Horrific: Bing plans to end water, sewer, public safety services to 1/3 of Detroit

[Hannah Bell]

In a recent press interview Mayor Dave Bing revealed his plans to downsize Detroit by depriving residents living in large swathes of the city of essential services. This effort to drive out the population from one-third of Detroit’s total land mass is being billed by the government and the media as a plan to “incentivize” people to relocate rather than “forcing” them.

The supposed incentive is that those who relocate to one of the neighborhoods slated for survival will actually have access to such things as public schools, transportation, fresh water, gas, electricity, and emergency services. Those who remain outside of these seven to nine neighborhoods will go without.

Speaking to the Detroit Free Press, Bing stated, “We’re going to be encouraging to move and put themselves in a better situation. They are much better moving into a more dense area so that we can provide them with the services they need: that would be water, sewer, lighting, public safety—all of that.”

In order to underscore his point, the mayor made clear that those who did not relocate “need to understand that they’re not going to get the kind of services they require.” He added, “I don’t want people to think that, if they hold out, there’s going to be a pot full of money somewhere, because there’s not.” In other words, the city will not provide any financial aid to residents being forced with the choice of losing their homes or living in pre-20th century conditions.

However...tens of thousands of people still reside in the neighborhoods that the city intends to cut off from all services...Bing’s plans would leave thousands of residents stranded in areas of Detroit. Anyone who does not have the resources to relocate, which would constitute a large portion of the elderly and impoverished citizens of Detroit’s decaying neighborhoods, will be made to live in barbaric conditions and essentially left to die. Residents will have no access to clean water, the streets will be clogged with sewage, homes will burn down in fires, and children will be without schooling.

The notion of depriving a city’s residents of essential services in order to force out the population brings to mind events from World War II. During the siege of Leningrad, the Nazis blockaded this Soviet city with the aim of driving out and starving the population.

The fact that the mayor of a US city is proposing that similar methods be used to force the relocation of his constituents speaks volumes about the social interests represented by the government and the decay of American democracy.

In an expression of the profound disdain the Detroit city government has for public sentiment, the mayor’s office is refusing to release the full details of its plan. Although it has already identified which neighborhoods it intends to let go to seed, the city will not make this information public until the spring, claiming that its plans are “not final.” While Bing’s office maintains that it will seek public input in a series of forums held in the coming months, its decision to withhold information about which neighborhoods will be targeted for denial of services is aimed at preventing the growth of public opposition.

The downsizing of Detroit is closely related to plans to create a tax haven in the city, whereby big business, including auto manufacturing, will be able to take advantage of cheap land, poverty-level wages, and huge tax breaks. The Detroit Regional Chamber, a commercial lobbying organization whose board is made up of leading Michigan business figures, is heavily promoting this idea.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/dec2010/bing-d10.shtml


Bing Plan Misses Mark

http://fixdetroit.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/bing-plan-misses-mark/



Dave Bing says there'll be incentives for Detroiters to move

http://www.freep.com/article/20101209/OPINION02/12090488/Dave-Bing-says-there-ll-be-incentives-for-Detroiters-to-move#ixzz17gxMioXz

[Systematic Chaos]

1. I'm completely speechless.

And beyond furious.

[Gator_Matt]

2. It'll be called 'New Detroit' and will be designed by OCP

"Good business is where you find it."

[walldude]

37. Can you believe this shit? Talk about life imitating art...

Now where the fuck is our "Murphy"? :toast:

[Change has come]

3. This reads like science fiction.

The people with out resources to move will be abandoned? :scared:

[Canuckistanian]

18. Yes, it does.

And it does sound like the start of absolute societal breakdown in those areas if people decide NOT to abandon their neighborhoods.

And the street-living homeless will flock there for the free shelter...... wait, maybe that's the PLAN.

[Hannah Bell]

21. like homeless people don't already live in abandoned properties...?

