12/31/2015 Executive decision | Politics & Prejudices | Detroit Metro Times
NEWS & VIEWS » POLITICS & PREJUDICES July 17, 2002
Executive decision By Curt Guyette
Whatever your opinion of Wayne County Executive Ed McNamara, no one can deny that the guy is a consummate politician. For nearly 16 years, he’s used the power of his office to build a political machine that’s achieved stunning success.
His grip on the county’s top elected position has been ironclad, and his ability to help promising protégés gain key offices remarkable. Former U.S. Attorney Saul Green, current Michigan Attorney General Jennifer Granholm and Wayne County Prosecutor Mike Duggan are, to one degree or another, all beholden to Big Ed and his skill at making campaign contributions flow like beer at a frat party. And it doesn’t take a Ph.D. in political science to recognize that, when the occasional milliondollar nobid contract lands in the hands of family connected businesses, it doesn’t hurt to have former staff members populating offices that wield investigative powers.
Now the king is abdicating his throne, and the race to succeed him has so far been … sort of a snooze.
“It’s not that the candidates aren’t appealing,” observes political consultant Mario Morrow. “It’s just that none of them are very exciting. It’s like they’re all a bunch of businessmen. Put it this way: If you were to have a fundraiser, and the prize was going out to lunch with one of these guys, you wouldn’t raise very much money.”
Political consultant Adolph Mongo calls it a campaign that would “have made Abe Lincoln proud, one where you just sit around on the front porch, meet with the folk and say nothing important. Unless you know the candidates personally, or have been around, I don’t think voters know what anybody stands for.”
This much, everybody knows: This race is all about the Democrats. The county is so overwhelmingly Democratic that whoever emerges from the GOP side of the Aug. 6 primary will be a sacrificial goat come November’s general election.
Officially there are eight Democrats vying for the office, but if the polls are to be believed, it’s really a twoman race between Sheriff Robert Ficano and former Detroit Police Chief Benny Napoleon. A poll conducted by Lansing’s EPIC/MRA late last month showed the two cops were virtually even, with Napoleon holding a onepoint edge at 29 percent. At that point, 30 percent of the voters were still undecided.
On paper, anyway, County Commission Chairman Ricardo Solomon should be a strong contender. He knows the issues inside out, has gained endorsements from Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, City Council President Maryann Mahaffey, Duggan and the influential Fannie Lou Hamer PAC.
Even so, the EPIC poll showed him collecting only 4 percent of the vote. http://www.metrotimes.com/detroit/executivedecision/Content?oid=2174130 1/4 12/31/2015 Executive decision | Politics & Prejudices | Detroit Metro Times “The polls that have been reported do not reflect what we feel and see out there every day on the campaign trail,” insists Steve Wasco, press secretary for the Solomon campaign.
As Wasco points out, “In the past, polls have shown themselves to be marvelously wrong. We saw that most recently in the last Detroit mayor’s race.”
Even so, Solomon faces a namerecognition problem outside his own commission district, despite being chairman for the past eight years, and he’s likely to be outspent by Ficano by as much as 2to1.
By press time, Ficano had raised about $1.2 million, says his press secretary Sharon Banks.
“Did you ever see that movie Sixth Sense?” asks Mongo when assessing Solomon’s chances. “You know how the little boy in that movie says, ‘I talk to lots of dead people who don’t know they’re dead’? That’s the Solomon campaign.”
The situation’s not much different for the other two Dems considered serious candidates, State Sen. Joe Young and county Register of Deeds Bernard Youngblood.
So the conventional wisdom is that it’s cop vs. cop.
One thing to watch for, predicts EPIC/MRA pollster Ed Sarpolus, is a flurry of negative advertising as Election Day approaches. With two candidates locked in a dead heat like this, it is almost inevitable that one will start hurling mud in an attempt to break ahead. His guess is that it will be the Ficano camp that will throw the first punch.
But Banks says Ficano has no intention of running negative ads.
“We are not attempting to engage in that at all,” she says. “We’ll concentrate on his record and the endorsements we received.”
If Ficano were to go that route, he’d have the money to do it. He also has the most apparent ammunition: Napoleon’s record running the Detroit Police Department.
It is unlikely the U.S. Justice Department will be releasing its longawaited report (on an investigation of the police department begun toward the end of the Archer administration) before voters cast their ballots. But there is all the stuff that is known: Cops shooting citizens at a recordsetting pace; the dismal rate of solving homicides (despite the misguided practice of hauling in witnesses caught up in dragnets); and a reporting system so flawed the FBI refused to accept the city’s crime statistics.
