The Republican War Against Democracy: Michigan

I don't know what we'd do without Rachel Maddow. She's been incredible in keeping us aware of what neo-fascist Republican governors across the country are doing to undermine democracy from Maine to Arizona while the rest of us are watching what Scott Walker is doing to Wisconsin. Rick Snyder and Michigan have been very much in Rachel's sites. Tuesday night she talked (above) about how Snyder, a recipient of bribes from the anti-education DeVos family (long-time American fascists) is destroying public education in Detroit.

There are several reasons Michiganders are as eager to recall Rick Snyder as Wisconsites are to recall Scott Walker. And, at the root, they're very much the same. These guys want to undermine democracy itself and push America in the fascist direction they and their financiers have always believed in. You know how Republicans have always paid lip service to local government? It really was just lip service, as yesterday's Wall Street Journal made abundantly clear-- especially in Michigan.

Michigan has 1,773 municipalities, 609 school districts, 1,071 fire departments and 608 police departments. Gov. Rick Snyder wants some of them to disappear.

The governor is taking steps to bring about the consolidation of municipal services, even whole municipalities, in order to cut budgets and eliminate redundant local bureaucracies. His blueprint, which relies on legal changes and financial incentives, calls for a "metropolitan model" of government that would combine resources across cities and their suburbs.

In doing so, Mr. Snyder, a Republican, is taking aim at that twig of American government so cherished by many citizens-- the town hall. The long national tradition of hyperlocal government prevails in much of the Northeast and Midwest, with their crazy quilts of cities, towns, villages and townships.

"You do have to ask: 'Boy, do we really need 1,800 units of government?'" says Mr. Snyder's budget director, John Nixon. "Everybody likes their independence, and that's nice to have. But if you're not careful, it can cost you a lot more money."

...Proponents of consolidation come from both ends of the political spectrum. Some conservatives argue that having fewer layers and divisions of government is cost-efficient and improves the economic climate by streamlining regulation and taxation. Some liberals support eliminating local-government boundaries that they say have cemented economic and racial disparities between cities and surrounding towns.

Researchers, however, have raised questions about whether such consolidation actually delivers significant savings. Typically, they say, only a few administrative positions overlap between jurisdictions, and further savings can't be realized without compromising service. Public-safety agencies, for example, need a certain staff level to ensure the response times that residents demand.

A 2004 study by Indiana University's Center for Urban Policy and the Environment found that costs creep back in, partly because bigger pools of employees can negotiate for better wages, offsetting the savings of job cuts. Academic studies of Jacksonville, Fla.'s combination with Duval County, and Miami's merger with Dade County found that costs actually rose post-merger as new bureaucracies emerged.

In a study of Wheeling, W.Va.'s proposed merger with surrounding Ohio County, Mr. Rusk, the ex-mayor of Albuquerque, estimated that the potential cost savings would be barely 2% of the combined budget, because the overlap of services wouldn't be as extensive as expected.

Mr. Rusk says the benefits of consolidation don't necessarily come from cost savings. Fragmentation retards economic growth, he says, "not so much because of waste and duplication of services as an inability to unify a region's resources" in everything from business development to road repair.

Various state legislatures are moving to spur consolidation. New Jersey, which has 566 municipalities, recently made it easier for communities to pursue mergers, and several are contemplating it. In New York state, which has more than 1,547 overlapping local governments-- a system Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo once called "a ramshackle mess"-- the Senate passed a bill in 2009 that gave voters the power to consolidate local municipalities and services. In Indiana, which has 1,008 townships, a legislative panel this year unanimously backed offering financial incentives to local governments that seek efficiencies through consolidation.

Michigan's laws make municipal mergers difficult. Minimum-staffing requirements and prevailing-wage laws protect public employees and make it hard to cut payroll costs. Thus far, only two mergers have occurred: The city and township of Battle Creek, and two cities and a village in the sparsely populated Upper Peninsula.

Gov. Snyder has pushed legislators to dismantle those barriers. The Legislature earlier this year strengthened the state's powers to take control of the finances of failing cities, empowering so-called emergency financial managers to void contracts, sidestep elected officials and dissolve municipalities.

While the governor can't force consolidations, he is trying to coax financially troubled municipalities to pursue them. He is withholding about $200 million of funds for cities in need, making that aid contingent on evidence of consolidation of services such as fire departments and trash collections.

His budget sets aside $5 million in transition aid for communities seeking mergers.

Similar incentives are being offered to school districts to share services such as busing, or to merge altogether. In addition, the governor has proposed a new policy that would in effect blur the existing school-district boundary lines.

"It is an evolutionary process, starting with service consolidation." Gov. Snyder said in an interview.

Home rule? "That costs money," as Snyder's spokesman said. It could jeopardize tax cuts to his fat cat donors and loopholes for Big Oil, certainly a higher priority for any Republican than something like democracy that they fear and loath anyway.