Could Detroit be the new Amsterdam?

Prostitution, pot legalization could make Detroit attractive, Fieger says

BY CAROL CAIN
DETROIT FREE PRESS COLUMNIST


Could Detroit be the new Amsterdam -- a city where prostitution and marijuana are both legalized to help attract young people and turn the troubled city’s prospects around?

Why not, barrister and occasional mayoral candidate Geoffrey Fieger said during a taping of “Michigan Matters” on what he would do if he walked in Detroit Mayor Dave Bing’s shoes and tried to address the city’s woes.

“I could turn it around in five minutes,” Fieger said.

“I’d shovel the snow and I’d clean the streets and parks. Then, I’d tell the police department to leave marijuana alone and don’t spend one dime trying to enforce marijuana laws. I also would not enforce prostitution laws and I’d make us the new Amsterdam.”

“We would attract young people,” Fieger said. “You make Detroit a fun city. A place they want to live and they would flock here.”


Continued at: http://www.freep.com/article/2011041...ve-Fieger-says

I'm sure glad he doesn't live here or run this city....This is Detroit; not Las Vegas.

Honestly, how is not enforcing marijuana and prostitution any different than the status quo?

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Originally Posted by BrushStart

Honestly, how is not enforcing marijuana and prostitution any different than the status quo?

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I posted this after hearing Jay Leno talk about it in his monologue. His punchline? "Is this any different than what Detroit is today?"

Edit: I don't know what kind of existence Feiger lives, but most young people are not attracted to drugs and hookers. However, they do want public transit, access to amenities, a vibrant social scene, diverse cultural experiences, excitement, entertainment, proximity to jobs, and the possibility of upward mobility. Many young people care about the arts and the environment, and they desire to be part of social progress. They want a sense of community and connectivity to the larger world. They want to see and be seen. They want a reasonably safe environment to live life and conduct business. They want inspiration and hope for the future. They want leaders who are worthy of trust. They want positivity and the potential to grow and enhance their lives.

Deliver on that, and you will be THE MAN.

Im with the lawyer. Ive been saying this for sometime now. If you cant see it your obsolete, your old, you dont matter.

Red Light District Detroit.

As for marijuana, legalize & control it.

Prostitution? No.

Feiger? Muzzle.

What exactly is the point of keeping prostitution illegal? There are so many different forms of prostitution that are legal, why does it stop when it comes to sex?

Who is anyone to say who you can have sex with?

I think people just see it as a slippery slope that further threatens the rules/glue of their society.

What a loser. Drugs, hookers, and what else? I want these kind of young people doing anything for me? These are the people who will make Detroit great again?

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Edit: I don't know what kind of existence Feiger lives, but most young people are not attracted to drugs and hookers

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Yes, sounds more like what Geoffrey would think is fun.

he was just looking to cause a stir. Jockeying for cheap attention. Once he heard Bing was running he pumped his brakes.

anyhow DY. Prostitution is nearly a victimless crime. If they were to do it right i'm certain it would work out just fine. The casinos are vice. And lets face it. There is plenty of illegal prostitution going on in the city. For that matter DPD has turned the blind eye to weed for years. They are more likely to dump your bag or take it than ticket you or arrest you.

I don't really care about enforcing these laws, which are barely enforced anyway--look at the back of the Metro Times--but the idea that they would have a big effect on improving the city seems unrealistic.

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Originally Posted by drippyhollows

anyhow DY. Prostitution is nearly a victimless crime. If they were to do it right i'm certain it would work out just fine. The casinos are vice. And lets face it. There is plenty of illegal prostitution going on in the city. For that matter DPD has turned the blind eye to weed for years. They are more likely to dump your bag or take it than ticket you or arrest you.

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I'm not so sure about this statement. Prostitutes and drug activity go hand in hand. I am talking the hard stuff. Once you get both into your neighborhood, houses get broken into by junkies, pimps beat up women, the whole composition of the neighborhood changes to a loud lawless mess.

This does not even include the folks who get infected by STDs and then bring that home to thier spouses or keep giving it to others.

Fieger is a lawyer. Lawyers like crime as it pads thier pockets.

i'm not so sure about my statement either Planner. But we are talking Detroit here. Not Grand Rapids or Ann Arbor. Hard drugs are already inside or very near every pocket of the city and for the most part prostitution thrives in areas that are already way far gone. The prostitutes are in those areas because the drugs are very available. Its the drugs that show up first and not the street walkers.
People see women selling it on the street and get upset. Probably because it is in their face.

How do cities worldwide succeed without having to legalize drugs and prostitution?

Our city will NOT prosper with Gypsies, tramps and theives.

Legalize everything and you take business away from criminals [[and cops) and put it in the hands of responsible people.

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Originally Posted by coracle

How do cities worldwide succeed without having to legalize drugs and prostitution?

