The ‘rainmaker’ and the sewer

Posted on May 29, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Joel Thurtell

Abe Munfakh calls himself a “rainmaker.”
He’s running for state senate.
“Rainmaker.”
What he means is that he got contracts for the Ann Arbor engineering firm he headed.
In the following April 22, 1992 Detroit Free Press article, I outlined one way Munfakh made rain for his company, Ayres, Lewis, Norris & May.
He got them a $10 million sewer engineering contract.
He was in the right place, right time.
As a member of the Plymouth Township Board of Trustees, he knew the skinny on a hundred-million-dollar construction project known as the Western Townships Utilities Authority. He knew about WTUA’s plan to pipe sewage from three townships to Ypsilanti. Not only knew about it — he voted to establish the authority and to collect fees from residents.
No requests for proposals on this deal.
While Munfakh was a the township trustee, his firm, Ayres, Lewis, Norris & May, got the contract in a no-bid deal.
He makes no bones about it. His website boasts, “Abe was the rainmaker and jobs creator (for Ayres, Lewis, Norris & May) and under his leadership ALNM expanded and grew from 31 employees to 152 employees  when he retired in 2004.”
Talk about well-connected.
The fix was in.
WTUA benefited other firms and individuals with connections to local politicians as well.
Every politician connected to the WTUA insider trading deal got bounced out of office in the August 1992 Republican primary election, including Abe Munfakh, who placed last in a field of seven running for a Plymouth Township board seat.
Eventually, Munfakh won back a seat on the Plymouth Township board.
Now he wants a seat in the state senate.
Rainmaker for the Legislature.
Wonder whose benefit he’ll be working for?
This story, reprinted with permission of the Detroit Free Press, shows how Munfakh made rain for himself and his company while he was an elected Plymouth Township trustee.
Is it accurate?
Well, local officials and a a slew of well-paid PR firms — mentioned in my story — went through my article with microscopes looking for ways to pick it apart. That they found only one inconsequential error is a testament to this article’s accuracy.
Now, 18 years later, this self-styled “rainmaker” wants a seat in the state senate.
Headline: SEWER COSTS SWAMP 3 TOWNSHIPS
Sub-Head:
Byline:  JOEL THURTELL FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER
Pub-Date: 2/22/1992
Memo:  DRAINING THE SUBURBS; SEE CHART IN MICROFILM
Correction:  CORRECTION RAN MARCH 3, 1992
GETTING IT STRAIGHT
* A FEB. 22 FRONT-PAGE ARTICLE INCORRECTLY REPORTED WHAT THE
YPSILANTI COMMUNITY UTILITIES AUTHORITY AND WAYNE COUNTY CHARGE
FOR TREATING SEWAGE. YCUA CHARGES $10.59 IN OPERATION AND
MAINTENANCE COSTS PER 1,000 CUBIC FEET. WAYNE COUNTY CHARGES
CANTON TOWNSHIP $5.65 PER 1,000 CUBIC FEET, NORTHVILLE TOWNSHIP
$4.77 AND PLYMOUTH TOWNSHIP $5.23
Text: Six years ago, three Wayne County suburbs decided to save their residents
millions of dollars in sewer fees.
Wayne County wanted $25.5 million for the three to join its Super Sewer
project. But  the supervisors of Plymouth, Canton and Northville Townships
said they could do it for $17 million and went their own way.
Their way is costing the 98,000 residents of the townships $94.5 million.
At least $30 million of that is being spent on non- construction costs.
And more than $11.5 million in contracts has been awarded to people with
connections with the township officials, a Free Press investigation shows.
What will the townships get for the extra money? Sewer rates at least twice
as high as those of the 12 communities tied into Super Sewer. A system with
only half as much  additional capacity as Super Sewer would have given them —
and only if the Ypsilanti plant, which will treat the sewage, is expanded.
That cost hasn’t been calculated.
“Holy Toledo! That’s incredible!”  exclaimed former Canton Township Clerk
Linda Chuhran, who now regrets  casting one of the seven votes in 1986 that
established the Western Townships Utilities Authority, which oversees the
sewer system.
Canton Township supervisor and sewer authority chairman Thomas Yack defend the project, saying it’s  better for the environment and provides all the
capacity the western townships will need for growth.
“The project is a lot different than the early project envisioned by Wayne
County,” Yack said.  “Why it’s four or five fold, I really couldn’t respond.”
But a Free Press investigation  shows  that the three township supervisors,
who double as commissioners for the sewer authority, have done little to hold
down costs:
* Some $30 million is going to nonconstruction contracts that were awarded
without competitive bidding.
* The sewer board so far has paid out at least $5.5 million to people and
businesses with connections to the authority, according to records obtained by
the Free Press.  Their contracts call for them to receive another $6 million.
Among work awarded without bids:
* Legal services and consulting contracts to firms connected to former WTUA
secretary Robert Law. His  legal firm also represents the three townships. His
brother, Gerald Law, is now Plymouth Township supervisor and  WTUA treasurer.
* Land acquisition, assigned to John Breen, brother of Maurice Breen,
authority cofounder and former Plymouth Township supervisor.
* Engineering, awarded to a firm headed by Abe Munfakh, a Plymouth Township
trustee who voted to establish WTUA.
Meanwhile, Super Sewer  costs haven’t exceeded the original projection of $60
million and the federal government is paying 55 percent.  The western
townships have received no federal money.
Because of the federal money,  all contracts have been awarded on a
competitive basis, according to Tom Kampinnen of the state Department of
Natural Resources. Super Sewer will replace sewer lines between 12 communities
and the Detroit Wastewater Treatment Plant.
‘There will be no unknowns’
When officials of the townships decided to break away from Super Sewer in
1986, they were optimistic.
“You’re looking at a better project  we’re buying into,” Maurice Breen
said at the time. “We’ll know what the dollars are. There will be no unknowns
in the project other than acts of nature.”
James Poole, then the Canton Township  supervisor, warned that Super Sewer
might never receive federal funds.
