A public meeting

Another protest. Kevyn Orr, Emergency Manager for Detroit, issued a document giving the state of Detroit's finances a few weeks ago. According to the EM law he then has so many days (I think 30) to hold a public meeting to lay out what he was going to do to fix the finances he had documented. The first of two meetings was scheduled for this evening at a church on the west side of Detroit with another on Monday on the east side. The Moratorium Now and Detroit Debt Moratorium groups arranged a rally outside the church to tell Orr the solution is simple -- cancel the contracts with the banks that are sucking the life out of Detroit. So about 50 of us gathered outside the church. We had signs. We had chants. We had a loudspeaker where leaders told us (and passersby) what the situation was. We had leaflets we handed out to cars stopped at the nearby light. What we didn't have was a target.

Orr didn't show.

A couple hours before the meeting he apparently heard about the protest and canceled the meeting. The rally organizers knew that but rallied anyway, partly to show how chicken Orr is in encountering protesters. But Orr must hold a public meeting by Tuesday. We were all told how to check for news. We might only have an hour's notice. The question is: How much public will be allowed to know about the "public" meeting?

One of the situations the leaders discussed was the city of Hamtramck. Their finances were getting unsustainable and the city talked to the state about bankruptcy. The state urged the city to take out loans to tide them over, which the city did. The situation is still dire. Now the state is talking about an Emergency Manager. The speaker told us about the difference. Under bankruptcy the courts must look out for the interests of the citizens. But the EM must look out for the interests of the banks. So the state delayed and compounded Hamtramck's problems so it could be resolved in the bank's favor.