WDET News
- Council to Debate Forfeiture Resolutions Against Kilpatrick
-
May 12, 2008General
The Detroit City Council is ready to consider removing Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick from office.
After asking outside attorney William Goodman to draft the “forfeiture of office” resolution the council has two choices to consider. The first is removing the Mayor under the city charter. The second is asking Governor Jennifer Granholm to remove him under her Constitutional powers.
Council President Kenneth Cockrel says he voted “yes” to move the resolution to debate but is not sure if he’ll vote to have the council remove the Mayor from office because of the obstacles involved.
"The cost of forfeiture, the time consuming nature of it, the fact that forfeiture proceeding could actually spill into next term. Now, the one thing that does give me a bit more comfort though is the response that we got from our counsel to one of my questions which is that if council does indeed decide that we don’t want to go this route and see it through to the end that we could ask for a stay and stop the court proceedings on it."
The council’s attorney says the entire forfeiture process could take over a year to complete with its public hearings and judicial review.
The council will also consider a resolution to censure the Mayor.
Deputy Mayor Anthony Adams says these new resolutions are just a continuation of “meaningless gestures” by the city council.
“First, they take a vote to have the Mayor resign. He did not do that. Then they spend $200,000 on an attorney to tell them in essence that what they want to do is fraught with danger. Now, they continue to potentially move forward with another vote… another meaningless gesture. We have bigger fish to fry for the citizens of the City of Detroit.”
The Detroit City Council debates the removal and censure resolutions at its formal session Tueday.