Riverside Park Extension cleanup May 1!

[urbanoutdoors]

DYeser's

Date:Saturday, May 1, 2010
Time:2:00pm - 5:00pm
Location:Riverside Park Extension [[Jefferson and 24th)


Come out help clean up the park and play some ball!

On May 1st we will Clean up Riverside to get it ready for the 2010 People's League Softball season! We will be using riverside and need your help to get its back to its glory! Please invite all your friends and come out and have a blast!

We want this to be a huge success and want everyone to be able to utilize for years to come.

We invite ball players, community members, friends and all green space lovers to come out and help us!

We will have some tools thanks to SDEV but we encourage you to bring your own tools weed wackers and Lawn mowers! It will take everyone’s help to make this a success...

Also if you know anyone who is willing to donate materials please let me know as it will take plenty of resources to make this happen!

And if we have enough energy we will play some ball after to test out our nice revamped field! So bring your Bats and Gloves as well...

Additional info contact Joe Rashid- Josephrashid@gmail.com

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?ei...1645732&ref=mf

[urbanoutdoors]

Great News! Edward C Levy Company agreed to donate supplies to resurface the infield and parking lot! Bring your wheel barrows and shovels as it will be great to restore Riverside this Saturday May 1st!

We need all the help we can get so invite your friends as we want to get the community out to clean and use the park for this summer and for many years to come!

For More info on Edward C Levy Company Go to: http://www.edwclevy.com/community.aspx

[urbanoutdoors]

Volunteers for Riverside

by Joel on April 30, 2010

By Joel Thurtell
STILL SQUATTIN' -- The area between the chain-link fence and the Ambassador Bridge is part of Detroit's public Riverside Park still occupied by Manuel "Matty" Moroun. Joel Thurtell photo.

Volunteer workers are needed to make improvements on Detroit’s Riverside Park.
Matty Moroun’s fence — declared illegal by a Detroit judge — still surrounds part of the city’s Riverside Park, but the billionaire’s squatting won’t stop people from renovating a softball diamond in a section of the park that is not occupied by Matty, who owns the adjacent Ambassador Bridge.
Work will begin at 2 p.m. Saturday, May 1 on the ball field at 24th Street a block south of East Jefferson. The city’s Recreation Department meanwhile plans to organize a clean-up from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. on Saturday, according to recreation director Alicia Minter.
Plenty of work to do.
“The Peoples Softball League will play at Riverside every Friday night,� said community organizer Joe Rashid. “So far clean-up materials were donated by Southwest Detroit Environmental Vision. The materials to resurface the field and parking lot came from Edward C. Levy Company.�
More volunteer workers are needed, according to Rashid.
“Every little bit helps — shovels, people, we will take whatever we can get!� said Rashid.
“I am hearing we may have DFD [[Detroit Fire Department), Rec Department and other support at the park on Saturday, so it is coming together nicely,� Rashid said.
“Plus I got the materials secured to resurface the field,� he added.
“So far, it is mainly focused on the softball diamond, as that will take a good amount of time and energy to get in playable shape,� Rashid said in an e-mail.
STILL LOCKED -- Padlock on Detroit's Riverside Park boat launch closed by Matty Moroun for fake security reasons. Joel Thurtell photo.

Moroun closed the boat launch a few years ago for phony security reasons, placing padlocks on the gates along with a bogus “Homeland Security� warning sign. He also fenced off an area of the park near the ball field that once had basketball hoops and trees. His fake “Homeland Security� signs still hang from the chain-link fence a judge has ordered him to remove. Inside the fenced area where shade trees once stood, he stores materials for the second bridge he started to build without permits from either Canadian or U.S. authorities.
Drop me a line at joelthurtell@gmail.com
Tagged as: Ambassador Bridge, Detroit, Manuel Matty Moroun, Riverside Park

[DetroitPole]

There is also a large community picnic event planned for this exact same day and time at Roosevelt Park.
Why are there two Southwest Detroit park events at the same time on the same day? They will be competing for attendance and involvement. It seems like very poor planning to me.

