About a year ago, I YouTubed a video concerning the plight of Detroit Public School buildings that were abandoned, yet continued to house important, sensitive student & teacher records and books, which would be accessible to any vagrant. Joy Middle School, I believe, was the focus school as there was local community outrage over the story, originally posted in the Free Press.
Yesterday, it was reported that Joy School is in the process of being demolished. It's about damn time.
Continuing the theme of my previous post about funding projects, it was not stated in the article who's funding this demolition, but you can bet the city itself, or the DPS, did not loan one red cent. In other words, it's likely to be funded by a private contractor outside of city operations. This is a good thing!
Scanning the article and the public response blog, I was sure I would see a dissenting opinion, saying "Why doesn't Detroit get this project? Why aren't Detroit natives picked first to do the demolition?" It's just like they've been saying about Cobo Hall in recent months: "Why let it be taken over by a tri-county authority? Where's the preference for Detroit natives and city-based companies?" It's their indirect opinion that the people seeing the blight would be the ones responsible for correcting it.
Thank goodness the thought on this was: Just get it done; no matter the cost, no matter the type of personnel. The response time on Joy School is probably happening faster, under NO city control, than it would otherwise. To improve the quality of life in the city, the blight has to be demolished. The ultimate candidate should be ANY candidate that is capable of demolition. The focus shouldn't be on who does it, or where they live, but just to get it done so the neighborhoods can move forward.
Just a small step... but if the deal was brokered by new mayor Dave Bing, then he's off to a great start in office after mere weeks on the job.
