pissant press

The Pattern

Two years of quiet agreement. Then lockstep, from the first vote of the first night.

We put every thread on one timeline: 48 split votes in the two years before November 2025, then 83 in the seven months since, starting with four 3-2 votes before the new commission reached its first item of business. Michigan law says deliberation happens in public. So where is it?

Investigation

The mayor wrote his own review form. Then he was the only one who failed the city manager on it.

Lapeer’s mayor gave City Manager Mike Womack a failing grade and moved to fire him “for cause.” We read all 14 documents the city released, the contract, every meeting minute, and all 21 of the mayor's exhibits, and checked them line by line. Not one clears the bar set by the contract he keeps citing.

The Voting Record

The commission split 83 times since November. The same three votes won almost every one.

From the night Mayor Hing was seated through June, the Lapeer City Commission divided the same way again and again: Glisman, McCarthy, and Petrie in the majority, Atwood and Brady outvoted. We charted every roll call, who sided with whom, and what they fought over, in one interactive record. Then we went back further: in the two years before that night, the same returning commissioners split just 48 times.

The Record

Ruled out of order 16 times since November. 15 landed on the same two commissioners.

We logged every point of order, out-of-order ruling, censure, and "dilatory" label in the city's own minutes: 85 incidents across 15 meetings and a workshop. The gavel points the same direction as the votes, and on June 1 it reached past the dais to a resident at the microphone.

Why We Exist

Mayor Hing silenced residents during public comment. That’s a First Amendment violation.

Pissant Press exists for one reason. At the May 18 and June 1, 2026 Lapeer City Commission meetings, Mayor Jeramy Hing cut residents off during public comment, the protected speech at the heart of an open meeting. Both are on the official record.

We did not start here. For weeks we tried to reach the mayor about it, by email and by phone. He never answered. So we are bringing it forward ourselves, alongside a wider pattern of abuses of power by the mayor and his allies.