[gnome]

Wow, people are actually complaining about having too many things to do in Detroit. That might be a first.

D-Pole, it might be splitting hairs, but Roosevelt is really more of a Corktown thing, and while you might have a point about the uncoordinated timing of events, you should know that the Friends of Riverside Park are not all residents of Southwest Detroit.

In fact, I'll bet ya that the vast majority of the people who will be down there sweating under the pereless glare of Stamper and Maroun don't live anywhere close to Riverside Park. The Friends of Riverside Park started as an answer to Maroun's building of a fence around the park and storing his construction equipment on City property.

For several years now, the Bridge company has employed shotgun toting guards to chase citizens off of City property. It is true. Regular old folks walking their dogs, playing catch or launching a boat would be harrassed by men with shotguns. Men hired by Manny Maroun to keep people away from property he wants for a twin span of the Ambassador.

D-Pole, the guy who started this thread, "UrbanOutdoors", has been on the front lines in confronting Mr. Maroun and his thugs. He has faced the thugs and has told them that they don't own the park. The citizens do. Urbanoutdoors is one of folks behind the Friends of Riverside Park along with several other forum members. Since the City will not cut the grass, this little group does the best it can with hand mowers, and weed wackers. Anyone is welcome to join, even you, there are no dues, no requirements and no meetings to attend. Yet there is a secret handshake.

But of course, to learn the secret handshake, you need to swing by the Park and wack a few weeds. No charge.

[DetroitPole]

Wow, people are actually complaining about having too many things to do in Detroit. That might be a first.

D-Pole, it might be splitting hairs, but Roosevelt is really more of a Corktown thing, and while you might have a point about the uncoordinated timing of events, you should know that the Friends of Riverside Park are not all residents of Southwest Detroit.

In fact, I'll bet ya that the vast majority of the people who will be down there sweating under the pereless glare of Stamper and Maroun don't live anywhere close to Riverside Park. The Friends of Riverside Park started as an answer to Maroun's building of a fence around the park and storing his construction equipment on City property.

For several years now, the Bridge company has employed shotgun toting guards to chase citizens off of City property. It is true. Regular old folks walking their dogs, playing catch or launching a boat would be harrassed by men with shotguns. Men hired by Manny Maroun to keep people away from property he wants for a twin span of the Ambassador.

D-Pole, the guy who started this thread, "UrbanOutdoors", has been on the front lines in confronting Mr. Maroun and his thugs. He has faced the thugs and has told them that they don't own the park. The citizens do. Urbanoutdoors is one of folks behind the Friends of Riverside Park along with several other forum members. Since the City will not cut the grass, this little group does the best it can with hand mowers, and weed wackers. Anyone is welcome to join, even you, there are no dues, no requirements and no meetings to attend. Yet there is a secret handshake.

But of course, to learn the secret handshake, you need to swing by the Park and wack a few weeds. No charge.

Okay, all the glory, laud, and honor aside, let's get back to the practical reality of things:
I [[yes, even me) am a resident of Southwest Detroit and have to make the decision of which of these events to attend. Other active residents must also make this decision. Those of us who have the luxury of a free Saturday to spend on unabashedly political events, that is.
Whereas, if these events were coordinated in a pragmatic fashion, as simple as one being the next weekend, active residents, and whoever else may be on the bandwagon, would not have to make that choice.
It absolutely, without question, is splitting hairs. Corktown is in Southwest Detroit and Roosevelt Park is in Corktown and Southwest Detroit. We cannot afford to dilute our numbers because as working people we have almost no political capital against the monsterous billionare who knows how to spread his influence around. So a stupid, avoidable scheduling mistake can amount to everything in this community.

[gnome]

Well Pole, since you obviously know what is best, how about you join the Friends of Riverside Park and become its Coordinator Of Events. I happen to know the job is available and with your finger on the pulse of what is happening, I'm confident you can bring a cohesive stickiness to political acts of gardening.

A person like yourself, with strong self-direction, might be just the spark to channel everyone's energy in the right direction. In fact, you can prove to the world that you are as hard charging as you say, by showing up and lending a hand. Riverside Park needs you.