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There are many factors like a good business climate, leadership, location and luck.Detroit has gone too many years without these.

I know you can get high as hell in Amsterdam with old men, but the reasons that city is vibrant also include the fact that they have extremely progressive planning, bike lanes for days, good public transit, leniant policies towards squatting, and a much more dense urban core.

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Originally Posted by begingri

I posted this after hearing Jay Leno talk about it in his monologue. His punchline? "Is this any different than what Detroit is today?"

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good lord, Leno.. I wonder what Martha Reeves would say.. heh-heh..

Didn't we just do this thread?


http://www.detroityes.com/mb/showthread.php?9732-Fieger

Be careful comparing the Dutch capital to Detroit. [[Window-) prostitution might then be legalized but up to a certain point. Everything is being done here to prevent people traficking and exploitation. Legal prostitutes do pay their taxes. Pot is semi-legal. Only a small ammount for personal use is permitted.

I guess this link is useful.

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Most policymakers in the Netherlands believe that if a problem has proved to be unsolvable, it is better to try controlling it and reducing harm instead of continuing to enforce laws with mixed results. By contrast, most other countries take the point of view that recreational drug use is detrimental to society and must therefore be outlawed. This has caused friction between the Netherlands and other countries about the policy for cannabis, most notably with France and Germany. As of 2004, Belgium seems to be moving toward the Dutch model and a few local German legislators are calling for experiments based on the Dutch model. Switzerland has had long and heated parliamentary debates about whether to follow the Dutch model on cannabis, most recently deciding against it in 2004; currently a ballot initiative is in the works on the question. In the last few years certain strains of cannabis with higher concentrations of THC and drug tourism have challenged the current policy

While the legalization of cannabis remains controversial, the introduction of heroin-assisted treatment in 1998 has been lauded for considerably improving the health and social situation of opiate-dependent patients in the Netherlands.[3] In 2010 research shows that the "heroin-junkies" have disappeared from the streets of the Netherlands and the treatment is upgraded from a test-trial to standard treatment for otherwise untreatable addicts. Also, the number of heroin addicts has dropped by more than 30% since 1983.

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And we wonder why nobody listening to us and learning from us.... Oh, heaven forbid!! This is a social program!!! You do see junkies now and then but they are no nuisance. I fact, sometimes you get the most amazing stories talking to them!

I belong to the majority of Dutch citizens that never smoked pot, I never smoked anything at all.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...Blowverbod.jpg
Traffic signs, in this case banning smoking canabis and drinking alcohol in public [[with te exception of terraces..


To Detroit I would say; Don't do it. It will attract all the wrong people into the city. there is not a large enough police force that can handle this.

Make a red light district. Put all the pot and hookers there. Move them out of the neighborhoods away from family's and children. Tax it. Boom.

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Originally Posted by mikeg19

Make a red light district. Put all the pot and hookers there. Move them out of the neighborhoods away from family's and children. Tax it. Boom.

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And what part of detroit would you sacrifice for that? [[Suddenly I see all sorts of possibilities for the MCS! Plenty of windows, shine a red light on the exterior, et presto!)

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Originally Posted by BrushStart

Honestly, how is not enforcing marijuana and prostitution any different than the status quo?

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That's probably true, but decriminalizing prostitution is only useful if the gov. requires prostitutes to get licenses and medical certificates of good health.

WhiteHouse:
Is there a recent poll of Dutch attitudes towards the different drugs?

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Originally Posted by Whitehouse

And what part of detroit would you sacrifice for that? [[Suddenly I see all sorts of possibilities for the MCS! Plenty of windows, shine a red light on the exterior, et presto!)

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It worked well for the cass corridor after the 60s..

No............

The first thing I do once prostitution and drug trafficking is legal is send my kids to ply the trade.

there already is a red light district. South Cass. Not too many families or children down there but really. That area is too important for what Detroit should probably do.... Connect downtown with midtown as a legitimate living area for young professionals who work downtown. Corktown stands a legitimate chance, Woodbridge, WSU area north of Willis. I feel like it could extend all the way to Boston Edison and not a step further. Then again they are planning to relocate police into that neighborhood so who knows. The 1 area that stands in the way is South Cass. Between Willis and the freeway.

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Originally Posted by Whitehouse

And what part of detroit would you sacrifice for that? [[Suddenly I see all sorts of possibilities for the MCS! Plenty of windows, shine a red light on the exterior, et presto!)

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Last time I checked 1/3 of Detroit was not habited.....

PLEASE! I did not read a single response to this thread before responding. Detroit does not have to be like anywhere else! I just posted a new thread "Detroit Now".
For Detroit to become onto its own again, it must remake itself. The auto industry and supporting staff is gone. Never to return. Detroit must take up what remaining assests it has and grow from there. Being a copy of another city is not the answer. Detroit's future lies with recreating itself! Being a new and unique adventure! Not a carbon copy of a city of legal whores and drug use.
Be your own person. Lay it out there. See what happens!

