Detroit — Who actually will take a call from the people of Detroit?
The answer is harder to find than a working payphone, which wouldn’t do a citizen of Motown much good since their politicians don’t return calls anyhow.
City Hall is mum, caught up in yet another poisoned dirt scandal. After Michigan Enjoyer published an expose where three whistle-blowers claimed contaminated soil from the old Northland Mall demolition site was diverted into demolition holes in Detroit, the phones lit up.
Citizens desperate for information called me to complain. Why can’t they get answers from the elected officials?
Mayor Mike Duggan? Running around the country trying to convince the public that the Detroit Comeback is more than a mirage. Meanwhile, he’s quietly pushing for a tax on suburban sports fans and concertgoers as the city’s finances continue to slide.
Mallory McMorrow doesn’t answer. She wants to be Michigan’s next U.S. senator, but she’s not even a good state senator. She posts missives about representing “constituents”—when she’s referring to the illegal aliens who have flooded into Michigan.
McMorrow says nothing about the people of Detroit—whom she nominally represents by way of a Frankenstein district that was so heavily gerrymandered it was ruled unconstitutional by federal judges. Her district stretches all the way from Big Beaver to the Jeffries Freeway.
What Brightmoor and Birmingham have in common is anybody’s guess.
Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib? She’s busy weeping over the tortured history of Palestine on the floor of the House rather than rallying to her constituents on Detroit’s west side who are getting dumped on.
Congressman Shri Thanedar? When he was running for the U.S. House of Representatives, he asked me to take him on a tour of his own district since he had just moved in from Ann Arbor. Today, it seems, he doesn’t even know who exactly he represents.
A Detroit city councilwoman in a hearing last week said she had read our expose and was monitoring it with great interest. Nothing more.
Funny, Detroit is run by Democrats. For years, they casually tossed around the phrase “environmental racism” while it was being perpetrated right under their noses, and with their help.
So, in an information vacuum, the people call me about the latest dirt scandal. This is what I can accurately report: A law enforcement agency has opened an investigation. At least four contractors have given statements, and subpoenas for payment records are being drafted.
I am withholding which agency, specifically, is investigating since I have watched the silent hand of politics scuttle previous investigations.
So as Detroit City Council President Mary Sheffield makes a bid for mayor, and Mayor Mike Duggan makes a bid for governor, and State Senator McMorrow makes a bid for Washington D.C., who you gonna call?
At your service.
Charlie LeDuff is a reporter educated in public schools. Follow him on X @Charlieleduff.
