Stand Up for Democracy is announcing it has verified more than half of the 250,000 signatures the group wants to collect. Only 161,304 valid signatures are needed to freeze the emergency manager law and put it on the November 2012 general election ballot. Leaders representing more than 3,500 volunteers from across the state held a teleconference call today detailing many of their successes.
Rick-tator Snyder signs PA 4 into law
The petitions call for a vote to repeal the emergency manager law that gave them sweeping powers,including the ability to:
– Seize and sell public assets without a court order
– Remove elected officials from office without due process
– Dissolve or merge cities,townships and school districts without a popular vote
– Break binding contracts and eliminate collective bargaining rights at will
– Close vital public services without a public hearing
“The law is a naked power grab byLansing politicians,” said Traverse City resident Amy Hardin,from Reject Emergency Managers, a member group of Stand Up for Democracy.
“This law has disenfranchised over 550,000 registered voters and counting,we must strike down this law immediately for the sake of Michigan Democracy. Emergency managers are dictators over local communities who rule with impunity;threaten our Democracy and local rights. Michigan’s communities can’t continue to sell public services,layoff employees and create local policy and ordinances without community input,” said Brandon Jessup,Chairman & CEO of Michigan Forward and member of Stand Up for Democracy.
“We’ve documented the ills of this odious law in our mini-documentary released on Labor Day. This coalition is the elixir for communities under the dictatorship of emergency management and those facing possible takeover we are champions for Democracy and we encourage all Michigan voters to with us.” Jessup said.
Today the Supreme Court spoke and the news, once again, is not good for the Governor. (I say “once again” because the Supreme Court already smacked down Governor Snyder just last week.) Instead of accepting Governor Snyder’s request to bypass the normal judicial process, they have asked both parties to submit briefs in support of their positions regarding the Governor’s request. The order is HERE (pdf).
It reads as follows:
The Executive Message of the Governor pursuant to MCR 7.305(A) was received on August 12, 2011, requesting that this Court direct the Ingham Circuit Court to certify certain questions for immediate determination by this Court. In lieu of acting on the Governor’s request at this time, we DIRECT the plaintiffs and the defendants to file with this Court by December 14, 2011, briefs, including a statement of facts, in support of their positions on the questions posed by the Executive Message of the Governor. The parties shall address:
whether the requirements of MCR 7.305(A) have been met;
whether the urgency of the request under MCR 7.305(A) is mitigated by MCR 7.302(B)(4)(b), which allows a party to request this Court to bypass review by the Court of Appeals after “a ruling that a provision of . . . a Michigan statute . . . is invalid”;
whether 2011 PA 4 violates Const 1963, art 3, § 2 (separation of powers), or art 4, § 1 (legislative power), in its authorization of an emergency manager;
whether 2011 PA 4 violates Const 1963, art 4, § 29 (local or special acts) by permitting an emergency manager to exercise powers of a local governmental unit;
whether 2011 PA 4 violates Const 1963, art 7, § 22 (charters, resolutions, ordinances, enumeration of powers) by allowing an emergency manager to exercise powers of a local governmental unit;
whether 2011 PA 4 violates due process rights set forth in Const 1963, art 1, § 17, or violates any right that is retained in Const 1963, art 1, § 23, by allowing an emergency manager to assume the power and authority of a local governmental unit;
whether 2011 PA 4 violates Const 1963, art 7, §§ 21, 22, and 34 (provisions for local government) by allowing an emergency manager to assume the power and authority of a local governmental unit;
whether 2011 PA 4 violates Const 1963, art 9, § 29 (Headlee Amendment) by requiring the local government for which the emergency manager is appointed to pay for certain costs associated with the emergency manager.
The Executive Message requesting the bypass remains under consideration.
While most of these items are pretty self-explanatory, the first couple warrant a bit of explanation. [I’m not an attorney so, if any attorneys out there spot something wrong in my analysis, please let me know.]
The first item references Michigan Court Rules (MCR) Subchapter 7.300 which cover the Supreme Court. Section 305 (A) allows parties to ask the Supreme Court to skip reviews by lower courts and the Appeals Court (which is the last stop for appeals before the Supreme Court) if “the question is of such public moment as to require early determination according to executive message of the Governor addressed to the Supreme Court”. Snyder’s request was an “Executive Message”. So the first item is basically asking “did he meet this requirement?”
The second item refers to MCR 7.302(B)(4)(b) which allows for appeal directly from a lower court to the Supreme court if it “is from a ruling that a provision of the Michigan Constitution, a Michigan Statute, a rule or regulation included in the Michigan Administrative Code, or any other action of the legislative or executive branch of state government is invalid”. In this case, we’re talking about a Michigan Statute (that’s what Public Act 4 is) so, if the Ingham Circut Court rules that it is invalid, the Snyder administration can then leapfrog the Appeals Court and go directly to the Supreme Court under this rule. So, the second item basically asks “is this ‘urgency’ made less urgent by the fact that the Snyder administration will be able to do this if the Circuit Court rules against them?”
The fact that the Supreme Court didn’t agree to Governor’s Snyder’s request suggests that his case is weak. The lower courts are normally the place where discovery happens; where both sides present their facts and arguments. These are then used in subsequent decisions. The Supreme Court seems to be signalling that things aren’t so cut-and-dry as the Governor suggests they are and that they need more information. If that is the case, it seems to me that they will be inclined to let the normal judicial process play out as it should. They’ve also made it clear that they are not lapdogs for the Republican Party. Recall that the Supreme Court has issued smackdowns to Rep. Paul Scott regarding his recall no less than three times recently as well.
The Sugar Law Center issued a press release welcoming this decision.
“Instead of immediately granting the governor’s request to take up this case, the Supreme Court is challenging the Snyder administration to address why an urgent appeal short-circuiting the normal judicial process is necessary ,” said Tova Perlmutter, Executive Director of the Sugar Law Center. […]
Sugar Law’s Legal Director, John Philo, said the appropriate place for the case for the facts to be developed and to be first heard is in Ingham County Circuit Court. Philo has asked the court to reject the administration’s request to bypass the trial court and make an immediate decision in the case.