Napoleon’s record as chief could certainly explain why he didn’t get the endorsement of the oncepowerful Black Slate, the political arm of the Shrine of the Black Madonna that was perceived as the maker of kings as far back as the early days of Coleman Young. The Shrine had problems with the Archer administration in general, and the police shooting issue in particular.
But that doesn’t explain why a black nationalist group would bypass an AfricanAmerican candidate such as Solomon in favor of the white Ficano — unless, of course the members are hedging their bets and going with the guy most likely to win. http://www.metrotimes.com/detroit/executivedecision/Content?oid=2174130 2/4 12/31/2015 Executive decision | Politics & Prejudices | Detroit Metro Times “It is not the first time we have endorsed a white candidate,” says Cardinal Baye Lande, Black Slate field operations director. “We have endorsed white candidates throughout the state of Michigan.”
Lande says that the group wrestled with its decision, but went with Ficano over Solomon because “We think it will take someone of tremendous skill, not to take anything from Solomon. He has done some things, but not much to make himself established as a leader that the executive office needs. We think that is Ficano.”
Ficano also gained an unlikely semiendorsement from McNamara. There’s a long history of bad blood between the two, which would explain why Big Ed has refused to throw his full weight behind Ficano. But he at least signaled support by showing up at a recent fundraiser, and several members of his staff, likely with an eye on continued employment after the election, are working on the Ficano campaign.
At this point, say at least a few observers, Ficano appears to hold the edge heading into the last three weeks of the campaign. But, in terms of elections, that’s a lot of time. Plans are in the works to hold at least a few highprofile debates, and the ad blitz is yet to come.
The question that will take even longer to answer is whether the eventual winner will, for better or worse, be able to establish the kind of power base McNamara enjoyed.
Some say it’s possible, but doing so will take time. Mongo, however, doesn’t think it will happen — no matter who wins.
“Things are changing,” he observes. “With campaign finance reform becoming more of an issue and other changes, I don’t think you’re going to have these kinds of dynasties anymore. For Michigan, I truly think Ed McNamara represents the last of the political machines.”
Curt Guyette is Metro Times news editor. Contact him at 3132028004 or [email protected]
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http://www.metrotimes.com/detroit/executivedecision/Content?oid=2174130 3/4 Obtained by FBI, campaign emails show Ficano officials expected big donations from county vendors BY: Ross Jones POSTED: 3:54 PM, Jan 20, 2012 UPDATED: 6:20 PM, Jan 21, 2012
(WXYZ) DETROIT When he took office in 2003, Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano promised a new era of ethics. But emails we've obtained cast serious doubt that Ficano made good on his word.
The emails show how his administration expected county vendors to write large checks to Ficano's campaign war chest. And many of the emails are written by or about Ficano's campaign czar Nader Fakhouri.
In an email Fakhouri sent to another appointee in 2009, he writes about "preliminary numbers" for what he thinks county vendors should give to Ficano's campaign fund:
$25,000 each from Secure 24, AT&T, Open Text, Strategic Business Partners and Strategic Staffing Solutions
$15,000 from CATS Co.
$10,000 from Sync Technologies, ASG Renaissance and CISCO
and $5,000 from Peter Chang Enterprises and Optech
It's not clear if all those vendors were solicited, but several of them later gave to Ficano's PAC. We spoke with one who said he felt obligated to. That vendor did not want his name used for fear of retribution, but told 7 Action News:
"It's disgusting that they're going after vendors like that…I just don't think it's proper." Campaign finance expert Rich Robinson says when vendors are leaned on for contributions, it's common for them to factor that cost into their next county bid.
"It's a world where there is corruption of dependence," Robinson said.
"You end up with kind of a political tax rolled into it, because I don't think the vendor says, well, we'll squeeze this out of our profits this year," he said.
Other emails show that campaign work is often required of appointees. In one from last May sent by JoAnn Abdenour, Fakhouri's fundraising deputy, she ordered department heads to attend a meeting for the upcoming Ficano Gala, a campaign fundraiser at Ford Field.
The meeting is "mandatory," she writes.. The purpose, she said, was to get an update on appointee ticket sales.
Other emails from Abdenour were more harsh. When Treasurer Ray Wojtowicz was last up for reelection, a candidate Ficano supported , about 100 appointees received an email that told them they had to work the campaign's phone banks. "…there are NO EXCEPTIONS for this week's phone bank…everyone is expected to participate," she wrote.
