Let others believe Detroit problems deserve regional concern and responses, Oakland County's chief executive suggests in a characteristically frank Oakland Press interview.
Using words such as "insult," "Infuriated" and "doomed," L. Brooks Patterson makes clear he has no room for that sink-or-swim-together stuff.
Here's some of what he tells Charles Crumm after Gov. Rick Snyder's declaration Friday that Detroit has a financial emergency:
- Pessimism: "It's doomed to failure. Detroit is so far beyond the pale. A manager should have been in there a year or two ago. . . . The law doesn't give the emergency manager the autocratic powers he'll need in order to go in there and sever contracts, and really go in there and grab Detroit by the heels and shake it up."
- Bankruptcy: "If a bankruptcy hits, then all hell breaks loose. I'll lose my AAA bond rating, which raises the cost of doing business for Oakland County government by a couple million dollars a year. I don't need that insult."
- "I would be infuriated:" The federal judge in bankruptcy could order a regional tax to bail the city out, just as it did with the [Pontiac] school system . . . Wayne, Oakland and Macomb tapped to help the city, which I would be infuriated because why are you tapping me to help Detroit when they won't help themselves?"
- EM candidates: "None of my guys want the job."
- Self-censorship: "It's just a quintessential cluster down there and I just don't think Detroit has many options on the table." [Yes, he omits the customary word after "cluster."]
-- Alan Stamm
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The Oakland Press
