Park city council grapples with
art, expression and pavement
Grievances and shows of support dominated yesterday’s Grosse Pointe Park City Council meeting.
City officials completed the actions on the agenda within 15 minutes. Most of the remainder of the meeting’s hour that was open to the public consisted of a discussion on freedom of expression and road classification.
A crowd of around a dozen showed up in support of Laurent and Erica Chappuis, who were fighting what they called persecution from the city.
Erica, a painter, displayed some of her works on the outside of her Beaconsfield home five years ago to liven the atmosphere. She said she received positive feedback from her neighbors, but also a ticket for erecting signs without a permit.
The Chappuis family fought the ticket and was defeated by the city court. However, when they appealed at Wayne County Circuit Court, that judge dismissed the case because the ordinance filed to them was vague.
The city has now taken the case to the Michigan Court of Appeals, but Erica, Laurent and several of their supporters arrived at the meeting to encourage the city to reach an agreement with them out of court.
“So you’re going to come back here five years from now and have to rewrite the sign ordinance,” Erica said. “Why go through all that when we can do that now?”
Dennis Levasseur, the city attorney, said he would be more than happy to discuss this with their council.
When the painter’s supporters began saying the right to freedom of expression was being infringed upon, Councilman Gregory Theokas expressed his worries that displays like those outside the Chappuis home could be used to display graphic images.
“As a community, we have a right to set the standard against overly graphic representations,” he said. “It should not trample on free expression … but I think the majority of us would agree with this.”
Theokas later said he agreed that the Chappuis matter should be settled outside of court.
Later, Park resident Tim Prophit encouraged city council to take action against the changes that came as a result of Cadieux Road being reclassified as a minor arterial roadway.
When Cadieux was being repaved, Prophit learned it had been designated as a road on which over 9,000 vehicles travel each day. As a result, the right to park on the street was taken away and a large yellow line was painted on the road.
Prophit, who has lived on Cadieux for 17 years, told the council that 9,000 cars have never traveled on that road any day that he lived there.
He asked the council to use the city’s traffic-counting equipment so Cadieux can return to its old classification. The council told him they would use the equipment.
“It’s nice to see a little progress, but it’s one thing to say we’ll act on it,” Prophit said. “The road is no wider; it’s no narrower than it was before. We just want the status quo returned.”
Before the council listened to the resident’s complaints, Mayor Palmer Heenan proposed a resolution to honor the 50th anniversary of the Goodfellow Game between St. Ambrose and Cooley high schools. The motion passed unanimously.
Also passed unanimously was a motion that the city’s expenses over $5,000 be approved.
Other concerns from the audience included a request to restore skateboarding rights and to help fund renovations to Harry’s of Grosse Pointe.
After the public’s issues were addressed, the council met in a closed-door session to discuss litigation.
