Posted on 11/21/2009 12:37:15 AM PST by bruinbirdman
The abandoned corpses, in white body bags with number tags tied to each toe, lie one above the other on steel racks inside a giant freezer in Detroits central mortuary, like discarded shoes in the back of a wardrobe.
Some have lain here for years, but in recent months the number of unclaimed bodies has reached a record high. For in this city that once symbolised the American Dream many cannot even afford to bury their dead.
I have not seen this many unclaimed bodies in 13 years on the job, said Albert Samuels, chief investigator at the mortuary. It started happening when the economy went south last year. I have never seen this many people struggling to give people their last resting place.
Unburied bodies piling up in the city mortuary it reached 70 earlier this year is the latest and perhaps most appalling indignity to be heaped on the people of Detroit. The motor city that once boasted the highest median income and home ownership rate in the US is today in the midst of a long and agonising death spiral.
After years of gross mismanagement by the citys leaders and the big three car manufacturers of General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, who continued to make vehicles that Americans no longer wanted to buy, Detroit today has an unemployment rate of 28 per cent, higher even than the worst years of the Great Depression.
The murder rate is soaring. The school system is in receivership. The city treasury is $300 million (£182m) short of the funds needed to provide the most basic services such as rubbish collection. In its postwar heyday, when Detroit helped the US to dominate the worlds car market, it had 1.85 million people. Today, just over 900,000 remain. It was once Americas
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
I just don’t understand a lot of things I suppose.
1. I thought Obama had brought us back from the brink.
2. Cant they bury them for the $250 burial money the Social security allows?
3.Philanthropists have donated $8,000 dolars to help bury the dead. Damn a funeral here costs over $10,000 dollars for just one.
4.It appears everyone who wanted a job in Detroit has left to go elsewhere to get one leaving the drones and entitlement crews behind, If this keeps up there wont be anyone left for the thieves to rob.
5. A city the size of Detroit with an annual budget of $21,000 to bury it’s dead, that certainly seems a bit extravagant, doesnt it? (Sarcasm)
Detroit doesn’t have a Potter’s Field?
Dont you guys in the States have a local authority which cremates or bury’s unclaimed bodies? Surely it would be far more cost effective to do this rather than store the bodies?
I’m no expert in these matters but there used to be a thing call a paupers grave, whereby the local authority dealt with the corpse if the family couldnt afford a funeral or the body wasnt claimed.
How positvely......vibrant!
They say “diversity” is so wonderful because people with different backgrounds and cultures have different viewpoints and ways of doing things.
Evidently......
Here is the solution.
Reroute the Detroit River around to the West of the City.
Retaining the river, in it's new path, as the international border.
Detroit, Ontario, Canada.
You see the commercials and articles during black history month (all 12 of them) bragging that blacks invented everything from the electric turd polisher to the western omlette. Where is the young black Bill Gates or Henry Ford in Detroit who can lift the city up by his technological brilliance?
You are correct. This sentence is very telling. The "people of Detroit" are victims. This has all "happened" to them.
Welcome to FR.
Which socialist empire do you reside in?
Instead of standing in line for handouts, put the layabouts to work with a truly shovel ready project. Knock down some of these abandoned buildings, clear the lots and bury your dead!
Holy mackerel. It’s like a third world country.
I stayed at a motel in Northern Michigan that happened to be holding a meeting for state DNR and DOT bureaucrats. The parking lot was filled with new SUVs and pickups, each costing, I’d guess, $30,000 or more.
Michigan’s top priority is to enrich crooked bureaucrats and thieving politicians. The people in MI are being robbed and the liberal voters are too stupid to see it.
Estimates are that 800,000 productive citizens have left the state. The state’s No. 1 export is young people - the future.
Yep...
Gotta put some of that Obamamoney to good use. /satire button on
Detroit Denby , Class of 67
I was thinking the same thing. Are these unclaimed bodies or are they actually claimed?
It also says some have been in the freezer for years? Why? It just doesn’t make any kind of sense really.
Pricing for cremation can range as low as $1100 around these parts.
First time some relative tries to claim dear old “Auntie Welfare” and finds that she’s been cremated there’d be a massive lawsuit joined by the the usual alphabet-soup groups that flock to these kinds of legal cases in search of a juicy settlement & publicity. Fear of a lawsuit explains a lot of this.
DEMOCRATS RUN this HELLHOLE and have for YEARS! This is what is happening in Other DEMOCRAT cities.
LOL! LITERALLY!!
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