Detroit Files For Bankruptcy Protection: The Facts, The Figures, And The Fallout. Article_5090bf00-2e47-5c7e-83bf-e63fc795b89b. DETROIT - In the past four years, at least 21 people in the city have died in fires in which defective trucks responded or the closest fire station was closed that day, according to a newspaper's investigation.
The Detroit Fire Department has too few people, uses trucks that do not work and relies on broken equipment to put out fires, The Detroit News reported Sunday, citing a nine-month investigation involving interviews with more than 300 firefighters and fire officials and reviews of thousands of pages of fire reports. A spokesman for Mayor Dennis Archer, responding to the report, said Sunday that it was important to put the 21 deaths in perspective. The city responded to 87,914 fires in those four years, of which the deadly fires cited by the News are a tiny fraction of 1 percent, spokesman Greg Bowens said. Even so, he said, the report raises serious concerns. Five killed in fire as winds wreak havoc in Detroit. Update - 3:15 p.m.: A fifth person has died after being pulled from the building and taken to a hospital, said Deputy Fire Commissioner David Fornell.
DETROIT -- Four people were killed in a fire Wednesday afternoon, with extraordinarily strong winds exacerbating the flames and hindering firefighting efforts. Firefighters were called to the eight-unit apartment building at Whittier Avenue and Greensboro Street around 1:27 p.m., said Deputy Fire Commissioner David Fornell. Cuts in fire protection leading to deaths in Detroit. By Lawrence Porter 12 February 2013 Detroit firefighters battle a house fire A series of brutal budget cuts to the Detroit Fire Department and other social services by Mayor David Bing, the Detroit City Council and Michigan Governor Rick Snyder is producing the foreseeable outcome: the death of Detroit residents.
One tragedy follows another. Most recently, six-year-old Miguel Chavez died, in part due to a delay in the arrival of emergency services, when his family’s Southwest Detroit home caught fire. Firefighters eventually took Chavez and his brother, Julio, to the hospital in a fire truck. A week earlier, firefighters from southwest Detroit were called to fight a fire in the northwest, a distance of 18 miles, because of fire station closures. Not long before that, a 71-year-old man died in a house fire only four minutes away from a fire station recently closed. Definite individuals are responsible for a policy that has produced these and many other tragedies. Under Funded Firefighters. (Photo borrowed from In recent years fire departments have been faced with reduced budgets as many other services and businesses have.
This has led to underpaid firefighters and under equipped departments. The shocking rate of crime Detroit kids face each day. Crime in Detroit is down overall in 2016; homicides up by 7. Carjackings, robberies and non-fatal shootings dropped in Detroit in 2016, while the number of homicides in the city edged up by seven, according to figures from the police department.
The preliminary numbers were released Tuesday to the Associated Press and show that aggravated assaults, burglaries and larcenies also were down. Seven more homicides were committed — and Detroit still has one of the highest murder rates in the country, but the city did not see the drastic spike that Chicago reported and some other cities experienced last year. “We’re finally making that turn,” Police Chief James Craig said about Detroit’s overall crime numbers going down. “We’re continuing to make steady progress. Murders, shootings increase in Detroit in first quarter of 2017. It has been a violent start to 2017 in Detroit.
Murders and shootings spiked in the first quarter of 2017 compared to the same period in 2016, according to crime records first reported this morning by Steve Hood on the 910AM Superstation. The city recorded 66 homicides from Jan. 1 to March 26, a 14% increase over the same period in 2016. Non-fatal shootings rose 11%, from 195 to 175. Among those shot were two Detroit police officers last month. Burglaries increased 5%, from 1,909 to 2,008. 9 ways Detroit is changing after bankruptcy. When Detroit filed for bankruptcy last July, observers around the world were shocked by how far some city services had deteriorated -- though it was no secret to residents.
Average police response times clocked in at almost an hour. Tens of thousands of broken streetlights meant entire streets go dark at nightfall. Detroit Rising: Life after bankruptcy. One year after a federal judge approves Detroit's bankruptcy exit plan, progress has been made while looming challenges remain, especially city pensions The City of Detroit has more than enough cash to pay its daily bills.
Thousands of busted streetlights have been replaced. City retirees still receive pension checks, and valuable paintings remain ensconced in the gilded halls of the Detroit Institute of Arts. Fewest cops are patrolling Detroit streets since 1920s. Detroit — There are fewer police officers patrolling the city than at any time since the 1920s, a manpower shortage that sometimes leaves precincts with only one squad car, posing what some say is a danger to cops and residents.
Detroit has lost nearly half its patrol officers since 2000; ranks have shrunk by 37 percent in the past three years, as officers retired or bolted for other police departments amid the city's bankruptcy and cuts to pay and benefits. Left behind are 1,590 officers — the lowest since Detroit beefed up its police force to battle Prohibition bootleggers. "This is a crisis, and the dam is going to break," said Mark Diaz, president of the Detroit Police Officers Association.
"It's a Catch-22: I know the city is broke, but we're not going to be able to build up a tax base of residents and businesses until we can provide a safe environment for them. " Police Chief James Craig acknowledges he doesn't have as many officers as he'd like. Staffing challenges Deployment shuffle. As Detroit breaks down, scourge of arson burns out of control. Pay cuts coming to Detroit police, fire officers - Aug. 2, 2013.
The 10% cuts apply to 1,200 police lieutenants and sergeants and 400 comparable officers in the fire department.
The cuts, announced this week, will take effect in September. Bill Nowling, spokesman for Kevyn Orr, the emergency manager overseeing the city's reorganization effort, said other city employees took the same 10% cut in 2012. The cuts for these officers was delayed because of union contracts that were in effect. "We had to make this cut due to disparity between management and rank and file," said Nowling. He said the city will save $4.5 million from these latest cuts. Donors, Private Citizens Now Take Care of Many of Detroit’s Public Services – TheBlaze. DETROIT (TheBlaze/AP) — Detroit may be broke but it will soon have a first-rate motor pool, featuring 23 new ambulances and a fleet of 100 new police cars. Some city parks also are getting tender loving care.
New fruit trees and shrubs have been planted, and mowing crews are beginning to make the rounds to keep the green spaces tidy. One of the surprising things about Detroit’s descent toward insolvency — so dire that a state-appointed emergency manager recently arrived to take over – is that public services haven’t collapsed as completely as some might have expected. But that’s not because city departments are functioning as usual. They’re not. Detroit’s Department of D.I.Y. is either the most heartwarming or humiliating reflection of its distress, but the volunteers insist it shows their refusal to give up on the place where they live. Bus service has been reduced or discontinued on about three dozen routes, leaving thousands of daily riders to find other ways around town.
Detroit's biggest crime problem: Lack of police, poll finds. Detroit — Detroiters overwhelmingly feel the biggest contributor to crime is a lack of police on the streets — and they'd gladly pay more taxes to hire more officers, according to a poll commissioned by The Detroit News and funded by the Thompson Foundation. The finding comes weeks after the City Council refused to put a measure on the ballot to do so. The poll found that 49 percent of residents don't feel safe in their neighborhoods. The results cross most income and gender lines, but generally those who make more money feel safer in their neighborhoods.
The survey also found that residents have mixed views of the Police Department, but generally liked Police Chief Ralph Godbee. Residents were surveyed, however, before a sex scandal that exploded last week. "I'd be willing to pay more taxes if it meant the police could come around more," said Levona Coles, 74, who lives on Detroit's west side.