family and I am

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so blessed to come home to these crazy smiles every

night. I have to share a recent story that sums up the

fun we have. Tristan’s elementary class came

through on the 4th grade tour of city hall last month.

He told me the night before that it would be fun to

wear matching shirts so we started the tour like

this….and then ripped off our shirts and spent the

rest of the time answering questions about what

being a Mayor and what being the Mayor’s son is

really all about wearing matching Captain America

shirts of course! It was one of my favorite moments

as Mayor. I would like Corrin and my boys to

please stand and be recognized. Love you guys.

I also want to thank a team of people that deserve an

enormous amount of credit for the tremendous news

you will be hearing tonight. And that is our

leadership team. My 11 Department Directors and

immediate office team form the core of our

administration and have been so wonderfully

innovative, creative, and focused on serving our

residents. I’d like to ask my directors and Mayor’s

office team to please stand and be recognized.

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Friends, we have a great community and you’re

going to hear a lot about that this evening. You

know, when you have a well-run community, you

can usually trace that back to innovative and

engaged leadership and our region has just that!

I would like to recognize the elected leaders here

tonight and have them stand. Please hold your

applause till all have been recognized.

RECOGNIZE ELECTED OFFICIALS

Tonight I want to specifically recognize my

colleagues on the Rochester Hills City Council.

They are a dedicated team of intelligent and selfless

volunteers who desire the very best for our city.

They are so integral to our success that they each

deserve an award. You remember back in high

school when they used to give out those “most likely

to succeed” and “class clown” awards? Well we are

going to hand out some award this evening in a little

segment we call

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“Tonight Show Superlatives”

Friends, Rochester Hills is absolutely on a roll! In

fact, I think you would be hard pressed to find a

time in our history where we have enjoyed such

across the board success, and we have been around

for some time. In fact, our roots go .

All the way back to March 17, 1817 to be exact.

When James Graham first settled in Avon

Township. 198 years ago almost to the day.

Brooks…you remember. Times were different…or

were they. Sure there was less traffic and not as

many Walgreen’s or Starbuck’s…..but families still

gathered to share a meal and talk about the day’s

activities. Parents worked hard to provide

opportunities for their children. Our community

continues to celebrate education and freedom, and

has always loved the outdoors. In many respects

those key founding attributes are still visible in

today’s Rochester Hills.

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And over the past 198 years, more and more

families, businesses, friends and visitors have come

to know and love what our community is all about.

While not always stated as such, it is clear that our

community’s long standing guiding principle has

been to be the preeminent place to live, work and

raise your family, and for decades the leaders of this

community have carefully charted our course.

From sending every eligible young man to fight in

World War 1 as our little Stoney Creek Village did

in 1918 to the tinkering the Dodge Brothers did over

at Meadowbrook a few years later, to the cutting

edge robots FANUC creates on Hamlin Road today,

our city has grown and changed with the times.

From those humble beginnings, Rochester Hills is

now the 15th largest city in the state of Michigan.

And tonight, our show is going to celebrate our

leadership and innovation and the many people both

responsible for and impacted by our cities success.

We have a great show tonight and we are just

getting started. Local Business woman and CEO

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Anita Sanai is here…..Senator Gary Peters is on the

show. Musical guest Kenny Nelson is in the

house…….Hotsauce is here…and we will be right

back after these messages.

And we are back. We are here tonight in Rochester

Hills for a very special evening in a very special city.

We left just before the break talking about the

incredible growth here in Rochester Hills and a

deeper dive into the numbers certainly bear out that

something really special is going on here

Now traditionally, I always tend to lead with these

housing statistics because they are, in my opinion,

some of the most important we have. These are

really the building blocks for any community. New

families putting kids in our schools, helping support

our nonprofits and demanding new services from

our retailers and businesses.

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Each year, hundreds of new home buyers make the

pilgrimage to city hall and to my office to pick up a

welcome packet. We decided to ask one of these new

residents, who actually just purchased their first

home in RH, to tell us why they chose our city and

what their first impression has been. Please allow

me to introduce you to….. the McKean Family

(Interview with first time homeowner in RH)

A new family and some cool new accents. A double

bonus! Well, Pete and his family were joined by

many other new residents as last year we had our

highest total of building permits since 2007and

among those new permits, were nearly 90 for new

houses

And those new homes they moved into….well those

new homes averaged a construction cost of nearly

$490,000 meaning they sold for closer to $600,000,

representing a significant investment in our

community and lots of new neighborhoods that I

just simply can’t afford!

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The housing market in general has come roaring

back. Realtors are reporting bidding wars for

Rochester Hills homes with many buyers paying

more than the asking price. Property values

increased on average over 11% this year with some

neighborhoods up as much as 25%! The market in

our city is as hot as Greg Kampe on a losing streak!

