Time cover story: The Death and Possible Life of a Great City

[RealityCheck]

Daniel Okrent, a 61-year-old major league journalist and "a Detroit native [northwest side] who recently went home to find out what went wrong," tells Time readers what he found. His cover report for the Oct. 5 print issue went online today.

Old friends and new acquaintances, people who confront the city's agony every day, told me, "I hope this isn't going to be another article about how terrible things are in Detroit."

It is — and it isn't.

Either way, lots of red meat to chew on here -- including harsh comments about CAY and John Dingell.

Link again.

[R8RBOB]

Very good piece. It is worth reading.

[Det_ard]

I've been pleasantly surprised at the quality and breadth of writing thus far from the various publications. I expect to see even better work as they get the initial standard stories out of the way and gain more familiarity with the city.

[PCE]

Fantastic article. We need the national attention. In my opinion, Detroit can't bring herself back on her own. To me, it's doubtful that the region or even the State can pull off what's needed. We need Federal help. I'm not talking about throwing money at the problem. More like huge Federal tax incentives for manufacturing companies to set up shop here.

Back in the day, Detroit saved the worlds ass with it's manufacturing might. I think it's time to call in our marker.
I'm wondering what the group thinks about alternate energy production. Solar panels, wind turbines, etc. We have the infrastructure, the brain power, the employment base to make something happen. We also have the space. Imagine the Packard site with a state of the art production facility. Jobs would go along way to curing a lot of the ills we face.

Thoughts?

[sirrealone]

PCE, you are right, but there is work to be done here. This is our chance. This is the chance that the world is going to have to see Detroit. Along with that, they're going to see or not see exactly why we should be relevent and why we should get the federal help that you refer to. If, at the end of the year, the key takeaways are corrupt politicians, terrible local governments, unsolved crimes, too many crimes, and too little education, then we're going to lose.

Because if that happens, nobody is going to care. People will have spent a year trying to care but they will realize that it's a waste.

Instead, I hope that you can see positive stories. I want to see stories of people who fight back against crime, not by vigilante justice, but through more teaching and humane methods. I want to see stories like the series on Fletcher Field that gets zero attention, but is a demonstration of a community trying something, anything to get their neighborhood back. A year from now, wouldn't it be nice to see stories like that, as well as:
--The success of the mayor in turning around a key issue. Which one, doesn't matter. Any of them.
--The first year outcome of the Cobo regional deal and how that can help expand regionalism
--Crimes solved because people turned the criminals in
--Students lives turned around because they stayed in school.

Detroit and Michigan have felt ignored for a long time. It's front and center right here and now. What are we going to do with it?

[lilpup]

I think it's time to call in our marker.

As far as the rest of the nation is concerned Detroit already got more than its share with the $$ that went to GM and Chrysler.

[PCE]

Very well stated sirrealone.

[Det_ard]

We need to get our own act together before we ask the other 49 states to subsidize our foolishness.

[PCE]

As far as the rest of the nation is concerned Detroit already got more than its share with the $$ that went to GM and Chrysler.

I'm not sure if I agree with you or not. In my little corner of the world, there was a huge backlash for the auto bailouts. Until the local GM dealership got its pink slip. At that point attitudes seemed to change.
Like I say, my little corner of the world. I can't comment regarding the national perspective.
I'm hoping these Time articles will help to change negative opinions about Detroit.

[TKshreve]

There is a lot of ammo for the nation to use against us. Couple that with southern politicians who undermine any attempt to rise and we end up with a lot of gum on the face.

I admit, it is not going to be easy to "180" the perceptions and attitudes inside and outside of Detroit. Right now, it's our only choice. Sierralone created a very simple and accurate list of where to start:

--The success of the mayor in turning around a key issue. Which one, doesn't matter. Any of them.
--The first year outcome of the Cobo regional deal and how that can help expand regionalism
--Crimes solved because people turned the criminals in
--Students lives turned around because they stayed in school.

I just can't see where this would ever start. Call me pessemistic, or show me something of substance that points towards anything getting done on that list. Here's to another shot at it.

[sirrealone]

To clarify, I don't think that they have to solve everything or even one thing on the list, but just show steps in the right direction. We have to show the country that we care about ourselves before we can expect the country to care about us.

[R8RBOB]

As far as the rest of the nation is concerned Detroit already got more than its share with the $$ that went to GM and Chrysler.

I have to disagree with you. Corporations, not the city of Detroit got bailout money. Socialism at work. I think I know where PCE is going with this. Detroit needs to be treated as if a disaster like Loma Prieta or Katrina has hit the city. Detroit needs a bailout but throwing money on the problem is not going solve the problems that is plaguing the city.

[RealityCheck]

One beauty of Time's full-team treatment can be seen already on their Detroit Blog, where Darrell Dawsey this afternoon comments on the cover story "from a slightly different angle."

He's a generation younger than Okrent, a different race and grew up on the other side of Woodward. [[Yes, yes -- I may have put the most important difference last.)