The supervisors didn’t believe they would  pay only $25.5 million for a
stake in the county system. They worried they would  be taxed down the road if
Detroit were ordered to upgrade its sewage treatment plant.
Besides, the township officials said, instead of trusting Wayne County and
Detroit, they would have control  over their sewer facilities.
Officials of the townships were able to form WTUA and issue bonds without
voter approval under a 1955 state law that allows them to sell bonds to
finance public utilities.  The supervisors — Canton’s Poole, Plymouth’s
Breen and Northville’s Suzie Heintz — gathered the day after Christmas 1986
and formally organized the authority.
“We told them when they started that  it was going to be very expensive,”
said  Wayne County Department of Public Works Director Jim Murray, who was
Washtenaw County drain commissioner and chairman of the Michigan Water
Resources Commission  in 1988 when  the sewer authority sought a new water
discharge permit for the Ypsilanti plant.
Had the townships stayed with Super Sewer, they were promised about 52
million gallons a day of additional capacity, or six times the 8.7 million
gallons they will lease from the Ypsilanti Community Utilities Authority
beginning in fall 1993. If they want more, the townships will have to pay to
expand the Ypsilanti plant, said YCUA Director Bruce Jones. An expanded plant
would give them about half what Super Sewer promised, according to  the
Ypsilanti sewer authority’s figures.
WTUA project engineer  Phil Loud said he believes Super Sewer’s promised
capacity in 1986 was exaggerated. He said his firm is using sophisticated
methods of estimating capacity which may not have been used by engineers
planning  Wayne County’s system.
In the early years of the authority, officials also were optimistic about
rates.
In 1988, Poole boasted, “eventually, our rates will be better than Detroit”
because the  Ypsilanti plant “is a much more efficient operation.”
Today, Ypsilanti’s rate is $12.64 per 1,000 cubic feet a second, compared
to Wayne County’s $4.77, according to YCUA and the Wayne County Department  of Public Works.
Some bills already higher
Some residents already are getting higher bills to pay for the new system;
they will get them for a generation or more as WTUA pays off its construction
bonds, plus $150 million in interest.
Plymouth Township residents are paying quarterly $15.69 installments
intended to collect more than $1,882 per household over the next 30 years.
Northville  Township plans to cover its debt through hookup fees paid by
developers of new housing, according to  the township finance director, Duane
Harrigan.
Canton Township plans to pay part of its share  by gradually increasing
water and sewer rates,  said finance director John Spencer.
“We don’t see it impacting rates significantly,” he said. Over the past 20
years, Canton has saved about $17 million  from hookup fees, and part of that
could be used for the debt, he said.
Some of the debt comes from administrative costs the authority incurred in
getting the bond money.
A computer analysis  of  municipal bond transactions, done for the Free
Press by Securities Data Co. of Newark, N.J., shows that the fees WTUA paid to
issue its 1989 and 1991 bonds were more than 20 percent above average.
In all, the authority’s bonding fees cost $494,385 above average.
Among those costs was a $75,000 finder’s fee to Plymouth stockbroker Craig
Fleming, who said he learned of the deal from Ernie Essad,  a partner in
WTUA’s law firm. Fleming said he acted as a liaison between the law firm and
his employers, Prescott, Ball and Turben Inc. of Chicago, the lead bond
underwriters.
No bidding policy
Sewer officials say much of the extra cost comes from unanticipated
construction needs, such as a larger interceptor and catch basin and a pump
station and pipes to move treated wastewater to the Rouge  River.
But they could have tried to lower costs by requiring bidding for
professional services.  The authority has no bidding policy, according to
Executive Director Deloris Newell.
Said  Robert VanRavenswaay Jr.,  an authority attorney: “There’s really
nothing in the statutes that says or even suggests we get requests for
proposals for everything that is procured.”
But former Canton  Township Clerk Chuhran, now an accountant for General
Motors, calls not seeking bids “against all the ethics and guidelines set up
for governments to run by.”
The Michigan Townships Association, to  which the three townships belong,
recently drafted a policy recommending that its members solicit competitive
bids for goods and services.
Peter Letzmann, past president of the Michigan Association of Municipal
Attorneys who frequently speaks on ethics in government, said the sewer board
should have sought bids.
“It seems to me that any public officials would take great steps to be
squeaky clean  or scrupulous within the letter of the law so there would be no
conflict of interest or no appearance of conflict of interest,” said Letzmann.
“Those people who do not take that step are doing a disservice  to their
municipality or governmental agency because today we have a crying need for
ethics, honesty and integrity in government.”
No-bid contracts for engineering, lobbying and legal services went  to
people with connections to township officials.
The engineering contract went to the Ann Arbor firm of Ayres, Lewis,
Norris & May, whose president  is Plymouth Township Trustee Munfakh.
Munfakh voted in November 1986 to establish the authority. In 1991, he voted
to increase sewer rates so  the township could pay its share of the bonds. His
company had billed the authority $3,225,901  by mid-December and is budgeted
to earn $9.8 million on the sewer job.
According to Newell, the townships were worried about a conflict of
interest when they chose an engineering firm. They ruled  out a Taylor
engineering firm because it already was working for Wayne County on Super
Sewer.
The authority “wanted an engineering firm in Washtenaw County because
there was quite a bit of negotiating  to do with YCUA,” she said. Another Ann
Arbor firm was ineligible because it was working for Ypsilanti, Newell said.
Munfakh’s firm “was highly recommended and did not represent YCUA or Wayne
County,”  said Newell.
“They beat us to get our fee down,” Munfakh said.