In fact, the Oakland Press reported that Rochester

Hills led all of our neighbors in home value increases

in 2014 and NerdWallet.com recently reported that

we were in the top 50 in the nation in terms of home

value increases! Top 50 in the nation!

Congratulations are also in order to our friends in

Rochester who were in the top 20 in that same

category..well done. Now, while I don’t want to

spend much time on any of the communities that we

beat….. I will share that one of them again…..was

Orion Township.

Total building permits were up 10% and building

department revenue up nearly 30%. We currently

have nearly 700 additional lots, site condos and

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apartments scheduled for 2015 as well as over

500,000 square feet of new development under

construction with the new Holiday Inn Express,

three senior living facilities and several retail centers

taking shape as we speak. We are on a roll!

In total, the new construction value added to our

community last year was $128 million up a total of

$52 million or 68% from 2013! That’s right….a

68% increase in investment!

New homes, increased sales, higher values…yes, in

Rochester Hills, when we talk about housing we

truly have many reasons to be toot our own horn!

That optimism, in the past however, has been

dampened by the foreclosure epidemic in America

And it certainly touched Rochester Hills. But our

economic recovery has reversed that trend and

dramatically improved our foreclosure numbers

from 352 in 2010 to just 49 in 2014. A decrease of

nearly 86% over the past 4 years. Simply an

amazing recovery!

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Perhaps the item however, that is most to credit for

our continued status as a desirable community to

live in, is the number of high quality, high paying

jobs available to our residents.

As most of you know, this mission is very personal

and passionate for me. I believe most community

issues can be solved by a good paying job.

And because of that, we spend an incredible amount

of time working to attract and retain, the good high

paying, technology based jobs of the future.

I am proud to report tonight that this focused

approach and strategy continues to pay dividends

for our residents. In 2014, 9 brand new, high tech

companies were welcomed into Rochester Hills and

with them over 250 new jobs and over $25 million in

new investment.

AdduXi, a French based company that provides

high end plastic injection molded components to the

automotive industry. They choose Rochester Hills

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for their first ever US location and have began

hiring 25 highly skilled employees immediately.

INZI is another international company which chose

Rochester Hills for their first US location. INZI is a

South Korean based company that manufactures

thermostat housing assembly units. They grabbed a

building on Technology Drive and anticipate

creating 70 jobs over the next 24 months.

These are just a couple quick examples of the global

impact we are experiencing and the innovations

flourishing in Rochester Hills.

So why are people so interested in starting a business

here in RH? Ladies and gentleman, my first guest

tonight is ANITA SAINI (SAN-EYE) the owner and

CEO of the cities two new Tim Horton’s restaurants.

Anita loves to cook, read mystery novels, and get

guests through her drive thru in under 60 seconds.

After waiting several years for the right location,

Anita and her husband Ravinder chose RH and then,

just a year later…chose RH again for their second

location. She comes from a family of entrepreneurs

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and is a busy lady but we are going out to visit her

right now at her newest location on Crooks road.

Anita…can you hear me….Good evening and thanks

for joining us.

With a community of nearly 75,000 residents, we

must have a wide variety of jobs for our diverse

workforce. By partnering with the Chamber of

Commerce, we’ve welcomed many other new

businesses to our community this year as well. Take

a look at this short video welcoming a few of our

newest partners…(Ribbon Cutting Video)

Thank you to all of the new members of our

business family for investing here and making last

year such a resounding success. Let’s give them a

round of applause.

Last year we were again awarded by the University

of Michigan the ECities Entrepreneurial award

scoring 5 out of 5 stars…the highest ranking of the

83 communities participating. This award aptly

recognizes the way in which we foster an

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environment where entrepreneurs can flourish as

Michael Symon Anita Saini (San-eye) noted.

We will, and must, continue to be aggressive and

innovative in our engagement of business leaders

and companies as competition abounds.

With that in mind, Last year we introduced a new

partnership between the City of Rochester Hills and

Google to help support our local businesses called

“Rochester Hills Get Your Business

Online”. This unique arrangement allowed RH

businesses to get a free website, domain name, web

hosting and access to educational resources

absolutely free.

This past year I was proud to introduce our latest

effort to help our business community while helping

our areas top students as well. The “Mayors Talent

Initiative” was launched and it’s the epitome of a

community win-win.

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Here’s how it works…..by now you are familiar with

the Mayor’s Business Council. A group I formed

just months after becoming Mayor. This self-funded

organization of our cities top CEO’s meets to

provide the city with business insight and feedback.

