World-class fiasco
I don’t usually like what Jack Lessenberry has to say, although, more often than not, I respect it. It is only rarely that he enrages me, still he gets me thinking nearly every time.
His article on the State of the City address (“Detroit’s state of madness,” Metro Times, March 3), though, is right on the money. It is sad to think that we are two years from hosting a Super Bowl and violent crime is skyrocketing.
Rather than refurbish the old Michigan Central Station to become our new police headquarters — which would cost about the same as building a newer smaller structure — why not just build a new one, with Detroit companies doing the contracting? It would show some respect for companies such as Compuware and General Motors that have hitched their wagons to Detroit despite the deafening protests of each and every molecule of common sense. And it would cut that scumbag Moroun out of the picture.
If money is tight — and it obviously is — then would it not cost much more to heat, cool and power that old behemoth than a newer, more efficient building? Let’s not just look at the one-time costs, but also the ongoing costs of operating such a building, and let’s opt for the more efficient choice.
Don’t even get me started on how we need, above all else, some type of mass transit infrastructure. Name a world-class city that doesn’t have one. —John Kenney, Commerce Twp.
The doctor is still in
Thank you for Jack Lessenberry’s excellent piece on Jack Kevorkian (“Kevorkian, remember him?” Metro Times, March 10). I agree fully that although he pulled a major public relations blunder with his televised act of euthanasia, history will one day look back and say: “Hey, this dude was thinking way ahead of his time, and the witch-hunting religious zealots couldn’t see the forest for the trees.”
Jack Kevorkian is not your average Joe, but that is often the case with people who think outside the box. Several years ago, one of my professors at OCC told me a story about attending a lecture by Albert Einstein. If I remember the story correctly, the great physicist came out in mismatching shoes, shirt and trousers, draped by a green bathrobe.
It is also interesting that Kevorkian has turned his attention toward the Bush regime. I say why not? He’s in jail; he has nothing to lose. Perhaps a fence sitter that likes limericks will read his book and realize George Jr. is not really on a mission from God after all. —Mark “Mad Dog” Barringer, Farmington Hills
A New York minute
I really apologize for this, and I know it’s presumptuous, but you guys have GOT to push your reporters to do better work. That profile of Claud Anderson (“Overcoming inequity,” Metro Times, March 3) was just, well, lame. I just checked out the PowerNomics Web site, and that group is affiliated closely with the Harvest Institute, which has a public position opposing immigration. That the city is bringing in someone to develop an economic policy for the city’s revitalization who may well oppose immigrants — a demographic that, in my last few visits home to Holly and to Detroit, seems to be a powerful force for revitalization — is a great story. Even just talking about what, exactly, this PowerNomics stuff is would be a great story — but not a word of that is in that piece. This wimpy regurgitation of Anderson’s biography on his Web site with a few quotes thrown in? Come on!
Seeing work like this just breaks my heart. Don’t you guys care about your city at all? —Tracie McMillan, Managing Editor, City Limits, New York, N.Y., [email protected]
Errata
In “Guess what blew in at the Blowout” (Metro Times, March 10), Gary Zych was misidentified as the mayor of Hamtramck and the owner of Whiskey in the Jar. The Hamtramck mayor and bar owner is Thomas “T.J.” Jankowski. Also, the author of “Old faithful fare” (Metro Times, March 10), was Jane Slaughter, not Elissa Karg.
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