(WXYZ) — The Michigan Court of Appeals ruled Friday that Warren Mayor Jim Fouts cannot seek another term, reversing a Macomb County Circuit Court judge's decision from March. In a 3-0 published opinion, the judges said the Warren city clerk is "hereby ordered to immediately disqualify Mayor Fouts as a candidate for mayor in 2023 and not place his name on the ballot for election."
An amendment to the Warren city charter in 2020 limits all Warren elected officials — including the mayor — to just three terms in office. Fouts would have been seeking a fifth term.
The Warren City Council filed a lawsuit to challenge whether the mayor could be on the upcoming ballot.
According to the opinion issued by Judge Joseph Toia in March, the confusion on whether Fouts could run for re-election was "based on the fact that the 'any terms or years served prior to this amendment are included' language was included in the ballot's explanatory caption, but was not included in the 'Proposal' section on the ballot or in the amended Charter.'"
He went on to say that "there is no specific language in the Charter indicating that prior years served are counted towards the amended term limits" before ruling Fouts could seek reelection.
The Warren City Council appealed the decision, which led to the ruling issued today by the Michigan Court of Appeals.
Court of Appeals Ruling by WXYZ-TV Channel 7 Detroit on Scribd
The ruling states in part that "the relevant charter sections’ failure to specify that time in office before the 2020 amendment will be counted does not make them ambiguous. Nor do we find dispositive the fact that the 'terms served prior' language was not in the ballot proposal question itself, where the language actually was on the ballot within the proposal section."
The Court of Appeals Opinion takes immediate effect.
Fouts won his first term as mayor in 2007.
7 Investigator Heather Catallo asked him, “Why are you ignoring what voters decided in 2020?”
He responded by saying, “I’m not ignoring what voters decided. To begin with, this was a targeted proposal. It never mentioned Jim Fouts, it never mentioned that this proposal would only affect the mayor of Warren or Jim Fouts. It did not mention that. It said it would make it fair. Well, I had five terms and the other had three terms, so that is not ignoring the voice of the people.
“I believe that I can help make life better for citizens of Warren.”
