Who would have ever thought that something like this was possible? Though not as charismatic as some of his fellow governors, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder might truly win the prize for the top government employee who hates other government employees. He has moved to take democracy away from many of the citizens he supposedly represents, treating them like an occupied territory, and introducing race into politics. As Snyder has assumed more power, he has also become a role model for other Republican governors, Scott Walker of Wisconsin for one, who like Snyder seem uncomfortable with the whole legislative process.
In January, Snyder asked for a substantially revised bill with regards to Emergency Financial Managers in the state. In early spring, the Republican controlled Michigan Legislature passed the bill along party lines. The legislature then defeated an amendment that would have limited how much these new financial czars could get paid. The EMF would be appointed by the governor, along with the state school superintendent in failing school districts. Snyder has said that the new “unelected” fiscal manager’s job will be to cut wages and benefits that are no longer affordable. At this time Michigan school districts are facing a dramatic decline in property tax revenues and Governor Snyder proposal to further slash taxes could drive other communities into fiscal uncertainty.
According to the Daily Tribune Snyder stated before financial bill was revised, “the current law doesn’t allow the state to act pro-actively, providing early intervention before a city or school district faces financial collapse. In recent weeks, the governor has said that removing officials or altering or deleting contracts is a last resort.” Then again he would say that. The legislature, which to this point has appeared little more than a rubber stamp, will be responsible for removing an EMF who has been found to be incompetent or overbearing. Once again this is the Michigan legislature as a whole rather then the individual communities they rule over. Those communities can’t be trusted.
Republican Senator Jack Brandenburg from Harrison said, “(The Emergency Manager) has to have the backbone, he has to have the power, to null and void contract.” (Daily Tribune, March 10,2011).
Democratic Senator Steve Bieda said, “Removing elected officials and overturning local ordinances show no respect for the will or the rights of the voters.” (same)
The districts currently with financial managers all have substantial African-American communities. They are: Pontiac, Benton Harbor, Ecorse and the Detroit Public school. According to Jesse Jackson in a Chicago Sun Tribune Editorial, “It is not surprising that these emergency financial manager are being foisted disproportionally on city and school districts with the poorest people and the largest number of minorities. Democracy, the governor seems to suggest, is something they can’t afford.”
Is Jackson right? One look at Kevin Boyle’s book The Arc of Justice: A Saga of Race, Civil Rights, and Murder in the Jazz Age suggest that Michigan has a history of racial politics. The book largely takes place in Detroit in the 1920s when local government was nearly taken over by the Ku Klux Klan. The story is about Dr. Ossian Sweet, the grandson of a slave, who tried to break Detroit’s invisible color line by moving out of a black ghetto and into a white working class neighborhood. The house is soon surrounded and the Sweet family soon learn that they can’t count on the police to protect their properly. The Sweet family and friends soon bring in their own weapons to protect their house. Shots are eventually fired and the doctor and people inside the house are brought up on murder charges. Clarence Darrow, fresh off the Scopes monkey trial and affiliated with the new NAACP wound up taking up the case.
Fast forward ninety years later… a white governor is allowed to declare any city or town in the state to be” failing” and appoint an unelected official to run the people in the communities affair regardless of what they think. Not surprisingly the districts that he has chosen to experiment on are predominantly African-American. Benton Harbor has a 92.4% African-America with an average income of $8965, the state’s lowest per capita income. The financial manager of Benton Harbor Joseph L. Harris just fired all the town’s elected officials with an order “prohibiting all action by all city boards, commissions and authorities except by the emergency manager.” (Truth Out 7-1-11)
Detroit has the second highest African-American population in the United States. Its school system is 95% African-American. Only recently every teacher in Detroit got layoff notices. Now less experience and less well paid teachers can replace them. What this seems to suggest is that Detroit cannot be trusted to take care of its own and that only poorly paid teachers can turn around this school district and that the well meaning white leadership, far removed from Detroit, can be trusted to have the Detroit students’ interest at heart.
Even in the two cities that are not as overwhelmingly African- American, still have about four times the number of African-Americans than the state average. Pontiac Michigan is nearly 48% African-American and Ecorse is 42%. Michigan, as whole, is just 14% African-America .
Last week 28 residents filed a civil suit against Governor Snyder. John Philo of Sugar Law Center’s legal director said, “PA-4 establishes a new form of local government, unknown anywhere in the united States, where the people in local municipalities are government by an unelected official who establishes local law by decrees. It’s a backdoor way to end collective bargain and effectively silence local firefighters, police, teacher, nurses and anyone who serves the public and provides essential local services.” (Truth Out 7-1-11)
It is just another lie. Communities can negotiate and agreement with people and Snyder can step in and make their word null and void. There has been a move to recall Snyder from office in Michigan. One more public servant who would be perfectly comfortable with the level of control Snyder has assumed.
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