In his state of the state address last month, Governor Rick Snyder said:

“It is important for all Michiganders to understand that having a thriving growing Detroit is critical to all of us.”

Most of the applause was from democratic legislators, not republicans like Snyder. He pressed on.

“We’re working in partnership with the city of Detroit, the four surrounding counties and the U.S. Department of Transportation to develop a new Bus Rapid Transit system, a BRT to service the entire region. It’s 40 years overdue. I encourage your support.”

The drive for decent mass transit between the city and suburbs has failed 23 times. Snyder is reportedly, wary of failing for the 24th time. The suburbs and the city need to share power and raise money. A regional transit authority bring both. Snyder has brought back a policy expert from the  John Engler era. His name is Dennis Schornack.

“The ultimate details, where stops occur, what the routes are, will be left up to transit professionals engaged by the board.”

That was Dennis Schornack last week  at a meeting with TRU, Transportation Riders United.

“The legislature, as much as I love them, are not transit professionals. I’m not a transit professional either. So don’t ask me about stations and stops. But once this thing gets rolling, those things will be contemplated.”

Since at least 2007, Detroiters have been waiting for a light rail line on Woodward. Avenue. Some felt anguish and betrayal when the governor and the mayor scrapped a 9 mile long plan and then, under pressure, only agreed to a 3 mile plan. Yes they want mobility. But they also want light rail for attracting investment in real estate. They want it for economic development. Dennis Schornack is not selling light rail either. He’s selling BRT. That means buses with their own lanes. Buses that don’t get stuck in traffic. Bus stops with clocks showing bus arrival times.

“For the same price, close to the same price, that you could build a light rail line from 8 mile down to Jefferson, you could put in a 110 miles of Bus Rapid Transit throughout the region. You’re shaking your head but I’ll show you the numbers.”

Schornack never showed numbers exactly. Nor did he say when the bus rapid transit system would be built. But transit advocates like TRU welcome new laws for a regional transit authority. Here are the roadblocks even with an RTA: suburbs opting out like Farmington has from SMART, suburbanites getting more votes on the RTA board than Detroiters, and suburban veto power against light rail.

“You know everybody has some place to go. I’ve even had buses pass me up because they’re so crowded. They don’t have any room for any other passengers so they just ride right by you.”

Patricia Ketzner was waiting at the bottom of Woodward near Campus Martius. It was windy and ten degrees. Ketzner and Keyarea Banks shivered alongside each other in the bus shelter.

“It’s even worse on the weekends. When I used to go to work. I was waiting for the bus at 12 O’clock just to make it there at 4. I was waiting for the 7 mile bus for 3 hours and it still did not come. I did not make it to work.”

“I mean, people are suffering.”

Benjamin Fields left the state and came back. Most Michiganders don’t.

“As much transportation as we can get we should have it. New York transportation system. I used to live in California. The BART system is off the chains. You don’t even need a car in Oakland California. If we get transportation like trains, cabs and better buses it will bring stuff into the city. You’ll have people moving back into the city and places to go because we can get to jobs. Right now people have lost jobs because of the transportation system.”

If what Benjamin Fields and Rick Snyder say is true then all Michiganders will benefit from mass transit in Detroit even if they never go there.

About 100 people filled the auditorium of Freeman Elementary School in Flint. They’d seen Mike Brown before. He was an interim mayor in 2009. But since Governor Rick Snyder appointed him the emergency manager in November, this was Brown’s first town hall meeting with citizens. Brown is trying to shrink an $11 million budget deficit.

“We have 3,000 retirees and about 750 employees. We’re challenged. That’s one of the structural problems that we have.”

Health care costs keep going up. While tax revenues keep going down. Brown’s job is to cut costs. Public Act #4, passed into law a year ago, allows Brown to renegotiate labor contracts with city employees. He could even cancel them. Though his mild manner didn’t reveal that Thursday night.

“We’ll try to continue this dialogue throughout the community to have an open and fair exchange of ideas. We’ll listen to you. We’ll try to implement some of those ideas and try to do the best job we can moving forward.”

Some residents are upset that Brown is their un-elected leader. And that he already sent his plan to the Michigan Department of Treasury before he talked to the community. Chris Del Morone says that makes this series of meetings even less democratic. And:

“My concern is they will attempt to regionalize what’s going on in the city of Flint and Flint will lose much of its autonomy in regards to quite possibly police and fire. We’ve seen the loss of our paramedics. There’s concern of our water plant being sold or given away.”