“Initial fact-finding and critical evidence occurs at the circuit court level,” said Philo. “This is why we have an established judicial system and for the governor to want to skip that process is troubling.”
VOD COMPILED CHART ABOVE, BASED ON ERNST & YOUNG REPORT
Mayor, City Council plan severe cuts based on faulty report
Even Ernst & Young disavows results: “reliance on this report prohibited by any third party”
By Diane Bukowski
Analysis
November 21, 2011
Mayor Dave Bing with buddies the Rev. "Swindell" Anthony and Confederate flag waving Kid Rock
DETROIT – Mayor Dave Bing and the City Council are basing their demands for up to 2,300 lay-offs, an increase in city income taxes, privatization and/or regionalization of Public Lighting, D-DOT and Health, 10 percent wage cuts, and 30 percent health care co-pays (amounting in reality to a 300 percent increase in all health costs), on a financial report from Ernst & Young that may be no more than another example of Wall Street cooking the books.
The report claims the city will face a $44.1 million cash “shortfall” by June 30, 2012. But EY disowns the report in a disclaimer, prohibiting reliance on it by “third parties.” Their report also makes clear that the “shortfall” is primarily due to the city’s debt payments.
Bing and the Council have talked about “shared sacrifice” from workers and residents, and even miniscule corporate cuts and taxes along with the $220 million the state owes Detroit (and, as Bing admitted on Channel 4’s “Flashpoint” Nov. 20, will not pay any time soon, such as before June 30.)
Occupy Wall Street protesters target the banks
But the one entity they have left out of the discussion is THE BANKS!
How could they miss that? What have tens of thousands of people been occupying Wall Street and more than 100 cities across the U.S. about? IT’S THE BANKS, STUPID!
According to Ernst & Young’s figures, the banks will get over one half-billion dollars from the city this year. Previous analyses by VOD show that half of that is interest. SO MAKE THE BANKS PAY the alleged $44 million cash shortfall out of the interest. After all, they got ftrillions from taxpayers in bail-outs.
In the 1930’s, Detroit Mayor Frank Murphy declared a moratorium on the city’s debt to the banks and campaigned for national legislation to allow it.
After his address to the city Nov. 16 (see video below) Bing published the EY report on the city’s website, first discussing it in an illegal secret session with the City Council October 26. (Click on Ernst Young Cash Flow Update[1] for the entire 29 PAGES of the report, which the city paid EY $1.7 million to produce.)
While this reporter is not an accountant or a rocket scientist, as most Detroiters are not, one really only needs common sense to review the report and see what’s wrong.
Even Ernst & Young, a global auditing firm which faces lawsuits from New York and New Jersey for cooking Lehman Brothers’ books before the sub-prime mortgage meltdown, disowns the report.
In a strict disclaimer, it states on page 29 that the “Cash Flow Forecast Report” is the product solely of City of Detroit management. (Are they afraid of being sued again?)
“With respect to prospective financial information relative to COD, Ernst & Young LLP (“EY”) did not examine, compile or apply agreed upon procedures to such information in accordance with attestation standards established by the AICPA [American Institute of Certified Public Accountants] and EY expresses no assurance of any kind on the information presented. EY did not assist in the preparation or assembly of COD’s prospective financial information or in the development of any assumptions therein.”
Robbing the poor to pay the rich: Council members (l to r) Gary Brown, Saunteel Jenkins and Charles Pugh have all demanded that tcity workers take more concessions
The disclaimer concludes, “Accordingly, reliance on this report is prohibited by any third party as the projected financial information herein is subject to material change and may not reflect actual results.”
(Excuse me–does that include third parties like the city’s unions and workers, who are to be at the table with first party Bing Nov. 22 to “negotiate” possible concessions, the city’s residents, and even — heaven forbid–the City Council?)
VOD compiled a summary of key information from the report, which includes the city’s actual and projected receipts, disbursements, and debt payments, from July 1, 2011 through June 30, 2012. Review the chart above–hopefully it won’t spoil your turkey day.
For those who missed it, below is the video of Bing’s vaunted speech to the city Nov. 16. But, poor man, despite the fact that he demanded 1,000 lay-offs, a 10 percent wage cut and health care cuts from the city workers, the City Council and the city’s daily media declared him a total wuss with not enough backbone to bring in the guillotine.
More on what our illustrious City Council members views shortly.
Charles Jones with his only daughter Aiyana during happier days
Charles Jones still held on murder charges, while Officer Joseph Weekley, who kllled 7-year-old child, is home with his family for Thanksgiving
By Diane Bukowski
Nov. 18, 2011
DETROIT—Chauncey Owens is asserting his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent in a murder case brought against Charles Jones, father of Aiyana Stanley-Jones,7. Detroit police officer Joseph Weekley shot the child to death during a horrendous Special Response Team (SRT) raid on her home May 16, 2010.
The announcement was made today at the start of Mr. Jones’ preliminary examination on first-degree murder charges in the death of Je’Rean Blake, 17. The prosecution had expected Owens, who is the fiancé of Mr. Jones’ sister LaKrystal Sanders, to be the main witness against Mr. Jones. Owens has already pled guilty to second-degree murder in the case.
Attorney David Cripps and Chauncey Owens during court hearing April 11, 2011
“My brother is incarcerated over hearsay,” Mr. Jones’ sister Erica said after the hearing. “The police officer who killed my niece will be home with his family for Thanksgiving while my brother is in jail away from his family. My brother is only guilty of losing his child. That is jail time itself, never to see his only daughter out of seven children walk across the stage at graduation or be married, his little princess.”
She, Mr. Jones’ mother Mertilla Jones, Aiyana’s mother Dominika Stanley, and at least 15 other family members and friends of Mr. Jones were present to support him, but were not allowed into the courtroom by court officers.
Family members said that police conducted a second raid of Mr. Jones home in Ypsilanti, Michigan, where he moved after Aiyana’s killing, during his arrest, holding guns on his toddlers and searching the place without a warrant.