They also have formed great partnerships and now

help us recruit their suppliers and customers to our

region in a unique way benefiting both the city and

our business community.

As we meet, we often ask how we can assist our job

creators in growing their business. Lately, their

challenge has been finding and attracting top talent.

Well, enter a little bit of innovation and some great

work by the Planning and Economic Development

team and the Mayors Talent Initiative was born.

We work with Oakland University and Rochester

College and asked them to send us their best and

brightest students. We give these couple of students

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a few minutes at the beginning of each MBC

meeting to pitch themselves and their skills. The

companies can then offer them full time jobs,

internships or anything in between. It was a

beautiful success almost immediately as the first

student to participate from Rochester College,

Maria was hired by Sanyo Machine, just a few

addresses down on Avon Road, right after our first

meeting.

We found, as a city, a valuable role….to connect top

talent with our businesses searching for it. Saves

them time and money and keeps your kids and

grandkids in our community. That, my friends, is

an innovative win-win!

You see our motto is simple…we don’t want to be in

your business…we shouldn’t be, but if there is a way

we can support you and help it grow, that’s a role

we can and will play.

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The bottom line is simple and our strategy is

working. We are bringing companies, creating jobs,

and our residents are benefiting.

Ladies and gentleman, since the start of my

administration, we have welcomed over 87 new high

tech companies, created and retained over 9,400

high tech jobs and nearly 210 million in new

investments.

In our technology parks, where 11,000 people go to

work each morning. Our vacancy rates are just

5.3%...the lowest in a decade.

And our unemployment rate, well that’s another

point of tremendous pride. In fact, I would like a

little help with this if you don’t mind. We want to

engage the studio audience in the first ever

interactive State of the City.

Grab those keypads you have and take a look on the

screen. I want you to guess what number you think

represents the city of Rochester Hills’ current

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unemployment rate. On the screen you will see a

series of numbers representing different areas

unemployment rates. If you think the city of RH

unemployment rate is 5.6%...Press 1. 6.6% Press 2.

3.2% Press 3 and so on You have 10 seconds to

make your selection . GO!

And (Drum roll please) …….there is the audiences

guess. And here is the answer along with the rates

for the other numbers

o Michigan- 5.6%

o US- 6.1%

o Oakland County- 5.5%

o Athens, Greece -25.8%

o Rochester Hills- 3.2%

Most economists consider anything less than 5% full

employment. Ours, ladies and gentlemen, stands at

just 3.2%, the lowest in Rochester Hills since 2008,

the lowest in Oakland County and the 2nd lowest in

the entire state of Michigan. (Applause)

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Thanks for your help and your obvious confidence

in the unemployment numbers. Friends, I will

never, ever, ever get tired of repeating a statistic like

that…ever!

And speaking of Michigan…my next guest is quite a

subject matter expert on the topic. He has held

many elected positions representing the people of

our state. Currently he is Michigan’s junior

Senator but what everybody should really care

about….he got his start as a city councilmember for

the city of Rochester Hills. I am very pleased to be

joined tonight by Senator Gary Peters. Senator

welcome to the program.

Senator Peters interview.

So the numbers are overwhelming and undeniable.

Residents & businesses are flocking to Rochester

Hills and we think we know why.

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For many, we know it’s a combination of access to a

talented and educated workforce, a business friendly

environment, and our world famous low tax rate

among cities in Oakland County.

Of course, our educated workforce is an exceptional

advantage on many fronts. With nearly 50% of our

population holding Bachelor’s degrees and nearly a

quarter with Master’s Degrees, our residents are

tech savvy and prepared for the knowledge based

jobs we are attracting.

And with two outstanding institutions of higher

learning like Oakland University and Rochester

College, we are perfectly positioned to remain the

educational epicenter of our region.

Take for instance, Oakland University, my alma

mater, and the 2ndlargest employer in our City. Now

with over 20,000 students, over 100,000 alumni, and

260 degree and certificate programs,

O.U has quickly become a national player…with a

little itty bitty piece of their parking lot in Auburn

Hills!

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The OU William Beaumont School of Medicine is

now in its 4th year and boasts 225 of the nation’s

brightest minds. These students were selected from

thousands of world wide applications. And, just last

month the school was granted full five year

accreditation by the Liaison Committee on Medical

Education a tremendous accomplishment. Once

fully integrated, the Medical School is projected to

have a billion dollar impact on our local & regional

economy and is single handedly reversing the brain

drain in our region.

Last year the campus welcomed new President Dr.

George Hynd and Dr. Hynd has hit the ground

running. Under his leadership the campus

continues to grow and reach into the community to

strengthen its ties with Rochester Hills and to

increase the way in which our two organizations

support each other.