Emergency Manager Brown’s plan is to help the water department fill a $6 million hole from last year. Flint’s water comes in a pipeline from Detroit. Detroit raised its rates and Flint residents are paying 30% more this year. This woman says water bills have become inaccurate.

“I don’t use $91. It was $80 last month and then it just keeps going up. I have a friend. She’s a widow. She hardly uses any water at all. Her water bill is more than mine.”

Emergency Manager Brown might cancel the water contract with Detroit. Then Flint might make a deal with Genesee, Lapeer and Sanilac Counties. They would all pay for a future pipeline from Lake Huron. The last question of the night came from a resident named John Fennessy.

“This is a question directed to the chief. What exactly are we trying to do to deter the high homicide rate with Flint being number one?”

When Michael Brown was interim Mayor in 2009, he named Alvern Lock as chief of police. Lock still has the job. Lock says if witnesses are scared of being snitches then criminals won’t be punished.

“We as a police department have been doing all that we can do. Initially we got some help. But then again now no one wants to call and give us the information to go in and help them. But we need everybody in here’s help.”

In the last couple years, The Flint PD has shrunk from 180 to 125 officers. 40 years ago, Flint had a population of almost 200,000. Now it has about 100,000. 40 years ago, General Motors employed about 80,000 people in Flint. Now it employs about 7,000.

“One of the consistencies that we’re seeing in a lot of the local units that do fall under review is there is a loss of residency, a loss of citizenry.”

Terry Stanton is a former tv anchor who works for the Treasury Department in Lansing. He didn’t mention that these communities are mainly black. But Stanton agrees they need jobs and downtown revitalization.

“The most important thing is to get a local unit on firm financial footing. That is the key. Because without that you may not be able to attract residents or business investment those critical pieces that important for all local units.”

Flint is attracting college students on several campuses. Suburbanites in Flint and Detroit are doing reverse white flight. They want mass transit and they like gardens and old buildings. These look like the only ingredients for economic growth. But emergency managers don’t use them.

Monday night, two men were guarding backhoes and a half demolished building.  The City of Highland Park is paying about $60,000 to smash and haul away bricks and limestone put together there in 1917. That was the height of Henry Ford’s empire in the city.

“This was the police station I think….the old Highland Park Police Department.”

The men keep watch while sitting in a car. The older man won’t give his name. He says he’s worked on Tiger Stadium and several other demolitions done by the company with this contract. The Farrow Group. The man says the demolition company is a job creator.

“All them machines you think one man is running all them? Yeah they give jobs. That company gives a lot of jobs to people.”

The man says he’s not emotionally attached to old buildings like this.

“Tear it down you know. It wasn’t no good for nothing else.”

In 2001, former Governor John Engler appointed an emergency financial manager to run the City of Highland Park. The EFM at the time ordered the police station closed. It was also a jail. Until about Friday, it will stand across from the old city hall and the fire station. Scrappers have taken clay roof tiles, bricks, doors, windows and much more from all three buildings. The City decided this is the best site to build its new fire station.

The State Historic Preservation Office has approved the project. It’s based in Lansing and nicknamed SHPO.

“SHPO actually came down last May and June and did a walk through of that entire site.”

Sandy McDonald is Highland Park’s Director of Community and Economic Development. SHPO works with non-profits and developers who try to save old architecture. SHPO is a division of the Michigan State Housing Development Authority. They have some power to halt demolition when they try. McDonald said.

“SHPO agreed that that site was past saving.”

That was last year. FEMA had offered the $1.6 million for the new fire station in 2009.   But McDonald says the State Historic Preservation office gave Highland Park a list of things to do that

“included everything from hiring an historical consultant to record the history of the building, take photos of the building, to do a narrative of the building and we had to submit all of that to SHPO before they would allow us to demolish the building.”

“It’s so sad. It’s such a beautiful building. It’s so sad it has to come down.”

Nancy Finegood runs the Michigan Historic Preservation Network in Lansing. She grew up in Oak Park.

“Not every building can be saved. We know that. Some are truly safety hazards. We try to save all the historic buildings. But some are beyond help and that’s due to lack of people that care about the building and maintenance and almost allowing them to deteriorate to that point so they do need to be taken down.”

Thanks to Sean for this photo.

You can hear his appeal for mass transit as a way of retaining young people like him in Michigan. He’s 26.  Click on audio on the right side of this screen.

The photos don’t include the space that trains or street cars take up on a typical street. But they show how much space cars take up. Any form of transportation other than personal cars will allow buildings to be built closer. This creates a safer walking environment. More people on the street encourage businesses to operate and criminals to go away.

It’s a basic principle of urban development known for more than a century with cars present and for thousands of years before cars appeared.

Please follow the 3-part series.

Aired Jan 6, 2009

INTRO: According to RealtyTrac, Michigan had the nation’s 7th highest foreclosure rate in the nation for the 3rd quarter of 2008. In Michigan in particular, copper theft has made foreclosure and abandonment even worse. Yesterday, Governor Granholm signed a law to clamp down on scrap yard. Michigan Now’s Chris McCarus reports.

Foreclosed homes stick out in Detroit’s grandest neighborhoods. They’ve got for sale signs, junk mail piled up on the porch. Broken windows and doors. Rochester realtor Karen Nihls is showing the Wonderbread Mansion on Boston Blvd. On the outside, so far, thieves have only gotten the solid wood front door. Nihls is opening the side door.

“You never know what you’re gonna find when you walk in. This is anywhere in metro Detroit or just Detroit? No. Any vacant house. Any vacant house I don’t like to go in by myself. The bank owned property ones.”

The basement of this house is dry and clean. But thieves have struck here too. The boiler is just a shell. Its copper parts inside are gone. A newly installed boiler costs about $7,000. You can Blame the auto industry for Detroit’s real estate collapse. But copper theft is driving down home values further and faster. Karen Nihls reads what this house was selling for in 2007.

“It started out on the market in September at 297 and it sold in November, 2 months after it went on the market at 297. Then they put it back on the market. So from 325 asking to 101. It’s amazing.”

Deal after deal is falling through. Damage by scrappers discourages banks. They don’t want to have to pay for repairs to make a house liveable again. So the house stays on the market a few more months. And the scrappers get more time to cannibalize. A single house can plummet in value and bring the block down with it. Cash is the quickest way to buy a house. But who has any of that these days? Michigan had 145,000 new foreclosures in 2008, that’s according to the foreclosure database–Realty Trac. In the city of Detroit, you can find hundreds of foreclosed properties in a single zip code. Realtor Karen Nils says the suburbs haven’t been spared either.

“I sold a house in Warren where they had stripped out pretty much everything. They had stripped out all the copper plumbing. They had taken out all the doors off the back. They had it boarded all up. It was a mess.”

Interim Mayor…. Ken Cockrel Jr seems to recognize the problem.

“To those of you who are bad actors. To those of you who are stealing gutters and air conditioning units and wiring from our citizens and our businesses, to those of you who are terrorizing our senior citizens to the point where they don’t feel comfortable walking out their front door, we’re coming after you.”

Cockrel set up a copper theft task force with the Police Department. The force gets help from Wayne County prosecutors.

“just after last christmas someone stole the county’s christmas lights for the metal.”

Assistant Prosecutor Dennis Doherty authorizes the police to serve warrants on suspects.

“We had a case where somebody stole an 8 foot statue of Jesus off one of the local churches. It was painted green. It was actually plastic but because it was painted green the thieves thought it was copper. The cross ended up for sale on Craig’s list the next day. But they must have got smart because police recovered it in an ally the next day. And the rest of the cases are a lot of wire cuts.”

Doherty says recent Michigan law has allowed law enforcement to crack down.

“Maybe somebody’s causing significant amount of damage cutting down some wire or stealing something, some kind of metal, and if the value of the metal is under $1000 we can only charge that individual with a misdemeanor.

That was the law before a year and a half ago. Then the law got changed to include stolen metal of any dollar value.

“But in the case of stolen scrap metal there is no dollar value requirement so that allows us to charge people with a felonies when they are selling stolen scrap metal or stolen wire and that’s been a significant help.”

So that loop hole was closed.. On Thursday, Governor Granholm signed a new law. It could close another loop hole. Police can go after the big scrap dealers who’ve been buying from individual scrappers for years. Detroit Senator Buzz Thomas sponsored the legislation.

“Folks are gonna have to start proving ownership of that and there will be a waiting period before people can get paid if they don’t have that ownership. There will be a provision for a tagging period and a holding period so that law enforcement has the proper time and then yeah. There will be a punishment for people who are knowingly accepting stolen merchandise. Unfortunately, we know who they are.”