Those emails conflict with the county's own rules. Every year, appointees sign statements acknowledging that "no…county employee is obligated to engage in campaign or other political activities."
In a different email, also from Abdenour, she tells an IT department appointee to solicit ITdepartment vendors:
"Nader has asked that you reach out to a company called 22 nd Century Tech and ask them for $2500 and Max Wolfgang at Sarcom and ask them for $5000 for the PAC…"
"…Nader is confident they will come thru," she writes .
A few weeks earlier, Ficano's office had asked the Wayne County Commission to approve an increase in Sarcom's county contract, and to approve a new contract for 22 nd Century Tech.
Robinson says it's harder for vendors to say no when he's being solicited by someone who oversees their contract. "It's much tougher position for that individual to be in," he said.
"It's somebody with whom they have a relationship on which their business is dependent."
Scores of other emails show campaign or political work being discussed while employees were on county time. In one,Fakhouri briefed appointees on campaign strategy in the middle of the county work day.
"Just some more intel on (Phil Cavanaugh)," the note reads. Cavanaugh was the candidate Ficano's office opposed for County Treasurer.
"Our huge 200,000 negative mail piece has been completed and is being printed," he writes.
Fakhouri, who would not go on camera, told 7 Action News that all fundraisingrelated emails were written during lunch or breaks.
Emails also show that some employees were asked to work on Ficano's charity, the Wayne County Vision fund, on county time. The charity gives scholarships to high school students. But some Ficano aides objected.
"…the Vision Fund is not an official county funded program," wrote Ficano appointee Cindy Dingell in January 2009.
"…try to be cautious about using internal resources for this," she wrote.
In a statement, county officials say "the county has strict rules prohibiting campaign work on county time. It has never been mandatory for any employee to participate or donate to any campaign fundraising event."
They also point out that 22nd Century and Sarcom had contracts before Ficano took office and have not donated to his PAC.
One reason for that, we've learned: the county appointee asked to solicit those vendors never solicited the companies. He didn't feel comfortable asking them for money.
If you have a tip for the 7 Action News Investigative Team, contact us at [email protected] (http://[email protected]) or at (248) 8279466. PAC includes donors with county deals | Crain's Detroit Business Page 1 of 7
Detroit and Southeast Michigan's premier business news and information website
October 16, 2011 8:00 PM PAC includes donors with county deals Is it quid pro quo? County exec says no By Nancy Kaffer
Leading donors
The top 10 Ficano PAC donors:
• Chaun Chang, CEO of Farmington Hills-based Peter Chang Enterprises, $50,000. Peter Chang Enterprises does business as PCE Systems, according to state records. A review Ficano of Wayne County Commission meeting minutes shows that in 2008, PCE Systems received a three- Airport is hub for controversy year, $4.6 million contract to "create a direct Before she became CEO of the Wayne County contract provider system for the Wayne County Airport Authority, Turkia Awada Mullin was one of Community Mental Health Agency." Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano's top
lieutenants, heading the county's economic • Robin Cole, CEO of Detroit-based ProCare Plus development operation. Inc., $18,250. In 2008, the commission extended
a $10 million contract with ProCare by another $10 The controversy surrounding the Ficano million. The company provides health care services administration began when it became public that to Wayne County residents. Mullin had received a $200,000 severance payment
after quitting her $200,000-a-year job at the county • Nabih Ayad, of Canton Township-based Nabih to become head of the airport authority, a job that H. Ayad and Associates PC, pays $250,000 annually. $12,500. Ayad represented a group of 340 minority
taxi drivers who sued the Wayne County Mullin isn't Ficano's only tie to the airport that raises Airport Authority after the group lost a contract to questions. provide service at Detroit Metropolitan Airport.