Among those honoring Assistan Prosecutor Augustus Hutting (second from right) were (l-r) Wayne County Chief Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Richard Hathaway, Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy and Third Circuit Court Judge Timothy M. Kenny. Photo by John Meiu
Detroit police claim they originally went to Mr. Jones’ previous address on Detroit’s poverty-stricken east side last year to arrest Owens for the Blake killing, which took place in a local liquor store parking lot, two days earlier. Owens lived in the flat upstairs from Aiyana’s family.
After nearly one and a half years, Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy announced in October that a “one man grand jury” had charged Mr.Weekley only with manslaughter and reckless use of a firearm. No charges were brought against other officers who participated in the raid, which was being filmed for A&E’s “First 48” series.
The “one-man grand jury” was Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Timothy Kenny, a member of the right-wing Federalist Society.
Liquor store at St. Jean and Mack where Je'Rean Blake was killed May 14, 2010; community had campaigned to keep store out of neighborhood
The same day, Ms. Worthy charged Mr. Jones with first-degree murder, perjury and multiple felony firearms charges in the Blake killing. The charges claim Mr. Jones supplied Mr. Owens with the gun.
Mr. Weekley was released on personal bond while Mr. Jones was held without bail.
“I filed a motion of assertion of Mr. Owens’ Fifth Amendment right not to give testimony, and placed it in the court file today,” said Owens’ attorney David Cripps. “There is obviously a change of circumstances in how Mr. Owens views this case. Mr. Owens is really a stand-up guy, the strongest young man I have met.”
Local daily media has reported that Mr. Owens named Mr. Jones in the case as part of a plea deal in April. However, this reporter thoroughly reviewed numerous statements in Mr. Owens’ court file, in which he never named Jones.
His sentencing has since been postponed three times. It is now scheduled for Dec. 2 in front of Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Richard Skutt.
Thirty-Sixth District Court Judge Donna Robinson Milhouse granted Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor Robert Moran an adjournment until Monday, Nov. 28 at 1:30 p.m., to allow time for him “to find out if anything is preventing Mr. Owens from coming forward.” He also said he wanted to inform Mr. Owens of the consequences of his decision.
Judge Milhouse denied Mr. Jones’ attorney Leon Weiss’ motions to dismiss the case, or at least release Jones on bond during the holiday. Weiss is from the well-known law firm of Fieger, Fieger, Kenny, Giroux and Danzig, which is representing Aiyana’s parents in a civil lawsuit against Weekley.
“I oppose the adjournment,” Weiss said. “There is not good cause, the case should be dismissed. My client Charles Jones has been incarcerated for almost six weeks. I’ve been through the discovery records in his case at least ten times. We vehemently deny that my client provided the gun, and now we have the prosecution’s main witness saying he will not testify.”
Charles Jones' defense attorney Leon Weiss
Weiss said the only other eyewitness the prosecution plans to bring saw one man alone exit a van and allegedly shoot Blake, in the parking lot of a local liquor store.
Cripps said later, “This adjournment will not change my client’s mind about testifying.”
During the brief hearing, an entire row of seats was occupied by Je’Rean Blake’s family and friends, including his mother Lyvonne Cargill. A witness reported that she was on the scene moments after his shooting. It is unclear if she is scheduled to testify at Mr. Jones’ trial. Ms. Cargill wiped tears from her eyes as she heard that Owens would not testify.
Aiyana Stanley-Jones' family members on front porch with couch she was killed on; they had moved it to the front porch the morning of her death May 16, 2010; window shattered by police grenade is at upper left.
Mr. Jones’ mother Mertilla Jones, still in deep grief, said she had just been released from the hospital with heart problems. She has lost two siblings since her grandduaghter’s violent death. She said she is so stricken that she cannot bear to see her other grandchildren because Aiyana is not among them.
Ms. Jones was sleeping with Aiyana on a couch under the flat’s front window, which police shattered with an incendiary grenade. She watched seconds later as Weekley shot the child in the head.
Another SRT team member, Officer Kata-Ante Taylor, picked up the child and ran with her out of the house despite the family’s pleas to let her father see her, according to Attorney Jonathan Marko, who is handling the civil suit against Weekley.
SRT member Kata-Ante Taylor took Aiyana's body out of house; he also killed Artrell Dickerson, 18 in 2008
Police have identified Mr. Taylor as the officer who shot 18-year-old Artrell Dickerson to death in front of Detroit’s Cantrell Funeral Home in 2008. Witnesses told this reporter that he stood over the already-wounded Mr. Dickerson and pumped more bullets into his back as he lay on the ground. No charges were brought against Taylor in that case or in the Jones case.
Ms. Jones was immediately arrested and drug tested, but later released. Police claimed she “interfered” with Weekley and caused his gun to go off. She has vehemently denied the claim.
Trial dates for Weekley and an A&E photographer, Allison Howard, charged with perjury for allegedly lying about showing the A&E videotape to a “third party,” have been set for March 2, 2011, in front of Wayne County Circuit Court Cynthia Gray Hathaway.
More than 300 people were arrested across the United States on Thursday in a series of protests marking the two months since the start of the Occupy Wall Street movement. In New York, which was again the focus of the now global movement, tens of thousands of protesters, including thousands of union members, walked across the iconic Brooklyn Bridge in a show of solidarity.
Published: November 17
NEW YORK — Occupy Wall Street protesters clogged streets and tied up traffic around the U.S. on Thursday to mark two months since the movement’s birth and signal they aren’t ready to quit, despite the breakup of many of their encampments by police. Hundreds of people were arrested, most of them in New York.
The demonstrations — which took place in cities including Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Boston, Washington and Portland, Ore. — were for the most part peaceful. Most of the arrests were for blocking streets, and the traffic disruptions were brief.
After a judge ruled that Occupy protesters do not have a right to camp in New York’s Zuccotti Park, demonstrators returned there. Early Tuesday, police cleared the encampment at the park.
Union members from SEIU and Good Jobs LA march with Occupy LA through California Plaza on the morning of November 17, 2011 N17
Chanting “All day, all week, shut down Wall Street,” more than 1,000 protesters gathered near the New York Stock Exchange and sat down in several intersections. Helmeted police officers broke up some of the gatherings, and operations at the stock market were not disrupted.