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In his spare time he mostly cuts ribbons as he did

last year on the new engineering building, new

parking deck, new on campus housing, and my

favorite, the new bell tower!

Dr. Hynd is my guest here tonight and I would like

to ask him to please stand and be recognized.

(applause)

And just down the road, Rochester College

continues to grow as well. They also have

experienced record breaking enrollment as new

incoming students have increased by 68% over the

last 6 years.

My friend Dr. Tyson has been wonderfully engaged

and supportive in growing the ties between the

college and the City since his arrival. As you know

he loves telling people he is from Texas which leads

us to a little part of our show where we weigh the

good with the bad in a segment called Pros and Cons.

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● Pros: In Michigan we have Fort Michilimackinac

(Mich-la-Mackinaw) with beautiful view of the

Mackinaw Straits.

Cons: In Texas you have the Alamo with a beautiful

view of Fast Eddies bar.

Pros: If Michiganders want to cross the

international border they need only $3.50.

Cons: If Texans want to cross the international

border they need a firearm, a prevailing wind from

the North and swim goggles.

Pro: Michigan has given us Henry Ford, Thomas

Edison and Charles Lindbergh.

Con: While Texas has given us Bonnie and Clyde

and Anna Nichole Smith

Con: In an older more obscure law, in Texas it’s

illegal to have “unusual haircuts:

Pro: In Michigan your Haircut Dr. Tyson is totally

acceptable. 25

Ladies and gentleman…Pros and Cons

Recognize Dr. Tyson if he is there

In short, both OU & Rochester College play an

important role in our cities success and all 3 of our

organizations are truly thriving.

At the end of the day however, what really separates

our community from the hundreds that surround

us, are the quality of life amenities we enjoy in

Rochester Hills.

It’s the world class senior services provided by the

OPC which last year not only served 120,000 meals

but provided over 53,000 rides for people in our

community.

It’s the fantastic Rochester Hills Public Library.

Now last year I gave the library a bit of a hard time

by showing the process for one to return a book with

the old drop off window…you might remember this

video footage. (SHOW LAST YEARS VIDEO)

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Well, after seeing that video my friend and Library

Director Christine Hage pledged to change it and

embarked on a $1.5 Million construction plan to

improve it…funded mostly by my families late fees.

The project does a couple other things too…but who

cares….as long as it fixes that drop off window it

will be worth it!

The OPC and Library are two great examples, but

we know there are literally hundreds of

organizations and groups that contribute to

improving the daily lives of our residents, like the

Rochester Area Neighborhood House, Blessings in a

Backpack and our incredible CERT Team. We truly

are grateful for their impact in Rochester Hills.

Let’s give all of our non-profits a round of

applause.

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And let’s not forget our top ranked school systems.

We are blessed to have such outstanding districts

that not only prioritize our community’s greatest

assets…our children, but also are consistently

ranked as some of the best in the state.

Ladies and Gentlemen, a great city has great schools

and over the years, we have stood beside our schools

to support them when they have needed it most.

Last Fall, Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, who

incidentally won a write in campaign for Mayor,

(pause) he and I participated in a joint SEMCOG

press conference about the importance of our public

schools. Take a look.

(VIDEO CLIP)

Ladies and Gentlemen, without solid high

functioning school districts nearly everything else

I’m mentioning tonight really doesn’t matter. I

want to thank the hardworking teachers, students,

(PICS) superintendents, School boards and all of the

support staffs who make learning in RH such a

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bedrock principal. Let’s give them a round of

applause.

Which leads me to tonight’s musical guest. We are

so excited to have a local guy who grew up in the

community and attended the Rochester Community

Schools here to perform with us tonight. Kenny

Nelson is a rising star in the Metro Detroit music

scene. He rocketed to local prominence after

winning the WDIV Fireworks Sing Off last year.

He’s opened for Jordan Knight and the Beach Boys

and has worked as a session singer for the popular

Fox show “Glee” His latest project drops this

summer and he’s here tonight performing an

original song called “Heartbeat” Please join me in

welcoming Kenny Nelson! (HIT STOP ON

PROMPTER)

Bryan joins him on stage with CD and thanks

Kenny for performing…and we will be right back.

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So, at my last State of the City Address, I promised

that 2014 would be a year of investment in our parks

and introduced the idea of the community garden,

the reuse of the 1827 Calf Barn, and the exciting

announcement of the development of Riverbend

Park. Ladies and gentleman…promises made…

promises kept!

The community garden has been a huge hit and this

year we are hoping to add a second location to try

and address the waiting list of residents for the first

garden. Take a look at some of these awesome

statistics. 50% ate more vegetables. 40% donated

all, or a portion, of their produce to the food pantry

and look at some of these comments from our

gardeners. This project has been a major success!

