Update 4:44 p.m.
From Michigan Radio's Rick Pluta
A judge has ruled that state-appointed review teams looking into the finances of the city if Detroit and the Highland Park school district broke Michigan’s open meetings law. The judge says review teams that can recommend state takeovers of local governments and school districts are public bodies that must operate in the public eye.
The ruling by Judge William Collette says the state needs to re-launch its review of the Highland Park school district, and do so in public. But there are no immediate plans to remove the state-appointed emergency manager who was placed in charge of the district two and a half weeks ago. The ruling also says future meetings of the Detroit review team – which has yet to make a recommendation -- must take place in public.
The lawsuit was filed by Highland Park school board member Robert Davis.
“This is a monumental victory for democracy,” Davis said.
It’s not clear what affect the ruling might have on the emergency managers already running four cities and the Detroit Public Schools. The state could appeal the ruling.
The emergency manager law is also facing a separate court challenge as well as a petition drive that seeks to put a referendum on the November ballot.
12:10 p.m.
LANSING, Mich. (AP) - An Ingham County judge has voided decisions made by a review team whose recommendations led to the appointment of an emergency manager in the Highland Park public
school system.
The decision Wednesday by Ingham County Circuit Judge William Collette says the review team violated the state's Open Meetings Act.
The suit was filed by Robert Davis, a Highland Park school board member. Davis said the ruling means that Gov. Rick Snyder's appointment of an emergency manager for the district last month is wiped out.
Messages were left with the Snyder administration seeking comment. A spokeswoman for the state attorney general's office said the ruling would be reviewed.
Collette has ruled that the state-appointed review teams should be subject to the state's Open Meetings Act.
Snyder's administration disagrees.
