A Detroit City Council member is pulling back on a controversial inquiry into the zoning compliance of several beloved bars and restaurants near Kercheval Avenue after the city’s building department provided proof that the establishments were in compliance.
Renata Miller, who took office in January to represent District 5, has faced increasing backlash from residents after she submitted two memos last week to the city’s Buildings, Safety Engineering and Environmental Department, as well as the council’s legal and legislative teams. Miller asked for reviews of Barkside and Two Birds, as well as multiple alcohol-serving businesses that have yet to open their doors in the area. She wanted to know if the businesses were complying with city zoning and licensing rules.
According to documents provided to Miller by BSEED and obtained by BridgeDetroit, the establishments in question — including Two Birds, Barkside, Bar IX, Grandma Bob’s and Our House Café — are all in the clear when it comes to their licenses and zoning. While some businesses had expired Certificates of Compliance from BSEED, the documents and BSEED confirmed they had begun taking necessary steps to comply with correction orders.
“This was questions to get information,” said Miller’s Chief of Staff Kai Paige, adding that the answers were being sought to talk to the business owners. “We’re not pursuing anything.”
The BSEED findings come after dozens of residents, largely from the West Village, Islandview and Charlevoix Village neighborhoods, spent the last week speaking out sharply against what many felt was an attack on small businesses. Miller has said that the request was largely driven by complaints and concerns she’s heard from residents in the area related to noise and the businesses’ distance from places like schools.
Going forward, Paige said, Miller intends to meet with the business owners named in the memos, as well as all others in the district, to ensure they have the information and resources they need to be compliant.
“The goal is to absolutely build a relationship with these businesses and hopefully to provide them with better service than what they’ve seen before,” Paige said.
Though she hasn’t heard from the councilmember directly, Bar IX founder Alissa Graff is connected with Miller’s office and said Thursday that she believes the intention to connect is genuine and is excited to move on while establishing a girls-and-women sports-focused brick-and-mortar in the neighborhood.
“We literally are on the start of our journey, so we want to do this the right way,” Graff said in an interview with BridgeDetroit. “We believe the right way is bringing people in as early as we can to say, ‘Hey, we’re going to be in this neighborhood. Please let us know how we can be a good neighbor.’”
Islandview resident Amy Hemmeter — who has been outspoken on the issue over the past week — is counting this as a win, but said she’s “not super moved” by the conclusion of the situation coming with the news that the buildings are in good standing.
Hemmeter said she and other residents felt Miller’s memos were targeted in the first place, given their scope was not districtwide and were largely tied to the businesses near the council member’s home in District 5.
“We were frustrated that this seemed a little witch-hunty,” Hemmeter said Thursday evening. “…I’m counting it as a win that people came out, showed that they will really show up for their local, small businesses and have made it quite clear that there would be ramifications to further action on this.”
Having heard from lifelong Detroiters, older folks, new residents and young families, Hemmeter said she was also pleased by the “diversity” of voices who spoke out on this issue. “I think that it kind of paints a different picture of a place where the community can get together,” she said.
Two memos and a week of community outrage
Most residents were fierce in their support of what they said were well-loved, family-friendly establishments that add to the walkability and development of their neighborhood. Others, including Villages CDC and Two Birds, acknowledged ongoing community issues, and said they felt the council’s energy should be redirected to properly addressing things like traffic and parking enforcement at the community or city level. They — as well as many other community members — also contended Miller was abusing her power to try to get area bars to close.
“Two Birds is the same establishment today as it was six years ago,” Two Birds ownership and staff said in an emailed statement to BridgeDetroit earlier this week. “Nothing has changed except for the single fact that Council Member Miller — who lives blocks away from Two Birds and many other neighborhood businesses and is a vocal critic of parking and development in the neighborhood — now holds a position of power.”
Many said they felt the memos could do little more than needle into those already struggling with the city’s challenging zoning and compliance processes. Mac Farr, executive director of The Villages of Detroit CDC, is a supporter of zoning reform. He said the current system is too difficult for both the city to administer properly and for businesses to comply with it.
Farr also said Miller’s inquiry into the zoning and licensing of these businesses — as opposed to how to manage the impacts of growth the community is experiencing — is telling.
“This (her request) is, in essence, a request to review their right to exist,” Farr said during Tuesday’s city council meeting. “I don’t believe — and the 200-plus residents in the Villages do not believe — that this is about zoning. She wants to end these businesses.”
Farr said Villages CDC looks forward to working with Miller’s office on impact mitigation from business developments, including traffic calming, parking enforcement and traffic patrols.
“We are pleased that Council Member Miller has decided to work with the Small Business Corridor instead of trying to penalize them,” Farr said.
Miller has denied having personal motivations behind her inquiry. She has repeatedly maintained her support for small businesses and economic growth in Detroit.
Trust in BSEED
Miller in recent days expressed frustration with BSEED over what she contends is a lack of transparency and accountability from the department
BSEED Deputy Director Raymond Scott sought to answer several of Miller’s questions during Tuesday’s City Council meeting. Miller shared her skepticism that the information provided on the status of several of the businesses had not been readily available before, including to City Planning Commission Director Marcell Todd, who said at the meeting that he’d previously looked into complaints about at least one of the businesses in the east side business district.
Miller told Scott during Tuesday’s council session that she doesn’t trust him or BSEED.
“Let’s be clear, it (the status) was not there (in the tracking system previously),” Miller said to Scott in Tuesday’s meeting.
Miller argued the information was only provided because “there’s a big uproar” and questioned its validity. “I do not trust BSEED,” she said.
Neither BSEED nor Scott had any comment on Miller’s remarks. Miller declined to elaborate on her mistrust of the department.
Business and community members continued to debate Miller’s requests during a Thursday meeting of the council’s Planning and Economic Development Committee. The session marked the latest in a series of discussions over zoning compliance within the business district, including contentious community and council meetings where angry residents argued that Miller was unfairly scrutinizing the businesses.
Miller, who is not on the Thursday subcommittee, attended and further clarified and defended her requests. The council member stressed that drafting memos is a typical, and often daily, function of the legislative body. She noted that memos are “the way that we communicate” and that her inquiry is “not a probe.”
“As an elected councilwoman, it is my responsibility to ask questions, review concerns, and make sure our rules, city rules and regulations are being followed,” Miller said during the Thursday subcommittee meeting. “This is part of my job, and I will continue to do it.”
But most residents who spoke out Thursday and during Tuesday’s formal council meeting praised the walkability of the neighborhood and soundly rejected the narrative of risks to children.
Eight-and-a-half-month-old Lila Croce Bojanic has been hanging out at Two Birds since she was vaccinated, according to her father, Peter Croce.
“It’s not just a bar, it’s not just a nightlife space. This is a community space, this is a third space,” Croce told council members. “I just kind of question the priorities of my council woman, especially since we do have crime and public disorder issues, broken sidewalks, etcetera. So I don’t know why we’re going after small businesses when there’s actual real issues in our neighborhood.”
Zahra Taha-Marks, one of the handful of Miller-supporters who spoke at Thursday’s meeting, was not upset about Two Birds specifically. She was bothered that some of the up-and-coming businesses would mean the children she’s raising in her home near Kercheval would have to walk past a handful of bars to get to the local park.
Taha-Marks said the traffic and many other issues she’s seen — including people urinating in public near Two Birds, as well as entering her yard, ringing her doorbell and knocking on her door while drunk — were “unconscionable.”
“So if that’s with one bar, what does it look like with six? No, to six bars,” she said.
