In Our Power
This week, images of FBI agents raiding Detroit City Council offices and homes flashed across the news media. Council members Janee Ayers and Scott Benson, as well as staff members, were raided in a federal investigation into public corruption. This raid comes just weeks after the Council member Andre Spivey was charged with bribery. Of the nine council members elected in the last cycle, four are now tainted with real or imagined charges of corruption. All have been strong allies of the Mayor and have steadfastly backed corporate interests.
Over the last four years, I have been on the opposite side of most issues that Ayers, Benson, and Spivey have supported. Ayers and Benson in particular have done all they could to gut community benefit agreements, encourage surveillance technologies, limit citizen oversight, and scuttle a true water affordability plan. They have used their committee power to stall, delay, and dilute community driven efforts at increasing public accountability and budget transparency. For these reasons, neither Benson nor Ayers deserve to be reelected to the City Council.
But I take no joy in this wave of investigations. There is no doubt, whatever the outcome, media will portray these investigations as yet another sign that Detroit, a majority Black city, is exceptionally corrupt. This image of public corruption becomes another argument in the restriction of voting rights, fueling the white supremist idea that African Americans cannot govern.
To be sure, we have had a colorful history of public corruption, and much of it has been fueled by a media circus, catering to the white supremist imagination, attacking the achievements, as well as the follies, of powerful African Americans. For example, it came as a shock to most white folks in Southeast Michigan to learn that Coleman A Young, as mayor, not only fought corruption in the police department, but ran one of the most fiscally responsible cities in America.
These current raids are part of the work of the Detroit Area Public Corruption Task Force of the FBI, organized in 2012 , and still going strong. In 2019, the head of the task force acknowledged, "We definitely have a more significant corruption issue here in the Michigan region. But we are rooting it out a lot more than other people. We have a long-term campaign here to root out public corruption."
In recent years the FBI has focused its efforts in Macomb County, securing more than a dozen convictions there. Yet media rarely emphasizes the corrupt nature of Detroits predominantly white neighbors. Since 2008, when Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick was indicted for public corruption and racketeering, more than 100 politicians, union bosses, bureaucrats and police officers have been charged with corruption.
The best way to get rid of public corruption is to elect officials who are honest and wish to serve the people of the city. We have that opportunity this November. Many of the people running for City Council are people who have proven their commitment to the city, worked tirelessly to benefit people, and have a strong base of support.
In addition, many candidates, and a minority on the current Council, have been pushing for greater accountability and transparency in government. These citizen led initiatives are critical in providing a framework to protect all of us from corporate avarice.
We have the opportunity to create a progressive, imaginative, and thoughtful city government, committed to bold changes. This is in our power.