In the midst of Detroit’s bankruptcy and the city’s subsequent restructuring, many aspects of Detroit’s political structure changed. After current Mayor Mike Duggan took office he worked to structure his administration in such a way that would help solve three of the main issues he felt to be indicative of the city’s problems as a whole. These three main focus areas are the city’s blighted buildings, the relatively low number of street lights, and the underserving number of public buses. In attacking the issue of blight, Mayor Duggan developed several teams to take an in-depth and long-winded look at different ways to significantly decrease the amount of blight in the city. One of these team is the now two year old ‘Jobs and Economy Team,’ which is also referred to as JET.
After finding out that I would be working with the JET, I tried to do as much research as possible in order to find out what exactly the team does, however there was not much information available online. Luckily the first few days of my internship included reviewing somewhat complicated documents explaining the relationship between all of the teams working on the issue of blight and land development. After building my confidence in my understanding of these relationships, I was informed that I was to attend the the city’s weekly Real Estate Committee meetings. These meetings have not only kept me aware of the current happenings in Detroit with regards to land development, but they have also given me a more concrete grasp of what the JET works to accomplish.
Over the next 8.5 weeks, I will be tasked with various projects all revolving around the removal of blight and facilitating both residential and commercial land development. Until now my work has involved creating informational sheets for various properties and an in-depth look into numerous cities’ land use review procedures. As for the upcoming weeks, I don’t exactly know what I will be doing day to day, however I do know that I will be working to both rid the city of blight and aid in bringing both businesses and residents to Detroit.
Gabe:
As someone that is looking at property as part of my placement, I am interested in how the city is handling the vacant properties. Also, I am looking at proximity to public transportation for locations and finding little accessibility outside of the city center and midtown, so future developments would improve the accessibility of our clinic to a greater population. Overall, your placement sounds very interesting and I hope you continue to have a good, enlightening experience.
Best,
Luke
I think in a way you’re lucky to not know your daily work schedule! Each day is like a little adventure. I am also working with vacant properties, so your work is super interesting to me. Detroit Future City’s relationship with the city dictates a lot of what DFC does, so seeing how their interest might align or conflict is also really interesting. Keep up the good work, Gabe!