July 24, 2015 Dear Citizens of Cadillac and the surrounding area, | cannot emphasize enough the honor that it has been serving the Citizens of Cadillac for the past 16 years as a member of the city council. | have been thankful for you for putting your trust in me for four different terms. One thing that | know deep in my heart is that we have some very amazing people that have chosen to live and work in our great community. This community is beautiful because of the citizens that call this area “home”. While it is obvious to many that watch and participate in the city council meetings, they can be very stressful and at times very frustrating, That is only part of the job. The best part of the job was outside of the meetings working directly with the citizens either with issues or concerns ‘they have or working on a committee when you sit in amazement because people are giving their time and effort to help our community. It was working with other governmental units or on new positive projects that was the fun part of the job. ‘The other great part is working with the staff of our city. Underneath our city manager, there are men and women that serve our community with pride and commitment. | have enjoyed working with them and have always considered them the best asset that our city government has and will always have. When I first started on city council under the leadership of Pete Stalker, it was so exciting working on projects and team efforts to make our community better. While we didn’t always ‘agree with the townships and county on different topics, there was 2 level of respect with the City officials. Sometimes it was difficult because we couldn't come to an agreement , but both sides left the table with respect for the other side. In the past years, the divisions in our community have taken over the positive energy that used to be part of our government. It has been as if there has been a line drawn in our community and those on the other side have become the enemy. People can spend the energy at the coffee table talking about how they disagree with the action of the other side, while those at the table are doing the same action. More energy is focused on how we can get the other side and less energy on how we can all work together to make our community better. know that | am not stating anything that the community doesn’t already know. The message gets lost because there is so much focus on the messenger instead of the message. An idea gets considered if it is good or bad based on if the messenger is on “their side” or “the other side”. This has started to hurt our community and preventing us from becoming better.So as | was deciding if | was going to run for re-election, the factors above where all factored in. My love of the community, my enjoyment working for the citizens of this community, and looking out for the staff were the main reasons that | looked to continue serving on the council On the other hand, | am very aware of the division that is throughout the community. | realize that the division is strong enough that | am not considered part of the team by the decision makers at the city. | also realize that this division is going to continue until new faces get into these leadership positions. Ihave always prided myself, and | know that my voting record and discussions at the meetings shows, that ironically when | am debating an issue, it is not to put more regulations or policing on the citizens, | am pushing to put more regulations and policing on our city government Making sure that we are being ethical, following the rules and hopefully treating others fairly and working fairly with the other governmental unit in our area has been my focus. With that said, | have realized that | can be more useful to the community by not running for re- election. There is so much division that it hard to work being considered an outsider by the decision makers at the city to serve the community better. | can’t stop them from constantly pushing the limit on follow the laws and losing the trust with the citizens and other governmental units. | truly believe until we have new faces in these leadership spots for the city of Cadillac, the division will continue. | will lead the way and be the first one to remove myself so that this can happen can be more useful by doing everything in my power to get rid of the division. | can’t do that serving on the city council. 11am strongly encouraging all those that see themselves as community leaders to join me in an effort to stop the division and start working for Cadillac. The best way this can be done is to hold our own groups accountable. When we see those that, are part of our own group bullying or focusing their energies on destroying others instead of building our community, then we need to hold them accountable. When we see those acting as if they are “entitled” and act as they are above the law, we need to hold them accountable. Right or Wrong should be determined by the action, not the person doing the act. | will be working very hard over the next months encouraging community leaders to join m this effort to “heal” the divisions that exist. We have a beautiful community with amazing people. People of all backgrounds and histories have decided to make Cadillac their home and they should all be welcomed and treated with the same respect. | truly believe if we put these divisions aside and stop trying to win against the other side and put our energies in the same direction of a successful private business focusing on the customer. | know that there are thousands that agree with me because | hear it all the time. They may disagree with which side to blame but are unified in the fact that they know it is aproblem. Once we get past this division like it was when | first started on city council, I believe we have solved one of the biggest issues in our community. My final decision to not run for re-election occurred at the 4" of July parade that | was honored to walkin this year. | was able to give candy to this little girl in a wheel chair that was watching the parade with her grandparents. They made a statement about the wheelchair and later | wanted to find out who they Were so that | could maybe help them with the wheelchair. I went to work trying to get information on who they were to contact them. | sent out group emails and made numerous calls. It got back to me from one of these contacts that there was a concern that | may use this contact for a benefit to my campaign. It was then that | realized that the human element has been overshadowed by this division. It is too much, | again want to thank all of you for the amazing experience that you have allowed me. | believe that we have an amazing community because I have met so many of you that are just living your lives, working hard and providing for your family.. This is a great place to do all of that. Most of you don’t want to be considered to be on one side or the other, you want to be part of Cadillac. | hope to join many of you as we work to get rid of the sides and all join Team Cadillac. Art Stevens