Saline Election Preview: Meet Saline City Council Candidate Miri Weidner

Six candidates are running for three open seats on Saline City Council in November.  One of the candidates is Miri Weidner, who answered our questions.

Miri Weidner

Bio

My name is Miri Weidner. I am happily married to my wife Cass and live in Saline along with the majority of my immediate family. We have two rescued Shih Tzus, Frodo and Flower and a rescued cat named Addie. As of this past May, I have been in analytical-oriented jobs for nine years and I am currently a Royalties Analyst.

What is motivating your run for council?

My love for the city of Saline is a driving force for my run for City Council. I have been lucky enough to be able to volunteer around town at events such as Celtic Festival and have collaborated with many citizen-run organizations over the10 years I've lived in Saline. I've also volunteered at county wide events annually, such as the Humane Society of Huron Valley's Walk and Wag and Washtenaw County Conservation District's Native Plant Expo. I am currently on the Parks Commission for Saline - you may see me putting up Green Thumb Award signs around town. When Saline thrives, we all thrive - and I want to help achieve that goal however I can.

Tell us about one issue that has got your attention.

Currently, there are a few issues in Saline that have caught my attention: the slow moving progress of projects at the water treatment plant, helping new businesses settle successfully in Saline, making sure incoming housing and building projects fit into the area they are being constructed, as well as regulating traffic and sidewalk accessibility in those newly constructed areas to ensure safety for all residents. One problem in particular has been procuring raw data while analyzing solutions for Saline's issues. For instance, the Saline dam rehabilitation or removal project has been a hot topic in our community. The study for this particular project primarily focused on ballpark numbers for costs and hypothetical availability of grants instead of evaluation of current market costs and current status of grant availability. With an ever changing economic environment, ballpark figures that are not backed up by concrete examples do not deliver sufficient insight into projects and put us at risk for overspending on projects at a time we cannot afford to do so. With current marketplace costs, rehabilitation of a dam in fair condition in preparation for the next 30 years would be more cost effective than removal - something that would create many unknown costs to reshape Mill Pond Park and put that park in a rehabilitation limbo for upward of two years or more. This rehabilitation limbo would also be an unknown cost for the city, as this park is a frequent spot for festivals and tourism. Having it unusable for any duration of time could cost the city money and impair accessibility for citizens. We need thorough reports to evaluate our issues, not ones containing ballpark data or hypothetically available solutions. We also need to factor in all possibilities for each project before we determine what is the right course of action for Saline residents.

Why should voters choose you?

I fully believe we need to communicate with the Saline community more effectively in every project we take on whether it's a new build or renovating areas of our city. Every building built, every road that is altered or updated, every crossing we put in - even maintaining our parks, these are all projects that affect each resident, regardless of where they live in the city. We should have the possibility of city-wide notifications for projects, instead of area specific notifications. Entire residential areas are unaware of changes to parks they frequent or entryways to their neighborhoods because they are missed in our current notification system. I believe we can make Saline a place where new changes to the city are better accepted with broader communication and we can make changes that enrich everyone's lives. I believe voters should vote for me to be part of the City Council because I want to make sure to listen to and represent the entire community so everyone will be heard.

The Saline Post hopes to schedule an interview with Miri Weidner in the near future.

More News from Saline

• Saline Election Preview: Meet Saline City Council Candidate Matthew Aungst Matthew Aungst is running for Saline City Council.
• Saline Election Preview: Meet Saline City Council Candidate Tramane Halsch Tramane Halsch is running for Saline City Council.