....as far as an "entertainment district", I would like to see a coney island [[brooklyn) style amusement park on the river front, with roller coasters, ferris wheel, other rides and attractions, and have some retail shops interspersed throughout an open-air setting. growing up here in Detroit, folks inevitably go to Cedar Point, Kings Island, or the upstate amusement parks.. why can't Detroit have one? Not the same thing as a casino, this would be family friendly entertainment and retail..
...as far as the uh, "red-light" pitch goes.. I don't see it happening anytime soon, it would be the death-knell for any politico trying to convince church-folk types and the pastors.. but anyway.. on a pure fantasy level.. the city's major semi-truck traffic would be concentrated in the deep southwest-near-downriver area, and not to cast aspersions on all truckers, but considering the element of that demographic who frequent strip clubs, the "good time girls" who hang out at the truck stops and the like, plus all the ongoing industrial pollution in the deep-southwest area [[prompting most folk to leave), that would probably be the "best" area to concentrate all the 'seedy' businesses..

You never hear about it but Portugal legalized all drugs about ten years ago but what I have read about the country is good. Former drug areas are now cleaned and bustling, theres more money for treatment instead of jails, most def a place to watch.

It cracks me up when ppl assume that if drugs were legalized or an area would be turned into a red light district that all of a sudden everybody would start shooting heroin into their eyeballs and selling their own children as sex slaves. Theres been a few studies and they show that use wouldnt go up significantly. Amsterdam is a huge tourist destination, I dont see why Detroit couldnt become the same, if planned correctly.

No one wants to see anyone go down the path of using drugs irresponsibly or for the wrong reasons but they are a fact of life. A red light district wouldnt take a majority of the profits out of the equation but it would help. Money drives the drug trade and as long as we keep drugs illegal there will be big profits to be made, thats why our prisons are big business, thats why ppl are dying over drugs [[more than dying from drugs).

A red light district is a great idea but we all are just not informed enough with the real facts to accept an idea like that yet [[which is why Im constantly discussing it) Theres another older thread on the subject here somewhere.

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Originally Posted by Django

... Amsterdam is a huge tourist destination, I dont see why Detroit couldnt become the same, if planned correctly....

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I find it interesting that that's the first use of "tourist" here [[aside from the Wikipedia quotation).

Remember all the handwringing about casinos sapping tourist revenue from neighboring states [[and countries) a few years ago?

Detroit could seize the initiative here and get in on the ground floor.

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Originally Posted by Jimaz

Detroit could seize the initiative here and get in on the ground floor.

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WORD. This type of thing [[RLD) is going to happen someday somewhere, Eventually Americans are going to see the drug war for what it is, a total failure. Detroit could reap the benefits if we could all just be a little more forward thinking than the rest of the country and back Feiger on his idea. And to toot my own horn, my idea from years ago. .

Kind of funny- Geoffrey Gieger Law: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qq33JhF7v68

So sex and drugs wil help young folk to make Detroit feel like a suitable place to live? When you're young, you get sexual partners more easily - it's the older guys who need to visit prostitutes, I figure.

Amsterdam's lax drug laws made the city a magnet for Europe's junkies. Drugs are not legal in Am'dam but the authorities turn a blind eye to small amounts for personal use. You can buy it in the coffee shops, but many of the coffee shops are now tacky tourist traps, like the supposedly 'famous' Bulldog Bar became.

I lived in ZO [[southeast, or Zoud Ost) Amsterdam on the street called Geldershoofd. In Dutch, the letter G is pronounced like a H. My street [[Geldershoofd) was pronounced 'Helders Hooft '. The popular Dutch beer Grolsh is pronounced "Hrolz" - but don't walk into a liquor store asking for Hrolz - they won't know what you're talking about.

Grass was sold openly in some youth hostels, but only the independent ones, not the big chains.

My main concern with any form of drug legalization is that it makes drugs more readily and easily available. It may even give them an air of respectability, as though their use is condoned. If I wanted drugs now, where would I go - to rough parts of town. That's enough to scare me away, assuming I got a sudden urge from out of nowhere to take drugs.

For sure, making drugs readily available will only lead to more people taking them or being tempted. I don't know about you, but keeping them illegal keeps me away from them.

There is a weird logic at work in relaxing the current drug laws so more and more people can take them, and more easily. That 'solves' problems, does it - or does it create a bigger problem, and for more people?

No-one really knows the answer. Even if relaxed laws came into effect, there would be an 'experimental phase' where Detroit would have to wait and see what happens down the track under the new system.

Legalize small amounts of marijuana possession for personal use so the DPD can turn a blind eye to it and focus on bigger problems? The DPD at present would probably not be targetting marijuana as a big problem right now, anyway.