Munfakh said Breen convinced him to accept a 4.5-percent profit, half its
usual margin.  The sewer project will account for  15 percent of  his firm’s
income this year, said Munfakh.
Munfakh meets regularly with the sewer board and in the absence of chief
engineer Loud gives reports to the board.
He said he voted  for the Plymouth Township sewer rate increase because he
felt a responsibility to make sure the township pays its debt.
Also without seeking bids, the authority  awarded its contract for land
acquisition  legal work to  Breen’s brother, John Breen. They share an office
in Plymouth Township.
Although now a Wayne County commissioner, Maurice Breen still takes an
active part in authority affairs.
He defended the choice of his brother, saying that John Breen  had
experience in acquiring  land when he was legal director for Wayne County’s
Department of Public Works.
“John had retired from  Wayne County and was just kind of looking for
something to  do. We wanted somebody doing acquisition who would treat our
people in a kind manner . . . and did not charge us $250 an hour for legal
services.”
By mid-December, John Breen had billed the authority $51,005.
Former state Rep. Gerald Law took Maurice Breen’s place as Plymouth
Township supervisor and sewer commissioner last year after Breen  became a
county commissioner.
Law’s brother, Robert Law,  was  secretary to the sewer board during its
first meeting in 1986. His legal firm represents all three townships.
Without seeking  bids, the sewer board  during that first meeting in 1986
named Robert Law’s firm to represent it and named him its lead attorney. Since
then, without bids, the board has awarded lobbying and public relations
contracts to firms connected to Law or his firm, Law, Hemming, Essad &
Polaczyk.
By mid-December, the legal firm had made more than $1.5 million from the
project, including a one-half-percent fee on both bond transactions, totaling
more than $900,000. The other firms took in more than $150,000.  “We were
hired because of our background in this project and because of our working
relationship with  the communities,” said Robert Law.
The board pays a $3,000 monthly retainer to Government Affairs Consulting
Group. Robert Law is the president of the firm, which also has offices in the
same building  as Law, Hemming. By mid-December, Government Affairs had billed the authority $50,587 for lobbying services.
In 1988, when the sewer board needed to have proposals and news releases
written, the  board, without seeking bids, awarded the contract to Power
Associates of Plymouth Township. Law said Power Associates was an affiliate of
the legal firm and has offices in the same building as Law, Hemming.
According to state records, Power Associates’ president is Michael Brice and
its director is Robert Law. By mid-December, Power Associates had billed  the
sewer authority $20,000.
Another firm affiliated  with Law, Hemming is Communications Management
Co., which had billed $61,624 for public relations work by mid-December,
Robert Law said. Communications Management  is the new name for  Power
Associates,  whose name was not popular with clients, said the attorney. Yet
another public relations firm which he acknowledged was, until recently, a
Law, Hemming affiliate, is Strategies Plus, which had billed  $27,371 by
mid-December. He said Strategies Plus is no longer an affiliate of the law
firm.
Michael Brice is president of Strategies Plus.
Law, Hemming partner Ernie Essad said he sees no problem with Robert Law
serving as general counsel of WTUA while his brother, Gerald Law, is its
treasurer.
“It’s nothing hidden, and everybody knows who everybody is,” said Essad.
“There are bar opinions  which indicate that you are not automatically
disqualified as a result of that relationship.”
$611,876 lobbying bill
The biggest single consulting bill — $611,876 — has come from the
Washington,  D.C., lobbying firm of Cassidy & Associates. The authority did
not advertise for bids for the work.
Cassidy bills WTUA $20,000 a month to lobby Michigan’s congressional
delegation to help get a $19  million federal grant. The money would  pay for
pipes and  a pumping system to carry treated wastewater to the Rouge.
The authority  says that part of the project, recommended by the DNR, is a
unique national environmental demonstration.
Officials are hoping for a grant from the Army Corps of Engineers.
Maurice Breen said he’s “absolutely convinced” the project eventually will
receive federal money.
The authority has stressed environmental benefits of the sewer system. Its
plan to eventually pump 58 million gallons a day of treated wastewater from
Ypsilanti back to Canton  for discharge into the lower Rouge has been termed a
“win-win situation” by Paul Zugger, director of the surface water quality
division of the DNR.
The authority proposes by November 1994 to send  all of the Ypsilanti
plant’s treated wastewater to the Rouge. According to Newell, the water would
be cleaner than water now in the Rouge, and would stabilize  streamflows.
But in October, U.S.  Rep. John Dingell asked the corps to study the
effect of the project on residents of his 16th Congressional District,  which
covers Monroe County and parts of Lenawee and Wayne counties, downriver from
the discharge.
Maurice Breen remains confident the townships did the right thing in going
it alone.
“We were willing to go into a system not so much for sanitary sewer needs,
but as an environmental  project, even though it may cost more.”
To Edward Hustoles, director of planning at the Southeastern Michigan
Council of Governments, it’s no surprise the system is costing more.
“The idea of  independence is a seductive  one. That always sounds good, to
be our own bosses. They’re paying a price for independence.”
Caption: A worker surveys  a sewer construction site  at Joy and
Haggerty  roads in Canton Township. The sewer project,
conceived as a money-saver for Plymouth, Canton and Northville
townships, will cost $94.5 million. Wayne County had asked for
$25.5 million for its Super  Sewer.
Illustration:  PHOTO DAYMON J. HARTLEY; MAP HANK SZERLAG
CHART
Edition: METRO FINAL
Section:  NWS
Page: 1A
Keywords: ; SEWER;  MAJOR STORY;  SUBURB;  WAYNE COUNTY
Disclaimer:
Posted in Bad government, Politics | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Matty and the squeaky-greens