Thomas says large, expensive homes in the upscale neighborhoods of Palmer Woods, Sherwood Forest and Green Acres have been hit hard.

“Three years ago houses were selling from $300,000 to $500-600,000. Some of those neighborhoods, University district as an example, has more than 150 of their 1,200 houses that are abandoned, foreclosed, many of them have been stripped of their copper, all of the great things that made these great historic homes. But they’re empty, vacant properties.”

These grand homes are enticing to some suburbanites and out of towners. Their destruction might make people dream less about fixing up Detroit.

“You gotta completely redo all of the plumbing, you gotta completely redo all of the heating and cooling that has been taken out and as a result now the economics don’t make any sense for doing that deal and that does happen because we’re letting scrappers come in.”

To see what someone dealing in illegal metals looks like, go to 36th district court Tuesday morning and look for 60 year old William Charles Heany. He’s facing up to 5 years in prison for allegedly buying stolen tools at his own plumbing supply shop on Gratiot Avenue.

INTRO: When they got their jobs in October, interim mayor Ken Cockrel Jr. and police chief James Barren put together a copper theft task force. In the last couple years, thieves have done tens of millions of dollars in damage to homes and businesses. They often steal copper piping just to get a quick $20 for drugs. In part 2 of a series on copper theft, Michigan Now’s Chris McCarus follows police to Southwest Detroit.

The Detroit police SWAT team is loading ice picks and claw hammers into what looks like a UPS truck. Lt. Derrek Hassan will follow in his own vehicle.

“We can get out here. We’ll get in the car. We caravan over there.”

The caravan slides out of the unmarked police building through unplowed streets. A few minutes later it turns just off Michigan Avenue. The Michigan Central Train Station stands nearby. Fifteen stories of broken windows. Its metals ripped out years ago.

“It’ll be showtime here in a minute.”

Lt Hassan heads the copper theft task force. He’s directed the SWAT team to a small white house on Wabash. They’ve anticipated every move the suspects inside might make. And where they’ll take em if they shoot em.

“Then our hospital of choice will be DRH. We’ll just shoot Rosa Parks to 75. 75 Mack.”

The truck has reached the house. A dozen men jump out of the back. They’re wearing vests, helmuts, gloves and automatic rifles. All in black. Lieutenant Hassan follows.

“Let’s go.”

Police are exiting the car then they break down the door.

The SWAT team hurls their icepicks and hammers into the front door. They surround the place. That’s not hard, cuz it’s tiny. Some people are inside. But the team is focusing on a German Shepherd and two pit bulls. They might have to shoot THEM. Lieutenant Hassan can’t see all this yet.

“alright we got a dog and we got somebody in the house.”

A dog is let out. The team holds their fire. Some of them are also Army Rangers. Trained to stay focused.

“We got at least one in the house. Dog coming out the back. Dog coming out the back…….all right what our SRT team will do is they’ll secure the house, the residence and anybody inside and we’ll go in and start our search.”

The house across the street is suspicious too. A man whose name I’ll change to Bill lives there and possibly runs this little white house as a scrap metal depot. Residents walk down the street and come out of other houses and stop and stare.

“we get a lot of this with the neighbors. You know. I’m sure some of the elated and some of them may have a connection with this house. Hard to say.”

The team uses a device to probe up into the attic and behind doors. The Lieutenant will wait a couple more minutes before going in.

“Hey stretch you guys secure back there?…..(beep) all right we’re holding it down up front.”

“A lot of this piping is difficult to identify. You know but many of these items came from nearby vacant homes. Even occupied churches and homes. It’s quite the epidemic.”

The SWAT team flows out of the house and stands in the front yard.

“Clear. Yeah we’re all set the house is clear now.”

Lieutenant Hassan walks in. Three middle aged black man are kneeling handcuffed facing the wall. They wear trousers, dark sweatshirts and knit caps. The taller one, wears no socks or shoes. They say they don’t know where Bill is. Hassan says Bill could be trading drugs for scrap metal. These guys are just here for the drugs.

“What you guys doing? Doing a little scrappin? I don’t scrap. You don’t scrap? I work in a bar. Do ya? Who’s doing the scrapping? Who lives here?”

A man who says his name is Van Johnson says he’s watching the house for a woman named Janet.

