FLINT MAYOR DAYNE WALLING ON DARNELL EARLEY, THE FPOA’S ENDORSEMENT OF KAREN WEAVER AND MORE…

HASHTAG FLINT: In endorsing Karen Weaver on behalf of the Flint Police Officers Association, president of the FPOA and 16 year veteran of the force Kevin Smith stated, “I have seen plenty of mayoral administrations come and go. The Walling administration is dysfunctional.” How do you respond?

FLINT MAYOR DAYNE WALLING: Over the last six years Flint has done more to become a high performance plan based organization. The officer’s entitled to his opinion but I couldn’t disagree more. We’re doing more with 500 employees than a lot of departments were doing ten years ago with 1,500 employees. We’re using technology. We’re focusing on performance. When people look carefully at the resource level we have I think they see we’re making very good use of tax payer dollars and we’re doing everything we can to respond to the tough challenges that face our community.

HASHTAG FLINT: The blame game is in full effect. In an email to mLive, former emergency manager Darnell Earley said “The decision to separate from (the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department) and go with the Karegnondi Water Authority, including the decision to pump Flint River water in the interim, were both a part of a long-term plan that was approved by Flint’s mayor, and confirmed by a City Council vote of 7-1 in March of 2013 — a full seven months before I began my term as emergency manager.” This came in response to the Michigan Democratic Party’s request that Governor Snyder fire Earley from the position he currently holds as emergency manager of Detroit Public Schools based on his involvement with the city at the time of the switch in water source.

In so many words, the Flint Journal has you as saying that “the vote to become a partner in the KWA, a new regional water authority, should not be confused with a vote to use the Flint River as a temporary source of drinking water.”

If you would please, elaborate just a bit on that point, that Earley is essentially misrepresenting the vote you participated in, and share your thoughts as to whether or not the party’s call for Earley’s termination is an appropriate response to his participation in the matter.

FLINT MAYOR DAYNE WALLING: Mr. Earley should focus on accounting for the decisions he made while he was the emergency manager of Flint. He’s correct on one point, that the decision resolution that came before City Council and I was before he was emergency manager. Emergency manager Ed Kurtz brought a resolution for the city to become a contract customer of the KWA for raw water and the financial projection that was provided to us – which I can share with you, I’ve already sent it to mLive – shows the city paying DWSD until switching to the new Karegnondi Water Authority. That was the financial projection that was provided to City Council and I. There was no discussion in March of 2013 about any interim water source except DWSD, and the city staying with DWSD. It’s a complete misrepresentation and I think it confuses where the accountability lies on this. As Mayor I have to take responsibility for the actions and statements that I’ve made based on the information that I had at each of those times, but it’s incorrect for anyone to go back in time with false information that simply wasn’t presented.

Frankly, I haven’t paid attention to Mr. Earley’s performance in the Detroit public schools and I don’t take a position on what the governor should do with that appointment. I generally believe that communities should govern themselves. I think the state needs a better solution for Detroit Public Schools than appointing emergency managers. The state played a bad trick on a lot of people in Detroit when they swapped out the prior emergency manager a couple of days before the 18 month term and assigned Darnell Earley to that post. I can’t see how that was a good decision for the city of Detroit from the beginning.

HASHTAG FLINT: You’ve been the target of a lot of criticism regarding the city’s decision to use the Flint River as its source of drinking water. Do you feel that the criticism has been fair? And if not you, who should bear the brunt of the blame for this mistake?

FLINT MAYOR DAYNE WALLING: Being mayor in Flint is tough, and I know a big part of the job is hearing criticism. Along the way you also get some suggestions and encouragement too because we have a very engaged citizenry but the state bears the responsibility. Public Act 472, 436 – they were all designed to take away local control. The emergency managers, the state treasurer, and ultimately the governor are accountable for the major decisions that were made, especially one that was made behind closed doors without input from myself or City Council. The decision to go to KWA was different. We were under Public Act 436 but that resolution did go before City Council and I and we made our decisions about that, it still had to be implemented by the emergency manager, but it’s fair for all of us to be held accountable for the actions and statements that we made. I look back and see that I made statements and decisions in the best interest of the community based on the information that I had. I also look back and wish that the city would have stayed with the original plan of using DWSD and not getting into the Flint River water whatsoever because it has been one problem after another, but that’s with the benefit of hindsight.

HASHTAG FLINT: In regards to being mayor, what do you have a better understanding of now that maybe you didn’t before taking office? What have you learned about administration and governance during your approximately six year tenure?

FLINT MAYOR DAYNE WALLING: Being mayor means that you have to wake up every day and fight for the community. It’s very complicated with all the different government agencies that you have to deal with. Even without Public Act 4, a lot of the funds that the city depends on comes through the federal and state governments, and the budget decisions and policy changes that are made at both of those levels have a great impact. When I first came into office, I understood that the city had a stable budget projection. It wasn’t but a couple of weeks later the state budget cut local revenue sharing again and we went from a $10 million audited budget to a $20 million projected budget just like that, because of a decision made outside of the city of Flint that had great impact. So, I see an important part of the job of being mayor as managing a very complex intergovernmental affairs effort to fight for the resources Flint deserves and that takes a lot of relationships and experience that I’ve built up over the last six years. I’ve sat across the table from President Obama and discussed strategies for youth violence prevention. I’ve had to sit across the table from Governor Snyder and demand resources for Flint’s water based on the decisions of the emergency managers he appointed to this community. That’s not easy, but that’s a big part of the job. It goes back to your high school civics class where you learn that there’s federal government, state government and local government, and at every one of those levels there’s executive, legislative and judicial. You think about the challenges in Flint and how everything we face is affected by the local council, the local courts, then you’ve got the state legislature, the governor, the courts. Then the same thing at the federal level. All of those decision affect us. Being mayor is having to coordinate all of those different entities, starting with working with city council right on the third floor of City Hall.

HASHTAG FLINT: If you are re-elected, what do you hope to do in the coming four years to shape your legacy?

FLINT MAYOR DAYNE WALLING: I see Flint fixing its water problems and infrastructure. That’s a major problem of the adopted Capital Improvement Plan and comprehensive plan that’s now in place for the first time in decades. I’m also going to continue to push for strong economic development and job creation because the foundation of this community has to be economic opportunity. People have to be able to go to a good paying job, pay the bills, support their families, and also, yes, pay a little bit of taxes back to the city of Flint so we can provide basic services. I think the most important mission that we have to have as a community after dealing with the governmental services is we have to find a way to invest more in our kids. That’s why I’ve been such a strong supporter of the President’s My Brother’s Keeper initiative because we have to provide more opportunities for our youth, especially our boys and young men of color who are discriminated against and disadvantaged in a lot of ways outside of their own control. Everybody has to take a certain amount of personal responsibility but we need to have a society that’s truly offering fair opportunities to everyone and there’s not enough of that in a lot of parts of Flint. We’re looking to expand the work at our youth centers and with mentoring and to bring community education back to every one of the Flint schools so those schools are hubs for neighborhoods again and students, whether they’re attending the school or their parents have them attending a charter school during the day, or a private school, that in the the afternoons and evening they have access to citywide sports and computer labs and libraries. If we do that all across the city then I think we can make a fundamental change in this community’s prosperity. Once you have an educated workforce then you’re able to do even more with economic development and you put a positive cycle in place. That’s what we envision in the adopted Imagine Flint plan and I truly believe over the next five, ten, twenty years we can become a place that has great opportunity again just like we had in the 20th century.