Gary Peters

Gary Peters (born 1958) is a former Democratic Michigan State Senator representing the 14th Senate District. He recently resigned as Michigan Lottery Commissioner in order to challenge Congressman Joe Knollenberg in Michigan's 9th congressional district.

Biography

Peters was born and raised in Oakland County. He is married to Colleen Ochoa and has three children: Gary Jr. Madeleine, and Alana. They reside in Bloomfield Township.

Education

He graduated from Alma College in 1980 and received an Master of Business Administration from the University of Detroit in 1984. He is also a graduate of Wayne State University law school in 1989.

Professional

Peters has taught Finance at Wayne State and Strategic Management and Business Policy courses at Oakland University.

He has also served as a senior policy and financial analyst for the Michigan Department of Treasury and was a financial manager at Merrill Lynch. He also has served on arbitration panels for the National Association of Securities Dealers and the New York Stock Exchange. Governor Jennifer Granholm appointed Peters as the Michigan Lottery Commissioner on April 9, 2003. As Commissioner, Peters helped to implement new games and more efficient methods of delivering products. In Michigan, the Lottery is designed to provide financial support to K-12 public education.

Political Career

Michigan State Senate

On November 8, 1994, Peters was elected to the Michigan State Senate to represent the 14th State Senate District in Oakland County. He was re-elected in 1998 and served until 2002, when he retired from the Senate due to term limits. The district is one of the most diverse State Senate districts–containing nearly every racial, ethnic and religious group in Michigan. The district also includes areas of great wealth and great poverty.

He served as the vice chair of the Senate Finance Committee and a member of the Education, Judiciary, and Families, Mental Health and Human Services Committees. He was chosen by his Democratic colleagues to chair his party's caucus. He was also a member of the Michigan Lew Revision Commission and served on the Michigan Sentencing Commission.

As a legislator, Peters was able to lead many successful legislative battles. He led an effort to ban directional slant oil drilling in the Great Lakes. Both the House and the Senate passed a bill sponsored by Peters which banned any new wells under the state waters of the Great Lakes except in case of a state energy emergency. The bill passed into law without the signature of Governor John Engler. Peters also was known for his support of law enforcement initiatives. After he spoke with law officers about the extreme degree of danger an office can encounter when facing a criminal equipped with body armor, Peters helped usher through a bill that led to the criminalization of the possession of body armor by convicted felons. Peters also wrote a bill that was the initial establishment of penalties for false threats of chemical and biological weapons, which became law before the September 11, 2001 attacks.

2002 election

In his final year as a member of the Michigan Senate, Peters was both a candidate for Governor and later Attorney General. As the Democratic nominee for Attorney General, he lost to Republican Mike Cox. The margin in the race was close, with Peters coming within 5,200 votes–less than a 0.17 percent margin. Peters decided not to contest the election results despite reported irregularities. Several mistakes were found during analysis, including a precinct in Dearborn which had Peters with 96 votes when he actually had 396. The race was the closest statewide contest in Michigan since the 1950 governor's race.

2008 election

On August 7, 2007, Peters ended months of speculation by formally announcing he would run against Joe Knollenberg for his congressional seat. Knollenberg is in his eigtht term after winning re-election in 2006.

National Democrats, as well as local pundits, consider Peters to be a strong candidate. Knollenberg is considered vulnerable as he barely won in 2006 against a poorly-funded and little-known opponent, radio personality Nancy Skinner. Knollenberg's opponents in 2002 and 2004 performed significantly below the Democratic base in the 9th District. In the 2002 Attorney General race, Peters performed at or above the Democratic base in 72 percent of the 9th District precincts. In his 1998 State Senate campaign, he performed at or above base in 99 percent of the precincts.

In 2008, Knollenberg will be targeted for defeat by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC).

Peters will face local activist Rhonda Ross in the Democratic primary. There is also speculation that Skinner, the 2006 candidate, will run for the nomination.

Central Michigan University controversy

In April 2007, it was announced that Peters signed a three-year contract to become the next Griffin endowed chairman in American government at Central Michigan University. The adjunct faculty position involves teaching one, three-hour class a week, organizing two forums a year on public policy and political issues, and working on an electronic policy journal. The position pays an endowment salary of $65,000 which is paid by private contributions to the university.

The hiring has been criticized by students, including the Central Michigan chapter of Young Americans for Freedom (YAF), a conservative youth group, because they feel Peters will "sacrifice the education of students" by running for Congress. They also feel his candidacy could present a conflict of interest.

CMU's media relations director said Pam Gates, interim dean, as well as former U.S. Senator Robert P. Griffin (for whom the chairmanship is named) will meet with Peters to discuss "how it may or may not affect his role as the Griffin Chair for the fall 2008 semester." The director went on to add that "Peters is aware of the small group of students who are opposed to his occupying the Griffin Endowed Chair and has restated his intention to be very even-handed as Griffin Chair by encouraging differing opinions and keeping his campaign out of the classroom."