Let not the rain dampen your drive. You can stand above the rest and all it takes is grabbing the business end of a shovel.

[urbanoutdoors]

Okay, all the glory, laud, and honor aside, let's get back to the practical reality of things:
I [[yes, even me) am a resident of Southwest Detroit and have to make the decision of which of these events to attend. Other active residents must also make this decision. Those of us who have the luxury of a free Saturday to spend on unabashedly political events, that is.
Whereas, if these events were coordinated in a pragmatic fashion, as simple as one being the next weekend, active residents, and whoever else may be on the bandwagon, would not have to make that choice.
It absolutely, without question, is splitting hairs. Corktown is in Southwest Detroit and Roosevelt Park is in Corktown and Southwest Detroit. We cannot afford to dilute our numbers because as working people we have almost no political capital against the monsterous billionare who knows how to spread his influence around. So a stupid, avoidable scheduling mistake can amount to everything in this community.

DPole,
As an advocate for Southwest including Corktown I think it is a great dillema to have to have, to decide between 2 worthy events. However it was nothing to do with poor planning on my behalf or Corktowns. We had a great cleanup today and am stoked about what is shaping up at riverside!

The reason for my clean up being this week was because the city finally granted People's League Softball the field just over a week ago and our season starts Friday. So I did not have the luxury of delaying the clean up as we need the field ready. It was a horrid weekend because of everything happening period, from Obama, Immigration reform rallys to a Conference I was even speaking at but in the end it didn't matter it had to be done... And it got done and the park looks amazing! We still do have work to do and I will be having cleanups throughout the week to make sure this is ready for Friday...

At one point I had thought about Sunday as well but that was the Parade... This was what we were left with and it was a huge success! No reason to make a negative out of a positve. I am proud to be part of both Corktown and Hubbard Farms communites as we are all part of Southwest and it is a great time to be active in Southwest!

Thanks for your concern,
Urban

I will post pictures in a few...

[urbanoutdoors]

Here are a few pics

[gnome]

UrbanOutdoors is being modest. He put together a hell of an event. The group picture above represents only a third of the people who showed up to help. He twisted some guy's arm to donate at least 10 yards of slag sand for ball field resurfacing, someone else to donate water/ice and ten others to toss in shovels and rakes.

If you have ever tried to organize an event and get things donated, it takes persistence and patience and a lot of hard prep work. And then you have to get people to show up to work for free.

UrbanOutdoors, and wife, did a great job yesterday and should be recognized for their countless hours of hard work.

[urbanoutdoors]

Thanks for the kind words Gnome.

Here is an update on the Rverside Boat launch among other things...
http://joelontheroad.com/?p=4577

Eat your heart out, Matty!
by Joel on May 2, 2010

RIVERSIDE PARK BOAT LAUNCH -- As seen from canoe May 1, 2010, with Ambassador Bridge. Joel Thurtell photo.
By Joel Thurtell

PADDLING AT RIVERSIDE -- Curt Guyette in bow, Karen Fonde in center of canoe with blogger JT in stern just put in at Riverside Park boat launch. First boat launched from this public ramp in nearly nine years. Joel Thurtell photo.
We put a boat into the Detroit River at Riverside Park on Saturday afternoon, May 1, 2010.
It felt great!
Thanks to Matty Moroun, the billionaire owner of the nearby Ambassador Bridge, no boat had set forth from the public Riverside Park boat launch since before the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. Matty exploited 9/11 to seize park land adjacent to his bridge, and his henchmen padlocked the boat launch gate and hung a fake “Homeland Security� sign from its chain-link fence.
Sometime in late 2001 or early 2002, Matty’s goons ejected city recreation officials, citing Homeland Security authority which the real Homeland Security people tell me was a complete sham. But although city recreation officials and city lawyers wanted to take Matty to court and eject him, nothing happened while the Matty-supported felon, Kwame Kilpatrick, was mayor of Detroit. Then, with Kwame out of power, one of Matty’s shotgun totin’ goons tried to arrest a blogger [[me) for taking pictures at the park and instead set off a chain of events that led us to put a boat into the river at Riverside Park on a windy afternoon in May, 2010.

