Myth #11: Duggan Got People to Move Back Into Detroit
Part of what Duggan campaigned on was rebuilding the neighborhoods and getting people to move back into the city, at a time when the population was fleeing due to the Great Recession and foreclosure crisis.
The 2020 Census is pretty clear that Detroit's mass exodus has continued since 2010 to the surprise of no one, even in the face of the nonstop corporate media cheerleader chorus that told us Detroit was having a "comeback," "rebirth," "resurgence," or whatever the word of the day is. The numbers do not lie, they are a direct reflection of the Duggan era, which included the foreclosure crisis, gentrification, overtaxation, loss of good jobs, continued school closures, library closures, demolition, and a focus on downtown while neglecting the neighborhoods where people actually live.
All those factors pushing longtime residents out of the city was more than enough to offset any gains made by a couple Grosse Pointe hipsters buying lofts downtown while still claiming their primary residence address in the burbs (for taxation and insurance purposes). The large decrease in population not only represents another failed Duggan campaign promise, but it also represents the fact that we will lose Congressional seats as a result, meaning that Michigan and Detroit will have less representation, and less relevance in national politics.
This is the yield you get when you sow seeds of corporate takeover and regentrification; Duggan is allied with people, lending institutions, and corporations who played a major part in causing or profiting from the foreclosure crisis, and demolition. That does not sound like a winning team for increasing population count, it sounds like you're trying to turn Detroit into a prairie.
"But what about all the new jobs that Duggan brought in?!" Well, survey says most of those "new" jobs have been going to suburbanites whose companies recently relocated to Detroit to dodge taxes...
"Just because a job is located in Detroit, it does not mean that a Detroit resident holds that job. In fact, over the same five-year period [2011-2016], the number of Detroit residents who had jobs declined by more than 4,800 (2%) according to American Community Survey data." The number of jobs increased in 20 of Detroit’s 26 ZIP codes, but fewer than half of those ZIP codes recorded gains in the number of employed residents.
Another issue forcing Detroiters out is the fact that many of those who lost their homes in the foreclosure crisis have been shacking up in the basement of a relative...and now with the constant flooding of our basements every time it rains (thanks to mismanagement and incompetence from the DWSD and GLWA), those people are homeless again, often forced to leave the city entirely. I don't blame them.
From a New York Times article:
"Hours after the census count was released, the mayor fired off an indignant statement accusing the bureau of undercounting Detroit residents by at least 10 percent. Mr. Duggan said municipal utility data backed up his claims, but his office declined to provide localized evidence to prove that."
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/28/us/detroit-census-mike-duggan.html
From a New York Times article:
"Hours after the census count was released, the mayor fired off an indignant statement accusing the bureau of undercounting Detroit residents by at least 10 percent. Mr. Duggan said municipal utility data backed up his claims, but his office declined to provide localized evidence to prove that."
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/28/us/detroit-census-mike-duggan.html
Duggan also threatened to sue the Census Bureau, but that's just the same old Duggan: angry and petty, making threats of retribution for making him "look bad." He's been behaving this way since the 1990s when he was under Wayne County...now he's just an angry old leprechaun on the 11th floor, plotting vengeance against the people who stole his lucky charms, bitter that he is so politically dirty that he can't get a job at the federal level.
