New supervisors who have taken the helm in at least five townships across Metro Detroit have hit the ground running as they face a range of priorities and challenges, from spurring economic development to fixing aging roads.

In Bloomfield Township, Supervisor Mike McCready wants to find new ways to pay for road improvements, which he says are “in bad shape.” In Plymouth Township Supervisor Charles Curmi is working to keep “the feel” and quality of life in his Wayne County community.

And in Clinton Township, Michigan’s largest township with more than 100,000 residents, newly elected Supervisor Paul Gieleghem already has met with shopping center owners to see how the township can help fill vacancies.

Gieleghem said “every day” he feels a sense of responsibility being the township’s first new supervisor in nearly two and a half two decades.

“Every night, it’s debating: ‘Do I have the ability to go home at a decent hour or do I have to get this last thing done before I go? … That weight never, never is lifted off the shoulders because you have 100,000 people relying on you,” he said.

Voters in at least four Metro Detroit communities elected new supervisors in November. Supervisors oversees the day-to-day operations of a township and run board of trustees meetings.

Other new leaders include Anthony Bartolotta of Waterford Township, a Republican, and Jonathan Warshay of West Bloomfield Township, a Democrat who was appointed supervisor in December. Gieleghem is a Democrat, while McCready and Curmi are Republicans.

In all five townships, the leaders are mapping their priorities as they settle into office. Warshay is working with waste contractor Priority Waste to fix issues that West Bloomfield residents have experienced with garbage pickups. Bartolotta plans to create a new community center for Waterford. And Curmi wants to attract technology and engineering jobs to Plymouth Township.

Most will face similar issues from dealing with repairing infrastructure to staffing challenges.

“It’s really just kind of everything,” said Michael Selden of the Michigan Townships Association.

“They’re going to have aging infrastructure. … Most are going to have fire departments, many are going to have police departments,” said Selden, the association’s director of member information services. “It’s staffing; it’s funding services.”

Adding amenities

Gieleghem succeeded Supervisor Bob Cannon, who held the post for 24 years. He said he wants to make “people proud of being from Clinton Township.”

Good schools and recreational opportunities are ways of doing this, he said.

In an interview, Gieleghem unfurled a map of the Clinton River spillway and surrounding areas, sharing ideas for new amenities. One idea is to build a Great Lakes Nature Center in Shadyside Park in Mount Clemens. The nature center was a proposal of the Detroit Zoo that the zoo is no longer pursuing. Another idea is a disc-golf course along the spillway.

“You can do a disc-golf course here and create recreational space that doesn’t upset the habitat,” Gieleghem said, “and then you get people using these areas.”

Bartolotta of Waterford said his township is creating a new community center. The current recreation center on Williams Lake Road is “falling apart,” he said. Bartolotta said the township is set to purchase 51 acres of Oakland Community College’s Highland Lakes Campus and will move its community center there, revamping some of the buildings on the property.

“I really want to see this community center up and running,” said Bartolotta, who owned a car wash business with his brother for 30 years.

He said Waterford Township recently bought the senior center from the Waterford School District. He said the district decided it would stop running the center, so the township of about 69,400 residents purchased the building to keep senior programs running.

Infrastructure and personnel

McCready, a former state representative, said Bloomfield Township’s roads are a priority because of their bad condition.

He said the township of about 43,750 residents hasn’t seen significant funding from Oakland County to repave neighborhood roads. The county does repave main roads.

The township is repairing some roads through special assessment districts, which is when neighborhood residents choose to increase property taxes for improvements.

“We have to find other ways to help pay for these ? I don’t know what that is,” McCready said.

Selden of the Michigan Townships Association said townships don’t own roads, so they don’t receive road funding. In many cases, counties don’t have enough money for repairs, so they ask the township to help pay for the upgrades.

Another challenge is that Bloomfield Township’s McCready wants the Oakland County community to look at how to “better control” water and sewer rates. He wants Bloomfield to consider joining a consortium that buys water at wholesale levels and stores it for use during peak hours — or create its own water storage facility.

The Great Lakes Water Authority’s wholesale service charges for water and wastewater services increased 3.25% and 3%, respectively, in July in southeast Michigan.

Bloomfield Township was losing employees, especially police and fire personnel, to other local governments for better pay. McCready said the township has instituted a parental leave policy for employees and is giving higher raises than normal this year in a bid to retain workers.

Some townships have been dealing with changes in waste contracts. Clinton Township-based Priority Waste closed on the acquisition of GFL Environmental’s residential waste management contracts across 73 communities in Metro Detroit last June and took over pickup of trash, recycling and yard waste on July 1.

Warshay, West Bloomfield’s supervisor, said his Oakland County community of 65,100 residents is still dealing with fallout from the sale. Since Priority took over, he said, some residents have experienced missed or late pickups.

“The volume of complaints is down,” Warshay said, “but it’s still above what it should be.”

Attracting businesses

Gieleghem said he and Clinton Township’s planning director recently met with the owners of the Parkway Plaza on South Groesbeck to learn about development plans. The strip mall has a vacant anchor, which used to be a Kroger store, and other vacant storefronts.

Gieleghem, the township’s former treasurer, also met with the owner of The Mall at Partridge Creek. The outdoor mall lost anchor stores Nordstrom and Carson’s in the late 2010s, though the Powerhouse Gym has since moved into one of those spaces. He said the township wants to partner with the mall’s owner as it tries to fill vacancies.

Clinton Township can facilitate the growth of these shopping centers by “tightening up our process for improvements,” he said. The township is developing a tracking system to allow employees to see where a development project is in the approval process. The system would allow them to see, for example, if the building department and fire department have reviewed plans.

Gieleghem said Clinton Township can also work with Macomb County’s Planning and Economic Development department to boost development.

In Plymouth Township, Curmi wants to attract development that does not “attract crime or traffic,” including technology and research jobs. He said there is only one large piece of land left undeveloped in Plymouth Township - the former Detroit House of Correction property that closed in December 2004.

“We want to attract some technology and research activities there, engineering offices, laboratories, light manufacturing,” said Curmi, who was a trustee before getting elected to supervisor of the community of 27,000 residents.

Curmi formerly worked in automotive engineering and product development. He defeated incumbent Supervisor Kurt Heise in a contentious August GOP primary and didn’t face a challenger in the general election. Curmi was accused of harassing a poll worker and voters on Election Day in November. He denies this allegation and said it was “politically motivated lawfare.”

Curmi said he does not want to attract more retail businesses to the township and has concerns about the Meijer store being built near Five Mile and Beck roads. Last January, Meijer and developer Redico won the right to go forward with the plan after filing a lawsuit against the township.

“I love Meijer - great place to shop - just not the target for the very limited amount of land we have to develop,” Curmi said, “and it is a disappointment that that chunk of land … will be used for that purpose.”

Curmi also opposed a plan, which ultimately failed, to bring the former Northville Downs racetrack to the township.

He said a priority is maintaining “the feel and the quality of life that Plymouth Township has.” Asked if there’s a conflict between maintaining the community’s character and bringing in new jobs, he said, “No, not at all.”

Plymouth Township has being doing this for decades, Curmi said. The township has industrial parks north of M-14 that are home to engineering, sales and testing operations. He said many of these businesses are “unnoticed by the residents,” as they operate during daytime hours.