Politics

In Bankruptcy Water Deal, It's Brooks Patterson Vs. Detroit, And Detroit Is Winning

May 30, 2014, 6:43 AM

For a politician who has made a career out of objecting to Detroit in general, the deal coming together over regionalizing the Detroit water department is the ultimate nightmare.

But everyone from Gov. Rick Snyder to U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Steven Rhodes appears to be pushing Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson into a corner.

As Nolan Finley writes in the Detroit News today: "One thing Patterson likely will have to come to grips with is that, in some fashion or another, the water department will be monetized for the benefit of Detroit. That will be a tough pill for him to swallow and highlights the tenuous road ahead for getting a deal done."

Finley, reporting from the Mackinac policy conference, says:

Very quietly, behind the scenes here, Gov. Rick Snyder and L. Brooks Patterson had their first face-to-face meeting Thursday on the contentious issue of regionalizing the Detroit water department, as Republicans tried to defuse a stand-off that has split the party’s top elected officials and increasingly isolated the Oakland County executive.

Snyder and many business leaders gathered on Mackinac Island are irritated that Patterson is pushing the story line that suburban customers of the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department will pay the cost of Detroit’s rescue because of the way a pension pay-back plan is structured, Finley reports. They’re worried Patterson’s argument could derail a vote in the state Senate next week in support of the city’s $195 million state aid rescue package.

Snyder’s office issued a white paper on the proposed deal and Rhodes, Finley says, contradicted Patterson's claims in a a point-by-point rebuttal.

The dispute centers on how quickly the water department repays its pension debt.

Patterson analysis shows regional water ratepayers, who are now contributing $15 million to $18 million a year to the department's pension fund, will be bumped to $65.4 million in the first year, and $45.4 million for the next nine, Patterson says.

That adds up to about $474 million.

The extra revenue, Patterson contends, will cover the city’s entire obligation to the trust for the next decade, so that it can use the payments from other departments to bolster the city’s general fund, if it chooses. Patterson figures they’ll have a $25 million-a-year windfall to work with.

As Oakland County grew while Detroit declined, Patterson has been the city's most prominent critic in southeastern Michigan during a public career that goes back to the 1970s. In January, his anti-Detroit comments in a New Yorker profile were widely condemned across the region.

The article was titled, "DROP DEAD, DETROIT! ... The suburban kingpin who Is thriving off the city's decline." 

 

 


Read more:  Detroit News


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