From Diane Bukowski, sent as a response to Jack Lessenberry’s column of Jan. 25, 2012 in the Metro Times, at http://metrotimes.com/columns/want-to-stop-the-emergency-manager-1.1262018 (watch to see if it is published)
Diane Bukowski under arrest the day President Obama was elected in 2008, for covering state trooper chase that resulted in deaths of two Black Detroit men.
I am one of Detroit’s 700,000 “dirt-poor” residents, as Jack Lessenberry called us in his column of January 25, 2012, I am absolutely appalled that the Metro Times allows this man to continue writing for you. After killer cops Larry Nevers and Walter Budzyn beat steelworker Malice Green to death in 1992, Lessenberry called Green a “crackhead.” His column “Help Snyder” is the last straw.
“How will the remaining 700,000 mostly dirt-poor Detroiters get themselves out from under this mountain of debt, while maintaining some minimal standard of city services?” Jack asks. “They can’t, they never will, simple as that.” Then he calls for the city to be folded into Wayne County.
He blames all critics of the emergency manager law for not coming up with alternative solutions, and Detroit’s politicians for incurring the city’s debt ($579 million paid in 2011-12).
Jack Lessenberry
Where was he in 2005 when Wall Street in the persons of Stephen Murphy from Standard and Poors and Joe O’Keefe from Fitch Ratings (photo at top) actually came to the table to twist the city council’s arms to borrow $1.5 billion in pension obligation certificates from UBS AG, the second-largest assets management firm in the world? The city’s pension boards and unions vehemently opposed this action. It amounted to the city borrowing its entire outstanding obligation to the pension funds for years to come.
UBS Logo, pictured Tuesday, February 14, 2006 in Zurich, Switzerland. Swiss based UBS AG, Europe’s largest bank, reported Tuesday, 14 February 2006, a record fourth-quarter profit. For the full year UBS posted a net profit rose of 75 percent to 14.029 billion francs. (KEYSTONE/Walter Bieri)
In 2009, the city defaulted on that debt and UBS AG called it in. A complete financial collapse was averted only because the city agreed to hand US Bank NA its entire casino taxes and state revenue-sharing funds annually, so it can lop off enough to pay off the debt. US Bank NA gets an unknown fee for this “service.” I’ve never seen an accounting from US Bank NA on how they distribute the funds, so who knows how much they ACTUALLY take?
Ob, by the way, Wall Street is rooting for a Detroit EM. Fitch Ratings has already said the appointment of one will precipitate an immediate demand from the banks for $400,000, and then some.
Occupy Oakland march during November general strike
Where’s Jack been over the last six months, as Occupy Wall Street has taken the nation’s banks to task for getting bailed out with OUR taxes and still foreclosing on millions across the country, using illegal sub-prime mortgages and other fraud? Detroit’s neighborhoods are a shell of their former selves as a result.
The well-known Moratorium NOW! Coalition to Stop Foreclosures, Evictions and Shut-offs has raised the demand for a moratorium on the city’s debt to the banks. Detroit’s former Mayor Frank Murphy and former Detroit U.S. Congressman Clarence McLeod called for a TEN-YEAR moratorium on the debts of cities across the country during the 1930’s, so that their mayors could take care of the homeless and starving masses.
Jack must not have attended the Dec. 1 City Council meeting where the city’s union leaders put all SORTS of plans on the table to increase the city’s revenue. Jack should go to Michigan Forward’s website at http://michiganforward.org/index.php/2012/01/detroit-city-council-december-2011-hearing-on-cost-cutting-alternatives/to watch the tape of that hearing. It’s two and a half hours, but he’s a professor, he’s used to listening and learning, right?
Home on York Road, Jack Lessenberry’s street in Huntington Woods
According to on-line records, Jack lives in Huntington Woods, whose population is currently 96 percent white and one percent Black according to current U.S. census figues. Median household income is $104, 879. Two percent of the city’s population lives below the poverty level. Seventy-eight percent of residents over 25 have at least a bachelor’s degree. The city actually has a rainy-day fund, which it used to help erase a $170,000 deficit in the last fiscal year.
Rather typical low-iincome Detroit home on West Parkway; resident was severely injured in fire after her utilities were shut-off
Detroit’s population is 82.7 percent Black, and 10.2 percent white. Median household income is $28, 357. The percentage of Detroit residents living in poverty is 34.5 percent. The percentage of Detroiters with bachelor’s degrees is 11.8 percent.
How does Jack Lessenberry, living in the wealth, comfort and security of Huntington Woods, in a four-bedroom, air-conditioned home worth $302,700 according to the website Zillow, have the gall to make any declaration regarding the manner in which Detroiters should run their own business?
Jack Lessenberry is a DISGRACE. I call on all Metro Times advertisers and readers to boycott the paper until he is FIRED.
From Diane Bukowski, lifelong Detroit resident, 63 years; City of Detroit retiree and union leader, Editor of the Voice of Detroit
I just saw this crazy post. I don’t live on that street and that isn’t my house, but why should Diane let facts get in the way of her ideology?
Sorry for the error, Jack, but the fact remains you are NOT a resident of Detroit or even of Wayne County. So WHY do you keep calling for Detroit to be folded into Wayne County. And WHY are so many of your columns absolutely insensitive, if not racist, to the majority population of Detroit, going back to when you called Malice Green a “crackhead?”
Jack has always had contempt for residents of Detroit. He has stained the relations between Detroit and the suburbs for decades.