As darkness fell, a coalition of unions and progressive groups joined Occupy demonstrators in staging rallies at landmark bridges in several U.S. cities to protest joblessness.
In New York, a crowd of several thousand people, led by banner-carrying members of the Service Employees International Union, jammed Manhattan’s Foley Square and then marched peacefully across the Brooklyn Bridge on a pedestrian promenade.
Police strike protesters with batons on live TV. After eight UC Berkeley students protesting tuition hikes chained themselves together on a narrow ledge atop the University’s historic Wheeler Hall, authorities decided they’d gone too far. As hundreds of the students’ supporters rallied and chanted on the building’s steps, police arrived to break up the demonstration and things got ugly.
As they walked, a powerful light projected the slogan “We are the 99 percent” — a reference to the Americans who aren’t super-rich — on the side of a nearby skyscraper. Police officers dressed in wind breakers, rather than riot gear, arrested at least two dozen people who walked out onto the bridges’ roadway but otherwise let the marchers pass without incident.
Several weeks ago, an attempt to march across the bridge drew the first significant international attention to the Occupy movement as more than 700 people were arrested.
On November 17 2011, on conjunction with the worldwide Occupy Everything Day, the Occupy St. Louis protesters took over the abandoned city’s municipal courts building after being evicted from Kiener Plaza the week before.
Thursday’s protests came two days after police raided and demolished the encampment at lower Manhattan’s Zuccotti Park that had served as headquarters of the Occupy movement and as demonstrators and union allies tried to regain their momentum.
“This is a critical moment for the movement given what happened the other night,” said demonstrator Paul Knick, a software engineer from Montclair, N.J. “It seems like there’s a concerted effort to stop the movement, and I’m here to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
At least 300 people were arrested in New York. Some were bloodied during the arrests. One man was taken into custody for throwing liquid, possibly vinegar, into the faces of several police officers, authorities said. Many demonstrators were carrying vinegar as an antidote for pepper spray.
A police officer, Matthew Walters, needed 20 stitches on his hand after he was hit with a piece of thrown glass, police said.
In Los Angeles, about 500 sympathizers marched downtown between the Bank of America tower and Wells Fargo Plaza, chanting, “Banks got bailed out, we got sold out!” More than two dozen people were arrested.
Police arrested 21 demonstrators in Las Vegas, and 20 were led away in plastic handcuffs in Portland, Ore., for sitting down on a bridge. At least a dozen were arrested in St. Louis in the evening after they sat down cross-legged and locked arms in an attempt to block a bridge over the Mississippi River. More were handcuffed for blocking bridges in Philadelphia and Minneapolis.
OCCUPY CHICAGO NOV. 17
In Chicago, hundreds of protesters organized by labor and community groups marched toward the Chicago River. They stopped at the river bridge and shut it down to rush-hour traffic. Police officers scrambled to divert cars and pedestrians. People watched the protests from office windows and bus stops.
In Seattle, hundreds of Occupy Seattle and labor demonstrators shut down the University Bridge as part of a national day of action demanding jobs. Traffic was snarled around Seattle’s University District as two rallies marched toward the bridge.
OCCUPY SEATTLE
After a judge ruled that Occupy protesters do not have a right to camp in New York’s Zuccotti Park, demonstrators returned there. Early Tuesday, police cleared the encampment at the park.
Several of the demonstrations coincided with an event planned months earlier by a coalition of unions and liberal groups, including Moveon.org and the SEIU, in which out-of-work people walked over bridges in several cities to protest high unemployment.
The street demonstrations also marked two months since the Occupy movement sprang to life in New York on Sept. 17. They were planned well before police raided a number of encampments over the past few days but were seen by some activists as a way to demonstrate their resolve in the wake of the crackdown.
OCCOPY LAS VEGAS PROTESTERS MARCHED ON FEDERAL BUILDING, INTERRUPTED CNN BROADCAST WITH CHANTS; 21 ARRESTED
thursday’s demonstrations around Wall Street brought taxis and delivery trucks to a halt, but police were largely effective at keeping the protests confined to just a few blocks. Officers allowed Wall Street workers through the barricades, but only after checking their IDs.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg said police had been expecting as many as 10,000 protesters based on what activists had been saying online. But he said there had been “minimal disruption.”
Occupy Boston was joined by trade unions in a march through Downtown and the North End / Waterfront to the Charlestown Bridge.
“Most protesters have, in all fairness, acted responsibly,” he said after visiting an injured police officer in the hospital.
Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said officers confiscated metal devices that some demonstrators had apparently planned to use to lock themselves into the entrances to Wall Street businesses.
The demonstration that drew thousands of people to Foley Square in the evening was a rarity in the Occupy movement: Union organizers obtained a permit from the city, and speakers were allowed to use a sound system.
VOD on Occupy Detroit: The questionable character of OD came out when they called on Detroit police to join them and then bragged about it. Earlier, they refused requests from union activists and others to occupy Detroit’s Water Board Building as a racist federal takeover of the country’s fourth largest water and sewerage system takes place, and also called for regionalization of Detroit’s transit system in this 86 percent African-American city. On Nov. 18, when their extended permit expired, they politely pulled up their tents as Mayor Dave Bing and other government officials lit the city’s Christmas tree a few blocks from their encampment. (VOD: as OWS says: SHAME!)
Among the demonstrators arrested in New York was a retired Philadelphia police captain, Ray Lewis, who was taken into custody in his dress uniform. Others included actor and director Andre Gregory, who said he hoped the movement would lead to national action on economic injustice.
“It’s a possible beginning of something positive,” he said.
Some onlookers applauded the demonstrators from open windows. Others yelled, “Get a job!”
“I don’t understand their logic,” said Adam Lieberman, as he struggled to navigate police barricades on his way to work at JPMorgan Chase. “When you go into business, you go into business to make as much money as you can. And that’s what banks do. They’re trying to make a profit.”
