Role of Community Influencers & Using Fiscal Solvency cont…
Detroiters clearly wanted to get out from under State Control. Ken Burney explains it himself:
“Lack of Leadership Continuity since June 30, 2005 I was CEO for 4 years; the (State Reform
Board under Mayoral Control) ask to me remain 5 years; the takeover legislation lacked
transition features should the vote return the district to the board. My intent was never to go
beyond the fifth; this was a family agreement. Since I left the district June 30, 2005, 41/2 years
ago, there have been 4 superintendents and 1 financial manager. …Kozol pointed this out years
ago; our progress since has been minimal, compared to what an all out commitment could have
produced. Our Administration’s Efforts made Our Predecessors Job’s Easier Mr. Bobb your
job is easier because the state learned that the take over structure under which we worked
caused too much consternation. You do not have to attend board meetings that are out of
control. The initial Reform Board removed disorderly people and prosecuted them. The Reform
Board under the next mayor allowed the meetings to become disorderly again to the point of the
inability to meet, the board being rushed from the stage and escorted out to the building.
Currently you are only the Emergency Financial Manger however, with out a board or a mayor
to report to you would be the sole recipient all anger. We accomplished so in DPS that the
Detroit News Edi torial Board said, “Dr. Burnley you have accomplished so much in such a
short period of time it is amazing. How much of this do you think you would have accomplished
under the former board? We eliminated 4400 positions closed 71 schools, reduced the salaries
and benefits of administrators. For these and many other tough decisions we made, the back
windows of my home received pellet gun holes, my car were damaged, my home address was
published on radio, protest marches occurred around my house. These are just a few issues I
hope you never have to experience.
Yes! Parents and voters were angry. They had been promised DPS would use the prepared neighborhood community plans
on the $1.5 billion dollar bond with minority construction companies the community had approved, and what they got was
crystal chandeliers and marble tiles in the Fisher Building and closed schools in their neighborhoods and the first huge wave
of 44,000 students leaving the district.
No one wanted what Burnley did the first time. No one wanted it again.
Yet here the wordsmiths are, with Robert Bobb acting for the State among them, working with outstate conservative
marketing firms, to figure out how to trick the community into accepting a model which removes the minority voter, and puts
their members in control over the money, not just DPS money, but all Federal and State dollars. The fact that the State agents
imposed over us, like Robert Bobb, would have loyalty to out-state corporate interests is deceitful. Being initiated into the
Coalition’s goings on, Steve Wasko wrote to Tonya Allen to voice concerns about what essentially amounted to a lack of
democracy and authenticity.
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