SHOTGUN TOTIN' GOON
It was the first boat launched from the park in almost nine years.
And, as I say, it felt fantastic.
The boat was a 15-foot Michi-Craft aluminum canoe, the same one used by Detroit Free Press photographer Patricia Beck and me on our five-day, 27-mile odyssey up the Rouge River five years ago.
This time, on May 1, 2010, the canoe’s crew consisted of me, my wife, Karen Fonde, and Metro Times Editor Curt Guyette.
I’d been wanting to launch a boat from this ramp ever since September of 2008, when I learned that Matty had closed the launch shortly after September 11, 2001, citing security concerns for his neighboring Ambassador bridge. Those concerns were bogus. The opposite side of the bridge is accessible, as is the Windsor side in Canada. Matty’s real reason for wanting control of the park is that he needs the land for the bridge he wants to build to replace the aging and decrepit Ambassador.

OH, OH! SECURITY THREAT! BLOGGER APPROACHES MATTY'S BRIDGE IN CANOE! Where's the shotgun totin' goon when you need him? Joel Thurtell photo.
Most people buy the land they want for their construction projects. That didn’t suit Matty. He just took it. His fence still stops people from using part of Riverside Park, even though a judge ordered him to get out.
On September 22, 2008, when I went looking for the boat launch, I found instead one of Matty’s shotgun-totin’ goons, who did the same thing to me that Matty’s thugs did to City of Detroit Recreation Department staffers late in 2001. The goons kicked the city workers out of a public city park.
Matty’s goon tried to arrest me, and I high-tailed it out of the park.
Exactly what Matty wanted.
He thought the park was his.
But hey, the news today is that the city is committed to re-opening the boat launch. This is about more than a boat launch. By investing in Riverside Park, the city is telling Matty he can’t have Riverside Park. And if Matty doesn’t get the park, his dreams of building a new bridge are dead in the water.

CLEANUP AT RIVERSIDE -- Jennifer Roberts, public relations manager for Detroit's Recreation Department, sweeps at Riverside Park boat launch. Joel Thurtell photo.
I’d gotten a tip that recreation staffers would be working on their own time to clean the boat launch on Saturday, May 1. I got excited. Maybe I could put a boat in! Screw Matty and screw his goons! What a thrill it would be to dig my paddle into water at Riverside.
Recreation director Alicia Minter gave me permission to put the canoe in. I did not ask Matty.
Oh, by the way, I can’t help mentioning that Pat Beck and I co-authored a book about our Rouge adventure. It’s Up the Rouge! Paddling Detroit’s Hidden River, published in 2009 by Wayne State University Press. It was named a Michigan Notable Book for 2010 by the Library of Michigan.
I bought the canoe later from the canoe livery that rented it to us back in 2005.

OH, MY GOD! IT'S ANOTHER JOURNALIST IN A CANOE HEADING FOR MATTY'S BRIDGE! Metro Times Editor Curt Guyette checks Ambassador bridge security from canoe. Joel Thurtell photo.
As I chatted Saturday with recreation staffers doing volunteer cleanup work at the launch, who should show up but Curt Guyette of the Metro Times. Curt, who has done terrific coverage of Moroun, was game to go in the canoe. Curt, Karen and I paddled the little metal shell through the launch area and into the river.
Into, I might add, a strong wind from the south that was raising swells far higher than the low freeboard of a 15-foot canoe loaded with three passengers.
I was frankly glad to nose back into the placid waters of the launch area. Why, I didn’t even pull out my camera to shoot photos of the toilet paper-encrusted sewage outfall that stands beside the launch outlet.
As we loaded the canoe back atop my car, more and more volunteer workers were showing up to rake, pull weeds and haul junk wood out of the launch area. My photos from the water show lots of driftwood and flotsam in the launch area. That was gone later in the afternoon.