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The Calf Barn, Michigan’s 2014 Barn of the Year by

the way, is nearing the completion of its final phase

completely funded by donations provided by our

generous community. The Calf Barn will now be

available year round and is already completely

booked for this year and well into next. Another

major success!

And Riverbend Park. . This is truly a wonderful

story and my personal passion at the moment. Most

of you know we reached out to our friends at

Lawrence Tech University’s Graduate Land Use

Planning class who spent the semester researching,

dreaming and exploring the park. They put those

dreams on

paper and submitted them to the city along with

sketches, charrettes and models. Those models were

placed around city hall for the exact purpose of

igniting a passion and vision for implementation.

And that’s exactly what has happened.

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A very generous donor was moved by the ideas and

pledged a $1 million dollar donation to get things

going.

We then received word that this project was selected

as one of 8 nationally to be submitted to the Mayors

Institute of City Design late last year. I was asked to

pitch the park to some of the nation’s foremost

authorities on landscape architecture, park

development and environmental stewardship. They

picked, prodded and eventually provided some great

guidance to me and the city on how to move

forward.

Currently, we are engaging a professional group to

assist and, in the very near future, will enlist key

community leaders to help move the project forward

and develop a truly lasting legacy for the residents

to enjoy.

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Ladies and gentlemen, in 2014 we delivered on each

of those new projects. Promises made. Promises

kept.

Overall, we know our parks system is beloved,

dynamic, diverse and highly valued. And last year,

for the 6th year in a row, we topped 1 million visitor

days in our parks! Congratulations to Mike

Hartner and our entire Parks team for a job well

done!

Parks are important to our residents, so they are a

priority for us. But the parks weren’t the only

department to see major investment last year. The

city made a considerable contribution to improving

our infrastructure as well.

Remember that Salt Storage facility we built 18

months ago. With the worst winter in history last

year and some pretty big snowfalls this year, the

investment in that facility has already paid off.

Additionally, the Department of Public Services

applied for and received a grant to study snow plow

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optimization. It’s a bit nerdy but essentially, was

provided so that we can use GPS technology to

absolutely assure we are maximizing every second

we are on the road during storm events. Every

second!

For example, we are learning that less left hand

turns are good for efficiency and, conversely, that

Taco Bell runs are bad.

Through innovation and creative determination, we

have been able to enhance service delivery, address

environmental concerns and improve the speed in

which we clear your streets. In fact, because of these

factors and a myriad of other innovative solutions,

our DPS Fleet Team was ranked one of the Top 100,

actually #59 in the nation….out of over 38,000 by

the way! Good to know we have the best and

brightest on the cities front lines!

Additionally, knowing that the #1 issue residents

rated as a “serious concern” was the condition of

our residential road network; the city council and

administration have prioritized road funding and 34

increased the amount we spend on your roads to the

highest amount in 15 years! You told us what was

important and the elected leaders of this community

have listened.

Ladies and gentlemen, this coming summer we will

have more residential street repairs than any

summer since 2002. Take a look at this incredibly

extensive list of neighborhoods we will be visiting.

And it’s not all just ugly pavement this year either.

With the completion of the work on Tienken we will

be beautifying the roundabouts on Tienken at

Livernois, Sheldon and Washington. We feel it is

important to take pride in our common spaces and

want our residents to be proud as well. Here are a

few pictures of the approved construction designs

that will begin within the next couple of months.

Now, while these are some beautiful designs I do

think it’s important to show you some of the designs

that were not selected! (CRAZY PICS OF ROUNDABOUTS)

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But, perhaps just as impressive as the amount of

work we have done, has been the way we have been

able to leverage the limited resources we have

allocated. The city has been tremendously proactive

and resourceful when it comes to stretching your tax

dollars.

Over the last 8 years, we have invested nearly

$150M on our roads and bridges. Of the $150M

total, only $17M (or 12%) was directly from our city

coffers. The rest leveraged through our partners,

governmental agencies and grants. Truly a record to

be proud of.

And our proactive approach was perhaps most

evident in the recent signing of the NOCWA or

North Oakland County Water Authority agreement

with our neighbors in Pontiac, Orion Township and

Auburn Hills. Our city took the lead in these

negotiations to put together one of the most

collaborative and innovative solutions to one of the

most complex problems in our region…the high cost

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of water. Rather than complain, we put together a

plan that utilized our partner’s greatest strengths to

arrange a deal that saves our residents money.