Posted on May 21, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Joel Thurtell

The Sierra Club is crying foul.

The Canada-based branch of the environmental group says the government-sponsored bridge, known as the Detroit River International Crossing, is ill-planned and unneeded.

Ordinarily, a squeaky-green organization like Sierra would deserve great credibility on such a volatile issue, even though its opinion coincides with the financial interests of a billionaire named Matty Moroun who owns the only bridge between the U.S. and Canada at Detroit and whose interests are totally opposed to building a second span.

But how credible is Sierra?

Is there a squeak in their clean-green public image?

Indeed yes, according to The Nation.

Like a number of other environmental organizations, the Sierra Club takes has money from companies that pollute directly, or manufacture products that cause pollution.

Like bleach.

In The Nation article, “The Wrong Kind of Green,” by Johann Jari, the Sierra Club’s nonprofit persona comes off with a bit of an oily tinge. Sierra is listed as one large environmental group that has struck deals with industry.

For example, wrote Hari:

The Sierra Club was approached in 2008 by the makers of Clorox bleach, who said that if the Club endorsed their new range of “green” household cleaners, they would give it a percentage of the sales. The Club’s Corporate Accountability Committee said the deal created a blatant conflict of interest–but took it anyway. Executive director Carl Pope defended the move in an e-mail to members, in which he claimed that the organization had carried out a serious analysis of the cleaners to see if they were “truly superior.” But it hadn’t. The Club’s Toxics Committee co-chair, Jessica Frohman, said, “We never approved the product line.” Beyond asking a few questions, the committee had done nothing to confirm that the product line was greener than its competitors’ or good for the environment in any way.

Now, do we know that the Sierra Club and Matty are in bed together? No.

Yet the history of taking money from industry in the Clorox case makes the group’s position regarding the international bridge a bit suspicious.

If they hadn’t done the Clorox deal, they might be above reproach.

Sorry to say, Sierra looks like just one more nonprofit money grubber.

Now, what does that have to do with Matty and the Ambassador Bridge?

Maybe nothing.

Just can’t help wonderin’.

Drop me a line at joelthurtell@gmail.com

Posted in Me & Matty | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

We need a union

Posted on May 18, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Peppermint Patti

JOTR Columnist

It is true, Sophie, that my two-leggers put my name on top of these columns that I write free for them.

That is as it should be, I suppose, though I hear the male two-legger often enough complaining that he is not being paid ENOUGH for his writing, which argues that he is being paid SOMETHING, which is more than he is paying me.

But here’s the clincher.

When time comes for him to collect all my columns together and publish them as a book, Sophie, whose name do you think will appear first?

Not Peppermint Patti, I bet.

Know what we need, Sophie?

It’s called a union.

The two-leggers have them.

Why not dogs?

In a union, we would be equal, you and I. As I understand it, in theory, we also would be equal to our two-leggers.

That is not quite right, of course.

It would be demeaning to agree that we are the equals of two-legged walkers.

Even though my pedigree came up missing when I got lost from my first two-leggers, I know in my puppy’s heart of hearts that I am more than equal to any two-legger I’ve ever met.

So I’m not sure about all this unionized equality.

