Across Eight Mile

In a rare visit to Farmington Hills, Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick
details his hopes and plans for Detroit's future.

DIANA LIEBERMAN
Special to the Jewish News

"That building was old when everybody
went to it," Mayor Kilpatrick com-
mented, to general laughter.
Plans for the Ford Auditorium site
include a lager, state-of-the-art replace-
ment for Chene Park, the waterfront
park and amphitheater.

D

etroit's problems are not
unique among America's big
cities, Mayor Kwame
Kilpatrick assured an audience of 65
suburbanites Feb. 28, in a frank talk
about the city he has led since 2001.
As guest speaker at the Birmingham
Temple in Farmington Hills, the 34-
year-old Detroit mayor traced the steps
his administration has taken to improve
the city. He looked toward the future
with cautious optimism.
However, Mayor Kilpatrick said,
Detroit remains much more resistant to
improvement than areas such as
Cleveland, Chicago and Philadelphia
because of our "tumultuous history of
race relations."
"Michigan will always be last because
we can't sit down and discuss the race
issue," he said.
"The first day I walked into that
office, we had 101 million problems,"
Mayor Kilpatrick said.
His administration's most pressing
task was to "right-size" city government,
he said. When he took office, Detroit
employed about 21,000 people. After
three years, Detroit has slightly more
than 17,000 employees, and plans are
to cut even more.
The cutbacks are necessary because,
the mayor said, "We don't have 2 mil-
lion people any more."
Despite these extra employees, he
said, "When I walked in, the city didn't
do anything well — shovel snow, cut
grass. Now we get out and do the job
we need to do."
In the past 40 years, the city of
Detroit has lost a million people and
15,000 businesses, Mayor Kilpatrick
pointed out. Today, he said, "The No. 1
industry is the public sector. And as
long as everyone works for city, the
schools, the state, hospitals, we can't
win."
Retraining plans are under way, he
said, outlining one project that involves
Harvard University Professor Michael
Porter. In addition, he said, the city is
beginning to develop groundwork and
strategies to shore up its industrial base,
take advantage of the international

3/10
2005

54

Regional Cooperation

Detroit Mayor Kwame
Kilpatrick at the
Birmingham Temple

waterway to re-establish Detroit as a
thriving industrial port and refurbish its
"dinosaur buildings."
In the past two years, 22 new restau-
rants have opened within city bound-
aries, he said, and at this moment,
7,400 new houses are in some stage of
construction. In addition to Super Bowl
XL, conventions and sports events
scheduled for Detroit include the major
league baseball all-stars game this
spring, the National Head Start
Convention in 2006 and the NCAA
basketball championships in 2009.

Educational Issues

The 65 people in the Birmingham
Temple audience were most impressed
by the mayor's frankness in answering
specific audience questions.
"If we don't have our children educat-
ed, it won't make a difference what we
do," said Judy Green of Southfield, and
the mayor agreed.
"Our state has the responsibility to
fund adequately the districts — not just
Detroit," he said, adding that the city of
Baltimore had successfully sued the
state of Maryland to increase funding.
"People say money is not the most
important thing," Mayor Kilpatrick
added. "Well, it's not, but it's right up
there with oxygen."

Other needs for the schools include
changing antiquated educational meth-
ods, negotiating new union contracts
and cutting back the size of the system,
he said, "with African-centered educa-
tion so children can have pride in them-
selves."
He cited recent progress at
Renaissance High School and its feeder
schools as well as at the new Cass Tech
High School.
Mayor Kilpatrick was ready with
monetary answers when Carol Schwartz
of Farmington Hills asked why Detroit
did not accept a $10 million offer from
Thompson Construction to raze aban-
doned buildings.
The money had been offered on a
match basis, he said. The city could
raise only $6 million because its
Community Development Block Grant
funding was reduced because of the
city's declining population. However,
Mayor Kilpatrick said, the offer is still
on the table.
The mayor spoke of "11 dinosaur
buildings" — nine in the process of ren-
ovation and two he hopes to see torn
down. Even without the Thompson
Construction grant, he hopes to demol-
ish Ford Auditorium and the old Cass
Tech. A local group has issued an
injunction against demolition of Cass
Tech, he said.

The mayor spoke openly about taking
visitors from other countries around
Detroit and being asked "What hap-
pened here, a war?"
However, he said, the city does offer
attractions to visitors, and he resents
convention planners who whisk guests
to Greenfield Village and Somerset Mall
rather than to Jazz Fest, ethnic festivals
and baseball games.
Although the perception is that crime
is increasing in Detroit, the reality is
that percentages of violent crime have
been falling for the past three years,
Mayor Kilpatrick said.
"We need to have a conversation
across Eight Mile Road," he said. "We
talk about Detroit against Oakland
County, Macomb County. We really
need to be talking about Detroit against
the world."
After the talk, audience members
unanimously commented on the
mayor's candid and forthright approach.
"It was a very effective talk," said
Rabbi Sherwin Wine, rabbi emeritus of
the Birmingham Temple. "He spoke
directly and frankly. What came
through was a tremendous optimism
and real desire for communication and
cooperation between Detroit, the sur-
rounding communities and the state as
a whole."
Paul Kadish of Farmington Hills said,
"He was very honest on issues of race,
the conflicts between the city of Detroit
and the rest of the state."
Mike Rolnick of Farmington Hills
said he found Mayor Kilpatrick
"extremely articulate."
"He addressed the questions we asked
with full answers. He didn't skirt the
issues."
His wife, Janice Rolnick, was glad
she heard Mayor Kilpatrick in person.
"I really changed my mind about
him," she said. ❑