Before Flint’s Lead Crisis, City Council Raided Money from 'Water Fund'

Before Flint’s Lead Crisis, City Council Raided Money from 'Water Fund' [Michigan Capitol Confidential]: 
"A few years before Flint’s lead crisis, city officials were taking money from a dedicated municipal water fund to pay for other uses. 
These fund-raids continued — using water service revenues to pay for unrelated city spending — even as the water fund accumulated a $9 million deficit in 2011.
Those were among the findings of a state review team that examined Flint’s books, which led it to recommend that the state appoint an emergency manager to take control of the city’s finances.
While that state review is now five years old, its findings warrant another look as they are relevant to later decisions city officials took leading up to the water contamination crisis.
The review team examined Flint’s financial condition in October and November of 2011. 
It found the city’s total debt had risen from $1.5 million in 2007 to $25.7 million in 2011. 
The city’s annual revenues rose from $104.5 million at the start of the period to $109.0 million in 2011.
The growing debt was the result of five years in which the city council and mayor failed to balance the city’s budget and control spending.
From 2009 to 2011, Flint officials took about $10 million from water service operations to pay for general city operations. 

• These raids contributed to a growing hole in the city water fund.
• Officials also raided Flint’s sewage disposal fund, taking $61 million for general city operations from 2001 to 2011.
• And the city’s leaders broke state road funding laws by taking just over $1.0 million from the local street fund. 

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