Gene Williams, a bond trader, joked that he was “one of the bad guys” but said he empathized with the demonstrators: “The fact of the matter is, there is a schism between the rich and the poor, and it’s getting wider.”
The confrontations followed early morning arrests in other cities. In Dallas, police evicted dozens of protesters near City Hall, citing health and safety reasons. Eighteen protesters were arrested. Two demonstrators were arrested and about 20 tents removed at the University of California, Berkeley.
City officials and demonstrators were trying to decide their next step in Philadelphia, where about 100 protesters were under orders to clear out to make way for a long-planned $50 million plaza renovation at City Hall. Union leaders pressed the demonstrators to leave, saying construction jobs were stake.
Associated Press writers Colleen Long, Jennifer Peltz, Meghan Barr in New York contributed to this story.
Nov. 17, 2011: To watch today’s events as they unfold during OWS’ Day of Action v. Austerity, especially in New York, where demonstratrors are marching on the New York Stock Exchange and planning to occupy the subways as well, click on:
Occupy Detroit demanded tax the rich for good DDOT transit during march Oct. 28, 2011
(VOD ed.: AFSCME Council 25 is also calling public workers and the community to participate at 4:30 p.m. in a march outside CAYMC vs. takeover of Water Department, Bing’s cuts –see next two posts.)
From the Direct Action Committee, Occupy Detroit
In response to a nationwide call from Occupy Wall St. to protest austerity cuts: A teach-in and rally at Grand Circus Park at 3pm followed by a march to the Coleman A. Young Center at 4pm.
Dear Friends of Occupy Detroit,
Thursday, November 17 is a National Day of Action to Resist Austerity.
Austerity means more sacrifices from the 99% so that the 1% can impose its political and economic agenda. Here in Detroit we would like to focus on opposing the cuts to public services and the recently passed Emergency Manager bill. That law hijacks the democratic rights of voters, public sector workers and the entire community. This is done in the name of erasing a deficit. But why is there a deficit?
Thousands from Occupy Detroit marched down Woodward to establish first camp in October
While speculation continues, the economy is drowning us in debt, foreclosing on our homes, eliminating our jobs and closing our schools and hospitals. The war machine demands to be fed. This is the logic of austerity — squeezing money from the meager services that remain and funneling it into armies and prisons and more tax breaks for the wealthy.
As we can see in the case of the takeover of the Detroit Public Schools, Emergency Managers collect large salaries while cutting the wages and benefits of public school workers. Teachers have been moved around as if they are cards in a deck. With little data to back up the claims, charter schools are extolled while public schools are closed. The resulting chaos has forced many parents to take their children out of the public schools. And, not surprisingly, the Detroit public school debt has risen and the banks demand payment. We see something wrong with this picture.
Rick-tator Snyder and Mayor Dave Bing conspired to establish PA 4, Bing now threatening to implement it in Detroit
Emergency Managers are put in place by the governor, not the people. By taking away any semblance of a democratic process, the law undermines our ability act in our own best interests. Emergency Managers act in the interests of the wealthy, bleeding the public sector to cover debts we’re not responsible for. The fact that Emergency Managers have thus far only been appointed to predominantly African-American cities and school districts highlights the structural racism of these power grabs. We have the capacity to make our own decisions; we have the strength to stand together. An Injury to One is an Injury to All!
Politicians and the media demonize teachers, office workers and those who need social services. We all need public services—libraries, schools, youth and senior centers, parks and a myriad infrastructural services. We will not stand by while children go hungry, while families are refused access to water and heat, while already inadequate transportation undergoes another round of cuts. We say no to cuts that destroy the social fabric of our community! We are for jobs and the welfare of the entire community!
We ask you to join Occupy Detroit in a rally and march against austerity on Thursday, November 17. We will march against cutbacks demanded of city, county and state workers. We march against the Emergency Manager legislation. We demand that our society prioritize human rights–not the maximization of corporate profit.
Join us on November 17 for a 3PM rally in Grand Circus Park. At 4PM we will march to the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center at the foot of Woodward. Our route will pass the Rosa Parks Bus Center (Bagley & Cass) and then march by the Wayne County offices in the Guardian Building on Griswold before reaching the municipal center at 4:30PM. We will rally there from 4:30-5:30PM.
No to Cuts! No to Austerity! No to Emergency Managers!
Marie Thornton, former Detroit school board member who fought emergency managers, school closings, and costly private contracts for eight years, helps lead first Occupy Detroit action; 87 percent of Detroit Public Schools state aid goes to pay debt.
AFSCME Local 2920 President Thomas B. Johnson II address union leaders at Nov. 10, 2011 press conference opposing Judge Sean Cox’s water department takeover
AFSCME Co. 25 files motion to intervene, bar contract changes
City union leaders join to support AFSCME
Rally set for Thurs. Nov. 17, 4:30 p.m. at CAYMC
By Diane Bukowski
Nov. 14, 2011
DETROIT – In the wake of a mass press conference held by city union leaders Nov. 10, Michigan AFSCME Council 25 on Nov. 14 filed a motion to intervene in the federal lawsuit against the water department and to bar massive changes to AFSCME’s contract with the city.
The union has also called on union members, the community, and Occupy Detroit to rally Thurs. Nov.17 at 4:30 p.m. outside the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center,then march to the Guardian Building, where embattled Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano’s offices are located.
George W. Bush appointed Cox to federal bench
On Nov. 4, U.S. District Court Judge Sean Cox issued a broad order attacking the rights of workers, Detroit residents, and the City Council with respect to the Detroit Water & Sewerage Department (DWSD) under union contracts and the City Charter. He also barred actions brought with the Michigan Employment Relations Commission and state courts challenging his ruling.
During the press conference, union leaders likened Cox to a slavemaster.
Cox and Detroit
“Cox is treating Detroit like it’s a slave plantation he gets to run,” said Attorney George Washington. Susan Glaser, president of the Senior Accountants, Analysts and Appraisers Association (SAAA), compared his naming of a “Special Master” to the appointment of a plantation overseer.