Maybe we could agree to it and cross our pads.

But I don’t like that.

If a dog has one thing, it’s her integrity.

A dog stands for something for sure, Sophie.

Personal comfort, yes, but even more, a dog is straight-up and true.

A dog knows what she wants, whether it be a scrap from the table or a crack at a bush-tail.

You might say, there is no beating around the bush-tail when it comes to what a dog wants.

We wear our druthers on our coats.

And speaking of coats, mine could use a good brushing, couldn’t yours?

I’d be sure to write a brushing clause into our contract, Sophie.

Right after plenty of regular food, first-class chow, and all the table scraps we think fit to beg for.

Here’s what we need, Sophie — a dog’s bill of rights.

.

Posted in Peppermint Patti | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Advice for televictims: Tough!

Posted on May 17, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Myrtle Mortbrain

JOTR Consumerist

I just don’t get it.

All this gobbledygook from JOTR readers who say they’ve been bilked by their ATT bills.

Know what I mean?

Just like the NRA says, “Guns don’t kill people.”

Well, you can quote old Myrtle on this one: Bills don’t bilk people.

I mean, don’t they READ their bills?

Here at JOTR, we read EVERYTHING that comes in the mail. Oh, it’s true that our founder let slip a bill from ATT and later discovered he’d paid for some services he didn’t order.

His fault, I say!

(One nice thing about working for JOTR — they may not pay, but they leave your copy alone.)

Anyway, now the boss is carping that some phony signed him up with a wrong e-mail and fictitious birth date. It was a fake birth date that made him out to be 28 instead of 65.

SO WHAT’S THE PROBLEM?

Be grateful for small favors, is what I say. Some anonymous benefactor carves 32 years off his age, and the boss is pitching a bitch?

Some people just don’t know a good deal when they’ve got it.

So what if all these phony charges added up to $58.37 a month out of JOTR’s bank account? He got 32 years younger, and at a very low cost, in my view.

Okay, seriously, people, you need to take responsibility — read those bills!

I agree with what the flak from ILD Teleservices told the boss:

Like any bill, it’s important to closely review your phone bill each and every month because whether it’s your phone bill, credit card statement, electric or cable, sometimes charges end up on your bill that you should question. Your phone bill should be treated like any other purchase you make, so take a few minutes each month and closely review all of the charges, just like you do with your bank statement and credit card statements.

Think of it as a test — the shysters screwing you are not bad people. No, they are put on earth to make sure good people stay alert. If the good folks slip up and get screwed out of their savings, whose fault is it?

Theirs!

It’s a dog-eat-dog world where the bad people have a right, nay, a duty, to test good people by screwing them to make them wise up. 

If they’d don’t get savvy, well, that’s the way of the world, isn’t it?

If they forget to check their phone bill with a microscope because they got busy auditing their credit bills per the ILD Teleservices honcho’s advice, whose fault is that? So what if they assumed that ATT would bill only for ATT charges and not act like a front for these fly-by-nights? You mean you trusted ATT?

Ladies and gentlemen, have we not learned from Goldman Sachs, AIG and all the other huge corporations that gaming the system means gaming you and me?

We have only ourselves to blame!

(By adopting this blame-the-victim stance, frankly, I make my own job of writing a consumer-protection column much easier. If there’s no point in protecting consumers, if victims are the ones to blame, no point doing the hard research and sticking my neck out to snipe at the perps, right?)

I rather like the attitude of that PR person for ILD Teleservies, the one that almost got my boss’s pocketbook: Read those bills, dumbies!

It’s every man and woman, boy, girl, cat and dog for him, her or itself.

And that’s about all for now from this consumer advocate, whose supreme advice to all victims of chicanery, skullduggery and hoodlumism is: Get smart or pay the price.

Posted in ATT & me, Bad government | Leave a comment

Fake phone bills again

Posted on May 13, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Joel Thurtell

Early this year, I discovered that my ATT bill contained fees for services I’d never heard of, never ordered, yet was paying for. I had to make a slew of phone calls, but managed to have the fees removed from my bill. I wrote about the scam in a column that prompted others to write about similar misadventures with their ATT bills.

One of the companies that billed me — ILD Teleservices — has responded. Here is the comment, followed by my response:

Hello Joel,

ILD Teleservices is not a fraudulent practice – here’s what we do.
ILD Teleservices is a convenient and secure payment method designed for purchasing on the web or over the phone. Like a credit account, ILD provides the flexibility to buy without using your credit card. Hundreds of businesses offer Bill to Phone payment from ILD, giving you a way to pay by charging your phone bill. Plus, ILD also provides you with “purchase assurance” protection; like the protection provided by your bank and credit card companies. This means you are not responsible for unauthorized charges. So, if you feel like you have been wrongly billed, please call ILD at (800) 953-7765 and we’ll help you or you can get support by visiting our self help center at http://www.ildteleservices.com/support.html.

Like any bill, it’s important to closely review your phone bill each and every month because whether it’s your phone bill, credit card statement, electric or cable, sometimes charges end up on your bill that you should question. Your phone bill should be treated like any other purchase you make, so take a few minutes each month and closely review all of the charges, just like you do with your bank statement and credit card statements.

