The Foreign Lands

So the main focus of this blog is to inform people that do not live in and around the city of Detroit, that Detroit is not as bad of a place that it is made out to be.

For as violent Detroit is made out to be, people might be surprised to find out that New York out ranks Detroit in the amount of crime and that the crime in Detroit is slowly going down, but this is not really the topic I wanted to touch on today.

The real topic I wanted to focus on is Canada. Yes, I know that this is a blog about Detroit, but you cannot understand Detroit without looking at Canada. Detroit is seperated from Canada by the Detroit River.

For roughly $4.00 each way, you can cross over to and from Windsor either by crossing the Ambassador Bridge, or taking the Detroit Windsor Tunnel. As I was growing up, all you needed tto bring was your birth certificate and a photo ID to prove you were a citizen. As of June 1st of this year, you need to have a Passport, Travel Card, or Enhanced Drivers License.

Now those who grow up in Detroit love this fact. The drinking and gambling age in Ontario is 19 as opposed to 21 here in the States. Because of this, and the fact that you can get more for the Canaidan Dollar than the US (Not as much so these past few years where you have seen the USD/CDN excahnge rate dip to an even 1 for 1, but I remember the exchange rate being $1.55/per USD) you have seen teenagers go over to Canada to drink and party.

Some might view this as a bad thing. Fair enough, everybody has a right to their opinion, but take this into account. When you are over there you are using a different currency sytem, and having to convert US measurements in to metric. It is a bit different when you are charged for gas by the liter and not by the gallon. (Sidenote: You think our gas prices were bad last summer, you should have seen theirs. Think a dollar more per gallon.)

Also we share the fireworks. Canada Day lands on July 1st and out Independence Day is of course a week before. Well a week before we have the International Freedom Festival Fireworks on the River celebrating two countries freedoms.

Now how's that for adding some culture into Detroiters lives?

Why I Started This...

It's funny how a Twitter reply can cause so many ripples. It started with a fellow tweeter Mona making a tweet about the Lions and the NFL Draft. This caused a great back and she asked me how horrible were the conditions in Detroit. Now I knew that 140 characters of a Twitter message would not allow me to fully express my thoughts. I ended up sending her an e-mail of my thoughts and I felt that I could type for hours about this subject. Which is part of the reason I started this blog. First I will post the e-mail that expressed my thoughts.

Detroit is odd. People fear the city, even people living in the suburbs of Detroit fear it. I had both parents who at one time worked downtown and I grew up not fearing it. Some people love LA, Chicago, or NY, I love Detroit.

There are however many problems facing the city. Starting with the leadership. Detroit had a great Mayor, Dennis Archer, that served 2 terms, but declined to run for a third term because the City Council was a joke that would not focus on the betterment of Detroit. Enter Kwame Kilpatrick, who just last year was outed that he lied under oath on firing the police chief because he was investigating the Mayor. The lawsuit was settled for a whopping 8 million dollars.

Despite all the evidence that came out, and I am talking about a thousand pages of texts from a city owned phone that proved that he had an affair with his Chief of Staff, and they planned on firing the police chief. It took him more than ten months before he finally pleaded guilty, and that was only because the governor was holding a hearing to force him from office. I could go on but that gave Detroit a national black eye.

The President of the City Council took over as Mayor, leaving the most unprofessional person President of the City Council. Go to Youtube and type "Monica Conyers" and you will laugh and then cry on how sad the City Council is.

With the Auto Industry being big here, we have a big Auto Show here. Unfortunately the place that is being held is too old and to small. In fact it is costing the city 15 million a year just to keep it open. The state tried to step in to help and sign it over to a regional authority and give Detroit money for it. The City Council stopped it because there is a weird disconnect between the city and the suburbs. The City Council is convinced that "whitey" is trying to take away their city. I am not kidding on this racism. There are words yet to be invented on how sad it is.

Then you move on to the School Board, which I think the article sums it up in a way. One other mismanagement is that when they closed some of the schools, they left textbooks and computers and other supplies in the schools that were left to be stolen.

Other than the failed leadership I think that Detroit is a city trying to grow despite the failed leadership. The downtown area that is developed is more of the size small town than one compared to NYC, LA, or Chicago. The people are not taking care of the history of the city, and letting some marvelous buildings fall to ruin.

The fear of Detroit is something that strikes me as something odd. I have a number of friends who have never even been downtown and they are over 20. I make it a personal measure to bring them to the downtown area to show them that there is nothing to be afraid of. The city was cleaned up a lot for Super Bowl 40 in 2006 and the city has attempted to keep it clean.

But I am wondering on how much Detroit has to prove to the national media. In the past 7 years we have successfully hosted (2) Stanley Cup Finals, Super Bowl 40, The 2006 World Series, The 2005 MLB All Star Game, (2) NBA Finals, and just recently the 2009 NCAA Men's Basketball Final Four. Yeah there were small hitches, but every city has that.

Also on Youtube, look up the Sam Roberts Band song "Detroit '67" a very moving video mixing the past and present of Detroit.

If you ever come to Detroit I would be more than happy to show you around. It has a lot of forgotten history, but it does have charm that makes me want to stay in the area.

--Keith

The videos that I referred to are posted below.





By the way, one other link I want to send to you. Deminski and Doyle are the hosts of the WCSX morning show on 94.7FM. A great segment from the March 2nd, 2009 show talking about the Detroit City Council can be found here.

The main reason I wanted to start this is to inform people outside of the Detroit area on what Detroit is really like. I will focus on the landmarks, the leadership, the education, and any questions that may come my way.

One thing that I would like to those who read this are your questions about Detroit and how people outside of Detroit view this city.

Thank you for reading, and see you next post.