Councilman resigns in a fit of anger

Councilmember Ian Perrotta

By Charles Sercombe
Following a wild and profanity-laced city council meeting Tuesday, Councilmember Ian Perrotta announced his resignation.
There was a lot to unpack from the meeting, the end of which broke down into Mayor Karen Majewski cutting off Perrotta twice for inappropriate comments.
At one point, Perrotta shot back to the mayor, “you have no f—— class,” and then blurted out “b—s—.” He also flipped his two middle fingers at the mayor and council.
At one point during the meeting Councilmember Saad Almasmari questioned whether Perrotta was drunk. Perrotta has been attending the Zoom meetings from his bar, Trixie’s, and visible in his screen background there were shelves of various liquor bottles.
He also appeared to be drinking during the meeting, although it was not possible to determine whether it was actually alcohol that he was imbibing.
Perrotta’s evening didn’t start out favorably, as he received pushback on his resolution to address the issue of street harassment of women from some unexpected critics: women.
Brooke Harris spoke out against the resolution at the beginning of the meeting during public comment and said she was concerned about “criminalizing” that behavior, because she fears it will give police officers “another reason to bother black and brown community members.”
Harris said that Perrotta’s intent was “great,” but “the harm outweighs” it.
Farhana Islam was also opposed to his resolution, saying it “won’t make the streets safer.”
Kit Parks echoed that sentiment, saying “police are not the solution to street harassment” because police officers have a high rate of domestic violence.
Some of Perrotta’s fellow councilmembers urged him to postpone a vote on the resolution to work on it more. Councilmember Mohammed Hassan also questioned what language may be interpreted as harassment.
He said, for example, someone might take offense to someone simply saying “Hello, hello, hello, hello.”
Perrotta responded that the resolution would simply open a door for the community to look further into street harassment with an eye toward shaping a city law in 60 days.
“We need to be proactive, and do something about this issue,” he said.
And he added: “We need to show our residents that we care about their safety.”
The council, except for Perrotta and Councilmember Almasmari, agreed to postpone a vote on the resolution.
He then lashed out at the council, which is comprised of all males, for taking that action.
“You guys are all dicks and no balls,” Perrotta said, which set the stage for what came later in the meeting.
The issue of women being harassed on the streets was initiated by a question posed on social media, by a local journalist, about women’s experiences in Hamtramck with catcalling.
Later in the meeting, Perrotta read from a prepared statement of over 2,200 words. It was essentially a litany of various grievances Perrotta has harbored during his tenure on council.
In it, he lashed out at Councilmember Hassan and his recall effort against Perrotta — that effort apparently never got off the ground, missing its deadline to move toward an election.
Perrotta said that has been a part of a pattern of harassment against him, which has included two censures by council over his behavior, including an incident where Perrotta cursed at a city hall employee regarding a zoning issue he had.
He said there was also someone who filed a grievance against him with the State Bar of Michigan, which he said was a “mish mash” of what he was accused of doing by Hassan in his recall language from six months ago.
Perrotta became an attorney about a year ago.
“Because it was dismissed the filer will continue to remain anonymous, but if it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like the asshole who has been harassing me for the past six months, well …” Perrotta said, in an apparent reference to Hassan.
Hassan did not return calls to comment on his recall effort, nor did he say anything about it in response to Perrotta’s comments.
It wasn’t long after that comment by Perrotta that Mayor Majewski put an end to his speech, much to his objection.
“You’re not going to let me say my piece? … This is something the residents need to hear,” Perrotta said.
Majewski said that Perrotta’s behavior violated the council’s own rules on conduct, and that Perrotta persisted in using profanity.
“I let you continue, but it only got worse and escalated,” Majewski said after cutting him off for the second time.
After the meeting Perrotta posted his statement on his Facebook page, which concluded with his announcement that he is resigning from the council.
His departure means that the next person in line who ran for council in the last council race takes his place, if they want the job and still live in the community.
That person is Carrie Beth Lasley. If she can’t or won’t take the job, the council then makes an appointment, and if the council deadlocks, it’s the mayor who makes the appointment.
Posted April 16, 2021

One Response to Councilman resigns in a fit of anger

  1. Bogdan

    May 25, 2021 at 10:37 am

    I have always thought that Perrotta lacked the temperament to be in a position of leadership.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *