Flint, MI—Three Flint city council members have had paperwork filed against them to be recalled in the month of September.
Two of them were filed in the last week.
Flint resident Richard Jones filed recall paperwork against 3rd Ward Representative Councilman Santino Guerra on Sept. 28th, and two days later, resident Audrey Muhammad filed paperwork against 2nd Ward Representative Councilman Maurice Davis.
Johns is looking to recall Guerra for voting, “no to override the Mayor’s veto to Resolution 200361 (Resolution resolving that the Flint City Council Wishes to do all things necessary to immediately release the funding being withheld by the City to pay WT Stevens per its contract for water service line services).”
WT Stevens, a company based in the 3rd ward, was withheld pay after being accused of illegally dumping materials on a site and not cleaning it up. When the council learned the company had cleaned the site, they voted 5-4 to release the funds back to them.
Mayor Sheldon Neeley vetoed council’s resolution to do that and when overriding the veto came to a vote at council, Guerra voted against it.
Jones said that vote was “the last straw.”
“He should not have voted the way he did when it came to that. He took jobs away from 3rd ward residents and Flint residents,” he said. “They could have fined them, they didn’t have to withhold their pay. He’s been making unpopular decisions for a long time, this was just the final straw.”
Guerra could not be reached for comment.
Muhammad filed the paperwork against Davis because, “On Monday, August 26, 2019 Second Ward Councilman Maurice Davis in A SPECIAL AFFAIRS COMMITTEE Meeting (voted NO to issue a subpoena to Chief Advisor & Outreach Development Liaison Aonie Gilcreast.)”
Arthur Woodson submitted recall paperwork against Davis for the same reason last year, and Davis said “this feels like corruption.”
“I’ve had three recalls all because I voted not to subpoena the administration. My job is to work with administration,” Davis said. “I was recalled by someone I thought was a friend…the corruption is so thick.”
He said the whole situation is “frustrating.”
“It’s a distraction to me, it’s embarrassing me,” he said. “I was elected to serve in Civic Park…We should be down there helping them instead of bickering with this childish mess.”
Davis said he will be examining every signature the petition receives very closely.“If I catch any signature invalid, I’m going to federal court and I’ll be pressing charges with everything I got,” he said.
Councilman Allan Griggs was the first to have paperwork filed against him on Sept. 16, by former mayoral candidate and 8th Ward resident Don Pfeiffer, although the county election commission rejected the language in the paperwork.
Pfeiffer wrote that Griggs “voted Aye to appoint Lynn Sorenson to a three-year term on the Flint Planning Commission.”
The election commission decided that the language would be unclear to the average voter, and that it should say Griggs voted “yes” rather than “aye.”
David Linder with the elections commission said there has not been any further paperwork filed against Griggs.
The Genesee County election commission will meet Oct. 13 at 3:00 p.m. to consider the recall petition language submitted against Guerra and Davis.