Thought Experiment: Consolidating 3 Counties into 1

[Hermod]

I guess a lot of people feel their jobs would be on the chopping block if merging of services were to occur. That will be another obstacle.

Fire every last one of them and let them reapply for their jobs with Semi County.

[bailey]

Fire every last one of them and let them reapply for their jobs with Semi County.

well, if that's the logic...then why have any counties at all? Lets just have one statewide government...one State PD...one State FD....one State School district....etc, amiright? Get rid of the 1000s of government bodies because EFFICIENCY!

[BankruptcyGuy]

Bucket, I love thinking big. Even if it doesn't seem feasible or politically viable.

I think there's a much better scenario that gets efficiencies while still preserving local control.

1) No county merge
2) All fire departments are replaced with a county fire department
3) All police departments are replaced by county sheriff [[many communities already contract out to the sheriff)
4) All school districts dissolve and ISD's\RESA's do schools at a county level [[Florida already has this)
5) Cities remain intact and are allowed to do everything else

This would result in HUGE efficiencies while still leaving local control intact for many functions. I would foresee the hardest to swallow part of my plan to be the school districts dissolving.

#4 is demonstrably less efficient than the current system. Wayne RESA is managed so much more poorly than our local districts it's hard to describe.

Many of us who have worked for small and large companies in our industries would agree--bigger is not necessarily more efficient.

[ABetterDetroit]

#4 is demonstrably less efficient than the current system. Wayne RESA is managed so much more poorly than our local districts it's hard to describe.

Many of us who have worked for small and large companies in our industries would agree--bigger is not necessarily more efficient.

Great analogy, I agree completely. How anyone can think bigger is always "more efficient" in government is pretty amazing considering the example the federal government sets.

[EastsideAl]

I don't think this sort of consolidation would be all that beneficial. it would probably create more problems than it would solve, and would create a potentially very ugly internal competition for resources. It would basically turn the tri-county area into a sort of mini-state, with much more limited fiscal authority.

That, and the fact that it doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell of happening.

However, there are certainly a number of areas where we could all benefit from much greater regional cooperation. And perhaps we could see a number of services run or managed by regional authorities. Starting, of course, with transit. Getting over the past animosities and distrust will be tough, and will require strong sensible modern leadership, but the costs of not doing so are now getting too high.

[ronaldj]

Again, I am talking out of my backside here. I love Toronto. Do not mind paying the price during a visit. The Greater Metropolitan area is subsidized by the Province of Ontario. Talk to a Torontonian. You will get the picture and the vitriol. Jesus, I could not afford to smoke there.

[1953]

I like the plan - and, it was proposed as a thought experiment, so the idea is not to comment on whether or not it would actually happen. The idea is to comment on what it would be like, how it would work, etc.

That said, we could normalize the shapes and governance structures of some of our 139 municipalities, we could tout ourselves as more important in national discussions, and we could have more influence in Lansing and DC.

Also, we could adopt the Detroit flag for the whole region, growing its use and annual sales.

1953

[Scottathew]

#4 is demonstrably less efficient than the current system. Wayne RESA is managed so much more poorly than our local districts it's hard to describe.

Many of us who have worked for small and large companies in our industries would agree--bigger is not necessarily more efficient.

I'm much more experienced with Oakland ISD, which is becoming a lot more relevant in Oakland County via technical services.

For over a decade Oakland ISD has had a private fiber ring in place that provides high speed internet to all districts [[districts pay for this). Now Oakland ISD is starting to provide technical services for smaller districts like Clawson, Royal Oak, and Ferndale.

My exposure to Wayne RESA is much more limited, and I haven't been impressed with the little bit that I've seen.

[Hypestyles]

as long as folks of a certain hue and social worldview feel that "their money" is simply going to "support welfare cheats, career criminals & corrupt inner-city officials" it's not going to happen.