An oversight report found that overtime payments exceeding $40,000 were among other city resources wasted by the Detroit Department of Transportation (DDOT). The overtime payments were used to transport an employee to and from work in a city vehicle, and the payments occurred over the course of a year.
Detroit’s Office of Inspector General received a complaint that accused DeMarcus Garrett of abusing his power as a DDOT supervisor. Garrett asked staff to drive another employee to and from work, and he allegedly retaliated against those staff members when they refused to continue this transportation arrangement.
Garrett’s actions weren’t found to be an abuse of power
The situation began when a DDOT employee submitted a doctor’s note saying that they were unable to drive. To accommodate this employee, Garrett offered four paratransit driver trainers overtime if they drove the employee to and from work. Two of the trainers agreed, and Garrett would approve the $40,000 in overtime pay for them over the course of a year from November 2024 to November 2025.
Garrett claimed that this setup was approved by former DDOT leadership as a medical accommodation. However, the setup proved to increase liability for those trainers when one trainer got into an accident in a city vehicle in Clinton while driving the employee, as the Clinton Township is where said employee’s home was located…