Metro

Wayne County Energizer

Matthew Schenk keeps the Executive's office moving forward.

Judith Doner Berne

always part of growing up that you always
thought about what was going on around
you. We had detailed political discussions
around the dinner table'
His dad, Alan, is a law professor at
Wayne State University and his mom,
Betty, taught pre-school in the Indian
Village neighborhood of Detroit.
His two brothers also went into pub-
lic service. Jeffrey is an assistant United
States district atorney in San Jose, Calif.,
and Todd a social worker in charge of
developing programs and budget for the
Jewish Board of Family and Children's
Services in New York City.
"I attribute a lot of how they've devel-
oped to their upbringing in the city:' Alan
Schenk says. "They way they lived, they
saw opportunities and problems; they
lived among diverse populations. They
were always either the Jewish minority or
the racial minority
"When they were growing," his dad
says up, "we practiced a Jewish value of
welcoming the stranger — we always had
non-Jews at our festivals. It was always
clear to them that our life was not insular"

Special to the Jewish News

The Early Spur
"I work with big economic development
projects;' says Schenk, 37, who after grad-
uating Wayne State University Law School
in Detroit in 1996 headed straight for the
public-service sector.
"I was always interested in public
policy:' says the native Detroiter who also
graduated from Detroit Cass Technical
High School and the University of
Michigan. "A law degree was the best way
to get there'
After internships in Washington, D.C.,
he returned to Detroit, taking his first
job as Detroit City Councilwoman Sheila
M. Cockrel's senior legislative analyst in
November 1996.
Although his work in D.C. "was very
inspiring, at the local level you see the
impact much more. I immediately started
working on the new stadium, two casinos,
Compuware and Campus Martius Park:'
Four years later, he found himself as
legislative assistant corporation counsel

A22

January 15 • 2009

ta ff pho to by Ang ie Ba an

D

espite our current financial
woes, December may turn out
to have been a great month for
Metro Detroit's future, at least partly due
to Matthew Schenk.
Schenk, one of six assistant Wayne
County executives, saw two of the block-
buster projects he has been responsible for
take off.
On Dec. 8, the Big Four (Wayne,
Oakland, Macomb counties and the city of
Detroit) approved the first regional trans-
portation plan in 50 years designed to link
Detroit to Metro Airport in Romulus, Ann
Arbor and the northern suburbs.
On Dec. 18, the state legislature gave
the go-ahead to a light rail line that would
link downtown Detroit to the New Center
area, the first stage in that regional transit
system.
On Dec. 19, the legislature, supported by
Gov. Jennifer Granholm, passed the long-
sought plan to transfer ownership and
administration of Cobo Center from the
city of Detroit to a regional authority. The
legislation included a three-bill tax pack-
age to pay for it.
All were "very big Chanukah preents','
said Schenk, a Grosse Pointe resident.

Matthew Schenk: "Survival of the domestic auto industry is critical to everything."

for the city of Detroit's Law Department,
rising to principal attorney in 2003.
One of his responsibilities was providing
legal advice to Wayne County, including to
Wayne County Executive Robert A. Ficano,
who hired him away three years ago.
"Matt seemed instrumental in the
casino and stadium situations:' Ficano
says. "He's not only intelligent, but very
hard-working, He gets you where you need
to go and shows you how to get there with
a road map.
"He's one of those people who make
government work."
Schenk equally admires his boss.
"Ficano has the ability to understand
what's going on around him but his vision
is on the next thing," he says. "It is so
much easier to work with someone who

looks forward."
Schenk also has enjoyed the mix of peo-
ple Ficano has tapped, including a deputy
county executive who is Palestinian. "It's
wonderful to work around such a diverse
group of people;' Schenk says, "where
everyone is valued for what they bring to
the table:'

The Jewish Factor
Meanwhile, Schenk is used to being a
minority in terms of both race and reli-
gion, growing up in Detroit's Lafayette
Park neighborhood and attending his
local elementary school, University Liggett
Middle School in Grosse Pointe Woods
and Detroit Cass Technical High School.
"Tikkun olam (repair of the world)
was very important:' he said. "It was

Synagogue Ties
Alan and Betty Schenk, along with U.S.
Sen. Carl and Barbara Levin, helped found
the downtown Congregation T'chiyah,
which later moved to Royal Oak.
That left a void that Matthew Schenk
moved to fill, becoming the first president
-of the new Reconstructionist Congregation
of Detroit in 2000. His dad was its second
president.
"We are the only congregation holding
High Holiday services in Detroit:' Schenk
says. The group of 25-30 families, he says,
is dedicated to preserving some of the
Jewish heritage and artifacts from other
synagogues that have disappeared from
the city.
He and his wife Jessica and their three
boys, Jared, 9, and twins Daniel and Ethan,
6, also belong to the Grosse Pointe Jewish
Council.
"Matt is passionate and committed to
improving the quality of life and economic
conditions in Wayne County," says Gary
Torgow, CEO of the Sterling Group real
estate company, who has worked with
Schenk on a number of projects.
"He is by all standards a terrific person
and a remarkable representative of our

