Two children dying in a cold van on a drab casino parking deck has exposed the Detroit homeless industrial complex. Hundreds of millions of dollars in federal grants flow in to fix the problem, but the city can’t keep a hotline open past 6 p.m. in the dead of winter.
The grifters in this homeless racket are a roach horde feasting on the city’s most vulnerable.
The Findings
- The emergency shelter hotline does not operate after business hours, on weekends or on federal holidays.
- The bureaucrat overseeing operations of that hotline is a convicted pedophile who sexually assaulted his 13-year-old stepdaughter.
- The administrative agency that disperses hundreds of millions of federal dollars for the city’s homeless and housing programs was red-flagged in a recent audit for “material weakness” and “significant deficiency.”
- Further down the web of agencies are executives of a nonprofit charged with running the day-to-day operations of the hotline who receive large six-figure salaries. The bookkeeping of that nonprofit was also red-flagged in a recent audit.
- A study commissioned by the city to eradicate homelessness in Detroit within five years detailed the deplorable conditions in the city’s shelter network including: vermin, violence, and human beings housed in basements. The city is now in year two of that five-year plan. The study’s cost exceeded $400,000.
The Background
After Tateona Williams and her four children were evicted in September 2023, she went on the bum, calling the city’s housing hotline at least three times looking for help to find her family a home. Her pleas were ignored. The bureaucracy never called her back. And so the floor of a 20-year old minivan became the children’s de facto bedroom.
“I asked the wrong people for help, but that’s the only thing I did wrong,” Williams told the world through heavy sobs. “Those children wanted for nothing. They was clean, fed, and they went to school everyday. I saw to that.”
Mayor Mike Duggan acknowledged at a press conference convened the next day that the emergency shelter hotline—which was awarded a $10 million grant two years ago—is not staffed at night. Even if Williams had called, there was no one there to help.
“If it’s after 6 o’clock at night and you’re in an emergency situation,” Duggan advised, “go to a police precinct.”
The Fallout
Williams had a good reason not to contact the authorities. When the police arrived, they found the children in a woeful state of neglect described as “filthy and underfed, their teeth rotting.” The dead boy, Darnell Currie Jr., 9, had missed 26 days of school.
What’s more, Williams knew that her 2-year-old daughter Amillah was unresponsive but delayed taking her to the hospital, possibly costing the child her life.
Detectives have forwarded their findings to the Wayne County prosecutor, who will determine if charges will be filed against the mother.
“This whole episode just outrages me,” said a high-ranking police official who exchanged his candor for confidentiality. “This just didn’t have to be. These poor children just fell through the cracks. What happened to all the supposed money and resources they were supposed to get? Where was the help?”
The Money
Detroit spends more per capita on the homeless and at-risk people than Los Angeles, the notorious capital of American squalor. These massive pots of federal money are nearly impossible to trace.
Consider: a $40 million Housing and Urban Development grant issued to the city just this month. The $48 million in repurposed FEMA flood money. The $203 million affordable housing plan of 2022. The $58.7 million in Covid money earmarked for “housing.” And the big daddy: $346.8 million in unencumbered HUD dollars awarded to the city in January to prevent basement flooding and add affordable housing.
“We need our own DOGE right here in Detroit,” said Taura Brown, a member of the board of directors of Detroit Continuum of Care, the governmental blob that allocates the federal money for the homeless and at-risk. “When it comes to these dollars, the math just ain’t mathing,” Brown said. “There’s a lot of people driving around in nice cars, but we’re not talking about the best and the brightest people here.”
The Rapist
Take Alan Rosetto. He sits on the board of directors of the Detroit Continuum of Care and is chair of the committee which monitors the phone intake system for vulnerable women and children.
Rosetto was elected to the public board in November 2023 and was never asked about his criminal history. He should have been, because two months prior to being elected board, Rosetto was released from parole for the sexual assault of his 13-year-old stepdaughter. At his 2019 sentencing hearing, Rosetto insisted to the judge that he wasn’t a predator at all, but rather a “participant.”
The judge corrected him. “You’re a rapist.”
When asked if the board was aware of his criminal history when they elevated him to oversee the homeless intake system, Rosetto said: “Yes, they were made aware. They were well aware. A man should be able to restart his life and do something different.”
Rosetto’s resume lists no educational achievement, no executive training certificates, no financial acumen. But he does claim to have founded an advocacy group in 2022, while he was still reporting to his parole officer.
When asked about his yawning of qualifications, Rosetto said, “I learn very quickly.”
The Aftermath
The day after the children were found frozen to death in the back of a rusting van, the scandal pinged across the world. Duggan convened a press conference attempting to summon both sympathy and stewardship. A scandal like this has a way of sinking a gubernatorial run, after all.
“The heartbreaking part of this,” Duggan croaked, “is that there were family shelter beds just a few miles away.”
Perhaps. But just a few hours after the press conference, a citywide bulletin was sent out to shelter providers: No beds available.
Charlie LeDuff is a reporter educated in public schools. Follow him on X @Charlieleduff.