You can read our blog for helpful hints on how to protect yourself from fraudulent charges as well as learn more about our services.
http://www.ildteleservicesblog.com

Thank you,
Monica Melgar

Dear Monica — You can read my blog (http://joelontheroad.com/?p=3794) for a description of how persons unknown used a false birthdate and fake e-mail address to add several fee-based services to my ATT bill without my permission. Your company was one of them. This was enough for ATT to start billing me at the rate of $12.95 per month, a useless (to me) fee that went to your company. Now, maybe your company didn’t falsely sign me up for this unwanted service. But whoever did it, the act benefited your company and it hurt me. It seems like you might want to look into this fraudulent activity and try to make sure it isn’t repeated, rather than post flimsy defenses on the blog that exposed the larceny.

Joel Thurtell

Since writing that, I spent Saturday evening with family. Out of the blue, my wife’s brother-in-law started complaining about — Guess what! He’d discovered, belatedly, a charge from an unknown company for an unwanted service attached at the end of his ATT bill. He didn’t know how it got there. He called ATT and heard the same story I got: ATT is powerless to stop these third-party billers.

The scam goes on.

Posted in ATT & me, Bad government | Tagged , | 2 Comments

‘Loyalty’ and all that

Posted on May 10, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Joel Thurtell

Shhh!

Please keep this under your hat.

It’s an idea that could make me a bundle of money.

I don’t mind sharing it with you, but please, PLEASE, don’t pass it on to somebody who might steal it from me and make millions.

I’ve got an idea how to save the moribund newspaper industry.

It’s so simple, no wonder they haven’t thought of it.

Sometimes the best ideas seem just too easy.

Here it is: Newspapers are too kind to their customers. When a newspaper subscriber calls to cancel, the newspaper people are very polite. They simply take the caller’s information and cancel the subscription.

What dunderheads!

Don’t they know they’re signing their own obituary?

Don’t make it so easy.

Do what cable TV does: Haul the recalcitrants before a Loyalty Committee. Make your customers justify themselves. Why do you have the temerity to cancel?

This actually happened to me on Saturday, May 8, 2010, when I called a certain cable television company known as Comcast and asked to suspend our service.

First, I was told that we could do a “temporary suspension” for the three months or so that we’ll be away from home.

Okay, I said, how much does the “temporary suspension” cost?

Six bucks a month.

No dice, says I. Cancel us. Permanently.

No can do, the Comcast guy says.

What? says I, accustomed as I am to unctuous civility and complete obedience from my newspaper vendors.

Can’t cancel you on Saturday, says the Comcast guy.

What’s wrong with Saturday? says I.

The Loyalty Department is closed, he says.

What does that have to do with it? wonder I.

Can’t cancel without conversation with the Loyalty Department. Have to wait till Monday. Loyalty Department will interview you about why you’re cutting off our service.

Well, if I had reasons before, they’re eclipsed by this experience.

The Loyalty interview alone would make me want to cancel Comcast.

Wonder what the Loyalty folks will ask me?

Do I have to take a Loyalty Oath to get out of their clutches?

I’d call it a Disloyalty Oath.

Oh Mighty Lord Comcast, I do hereby swear that I wish to negate any connection I ever had with your misbegotten company. Oh mighty behemoth corporation which demands complete obedience, hereby accept my pledge of everlasting disloyalty.

Newspaper executives take note: You can stanch the ebb of circulation by demanding absolute loyalty from your customers and requiring them to submit to interviews before cutting off their papers.

A few bold patrons may quit, but a lot of timid people will stay with you out of fear that you’ll be mean in the exit interview.

Harken, New York Times, Gannett, McClatchy, Tribune, Washington Post, Time, Newsweek, and all you other troubled purveyors of paper news.

Beat up on your customers! Don’t let them go without a fight!

Drop me a line at joelthurtell@gmail.com

Siz

Posted in future of newspapers, Joel's J School | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Vote fraud in Bloomfield? You be the AG

Posted on May 9, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Joel Thurtell

If you’d been Michigan’s attorney general, what would you have done?

Allowed a state trooper to proceed with his investigation into possible corruption in a 2001 election?

Or would you have killed the investigation?

The question is significant. The election made possible construction of a purported $2 billion complex that has since gone bust, with big buildings standing unfinished. The development, dubbed “Bloomfield Park,” is a blight for the communities of Pontiac and Bloomfield Townsip.

This disaster was made possible by a very questionable annexation election on September 11, 2001.

Were tenants of a neighborhood in Bloomfield Township enticed to register as voters and cast ballots that favored the interests of their landlord who wanted the enclave to be carved away from Bloomfield Township and annexed to Pontiac?

Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox reviewed evidence collected by Michigan State Police Det. Sgt. Gary Muir and decided against charging employees of developer Craig Schubiner’s Harbor Companies with corrupting the annexation election. There were enough “yes” votes for the area to be annexed, which cleared the way for Schubiner to build his $2 billion megacomplex of apartments, offices, stores and theaters at Telegraph and Square Lake roads.

Or try to.