The motion, filed by Attorney Herbert Sanders of the Sanders Law Firm, contends that Cox’s Nov. 4 order violates the contracts and takings clauses of the U.S. Constitution. It also demands that Cox permanently bar “the modification, amendment, or termination of the AFSCME collective bargaining agreement.”
It notes that AFSCME was never contacted by Cox regarding his changes to its contract.
It says, “None of the recommended changes to the AFSCME collective bargaining agreement are even remotely connected to enforcement of the Clean Water Act.” The federal lawsuit against DWSD, #77-71100, under which Cox acted, was filed in 1977, specifically to address violations of that Act.
Atty. George Washington, Local 207 officers John RIehl and Mike Mulholland announce lawsuit against Synagro contract Jan. 26, 2099
“We are standing in defense of our city workers, members, and residents,” John Riehl, president of AFSCME Local 207, which represents 1,000 DWSD workers, said Nov. 10. “Detroit deserves better treatment of its workers and residents.” (Click on Riehl declaration to read Riehl’s affidavit filed in Cox’a court.)
Riehl noted, “Our union was highly instrumental in exposing and defeating the Synagro contract, brought by the Kwame Kilpatrick administration. Judge Cox’s order threatens to reinstate the same corruption that existed then.”
The U.S. Justice Department has brought extensive charges against Kilpatrick, former Water Department Director Victor Mercado, Kilpatrick aides, City Council member Monica Conyers and city council aides, among others, related to the Synagro contract.
BOWC chair James Fausone, representing Wayne County
Cox’s order largely transfers contracting and rate setting powers to the seven-member Detroit Board of Water Commissioners (BOWC). It is now dominated by three suburban commissioners because they have veto power on contract and rate votes, which require a supermajority. Many, like BOWC chair James Fausone, representing Wayne County, have ties to water contractors.
The entire Wayne County administration under Ficano is also now under investigation by the U.S. Justice Department largely related to allegedly corrupt contracting practices.
Riehl said the city administration has caused many problems with Clean Water Act compliance by understaffing the water department.
“There is a brain and experience drain because of attacks on pension rights,” he explained. “Every week, 10 0r more DWSD workers retire before more attacks come. The real shortages started under Kilpatrick and [former Water Department director Victor] Mercado with lay-offs and privatization.”
Former DWSD director Victor Mercado and former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, both under federal indictment
Kilpatrick laid off hundreds of DWSD workers in 2006 after Local 207 voted against a take-back contract.
The Council 25 motion contends among other declarations, “The collective bargaining agreement . . . encourages management to maintain a full staff of regular workers capable of running the plant on a daily basis. Daily operations and maintenance are subjected to better quality control and greater collective knowledge and skills when this work is done in-house.”
Thomas B. Johnson II is president of AFSCME Local 2920, which represents clerical and other city-wide classifications at DWSD.
Local 2920 Pres. Thomas B. Johnson II
“There is too much management and too many consultants in the Water Department, who have carte blanche to do whatever they want to do,” he said. “The Water Department has never been under a deficit so there has been no reason to lay-off our workers.”
Cox’s order bars city workers from other departments from using their seniority rights to bump into DWSD if they are laid off, as Mayor Bing is threatening. It thus represents an attack on ALL city workers, not just those at DWSD, Johnson agreed.
“Cox is trying to bust our unions,” Dempsey Addison, president of the Association of Professional and Technical Employees (APTE). “We are not going to stand for this. Nobody has absolute power, not even a judge.”
APTE Pres. Dempsey Addison at first Occupy Detroit march
Washington said that if Cox denies the union’s motion to intervene, “We will be in the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in 24 hours.”
Cox held a “status conference” on the AFSCME motion Nov. 14. Further details were not available at press time.
Detroit’s City Council earlier voted to hire its own attorney to advise it on Cox’s order, which overrules many of its powers, but to date has filed no action. Cox appointed Detroit City Council President Charles Pugh and President Pro-Tem Gary Brown to a four-member committee which issued a “Committee Plan” to him Nov. 2 recommending many of the changes he ordered.
SEAN COX CHAIRS U-M LAW SCHOOL MEETING OF RIGHT-WING FEDERALIST SOCIETY (video below)
The Federalist Society’s Student Division presented this speech and commentary at the 2008 Annual Student Symposium on March 8, 2008.
Speech and Commentary: An Originalist Judge and the Media
–Justice Stephen Markman, Michigan Supreme Court
–Prof. Richard Primus, University of Michigan Law School
–Mr. Pete Williams, NBC News
–Moderator: Judge Sean Cox, United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan
Mayor Bing uses shadowy E & Y report to demand city cutbacks
CUT DEBT TO THE BANKS, NOT WORKERS AND SERVICES!
By Diane Bukowski
November 14, 2011
Ernst & Young Detroit building towers over Campus Martius
DETROIT – Ernst & Young, author of the secret report on Detroit’s finances that Mayor Dave Bing is brandishing like a cudgel over the heads of workers and residents, faces lawsuits by the states of New York and New Jersey for actively helping Lehman Brothers cook their books over a seven year period.
Lehman, worth $600 billion, collapsed in 2008 in the largest bankruptcy filing in U.S. history. Its collapse was a key factor in the Wall Street’s subprime mortgage meltdown.
Despite Ernst & Young’s reputation, Bing is demanding heavy concessions from city workers and residents, after meeting in an illegal secret session with the entire City Council Oct. 26 to discuss the firm’s report. He plans to address the city as a whole about city finances Nov. 16 at 6 p.m. at the Northwest Activities Center.
Mayor Dave Bing listens approvingly to Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano discussing cutbacks during interview at 2009 Mackinac Island conference
Bing met with leaders of the city’s 40 plus union s Nov. 8 and gave them a two week deadline to comply with his demands.
Leamon Wilson, president of Local 312 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), said Bing specifically refused to give union leaders at the meeting the Ernst & Young report.
“He said the city will be broke by late April and he wants to cut $64 million,” Wilson reported. “He wants to eliminate furlough days and instead institute a 10 percent pay cut, replace overtime with straight time, get rid of the pension multiplier, totally privatize maintenance at DDOT, and lay-off 1000 workers. He ended the meeting with only four questions from us. He also said he doesn’t want to be the city’s emergency manager, that he was elected to be Mayor.”
