The police chief and the consent agreement

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Jun 252012
 

Detroit police Chief Ralph Godbee is using this YouTube post to prepare officers for reduced standards of living and working under the city’s controversial consent agreement with the state of Michigan. He urges all police department employees to accept cuts in wages and benefits so that he won’t have to lay off any more officers.

“There will absolutely be some critical sacrifices we all must make,” Godbee says. “Yet I implore everyone to really understand that without these structural changes, our department will be drastically reduced even further.” Only one of the three police department unions has a contract. The other two have expired, Godbee said.

The consent agreement, which the city also calls a financial stability agreement, frees the city from negotiating with employees starting July 12. According to the official summary of the consent agreement, when a union contract expires, the city can let it lapse and set wages and benefits unilaterally.

Godbee says the current Detroit city budget cut away $75 million, or almost one fifth, of the department’s funding. That means Godbee already is struggling to cut 380 jobs, mostly by not replacing people who leave or retire and, according to the Detroit News, by requiring all job applicants to work as volunteer reserve officers before they’re put on the payroll.

Worse, Godbee says, under the 2012-2013 budget that starts July 1, the department still has 108 more people working than it can afford. The city of Detroit employees almost 10,800 people, down from 13,400 when Mayor Dave Bing took office, according to Bing’s state of the city address in March. The cuts continue.

The consent agreement restructured Detroit government so that it is controlled by a nine-member, non-elected financial advisory board that works with and answers to two new, non-elected officials in the mayor’s office: a program management director, and a chief financial officer. The city council approved the agreement in late April. The advisory board, which includes the president of Charter Bank of Michigan, began meeting in mid-June.

Bing and Gov. Rick Snyder have argued that the consent agreement lets city and state governments share control of city affairs instead of turning everything over to a non-elected emergency manager. Under the vilified Public Act 4, Michigan’s emergency manager law, the governor could appoint a single person to control all city finances and control all city operations. That includes firing elected officials, closing departments and agencies, outsourcing public services such as street lighting or buses, selling off public assets such as parks, and, of course, voiding union contracts.

–Janet Braunstein

Mayor, Detroit City Council tussle over consent agreement

 News, Photojournalism  3 Responses »
Jun 112012
 

Detroit Mayor Bing. Photo by Terry Hall

In the continuing struggle over a consent agreement that takes control of City of Detroit finances and operations and puts them into state hands, Mayor Dave Bing again urged the Detroit City Council to stop fighting it.

Bing spoke to the council a day before a scheduled hearing on a case challenging the validity of the consent agreement. Detroit Corporation Counsel Krystal Crittendon, who filed the suit, argues that legally the city can’t sign an agreement with the state until the state pays what it owes Detroit: about $300 million.

 But Bing and Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder have warned repeatedly that the city will run out of cash at week’s end, leaving it unable to pay employees, let alone a $34.2 million bond payment, if the consent agreement is held up in court. At Tuesday’s meeting, Bing demanded the city attorney drop the case.

JoAnn Watson: "It sounds like extortion." Photo by Terry Hall

City council members agreed to wait for the judge’s decision on June 13. 2012. The argument: the council has no authority to drop litigation filed by the autonomous corporation counsel, or city attorney. Furthermore, council members agreed, moving ahead before any litigation is settled would be financially irresponsible.

Bing said he has no quarrel with the city council or with Crittendon. He simply disagrees with the city attorney’s recommendation.

But Councilman Kwame Kenyatta said the governor should follow his own anti-bullying law. Colleague JoAnn Watson said: “It doesn’t sound like bullying. It sounds like extortion.”

Time's up: Detroit's running out of cash. Photo by Terry Hall

Bing wants the council to move forward with the consent agreement in good faith, and resolve problems with the city Charter later, because “there is no Plan B.”

Council President Charles Pugh said he found the public meeting on the consent agreement and the lawsuit altogether irresponsible. He scolded the mayor for using “the sky is falling” tactics.

-- Terry Hall

Update: June 13: Crittendon’s suit was dismissed in Michigan Circuit Court in Ingham County. Judge William Collette ruled that only the mayor or city council can decide to sue; the city attorney has no autonomous authority to file suits, let alone challenge the mayor in court. He said the city council should have passed a resolution declaring the consent agreement invalid; since it did not, the agreement will stand. –ed.