Here's a sample of how a writer who "came of age on the eastside of Detroit in the 1970s and 1980s" sees the Coleman legacy:

I won't argue that voters left him in office too long, but I'm loath to agree with the contention that he "cared more about retribution than resurrection." . . . I remember well the resentment and outright race hatred directed at Young, the city's then-nascent black political leadership and its growing black and brown population. Although much of the real power and money in Detroit remained in the hands of white pols and business leaders -- and still does today -- white residents felt that Young's win meant they'd somehow lost ground.

. . . As Young himself was later quoted as saying, "White people find it extremely hard to live in an environment they don't control." What seemed to whites like defiance and dismissal from Young was usually interpreted by black folks as, "Well, with or without you, we've got to go on." . . . But when so many people and businesses fled, taking a hunk of tax base with them, my parents' generation found themselves holding the bag and being forced to soldier on anyway.

Blog link again.

[Lowell]

I found the article disappointing. It carries the same tired litany of ills with which we on this forum are so familiar. Nothing new is offered either in details, context or assessment. In the end the writer, like most who come to ‘stare into the abyss’ as I call it, ends up like so many others have, gravely shaking his head and offering no insight.

Some of the usual simplistic gloss-overs are there too-- the 67 riot gets profiled as the impetus for a flight pattern that was fifteen years in motion with hundreds of thousands having already moved since population peak. No mention is made of its acceleration by tax advantages, public financed expressways that destroyed houses, businesses and chopped up neighborhoods in Detroit while easing movement to tax subsidized new factories, houses and plain old space and country air.

Then the ghost of Coleman Young gets resurrected, reamed and all but called racist while L. Brooks who did as much to stoke that divide gets a half paragraph of marshmallows tossed at him. None of the many other antagonists of that circular firing squad are called to task.

Similarly the Devil's Night ghost is brought forth while the triumph of Angel's Night of which the author was either ignorant or chose to ignore is not mentioned. Every year tens of thousands of volunteer angels unite, patrol their neighborhoods and make that formerly infamous night one of the safest and most arson free nights of the year.

The UAW gets more blame than the auto companies and John Dingell is far more the blame than the [not mentioned] giveaway trade treaties did far more to destroy American auto industry in particular and manufacturing in general.

I felt this article could have been completely comfortable in the Wall Street Journal of Fox news.

Sorry, but if you are doing the D with that much emphasis, I expect more.

[lilpup]

I have to disagree with you. Corporations, not the city of Detroit got bailout money. Socialism at work. I think I know where PCE is going with this. Detroit needs to be treated as if a disaster like Loma Prieta or Katrina has hit the city. Detroit needs a bailout but throwing money on the problem is not going solve the problems that is plaguing the city.

You differentiate between the auto companies and the city. Most people nationally do not understand that the City of Detroit's issues are largely separate from the automakers' struggles.

[lilpup]

I felt this article could have been completely comfortable in the Wall Street Journal of Fox news.

And this is what scares me the most about this project. There have been times I thought this entire project might be little more than a right wing bashing of what has been noted as the most Democratic city in the US. The regurgitated CNNMoney articles are particularly ugly.

Okrent, on the other hand, trots out many of the same things the far left does, too, re: Dingell and and the autos.

So far the pieces from Gray, which seem the most even-handed, and the SI stories are the ones I like the most.

[DetroitPlanner]

I think he was a bit harsh on Dingell and Young. These guys are/were politicians trying to keep the ship afloat. As much bad as I've heard about Young, it was typically from old white people who were mostly scared that they were somehow losing power or control. I've said this before and I will say it again, under Young neighborhoods were in much better shape, grass got cut in the parks, garbage got picked up, police came when needed, houses did not become as blighted as they are now, the books were balanced, and there were recreation centers. We have had a lot worse mayors than Young.

I doubt Dingell was this guy's rep ever. I have lived in W Detroit near Dearborn for nearly my entire life [[40 plus years). Dingell was never my Rep. Wow a rep that repesented the business interests of his constituency. What a shock.

[EastSider]

I found the article disappointing. It carries the same tired litany of ills with which we on this forum are so familiar. Nothing new is offered either in details, context or assessment. In the end the writer, like most who come to ‘stare into the abyss’ as I call it, ends up like so many others have, gravely shaking his head and offering no insight.

Similarly the Devil's Night ghost is brought forth while the triumph of Angel's Night of which the author was either ignorant or chose to ignore. Every year tens of thousands of volunteer angels unite, patrol their neighborhoods and make that formerly infamous night one of the safest and most arson free nights of the year.

Maybe it's different from where you sit, but down here, actually in the city, I don't see much to "celebrate" that we have to have citizen patrols so the city doesn't burn down.

Yeah, rah, rah, people volunteer. The sense of community is so strong and all that other bullshit.

Wouldn't it be more meaningful if we could treat those nights just like any other? Seems like every mayor learns the hard way about ignoring it, though. Archer got his ass burned his first Halloween, and so did Kwame. I haven't heard much about the issue from Bing yet, so better get your marshmallows ready.

