Friday Focus: Show Your Work at Pecha Kucha Night

PKN Detroit Poster - Click for Larger Image

Pecha Kucha Night is an event that takes place in more than three hundred cities around the world. It provides creative professionals with an opportunity to showcase their work in a lively, engaging format that's fun to watch. Locally, the next installment of PKN Detroit will happen on Belle Isle on Thursday, July 26 with doors at 6:30 p.m. and presentations starting promptly at 8:20 p.m.

Anyone with a creative body of work that they would like showcase is invited to apply to be one of those presenters. Interested professionals and students should send a description of themselves, a description of their work, and a 3 MB sample of their work, along with their contact information, to pkndetroit [at] gmail [dot] com no later than July 9.

Some of the professionals who have presented at PKN Detroit before include:

• Architects;
• Dancers;
• Filmmakers;
• Furniture designers;
• Graphic designers;
• Historians;
• Landscape architects;
• Interior designers;
• Painters;
• Photographers;
• Sculptors;
• Software developers; and
• Urban planners.

Presentations will happen inside the Belle Isle Conservatory (7000 Inslerue Ave). There will also be a special reception inside the Belle Isle Aquarium, which is attached to the Conservatory.

PKN Detroit is presented locally by the AIA Detroit Emerging Professionals Committee and Detroit Synergy.

Judge Dismisses Lawsuit Challenging Detroit's Consent Agreement

Judge William Collette, Chief Judge of the Ingham County Court, dismissed the lawsuit moments ago brought by Detroit's Corporation Counsel Krystal Crittendon that challenged the legality of the consent agreement between the City of Detroit and the State of Michigan.

This, by the way, was predicted by almost every person with a law degree, except for Ms. Crittendon and her staff. The one interesting point is that Judge Collette decided to only rule on Ms. Crittendon's authority to bring this lawsuit and not on the underlying points in her complaint.

Update @ 12:12 p.m.
Gary Brown, President Pro Tem of the Detroit City Council, released a statement regarding this dismissal on his Facebook page.

Now that the litigation with the State brought by Corporation Counsel is dismissed, it's time to move forward. We will appoint our representatives to the Financial Advisory Board tomorrow and approve the duel appointment by Governor Snyder and Mayor Bing. Then, we must have a razor-sharp urgent focus in partnership with the Bing Administration and the State to implement restructuring and focus on our core municipal services.

Detroit Water & Sewage to Hold Public Hearing for Sewage Project

Stock Photo from Stock.Xchng

The Detroit Water and Sewerage Department will hold a public hearing regarding its draft Project Plan covering a proposed new Combined Sewer Overflow Control Facility. This will be built at the Puritan Outfall, which discharges into the Rouge River at a location that is in the Warrendale neighborhood.

DWSD will seek low interest loan from Michigan's Clean Water Pollution Control Revolving Fund in order to fund the construction of this new facility. This fund provides loans for construction of pollution control facilities to communities throughout Michigan.

The public hearing will be held at 1 p.m. on Wednesday, June 27 in the 5th floor board room of the Water Board Building (735 Randolph). More information about this water project is available here.

Mayor Bing Orders Crittendon to Drop the Lawsuit Against the State of Michigan

Mayor Dave Bing, in the fourth change of position that he has had on this issue, has ordered Krystal Crittendon, Corporation Counsel for the City of Detroit, to drop her lawsuit against the State of Michigan, which challenged the legality of consent agreement that City and State governments entered into recently. Mayor Bing previously stated as recently as yesterday that, while he opposed the lawsuit, he was powerless to stop it. In a letter to Ms. Crittendon, a copy of which is available here, Mayor Bing today argued that the City Charter does indeed give him the authority to compel her to drop this case.

Judge William Collette, of the Ingham County Circuit Court, is scheduled to hear arguments in this case tomorrow morning at 10 a.m. in Lansing. It's not clear as of this writing whether or not Ms. Crittendon will, in fact, drop her lawsuit before that time.

Open Letter to Krystal Crittendon, Corporation Counsel for the City of Detroit

Michigan Capitol - Photo by Frank Nemecek

Dear Ms. Crittendon:

It seems that Mayor Dave Bing has thrown you under the bus by initially supporting your lawsuit against the State of Michigan, then saying that he's neutral, and now - in a third change of his position in less than 2 weeks - he now says that he opposes it, but is powerless to stop it. It seems that Mayor Bing wants you run this fool's errand, but doesn't want the foolishness to be seen as being on his hands.

That must put you in a very lonely position, one only made worse by media outlets calling for your removal from office. The fact that almost every attorney, and even most law students, in Michigan ridicules your interpretation of the law presumably adds insult to this injury.

Luckily, there are a few things that you can do to make what will most likely be last days as an attorney more enjoyable.

File Motions in Klingon

Michigan Court Rules, believe it or not, do not specifically require attorneys to file their motions in the English language. Therefore, in the interest of making you seem more intimidating, I recommend that you file all of your motions, briefs, and appeals in this case in the Klingon language.

I'm certain that our friends at the Klingon Language Institute will be happy to help with the translation. Besides, it's not like people will take you any less seriously once you start speaking in Klingon.

Re-File Your Lawsuit in England

The Michigan Territory was returned to the United States after the Treaty of Ghent in December of 1814. This treaty called for the purchase of land as a buffer zone between American forces and Native American tribes that were loyal to the British Crown. The land was never paid for, in violation of said treaty, so this is clearly a defaulted debt, similar to the ones that form the basis for your lawsuit.

If the alleged debt between the State of Michigan and the City of Detroit voids the consent agreement then a similar debt between Great Britain and the United States must also void the Treaty of Ghent. This, in turn, means that Michigan is properly a part of Great Britain. Thus, your case should be heard in London.

Oh, and as a bonus, British judges love it when you speak Klingon in their courtrooms.

Pay-Per-View

No matter where you file your lawsuit or what language you file the paperwork in, this case will eventually end up in a courtroom and the City of Detroit will still be broke in spite of the exceptional financial management skills of everyone in the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center. When this happens, I believe that it should become a pay-per-view event.

People around the globe will gladly pay $9.95 to watch a judge delegate to a first-year law student the task of explaining the inherent absurdities of this case to you. This should easily get you the $224 million that you are looking for from the State of Michigan.

Unless, of course, that first-year law student decides to start speaking in Vulcan. Nobody pays to hear someone talk in Vulcan.

Sincerely,
Your Friends at the Warrendale (Detroit) Blog

Detroit Works to Host a Telephone Town Hall Meeting

The Detroit Works Long Term Planning Project will host a Telephone Town Hall meeting tomorrow evening from 7 - 8 p.m. Detroit residents are invited to participate in this meeting to learn about long term plans for growing Detroit and to ask questions about what will come next.

More details are available in the video above.

Body of Missing Woman Found in Rouge Park

Stock Photo by Lehcar/Stock.xchng

The decomposed body of Margaret Theut was found in a heavily wooded area inside Rouge Park last month. However, at the request of the family, news of this fact was not released until DNA testing was completed to confirm her identity.

The 71-year-old lived on Patton Street in Detroit's Warrendale neighborhood for decades. She went missing last November and was presumed to have been murdered.

A police investigation into this matter is continuing. Anyone with information about her disappearance or death is asked to contact the Detroit Police Department.