Putney Sues Village over Bay Valley Inn Property

• The office of Plunkett Cooney confirmed yesterday (4/9) that Gretchen Olsen is representing the Village and its agents in the Putney litigation.

** Channel 7&4 reported on the case yesterday (4/9) evening. The video may be viewed here. Note that because of the ongoing litigation, the news reporter could not get any comment from council members, and she apparently didn't try very hard to get a comment from anyone else, either.—Emily Votruba

At about 5 pm on Wednesday, IPR's Bob Allen reported on fruit farmer Loy Putney's suit against the Village of Elberta. We'll post a link to the IPR story when it's available, in which you can hear audio of the March Village Council Meeting that IPR obtained from the Alert.

The Alert obtained a copy of the lawsuit, filed March 28, from the County Clerk on Wednesday morning. Village president Reginald Manville, clerk Sharyn Bower, trustee Kenneth Holmes, and zoning administrator Carl Noffsinger are named in the suit.

Putney is accusing the Village leadership of racism in denying him a permit to use the Bay Valley Inn Property for migrant worker housing. Putney does not yet own the property, but at the last Village Council meeting he produced an affidavit from the current owner, First Bank Mt. Pleasant, attesting their intent to sell it to him and giving him the authority to seek permits.

According to IPR, he says Elberta Village officials "made arbitrary decisions to deny him a permit three times over the past few months. And in a public meeting last month, council member Ken Holmes seems to refer to Putney as a 'rhubarb' and his project as a 'trash house.'" The station then aired audio of Ken Holmes saying this: "We don't want just any rhubarb coming in there and making a trash house out of that place."

Putney's attorney, his nephew Brad Putney, has notified the Michigan Department of Civil Rights, and IPR said that department has undertaken an investigation of the allegations. Neither IPR nor the Alert have been successful in getting comments on the situation from Village leadership, on or off the record.—Emily Votruba

A description of Loy Putney's operation from the site MichiganAgLabor

The complete IPR web story