County Executive: Consent Agreement Best Option For County's Financial Woes

DETROIT (WWJ) - The best option for dealing with the debt in Wayne County is a consent agreement. That's the recommendation of County Executive Warren Evans saying it's the best of four options that the county is looking at in order to deal with the financial crunch.

"We had a $52 million structural deficient we had a $1.3 billion under-funding in our health care and upwards of $900 million underfunded/unfunded liability in the retirement system," said Evans.

"There's no dictatorship idea here - the idea here is exactly what the recovery plan and the '15 - '16 budget says. We've got to get resolution on union contracts in order to finish off what we have already started."

He says the consent agreement would give the county executive the ability to settle a collective bargaining agreement. "I have no desire to take any of the authority away from the county commission," added Evans.

Governor Snyder confirmed a financial emergency for the county last week. Under the law, the county commission was given until Thursday to choose between a consent agreement, an emergency manager, a neutral evaluation, or Chapter 9 Bankruptcy.