News Photo by Mike Gonzalez Members of the Alpena Municipal Council get prepared on Monday for the meeting in City Hall. Members were handed pinwheels in honor of Child Abuse Prevention Month.

ALPENA — The Alpena Wildlife Sanctuary Board, a group overseeing and maintaining Island Park, stated in an annual report for the Alpena Municipal Council meeting on Monday that bids to build a pavilion and restroom facility could begin this month.

The report says that bidding started in March, but Wildlife Sanctuary Board Chair Lisa Kruse, said that it should start this month.

The pavilion and restrooms are expected to cost about $300,000 and the Thunder Bay River Center Committee has raised about $400,000.

This is the first phase of two, as the Sanctuary Board also plans to build the Thunder Bay River Center, a location meant to be a learning center, exhibit, and wildlife research center expected to cost about $2.8 million.

For 2024, Kruse told the council that the Sanctuary Board aims to complete the rewriting of the Island Park Management Plan, as the current management plan is exclusive to Island Park and not the 443 acres within the sanctuary.

“The Wildlife Sanctuary includes hundreds of acres plus the island,” Kruse said. “The management plan is really aiming to be all-encompassing for the entire sanctuary and Island Park. We’re working on the outline and we’re hopefully going to have that drafted out in a couple of months, but we’ll see how it goes.”

By the end of the report, Kruse asked the council for $7,600 for the board’s annual budget, which includes monetary support for repairs, vegetation removal, invasive and native species management, and more. The Alpena Municipal Council unanimously approved a motion to grant the budget.

Kruse said that some funds in the budget will go towards wood chips because, previously, the Sanctuary Board received free wood chips from DPI.

“We used to receive free wood chips from DPI, but that’s no longer an option, so we’ll be requesting funds for maintenance in the future”, Kruse said to the board. “There is a wood chip pile set aside but we didn’t necessarily want to dip into that pile since the Island Park does require a large amount of wood chips to upkeep the trails and prevent soil erosion. So we wanted to make sure we had a designated fund for the chips.”

The report also displayed the Sanctuary Board’s accomplishments from 2023, such as installing a birdhouse in a poplar grove area, putting wood chips on several Island Park trails, and more.

The project has been in the works for nearly a decade and aims to educate visitors on how to preserve, protect, and interpret the Thunder Bay River Watershed.

IN OTHER BUSINESS

The Alpena Municipal Council on Monday also:

* passed a motion to approve the consent agenda, which includes the council reappointment of Steve Wilson to the Harbor Advisory Committee for a three-year term ending on April 1, 2027, a council reappointment of Julie Krajniak to the Retirement Board for a two-year term ending on April 1, 2026, and the mayoral appointment of Matt Waligora to the Authority for Brownfield Redevelopment for a three-year term ending on April 1, 2027.

* Mayor Cindy Johnson officially acknowledged this month as Child Abuse Prevention Month.

* Approved a motion for Mayor Johnson to sign a 5-year service agreement with Stryker, a medical device and equipment manufacturing company, for the preventive annual maintenance of cardiac monitors and power cot lift systems for $30,999.23 per year.

*Approved a motion to give the Northeast Michigan Materials Management Authority funding for the annual Countywide Clean Up Day and Electronics Day.

*Went into a closed session to discuss an update on sewer and water litigation. No motion was made.