Sunday afternoon, people will wear green, drink green and see green as Michigan Avenue gets Irish for the 51st annual St. Patrick's Day parade in Corktown. Get in the spirit with the pics from Model D photographer Marvin Shaouni.
Dave Bing sees the city at a crossroads, he tells the New York Times.Excerpt:Bing came to Detroit as the No. 2 pick in the N.B.A. draft in 1966 and has lived here ever since, playing nine seasons for the Pistons. He held a job every off-season, either with the National Bank of Detroit or Chrysler. After retiring from basketball in 1978, Bing started his own business, the Bing Group, in 1980. A company that primarily manufactures auto parts, the Bing Group employs 500 people and has brought in as much as $300 million a year in revenue, Bing said. He sees his city at a crossroads. “Our city is in a crisis,” Bing said. “We lack leadership. We’re fighting against each other. You have the city versus the suburbs. Black against white. We’re a mess right now. I feel with my people skills, with the contacts that I’ve made over the 42 years both in the city and outside, I think I bring a knowledge base and connectivity to try and right our ship here.” Read the entire article here.
Central High grad, WSU alum, and national film critic Armond White is the subject of a New York Magazine piece.Excerpt:The youngest of seven children, and hailing from northwest Detroit, where his family “busted the block” as the first African-Americans to move into what had been primarily a Jewish neighborhood, White grew up in the era of white flight, the civil-rights movement, and Motown. His father played piano and worked for Ford after trying his hand at owning a gas station and a pool hall, neither of which lasted. “He taught us about the rights of the working man, and also that if you didn’t have anything to say, you should keep your mouth shut. But if you did have something on your mind, you should talk up, don’t keep it to yourself,” White recalls. “We always went to the movies, every Saturday at least,” White says. “I used to love to see stuff like The Long, Hot Summer and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. To me, this was a window into the adult world. Now people watch movies so they can stay kids, which proves how infantilized the culture is. I wanted to see how grown-ups acted, in CinemaScope. Paul Newman and Elizabeth Taylor, the most beautiful people ever, on that giant image: It filled my head … Detroit was a great movie town then. We got Canadian TV, so I got to see stuff like La Dolce Vita, Jacques Demy’s Lola, 8½, all of them dubbed. Boccaccio ’70—these shorts by Fellini, De Sica, and Visconti—I must have seen that one twenty times.Read the entire article here.
The Freep sits down with one of Detroit's many young professionals who has decided to buy urban rather than suburban. In doing so, he revived a foreclosed house on the city's west side.Excerpt:"I chose to purchase and bring back to glory a foreclosed house in the city rather than do the typical suburban move," says Ali, who has an industrial design degree from Wayne State University and works for BDS Marketing. "In the end it proved to be a year-long labor of love that brought my family closer together and helped save a beautiful home." Metro Detroiters are more than familiar with the city's dismal foreclosure situation. RealtyTrac, a company that tracks foreclosures nationally, reports that Metro Detroit remained among the Top 10 for foreclosures last year. The state of Michigan ranked seventh. Hopefully, for homeowners and banks alike, the new administration's policies will lessen this sad state of affairs. For now, however, Ali and other urban boosters, are taking the matter into their own hands. Read the entire article here.
The Detroit Zoo (and Michigan for that matter) get some screen time in the new animated feature "Coraline."Excerpt:In one scene, Coraline reflectively picks up a snow globe holding a replica of the iconic Detroit Zoo fountain as a joyful reminder of her favorite place back home. The globe figures prominently in a pivotal scene later in the film. Movie-goers also may spot a photo of Coraline and her parents in front of the fountain. The fountain features two, 10-foot tall bronze bears in a 75,000-gallon pool with life-sized sea lions, turtles and frogs. The fountain is a favorite meeting place at the zoo and one of its most photographed attractions.Read the entire article here.
Detroit's space and vacancies afford the city an ability to transform itself into a city of hope and sustainability.Excerpt:“I see it as the quiet revolution,” she said. “It is a revolution for self-determination taking place quietly in Detroit.” This quiet revolution has been preparing Detroiters to meet today’s growing crises of global warming and spiraling food prices. As writer Rebecca Solnit said in the July 2007 issue of Harper’s, “Detroit is where change is most urgent and therefore most viable. The rest of us will get there later, when necessity drives us too, and by that time Detroit may be the shining example we can look to—the post-industrial green city that was once the steel-gray capital of Fordist manufacturing.”Read the entire article here.
Investors and Blight Busters are working together to rehabilitate Detroit houses.Excerpt:Kopanakis said Blight Busters crews have rehabbed about 40 homes for Urban Wholesalers. He estimates that 40,000 blighted properties in the city need to be rehabbed or torn down."One reason we think it is important to work with these guys is time is of the essence. If we move quickly and get these houses back, the likelihood of the copper being stolen is diminished," said John George, founder of Motor City Blight Busters. "We want these houses, like the whole city, to be stable."Read the entire article here.
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