City workers demand no attacks on pensions
Regarding Bing’s stance on becoming Detroit’s EM, Nolan Finley of the Detroit News commented Nov. 13, “The emergency manager law allows for public officials to ask for a consent agreement from the state that bestows on them certain powers of a state-appointed manager, without surrendering local control. That includes the ability to revise contracts to reduce budget-busting pension and health care obligations.”
Bing additionally demanded that city workers pay 30 percent of the cost of their health care, up 10 percent, saying the cuts in total would result in $118 million annually in savings. (Click on BINGS-UNION-DISCUSSION-POINTS[1] for copy of document Bing gave to the union leaders.)
Union leaders left the meeting enraged.
AFSCME Co. 25 President Al Garrett (r), Metro Detroit AFL-CIO President Saundra Williams (center)
Al Garrett, president of Michigan AFSCME Council 25, said, “Cuts and more cuts and more cuts, with little regret for the families of those who work for the city! At the end of the day he is saying your jobs still won’t be safe, but while you’re waiting to become unemployed, you’re going to make less, pay more for your health care, and decimate whatever pensions you’re going to get, and that’s life in Detroit.”
The Oct. 26 City Council agenda says the closed session on the Ernst & Young report was held to “discuss a privileged and confidential memo submitted by the Law Department dated October 21, 2011 entitled Report by Ernst & Young, LLP, Concerning the City of Detroit’s Cash Flow Analysis in the General Fund Area Beginning May 1, 2011 through August 26, 2011 as it Relates to the Emergency Financial Manager Legislation Otherwise Known as ‘The Local Government and School District Fiscal Accountability Act.’”
Council Pres. Pro-tem Gary Brown, Member Saunteel Jenkins, Pres. Charles Pugh; all have endorsed worker cuts
On the same day, the Council held another closed session to discuss another “privileged and confidential” matter: “The Necessity of Emergency Procurement for the Detroit Public Lighting Department for the Installation of New Lighting and Repair of the Grid System.” It later voted 5-4 for a three-quarter million dollar contract with DTE to fix 500 street lights out of 12,000 that are out.
The Council has also scheduled a Nov. 16 closed session “to discuss privileged and confidential legal opinions submitted by RAD and the Law Department entitled (1) Legal Rationale for Proposed Amendment of the Privatization Ordinance dated October 26, 2011; (2) City of Detroit Privatization Ordinance dated October 3, 2011; and (3) Documents Supporting the Proposed Ordinance to Amend Article V, Chapter 18 of the 1984 Detroit City Code, Finance and Taxation, Purchased and Supplies, Division 8, Privatization of Certain City Services, commonly known as the “Privatization Ordinance.”
Closed sessions of bodies like the City Council, by state statute, are narrowly limited to discussions of matters like lawsuits.
All Council members were contacted for their response on whether they voted for the secret session on the Ernst & Young report, whether they believed it was legal, and their stance on Bing’s demands to the unions. No council members had responded by press time.
Ernst & Young offices in New York
The Voice of Detroit and the Detroit Free Press have filed Freedom of Information Act requests for the Ernst & Young report, which cost $1.7 million of taxpayer funds, with the city’s Law Department.
VOD also contacted Ernst & Young’s media director Charles Perkins for comment on the New York and New Jersey lawsuits, with no response before press time.
New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo filed that state’s suit against Ernst & Young in December, 2010.
WPP CEO Sir Martin Sorrell gestures next to Ernst & Young CEO and chairman James S. Turley during a session untitled "What Is the New Economic Reality?" on the opening day of the World Economic Forum annual meeting on January 26, 2011 in Davos. AFP PHOTO / FABRICE COFFRINI)
In a release, he said Ernst & Young engaged in accounting fraud for seven years, explicitly approving the surreptitious removal of tens of billions of dollars in liabilities from Lehman’s balance sheet, transferring it temporarily to overseas banks, in order to deceive the public and the market about the company’s true financial condition.
“This practice was a house-of-cards business model designed to hide billions in liabilities in the years before Lehman collapsed,” Cuomo said in a release. “Just as troubling, a global accounting firm, tasked with auditing Lehman’s financial statements, helped hide this crucial information from the investing public. Our lawsuit seeks to recover the fees collected by Ernst & Young while it was supposed to be using accountable, honest measures to protect the public.”
The Wall Street Journal reported in October, 2010 that the state of New Jersey had re-instituted legal action against the company.
“New Jersey’s investment division, which manages pension- and retirement-plan funds for over 700,000 state workers, including teachers, police and firemen, pumped $385 million into Lehman, purchasing a combination of stock and notes from the investment bank before its collapse,” said the WSJ. It said New Jersey lost $192 million on its Lehman investment.
“[Ernst & Young’s] review reports were false, as E&Y knew or should have known that Lehman’s quarterly financial statements were not prepared in accordance with ‘generally accepted accounting principles,’” the WSJ quotes from the suit. “E&Y had no reasonable basis for issuing its clean audit and review reports.”
Bail Out the People, not the Banks march on Wall Street
One of the Big Four accounting firms, Ernst & Young is headquartered in London, UK, and has member companies in over 140 countries, with global revenues of $22.9 billion. In 2010, Forbes magazine ranked it as the ninth largest private company in the U.S.
It has offices all over the world, including one on Wall Street and a spanking brand new green glass building glowering over downtown Detroit.
It is part of the global cabal of banks, mortgage companies and professional services firms which created the current economic crisis. They are now demanding that workers and poor people suffer for their actions.
Crains’ Detroit Business reported from an interview with the City Council’s fiscal analyst Irvin Corley in April of this year that the city cannot borrow more money to shore up its finances.
“The city can’t fund its deficit with borrowed money,” Corley said according to the article. “Detroit’s low credit rating makes short-term borrowing too expensive, long-term borrowing would require state legislation, and the city lacks a revenue stream to pledge as security for another bond sale.”
