JoAnn Watson - Wants to bring back residency requirements

[evergreen]

For the record, I live in the city. The abolition of residency made it possible for the City to get talented people to work for it who otherwise simply would not have subjected their families to the very real hazards of life in Detroit. Dennis Archer had a very difficult time with this issue.

The Detroit Public Schools are in a state of near collapse and, even if they got competent leadership tomorrow, it would take a minimum of seven to ten years to establish the system's credibility. The parochial school system in Detroit, which was once a safety valve for many families, is gone. People with children simply will not gamble their future on Detroit and I don't blame them.


Ms. Watson should focus her considerable energies on making the city a desirable place in which to live rather than seizing hostages for the Titanic.

[Vic01]

The employees would pay more income tax and those properties would be paying property tax. Good 'nuff for me!

If they're going to "purchase a $1,000 house and never live there", what makes you think that they'd pay property taxes when so many others already aren't pay their taxes?

From the "city council" to the average resident... keeping property taxes up to date seems optional...

[Vic01]

Yep, that's the way I'm looking at it too. Not to mention they MUST legally count themselves as Detroiters in the census. Who cares if they have alternative homes in the suburbs?

So, are we all going to just agree that even more fraud is OK?

[Honky Tonk]

For the record, I live in the city. The abolition of residency made it possible for the City to get talented people to work for it who otherwise simply would not have subjected their families to the very real hazards of life in Detroit. Dennis Archer had a very difficult time with this issue.

The Detroit Public Schools are in a state of near collapse and, even if they got competent leadership tomorrow, it would take a minimum of seven to ten years to establish the system's credibility. The parochial school system in Detroit, which was once a safety valve for many families, is gone. People with children simply will not gamble their future on Detroit and I don't blame them.


Ms. Watson should focus her considerable energies on making the city a desirable place in which to live rather than seizing hostages for the Titanic.

Nicely put. Thanx for adding some sensibility to an otherwise unrealistic approach.

[Zacha341]

Yep, it's far, FAR too late. What was cooper canyon and other areas on the east side is now pretty bad, with plenty of brown-fields where houses once stood. Driven down Hayes off Kelley lately. Horrible... The west side also has lots of gaps or houses abandoned.

Who's coming back to that?

Where the hell would all these people live? Gratiot and Houston-Whittier? The humble but lovely neighborhoods where civil servants used to live before are shelled out now for the most part now. Civil servants can't afford Midtown lofts or Palmer Woods mansions.

[ypsifly]

I think the focus needs be more about maintaining the current PD and FD while attracting new recruits and at least maintaining current equipment before telling where they need to live for whatever tax gains that might garner in the short term.

Addressing crime should be the main focus of anything having to do with the PD. Get a better grip on the crime rate, improve the city's image...then tell them where they can live.

[jtf1972]

A broken clock is correct twice a day. Watson's batting average is much, much lower and her reasoning may be skewed. But she is right on here.

It is no surprise that the abandonment of Detroit increased once the city workers moved out. What does it tell average residents when those whose salaries your tax dollars pay don't want to live here? And why? It has been noted that the Northeast neighborhood wasn't much different from neighboring Harper Woods. Why did they leave like birds in a pond when they hear a loud noise? It wasn't just the schools, as they probably had their kids in private school anyway. It wasn't to save money, as they would have been spending more to move to a more expensive area and pay more to commute further. It was because they bought into the notion that the suburbs are better.

The negativity surrounding Detroit is crippling. It is sickening. It is killing Detroit.

I have seen the suburbs. Let me tell you... They ain't pretty. They don't attract anybody other than those from this area conditioned to believe that they are good for living.

The future of this entire region rests on Detroit's shoulders. Some people feel that just sprawling out further and further creates a nice environment, but it is simply unsustainable. Tax dollars paid by city residents has long gone toward supporting actions that destroy it. Gas prices go up. People drive farther. The only thing that actually makes sense is to concentrate and centralize society. Sadly, I don't think it will happen in our lifetimes. When is the last time we even heard a president mention an urban agenda?

...

I have to admit that I am a bit of a hypocrite. I moved back to Detroit from New York a couple years ago. Since then I have found work to be practically nonexistent & have been commuting out to the suburbs for income. The simple fact is the money is barely livable and the commute horrible [[I absolutely hate driving.) I am in the process of being just another person to sell and move from Detroit, but I cannot stomach the idea of suburban living. It's back to New York to live in a functional society where I can actually support myself with my income and maybe have a couple of dollars to enjoy life with. I also won't have to deal with a society that regularly dumps on Detroit and has a completely backwards manner of thinking.