[elehhhhna]

48. instant mad maxification

[Orsino]

35. Specifically, like Robocop. n/t

[JCMach1]

4. Sounds like Katrina without the hurricane and mardi gras parades... oh

and Presidential flyovers

[Systematic Chaos]

6. Or maybe a mini-Somalia in progress on US soil.

If it could be proven that EVERY person in these "dead zones" would be properly relocated into livable conditions at least as good as what they're living in now -- preferably far better -- then maybe I'd be on board.

Problem is, you just know that this is going to result in hundreds, if not thousands, of premature and possibly violent deaths, the elderly being mistreated...the list goes on and on.

[jpgray]

5. Facilitate resource scarcity to incentivize relocation of all rational actors

Business school euphemisms always sound so lovely.

[Systematic Chaos]

8. You channel Mr. Carlin rather eloquently.

I wish I could laugh at your post but I'm feeling more inclined to break things.

[glinda]

7. I couldn't believe that I was reading this. Unfreakinbelievable.

[davepc]

9. 800,000 people in over 139 square miles.

Once a city of nearly 2 million, Detroit has lost more than half of its population since 1950 -- and continues to lose 10,000 people a year, or more. More than a third of the city -- perhaps 50 square miles -- lies vacant. On the near east side, for example, blighted blocks stand 80% empty. Even historically strong communities such as Palmer Woods, North Rosedale Park, East English Village, Boston-Edison and Grandmont Rosedale are showing signs of blight that can quickly erode a neighborhood.

Bing said the 2010 census would put Detroit's population at "800,000 to 850,000, max," but the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments estimates Detroit's population as already below 775,000. The city holds an estimated 78,000 vacant homes.

http://www.freep.com/article/20101209/OPINION02/12090488/Dave-Bing-says-there-ll-be-incentives-for-Detroiters-o-move#ixzz17h4vXuG8


Whats the municipality to do?

Continue to provide full services to ever increasing areas of bareness? Raise taxes to support the cost? Buy their homes and relocate them? Use eminent domain to seize their property and relocate them?

How do you get people to move so you can transform the city into a smaller, more efficient municipality where resources are focused in places to benefit the most people?

[Hannah Bell]

11. Detroit = 139 m2, about 750K people. Seattle = 142 m2. 617K people

Why isn't Seattle shutting down services?

144 square miles = 12 mile x 12 mile square, and 12-15 miles is about the longest distance from any point in detroit to another.

Detroit is the largest city in Michigan & the 11th-biggest city in the US.

Austin, TX: 296 sq miles, 786K people. Population density about half that of Detroit.

This plan is complete bullshit.

[davepc]

13. The tax base in Detroit isint anything like Seattles.

Seattle has a big wealthy downtown. Detroit has ludicrously wealthy suburbs and little else.

[Hannah Bell]

15. which has nothing to do with the argument you originally made about how very biiiiiig detroit

was.


so now you're saying detroit is too pooooooor to provide basic water, sewer, police & fire services for all the citizens that live within its approximately 12 mile x 12 mile area.

Detroit:

Median household income: $29K
Median family income: $33K
Per capita income: 15K


Birmingham Alabama:

149 square miles
231K people

Median household income: 26K
Median family income: $31k
per capita income: 15K


With the same per capita income & a smaller population in a slightly larger urban area, Birmingham ALABAMA has not yet threatened to cut off BASIC HUMAN SERVICES LIKE WATER to 1/3 of the city.

Detroit is headquarters for at least two of the biggest corporations in the world, GM & DTE.

Sorry, your arguments (& Bing's) = fail.

It's bullshit. we know it & bing knows it.

They are trying to force people out of their homes on the cheap.

They want the land a/o they want the poor scary people out.

And apparently they don't care if they kill or dispossess them.

And if they can do it in Detroit, they can do it in your town too.

Why are you making excuses for fascists?



Here's what happened to the tax base in Detroit:

1970s, the first round of auto layoffs: last in, first out:

[JDPriestly]

12. You have to buy the homes and pay for the owners' or residents' relocation.

Anything less than that is indefensible.

