Sunday, October 30, 2005

Soon-to-be mayor: Do you know what you're getting into?

By Daniel Howes / The Detroit News

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Memo to the new mayor, Wednesday, Nov. 9:

Sir, are you sure you actually want this job?

The next few years are likely to be the most turbulent this city has seen since the late 1960s -- and we all know what happened back then. This will be different, a financial crackup that will come because it has to come.

You and your opponent both talked about it, sort of, during the campaign. Residents are fleeing by the thousands because they don't feel safe, don't think their kids can get a good education and don't get basic services for their tax dollars. Bottom line: There is no economic case for living here unless you can't get out.

Just 11 percent of Detroit's tax base comes from property taxes, compared to 60- or 70-some percent in the suburbs. Union contracts, especially retiree health care and pension obligations, are eating into an ever-dwindling pile of cash. And, frankly, there are way too many people on the public payroll.

A clear choice

Right now, we act like General Motors -- bigger, richer and better-led than we actually are, and probably can ever hope to be. Truth is, many of Detroit's problems mirror what ails GM and bankrupt Delphi Corp., which is why the first two years of your term are likely to be some of the most important in the modern history of Detroit.

Detroit, like the automakers that helped build it into a muscular industrial powerhouse, is at a crossroads. Under your leadership, the city will either move to dismantle the discredited welfare state hijacked by special interests keen to maintain their power and suck the city dry. Or it will become a smoldering ruin of industrial America weighing on the taxpayers of Michigan.

Yes, there are pockets of promise. Under former mayor(s) Archer-Hendrix, we got three casinos, two stadiums, a new Compuware headquarters deal and lots of feel-good. Between Mayor Kilpatrick's publicized scandals and grandiose plans, we got new restaurants, new housing, refurbished streetscapes in the central business district and some decisions on the riverfront.

Three times wrong

That's a start, which is pretty pathetic considering we're talking about three mayoral terms -- 12 years -- most of which coincided with one of the biggest economic booms the auto industry has seen in decades.

Detroit's political and municipal union leaders made the same mistakes as their automotive peers: They built an expensive machine that didn't pay enough attention to consumers, assumed the good times would never end and figured the competition didn't matter.

Three times wrong. They had foreign automakers. We have the suburbs. And everyone is free to drive what they like and live where they want -- whatever the economic consequences.

When you take office, you won't quite be where Delphi's boss, Steve Miller, found himself on the morning of Oct. 8 -- preparing to declare bankruptcy. But you should prepare to lead as if you are.

Daniel Howes' column appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. He can be reached at (313) 222-2106 or dchowes@detnews.com.