Looking up you’ll see bare rafters, no ceiling, no insulation. Just the roof built a hundred years ago. Same for the walls. Just wooden planks. On the floor, 200 or so pounds of copper piping. An assortment of sizes and angles in a pile. Cut with hacksaws or just ripped out.

“Looks like a residential line. They burn it in a pit and take it to the scrap yard. Cash.”

In April, copper sold for $4 a pound. Now it’s down to about a buck 25. That doesn’t necessarily mean copper scrapping is down too. The youngest and least grungy of the three men in handcuffs says he doesn’t have any warrants for his arrest. And he doesn’t want to go back to jail.

“I shouldn’t have any. I just did 6 months. He cut me loose. I just was down there.”

Down in the Wayne County jail. The man is ready to talk to police.

“Sgt. Can I have a word with you privately.”

This man walks to the back of the house with Sgt Cole. Another man, 10 or 15 years older, says he’s never been in trouble with the law.

….you might be able to get there but I’ll tell you what. I’m gonna give you a ticket.”

The older man doesn’t have any outstanding warrants for his arrest. The other two do but they are for misdemeanors. Sgt Cox has called in their names to the station and run a background check.

“What happened they were issued tickets. And they didn’t appear in court and a judge issued warrants for their arrest. And consequently they are in contact with police now and it’s up to my lieutenant whether we’re gonna kick ‘em or lock em up on misdemeanor warrants.”

Van Johnson gets arrested for operating without a scrap dealer’s licence. Amongst some rags on the floor he finds two socks and shoes to slip on. An officer escorts him to a police car. Before the raid, the men were sitting on soiled upholstered chairs watching tv. They had an illegal hook up to the gas line. They tore the door off a gas stove and set it next to them and the tv to stay warm. Sgt Worboys says:

“probably more than half the houses that burn up in the city in the winter time are due to people trying to heat it with a stove or portable heaters. The cords fray. The house goes up in a matter of minutes.”

Lieutenant Hassan wears rubber gloves. He’s looking for more scrap, money or other suspicious things. He finds an ammunition clip for a hand gun.

“There’s a lot of scrap in here. There’s a lot of hiding places. Bunch of food. They’re in hear for the long haul. A lot of sandwiches packed.”

Sandwiches, marijuana, some crack and a tv. That’s what these low level copper scrappers are living for.

“Yeah. They’re on the bottom of the operation. And we see that. But we eventually get to the top of the operation. So to get to the top you gotta go through the bottom. But that’s what we do. It’s a lot of hard work. But it pays off.”

Lt. Derrek Hassan has executed13th search warrant in 3 months. After this raid, he questioned Bill who denied involvement with the scrap house. In the meantime, AT&T says since the Detroit Police Copper Theft Task force started, destruction of their wires has gone down by 75%. The Police chief and the mayor are pleased. They want to keep up the show of force.

INTRO: A Detroit man is facing up to 5 years in prison for selling stolen scrap metal— 400 thousand dollars worth. This is the biggest case so far for the new police copper theft task force. Michigan Now’s Chris McCarus reports from 36th District court..

In 2007, Mark McCloud was jailed and convicted of selling stolen scrap metal. He was paroled in June of ‘08 and given a tether. In December he was arrested again for selling stolen scrap metal and charged with 7 other offenses. He’s an habitual offender. He was convicted on gun and drug charges when he was 20. He’s now 34. Dennis Doherty is prosecuting McCloud for Wayne County.

“The people have probable cause to believe the defendant is guilty of selling stolen scrap metal as a second hand dealer.”

Police obtained records from SLC Recycling in Warren. The scrap yard shows Mark McCloud sold them $400,000 of scrap metal in just over a year. Prosecutors want McCloud to stand trial in the higher court. His attorney Corbett O’Meara is trying to prove that while illegal activities were happening in one place McCloud was somewhere else.

“He seems like a pretty suspicious shady character. But there’s not probable cause. And just because the Detroit police department thinks you’re shady doesn’t mean this court should bind you over.”

GPS satellites tracked the tether on McCloud’s ankle. He owns a boarded up house on Mackenzie, near the Dearborn line. Prosecutors allege he would come to the house then sell scrap the same day. Sgt Dennis Ramell is a deputy sheriff who monitors parolees by their tethers. Defense attorney O’Meara tried to discredit him.

