Here is my Sunday column …
Oversight.
On Capitol Hill, congressional oversight serves as a routine procedure, with committees routinely questioning representatives of the executive branch. But the county charter, based largely on the president/Congress relationship, unfortunately left out any oversight duties for the 13-member Board of Commissioners.
As a result, the new government is dominated by County Executive Mark Hackel in a way that was barely imagined, while the board sits on the sidelines, trying to keep busy in between the infrequent budget matters that come to its attention.
What we’re faced with now is a government embroiled in lengthy conflicts based on executive vetoes, one of which extends into 2012 and could result in a lawsuit pitting the board against the executive.
This is not the co-equal branches of government that voters were promised.
If they were given oversight authority, the commissioners could routinely hold meetings at which they would scrutinize and criticize policies, procedures and goals of each department. Even if they can’t dictate, the commissioners could surely question the administration’s actions in a public forum.
Instead, the give and take between these two branches is not debated openly by elected officials, it is hammered out behind closed doors by competing attorneys.
This is not the way it was supposed to be.
Shortly after Hackel took control one year ago, the executive’s office seemed to recede into a cocoon. The commissioners were stunned when the executive initially would not allow his department heads to appear before their committees. At that point, some of the longtime supporters of a charter/executive government were nothing less than distraught.
The atmosphere was more akin to a university professor’s classroom lecture than a meeting of a decision-making body.
Overall, the voter-approved charter, in many respects, fulfilled its promise. Limits on taxes and spending. A slimmed down government bureaucracy. A line-item veto for the executive.
But what about “checks and balances?” How about the supposed power-sharing?
Those principles were cast aside as the 13-member board’s “power of the purse strings” rarely comes into play.
This is not transparency in government.
Frankly, the restrictions on the commissioners devised by the Charter Commission emerged from the former board’s inclination toward political pettiness and dysfunction, which amounted to a model of inefficiency.
Unfortunately, the new system sometimes consists of a replacement of 26 shrill voices with 13 shrill voices. The penchant for micromanaging, debating minutiae and becoming bogged down by competing personalities still surfaces on a routine basis.
Meanwhile, Hackel has demonstrated his skills as a charismatic leader, a county spokesman, a CEO with an eye on the big picture — at times. But he waited far too long, until a strangely scheduled December State of the County Address, to establish a vision. That speech, delivered in an energized format accompanied by three huge-screen videos, may have been precedent-setting. But it was also 10 months too late.
In the first six months of the year, while the executive’s staff waded into the countless details of launching a new government, Hackel was strangely quiet, shunning the media spotlight.
The charter mandated that the commissioners create ethics rules in the first year. But the board, slumbering through much of the summer months, never took that task seriously until August.
The need to develop a new purchasing ordinance was put off for much of the year until, in November, the commissioners finally realized that the Hackel administration had been signing contracts while leaving them in the dark.
Now, the contracts issue may result in a court fight. Hackel, in a very un-Macomb-like manner, has raised objections to the board approving any contract above $15,000.
This followed on the heels of a surprising decision by the executive that was also far out of the mainstream of Macomb County politics — expanding his personal staff beyond what the charter allows.
Yet, the biggest power play by Hackel may have come when he eliminated the public Water Quality Board and replaced it with an advisory board on water issues that reports only to him and meets behind closed doors. The commissioners were powerless to challenge the decision.
Hackel is right on target when he pushes for a Blue Water Initiative that takes advantage of the many opportunities provided by Lake St.Clair and the Clinton River. But if he chooses to bury the concerns about pollution pouring into the lake and river, he will be left with a Brown Water Initiative.
As the year progressed, county board Chair Kathy Vosburg took a tentative approach, seemingly eager not to pick a fight with the executive’s office. But her acknowledgement of the board’s shrunken duties, combined with her end-of-the-year statement skewering Hackel’s forcefulness, signaled a welcome change.
If the part-time commissioners become comfortable with a 2012 schedule that requires them to work only three days a month — at a salary of nearly $31,000, plus a full benefits package — then maybe a more robust set of duties, including oversight responsibilities, is simply too much of a reach.
Nonetheless, the pay and benefits must be addressed. It’s largely forgotten that the Charter Commission which drew up Macomb’s first county constitution expected the new board to quickly adopt a pay ordinance. Some charter commissioners envisioned a system that limited the commissioners’ pay to $15,000 or even less. And it’s worth noting that most members of the Board of Commissioners are either retired or hold a second job, which means the generous pay and perks are more about gravy than bread and water.
In 2008-09, I suspect none of the 26 charter commissioners realized what a weak legislative branch they were creating. There is still time to fix this before “three days a month” becomes the norm, as political power consolidates and insiders shape the status quo to their favor.
If the commissioners are unwilling to push for true oversight, perhaps the Macomb voters will petition for a charter amendment that could make it happen.
For the most part, the charter, building on the momentum of countless people who made this happen, going back to 1986, establishes a number of reforms that foster good government. I suspect it’s now increasingly understood that, in practice, the document is saddled by this one major flaw. A mistake, not a conspiracy.
But politics has a way of making months and years of goodwill dissolve into partisan and personal power plays.
After all these years, the clock is still ticking.
Just curious, would you be printing the same thing had Bruley won as the Executive Chad? I find it laughable you call yourself a "political" reporter. More like a hack with a column out to destroy Hackel.
So what did Bruley promise you anyway?
I guess you'll never answer that one. BTW, have the Daily techies block my URL again.
Hackel has not been scrupulous, any business individual that funded his reelection is now able to get more county business at inflated prices, see Nick's or King's Towing, it is unbelievable.