Community organizer Joe Rashid works on fixing Riverside Park ballfield. Joel Thurtell photo.
At the Riverside park extension nearby, Joe Rashid with friends and relatives, were putting a new surface on the softball field near the fenced-off park land Matty still holds illegally. I’ll be writing more about this effort.
There will be another work party on Saturday, May 15, 2010, so if you’re someone who likes parks or wants to put a boat in at Riverside, here’s a chance to help the city with this noble project.
Recreation officials told me the city plans to spend $250,000 to replace the two docks, install new LED floodlights, replace the restrooms and renovate an office, replace benches, a water fountain and trash cans and paint the railing. Later in the summer, the city will seek state grant money to repave the parking lot.
Meantime, while Matty sends flocks of lawyers to court in a try to endlessly stall a government-proposed international bridge, work will proceed through the summer so the boat launch can re-open in August. It would remain open through the remainder of the boating season this year. Next year, it would open in the spring for a full boating season.

RAMP INSPECTORS -- The boat launch works. Karen Fonde and Joel Thurtell. Curt Guyette photo.

AFTER THE TRIP -- Curt Guyette and Joel Thurtell after checking Riverside boat ramp. Karen Fonde photo.

[urbanoutdoors]

Swell day
A day at the park, in spite of the bridge baron

By News Hits staff
SEE ALSONews Hits ARCHIVESMore Politics StoriesStronger than tea [[4/28/2010)
What it means to host the U.S. Social Forum
Ganging up on Matty [[4/21/2010)
The latest on the world's most oppressed billionaire
Remembering Ravitz [[4/21/2010)
Former councilman was a voice of reason
More from News Hits staffContemplating contempt [[4/28/2010)
In untangling legal wrangle over bridge, judge gets it right
Cross winds [[4/21/2010)
Plans for wind power sites have some lake-watchers taking notice
Hit and hit again [[4/21/2010)
This just isn't Manuel Moroun's week ...

Anyone who has come within sniffing distance of this column during the past 18 months knows we've been fixated on Detroit's Riverside Park, located next to the Ambassador Bridge owned by Manuel "Matty" Moroun.
The city, since late in 2008, has being trying to get Moroun to return a 150-foot swath of what's known as the Riverside Park Annex; Moroun and his hired hands fenced off the strip of land at the edge of the annex [[and next to the bridge) after 9/11, and have been squatting on it ever since — despite what were at first sweet entreaties from the city followed by a contentious lawsuit.
With the city too poor to maintain the annex, about 30 people showed up there on Saturday to take matters into their own hands and participate in a cleanup sponsored by the West Grand Boulevard Block Club, People's League Softball and Bridgewatch Detroit. Waist-high weeds were mowed down, and the infield of the ball diamond resurfaced. Some work was also done on the parking lot.
"We're in the process of trying to get a bulldozer or something out there to kind of smooth out the parking lot," says Joe Rashid, one of the organizers of the cleanup. It's full of potholes and needs to be resurfaced."
The Edward C. Levy Co. donated about 150 tons of slag — rock material — for spreading over the parking lot and walkways, says Terria Ellis, inside sales representative at Levy, which is located in Dearborn near the southwest Detroit border.
"We're going to be spreading it later this week," Rashid says.
Volunteers will return to the park May 15, the day of the Motor City Makeover citywide cleanup effort. "It's going to be an ongoing project throughout the summer," Rashid says.
The softball league, an organized group of teams that's played since the 1970s, had been playing at Clark Park since 2001, but now can return to Riverside. The league's first game is scheduled for May 7.
"I'm hoping it's a new era. It's now just a matter of getting the fence down," Rashid says.
The high point of our day came when News Hits ran into former Free Press reporter Joel Thurtell and his wife Karen over at the park's boat launch.
Unable to afford keeping it open, the city blocked access to the boat launch and surrounding parking lot back during the Kilpatrick administration. When someone rammed through the barrier, Matty's helpful men put up a new fence, then chained it shut with one of their padlocks, putting up some bogus signs saying that the Department of Homeland Security would come after any illegal trespassers. In reality, it was only the bridge company's security guys who harassed anyone who had the temerity to actually try to set foot on what remained public park land.
Unfortunately for Matty and Co., one of his security guys made the mistake of trying to intimidate Thurtell when he was in the park taking pictures of the bridge in the fall of 2008. He blogged about his encounter with one of Matty's "shotgun-toting goons" and began asking questions about what was going on. Before long, the city apparently realized that a very rich squatter was sitting on a piece of its land, and it has been trying to get it back ever since.
At the boat launch on Saturday, three employees of the Rec Department were volunteering time on their day off to help clear out some of the weeds that have been growing wild over the years. One of them, an amiable guy named D. Scott Brinkmann, informed us that a grant had been obtained and the launch area would be restored and then reopened sometime late this summer.
Thurtell got wind of what was going on and hauled his canoe down to the park to engage in a little pre-opening launch of his own. To our delight, he asked News Hits to tag along as he and Karen slid it into the canal and then paddled out into the river.
The water was choppy enough to cause a little heart-racing worry about capsizing. But that only added to the fun, which culminated with a joyous whoop as we stepped to shore and faced the towering bridge.
It's only fitting, we think, that Thurtell is the first guy in years to get to use that launch. Sure, the legal battle to reclaim the entire park isn't over. Even so, on that afternoon, as the canoe slipped into the water, it felt very much like we were sticking a sharp little thorn into the rump of a billionaire who, until recently, had grown too accustomed to always getting exactly what he wanted.
Yeah, it was a swell day.
News Hits is edited by Curt Guyette. Contact him at 313-202-8004 or NewsHits@metrotimes.com.

