Detroit's Emergency Manager has a Personal Tax Emergency!

I wonder, is it too much to ask that those who are selected or elected to Government service first pass a credit check? I don't mean that 3 digit score that has come to define the very worth of a person in this world. I mean, can we perhaps insure they don't have any *ACTIVE* Liens, Judgments or other actions pending against them for matters of fiscal mismanagement?

Detroit — The man charged with fixing Detroit's faltering finances has been hit with four liens in four years from the state of Maryland for unpaid taxes, records show.

State records show Kevyn D. Orr, who was appointed emergency manager on Thursday, has two outstanding liens on his $1 million home in Chevy Chase, Md., for $16,000 in unemployment taxes in 2010 and 2011. Two other liens of more than $16,000 in unemployment and income taxes were satisfied in 2010 and 2011, records show.

As many may recall from other stories, Detroit is the land that success forgot. This is the city in a state of total collapse with state intervention in progress and small things like keeping the street lights on and basic police service available seemingly too much a challenge to handle.

Critics of the emergency manager said the liens are troubling, since Orr is tasked with improving tax collections. The Detroit News reported last month that only 53 percent of homeowners paid property taxes last year, leaving $246.5 million uncollected for Detroit and other governments. City records estimate that, in 2011, Detroit collected $32 million less in income taxes than it was owed.

"It's quite interesting that he feels he could manage the city of Detroit and he's having trouble managing his own affairs," said the Rev. Charles E. Williams II, president of the National Action Network of Michigan that is fighting the appointment.

Source

No one expects the people running our cities, states and nations to be the ideal role model. We'd all like it, but most people worth electing or hiring won't seek work in this area to begin with. We take what we can. Had this man been in an area of City Government other than hands-on emergency management from fiscal mismanagement, I may not think that much of it.

However, like Timothy Geithner being appointed as Secretary of the United States Treasury WHILE STILL SETTLING TAX VIOLATIONS...I think there are some jobs where the state of one's personal life can say a great deal about one's competency and likely performance. When an Emergency Manager can't handle his own HOME and basic finances to avoid liens? Well...I think Detroit needs a better manager of their emergency before new ones are created. What say everyone?

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


I'd like more information in this.

Is this an accurate reflection on the man, or mud-slinging?

There is a lot of emotion-driven news coming out of Detroit on this issue....and, well, I'm not certain this is a fair and balanced issue.

On one hand, I don't think the prefect person exists to get Detroit even near fiscally responsible.

OTOH, he should have been up-front.

reply to post by DontTreadOnMe

Well, his claim is that this came as the result of an outside tax preparer that he didn't have direct control over.

Now I understand it happens. Some of the big names people see in the store kiosks have been known to screw up people's taxes for various reasons. However, I really feel that when your chosen line of work includes the emergency recovery of municipal disasters such as what Detroit has endured, keeping one's personal life in order takes on a new level of priority and importance.

Personally, I'd like to see a much higher bar set for personal conduct and standards in a great many areas. Things like school teachers should be paid the best but also hold to a level of personal conduct that stands above the average person...as role models to all our children. I'd settle for people charged with handling emergencies, not allow themselves to fall victim to similar ones in their own life......and neglect them.

I went and did a bit more looking.... Here is some more basic information on him and perhaps a bit more to what gives me a bad feeling when someone in this position isn't a man of details and getting things precisely right.

The distressed US city – once one of the nation's most prosperous manufacturing centres – is now the largest US city to have its finances placed under state control.

Governor Rick Snyder announced on Thursday that he had chosen Kevyn Orr, a partner in the Cleveland-based law firm of Jones Day, to be Detroit's emergency manager, a position that gives him broad powers to control all spending. The move makes Detroit the largest city in the US to have its finances placed under state control.

Source

The state's emergency loan board approved Orr 3-0 later Thursday on what Snyder called Orr's ability to work with people cooperatively, great technical skills and a record of tough decision making. Under state law, the Local Emergency Financial Assistance Loan Board officially hires the emergency manager and sets a salary. Orr will make $275,000 a year.

In the early 20th century, Detroit was the country's fourth most populous city behind New York, Chicago and Philadelphia. It had nearly 2 million residents in 1950 and now has shrunk to 700,000 and 18th in rank. A declining tax base; nearly 2 in 5 residents living in poverty; and a former, now convicted, mayor who spent lavishly have taken their tolls on the city's finances.

Source

Finally, on the powers and authority he was handed upon arrival and without appeal or close oversight...

Detroit’s new Emergency Financial Manager Kevyn Orr, who was appointed Thursday by Michigan’s Republican Gov. Rick Snyder, faces a daunting financial clean-up: $327 million in budget deficits to balance, $14 billion in long-term liabilities to resolve, and an 18.2% unemployment rate to lower. And he has 18 months to do it.

^^ He has A LOT to do....and that's a big job for any man. He also has near unlimited personal power to do it with.

“Customers”–not constituents. Orr is one of several emergency managers (EMs) who have been appointed–not elected–in cities and school districts across the state of Michigan, and who have the power to overrule local
governments. Critics contest that past EMs in the state have used their unchecked powers to circumvent the democratic process and effectively steamroll elected city council officials.

Source


Now I sincerely hope his personal case of fiscal mismanagement and irresponsibility IS unique, isolated and generally an explainable one-off incident. However, if it's not..there isn't much for a check or balance over the position he now holds. After all, He IS the check and balance.

Do they even do a basic, cursory background check as a part of vetting? Given some of what we see happen and come out of the process, are some vetted at all beyond personal name recognition and a face to face interview?

It seems as though Detroit thrives on ineptitude... in that case, this guy is over qualified. Detroit is a perfect study of what NOT to do in urban planning and management.
Detroit, a city built on the backs of the auto industry worker, decimated by the boots of the labor unions on the backs of the auto industry workers...

State of Michigan has their own peoples in City Hall cooking the books they have 2 sets of books, the media puts out what they are told to put out, that the City of Detroit is broke, it's all a pack of lies and the national media just parots the Detroit media.

Detroit has tonnes of money and the State is going to take control of it. The State is going to destroy the public schools in Detroit The State already stripped collective bargaining away from the teachers the EM has taken over the school board.
Michigan has turned into the political wild west, graft, corruption and greed rule, now they have their Czars to tell every one where to get off and toss them under the bus.

Alas there are a few peoples suing the State of Michigan over the EM and it's not making the media outlets at all.
My source is #OccupyDetroit they had a live feed on the Saturday before the EM took over they could make a sequel to the movie wag the dog, talk about having the wool pulled over peoples eyes. Only hope is if some Judge sees the light. I got to get out of Detroit and move to a 3rd world country

reply to post by Wrabbit2000
Regardless of this man's personal issues, I couldn't help but notice that he is about to take on a $275k position. Why does he need more $ to run Detroit than the POTUS earns for runnning the country. They both have books to balance and people counting on them. Why the pay difference?

reply to post by evc1shop

It does make you wonder, doesn't it? Particularly in a city where you can buy BIG Victorian type homes for 10-30,000 dollars. Corner lot businesses with tenants still operating in them for $50,000. I'd been on Zillow awhile back looking things up to see what it was in Detroit these days and I couldn't believe it. Some of those $10,000 homes weren't ghetto specials, stripped to the 2x4's....but houses I'd LOVE to look closer at if they were anywhere but there and for prices much higher than that.

Yes, why does he rate SO much and in a position of such autonomous power, at that? Poor Detroit. I recall a nice city, as big cities go, when I was in and out for my first trucking company in the mid 90's. Their 'anchor' customer was a produce handler in downtown. So different now.