DETROIT (WXYZ) — The Detroit City Council will take public input at a Committee of the Whole meeting at 5pm Monday and vote on Tuesday.
The issue is whether to put on the ballot a $250 million bond issue to pay for continued demolition. If the council votes yes, it would go on the Presidential Primary Ballot on March 10 for Detroit City voters.
Mayor Mike Duggan tells 7 Action News the progress must continue.
“We’ve taken down 20,000 houses in the city. We have 18,000 to go,” The Mayor said.
The Detroit Auditor General found the city has spent a half billion dollars in demolition since Duggan took office in January 2014.
State and federal investigations have been underway as state and federal funds are involved. That’s why City Council put off its vote.
“I’ve heard a lot of conflicting things on that. Here’s what I know for sure. In the last 3 years the feds have released nearly $250 million in demolition money. They have a representative in our office sighing off on every single piece of paper,” Mayor Duggan said.
Throughout Detroit the vacant buildings have been sitting and rotting for years.
On Friday afternoon a crew from Homrich was tearing down a house on Birwood on the west side. This one has been here 7 or 8 years says Regina Montgomery who lives across the street.
She adds, “If we have to pay for it, we gotta do what we gotta do. But all of them need to be gone for the kids.”
The Mayor says the stakes are high.
He says no vote by City Council would be devastating, “You would slow demolition really to a trickle in the city. We’d still be able to address the most emerging conditions that are a hazard. But otherwise the demolition program would pretty well come to a halt.”
