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...is this Saturday & Sunday, December 4th & 5th at Cass Technical High School, 2501 Second Avenue. There will be presentations from City Council & the Mayor's Office, focusing on their recommendations for charter revisions. City Council has submitted some recommendations, which will be the focus of discussion. They can be found here:
http://2009dcrc.org/CityCouncilRecommendations.aspx
Here is an OpEd piece from the Freep:
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a...te=fullarticle
I couldn't make the saturday all-day session, instead I went to the Sunday, 1 pm - 5 pm session.. at Cass Tech, in their main auditorium. It was sparsely attended. Maybe 2-3 people in every row of seats, generally..
when it came time for comments from the public, some suggestions included a Vice-Mayor to run along with the mayoral candidates.. a publicly elected Police chief instead of an appointed position.. City council getting approval power over mayoral appointments.. some advocated not going to a district based system of council.. there were some reasoned statements, and a lot of emotionally-laded rhetoric.. some assumed the worst of a district system, implying that wealthier districts would get more development/maintenance assistance.. many openly bashed urban farming, frequently using slavery/plantation metaphors..
There was a presentation by the ACLU of Detroit to offer their take on certain charter issues.. some attendees apparently had no idea who the ACLU was, and started carping to Ken Harris, questioning the group's Detroit bonafides..
John E. Johnson discussed the Preamble and Declaration of Rights in the Charter, including revisions that were made in 1974 and 1997..
Thanks for the update, Hypestyles.
I tried to make it both days, but couldn't.
I am bummed...felt OK about it all weekend, because MANY of my friends in Corktown, Downtown, and Woodbridge told me they were going to be there...so I didn't feel too bad about missing it.
Damnit!
Now to see what they do with the rest of the process. We've got at least two trustworthy members on the committee, and from the interactions with a few others I had at that first meeting...there are more on the board genuinely interested in not letting Detroit suffer again what happened during the previous administration especially...and to correct things so we may move forward in this town.
Mschievous, I'll be in touch later...and will make myself available for any collating, sorting, and arranging of the data gathered at these meetings...or any other backroom philosophical and policy discussions. I've assembled a list of things we should be striving for, with regards to the troubles we suffered during those cartoonish dayz o' Kwhyme. Doing this sort of mathematical or logical analysis is a walk in the park for me...and it always helps me frame unique solutions to complex problems.
Sincerely,
John