The following guest post was written by Nate Breznau of Mannheim Centre for European Social Research. He is the co-author of a new study that looked at the disparate racial impact of Michigan’s Emergency Manager law, Public Act 436. The academic study proves that the elements involved in the imposition of an Emergency Manager in a city go beyond simple […]

The headlines tell the tale: The Detroit News: Task force: EM decisions led to Flint crisis Detroit Free Press: Task force slams Flint crisis, demands review of emergency manager law The Wall Street Journal: Michigan Officials Responsible for Flint Water Crisis, Panel Finds The Guardian: Flint water crisis was ‘environmental injustice’, governor’s taskforce finds The Washington Post: Scathing independent report […]

The term “Emergency Manager” was not invented by Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder and his corporatist Republican colleagues. In fact, Emergency Managers existed before that crew got around to passing what is perhaps the most anti-democratic legislation ever seen in the United States. According to the U.S. Council of the International Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM), Emergency Managers are professionals whose […]

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder began his opening statement before the House Government Oversight Committee hearing on the Flint water crisis by saying, “I am not going to point fingers.” In the same statement and in comments made during questioning, he then blamed the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the failure to […]

Yesterday’s Flint water crisis hearing held by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee was an astonishing thing to watch. As the beleaguered city is still reeling from the poisoning of its drinking water and the death of at least nine people from Legionnaires’ Disease, one of the men chiefly responsible for the catastrophe declared said that he’s been “unjustly […]

As we know all too well here in Michigan, once an Emergency Manager takes over a city, none of the elected leaders holds any power. In fact, anything they have done up to that point is considered to have been done by an inept, possibly corrupt, group of elected officials. Otherwise, an Emergency Manager wouldn’t have been needed. It’s at […]

It’s a uniquely Michigan story. To pinch pennies — saving $5 million, a tiny fraction of the hundreds of millions in corporate tax cuts Rick Snyder and Republicans have handed out while slashing government services — a city had its drinking water switched and poisoned with lead by an autocratic “emergency manager” who was appointed by and only reported to […]

With Emergency Managers now a four-letter word in Michigan, the Snyder administration has come up with a new way to take over public schools without having to invoke the epithet. In their on-going effort to “run government like a business”, they have appointed a “School District Chief Executive Officer (CEO)” for East Detroit Public Schools: A chief executive officer will […]

NOTE: There is simply too much news arising from the poisoning of Flint’s drinking water to do separate posts for everything. Therefore, I am assembling various news items into a single news round-up on a semi-regular basis. You can follow all of our coverage HERE. Former Snyder advisor concedes that “running government like a business” led to the poisoning of […]

While Flint contends with poisoned water, Gov. Snyder throws an opulent party in Ann Arbor Mark Maynard has an explosive post up at his site that starts with a description of a party he had gotten wind of: I got word this past weekend that there was a secret party taking place in downtown Ann Arbor, a posh event inside […]

On Monday, Michigan Democrat David Knezek introduced Senate Bill 734. The bill contains a single sentence: The local financial stability and choice act, 2012 PA 436, MCL 141.1541 to 141.1575, is repealed. Wouldn’t it be beautiful if the entire anti-democratic failed experiment known as Michigan’s Emergency Manager law, a law and policy that has done so much harm to our […]