Detroit Bankrupt? 
Five Ways the Motor City Is Thriving

Picture Participants in Downtown Detroit CROP Hunger Walk celebrate the life-giving importance of water
National media accounts of Detroit’s bankruptcy miss the growing industries, strong communities, and policy changes laying the foundations for the city’s recovery

by Larry Gabriel

Since Detroit filed for Chapter 9 bankruptcy in July, I’ve been reading about garbage piled up in the streets and blackout conditions with streetlights out, while the national news shows images of abandoned, dilapidated buildings and vacant lots. Based on what I’ve heard, one would think that nobody lives in Detroit but a handful of marginal folks and some gangsters busy killing each other.

But according to the 2010 census, there are still 700,000 people living in Detroit. We still eat, work, and shop like people every- where. We get married, have babies, and die. We love, hate, laugh, cry, and hope like people everywhere. Most of us are not thugs and wish for great neighborhoods as much as anyone else.

The bottom line is that the coverage of the bankruptcy reinforces a tired old story. But the internal narrative has already changed direction. There are plenty of positive major economic stories coming out of Detroit, starting with the federally bailed-out General Motors and Chrysler auto companies emerging from bankruptcy with improved sales and record profits, and continuing with the likes of the booming Midtown as a flagship community of the new Detroit.

The people of Detroit are certainly not bankrupt for resources or ideas. Here are five ways that they’re helping to create a stronger Motor City.

1. The powerhouse riverfront

One of the reasons the auto industry grew up in Detroit is that the needed technical expertise and facilities were already here serving the commercial ships on the Great Lakes. Basically, gigantic liner engines were downsized to become car engines.

Detroit remains the busiest border crossing between Canada and the US, and Michigan is intent on building a bridge, called the New International Trade Crossing, to accommodate the traffic.

2. At the forefront of urban agriculture

Keep Growing Detroit’s garden resource program supports more than 1,400 gardens, many of them organized as community projects. That’s in addition to a few dozen market gardens and numerous uncounted home gardens in yards and adjacent lots. Meanwhile, groups like the Detroit Food Policy Council, the Eastern Market Corporation, and the Detroit Black Community Food Security Network have been developing produce markets to bring more fresh nutritious food to the public.

Recently, their work has received some official support. In 2012 Detroit Public Schools initiated a program to teach agriculture at 45 schools with the expectation that jobs growing, selling, processing, and preparing food will be strong options for future Detroiters. In February, the City Council passed an Urban Agriculture Ordinance that gave the nod to the phenomenon and set some rules as to how it’s going to be done.

3. Making the city council accountable to the neighborhoods

In the past, because city council elections were held on a citywide basis, candidates had no accountability to specific neighborhoods.

That way of doing things is over. In November, Detroiters will vote for their council members in seven districts for the first time in nearly a century. This makes it possible for candidates to win based on their work at the neighborhood level; it will also be much cheaper to campaign in a district rather than across the entire city.

Citizens chose the new system because they expect more direct accountability for what’s going on in their neighborhoods. And if they aren’t happy with the performance of their councilperson, it will now be easier to unseat him or her in the next election.

4. The Boggs factor

The James and Grace Boggs Center to Nurture Community Leadership is a nonprofit organization that has been creating community leaders since being organized in 1995. Its do-what-you-can-with-what-you-have ethos has empowered Detroiters living at ground zero for deindustrialization to truly reimagine their possibilities. The Boggs Center is a place where people meet to engage in problem-solving discussion and imaginative ideas —not to receive marching orders from a leader.


At 98, philosopher and activist Grace Lee Boggs posesses a  true skill of helping others see that their power lies within themselves. After a lifetime working in leftist politics, Grace and friends have redefined revolution as personal transformation to meet the needs of where you live—be that safety, hunger, education, or artistic expression.

Julia Putnam, for example, was the first volunteer for Detroit Summer, a Boggs-related program. She is now a lead administrator at the Boggs Educational Center, a charter school that opened its doors on September 3. 

5. Grassroots urban renewal

One of the ongoing debates in Detroit has been about whether to focus on development downtown or in the neighborhoods farther from the city’s center. Most of the major efforts to revitalize the city—the Renaissance Center, Hart Plaza, Campus Martius, Comerica Park — have been downtown. At the same time parks, recreation centers, neighborhood city halls, police stations, and other services in neighborhoods have steadily closed down.
But many Detroiters aren’t waiting for the city government anymore. Among the efforts to create change from below are the Motor City Blight Busters, which started 23 years ago when insurance agent John George got fed up with the drug dealers operating out of a nearby abandoned house. One day he started boarding up the place. A few neighbors came out to help and a community group was born.
Since then, the Blight Busters have leveraged nearly 700,000 volunteer hours cleaning up, fixing up, establishing businesses, recycling building materials, and more. A recent ambitious project is to clear two full blocks to establish Farm City Detroit, an urban farm and community hub.

Final thoughts

Detroit is a story in progress with many possible endings. It will be years, even decades, before the conclusion is known. If we do the right things, then it will be in the near decades. 

I contend that the pieces are already in place to make Detroit a modern, socially, and economically diverse urban village sooner rather than later.
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Story from YES! Magazine 

Posted April 2014

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