How much? Well, many times in government you

evaluate a project based on its ROI…or return on

investment. In this case, the savings for our

residents resulted in a ROI of about…not 8 years…

not 8 months…but8 hours! 8 hours! We are going

to save our ratepayers over ¾ of a million dollars

annually. Innovation…with a purpose. Delivering

results for our residents and allowing you to keep

more of your hard earned dollars. That’s good

government and I want to thank Allan Schneck, our

DPS director and one of the key architects of the

agreement for his leadership.

Improvements in our roads, parks and facilities are

all designed to improve our efficiencies and

ultimately, improve your experience living in our

city. We exist to serve our residents and proper

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planning for our infrastructure is a cornerstone

principle of this administration and council.

You know, throughout my administration I have

been extremely proud of the importance we have put

forth in being responsible stewards of our

environment We ask our residents what they love

about living here and…the number one reason they

cited; the environmental characteristics of our city!

So as the Mayor, I have taken this as an absolute

challenge to our leadership team and am extremely

proud of the results we have delivered.

From introducing our 25 and 2 campaign. A

challenge we met to reduce energy consumption at

city hall by 25 % over two years.

To the grant we applied for which allowed us to

exchange older model light bulbs with newer high

efficiency bulbs in our two manufactured home

communities!

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To our efforts over the last few years to make the

purchase of Green Space an absolute priority.

Those efforts were rewarded with the acquisition of

the Dr. White property adjacent to Riverbend Park,

and the crown jewel of parcels just a few months

ago. We have now protected over 110 acres of land

in Rochester Hills….forever…an amazing legacy for

our children and grandchildren.

And speaking of legacy, there is probably one major

project that defines it as much as any in my time as

mayor. Our innovative trash program.

In 2009, we used the collective power of the city to

negotiate lower rates for nearly 95% of our

residents. And the innovation….that came by

adding those chips to your bins and partnering with

Recyclebank to incentivize recycling.

We were the 1st in Michigan. The 1st between New

Jersey and New Mexico as a matter of fact. The

Council and I took a significant risk at the time and

some thought the move was foolish. Well, 6 years

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later…the results are outstanding. In fact, this news

is so good…frankly…(speak slowly) it deserves to be

slow jammed!

(Slow Jam the News)

Now back to those rewards for just a minute.

Tonight we need your help.

This year four Rochester Community Schools have

been chosen for the Green Schools Program. Since

this programs inception, almost $15,000 has been

donated back to Rochester Hills schools to help

reinforce the environmental message to our next

generation.

Selection in the Green Schools Program means

participants from around the country can donate

recycling points to chosen schools for their

respective Green initiates. As I mentioned, four

RSC were selected. One of those schools, Reuther

has already met their goal. But the other

elementary are still working hard to achieve it.

They are Meadow Brook, University Hills and North

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Hill. Here is where we need your help. Grab those

pads again because you are going to help us choose

which program will receive a major boost by

receiving all of the cities 16,000 points to help reach

their goal. So here are the programs.

Meadow Brook Elementary-Outdoor Learning

Space. The school will convert a courtyard into a

learning space consisting of native vegetation, bird

houses and stepping stones where students will

receive lessons in the area of ecology, biology and

earth science.

University Hills- Outdoor Classroom Project which

will provide hands on opportunities through the

creation of an outdoor learning lab. Students will

create native gardens, develop wildlife habitats to

better appreciate the empowering sense of

stewardship that comes from engaging the natural

world

North Hill- Enhancements to Michigan Peace

Garden project. This project will include adding

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birdhouses, birdbaths, native plant material and

signage to improve the teaching environment

around native ecology and earth science topics

For Meadowbrook Press 1!

For University Hills Press 2!

For North Hill Press 3!

You now have 10 seconds to vote. (DRUMROLL

PLEASE)! And the winner is………

Congratulations to (Insert Name)!!

Anyone can donate to any school and the deadline is

Monday, March 16th. Let’s help all of our schools get

across the line!

Friends, I am supremely proud of this program. In

fact, every time you take your trash to the end of the

street I hope you take just a moment to read the side

of your bin. We took a risk 6 years ago, but that’s

what leaders do and our reward has been profound

both economically and environmentally. Rochester

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Hills is now proudly viewed nationally for this

leadership.

Tonight I am proud to announce our latest effort in

celebrating our environmental responsibility. The

City of Rochester Hills was honored this year by

being named a Tree City for the 25thconsecutive

year. (applause) What that essentially means is the

Arbor Day Foundation recognizes that we care

about, have a plan for, and understand the

importance of trees in our city.

Tonight we are issuing a community challenge and

unveiling a new city wide campaign. In honor of the

25th anniversary of being a tree city we are asking

the community to join with us in planting 25,000

trees over the next 12 months! Sound crazy….here

is our plan.

