Press enter after choosing selection

Exclusive Interview With Coleman Young, Part Iii: The Crisis Of The Cities

Exclusive Interview With Coleman Young, Part Iii: The Crisis Of The Cities image
Parent Issue
Day
17
Month
December
Year
1975
OCR Text

In the first installment of the SUN's exclusive in-depth interview with Detroit Mayor Coleman A. Young, we explored Coleman's formative experiences coming up in the East Side's old "Black Bottom" and his years of civil rights and labor activism, leading to his election as a State Senator, Democratic floor leader in the Michigan Senate, and eventually, in 1973, to the Mayor's post.

The second part of our interview focused on the Mayor's approach to two of the stiffest challenges he now faces: the task of reforming the police Department, which he made the most important single issue in his Mayoral campaign; and the struggle to come to terms with the federal government's Department of Housing and Urban Development (H.U.D.) and rebuild the city's devastated neighborhoods.

For this concluding segment of our interview, SUN Editor Derek VanPelt rode with the Mayor from Metro Airport to City Hall to gel Coleman's views on the nationwide urban crisis, including the fiscal difficulties of New York City, and it is in this context that the Mayor discusses the historic significance of the 1976 national elections.

Coleman goes on to talk about the struggle to build a mass transportation system for Detroit and the current renaissance of night life in the city. Finally, he reflects on the long-term prospects for "turning Detroit around" and the question of continuity of political leadership.

SUN: Are the financial problems besetting the city of New York shared, to some extent, by the city of Detroit? Would it be in Detroit 's interest, for example, for the federal government to bail out New York?

YOUNG: The answer to the first question is yes, to some extent. It's obvious to me, to the degree that the largest city in the nation, the financial capital of the world, is allowed to default by our government, that has to have an impact on the ability of all other cities and states and counties in the United States to raise the bond money they need. It could even, in my opinion, reverse the beginnings of what seems to be a recovery from very serious recession that threatens to become a worldwide economic crisis. So there's no question in my mind that I reject completely the President's, Secretary Simon's position that it would have a minimum effect.

It should be pointed out that Detroit's situation is entirely different. We don't have any big bond indebtedness as a result of financing our operational deficits by borrowing, so that our problem is different from theirs. But we cannot escape the implications of their default.

I feel that it ought not to be done on the basis of an outright grant, but there's a lot of misconception about it. They're not asking for a grant. What they're asking for is federal guarantees, and the bitter price they have to pay for it in terms of surrendering their autonomy to the state and the federal supervision. Actually, New York City, for the period of these guarantees- if they were extended- would no longer have control of its own city. No city, no people want to give up this type of autonomy ; so in New York, they're only doing this out of desperation. They're not rushing. And here again. the argument that New York or other cities will rush in-I can 't imagine any city that's gonna rush in to the state and say "take me over."

SUN: On the other hand, will the cities be able to get through their current crisis without some kind of massive help from the federal government?

YOUNG: No, I don't think so. But I think that what we have in this country, and what we've had for a long time, is a national urban crisis-a crisis of the cities. And it demands the same type of addressment, in terms of mobilization of maximum federal resources, that we addressed to the problem of the farms in the '30's when we had an agricultural crisis. There was a recognition then, a national recognition, that the nation could not survive if we allowed our farms to go down. Well, there doesn't seem to be enough national recognition that this nation can't survive without its cities, either.

So there's no question in my mind that there must be recognition of a national crisis of the cities. And that would call for much more direct support for central cities on the pan of both federal and state governments. We're not getting it now, as you know. I think there's a beginning of an awareness from the state, and some candidates and some congressmen and other leaders are beginning to recognize it on a national level.

SUN: How important are the next Presidential elections to all that?

YOUNG: Well, in my opinion, the next Presidential

"The next elections range in importance with the elections of 1860, in terms of determining a basic direction for the nation. In 1860, the question was: Could the nation exist with black people enslaved? Can it now exist if they are cordoned off in cities, from which suburbanites walk away, and left to fester in their own poverty?"