Sorry for getting a bit off topic, but having lived a large portion of my life outside of the area I see that there is a very large portion of people in this area who have a very narrow view of this world. I just wish more people here could see how much is out there and what we need to do here to get to that level. The suburbs ain't it. They certainly are not the solution.

[iheartthed]

Lot of good points here. Especially 1953's insight on having to weigh the best possible employees vs. only those who are willing to live here.

I have several family members who are either current or former Detroit police officers. I don't think any of them would say that the department is any better after lifting the residency requirement than it was before.

[Novine]

"I thought it was unconstitutional? The EFM doesn't change that."

It's not unconstitutional. The legislature passed a law banning requirements but a change in law or some EFM loophole could allow it to be reinstated.

To the point raised that abolishing the law has allowed the city to hire "talented" people who otherwise wouldn't have gone to work for the city, who are those people?

[corktownyuppie]

Yep, it's far, FAR too late. What was cooper canyon and other areas on the east side is now pretty bad, with plenty of brown-fields where houses once stood. Driven down Hayes off Kelley lately. Horrible... The west side also has lots of gaps or houses abandoned.

Who's coming back to that?

While I agree that it's not a cure-all, and also acknowledge that it's probably not feasible...I think it's worth addressing something that seems to be missing from the argument.

People on all sides of the issue say things like, "That area is horrible, why would they move there?" And it fails to take into account that if 3,000 cops were to move into an area of designated development, it wouldn't be filled with crime and brownfields anymore. And for those who say that the parochial school system disappeared...it didn't disappear. It just followed the population. You move 3,000 families back into Sherwood Forest, Rosedale Park, SW Detroit, or wherever...I can assure that some enterprising archbishop will say, "Boy, we should put a school there."

I don't know what the answer is, and I don't fall on the camp that moving people by "force" will solve the problem. But one way or the other, we need to consolidate our services for efficiency...consolidate residents for efficiency...and re-populate when possible.

[Wesley Mouch]

...snip...Ms. Watson should focus her considerable energies on making the city a desirable place in which to live rather than seizing hostages for the Titanic.

But you see that doesn't get you elected nor talked about. Its much easier to jump on issues like this and stir up xenophobia.

Residency is a bad idea. Even if you believe in it, I suggest that its one of the least effective tools for healing Detroit's problems. We've got an EFM here -- like it or not. So get behind it and get some things fixed while you can.

[SWMAP]

It just followed the population. You move 3,000 families back into Sherwood Forest, Rosedale Park, SW Detroit, or wherever...I can assure that some enterprising archbishop will say, "Boy, we should put a school there."

Unless the AoD had eveidence of catholic children needing a Catholic education, i doubt that he would be interested.

The free charter schools that provide the illusion of private schooling decimated the Catholic Schools in Detroit. Non-Catholic users of catholic Schools found a tuition-free alternative and they took it. For example, I hear that Most Holy Trinity, one of the last Catholic elementary schools left in the City, is very shaky as to staying open because the enrollment is low.

As you can imagine, prospective resident detroit police employees would consider their children as much at risk for retribution against the police if they were in charter schools as they do for DPD schools.

Can anyone find out how that much-heralded program that would let cops buy restored homes in Detroit's best neighborhoods for pennies on the dollar is going? We could learn which way the wind would be blowing for residency.

As to why recruiting doesn't appear to be better in the DPD after residency was lifted: isn't it pretty much a dead-end job now for lots of people? As i posted earlier, the sections that officers would compete to get into for the prestige, the professional growth and for advancement opportunity are pretty much all gone now: aviation, dive, mounted. There are others, but I don't know the names. I remember when the DPD had climbing teams. Is there still even a harbormaster?

The same for the DFD - poverty equipment, a scrooge for a chief - someone hard to respect.

Ask yourself who would want to be recruited into these departments at this point? And then to make them move their families into the city - its just not workable.

[downtownguy]

To the point raised that abolishing the law has allowed the city to hire "talented" people who otherwise wouldn't have gone to work for the city, who are those people?

Franklin resident, Dave Bing.


<sarcasm intended>

[jackie5275]

As to why recruiting doesn't appear to be better in the DPD after residency was lifted: isn't it pretty much a dead-end job now for lots of people? As i posted earlier, the sections that officers would compete to get into for the prestige, the professional growth and for advancement opportunity are pretty much all gone now: aviation, dive, mounted. There are others, but I don't know the names. I remember when the DPD had climbing teams. Is there still even a harbormaster?