“You don’t what methodology was used in mapping every single house in Wayne County do you? You don’t whether or not they actually went and found out where each house is on each lot do you? And how big each lot is do you? You have no idea how accurate this is do you? Well I have to trust it. Exactly. Thank you.”

Omeara is 6 foot 2 and about 250 pounds. He loosened his tie and never buttoned his blue blazer. He had moved in and out of the courtroom several times waiting for the McCloud case to start. He joked with District Court Judge Katherine Hansen. His voice filled the room. O’Meara argued that the sherriff doesn’t control the GPS monitoring system. The sheriff relies on a private company for that. And since the sheriff doesn’t gather that information every day, the numbers on the data sheet are disconnected from this court case.

“If these showed that he had been over on Mackenzie 200 yards from the house he lives in, that would make it likelier that he committed a crime over on Mackenzie. But none of these records show that.”

O’Meara also questioned Detroit Police lieutenant Derrek Hassan on the witness stand. Hassan heads the Copper Theft Task Force. O’Meara steers the witness with questions to get yes or no answers. Then he makes his conclusion and sits down.

“You witnessed people knocking on the boards covering the windows or the doors to gain entrance to the house right? Yes. Did you find any documents in Mackenzie that indicated that had Mr. McCloud’s name on it. Other than city records, no.”

O’Meara argues that police can’t prove this particular Mark McCloud was scrapping. He says anyone could be scrapping there. It doesn’t matter if McCloud owns the house. O’Meara used the same technique for another subject. Lieutenant Hassan testified he found a handgun under the mattress at a house on Monica Street. That’s 2 blocks away where McCloud admits he lives.

“The point and time when he was arrested the day before had you had the house under continuous surveillance? No. Do you know therefore whether other people were coming and going from this house from that 18 hour period. I do not. But you know that he was locked up for 18 hours before you found this gun. Yes. I have no further questions.”

This was a preliminary exam. The judge is supposed to decide whether there’s enough evidence to put the defendant on trial.

Finding evidence is the cops’ job. But anyone can hear testimony near 7121 Mackenzie Street. It’s a brown bungalow on a corner lot. It’s boarded up. A man walks by with a shovel in his hand and beer on his breath. He says his name is Donald. He says he was in Mark McCloud’s scrap house when McCloud wasn’t there. Another time he ran away from McCloud.

“ ….they come to this house right here.”

Back outside 36th district court downtown. Defense Attorney Corbett O’Meara looks at the big picture. How thousands of scrappers are using Detroit’s buildings.

“I’ve watched the neighborhoods collapse and become moonscape wastelands and if somebody wants to make some economically viable use of something that’s been abandoned by the establishment in America as they leave Detroit then God bless them. There’s no jobs here anymore. As long as they’re not stealing it from somebody who’s using it, let them take it from an abandoned building.”

Even if he’s just putting on a show, O’Meara’s defending the man police call the largest copper thief in city history. So together they’ll profit from Detroit getting torn apart.

Anti-tax, anti-transit mayor Janice Daniels said little during the meeting. She knew that one of the councilman had changed his mind. Councilman Wade Fleming voted for the project because it shrunk from 8 to 6 million dollars.

The bottom line is this is federal money. Like it or not, it’ll be spent on a transit center somewhere in this country if we do not use it in Troy.

The transit center building will be smaller under the new plan. The train platform will be shorter and the heated sidewalks won’t be built. Councilman Dave Henderson was on the mayor’s side.

“I think the whole project is suspect. I don’t see the benefits.”

The Troy Chamber of Commerce has been promoting the transit center for 7 years. To get it approved, they’re now in charge of finding money for the operating costs so taxpayers never pay anything. A final resolution says that the project can not exceed $6,272,500.  15% contingency padded into that budget.

When the meeting ended, Mayor Janice Daniels told reporters why she voted against the transit center.

“I had a lot of concerns on the business model. And the more I read the more concerns I had. But the underlying concern of mine is as a nation we are drowning in debt. I think it’s more important that we recover from this position we found ourselves in rather than continue this debt load upon our future generations.”

In December, Governor Rick Snyder wrote a letter to Mayor Daniels. He asked her to approve the project. Snyder’s point man for transit in Michigan is Dennis Schornack. He came over from Lansing for the meeting.

“We’ll we’re grateful for the passage of the resolution and the opportunity to build this transit center. It’s a very key part of transit in SE Michigan. And we’re grateful that the business community in Troy Michigan stepped up to the plate and made a real difference here.”

