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The threats, name-calling and other verbal pushing and
shoving at One Government Center between the 22nd
floor and the 8th floor are beginning to get out
of hand.
D. Michael Collins, dealing with his first budget as mayor,
faces a preliminary deficit of $23 million. Collins has
announced his intent to feed the shortfall by forcing Lucas
County to fork over its lunch money to the city, an amount
that could reach as much as $8 million.
To do so, the mayor has planned a policy change, which will
require the Toledo Police Department to begin charging most
criminals under the state code rather than municipal laws.
The shift will save the city $5 million per year but only at
the direct expense of Lucas County.
The action was like a sucker punch to county officials, who
had taken to heart the Mayor’s “consistent, public and
personal assurances that he would not change the jail
booking arrangement” with the county.
An $8 – 9 million hit could be catastrophic across all
county departments and affect everything from construction
of the new jail to child support, employment, public safety
and the county’s ability to fund economic development and
community partnerships.
Do not expect the county to accept a bloody lip without
fighting back, however.
The present county jail is under a federal consent decree
because of overcrowding. One possible strategy is for Lucas
County to contract for booking services with the regional
jail at Stryker, approximately 60 miles west of Toledo.
Rather than driving nonviolent offenders downtown to be
booked and to await trial, Toledo police officers would
instead have to drive criminals an hour to Stryker each way,
book them and house them there but then must make an
additional round trip to pick the accused up for court
appearances, an arrangement that would slap the city back
with a likely cost of $3 – 5 million a year in overtime and
other costs.
The county has another potential counter punch in its
arsenal. Collins is saving $6 million a year for trash
removal, a contract let out by Lucas County. That contract
is soon up for renewal. If canceled, and the city attempts
to go it alone, it would absorb a devastating blow that
could cost an additional $6 million.
A headstrong and determined Collins is not likely to back
down in the confrontation with the county, a conflict that
most see as unnecessary. However, the citizens of Toledo are
the ones that could get stitches in the head from Collins’
attempt to “play superhero and go it alone” in responding to
Chrysler president Sergio Marchionne’s threat to move
manufacturing of the Jeep Wrangler out of Toledo.
Although labor leaders and politicians alike, unanimously
portrayed the Jeep issue as “a fight worth fighting,”
Collins, ironically, seemed more interested in walking away
from the Keep Jeep movement and threw in the towel without
ever getting off the stool.
“I walked up there, and he looked me in the eye, and I
believed him, and he’s very polite, and he (Marchionne) said
that they can take the Jeep away, and give us two other
products, and we’ll be fine,” said a mesmerized and dazed
Collins, at a press conference following the meeting with
Chrysler. “I will not engage with anything that looks like a
fight with the Chrysler Corporation. Any campaign around
this would serve no useful purpose whatsoever,” he added.
The truth is that Toledo is the top city in the U.S. for
growth in high-skilled advanced manufacturing jobs like
computer-controlled machine operation or repair of high-tech
industrial equipment, according to Change The Equation. And
the Wrangler, at 250,000 units per year, is Chrysler’s best
selling model and sells in both a good and bad economy. To
exchange the Wrangler for two other unknown products that
would sell a maximum of 90,000 total units will not
guarantee employment at the median $23 per hour for Toledo’s
high-skilled workforce.
A fight to Keep Jeep is a fight that needs to be fought,
while the city and the county sit down and work out their
issues together, especially with the city spending tens of
millions of dollars in real estate and construction costs to
appease Marchionne and the county with a nearly $150 million
bill for construction of the mandated new jail.
Otherwise, the citizens of Toledo, who depend on community
projects and programs to lift them out of poverty, the
skilled workers who build world class products and the
government employees who have worked patiently for years
without raises are caught in the crossfire of a fight that
doesn’t need to be fought and our ability to partner with
the public on water issues and basic services around
recycling or garbage are all placed in jeopardy.
Contact Rev. Donald Perryman, D.Min, at
drdlperryman@centerofhopebaptist.org |
