Dicking Ludington Democracy

[XLFD]

Richard Wilson has been the primary City Attorney for Ludington for about ten years, and his service has not been without controversy.  This is an attorney who submitted for three years, invoices asking for extra special project billings at a rate that was up to $140 per hour more than what his contract entitled him or other lawyers in his firm. Where was the outrage by this city council the first time I brought this up in 2014? There was none. The second time, none. The third time, none. Even though I had sent them records showing this and the city manager's complicity in signing the 38 billing invoices with them.  

At the same time, I was telling them of another conspiracy involving City Manager Shay funneling money to Wilson via 'special legal billings' when the money was directly going to a cost of services consultant firm.  The invoices I eventually received through FOIA requests clearly showed that Beauchamp's consultant work for cost of service analysis and studies was being done for the City of Ludington with plenty of conferences with City Manager Shay and others in the city's utility wing. Yet, our city council had been out of the loop-- they never approved anybody contracting with UFS, as they need to do by charter, especially when the funds used are tens of thousands of dollars. 

These are the grandest past crimes of Dick Wilson that have been caught and ignored by the city government other than having Wilson voluntarily pay some of the money he wasn't entitled to back. His latest misdeed comes at the expense of democracy in Ludington.  Our city charter allows the electors to choose an autonomous city treasurer every four years, or shortly after the office gets vacated.  This posts a special problem to those who play with the city treasury with mostly impunity, like the aforementioned Shay and Wilson, as they need to have a special type of treasurer allow their special accounting practices that can be seen as unethical or illegal by most.  

As noted in Shay Usurps the Power of the Purse the push is on to make a new type of Ludington treasurer that does not comply with the charter's version.  To make sure a complicit treasurer is available, the position and its employees are scheduled to become subservient to Shay, and be that way for 2.5 years, as somehow they make the case that election law will not allow the people to vote for a treasurer in November 2018, the regular election nearly four months after the current treasurer's official last day.  

To make that case, City Attorney Dick Wilson has adapted a narrative that not even fellow officials seem ready to believe, as can be witnessed at the May 8th, 2018 meeting:

May 8th, 2018 Ludington City Council meeting from Mason County District Library on Vimeo.

Councilor Brandy Henderson (1:44:00 in): "We received a memo in tonight's packet, that was also made public, regarding the appointment/election of the city treasurer and for the record I would like to say that I respectfully disagree with the interpretation, and I think the issue and an abundance of others have made clear to me and others that we really need to take some time and prioritize getting our city charter cleaned up and revised, and so I hope we can make that a priority and move forward."

Attorney Dick Wilson: "Brandy, what I didn't say in the memo was that, is that the city clerk, Deb Luskin, and I have had many conversations with the bureau of elections trying to get this some way to the November 2018 election and they simply said it's not going to happen, and so ... they were fine with that with the mayor as I explained in the memo, but they weren't hearing anything about doing this in 2018, so..."

And the topic changed without further comment.  The memo was in the May 7 Council packet p. 221, the heading reproduced below:

A torturous argument follows that mercifully terminates with the following conclusions:

And if these rationales are understandable and seem like the only interpretations available, then your name is likely Richard Wilson.  The Ludington Torch has acquired some of the correspondence between City Attorney Wilson and a couple of State election officials they are available in this E-mail thread.pdf.  Look closely at those before we analyze it further. 

The discussions took place in December 2017, where it is fairly clear that the Treasurer position would be open following Treasurer Rogers' ten year anniversary in July 2018, chosen precisely for the additional fringe benefits she would be able to receive for the rest of her years.  This retirement was well known throughout city hall during that time, I even heard about it.  The concern by city hall staff was how to keep the City Treasurer position off the ballot in 2018.  Recall, these are the city officials who were hoping to get the clerk and treasurer spots to be appointive, only backing off when Ludington citizens in large numbers said it was an idea they didn't agree with.

Like most E-mail chains, the oldest statements are from the bottom.  As you read up, you find that parts of the conversation are not totally there; the chain starts with a response from Lori Bourbonais  noting two state election laws.  She then responds to another question by Wilson:

What Lori is saying is that a special primary is a type of special election, as seen in the definitions sections of election law (MCL 168.4 seen below in part) and just like in 2016 when we had four mayor candidates turn in petitions later than today, the winner of the majority of votes in the special election held that November won the election.  

 

In the non-partisan elections of Ludington elective leaders, there is not any need for primary elections, the only time such happens is when more than two take out petitions in the normal petitioning times, see Section 4.7 of the charter.  But this is a special election, not constrained by the usual deadlines for getting on the ballot, but constrained by when the city council fixes the dates and by the other limitations in the law, which allows them to avoid a primary.  As in 2016, they could avoid a primary election (which would only happen anyway under normal circumstances if three or more candidates filed) and put all candidates on the November ballot in plenty of time.  

So contrary to Dick Wilson's assertions that there were many conversations where election officials said a 2018 election was not going to happen and that they weren't going to do this in 2018, there is no such case.  The election official has noted that the need for a special primary is obsolete, the definitions agree that the special primary is an optional step, our own practice in 2016 for the mayor spot illustrated that.  

So why is our city attorney from Manistee, representing a Grand Rapids law firm, trying to take the elective position of treasurer away from the Ludington people?   Why is he drawing up and thereby creating an unlawful office of 'interim city treasurer' which has little resemblance to the actual city treasurer defined in our charter?  

If the past is any indication, he wants more money and less of a trail; how better than to have his usual accomplice John Shay, and not the elected representative of the people, controlling Ludington's purse strings.

[Brad]

Other then the proposal to extend the city manager's contract to 3 years, is there any other known city of Ludington proposals?

[XLFD]

Nope; Shay really wants this to pass, so he doesn't want to water the field down with other proposals that take away official accountability like they tried to last time.  This seems innocuous to most folks, but it effectively means the city manager is basically unaccountable for a three year period to the council and, as always, unaccountable at all to the people.  

It's too bad, I would have liked seeing a proposal making the city clerk and treasurer appointive positions rather than elective.  That would fail miserably and likely take any others down with it. 

The councilors lament that the charter is outdated and ambiguous, but the only changes they ever propose are ones that make officials more powerful and/or less accountable.  The ambiguities arise when our out-of-county attorneys try to interpret the charter differently from its clear meaning. 

[AQUAMAN]

It's really too bad the City Charter has become nothing more than some ancient article that means nothing any more these days, especially when it comes to the interpretations of the city mgr./attorney. These two Appointees RUN the CITY of LUDINGTON nowadays. The City Council may as well not even exist, at least where power and authority Should RULE! It's totally Sickening that this happens, and continues for so many years, and now, into the Future! Something MUST Change, and that will only happen when ALL citizens Wake UP! And make the overdue changes for the future. But WHEN?

[XLFD]

It doesn't get much clearer than:  "Elective officers so appointed shall serve until the next regular election, at which time an election shall be held to fill the remaining period of the term of office."  

The November 2018 regular election is almost six months away, plenty of time to advertise for candidates and have them get 40 signatures.  I will be actively pursuing this avenue to right the wrongs being permitted (with some resistance by Councilor Henderson), likely through the very people that Dick Wilson is misquoting.

[Brad]

I hope the city sees that they are doing wrong against the citizens.  No matter how good a choice Mr Ezdebski is.

Good luck, hope you are successful.