Daniels has been a hero to tea partiers in Troy. But she’s become a villain for her comments about gay teenagers, defunding the library and rejecting mass transit.  On December 3, she allowed David Wisz to make a power point presentation. Wisz is a patent lawyer who lives and works in Birmingham. He donated to her election campaign. Here’s some of what he said that night.

Attorney David Wisz didn’t show up at Tuesday’s Troy city council meeting. But I asked this of Mayor Daniels:

“Isn’t the crux of this matter, as it’s been in the Detroit suburbs for 40 or 50 years, to try to keep poor people and black people out of these fancy suburbs? That’s absolutely untrue, unequivocally untrue.”

Some residents of Troy say this is true. Sue Martin is with the citizens group called TRUST, Troy Residents Unified for a Strong Troy. She’s pleased the city has approved the transit center.

“I think that some people who were against it definitely had the impression that it would bring an element to the city that they did not want. And they couched it in other ways. They used other arguments against it but at the end of the day when you got someone spewing racist comments at a city council meeting you can’t cover that up.”

For Michigannow, I’m Chris McCarus in Troy

Below is the news release provided by the League.

Brownfield Credit Replacement Bills Victory for Michigan Communities

Lansing, MI – Cleaning up unsightly properties and buildings in Michigan communities took a huge leap forward today when the Michigan Senate passed bills creating the Community Revitalization Program. The bills were approved in the House last week and are expected to be signed into law by Governor Snyder by the end of the year.

Getting funding to clean up community eyesores feeds directly into the Michigan Municipal League’s overall mission: better communities equals a better Michigan. Read more about the League’s vision for a better Michigan here.

The bills approved by the Senate today (Dec. 6, 2011) and in the House last week create the Community Revitalization Program and the Business Development Program, which replace the repealed Brownfield and Historic and MEGA tax credits. These programs both tap into a $100 million fund created in the state budget for fiscal year 2010-2011. The League worked closely developing these bills in workgroups with the Legislature and governor.

“You can go to any community in Michigan and see areas that are eyesores and need to be either removed or refurbished. The action today by the Senate and last week by the House will provide a helping hand to address obsolete and blighted properties,” said Andy Schor, associate director of state affairs for the League.

Bill numbers creating the Community Revitalization Program and the Business Development Program are SB 566, 567, 568 and 644. Go here to read additional background about this Brownfield Tax Credit issue.

Real estate developers and non-profit groups had been revitalizing abandoned factories, warehouses and buildings under the tax credit programs created by former Republican Governor John Engler. They were angry when Governor Snyder ended the programs last year. Andy Schor works for the Michigan Municipal League. He lobbied Snyder to restore the money for cities.

“He does say that he’s a believer in the city of Detroit and Detroit being great causing Michigan to be great. I do believe that. It needs to translate into policy. But I do believe that. And he’s a believer in all this stuff we have been talking about: the transit, the walkability.”

The MML and its mayors and city managers have met with Rick Snyder several times. Though Andy Schor is not taking credit for pushing Snyder toward an urban agenda.

“I don’t know that we’ve pushed him or we’ve been able to allow him to say what he’s wanted to say.”

Snyder did write a letter to Troy’s Tea Party mayor, asking her not to scrap the Troy Transit Center before Christmas. But he let mayor Bing scrap Woodward Light Rail. Snyder let his emergency financial managers spend $3 million to tear down historic Cass Tech High School. And the tax credit program Snyder scrapped was the death knell for the ABC TV show Detroit 1-8-7. This was the theme song.

“That’s the perfect ad campaign.”

Ponsella Hardaway is director of the advocacy group called MOSES.

“Yeah Detroit 1-8-7 it was exciting to see the beauty of Detroit in the background and it boosted people’s self-esteem that we are on the map. We are not hidden.”

In its brief season it got kids from Tacoma, Topeka and Washington D.C. to romanticize Detroit just as generations here have romanticized and then moved to New York and L.A.  Governor Snyder has shrunk the pot of tax credits for movies. It had no cap. Now it’s $25 million. Here’s Ponsella Hardaway again.

“Cutting the movie film credits was a mistake. It was drawing people in. When I go to New York I see people standing in front of the New York police cars taking pictures.”

The Detroit police drama could have been a waste of $15 million or a priceless national PR campaign. We may never know. The show, the train and the school are gone under this pro-city governor.