Hillsdale’s new mayor has introduced what may be the most unusual transparency initiative in Michigan municipal history, a requirement that all council members CC both himself and the City Manager on every email so he can personally “monitor for negativity.” Not misconduct, not ethics violations, not misuse of public funds, just negativity.
It would be funny if it weren’t real, and if it weren’t already revealing a deeper problem in Hillsdale’s city government.
While the announcement drew plenty of raised eyebrows and support by the out of county and city liberals who claim they don’t want a dictator. It drew something else from the only council member who had the backbone to call it out. Councilman Matthew Bentley, as any good Conservative would, flat out refused to participate. No fluff, no hedging, just a clear No, the kind of answer that only comes from someone who has actually read the Home Rule City Act.
Bentley understood that under Michigan law, council members are independently elected officials. They do not report to the mayor, nor does any city resident they are elected to represent, owe him emotional cheerfulness in their emails. They do not submit their correspondence for tone inspection. The council certainly does not hand over their internal discussions so the executive branch can serve as a municipal HR department. Bentley recognized instantly that the mayor’s justification, monitoring tone for “negativity,” was not just inappropriate. It had no basis in law and every basis in executive overreach.
The truly concerning part of the mayor’s directive is not even his own involvement. It is his insistence that the City Manager must also be copied on every email. In most cities that might simply be odd. In Hillsdale it is alarming. The City Manager has been the longest running source of friction, tension, and administrative hostility since he arrived during Mayor Sessions’ first term, two mayors ago. While councils have changed and mayors have come and gone, he has remained the single most consistent generator of negativity in the building. If City Hall issued a forecast it would read cloudy with a one hundred percent chance of conflict, brought to you by the City Manager.
So when the current mayor decides that this individual, the most politically combative figure in the entire building, must read every council email to judge whether elected officials are being “negative,” it transforms a neutral administrative role into something entirely different. It turns an unelected administrator into a political monitor. That is not transparency. That is not professionalism.
The mayor and his liberal voters defend this policy with repeated references to a “chain of command,” a phrase that sounds authoritative until you remember that the city charter contains no such structure. The council is not subordinate to the mayor. The mayor does not command the council. The City Manager certainly does not. This imaginary chain of command exists for one purpose, to funnel all information through the two offices most interested in controlling it. Want ever happened to (No, KINGS)?
The legal issues are obvious to anyone not indoctrinated by our wonderful education centers. Forcing all council communication through the mayor and the manager risks violating the separation of powers embedded in municipal law. It chills protected political speech under the First Amendment, because elected officials have every right to challenge and criticize executive actions and their staff, especially the city manager. It invites Open Meetings Act violations by encouraging serial deliberations under executive supervision. Beyond the legal risks it damages trust, silences staff, and creates the kind of environment where disagreement is treated not as healthy debate but as insubordination. Hammer and Sickle, anyone?
Which brings us back to Bentley, because his response was not only correct, it was symbolic. Bentley is the same councilman who lost his recent mayoral race by roughly sixty votes, a loss widely attributed to poor turnout that was amplified by the constant accusations that he and a handful of conservatives were the “source of negativity” in Hillsdale. The irony is astonishing. The one person willing to stand up for transparency, legality, and constitutional governance is the same person who was politically punished for refusing to play along with a negativity narrative created by the very people now asking to monitor it.
Hillsdale does not need an email positivity police force. It needs leadership that values law over abuse of power, transparency over tone scoring, and open debate over passive aggressive monitoring. A mayor who insists on being copied on every council email is already pushing the limits of his authority and inviting litigation. A mayor who insists the City Manager, the most confrontational personality in City Hall, must also be copied is sending a message far louder than any policy language could convey.
Criticism is not the problem. Monitoring criticism is.
Negativity does not erode democracy. Controlling dissent does.
Hillsdale deserves elected officials who can speak freely, question authority, and, when necessary, be negative. Bentley understood that. The law supports that. Any resident who values accountability should too.
**Legal and Ethical Violations Created by the Mayor’s Invented “Chain of Command”
With Michigan Statutory Citations**
Violation One, First Amendment Suppression
The policy attempts to regulate political tone and viewpoint, which is protected under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Michigan courts have repeatedly affirmed that elected officials retain free speech rights regarding matters of public concern.
Relevant authority, United States Constitution, First Amendment,
42 U.S.C. 1983 (civil liability for deprivation of constitutional rights).
Violation Two, Open Meetings Act Exposure
Forced CC’ing creates serial deliberations involving a quorum outside a noticed public meeting. This is the exact conduct the Michigan Open Meetings Act prohibits.
Relevant authority, MCL 15.263, meetings of public bodies must be open and noticed.
Relevant authority, MCL 15.262 section d, defines deliberation by quorum.
Relevant authority, MCL 15.269 section 3, invalidation of decisions made in violation of OMA.
Violation Three, Separation of Powers Breakdown Under Michigan Municipal Law
City councils do not report to the mayor and cannot be supervised by the executive branch. Michigan’s Home Rule City Act establishes independent powers for legislative bodies.
Relevant authority, MCL 117.3, outlines the separate and independent powers of elected city officials.
Relevant authority, MCL 117.4i, defines the respective duties of the executive and legislative branches.
Violation Four, Abuse of Office and Misuse of Authority
Using executive power to monitor elected officials for tone rather than legitimate municipal purposes qualifies as abuse of position.
Relevant authority, MCL 750.505, misconduct in office, common law offense.
Relevant authority, Michigan Constitution Article 1 Section 2, equal protection and due process violations resulting from arbitrary state action.
Violation Five, Creation of a Hostile or Intimidating Governance Environment
Mandating surveillance by the City Manager, who has a documented pattern of hostility, chills communication between council members and staff and interferes with the proper flow of information. While not a standalone statute violation, it forms the basis for civil exposure under federal law.
Relevant authority, 42 U.S.C. 1983 for retaliation against protected political activity.
Relevant authority, First Amendment political retaliation doctrine from Pickering v Board of Education and Bond v Floyd.
Violation Six, Interference With the Independent Duties of Council Members
Council members have statutory duties that require free inquiry and independent judgment. Forcing all communications through the mayor and manager obstructs those duties.
Relevant authority, MCL 117.3 sections a through g, the legislative powers reserved to the council.
Relevant authority, MCL 15.243 section 1, access to public records that council members are entitled to review without executive interference.
Violation Seven, Conversion of an Administrative Role Into a Political Filter
The City Manager’s duties under Michigan municipal law are administrative, not political. Forcing him into a political monitoring role violates the structure of the council-manager form of government.
Relevant authority, MCL 15.401 et seq, standards of conduct for public officers.
Relevant authority, Home Rule provisions that restrict the political activities of administrative officers.
When a mayor demands surveillance over the conversations of elected officials because they might express “negativity,” the intent is unmistakable:
Prevent criticism, silence disagreement, and create a climate of fear.
Ironically, Bentley’s insistence on following the law is the very “negativity” the mayor and manager keep claiming is the source of Hillsdale’s problems, negativity that is simply the act of refusing to rubber-stamp bad ideas.
And for that, Bentley lost his recent mayoral race by about sixty votes, a margin small enough that a few dozen people choosing to stay home because they were tired of being told that disagreement is “negativity” could have flipped the outcome.
Thus, the only council member willing to stand against the mayor’s overreach is the same man who has been blamed for the negativity that this administration is now trying to police into silence.
You truly cannot script irony this well.
A city government cannot function under those conditions.
A healthy republic certainly cannot.
in liberty,
the Hillsdale Conservatives.
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