[RealityCheck]

As the builder and landlord of this open-door forum, Lowell clearly welcomes respectful, informed dialogue . . . so this feels only a little like turning up my nose at the host's latest serving.

. . . gravely shaking his head and offering no insight.

No quibble on the tone of grave dismay, but his insight about making Detroit the focus of an renewable energy stimulus package brightens the gloom at least a bit:

In Detroit's past, you can find an idea for its future — and the nation's.

. . . [The interstate highway system is] an adaptable model. The fuel-cell technology that dazzled me at the GM Tech Center is less about autos than it is about energy. . . . What's to stop us now from turning Detroit — its highly trained engineering talent, its skilled and unskilled workforce desperate for employment, its underutilized production facilities — into the Arsenal of the Renewable Energy Future?

If we did, Detroit could go back to building something America needs. As a nation, we could prove that we can still make things. And while we're at it, we could regenerate not just a city but our sense of who we are.

And while I'm at it, I encourage Lowell, lilpup and others to read Darrell Dawsey's blog counterpoint to the cover story.

What doesn't scare me about this project is that it embraces diverse voices -- though only Okrent's piece reaches print readers, true. Anyhow, check out how Darrell makes the same point as Our Founder about "the usual simplistic gloss-overs":

Detroit's troubles may have been accelerated by the '67 riots and increased white flight in the wake of Coleman A. Young's rise to the mayoralty, but that's hardly when the deeper-rooted structural problems began. Our tax base and population began dwindling in the late 1950s, early '60s, when our city was facing many of the same troubles it confronts today.

. . . Although the riots jumped off in the late 60s, it seems the table for the explosion -- and Young's subsequent ascent -- had been set at least a decade before.

Hope that eases your fear somewhat, lilpup.

Lastly, I agree that "the triumph of Angel's Night" deserved not to be overlooked or ignored.

[Lonyo exit]

I have to agree with Lowell, especially about Dawsey. This "different angle" is no different than someone submitting the umpteenth photo of a car wreck from a slightly different perspective. It's the same old car accident, regardless of where one stands to offer their supposedly different view.

The riots, Coleman Young, the UAW, etc., blah blah. This is somehow enlightening and illuminating? It's a simplistic glossover of the same old shit everyone here already knows about ad nauseum. Except now the caricature is on display for the country. Those themes may be underlying things here, but they caricature us and gloss over the nuances to be found here.

And frankly, I prefer the original detroit blog, you know, the one that had the name before the national media parachuted in and basically showed its contempt for local writers by just stealing the already established name. At least that site writes about things in the city I didn't know about instead of the tired and rather well covered auto industry/Coleman Young/racism/suburbs vs. city/unemployment angles.

Dawsey may be a good writer, but is he really telling us anything we didn't hear already?

[JStone]

I enjoyed both articles. Spot on if you ask me. Both expressed view points that are hardly ever talked about.

[iheartthed]

I doubt Dingell was this guy's rep ever. I have lived in W Detroit near Dearborn for nearly my entire life [[40 plus years). Dingell was never my Rep. Wow a rep that repesented the business interests of his constituency. What a shock.

I was curious about that too, but weren't the congressional district lines redrawn in the 1980s or 1990s? That's when Detroit was split into just two districts, which are currently covered by Conyers and Kilpatrick...

[iheartthed]

I thought the first article was every bit as cliche as the Detroit residents feared it would be. I did like the counter blog entry. It's a point of view that doesn't get much mainstream exposure.

[RealityCheck]

weren't the congressional district lines redrawn in the 1980s or 1990s? That's when Detroit was split into just two districts ...

Let's good to the bookshelves . . .

. . . to dust off volumes of The Congressional Yearbook from Congressional Quarterly Books.

Regret I no longer have easy access, tho' it's easy to visualize decades' worth filling rows in The Caitlin Library in the oak-paneled lair of DetNews editorial writers on the third floor.

DPL main library likely has comprehensive set . . . or we can trust his claim.

[RealityCheck]

The newsweekly's printed cover has different head than online version atop this thread.

The Tragedy of Detroit
How a great city fell and how it can rise again

Also, national media blogger Rachel Sklar [[Mediaite) noted early this afternoon:

"Detroit: The Death and Possible Life of a Great City" is right now both the Most Read and Most Emailed story on Time.com.

So maybe the story of Detroit will end up being . . . a profitable one? One that generates not only the good karma of covering an important American story, but the necessary clicks to justify funding it? These are of course the daily battles in media toda — if we’re gonna cover it, how are we gonna pay for it? . . . The reality is stark: Investing the time and money to cover this story means somewhere, somehow, that money has to be made back. And clearly, that money hasn’t been coming from Detroit bureaus over the past few years, since so many of them have been closed one by one — including Time’s.

. . . But at the end of the day this is what journalism is supposed to be about at its best: Shining a light, and helping to make things better.