Kilpatrick is AGAINST it!? I'm shocked! Pleasantly surprised, but shocked!
Double-barrelled Mega-PING! to both lists! If you want on, FReepmail me!
Posted on 10/18/2004 6:19:41 PM PDT by SmithL
DETROIT -- Detroit's City Council on Monday narrowly approved a resolution endorsing a controversial plan to use public funds to create a black business district in the city.
The council voted 5-4 to affirm a version of the African Town proposal that addressed legal concerns and specifically acknowledged the contributions of immigrants. Some people have criticized the original plan as anti-immigrant.
But the strongest opponents of the proposal, who include Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, say the city cannot and should not use public money to subsidize businesses of one race or ethnic group, in this case blacks. Supporters say the plan would make the city a model by granting black entrepreneurs access to capital they have historically been denied.
Under the proposal, the city would use $30 million set aside from Detroit casinos to fund grants and low-interest loans for minority businesses.
The resolution approved Monday does not carry the force of a law but signals the council's endorsement of the proposal. For African Town to be created, the council would have to work with Kilpatrick to ensure its legality and create a mechanism for financing it, mayoral spokesman Howard Hughey said.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
In aboutnthree years federal grand juries will begin investigating the disappearance of the $30 million...
Detroit? This story?
NO WAY!!!! /sarcasm off
No WHITE Business zones?
Detroit is a black business zone.
Ping
Ain't no whites left in crack town. Forced bussing ran them all off.
Ain't no whites left in crack town. Forced bussing ran them all off.
We ahould march!
Oh please. You make smartass comments about forced bussing but let one person say something about illegal immigration from Mexico and you go bananas. Now why is that?
Right on Bro!!!
Reverse Racism at it's finest in grand ole Detroit!!!
Kilpatrick is AGAINST it!? I'm shocked! Pleasantly surprised, but shocked!
Double-barrelled Mega-PING! to both lists! If you want on, FReepmail me!
Good for him. This idea stinks to high heaven. Like the other poster said, we'll be hearing about the investigation a few years from now. People like Madame CJ Walker didn't need enterprise zones did they??? You get my point.
Isn't this illegal? Using public funds only for blacks? The aims are praiseworthy, and God knows Detroit has to be creative and do something and fast, but this is asking for corruption on a massive scale.
No, because she did what everybody else did in her time: they got off their backsides and worked for it. In addition, there are so many programs already in operation to encourage small business (run by entrepreneurs of any color) that there is absolutely no need for this giveaway. And, as you indicate, it's going to end up in somebody's pockets, and those somebodies are NOT the small businessmen.
This is retarded economically.
Businesses in the "Black Business Zone" will suffer more than they will gain by being put in some special zone where others can't or are discouraged from doing business. It's almost like building a wall around the community.
agreed... also while many black people faced heavy discrimination in this country before, many STILL were able to do much with what they had. These people remind me of the Robert Mugabe types, which is why 'africa town' is so fitting.
Detroit council OKs plan that touts racial separation
September 21, 2004
BY MARISOL BELLO
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER
A majority of the Detroit City Council wants to implement an economic development plan it commissioned for $112,000 that preaches racial isolation and rails against immigration in its bid to gain economic success for poor blacks.
The crux of the plan is the creation of a business district -- dubbed African Town -- that would be funded in part with city money and made up of black-owned businesses catering to a black clientele.
The report also complains that immigrants from Mexico, Asia and the Middle East are stealing resources, jobs and other opportunities from blacks and calls on city leaders to stop the economic shift.
The report does not call on the city to stop immigration -- and the city wouldn't have any power to stop it, even if it wanted to -- but the report does call on the city to level the playing field between blacks and the newcomers who it says are economically surpassing them.
"We see this as another compliment to the exciting development going on in the city," said Councilwoman JoAnn Watson, who introduced the effort to the council earlier this summer. The plan is under scrutiny by some city leaders and economic development experts who question the legality of an effort meant to help only one race. Some officials decry the council's efforts as threatening to reverse strides made in the region to improve race relations and the city's relationship with its neighbors.
Such a plan also could further alienate efforts by Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick to seek regional cooperation and funding for major projects, such as an expansion and renovation of Cobo Center.
One official calls it outright racist.
"It's reverse racism," said Kay Everett, one of two councilwomen who voted against the plan. The other council member who rejected the plan was Sheila Cockrel.
"This is foolish," Everett said. "They don't understand. They're not thinking of the city as a whole. We need to bring harmony to this city, and if we say that we do not want any other people here, then we're being racist."
Council members who voted for the plan are quick to say they are not against immigrants. They say the city must act to help blacks, who more than any other ethnic group in the United States suffer from high levels of poverty, unemployment and school dropout rates.
Kilpatrick vetoed efforts by the council in July to implement the plan, but last week the mayor met with the plan's creator, Claud Anderson, a former Detroiter who had unsuccessfully applied for a casino license. He is also the author of popular books about the economic state of blacks in the country.
Kilpatrick officials said they did not sign any agreements with Anderson, but they are working to help him find land for a business district. So far, they have been unsuccessful.
