Greetings City of Rockford Residents!

Last week, I was able to join Michigan City Manager’s for their annual Winter Conference. This time away is always beneficial as it affords an opportunity to learn from fellow professionals of best practices that are occurring within the State and around the nation. Further, it affords an opportunity to network and have personal conversations with fellow professionals. We all are dedicated public servants, and this forum offers a great opportunity to improve skillsets as professional managers. I was also pleasantly surprised to see one of the speakers at the conference was from one of our Rockford city businesses, Wolverine Worldwide. The speaker is their DEI Manager and shared insights into identifying individual employee expectations leading to employment opportunities that are personally rewarding and gratifying to the employee.

Speaking of networking, a special thank you to our County Administrator, Al Vandenberg and Gordon Gallagher, the Spring Lake Township Manager. The two volunteered their time to work with the Rockford City Council during our recent Vision Session for the City. Both Al and Gordon are professional administrators who are skilled facilitators. They both did a great job leading our City Council through the visioning exercise. We are blessed to have professionals who are so giving of their time. 

Speaking of giving of one’s time. There are approximately 75 City residents who volunteer to

participate on a City Board or City Commission. These volunteers are truly the backbone of our organization and in large part are responsible for making Rockford so great. Staff are currently working on a Board and Commission Recognition Night, so we can honor these dedicated servants.

I hope you enjoy this quarterly newsletter and please contact us with questions or ideas for future articles.

Thad Beard

City Manager 

Presidential Primary

The February 27 Presidential Primary is quickly approaching. Michigan voters now have three different options for how they want to cast their vote - Absentee Ballot, Early Voting or on Election Day.

The Presidential Primary is the one election every 4 years where a voter must choose if they would like a Democratic Party or Republican Party ballot. It’s important to clarify that this provision does not register voters with the particular party they’ve selected for this election; it simply allows clerks to provide them the correct ballot.

Absentee Ballot: If you would like to vote by absentee ballot you can request an absentee ballot application from the Clerk's office or apply for one online through the Michigan Voter Information Center. Once we receive your ballot application, we can provide you an absentee ballot.

If you are on our Permanent Ballot List you were sent a Ballot Selection Form rather than a ballot for this election. Please indicate which party ballot you would like to receive and return it to the clerk’s office to receive a ballot. If you have misplaced or didn’t receive a Ballot Selection Form email kmurphy@rockford.mi.us and we can mail you a new one. Or you can select which ballot type you would like online through the Michigan Voter Information Center.

The deadline for us to mail an absentee ballot to you is February 23. 

When you return your absentee ballot, please remember to sign the envelope using the signature on your drivers license or ID.

Early Voting: Michigan voters now have the right to cast a ballot early and in person at an Early Voting site for 9 days prior to an election. The Early Voting process is very similar to voting on Election Day. Voters will fill out an application to vote, be given a ballot to vote, and then place the ballot in the tabulator themselves.

The City of Rockford Early Voting site is located at City Hall and will be available February 17-25 from 8:00am-4:00pm daily.

Election Day: The City of Rockford has two voting precincts. Precinct 1’s polling location is at the Fire Station. Precinct 1 is any house east of the Rogue River. Precinct 2’s polling location is at City Hall. Precinct 2 is any house west of the Rogue River. Both of these polling locations are at 7 S. Monroe St. Check out the Michigan Voter Information Center to find out where you are registered to vote.

Polls will be open on February 27 from 7:00am-8:00pm.

Following the lengthy process to review and adopt a 20-year Master Plan, the City is now reviewing and updating it’s zoning ordinance. The review process involves several meetings with and receiving feedback from various groups. Three unique user groups met with the City Planner to provide personal perspectives on how the zoning ordinance effected their building expansions and a separate steering committee will have several meetings to review and discuss proposed changes over the next year. The primary goal is to ensure the zoning ordinance is congruent with and not in conflict with the recently adopted Master Plan.  

In addition to updating the Zoning Ordinance, the City has recently created/adopted a new Community Recreation Plan. The Community Recreation Plan provides an inventory of City owned parks as well as a vision for the future of parks and recreation within the community. Having an adopted community recreation plan allows us to apply for state funded grants to improve our parks. All of our city parks and park improvements are at least partially if not fully funded using grants.