[DetroitDad]

Why don't we just take the fence down?

[gnome]

I was down there tonight and was delighted to see a bunch of kids playing baseball. The team, or league, was called the Detroit Bees and they seemed very happy.

The parking lot was filled with parents waiting for the practice to be over and I had the oportunity to speak with a couple of them. One dad, had some very interesting things to say about the fence.

As many folks know I have not been a big fan of the fence. I feel it is an intusion and an afront to the citizens of Detroit. A thumb in our collective eye as it were. However, I had that opinion changed tonight.

The dad I spoke with talked about playing ball back in the day and about how the park has been the target of vandalism throughout the years. It should surprise no one that teens loved to go off-roading across the field. Pull donuts in the outfield and power slides around the basepaths.

This dad convinced me that the fence is actually protecting the park. Now I know how that sounds, like a Dan Stamperism, but think about it for a minute. The park has fallen into disrepair because it hasn't been used or maintained. The City has abandoned the darn thing and if it wasn't for Urbanoutdoors, the place would still be reverting to ghetto lot. But now, since the corner has been turned, and folks are taking back the park, what would take the wind from their sails?

Donuts and power slides.

[urbanoutdoors]

I think its important to note what fence is being talked about Gnome... The north side fence was actually put up by accident by the city... Fom what I was told it was a miscomunication. As for the one with fake homeland security signs we all know that one is Matty... So maybe there was miscommunication, but also could be that not everyone understands the issue...

I am glad that kids got out and used the Park today though! All it takes is the community getting word its open and it will get plenty of use... Can't wait to play some ball there tomorrow!

Gnome,
Good seeing you and Mrs. Gnome today. Its funny how we keep running into each other!

[rjlj]

Question: Would a fence that was put up in a Suburban Detroit public park by a private citizen or in any other city park in the United States exist for more than a week ?

[gnome]

Just a different point of view and one worth thinking through. You know how I hate that fence and everything it represents, but what if we can turn it to our advantage. that is even more of a "fuck you Matty" than tearing them down.

Keep in mind those fences are keeping Matty's equipment and supplies off park property.

[gnome]

Question: Would a fence that was put up in a Suburban Detroit public park by a private citizen or in any other city in the United States exist for more than a week ?

Answer: of course not, but this is Detroit and logic is upside down in this rabbithole.

[kryptonite]

If Maroun is so vigilant about security at Riverside Park, what about the MCS train station? Does he have security patrols watching that property? "Homeland security" is not the bridge co.'s responsibility, there is a federal government department responsible for that.