Tamika Gaines Im SURE of one of TWO Things will happen after you read this! You will be more informed or you will Defend these lies! Either way I did my job I got you the information!!!!! Mayoral candidate Mike Duggan Mayoral candidate Mike Duggan: Duggan discusses the Detroit EM, police, blight, and his campaign in an interview with The Detroit News... editorial board. Detroit— Mayoral candidate Mike Duggan has hinged most of his campaign on his expertise as a turnaround expert who can revive a city in bankruptcy court, but critics contend his record is cause for concern. Duggan says he helped save Wayne County government, the Detroit suburban bus system and the Detroit Medical Center from financial collapse. He says he balanced budgets in the county and wracked up profits at the formerly money-losing DMC, giving him an edge over opponent Benny Napoleon, the Wayne County sheriff, in the Nov. 5 election. But skeptics point out that Duggan served under Wayne County Executive Ed McNamara, whose administration was dogged by accusations of cronyism. They note at least one audit that criticized several no-bid contracts when he was county prosecutor. Others have questioned his role overseeing the Detroit Public Schools’ summer bond project in 1999. But Duggan says it’s nothing more than a negative spin put out by his competitors, namely the Napoleon campaign. Most allegations have surfaced in a recent email making the rounds in political circles. “It’s been circulated by the Napoleon campaign, including by Napoleon’s campaign manager, so I think people see it for what it is,” Duggan said. From his tenure at the DMC, Duggan boasts of eight straight years of profitability after he took over in 2004. The health care system hadn’t turned a profit since 1997. At SMART, Duggan eliminated a deficit, helped get voter approval of a property tax to finance the system and spurred a 50 percent increase in bus service. The record has earned the backing of many Metro Detroit area corporate leaders and the Detroit Regional Chamber as well as several unions and a Detroit retiree group. But the email circulating in social media called “The 9 lives of Mike Duggan: 20 years of Corruption” cites media stories about Duggan’s record in the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office, DMC and leading a portion of Detroit Public Schools’ bond project. Among the allegations: ■Duggan and the now-deceased McNamara “carved out” county deals that were “borderline illegal,” according to a surveillance recording of Bernard Kilpatrick, former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s father, talking to a Synegro official — as The News reported in January. Duggan denies any wrongdoing. Duggan said U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade made it clear the day the tape was played in court that just because his name was mentioned doesn’t mean there was any wrongdoing. “The Kilpatrick trial went on for five months and my name came up once,” Duggan said. “It’s once more than I would have liked. It was a statement Kilpatrick made trying to con sombody out of money. People can take it for what it’s worth.” ■Critics accuse him of steering some of the $76 million he oversaw in no-bid contracts for summer Detroit school rebuilding work to campaign contributors in his bid for Wayne County prosecutor, The News reported in October 1999. “I made a policy not to take a single donation. I never took a single donation from any DPS contractor,” Duggan said. In 1999, he told The News the bidding process was “open” but different than usual because there were no architectural drawings for the summer work and “everyone who wanted work got work.” ■There were no competitive bids required for about $830,000 worth of contracts awarded to vendors, as outlined in audits of the Prosecutor’s Office from 2000 to 2003. That was about 75 percent of the contracts, the audit said. A second audit said it found the office did not use about $448,000 in authorized grants as a result of poor budgeting and lack of understanding of grant requirements. It also said the county’s general fund absorbed more than $30,000 in denied grant expenditures and no documentation for $68,000 in mileage and travel expenses. Former auditor general Brendan Dunleavy described the findings given to Prosecutor Kym Worthy as troubling, particularly the use of federal monies in what he called an illegal way. No charges were filed. “The report speaks for itself,” Dunleavy said. “It was no worse than most of the stuff we found in the administration at the time. It’s the way they ran business.” Duggan said the audits were released one year after he left the prosecutor’s office and he was not consulted, as protocol required. No information has ever been provided to him, he said. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to respond to a report with no documentation. I wasn’t given the documentation nine years ago and now,” Duggan said. “We had no input, no chance to respond and, when it came out, no chance to respond. I can’t even tell you what contracts are referred (to), and the information has never been provided to me.” Duggan’s association with McNamara also has been questioned. In 2002, 20 FBI agents and Michigan State Police troopers searched McNamara’s offices and campaign headquarters, putting him at the center of a wide-ranging probe. McNamara was never charged, but two former officials under him were convicted. Wilbourne Kelley III, a former airport official, served a prison term on bribery and extortion-related charges. Kelley and his wife Barbara were convicted of accepting more than $125,000 in gifts from a contractor who had been awarded $20 million in contracts at Detroit Metropolitan Airport. Wade McCann, a former county assistant prosecutor, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor for directing an intern to assemble a database of political donors on county time. Duggan got a letter from then-U.S. attorney Jeffrey Collins saying he was not a target of the probe. Political analyst Eric Foster said attacking Duggan on those issues won’t have much impact in the mayor’s race because they don’t rise to the level of the City Hall corruption or other scandals in the region. Foster, who was the campaign manager this year for failed Detroit mayoral candidate state Rep. Fred Durhal, said a more substantive criticism of Duggan would be to question his cutting of SMART bus routes in Detroit and the generation of budget deficits in the county prosecutor’s office. “Whether it makes business sense or not, (the route cuts) were still something that did hurt a lot of people and their ability to get back and forth to work,” Foster said. Political consultant Steve Hood said Detroiters are fortunate to have two solid candidates and said Duggan would make a good mayor. Bill Ballenger, publisher of Inside Michigan Politics, said Duggan is running a superior campaign and is likely to win on Nov. 5. Although Duggan has emphasized his turnaround record in the weeks since the Aug. 6 primary, while accumulating endorsements from some labor unions and about three dozen ministers, he also laid out a neighborhood revitalization plan. The 10-point plan includes proposing the creation of a Department of Neighborhoods, which would consolidate 14 agencies into a one-stop shop to deal with code enforcement, vacant lots, dangerous building demolition and federal block grant funds. The plan also includes a nuisance abatement initiative he launched as county prosecutor. Duggan also has tried to show his can-do spirit by offering to work with the Detroit City Council to create a Belle Isle alternative to Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr’s 30-year lease deal with the state that would match the savings proposed by the state. In the end, the council proposed its own lease alternative and Duggan decided not to offer his plan. The council acted, Duggan campaign manager Bryan Barnhill said, and “We respect their actions.” The candidate, who has spent about 30 years in public service, said he has nothing to hide. “I’ve lived my whole life in the public spotlight,” Duggan said.
Posted on: Fri, 18 Oct 2013 15:16:02 +0000
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