There is the possibility that the people in the abandoned communities could organize their own local authorities to take care of the garbage and find someone to dig wells and put in septic tanks for them. That would take money. But some out-of-work construction workers or union people might be willing to organize something.

[truedelphi]

49. I remember the Governor of Wisconsin once telling an assembled crowd, that under his

Term of Office, he would stop any further recruitment of any one holding a draft card who did not want to go off to Vietnam.

There was a time where polticians did things. Oh and they were then called STATESMEN.

Not that any governor of Michigan would have the insight or humanity to see to it that monetary resources were made available to people in Detroit. but once there was such a time.

[chill_wind]

10. $1,881,784,900-- what the people of Detroit have paid since 2001 for two permawars.

Instead of for its own citizens. The wars have cost the people of the entire state of Michigan $29,741,887,900 so far and continuously mounting.

Bled dry. Positively immoral in too many ways one could even measure.



http://costofwar.com/

[suffragette]

23. + 1,000

[Starry Messenger]

28. Thank you. n/t

[the redcoat]

14. Is it an attempt at congressional redistricting?

Aren't there multiple districts encompassing Detroit and it's suburbs?

Sure, it may sound a little conspiracy-ish, but "incentivizing" is bullshit; this is forcing, regardless of what Bing says.

[Kaleva]

40. Detroit is a blue as it gets. It's what keeps Michigan from becoming red.

[GodlessBiker]

16. Detroit's own Great Leap Forward.

[Canuckistanian]

17. Soon to be a Cultural Revolution

Maybe the revolution will start in Detroit.

[sandyj999]

19. Before you criticize use Google Earth and view the city.

You will see streets with one or two houses in many areas. I totally understand what he is trying to do. They are also trying to open up many barren areas to farming. But as usual people will not accept change and the city will just continue to deteriorate. Unless you have traveled the streets and neighborhoods as I have, you have no idea.

[Hannah Bell]

20. Here's $5000 for your house, now move. Sure, I bet that's change *you'd* accept.

Like hell.

[eleny]

30. I've seen Detroit houses for sale on realtor.com for under $500

That was a couple of months ago.

I just did another search there for "Detroit, Michigan", check it out-->http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-search/Detroit_MI/beds-2#/sortby-1

You have to get to Page 4 of houses to finally get to homes for sale for $1000. Pages 1 through 4 are under $1k.

[Hannah Bell]

32. so, you'd take that deal for $1000? "the mayor thinks i should leave

the only home i have & he'll give me $1000 to buy a new house."

if the rulers think that people should go homeless to "help detroit," then why won't the fucking banksters take a loss on their phoney, fraudulent "investments" & help the country?

answer: because they never take a loss on jack shit. they're all about making someone else take the loss for them.

[eleny]

33. No, I don't think anyone should be forced out of their homes...

I was just illustrating how desperate some people must be these days in the city. I've used Google's Street View to travel around some of the hardest hit areas of Detroit and it's terribly sad.

I'm aghast at what's happened to Detroit and hope that Werbe will talk about this plan on his radio program this Sunday night.

[Hannah Bell]

34. i didn't think you did -- just reiterating my point. bing wants people to move out of their houses

to further his plans to give their land to his ruling class buddies.

and he's going to give the homeowners "market value," if that.

and he's willing to leave people, many of them elderly, without water, sewer, street lights, heat, and police & fire protection.

in other words, he's willing to kill them.

[eleny]

39. It's chilling that in the article it's phrased as - people relocating - or some such

I paraphrased. But it's clear from the phrasing that the dislocated are on their own to move themselves. Writing a check is a starting place and then you work to assist people.

Oh crap, the whole thing makes me sick at heart.

[Hannah Bell]

43. it's pretty blatant. test to see if they can get away with it, imo.

[lfairban]

24. You are right about the satellite photos.

Some of those neighborhoods look pretty deserted.

I guess that the trick for the city is how to pull this off without making things worse. If they just pull the services, people will lose faith in the city and prices will drop all over.

