Last week, councilmembers were prompted to request that the city reassess the lowest-valued homes after new research on property values in Detroit. Assessor and Deputy Chief Financial Officer Alvin Horhn defended the assessor’s office and denied the city has a systemic problem with overassessments.
The Wayne County Art Institute Authority renewed an agreement between the county and the Detroit Institute of Arts that expired in December, with an increase in funding to support field trips for students. Public commenters called for more transparency and accountability from the authority moving forward.
At the request of a reader, we sent Documenters to attend a meeting of the Board of Trustees for the Wayne County Community College District. It was eye-opening and a great reminder that not all agencies comply with the Open Meetings Act. Governing bodies need oversight, and Documenters are some of the best public watchdogs around.
Keep reading for more of what Docs experienced at last week’s meetings.
Politics
Detroit councilmembers expressed concern about systemic bias in property assessments following a new report published by the University of Chicago.
The city’s Assessor and Deputy Chief Financial Officer Alvin Horhn said the study is a sales analysis of nationwide bias in assessments. He said he can’t do anything with the information because it’s not a review of assessment practices in Detroit.
Horhn said the city has 400,000 parcels, but only 566 (about 0.1%) were brought before the Property Assessment Board of Review . Councilmembers approved a walk-on resolution calling on the assessor’s office to slash property taxes by 30% for homes valued between $3,400 and $34,700. But Horhn said he lacks the legal authority to do that. He said the Board of Review is closed for the year and complaints need to be referred to the State Tax Commission .
Councilmembers also approved a resolution encouraging the Wayne County Treasurer’s Office to extend a 2023 moratorium on foreclosures on owner-occupied homes valued from $3,400-$34,700.
3/26/2024 Detroit City Council Formal Session, documented by Benjamin Haddix and Hannah Mathers
For more on City Council, check out Malachi Barrett’s City Council Notebook at BridgeDetroit.
Education
Documenters attended a Wayne County Community College District Board of Trustees meeting for the first time last week. The Detroit Documenters program was informed by a previous meeting attendee that the board denied them an opportunity to give public comment, and required them to identify themselves and sign in. We’ll leave it to lawyers whether this was against the law, but we think both practices violate the spirit of Michigan’s Open Meetings Act .
Under the law, registering or providing your name cannot be a condition of attendance at a public meeting. At last week’s meeting, Documenters were asked to sign in, and their names were read aloud into the record.
Agendas — printed and handed out before the meeting began , but not available on the board’s webpage — stated “Public Comment (None).” That’s because the board’s rules for giving public comment state: “The speaker must give his/her name and subject to the Board Secretary forty-eight (48) hours prior to the public Board of Trustees Meeting.” No contact information for the board secretary was provided, and we couldn’t find it on the board’s webpage either.
In terms of actual business conducted, Documenters reported the meeting was cordial, formal and seemed mostly self-congratulatory. Chancellor Curtis L. Ivery received a crystal trophy before his contract was renewed.
3/27/2024 Wayne County Community College District Board of Trustees, documented by Colleen Cirocco, Devyn McNaughton and Stephanie Jennings
Juvenile courts
3/18/2024 Third Judicial Circuit of Michigan, Documenting Juvenile Courts: As defendants were adjudicated, some were also offered second chances. Read the full notes to learn more about the legal issues youth are facing in Wayne County.
Documented by Deandrea White
Arts
3/25/2024 Wayne County Art Institute Authority: The authority increased annual transportation and program funding from $150,000 to $250,000, with a goal of engaging 26,000 public school students, or about 10% of students in the county. Public commenters called for more transparency regarding the Detroit Institute of Arts’ use of funds .
Documented by Clarissa Williams
Development
3/26/2024 Detroit Land Bank Authority, Board of Directors: Not much is changing at the land bank. Board members quickly voted to keep its same officers and service contracts. They also approved all property purchases, including 10 lots on Beaconsfield Street north of Mack Avenue that will be converted into a mushroom farm.
Documented by Amber Umscheid
Budget
3/28/2024 Detroit City Council Budget Hearings, Property Assessment Board of Review / Office of Inspector General: Officials with the Board of Review said the Pay As You Stay program helped save more than 12,000 people from tax foreclosure, and the Homeowners Property Exemption program will sunset next year, absent additional action. The Office of Inspector General closed 16 of 24 new investigations. Deputy Inspector General Kamau Marable is expected to succeed Ellen Ha as Detroit’s inspector general.
Documented by Amelia Benavides-Colón and Eric McCormick
3/28/2024 Detroit City Council Budget Hearings, Ombudsman / Department of Public Works & Greater Detroit Resource Recovery Authority: Ombudsman Bruce Simpson said the application process to defer a demolition order was confusing, and it has been revised to better track with city requirements. Simpson also shouted out a 2023 Michigan law that simplifies claiming a property tax exemption for veterans. Officials with the city’s Department of Public Works said it’s deferring the one-time $25 fee for recycling bins and is linking about 800 traffic signals to backup generators.
Documented by Amelia Benavides-Colón and Autumn Jackson-Hines
Transportation
3/28/2024 Detroit Transportation Corp., Board of Directors: The Detroit People Mover is seeing increased ridership with free fares. The board is focused on safety for the upcoming NFL draft, with improvements to cameras and redundancy measures in the control center. The corporation received a clean audit, and the board picked a new payroll system provider.
Documented by Anna Harris and Sandi Nelson
Policing
3/28/2024 Detroit Board of Police Commissioners: Commissioners want to know more about the Detroit Police Department’s (DPD) information sharing agreements with other law enforcement agencies and whether those agencies adhere to The Barack Obama Foundation’s Reimagining Policing Pledge , which the department has signed. DPD presented on its facial recognition technology practices and associated policies.
Documented by Gabriel Gamlin and Nathaniel Eichenhorn
For more on the Board of Police Commissioners, check out the latest BOPC Watch .
This story was written by Outlier Media’s Lynelle Herndon and Noah Kincade.
A Detroit People Mover win and a public comment fail · Outlier Media
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