Bloggin’ on the Edge

Posted by Scott Spielman at 12:41 PM | Comments | Permanent Link

I trudged up the stairs at the Old Village School in Northville Tuesday night, and a familiar figure was at the top, talking on the phone.

“Dude,” I told him as I shook his hand, “you need to get a life.”

It was State Rep. Marc Corriveau (D-Northville), popping in to give an update to the Northville Public School Board. I’ve talked before about how impressed—and surprised—I was that he regularly attended meetings throughout his district and, as his second term in the House winds down, that hasn’t changed.

School Superintendent Leonard Rezmierski hit upon it at the meeting, too.

“Not many districts have their state representative attend board meetings to explain the bad news,” he said.

He’s right. Corriveau was, in fact, there to explain some bad news: the impact of a ‘cuts-only’ budget on school districts across the state. He could have shipped off a form letter or had a staffer send out a mass emailing, but he was there in person and that’s worth noting.

The meeting summed up the challenges facing districts across the state, too. Within a two-hour period, the Northville School Board recognized several teachers who had earned distinction within their profession and later talked about the necessity of cuts that will ultimately make their jobs harder.

Maybe if more legislators made the rounds like Corriveau, this wouldn’t have to be.

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Posted by Scott Spielman at 12:45 PM | Comments (1) | Permanent Link

I was looking through the job description for the director of public safety in Van Buren Township, and wondering what type of candidate will apply for the job.

The board approved the description at their last meeting, and notices have since gone out.

Obviously, this will be a well-debated interview and hiring process, given what’s taken place in the community during the past year.

In some ways, the job description sells the township short. It requires only a minimum of a bachelor’s degree in public administration, public safety/emergency management, criminal justice, fire science or a related field. Maybe this was done to favor somebody who has already expressed an interest in the job, or to widen the candidate pool, but many police departments require a bachelor’s degree for entry-level police officers.

I bring this up because I think there will only be two ways the township will be successful in this. They’ll either go the fiscally smart route and put off hiring a director, or they need to find someone whose qualifications can’t be debated.

My big question about this originates in the reputation Van Buren Township earned throughout the past year. I was asked about it wherever I went in western Wayne County. The issue caused traffic to our website to spike up to about 140,000 hits in February. The law enforcement community is relatively close-knit, too, so I wonder what brave soul would be willing to put in for the spot.

In that, the township board has an advantage. They don’t need to hire anyone, and can reject all candidates if they feel they didn’t get enough qualified responses. That’s something for everyone to keep in mind.

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Posted by Scott Spielman at 3:29 PM | Comments (1) | Permanent Link

I’ve always had a few conspiracy theories about the price of gas as it relates to national—and sometimes regional—politics.

Congressman Thad McCotter has this to say about it recently.

Perhaps we should develop some kind of ‘educated idiot’ award on a local or regional scale (assuming McCotter doesn’t have a copyright, of course). I can think of a few that would fall under that category…

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Posted by Scott Spielman at 7:34 PM | Comments (1) | Permanent Link

I’m heading down to the City of Wayne tonight, where residents will get some concrete evidence of the financial crisis facing the city.

It comes under the ‘neighborhood ratio study’ portion of the agenda, where city officials talk about the changes in residential property assessments.

I suppose I’m one of the lucky ones; my property value only dropped 14.6 percent for the year, which is about average for the city. Of course, I doubt that is the bottom, since the abandoned and gutted house next door to me hasn’t been factored in and I doubt that the raccoon that moved in has a whole lot of money to spend (and why pay a mortgage when you can squat, anyway?).

Some neighborhoods dropped as much as 16.3 percent while one, which is actually pretty close to my home, only dipped an inexplicable .4 percent. I’ll have to look into that to make it…explicable.

Still, it shows what the city is dealing with. A drop in assessed value usually means a drop in revenue, too. Does that mean that residents should eliminate the one benefit they’re seeing from this downturn—a lower tax bill—and approve one or both of the millages the city is requesting?

I haven’t made up my mind on that.

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Posted by Scott Spielman at 1:24 PM | Comments (1) | Permanent Link

A press release came across yesterday with an eye-opening subject line:

“Slavens: Patterson’s Off His Rocker!”

It was about State Sen. Bruce Patterson’s (R-Canton) no vote against a ban for lifetime health benefits state legislators receive after the age of 55—even if they’ve only served for six years.

“I think Bruce Patterson is all wrong,” Slavens said. “We should be working to protect the autoworker who lost his job and his health care coverage, or the small business owner struggling to provide health care for himself or his hard-working employees—the perks of politicians.

“Our lawmakers must share in the sacrifices that families all across Michigan are being forced to make every day,” she added in the release. “That’s why I am giving up this extravagant perk for myself and I will keep fighting to pass my stronger plan to hold all state lawmakers accountable—including Mr. Patterson.”

I’ll be following up on this, because I think it’s an interesting situation. Slavens’ husband, Mark, ran unsuccessfully against Patterson prior to the latter Slavens’ appointment to a judgeship.

“What I find personally interesting is that she said I’m nuts,” Patterson said. “Why didn’t she say anything about the nine Democrats who voted the same way I did—and adopted my floor statement as their own?”

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