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• Ron Boji, president of the Lansing-based Boji The Wayne County Airport Authority was created in Group, 2002, a separate quasi-governmental agency with $10,053. Boji is a developer who recently built the independent oversight of Detroit Metropolitan $25 million Inkster Marketplace. Wayne County's Airport. economic development team helped the Boji Group secure $750,000 necessary for the seven-acre, Ficano appoints four members of the seven-member 92,500-square-foot project, according to Crain's board; the governor appoints two and the Wayne archives. Boji is also a member of the Wayne County Commission has one representative. Some of County Business Development Corp., a Ficano's appointments to the board also have membership nonprofit that pays a $75,000 bonus to monetary ties to his administration: its director, a Wayne County employee, for achieving business development objectives defined • Board chair is Renee Axt, president of RCP by the nonprofit. Associates. Axt is a founding member of the Wayne County Business Development Corp., a • Nawal Hamadeh, founder of Dearborn-based membership nonprofit that funds economic Hamadeh Educational Services Inc., $10,000. development-related activity that's not a core The company operates three charter schools in function of county government. The director of the Wayne County and one in Macomb County. nonprofit, a Wayne County employee -- formerly Hamadeh has traveled with Ficano on trade missions Mullin, during her tenure at the county -- can earn to China. up to $75,000 as a performance bonus if the nonprofit's objectives are achieved. • Alan Markovitz, strip club owner and author of Topless Prophet, The True Story of America's Most • Charlie Williams, president and CEO of MPS Successful Gentleman's Club Entrepreneur, Group Inc., a holding of Soave Enterprises. $6,800. Williams recently earned about $420,000 for brokering the sale of a piece of land for a parking lot • Roberta Sanders, head of New Center for a new downtown jail. Mullin, as the county's Community Mental Health Service, chief development officer, signed off on the $14 $6,800. In 2008, the organization received at least million deal. Williams voted to approve Mullin's $259,000 in county contracts to provide mental hiring by the airport. health services to teens at Highland Park High School and through Covenant House. • Tim Taylor, Wayne County's former human resources director, co-signed Mullin's severance • Thomas Vigliotti, president of Jefferson Land agreement. He retired this year with an annual Inc., $6,800. In 2010, the commission extended a pension of about $106,000, or 75 percent of his 2008 sole-source, three-year contract with Jefferson average final compensation, but continued to work Land to provide archive space for the Wayne County for the county on contract at about 90 percent of his Clerk archives division. The two-year, $464,802 salary and also was offered a $10,000 contract with extension increased the total value of the contract the airport. to $1.1 million. The airport contract later was rescinded and, on • M. J. Moroun, CEO of Centra Inc. and owner of Friday, Ficano said Taylor would no longer work for the Ambassador Bridge, $6,600. the county because of his involvement with Mullin's severance. • Philip & Janeit Shisha, of West Bloomfield Township-based Also, Southfield-based Trustinus LLC, the search
http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article/20111016/FREE/310169963/pac-includes-donors-wi... 10/16/2011 PAC includes donors with county deals | Crain's Detroit Business Page 3 of 7
Strategic Business Partners, firm that included Mullin on a short list of applicants, $6,500. In 2008, the company received a sole- is owned by Jack Krasula, an investor in a source, one-year contract worth $192,000 to racetrack in Wayne County. provide tech support for the county corporation counsel's Prolaw system. Earlier this year, the The land for the racetrack was sold to Krasula for commission approved a retroactive, three-year, sole- $1; the county made about $26 million in source contract with the company worth $120,000 improvements to the land. The track was to provide a project manager. The company also is unsuccessful, in large part because the state developing countywide eGovernment applications. reduced the amount it had budgeted for officials necessary for racing. Sources: Michigan Campaign Finance Network, -- Nancy Kaffer Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs, Michigan Secretary of State Campaign Finance Database, Wayne County Commission meeting minutes
In 2010, Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano had the largest leadership political action committee in the state.
With $432,945 in donations during the election cycle, Ficano PAC contributed money to candidates in most key Wayne County races that year, funded by donations from some of the county's most influential businesspeople -- many of whom do business with the county, some to the tune of millions of dollars.
The donations are legal, but for Ficano, who is trying to quell the controversies of his administration, Ficano PAC could confirm what his sharpest critics allege: that his administration is rife with cronyism, with sweetheart deals for those on the inside.
Ficano says there's nothing amiss.
"We have thousands of contributors," he wrote in an email to Crain's, via County Communications Director Lynn Ingram.
"It's not uncommon for county contractors to contribute. We wouldn't turn them away simply because they are contractors. People believe in what we are doing and the process is completely transparent."
It's been an uncomfortable month for Ficano. He's enjoyed a relatively trouble-free
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tenure, any problems in his administration overshadowed by the more dramatic political theater of Detroit municipal government.
All that changed late last month, when news broke that his former chief development director, Turkia Awada Mullin, had received a $200,000 severance payment as she left her $200,000-plus job with the county to become CEO of the Wayne County Airport Authority, with a $250,000 annual salary. Wayne County has a $160 million budget deficit.