First, the city is going to help by offering the first

250 people who want to participate in the cities tree

co-op program a free tree in both the Spring and the

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Fall. 500 free trees in total. The resident can pick

from a variety of species and the city will come out,

plant the tree and guarantee it for a year.

Here’s where we need the communities help. We

have around 26,000 residential dwelling units in the

city so we are asking each home to plant a tree.

ONE HOME: ONE TREE Together we can make

the most impactful difference in our community’s

tree canopy in history.

Anytime you look to do something historic, its

always nice to have a little inspiration. For our

inspiration, we looked no farther than our iconic

city tree. So to kick things off we will be planting

little Bebb Oaks, just like our famous city tree and

Americas largest Bebb Oak at each one of our parks

and each school in RH to help underscore the

generational importance of this initiative. This

Grand Ole Gal’s offspring will now be found all

across our town, and we would love it if you and

your family would take up our challenge as well.

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25,000 Trees!! ONE HOME:ONE TREE

RH….Let’s get Growing! And we will be right

back!

Tonight, friends, I hope you are clearly hearing

several things. Our Rochester Hills team is

exceptional and innovative. And those two words

describe the way we have handled our finances.

For years, the administration and fiscal team have

provided financial forecasts looking two to five years

into the future. But in 2010, we were the first city in

Michigan to incorporate a 3 year budget. That’s

right. The 1st city.

And, while Rochester Hills has higher than average

income and education levels, we too were blistered

by the recession losing 20% of our taxable value.

Fortunately, our collective vision and innovative

thinking helped us not only reduce our debt but also

to increase our General Fund Balance significantly

since 2010. That my friends, is where we are getting

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the money to do the most roadwork in 15 years! In

RH, you save first and then you spend.

We sit now in an enviable position ranked in the top

5% of Michigan municipalities for financial stability

and able to invest in our residents biggest areas of

interest.

And that financial stability is being recognized. As

Standard& Poor’s and Fitch’s Rating agency have

both awarded the City of Rochester Hills the coveted

municipal “Bond…AAA Bond” Rating.

Congratulations to Keith Sawdon, Pam Lee and our

entire fiscal team for their outstanding efforts!

Additionally, for the past three years, we have

produced both a Financial Summary Report and

Performance Dashboard. These documents provide

a way for citizens to easily review our finances and

simplify the budget process in a very easy to read

and understandable format promoting transparency

and accountability to our residents.

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In fact, our administration has won over 20 awards

for innovation and transparency over the last

several years. We are the Taylor Swift’s …….of

Transparency!

These accomplishments truly represent a team

effort. From outstanding information delivered by

our fiscal team to a City Council with a clear vision

and purpose, Rochester Hills is fortunate to have

some of the region’s best managing your money.

And let me talk about that team for a minute.

Through all of the successes, adventures,

innovations, challenges and awards, the thing I am

most pleased about is the absolute awesome team I

am honored to be a part of.

In years past, this is where I would go through and

mention a significant accomplishment from each

department. But I want to do something different

this year to show you another side to our team by

sharing a couple quick stories.

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In the early morning hours of Sunday September 21,

the first tornado in the city’s history struck the

North Fairview Farms neighborhood. Within

several hours over 75 city employees responded to

provide assistance. From our first responders, to

parks, building and ordinance, DPS, HR and others,

our team leapt into action to respond when our

residents needed it the most. This quick and selfless

response was recognized and appreciated by nearly

every homeowner affected by the storm as noted by

countless resident emails and letters.

In January, our city was introduced to Gage Garmo

and his heroic fight against a rare form of bone

cancer.

Upon hearing the brave story of this young man, our

employees again responded in amazing fashion and

with heartfelt concern. Members of our incredible

youth council, under the direction of our video

production team put together a tribute which

reached 30,000 views in under a week and got the

attention of Gage’s hero Eminem to pay a special

home visit. Gage’s favorite color was yellow so our

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fire department brought out our yellow ladder truck

for his fundraiser and provided a very special yellow

firefighters helmet to cheer up our hometown hero.

Our DPS team created #Garmostrong window

stickers which were displayed in our city vehicles

and handed out to students at Rochester High.

Our team rallied to support the community and the

Garmo Family in their time of need in the best ways

we knew how. Gage eventually lost his battle, but

the memory of this amazing young man has been

emblazoned in our hearts. Mr. and Mrs. Garmo and

their daughter Graci are my guests here tonight and

I want to say thank you guys for sharing your son

with our community.