The same for the DFD - poverty equipment, a scrooge for a chief - someone hard to respect.

Agreed. You have to have some kind of incentive of a better career for folks. When the residency requirement was lifted, Wayne County said you can't get a promotion unless you live in the County. This was the only thing that could be thought of to persuade folks to stay here. To my knowledge, it's not being enforced. But like the City, the County has it's financial troubles as well. Promotional opportunities, other than those for highly specialized positions, have been few & far between since at least 2007-08. Heck, not just promotional opportunities, but job opportunities in general are mostly non-existent. If I was a new college grad right now, I certainly wouldn't be looking at any government entity that looks to have no job security/sustainability as a career choice.

[hhockey]

Would it not be better to get all types of people to move back into Detroit than just Police and Fire? If we had a city that was more concerned about improving the conditions, people would want to return. We are more concerned whether a police officer or fire fighter lives in Detroit then anybody else. We need people to return to Detroit in droves not just city employees. and in order for that to happen we need to improve our neighborhoods. Downtown will take care of its self but the neighborhoods need to be a priority. The mere fact of having a cop in your neighborhood isn't going to turn Detroit into a utopia.

[EASTSIDE CAT 67-83]

Sounds like a good way to lose additional hard working Police and Firemen who are finally persuing the American Dream in their safe, quiet and comfortable ranch in Harrison twp or Mc Mansion in Shelby. Like they really want to move back to the hood and be faced with the doom and gloom of DPS, of course with all the $$ they would be saving on the drastically lower mortgage they could afford a good private school. Come on JoAnn leave these folks alone.

[jtf1972]

Like everything else around here this is one of those issues where there is never any real discussion. One side says yes. The other no. Then we go about bitching about how the other side is unfair. We never get anywhere. It's always "Detroit is a shithole. Why should anybody have to live there?" vs "This is what makes you think it's a shithole." It gets old really, really fast. I am frankly amazed that these threads continue getting posts that ping pong back & forth with variations on the same thing being repeated and only seem to die when another thread gets started saying the same thing.

[Dumpling]

jtf1972, when you commute, it is from Detroit to a suburb; are you commuting by car or by bus or by another means? Are you commuting to the Southfield-Farmington Hills [[sprawled) job axis or elsewhere?
Are you working within a job description in which there is much competition from other individuals from Detroit that keep your wages down?

[jtf1972]

Dumpling... Not trying to take it off topic, but commuting by car to 2 jobs in the Royal Oak area. Only 1 is in the field I have a couple decades in, the other is a "for now" job. The wages are low [[I was making more than twice as much at a part-time job in NYC) because it is a job that there is competition for, but that is greatly due to corporate downsizing that has gutted the business. I actually have more contacts in NYC than here, as all my old contacts are either out of the business or moved away.

[Dumpling]

I don't want to take it too far off topic either. I am a city employee that lives in the city and have certainly found that the experience puts hair on my shirt. But if some part of the city is sufficiently congenial for New Yorkers to want to move into, city workers may want to work there also. Not all are from Detroit.

[Dumpling]

The better wording in my last post might have been, "city workers may want to live there" but "want to work there" is not wrong.

[4V4DMD]

Good to see 80% of posters get that for city gain those providing the services need to feel the horrible or wonderful services they provide. Its called making them a stakeholder and humans be nature are selfish 9 times out of 10 and altruistic 1 out of 10. Why expect the 10%? Get real, Watson finally brings something good. Tons of space in East English Village, SW, Rosedale, University, East Village and more for these city employes. Come reap what you sow.

[mtm49269]

Hate to say this but, if memory serves well [[& I'm not as young as iIused to be), the residency requirement was struck down by the state Supreme Court as being unconstitutional because the government [[local/state/fed) can't tell people where they have to live. But, even before that occurred, I know several DPD/DFD who had dual residences.

[Honky Tonk]

Looks like you're right. First page, 6th paragraph.

http://www.fop.net/programs/research/residency.pdf

[Novine]

"Looks like you're right. First page, 6th paragraph."

That has nothing to do with a residency requirement after you take a job with the city. Whatever one thinks of residency requirements, if they are in place, you know that before you take the job. Don't want to live in the city? Don't take the job. I don't understand what the big deal is about that choice.