A mayoral spokesman said that while the meetings were not an endorsement of the politics behind Anderson's plans, the mayor sees merit in the portions of the plan that are focused on creating jobs and increasing the number of black-owned businesses in the city.
"As they do with any potential investors, the mayor and his development team will continue to evaluate any economic development proposal presented to the city as part of its ongoing efforts to grow Detroit," said mayoral spokesman Howard Hughey.
"This administration is committed to improving the social and economic conditions, not only of African Americans, but also other traditionally disadvantaged groups."
He said the administration is against the council's efforts to institutionalize a system that only helps blacks to the exclusion of other races. The council will find it difficult to implement its plan without the mayor's approval.
The report, "A Powernomics Economic Development Plan for Detroit's Under-Served Majority Population," says inner cities should be improved for its residents, who should own and control the businesses in their neighborhoods. He calls on blacks to support black-owned businesses, in the same way he says other groups frequent stores owned by people of their own ethnicities.
The report also says integration has failed blacks and that regionalism is a bid by whites to control the city's resources. Anderson warns city leaders to beware of non-blacks moving into the city because they will have their own agendas.
Anderson says his theories are not racist, but they are honest.
He said the city is bordering on an economic crisis, with 26 percent of the city's population living below the poverty line.
"The biggest problem in the city of Detroit -- and it's true of all urban areas -- are black leaders and white leaders who continue to use and hide behind the myth of a color-blind and race-neutral society and use it as an excuse not to deal with this dilemma," Anderson said.
"There are special problems unique to black folks, and the city needs to address their problems."
Detroit is the first city to begin to implement his Powernomics philosophy, Anderson said. He wants to create a business district for blacks, like Mexicantown or Greektown, that would include a fish factory with its own hatchery, black hair-care supplier, popcorn factory and fruit juice producers.
He said he has some investors lined up to help with such a project, but he would not reveal their names.
The executive director of the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City, a Boston-based nonprofit created by a Harvard University business professor, said the council is right to want to implement a plan to help blacks become entrepreneurs. But the director, Anne Habiby, said black-business ownership is not a panacea, especially if there are no plans in place to help the business owners succeed. The initiative is in talks with Detroit to work as a consultant on economic development issues.
Habiby said Detroit has suffered so much population loss that its future success depends on more people moving into the city.
"Detroit must be an attractive place for people to live," Habiby said. "It's shortsighted for city leaders to create an environment that feels unwelcoming."
Activists in the Hispanic and Arab communities say the city should work to help African Americans, but they said they worry that if the plan is seen as a race-based solution, it may deepen rifts between ethnic groups.
"I do think it's the city leadership's duty to work with the community and no doubt, the priority is African Americans," said Imad Hamad, Michigan director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. "We have to go by the makeup of the community. ... My concern here is that it depends how people read it or react to it."
One Hispanic business leader said the city should open its doors to all ethnic groups. She said the Mexican community has been part of the city since the early 1900s. Hispanics account for 5 percent of the city's population.
"There's a lot going on in the city of Detroit, and if there is a need for an African Town, go for it," said Maria Elena Rodriguez, president of the Mexicantown Community Development Corporation. "But we should not be knocked for trying to get a seat at the table."
And John Carroll, who heads the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce, said like it or not, the city and the suburbs are tied together.
"We think it's not a good option to pursue," he said.
But seven of nine council members did. They voted in July to begin implementing parts of Anderson's plan, including a resolution that designates blacks, who make up 83 percent of Detroit's population, as the "majority minority" group and another that creates a development corporation that would operate as a loan fund exclusively for black entrepreneurs.
The mayor vetoed both resolutions, but the same council members overrode the veto.
Councilwoman Cockrel, who supported the mayor's veto, said: "I'm not prepared to support an economic development strategy that has the unintended consequences of pitting people against each other. At the end of the day ... the plan ... advocates exclusionary classifications and illegal set-asides that only serve to divide and polarize within the city and the region. And we have plenty of that already."
I've been following the African Town proposal very closely. For some reason, everyone is getting this story wrong, especially the local media.
The proposal is for a business district in Detroit with specialty shops, bakeries and restaurants geared toward blacks. Just like Greektown, Mexicantown, etc.
The proposal says it already has financial backers for the specific businesses. What they are asking the Detroit City Council to do is provide funds to assemble land, fund parking, put in sidewalks, etc.
Things got crazy because the same proposal made some nasty allegations about other minorities who DO run the bulk of small businesses in Detroit; Arabs and Mexicans. Most grocery stores, convenience stores, gas stations, etc. are all minority owned here. It's this crap that the media is, rightly, focusing on. But somehow the story morphed into a $30,000,000 fund available to black people only, which isn't true. The 30M is for land assembly, parking, street signage, etc. that go with the district. In fact, the City did fund two parking garages in Greektown, put up distinctive lighting and parking in Mexicantown, etc.
"The biggest problem in the city of Detroit -- and it's true of all urban areas -- are black leaders and white leaders who continue to use and hide behind the myth of a color-blind and race-neutral society and use it as an excuse not to deal with this dilemma," Anderson said.
GEE! I didn't know that a race neutral and colorblind America was a DILEMMA.
So where can someone get accurate information then?
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