Relax the laws to attract people to Detroit and 'solve' the city's woes... and then wonder what sort of people you're going to attract.

Legalizing drugs to alleviate the workload of [[under-staffed and resource-starved) police forces only adds to all the problems.

Honestly. Comparing Amsterdam to Detroit....

I think there a bigger chance Detroit will dig canals in the streets than drugs being legalized.... :)

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Originally Posted by Whitehouse

Honestly. Comparing Amsterdam to Detroit....

I think there a bigger chance Detroit will dig canals in the streets than drugs being legalized.... :)

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Ha-- When I first saw this thread's title, I was thinking about canals. Damn. Now I know I'm getting old. OK, you hipster kids just leave gramps be in his Lazy-Boy...

One of the reasons Amsterdam and Rotterdam had such an open-city attitude to drugs and prostitution is that they are huge port cities which facilitates illicit trade. It is more difficult when your major ports of entry are rail or airport hubs. Bickerdike quay in Montreal is infamous for that. It is controlled by the Irish West End Gang which does business with the russian/south american/italian and middle eastern mafia. They export stolen cars to those countries import cocaine and heroin etc... That is one of the reasons Montreal was a loose city like Nahwlins when it comes to prostitution and drugs. Big international harbor. But I wouldnt wish more of that on Detroit, legit or no.

Weird.

As for the ethics of whether we should legalize a personal decision that people make about their own bodies, I don't see how we could enforce the terms by which people engage in sexuality or intoxication. As far as I can see, it's just given drug dealers and pimps more leverage over victims by making it a liability to involve the cops. Whether drugs or prostitution are good for the "moral fabric" of our society is irrelevant. What matters is the health of the users/practitioners, the cost of enforcement and the real-world, tangible impact on the community. As far as I can tell, these marijuana "dispensaries" don't bring crime to an area the way drug dealers do nor would a legalized and regulated sex industry damage an area the way pimps and hookers do. So, as far as whether we should lock up potheads and whores, I think the statistics [[google portugal, vegas, etc . . .) speak for themselves. . .

Thinking in terms how that has anything to do with Detroit's success, however, I'm baffled how anyone could think that the prohibition of the drug and sex industry has acted as a barrier to Detroit's progress. As many on this thread have already pointed out, those things are practically legal as it stands, and I've heard not one hip, young gunslinger say, " I'd stay if only I could buy a handjob and a doobie.". It's the lack of economic mobility, city cervices, transportation, cultural diversity and safety that drive young urban professional types out. Most of them are young and cute enough to get laid for free and access to medical pot is pretty easy to come by.

Fieger is most likely just looking for some cheap press, but anyone who lives in Detroit knows that it's not an issue of too many laws, just not enough action. Legalizing weed and prostitution, while doing virtually nothing to the existing Detroit "state of affairs", at least lets him feel/look like a rock star, walking on the edge. It's a bourgeois version of being legally "avant garde". Rich people from outside the city have absolutely no idea what this city needs, but they see us as so rough and depraved, they actually think they can pander to us by promising yet another legalized vice or two. It's actually their prejudice that's showing in offering the legalization of pot and prostitution instead of infrastructure, economic planning, public safety, art and culture. . .

Anyone got a light?

IMO drugs should be considered a health issue, not a legal issue. It may not be a necessary evil but its an evil we have to deal with. The drug war has not put even a slight dent in the drug trade so why continue down a path spending billions every year, tying up resources in courts and law enforcement while real crimes get secondary attention, filling up prisons with non-violent users and now, building prisons and keeping them full has become big business. The drug war has created 21st century slavery.

Im not saying I have the answers to how addicts should be able to obtain their drugs. Maybe addicts could be registered. Obviously if drugs were legal they shouldn't be advertised in any way. Money saved on prosecuting drug crimes could go toward rehab and the study of addiction and how to treat it, how to prevent drug use in kids. Instead of thugs running the drug trade it could be managed so that the cartels would have no profit motive therefore wouldnt be killing over 10,000 ppl a year in Mexico alone. Europe has programs where addicts are given up to two shots of heroin a day, its safe heroin and thats another dealer out of business. That program has had excellent results and is cheap to run, much cheaper than dealing with those same addicts if they were not being treated. Methadone has been a success for like 40 years but methadone is more addictive than heroin but thats a whole other issue.

Someday the drug war will be looked back upon the way we do today at civil war era slavery. I'm looking forward to hearing arguments on why making money off prisons is not slavery.. .

Free from the govt. I could fill the page with reasons

Thats not to say addiction isnt sometimes a form of self imposed slavery itself. We should all be able to make our own decisions though as far as what we do to our own bodies and minds regardless. Just because someone tries cocaine or uses it even on a regular basis doesnt mean their going to go out and start robbing old ladies to support their habit. I do not want our government making these types of decisions for me, this only weakens a person.