Earlier this month, I attended the first meeting of the Detroit Master Plan advisory committee. Detroit’s Planning Department and plan consultants began guiding the committee through the process by which we would, over the next two years, develop a policy pathway for Detroit’s Future for the next twenty years.
I cannot overstate the importance of resident participation in the survey. If you haven’t filled out a survey yet, do it today by visiting https://plan-detroit.webflow.io The survey closes June 30.
As of last week, District 6, our district, had less than 50% respondents compared to the highest respondent participation rate. The level of input will influence prioritization. Please invest a small amount of your time in making your voice heard for the future of the city where we make our home and raise our families.
The second phase of the process will be a community listening tour that will take place over the summer, concluding October 11, called the “City Voices Tour”. We are open to site suggestions and tour stop hosts in Southwest Detroit. This is an opportunity for any organization with the facility to host a Town Hall style event, to please submit it to the City Planning Department via the Plan-Detroit website. The Tour will provide an opportunity to engage in a community voting process that will result in the identification of issue priorities. We will be updating you as sites are confirmed and dates are set.
I am pleased to share that there are three Hispanics appointed to serve our community on the committee. In addition to myself, the two other Hispanic members are Raquel Casteneda Lopez and Alexis Escoto.
In another development related to participation in democratic practices, last week, Outlier Media and the University of Michigan’s Detroit Metro Area Communities Study (DMACS) released a study that finds interest in political involvement, most notably voting, and education are at the bottom of the lists for Latinx Detroiters. We have a responsibility to negate these findings by getting involved and actively participating in this process that will set Detroit’s course forward for the foreseeable future. The results, the outcomes of this process, depend on you.
