Monday, June 22, 2009

What does it take?

We will be having yet another primary in August.

In the special mayoral election in May, we had 95,477 votes counted (about 15% of registered voters). Many people may have decided that voting for someone to finish mere months of another's term was not worth the effort. And yet, even in the historic presidential election, only 53% of registered Detroiters voted.

What will be on the ballot?
  • mayoral candidates
  • 167 people vying for nine city councils seats, with the top 18 vote-getters making onto the November ballot
  • school board candidates
  • candidates for city clerk
  • Possibly commissioners to revise the city charter (though this actually might not be legally on the ballot...check out this story from The Michigan Citizen)
Will we vote? We have a scandal upon scandal in city government, with several members of council accepting campaign contributions from individual representing companies trying to get contracts with the city; a public school system that fails entirely too many of our children; what can seem like imaginary city services, especially if you've ever tried to call the police and expected them to come; and rampant financial incompetence. And yet we are not voting. As a city we seem to have stopped believing that it matters. And if we don't believe that it matters, the politicians can get away with anything.

So what does it take? What can get the masses in Detroit motivated to do something about city government? What change do we need?

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2 comments:

  1. AnonymousJune 23, 2009 at 3:29 PM

    I think the state of the city is an embarassment to the country and to me personally. I've lived in this city all my life and watched it go down the tubes. I've voted in every election I was available for, and still not satisfied with the quality of the city government. Our ancestors who fought long and hard for us to have voting power would be ashamed of us as a (Black community). The internalized racism and the post traumataic slavery disorder must be addressed at all levels.

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  2. MamaziJune 23, 2009 at 8:51 PM

    I feel you on the embarrassment, I really do. But what can we do to change the situation? How do we move past this? Because beyond being embarrassed, I'm angry. I pay income taxes, I pay property taxes, and this is what they do with my money? I deserve better, we as a city deserve better, and I think we have to figure out how to get it.

    Where's the problem? Is it that even when we do vote, our choices are so limited that the outcome is the same? But then we've 167 on the ballot for Council and surely *somebody* in that pool has got to be worth something...

    What exactly can we do to address the internalized racism and the post traumatic slavery disorder?

    *sigh*

    But I do need to point out that it is not just we as a city or we as a Black community with this ridiculousness. The New York State Senate is playing grade school right now (listen to this story at NPR: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105828972)

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