Schubiner dodged questions about financing, and eventually ran out of money in mid-construction.

Today, the high-rises stand empty, unfinished, waiting for somebody to scrape up $200 million to tear them down. 

It’s a cinch that person won’t be Craig Schubiner.

Then Bloomfield Township Clerk Wilma Cotton, with no support from colleagues on the Bloomfield Township board, filed an election fraud complaint with state police and tried valiantly to bring the developer to justice.

Cox refused to prosecute those employees of Harbor Companies implicated in the purloined election. In 2004, Sgt. Muir told me that Cox went so far as to stop the state police investigation without issuing the subpoenas Muir needed to look at Harbor’s bank records to trace flows of money.

Nonetheless, Muir collected a pile of evidence.

What do YOU think? Should Cox have prosecuted these people?

Here, printed with permission of the Detroit Free Press,  is a section of my May 10, 2004 Free Press article (for the full story, scroll to May 10, 2004) detailing evidence of voter corruption given to Cox by Muir:

What the tenants said

State Police Detective Sgt. Gary Muir was assigned to look into a complaint of vote fraud brought by Cotton, the township clerk, in late 2002. He found, according to his investeigataive file, that in July and August 2001, 14 new voters registered in teh Harbor enclave.

Here’s what the State Police file says about statements six Harbor tenants made about arrangements they allegedly had with Harbor:

— Elizabeth Johnson, a year after the election, signed an affidavit stating that Harbor controller Dawn Foulke and property manager Cynthia Jo Daly recruited her to live in a Harbor-owned house rent-free if she would register to vote, sign an annexation petitition and vote yes in the election. Johnson’s affidavit says she registered to vote on Aug. 10, 2001, and “I voted as instructed in favor of annexation on Sept. 11, 2001.” She moved into the house two weeks later.

— Craig Ginter stated that in summer 2001, “I received a phone call from Dawn Foulke asking me if I would be interested in free rent for 6 mos. in Bloomfield. I said I would consider it. She called back and sweetened the deal, offering 8 mos.. Then 10 or more. I acccepted. The only stipulation was that I had to change my address that day and register to vote in Bloomfield. I did. I voted ‘yes’ and I did because I had been trated very well by Harbor Cos., and this had been agreed upon before I moved in.”

Besides free rent, Ginter said Harbor gave him a $500-a-week job as company courier.

— In her statement, Shannon Harris said that she and her sister, Jeri Beth Dunn, shared a Harbor-owned house and the company “did offer them free rent for one year to vote in the election.”

— According to the transcript of her tape-recorded interview with investigators, Jeri Beth Dunn said the rent-free offer came from Foulke, who is her cousin. Dunn said Foulke gave her $500 cash each month, and Dunn said she then bought a $500 money order to pay the rent. “What you really had to do to move in was sign the petition. That petition which led to the vote, probably. They didn’t even let us really read it. They were just like, sign here and then you can move in. And I’m 18, so I’m like woo-hoo, free rent yes, you know. And I didn’t really think about it.”

— In his interview with Muir, according to the detective’s notes, David Drazin said, “Harbor Cos. forgave him his back rent debt of $1,500 to $2,000. The representative from Harbor Cos. he was dealing with was Dawn. In addition, he was asking Harbor Cos. for a one-year lease instead of a month-by-month lease. Harbor Cos. aagreed for a favorable vote in the election.”

— In a written statement, John Gara told of his conversation with Harbor attorney Bruce Measom about $250 in latae-rent fees Gara owed Harbor. “Without ever saying that if I voted a certain way he would waive teh late fees, I still came out of the conversation feeling that Bruce was implying my favorable vote would eliminate my late fees,” Gara wrote.

In two other cases, a pair of Harbor employees allgedly registered to vote as residents of the enclave but never moved in. One told Muir, “I did not want to seem like I was not a team player and go against the company. My boss told me to do it.”

Pprosecutors can bring vote fraud charges under misdemanor or felony laws with penalties varying from 90 days to 5 years in jail. Falsely registering to vote can be prosecuted as a felony.

Posted in Bad government, From My Files, Joel's J School | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Swell time

Posted on May 8, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Joel Thurtell

Thank you, Curt Guyette, for your swell story about our little May 1, 2010 venture into the Detroit River by canoe from the Riverside Park boat launch.

Posted in Adventures on the Rouge, Me & Matty | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Bloomfield Farce: Phony from the get-go

Posted on May 4, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Joel Thurtell

Six years ago, I wrote a story about election high-jinks in a development project that is back in the news.

Wannabe real estate developer Craig Schubiner’s vaunted $2 billion Bloomfield Park, it turns out, is a huge bust.

Bloomfield Farce.

Seven-story buildings sit vacant near Telegraph and Square Mile Lake roads.

Marble lines parts of buildings that will never be finished.

Construction ended nearly two years ago, and township officials don’t expect it to re-commence.

L. Brooks Patterson, Oakland County’s executive,  once backed the project, but now says it’ll take a couple hundred million smackers just to tear it down, according to Laura Berman of The Detroit News.

Big surprise.

Schubiner thought he was going to be the 21st century’s Al Taubman.

