Detroit's Mayor Kilpatrick Piles His Unethical Behavior Skyscraper High

Detroit’s mayor Kwame M. Kilpatrick is the new poster boy for misuse of office, lack of transparency, and covering up unethical behavior.

According to an article in the Detroit Free Press, it all began with an extramarital affair with his chief of staff, which he denied time and again (including on the witness stand), but finally admits to after the evidence is out. But that’s the least of Kilpatrick’s unethical behavior (although he is being investigated now for lying under oath).

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His first misuse of office was firing three police officers who say they had been unfairly fired, and then entering into a confidentiality agreement with them, which required them not to reveal information concerning the extramarital affair. Assuming they had actually been unfairly fired, doing this to protect his personal life was outrageous, and using tax dollars to defend himself and then to give the officers tax money ($8.4 million) in return for their promise not to reveal his personal secrets was even more outrageous.

Kilpatrick defends his confidentiality agreement as normal, as in a divorce. But a divorce is personal, so agreeing not to reveal personal information is appropriate. Agreements between public officials to suppress information is not appropriate. It’s conspiracy to undermine freedom of information laws. It’s misuse of tax money and power for purely personal ends.

City lawyers continue to seek to protect further documents from being revealed, even after a judge has ordered them to be made public. The city law department is appealing this order. Who is it representing? Certainly not the city. Certainly not the public. It is representing the mayor as a private individual, using public funds. This is deeply unethical, but a typical, very important problem: who does a city lawyer work for, and when can he or she say no?

Kilpatrick believes he has done nothing wrong, but has apologized for the affair he said he never had. The culprit, according to Kilpatrick, is the Detroit Free Press, which he says illegally obtained private phone conversations. “I think the Free Press has committed a crime,” Kilpatrick said, but he provides no evidence. Pointing the finger somewhere else is enough.

Kilpatrick’s actions tell the world that municipal government exists for the mayor, not for the people. He says they can vote him out in 2009, but that is not the limit of accountability. He owes it to the people of Detroit to resign his job immediately and to stop spending public time and public money to defend his personal actions.

Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics

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