With a new year, it’s time for a new beginning in city hall

It’s a new year and already we are off to a rocky start, politically speaking.
City Councilmember Anam Miah distributed an open letter to the community making scathing comments on how City Manager Katrina Powell went about appointing the city’s new police chief, Anne Moise.
You can read his letter in this issue as well as Powell’s response.
In a nutshell, Miah said Powell disrespected the city council by not first discussing the appointment with the council before announcing it to the state Transition Advisory Board, which has final authority over contracts and finances.
Powell’s counter-argument is that according to the final directives left behind by the former emergency manager, she is not required to seek the council’s OK on the hiring.
That is technically true.
But can we suggest something for the coming year?
Let’s stop the bickering in city hall.
We are a city that is still transitioning back to full local control. It was a year ago that a state-appointed emergency manager left her position after being on the job for 18 months.
In her place a new city manager was hired, and that position was given special authority and severely limited the role of the mayor and council. There are some who say this arrangement is deeply anti-democratic and is an insult to the voters of this community.
We would not entirely disagree with that.
But Hamtramck has been through the emergency manager process two times now, and maybe something severe needed to take place before local control is fully restored.
But that transition needs to start happening.
In hindsight, maybe the chief’s appointment could have taken a different path, one that included discussing it with the council before making the appointment official.
In fact, one of the final directives seems to say that it is the duty of the mayor and council to be involved in this process.
Look no further than this provision where the EM is talking about the role of the mayor and council:
“Confer with the city manager on the city manager’s selection of and performance evaluation of department heads and other positions designated as key positions of the city by the board.”
I think all will agree the position of police chief is a “key position.”
One could argue that this final directive is a little fuzzy on what it ultimately means. There are other directives that are equally unclear.
But the bottom line is that we need more communication and inclusiveness in city hall.
There is certainly no argument that Anne Moise is a good choice for the position of police chief.
Let’s move on from here, and let’s start building bridges.