by Fast Company
Photo: Fast Company
So it’s come to this:
Unable to provide basic services for all of his constituents, Detroit
mayor Dave Bing is drafting plans starve his city down to a manageable
size. Using proprietary data and a survey released by Data Driven Detroit, Bing and his staff will pick “winners and losers”
amongst the city’s neighborhoods and seek to resettle residents from
the losers, those deemed most unlivable. With Detroit’s tax base
withering from the implosion of two-thirds of the Big Three, the
housing crisis, and an ongoing exodus, Bing believes he has no other
choice.
“If we don’t do it, you know this whole city is going
to go down,” he told a local radio station last month. “I’m hopeful
people will understand that. If we can incentivize some of those folks
that are in those desolate areas, they can get a better situation” in
one of the remaining neighborhoods with schools and buses.
Can
Detroit really shrink its way back to greatness (or at least stop the
bleeding)? Part of the problem is that it’s been hollowing out for
decades. A city of 1.85 million residents in 1950, Detroit had just
951,270 as of the last national census a decade ago, and the
next—which is key to obtaining millions of dollars in federal
funding—is expected to turn up only 800,000 this year. Some believe it
might eventually slide to 700,000 before all is said and done. A
quarter of the city is nothing more than vacant lots—40 square miles
of “urban prairie.” Bing plans to shrink the occupied portions further
by tearing down another 10,000 buildings. That should earn praise from
economists like Harvard’s Ed Glaeser, who’s suggested similar policies for other Rust Belt cities. And what will Bing do with all of that
empty space? Turn over as many as 10,000 acres to John Hantz to farm.
The owner of an eponymous financial services firm, Hantz is prepared to sink $30 million of his personal fortune into coaxing peaches,
plums, lettuce, and heirloom tomatoes from the ground (or in hydroponic
greenhouses). In exchange, all he’s asking for is free tax-delinquent
land and tax breaks on agriculture. The city is considering giving him
both. Hantz told Fortune he’s aiming for an average cost of $3,000 per acre, valuing it no
differently than outlying farmland. But he also promises to create
hundreds of green jobs, grow a surplus of fresh produce for residents,
attract tourists, and “reintroduce Detroiters to the beauty of nature.”
Get the rest of the story from our friends at Fast Company.
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