PROPOSAL E: Detroit voters are negative about plan for schools

Detroit voters rejected Proposal E -- 64 to 36 percent -- with 79 percent of the precincts reporting. Opposition was across the board -- parents and non-parents, men and women. Detroit Branch NAACP president the Rev. Wendell Anthony said the ballot question was doomed from the beginning because it was a voting rights issue. "We fought too long and too hard for the right to vote," Anthony said. "This conjured up what we had been through in Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi." Proposal E, the ballot question about who will run Detroit's troubled schools, was perhaps the most emotional and publicly debated issue in the city. A "yes" vote meant the mayor would nominate a chief executive officer, who wouldn't answer to the elected school board for most academic and key financial decisions. A "no" vote meant the elected school board would hire a superintendent, who would then need board approval for almost all decisions. Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick said he was disappointed that the race to pass Proposal E fell short. "The Legislature in Lansing gave us only 45 days to run a campaign after five years of misery with this system," he said. However, he said he would not try to recruit candidates for the new school board. "We want to be careful not to micromanage that process," he said. [more]