On Friday, Ficano suspended for 30 days without pay Deputy County Executive Azzam Elder and Corporation Counsel Mariann Talon for their role in authorizing the severance.
Ficano PAC is a leadership political action committee, which allows politicians to make contributions to other politicians. It's separate from the Robert A. Ficano Committee, the candidate committee that supports Ficano's campaigns. During the 2010 election cycle, the Robert A. Ficano Committee collected $1.7 million, according to Wayne County campaign finance filings.
Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson's leadership PAC called OakPAC hasn't been a major player in recent years, with a balance of just $519, according to its most recent campaign filing. Macomb County Public Works Commissioner Anthony Morrocco's Anthony Morrocco Victory PAC had $232,470 in 2010.
Ficano PAC was the largest in the state -- in part, said Rich Robinson of the Michigan Campaign Finance Network, because term limits put statewide fundraisers like former Gov. Jennifer Granholm, former state Speaker of the House Andy Dillon and former state Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop out of the running.
But with that $432,945 in contributions in 2010, Ficano PAC is a sizeable fund that has spread its money widely, donating to almost every significant race in Wayne County in the past several years.
In 2010, the PAC donated to candidates in city council elections in Dearborn, Dearborn Heights and Downriver communities, to state House and Senate races, to Democratic
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gubernatorial candidate Virg Bernero and to Wayne County Commission candidates.
The top 2010 contributor to Ficano PAC was Chaun Chang, CEO of Farmington Hills- based Peter Chang Enterprises, who donated $50,000. The Wayne County Commission voted to approve a $4.6 million contract with Chang, which does business as PCE Systems, to create a medical records system. (See box, this page.)
Another donor to Ficano PAC was Thomas Vigliotti, the head of Detroit-based Jefferson Land. Vigliotti donated $6,800. In 2010, the commission extended a contract for 77,000 square feet of storage space for the Wayne County Clerk's Archives Division to a total five-year value of $1.1 million.
A Crain's analysis indicates that the contract seems to have been a good deal for the county, averaging $3 a square foot for the space, which, according to CoStar Group Inc., is below the average price for Detroit office space and on par with the cost of industrial space in the city.
Robin Cole, head of Detroit-based ProCare Plus, donated $18,250 in 2010. ProCare Plus has a $20 million contract to provide health care services to Wayne County residents.
"A public ethic is supposed to be government working for its citizens," Robinson said. "You don't want government procuring service on the basis of kickbacks or quid pro quo. ... When it appears to be individuals benefitting individuals, I think people are rightfully cynical about government."
Disclosure helps officials avoid the appearance of impropriety, Robinson said.
Still, Robinson acknowledged, when a vendor with a multimillion contract donates $50,000, "I think that always looks bad to the citizen/taxpayer/voter. I don't know if there's a way people can look at those facts and circumstances and say, "This is great, this is the way it should be.' "
Leadership PACs aren't uncommon at the state level, Robinson said.
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"Anybody who aspires to leadership has (one or) two or even three leadership PACs so they can support any of their caucus colleagues who are in a competitive race," he said, adding that multiple PACs can be used to dodge limits on donations and contributions.
And those donations tend to pay off, Robinson said.
"Whether it's reciprocity or just remembered, when it comes time for a leadership election" in the state House or Senate, "it is remembered," he said. "And I think it's the same theory (on the local level). You're demonstrating support and political love, and you expect reciprocity."
How Ficano's PAC might affect his long-term political future is uncertain. Much depends on how he handles the current controversy and whether a challenger emerges by 2014 -- or whether he's built too solid a base in Wayne County for a credible challenger to step forward.
But for Ficano to weather the storm politically unscathed, he's got to step up his game.
"He can't stonewall it," said Bill Ballenger, editor of the newsletter Inside Michigan Politics. "If it establishes a theme or a pattern that he doesn't put to rest, it's going to persist and cause him more problems rather than less.
"It really looks bad. Not just this particular appointment, but there's a pattern, apparently, here. ... (If) he's top-heavy with all sorts of cronies and hangers-on at a time of fiscal crisis and so forth, it doesn't look good, it looks very, very bad."
Though Ficano isn't up for re-election until 2014 -- he won his third term in 2010 -- a 2011 scandal with legs could be politically dangerous.
"The idea that some of these guys have that they can ride things out is misplaced," Ballenger said.
But Ficano says he's not worried now about re-election.
"That'll take care of itself later," he wrote in the email to Crain's.
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