A new character has been added to the bad soap opera that is Detroit politics today, and it's someone who's hoping to change the script. Metro Detroit media personality Charles Pugh will formally announce on Sunday that he is running for Detroit City Council.
If he wins, Pugh will become the first openly-gay man to be elected to that body. But the issue of his sexual orientation, Pugh said, is largely irrelevant.
"Detroit has a complex series of problems that need leadership, forethought and commitment, and we as a community are hurting too much to be concerned about my personal life," he said. "Who I date has nothing to do with the kind of leadership that I'm going to provide for Detroit. …We need 21st century leadership and who I'm attracted to is the last thing that should be on Detroiters' minds and, honestly, I think is."
A change of dream
If anyone should know what's on Detroiters' minds, it's Pugh. For the past 10 years, it's been his job as a reporter for WJBK – Fox 2 to go out into the city everyday and talk to its citizens.
"Reporters go everywhere," he said. "There's no place we don't go. We go to the hood, and we go to the corporate boardroom. We talk to the CEO, and we talk to the custodian. We talk to the crime victim, and we even talk to the perpetrator when possible. We talk to everyone. So I've been a trained listener and someone whose job it was to go into every corner of Detroit, and that is my number one qualification for being on the council. Detroiters know me, they've talked to me and they trust me."
It was a dream since childhood for Pugh to earn that trust. A native Detroiter, Pugh's beginnings weren't just humble, they were horrific. His mother was murdered when he was only three. Then, four years later, his father shot and killed himself in the bedroom across the hall from his, leaving a seven-year-old Pugh to call 911. Following his father's death, Pugh was raised by his grandmother. He went on to graduate with honors from Murray Wright High School and received a scholarship to the University of Missouri. After receiving his bachelor's degree in broadcast journalism, Pugh took reporting jobs in Kansas, Indiana and Virginia before receiving the offer from Fox 2 that brought him home in 1999, two months before his 10-year high school reunion.
Pugh was not only a successful reporter, he eventually worked his way up to the anchor desk for the station's weekend morning show. He also simultaneously took on the job of news director for WJLB, Detroit's top urban radio station and hosted a Sunday evening talk show on the station. Running for office meant giving up all those jobs, as well as the perks, privileges and hefty paychecks that came with them. He'll earn only a fraction of what he made as an on-air personality if elected to the council. But it's not about the money.
"I've had a philosophical epiphany that the closer I get to 40, the more involved I want to be in decision making and solution finding for our city," said Pugh, who is 37. "My jobs on TV and radio were to report on the decisions that were made, so that was involvement after the fact. And although that was a dream of mine while I was in high school, and it was an honor to live that dream, that's not something I want for my rest of my life."
A dream of change
To give up all he had accomplished to run for council is clearly an act of conviction and courage. Especially given that Pugh is well aware that in the last two election cycles, only one council member seeking reelection did not win. That was in 2005, when Alonzo Bates, under indictment for padding his payroll with family members, could not make the cut. He was later convicted of five theft and fraud-related felonies, and sentenced to jail time and hefty fines. All other changes to the council's composition have come about only when a member has died in office, or chosen not to seek reelection and instead run for mayor.
However, if former Council President Ken Cockrel, Jr., who has been acting as mayor since Kwame Kilpatrick pled guilty to felony perjury charges in September, wins the special election next week to fill the rest of Kilpatrick's term, his seat will become open. In addition, there are other possibilities. Current Council President Monica Conyers, after allegedly having trouble gathering enough signatures to put her name back on the ballot, has announced she may not run for reelection. Martha Reeves is currently facing her own padding-the-payroll allegations and was the subject of a lawsuit filed last week by a former employee as well as a pair of very revealing recent WXYZ-Channel 7 investigations. And then there's Barbara Rose Collins, busy wearing tiaras and singing campfire hymns at the council table. So more than a couple seats might be in play this time around.
Vying for them alongside Pugh are about 400 other hopefuls, according to the Detroit Free Press, including such notables as Gary Brown, the ex-police officer whose lawsuit against Kilpatrick brought the former mayor down, and James Tate, who worked for five years as the head of the Detroit Police Department's public information office. Still, Pugh is convinced he can do it.
"We're going to have a very active Web site that's engaging people," he said. "We're going to implement the street team concept for people on our staff. We're going to change Detroit. That's our slogan, but it's also our point of view. Our slogan is 'Pugh & You – Changing Detroit.' But that's real. That's no lollipop slogan. Our campaign is a movement, and it's a movement that's going to gain and sustain momentum."
And once he's elected, what will Pugh's first order or business be?
"First and foremost is to make Detroit proud," he said. "Detroit is frustrated and embarrassed. We need people who are going to make us proud and, at least, that we respect for the job that they do, the decisions they make and the work that they put into those decisions. We've got a budget that needs to be balanced and we need some marathon sessions and creative thinking and some reassessment as to how we do things now and to right the size of our government.
"We need new thinkers," Pugh continued. "We need smart people who are going to take the time to study the best practices of other cities who have solved the problems that we can't seem to get past. We need to try something new, because what we've been doing is apparently not working."
Charles Pugh kick-off rally
4 p.m. May 3
Trumbull Crossing, 5500 Trumbull, Detroit
http://www.pughforcouncil.com
