Crime in America 2016: Top 10 Most Dangerous Cities Over 200,000 - Law Street (TM) MSUE Detroit FY 2013 Budget FAQ 6 11 12. Firefighters Feel the Squeeze of Shrinking Budgets. As a matter of political gospel -- and survival -- firefighters are sacrosanct.
No matter the depths of a municipality’s budget crisis, neither the firefighters’ ranks, pay nor benefits are touchable. There are no reductions in force for firefighters. And yet, in cities all across the country, that’s exactly what has been happening. The men and women in red are becoming as vulnerable to budget cuts as other municipal employees. SUPREME COURT LETS STAND FAIR SHARE PAYMENTS TO UNIONS - Detroit Police Lieutenants & Sergeants Association. Huge Victory for the DPLSA and Unions Everywhere!
In a huge win for NAPO today, the Supreme Court split 4-4 Tuesday on a challenge brought by public school teachers who objected to paying union dues, delivering a big win for the unions – in the first major case where the late Justice Antonin Scalia’s vote likely would have proved decisive. Detroit FD facing more cuts. Apr 25, 2012 By Darren A.
Nichols The Detroit News DETROIT — Nearly a quarter of the city work force would be eliminated, services would be slashed and departments would disappear under the detailed version of Mayor Dave Bing's proposed budget delivered Monday to the City Council. The plan, which includes $250 million in cuts to all departments, expands on an initial proposal presented April 12. TO DO: Fire Fighter Salaries in Michigan and how key factors impact Fire Fighter Salaries in Michigan - Salary.com.
Detroit pays high price for arson onslaught. Detroit — Arson is a raging epidemic in Detroit, destroying neighborhoods and lives as the city tries to emerge from bankruptcy.
Even amid a historic demolition blitz, buildings burn faster than Detroit can raze them. Last year, the city had 3,839 suspicious fires and demolished 3,500 buildings, according to city records analyzed by The Detroit News. Burned homes scar neighborhoods for years: Two-thirds of those that caught fire from 2010-13 are still standing, records show. How Much Has the Detroit Police Force Really Been Cut? Soon after the city of Detroit filed for bankruptcy, many blogs and news sites began running "facts" about the city.
One common "fact" repeated often was that "the size of the police force in Detroit has been cut by about 40 percent over the past decade. " Although it makes for interesting reading, just how much the police department has been cut is not that simple to determine and is another example of the city's dysfunction. For example, the city's 2003 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report states there were 4,810 uniform police officers that year. Detroit faces exodus of police, firefighters.
Michigan excludes police and fire unions from “right to work” Lansing, Michigan is aflame with the anger of union workers who object to how state officials have rammed “right-to-work” legislation through the state house.
“Right-to-work” would end the requirement that workers join a union in their workplace if it is unionized. Union workers are especially incensed that the legislation was pushed through during a lame duck session without hearings or debate. The Detroit Free Press reports: [State Rep. David Rutledge, (D-Ypsilanti)] and many other House Dems decried the manner in which the bills were introduced and passed with no committee hearings or public debate. The legislation covers public and private unions, but there is a very odd exemption that carves out a special preference for unionized police and fire workers.
A Michigan political commentator pointed out that police and fire unions are contributors to Republican and Democratic politicians, according to the News: FY%202017 2020%20Four%20Year%20Plan%20 %20Section%20B%20 %20Departments. Detroit's other blight crisis: Commercial decay. They’re easy to find and hard to ignore.
In Detroit, many residents live and shop near hulking vacant buildings that have been abandoned for years, places that attract crime, vagrants, graffiti and scrappers. Many of these blighted buildings line well-traveled corridors throughout Detroit’s neighborhoods. But exactly who owns them and why they remain in terrible condition for so long remains a mystery to many. Standing on her porch on East Outer Drive among a stretch of homes with well-manicured lawns and hedges, Tomika Brown, 41, described the multitude of problems associated with a giant, crumbling building across the street.
The building is so rundown its hard to tell how it was originally used. “It just be a lot of drunks stopping in there, scrapping,” Brown said. Detroit police feel pain of city's financial collapse. Feb 23, 2014 By Sharon Cohen Associated Press DETROIT — It has come to this: Even some criminals sympathize with Detroit's cops.
Baron Coleman thought he'd heard it all in his 17 years patrolling the streets. But then came the city's bankruptcy, a 10 percent cut in police salaries, followed by support from a most unlikely corner — the bad guys. "When they saw us take a pay cut they were in shock. Detroit police officers have long known adversity: They've worked in crumbling station houses with busted pipes, driven run-down cars, tangled with balky radios.
Detroit City Council approves 2015-16 budget. Detroit — The City Council on Wednesday approved a resolution authorizing the former emergency manager's $1.1 billion spending plan for the 2015-16 fiscal year.
The general fund budget plan was supported in an 8-0 vote and is part of a two-year budget implemented by Kevyn Orr prior to the city's December exit from bankruptcy. Council President Pro Tem George Cushingberry Jr. was absent. The vote comes after the panel hosted a series of departmental hearings over allocations laid out in the general fund budget that runs from July 1 to June 30, 2016. 37%20EB%2013 14%20Police stamped. 24%20EB%2013 14%20Fire stamped. New chief putting mark on Detroit fire dept.
In his first months as the new head of Detroit’s beleaguered Fire Department, Eric Jones is building bridges with union leaders, touting improved response times and a decline in arson fires.
A city in flames: inside Detroit's war on arson. For eight long years, the firefighters of Highland Park, Michigan, worked out of a warehouse. There was no red-bricked facade, no lanky Dalmatian. No freshly washed engines gleaming in the sun. No second-floor fire pole to descend in the dead of night to wailing sirens. Whatever idealized vision you have of firefighting, Highland Park is not it. Instead, picture a hulking, boxy building on the edge of an industrial park about six miles north of downtown Detroit. The Highland Park fire department opened nearly a century ago, in 1917, to serve the booming city. $500K gift to fire dept. closes firm’s Chap. 9 role. A global law firm that billed Detroit taxpayers millions for representing retirees in the city’s bankruptcy case is donating $500,000 to the fire department for the purchase of hoses, winter coats and gloves and other essential gear for first responders.
The Dentons law firm announced the parting gift to Mayor Mike Duggan on Monday, the deadline for law firms and consultants that worked on the city’s bankruptcy case to submit their final bills to the city. The law firm said its donation will be used to buy 260 pieces of fire hose, 1,000 radio batteries, electronic notepads, self-contained breathing masks and replacements for other aging equipment at the Detroit Fire Department.
Dentons attorneys represented the nine-member Office Committee of Retirees from August 2013 through the city’s exit from Chapter 9 bankruptcy on Dec. 10. As of Oct. 24, the law firm had billed Detroit $15 million for its services. The final bills are not expected to be made public until next week.