Granholm, not Republicans, put Detroit Schools under state control in 2009

A recent newsletter from the American Federation of Teachers of Michigan criticized Republican U.S. Senate candidate Mike Rogers for a vote he made a decade ago while sitting in the state Senate. The vote was in support of an emergency manager to continue running the Detroit Public Schools.

Rogers voted to “strip Detroiters of their ability to choose a democratically elected school board,” the teachers union’s newsletter claimed in an Oct. 5 article.

AFT-Michigan’s claim deserves closer scrutiny.

The first emergency manager for Detroit Public Schools was appointed by Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm. She appointed Robert Bobb to as the financial manager of the district in January 2009.

A series of emergency managers continued to oversee the district in lieu of the school board until 2016. Unions at the time were critical of state-appointed emergency managers taking control of school districts from school boards.

On June 21, 2016, Republican Gov. Rick Snyder signed a bill that returned control of the school district to the elected school board of Detroit and bailed out the district to the tune of $617 million.

The circumstances that caused a Democratic governor to appoint an emergency manager are worth re-examining.

The Detroit school district incurred a $139.7 million operations deficit in 2007-08. By the end of 2008-09, that deficit grew to $218.9 million. Granholm appointed an emergency financial manager halfway through the 2008-09 school year, effectively placing the district in a form of state receivership. By the end of that fiscal year, the district's deficit had increased to $327.3 million. That was the responsibility of the locally-elected school board.

There were two significant events in 2016. The state bailed out the school district and the state was sued by a group of Detroit Public Schools Community District students. Those Detroit students claimed they didn’t receive an education.

The settlement included the state legislature’s giving the Detroit Public Schools Community District another $94.4 million, which the district received in 2026. In 2017, Detroit Public Schools Community District hired Nikolai Vitti as its new superintendent.

While the education results have remained very poor, Vitti has succeeded in slowing the exodus of students from the district and maintaining a balanced budget since the 2016 bailout.

In 2017-18, the district had 50,176 students, down from 168,213 students in 2000.

There were 52,504 students in 2025-26. Vitti has been helped in balancing his budgets by heavy state aid that makes his district the best funded in Michigan. In 2024-25, Detroit Public Schools Community District received $23,297 per pupil for its general fund - including local state and federal dollars. The state average that year was $15,968.