Detroit mayor facing governor's scrutiny

http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/17286692/detail.html

Michigan governor Jennifer Grahholm (Democrat; Caucasian) will be holding hearings beginning on Sept. 3; at stake is whether the governor will use a constitutionally legal but rarely used statute that allows the governor of the state to remove a city's mayor for indiscretions against the public. The defendant is Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick (Democrat; Afro-American).

Lead counsel representing the mayor in this case is Sharon MacPhail: a one-time foe of Kilpatrick, she ran unsuccessfully against him and others in the 2001 primary mayoral race (it came down to Kilpatrick and former executive cop & city councilman Gil Hill, who was in the Beverly Hills Cop films); eventually getting a seat at City Council, MacPhail as recently as 2005 accused the Mayor of rigging her seat to give her an electric buzz, which she claimed was giving her a recurring zap during a particularly contentious meeting with Mayor Kilpatrick. She has since vacated her city council position in 2005, shortly after Kilpatrick's successful re-election, instead choosing to join his administration's legal staff.

 

Kilpatrick is a fuckup seven times over and needs to step down. Detroit is one of the worst cities in America and needs at least two generations of quality leadership to recover.

 

You got that right. Homes better step down from office for the good of the city. He is doing stupid stuff which embarrassed Detroit. Hope he has a brain left to depart.

 

Dude fucked up it is not a the man is trying to get you,he played himself with the text messages.

 

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I watched the court proceedings on TV this morning until I had to go to work, but he was still on his way to court at that time, I did not get to see the public plea agreement live... apparently there is a big crowd at the Wayne County circuit court, both supporters and detractors alike.. lots of wayne county sheriffs and police..

but the drama continues--
the police chief, Ella Bully-Cummings, Detroit's first female chief, has just resigned..

...several mayoral staffers/appointees have just recently received pay raises, from 6% to 13%, in the past 2 weeks..

...several big projects loom stalled, including a proposal to sell the Detroit-owned half of the underground tunnel to Windsor, CA.. also a proposed expansion to the Cobo Hall Convention Center, in recent years criticized as too small for executives of the North American Auto Show..

...City Council President Kenneth Cockrel would be the interim mayor, pushing Monica Conyers (wife of Congressman John Conyers) to be City Council President.. the two have had a contentious relationship- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZQLxVO-qjM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TvgtGlcdTE&feature=related

.. several council staffers are under federal investigation relating to possible payoffs for a sludge-disposal firm city contract..

inevitably, there are folks who tend to feel "well, the white man gets away with A, B, C, why does the black man have to go to jail, etc.?", there's a reason for that, and an advantage that white folk politicians have that black politicians do not.

They're WHITE!!!!! They have that advantage of cultural sympathy when some wrongdoing goes down; black folks in public office and celebrities have always had to step up to be better in their behavior-- or at least better in covering it up..

Detroit is an 85% black city, so when it comes to city/taxpayer funds being rerouted for personal use, city-owned credit cards being maxed out on dinners and gifts to entertain mistresses as well as potential business partners/investors, but only slowly paid on, Vehicles being bought for his wife (but registered as 'police dept. property'), and a whistleblower lawsuit that costs the city over $8 million (where two internal affairs cops got fired for stumbling close to the truth of the affair-- his executive police/bodyguards had been charging extremely high amounts of overtime to their payroll), this is not being done to "get over on whitey"-- this is getting over on your black consituents!!

Kilpatrick has had the highest number of relatives and people already known to be close friends getting either lucrative city contracts for various projects (construction, etc.) or are city employees in some capacity..

Police response is still very slow, plenty of neighborhoods are in bad shape, the public schools are looking at less than 100,000 students overall this year, but still overcrowded classes, barely any books to go around, kids have to ask the teacher for toilet paper, etc.; it's still a huge mess here, and no amount of downtown refurbishing can fix that--

He liked to party like Puffy and live ultra-lavish, but also had a problem with being upfront about this—circa 2003 the the spoils of power were simply a given to him, and when certain stuff was exposed like the credit cards, the Navigator, and finally the text messages, his thing seemed to be deny relentlessly and if all else fails bring up God so the church folk will circle the wagons and he can flex the "strong black man targeted by the System" card..

Kilpatrick's legacy for the city is extremely mixed, IMO... and based on the end of his 'farewell' speech yesterday, he has vowed 'a comeback'... :shock:

 

No one really cares about Detroit, but good luck.