[mwooldri]

31. This may be a way forward for Detroit but it's poorly planned and publicized.

Round these parts we get complaints from people who do not want to be annexed to cities and be subject to getting public water, city police and other such services.

I will state that I do not know if Detroit is a city/county local government structure or a unitary structure ( where city + county are same ) but IMO why not do a "de-annexization" ? De-annexed citizens dont get city services, they would get county services. The city can still provide water and sewer at a higher cost to non city residents. The sheriff would answer 911, not the city cops. Transportation can be more effectively managed.

This could be the way Detroit ends up but... announcing it this way, this dramatic is too much change way too soon, and changes like this need years or decades.

Yes, change the service providers and the pricing, with protection for the vulnerable and poor. I guess we've become used to urbanization and cities getting bigger, not smaller so having cities scale back is shocking but not un-inevitable.

[chill_wind]

22. kick

[LiberalEsto]

25. Sounds like Urban Renewal in the 1960s-70s

when cities and towns used federal Urban Renewal funds to force the poor (particularly African-Americans) out of their homes, tear down the homes, and build high-rise projects to isolate them.

[Auggie]

27. Perfect example: San Francisco's Fillmore District

AP / msnbc.com

SAN FRANCISCO — Holding her cane and shuffling carefully down the sidewalk in the city's Jazz Preservation District, 88-year-old Leola King stopped and looked at the words stamped in concrete: Leola King's Birdcage, 1505 Fillmore.

Today, the site of King's 1960s nightclub is a Starbucks on the ground floor of a condominium tower.

A half-century ago, this neighborhood was nicknamed "Harlem of the West" and hundreds of black-owned businesses thrived here. At night its gritty streets were filled with the sounds of jazz and blues drifting from nightclubs.

Then the government, using race as a factor in its decision, decreed the area blighted and forced thousands of people, including King, from the neighborhood by way of eminent domain. The din of bulldozers and wrecking balls replaced the saxophones and snare drum-raps with the promise of a better neighborhood.

MORE: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27630914/ns/us_news-life/

[Hannah Bell]

38. fillmore was rentals. bad enough. in detroit, you're talking homeowners.

"the promise of a better neighborhood" FOR YUPPIES.

the old residents didn't get a better neighborhood. they just got uprooted & shuffled to another slum.

but at least they weren't dispossessed of their life's wealth in the form of their home.

[Hannah Bell]

41. yep.

[MilesColtrane]

26. If that doesn't work he'll call out the Scoops.

[eleny]

29. I sent the WSWS link to Peter Werbe and hope he talks about this on Sunday night

Since his weekly radio shows is in Detroit he should have a good handle on some of the details.
http://www.peterwerbe.com/

K&R

[bobbolink]

36. That would be the rich people who are being "encouraged", is that correct?

:nuke:

[nashville_brook]

42. Talk about redistributing wealth. THIS is fascism.

[Waiting For Everyman]

44. Paging Michael Moore.

Does he know about this? He needs to get on this if he isn't already. I don't know of anybody else who could shine a light on it well enough.

Astoundingly barbaric stuff. Feudalistic. It reminds me of the "urban renewal" after the 60s riots, only worse.

And how does Bing expect people to move if he doesn't say which neighborhoods are targeted? By ESP? :shrug:

[Hannah Bell]

45. he's keeping it quiet until he lines up support, then off with the water to

scare people into giving up easy.

[flvegan]

46. Good hearted and caring MI lawyers, on your mark please.

[elehhhhna]

47. It's like NOLA without the Katrina & the flood.

sort of

[delightfulstar]

50. And how much, pray tell, is he paying them to "relocate"?

Probably nowhere near what it's worth. The first ones I think of who are going to be affected are likely those who are elderly, have been in their homes for decades, and may not have the wherewithal to just up and move like that. They can ill-afford losing basic services in an already underserved city. Is it even legal or constitutional for Bing to do something like this? Really?