here's some good news to break up the blah, blah, blah, nasty threads...

While the eyes of the state and city were on Belle Isle during a year long, contentious battle over improvements and ownership, Sally Petrella and state Rep. Harvey Santana watched with rising frustration as River Rouge Park, the city’s largest, sat ignored.

“People are so focused on Belle Isle,” Santana, D-Detroit,said last fall, “but here’s Rouge Park that is larger than Belle Isle, and people seem to forget about Rouge Park. We have swimming pools, horse stables. The promised potential of that park is just enormous. I understand Belle Isle, but what about Rouge Park?”
What indeed?

Santana, Petrella, president of Friends of Rouge Park, and a host of volunteers have been working on a master plan for the 1,100-acre green space that the city has owned on the west side for nearly a century. The park has an 18-hole golf course, 12 playgrounds, 14 baseball diamonds, 11 tennis courts and 200 picnic tables. Its sheer size makes it hard tomaintain, and many areas of the park appear overgrown or underdeveloped or seemingly abandoned.
But now, business and civic leaders have stepped up, and River Rouge Park is ignored no more. The Lear corporation is spending $2 million to renovate the park’s two Olympic-size pools, and Santana worked a deal in the Legislature to get $300,000 for operations staff, including lifeguards. The city also has turned its attention to Rouge, contributing $1.2 million to help renovate the bath house, recreation department director Alicia Minter said Friday.

more at

http://www.freep.com/article/2014040...rochelle-riley