At the 11th hour on Wednesday, Mayor Dave Bing blindsided the city council by announcing he wasn't on board in the fight against the governor installing a financial emergency manager.
Fox2 reported that the council had assumed Bing was going to join in a united front against the governor's plan. The council earlier in the afternoon had voted 7-1 to take a stand against an emergency manager and fight the matter in Lansing.
Then about 20 minutes before Bing was to hold a press conference, he told city council members Gary Brown and Ken Cockrel that he would not fight the emergency manager plan. Brown said he opposed the fight without the mayor being on board.
Fox2 reported that the rest of the council learned of Bing's position from the press conference.
"If he doesn't want to move forward with it, that's fine, but it's unfortunate that we have to find out about it at a press conference," council member James Tate told Fox2.
Bing said he was not in favor of an emergency manager, and it was futile to keep fighting the matter. Fox2 reported that the mayor had told the governor the day before he would not oppose an EM.
"We need to stop BS'ing ourselves, quite frankly, and get on with this because all we're going to do is hurt the citizens of Detroit," Bing said.
"We need to end the drama and the infighting and understand that whether we like it or not, an emergency financial manager is coming to Detroit," he added.