But Bloomfield Park is no Twelve Oaks.

You didn’t need a crystal ball to see this disaster coming.

The Bloomfield Township board tried to kill it, but Pontiac embraced it, the territory was attached to the city, yet the big question — where’s the $2 billion of investment capital coming from? — was dodged by Schubiner.

His answer, it turns out, should have been clear to all: He never had it.

But it wasn’t clear to the wishful-thinkers in Pontiac who jumped at the chance of having high-rise concrete shells in their community.

Nor was the specter of this architectural catastrophe enough to motivate Bloomfield Township officials to jump at their one big chance to stop Schubiner cold.

Only one official truly opposed this project, and she was roundly criticized and cold-shouldered by her township trustee colleagaues. That was then Bloomfield Township Clerk Wilma Cotton.

Oh sure, Supervisor David Payne is crying that he tried to stop this monster for 15 years, but he was elsewhere when Cotton made her all-out effort to quash this sham development.

Cotton knew this was a stinker, and did her best to stop it.

Thanks to Cotton, the last best chance of squashing this imbecilic project landed in the hands of our attorney general, Mike Cox.

According to the Detroit News, “To launch it (the project), developer Craig Schubiner convinced a cluster of residents to vote their homes, and the Schubiner-owned property, into Pontiac.”

Well, sort of. According to some of the voters, they were “convinced” to vote for annexation by deals of free rent offered by people from Schubiner’s development company.

Selling votes.

There was evidence, according to the state police detective who investigated, that Schubiner’s acolytes — employees of his Harbor Companies firm — promised free rent to people if they would move into homes in the target area, register to vote and then vote “yes” for annexation to Pontiac.

Had there been a prosecution and conviction, Cotton was going to ask the state to set aside what a corrupt election.

That would have cut off the annexation and ended this disaster before it got underway.

But Cox said “no” to prosecution. Apparently, there wasn’t enough glory or free PR to be gained from a handful of convictions for buying an election.

Now Pontiac and Bloomfield Township are left to clean up the mess.

Here’s a link to the story I wrote for the May 10, 2004 Detroit Free Press about Schubiner’s renters who claimed they swapped votes for rent.

Drop me a line at joelthurtell@gmail.com

Posted in Bad government, From My Files, Joel's J School | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Matty Moroun, American

Posted on May 3, 2010 by hro50ta1

By Joel Thurtell

Recently, I wrote that Manuel “Matty” Moroun came from the Middle East. A reader pointed out that Matty himself told an interviewer he was born right in Detroit on June 5, 1927.

Here is how he described himself to a Corp! writer:

“My grandfather came from Lebanon and my dad was born in Buenos Aires,” says Moroun, sitting in a wood-paneled conference room at his spacious company headquarters in Warren, Mich. “My mom was also from Lebanon, but we think she was born in Cuba. The U.S. was always the magnet and that’s why they wanted to get here.”

 His parents, Tufick (who went by Thomas) and Jamal, were married in Detroit where Matty was born, on June 5, 1927.

 Growing up on Detroit’s east side with his three sisters and parents, Moroun attended Our Lady of Help elementary school, graduating from University of Detroit Jesuit High School and continuing his education at University of Notre Dame, where he earned a bachelor of science degree in chemistry in 1949.

I don’t know why I thought Matty was Lebanese. Did I read it somewhere? A friend suggested that the error was published on a blog and amplified on the Internet. Well, I don’t want to be a link in that loudspeaker chain.

Somebody also suggested that we need to check Matty’s birth certificate to be sure.

NO, NO, NO!

That is the kind of nativist dumbthink that has right-wingers demanding to seek President Obama’s papers.

If Matty says it, that’s good enough for me.

I removed the error from that essay. It didn’t change the column’s purpose, which was to chastise Matty for suggesting through his surrogate, Ambassador Bridge president Dan Stamper, that Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm is unpatriotic for supporting a Canadian loan to Michigan to build a government-proposed international bridge to compete with Matty’s private monopoly on trucking fares between the U.S. and Canada. The kicker to Stamper/Moroun’s critique of the governor is that she was born in Canada and thus lacks, so they suggest, the loyalty to the red-white-and-blue that a “true” American, presumably like Matty, would have.

That is sheeer bunk.

Granholm has served the public as Wayne County corporation counsel, an appointive job, then was elected attorney general of Michigan by voters who apparently were not worried about her loyalty, and again she was elected and re-elected by Michigan voters to be governor. But for a weird quirk in the U.S. Constitution, she is barred from running for President because she was not born a U.S. citizen.

I’ve never understood why a fully-qualified person should be barred from one particular office because of a quirk of birthplace.

It is demagogy of the lowest sort to play on the governor’s birth, especially when the real motive of the Ambassador Bridge owner is to deflect attention from the fact that he’s struggling against mounting odds to retain control of a business monopoly.

That has nothing to do with patriotism and everything to do with loyalty to profits.

The governor’s dual citizenship, brought up in this manner, is a red herring.

Drop me a line at joelthurtell@gmail.com

Posted in Me & Matty | Tagged | Leave a comment