Our city celebrated its 30th birthday late last year

and that celebration involved honoring our

employees and marking some of our

accomplishments

But, the most important aspect however, was not the

internal celebration, but the launching of an

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external challenge….30 days of giving. A call to

each team member to find some time in the next 30

days to give back, support, volunteer or somehow do

something for someone else. As you might imagine,

our amazing team took the challenge head on and

spent the next month supporting dozens of local

charities with 1000’s of hours of their time. From

serving food in Pontiac, packing lunches in Detroit,

driving meals on wheels in Rochester Hills or

helping to build a handicapped ramp for a

homebound senior citizen, I could not have been

more proud of our amazing team.

Again, they responded with their hearts…in

situations that aren’t scripted or part of anyone’s

official job responsibilities. They care about what

they do and the people they serve and it’s evident in

the way the react to the unique once in a lifetime

challenges, to the everyday mundane tasks of simply

answering a residents phone call. That’s who you

have serving you ladies and gentlemen…every single

day.

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Friends, it is pretty simple. We have created a

culture of excellent customer service and our

employees are delivering.

In our most recent survey, our residents validated

our employees hard work as 97% of respondents

reported feeling satisfied or very satisfied in their

experience with one of our team members! 97%!

Ladies and gentleman, none of this would be

possible without the amazing team of caring leaders

we have here and I would like to ask the employees

of the City of Rochester Hills to please stand and be

recognized.

So the main challenge for our well-oiled machine is

to keep improving. Keep innovating and keep

getting better. One consistent strategic focus for our

team is in the area of communication. In just about

any organization, communication is the key to

success.. Well, as a city, I challenged our team to

come up with better and more inclusive ways for our

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residents to engage their government and access

information. As you might expect, they did just that.

Thanks to the hard work of our Communications

Team and MIS Department, we launched Rochester

Hills Connect, the city’s first mobile app designed to

make communication as simple and easy as possible!

We became just the second city in Michigan to have

our own APP and the results have been incredible.

To date, over 4500 residents are connected to the

city via this innovative tool and are helping to report

potholes, get trail information and receive the very

latest breaking city news.

So tonight, ladies and gentleman it is my privilege to

introduce to you our newest initiative and the latest

in innovative communication tools as we partner

with MindMixer to officially launch Engage RH.

Take a look (video)

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We value connecting with our residents and have

put our money where our mouth is. As a Rochester

Hills resident you will have more ways to interact

with your city than any community in Michigan.

That’s inclusive leadership. That’s transparency

and that’s what we are known for!

We officially launch EngageRH tonight and we have

several questions already posted for our

communities input. We invite all Rochester Hills

residents to visit rochesterhills.org/engagerh to

make their voices heard.

Friends, Rochester Hills is truly on a roll. We are a

very blessed community and I feel very blessed to be

your mayor. I love this city deeply and feel so

fortunate to be a part of such an outstanding team of

public servants.

At the end of the day, with all of the growth,

changes, innovation and challenges, the final word

on our success rests with our end users. Our

residents. And their, thankfully, overwhelming

satisfaction with living in our beautiful town.

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By now you all know the numbers! 99% of our

residents are happy and satisfied with living in our

community. That’s right 99 out of 100 people are

happy with their decision to be in Rochester Hills!

The highest recorded total in our history.

Friends, I am proud to lead the most motivated and

innovative team of municipal employee’s anywhere

in Michigan. I am proud of our outstanding

accomplishments in 2014 and even more excited

about our ambitious plans in 2015.

We have had so much fun delivering this message

tonight in a unique and cool way. Our creative team

enjoys putting on a show and I think to some extent,

our audience expects it. But don’t be mistaken.

This is a powerful story with a powerful message of

leadership, innovation and promises made and

promises kept.

We have cemented our position as Southeast

Michigan’s fiscal, environmental, and innovative

leader. And have the awards to prove it. And as if

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that all wasn’t enough…….well….we went out and

picked up the mail in October. Money Magazine to

be exact. Guess what it said?

Can you believe we’ve gotten this far tonight and I

haven’t really even talked about it!! This is actually

the longest I’ve gone without mentioning it in over 3

months…I’m starting to get the shakes!

Friends..You know what it said. In fact you knew

before you read it. That our little community, out of

33,000 places to live in America, is #1 in Michigan

and # 9 in the country! Signed. Sealed. Delivered.

We are among the elite and best in the nation!

Ladies and gentlemen, the State of our City is

incredibly strong! In fact, it’s enviably the best in

Michigan and one of the top 10 in America. Thank

you for the privilege to serve as your host tonight

and as Mayor of this great town. I look forward to

keeping these good things going and leading the city

for many years to come..

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Thank you all for the role you play in helping make

Rochester Hills, well…you’ve heard me say this a

thousand times. How about a little help from our

special guests tonight…Thank you for making

Rochester Hills ….(Insert Clip)

May God bless you, our country, and may God

continue to bless our community for the next 30

years. Good Night!

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