In June, Fitch Ratings downgraded Detroit’s Unlimited General Obligation bonds to BB- and its Limited General Obligation Bonds to B+, “outlook negative.” (Click on Fitch Downgrades Detroit bond ratings June 2011 for full report. It states essentially that Detroit’s decline was caused by the national economic crisis, which of course in turn was caused by Lehman Bros., Ernst & Young, Fitch Ratings, et. al.)
Among other reasons Fitch cited for the downgrade:
“The debt burden is exceptionally high, offset somewhat by a sizable amount of pension obligation bonds that result in well-funded pension plans.” Detroit borrowed $1.2 BILLION in pension obligation bonds in 2006. How that debt “offsets” the city’s other debt remains to be seen.
(L to r) Detroit CFO Sean Werdlow, Stephen Murphy of Standard & Poors, Joe O'Keefe of Fitch, and Deputy Mayor Saul Green urge City Countil to borrow $1.2 billion in pension bonds in 2006
Ironically, Fitch representative Joe O’Keefe recommended in 2006 that Detroit borrow that money, despite heavy opposition from some City Council members, who had to be forced to the table by police to make up a quorum.
At the time, O’Keefe said Fitch rated the city “A,” with a negative outlook if the city did not enact lay-offs and service cutbacks to deal with a $300 million budget deficit.
The Kwame Kilpatrick administration and the City Council borrowed the money. In 2009, the lender, UBS Financial Services, called in the debt, which would have caused total economic collapse in Detroit. The lender, among whose agents was former Mayor Dennis Archer, compromised by agreeing that bank trustees would directly receive Detroit’s casino tax revenues and state-revenue sharing funds so that the $1.2 billion debt would be paid before all else.
Therefore, according to recent reports, half of the city’s vendors, including those who supply parts for its buses, are going unpaid, and the city is threatening payless paydays for its workers.
According to Detroit’s 2010 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report, the city’s total debt is approximately $7.7 billion, including the $1.2 billion pension obligation certificates.
Also according to the 2010 CAFR the city was scheduled to pay a total of $433,691,964 in debt to the banks in 2011. Of that, $216,418,043 was to be in interest alone. THE INTEREST ALONE IS FAR GREATER THAN THE CITY’S DEFICIT!
The U.S. government has bailed out the banks to the tune of trillions of dollars–time for the banks to put their heads on the chopping block, not the workers and people of Detroit.
US SUPREME COURT TO LOOK AT LIFE IN PRISON FOR JUVENILES
WASHINGTON November 7, 2011 (AP)
The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to decide whether juveniles convicted of killing someone may be locked up for life with no chance of parole, a follow-up to last year’s ruling barring such sentences for teenagers whose crimes do not include killing.
The justices will examine a pair of cases from the South involving young killers who are serving life sentences for crimes they committed when they were 14.
Kuntrell Jackson
Both cases were brought by the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Ala. The institute said that life without parole for children so young “is cruel and unusual” and violates the Constitution.
The group says roughly six dozen people in 18 states are under life sentences and ineligible for parole for crimes they committed at 13 or 14.
Kuntrell Jackson was sentenced to life in prison in Arkansas after the shooting death of a store clerk during an attempted robbery in 1999. Another boy shot the clerk, but because Jackson was present he was convicted of capital murder and aggravated robbery.
Evan Miller, foreground, and Colby Smith, wait for a jailer to take them back to the lockup after the teens pleaded not-guilty to capital murder and robbery charges Thursday. Photo by Clyde Stancil 2/2/06
Evan Miller was convicted of capital murder during the course of arson. A neighbor, while doing drugs and drinking with Miller and a 16-year-old boy, attacked Miller. Intoxicated, Miller and his friend beat the man and set fire to his home, killing the 52-year-old man. Miller’s friend testified against him, and got life in prison with the possibility of parole.
The high court has moved toward judging juveniles less responsible than adults when considering severe sentences.
The high court ruled out the use of the death penalty for people under 18 in 2005. In May 2010, the court said that teenagers may not be locked up for life without a chance of parole if they haven’t killed anyone. Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the majority opinion in both of those decisions.
“The identical analysis which led to the results in those cases logically compels the conclusion that consigning a 14-year-old to die in prison through a life-without-parole sentence categorically violates the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments,” Miller’s lawyer Bryan Stevenson said in court papers. The Supreme Court should “make that logical conclusion the law of the land.”
The court will hear arguments next year.
The cases are Miller v. Alabama, 10-9646 and Jackson v. Arkansas, 10-9647.
VOD: click on the following links to read Supreme Court questions and state court of appeals decisions in the cases:
The U.S. Supreme Court has decided to hear two cases involving whether life sentences without chance of parole for minors in death cases constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.
With more “juvenile lifers” serving the mandatory sentences in Michigan than almost any other state, 358, the high court’s decision could have a large impact here.
The ruling comes as a similar case makes its way through federal court in Detroit. It was not immediately clear what impact Monday’s decision will have on the progress of the Michigan case.
In deciding to hear the two new cases, the Supreme Court is potentially extending the reach of two recent decisions involving how juveniles are treated in adult court.
In 2010, the court extended protections, ruling a minor could not be sentenced to life without parole in non-homicide cases.
In both cases, the majority of justices ruled juveniles’ mental abilities are lesser developed than adults, and sentencing them as such violates the Eighth Amendment protection against cruel and unusual punishment.
The new cases would move the bar even further, banning mandatory life involving juvenile homicides, including when the juvenile was present at a crime, but did not commit the actual killing. About one-third of Michigan juvenile lifers fall in that category.
Both inmates in the cases involve 14-year-olds. But some Supreme Court watchers believe the justices would be unlikely to confine their ruling to that specific age, given their prior rulings using the 18th birthday as the constitutional dividing line.
There are about 70 such prisoners nationwide, according to the Equal Justice Initiative, a nonprofit law firm in Alabama that represents the inmates.
Six juvenile lifers in in Michigan were 14 at the time of their crimes, including Dontez Tillman, the state’s youngest. He was profiled Monday on Mlive.com.
