https://www.freep.com/story/news/columnists/john-carlisle/2017/12/07/delray-neighborhood-detroit-michigan/676597001/
This article does two things really well: Showcasing the atrocities of the disinvestment in Delray, and painting an unfair picture of those who choose to live there.
The first one is easy to do. Delray used to be a cultural hub of Hungarian immigrants, and had everything from its own hospital and movie theater to its own banks and auto dealerships. The article talks about the buzzing avenues, and beer gardens and house boats, as well as its peak population of 24,000 people.
This contrasts sharply with the current perception of Delray as the ‘bowels’ of Detroit. Delray has garnered this name for housing the largest water waste treatment plant in the United States. It has also gotten this name because of its terrible increased risk of cancer and asthma for its residents, and because it takes the police three hours to show up on its streets.
The article starts off following a family that lives directly inland of the infamous Zug Island. Fran, the sister of the family unit keeps a ‘muddy lawn with two chickens, three dogs, and six cats’ and has her pet opossum hang from her arm. Fran lives next to her two brothers with houses that are more run down than her own.
The article doesn’t talk enough about the houses that have had tens of thousands of dollars invested in them within the last five years, or about how local mason workers have installed their own sidewalks along one of the streets. The article does follow more families throughout the text, but there is never a real respect for Delray residents and their decision to stay.
The Detroit Free Press does a fine job of highlighting the environmental and societal effect of this disinvestment, but I can’t help but shudder when I think about the effects of this article being my first–and maybe only–glimpse into the Delray community.
This article did a great job of telling the stories of Delray residents and the reasons they remain in this desolate part of the city that is toxic in too many ways for their health. It goes to show how much weight the word “home” carries.
Hey, Nina.
The other weekend, I intended to go the gym but missed my opportunity after the building closed down for the day. I decided to take a run around campus instead, during which I discovered something to which I really didn’t give a second thought until I read your piece.
I was running on a street a little off-campus, turned a corner, and then got a whiff of something that smelled strongly of hot garbage. It was a sickly sweet thing and I was excited to get away and rid myself of the odor. In fact, it didn’t stop smelling like hot garbage, even when I arrived back at DeRoy. I pieced it together: because I was breathing more heavily, I was getting bigger whiffs of the Detroit air. I realized that the entire city smells vaguely of hot garbage.
I asked around and learned that there’s an enormous incinerator underneath the city. Those exhaust vents sitting in the middle of the street — on 2nd, on the way to the DIA — are piping out the vapors that the garbage produces as it burns. I was suddenly furious, both at myself for being so oblivious and for the residents of Detroit who have to suffer its lasting impact on the air quality. I was reminded how I felt then when I read your description of your article and I felt that familiar anger for the residents of Delray. I am reminded how angry I was when our president referred to Haiti and other impoverished nations as “shithole countries.”
The woman from whom I learned where the gas comes told me that she always tells kids who ask that the exhaust is monster breath. She did this so that they didn’t have to confront the reality that the place where they live is designated as a place where trash belongs and that it was decided for its citizens that they would bear the consequences.
I so appreciate your compassion for Delray and its citizens. I hope what I’ve written conveys my sympathy for the dissatisfaction you feel for the way Delray’s citizens are perceived and treated.