Motor City Karma Hits The Schools

The spectre of Detroit school kids returning to a greatly reduced educational program this fall has prompted a lot of lip service- but not much action- on the part of community business leaders.

The Bank of the Commonwealth, in the direst straits of all local financial institutions, has coughed up something under $150,000 to restore boys' football and girls' basketball to the Detroit school system. But nobody is saying anything about the 18,000 students now bereft of a musical instrument program- until this fall the most comprehensive of its kind in the nation- or the half-day classes first graders will be forced to attend as a result of budgetary deficiencies.

The real leaders of the business community- General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler- have posted record profits so far this year, with GM marking up the most profitable quarter (three months) in the history of American capitalism. Of course the auto companies cut some 119,000 workers from their employment rolls in order to achieve their current level of success, as UAW President Leonard Woodcock has reported.

Even more to the point is that the leaders of the auto industry have redesigned the Detroit area and its housing and employment patterns over the past thirty years to suit their needs, thinking of nothing but increased productivity and profits in the process.

Now the children of Detroiters who have suffered under The Master Plan during its developmental stages must grow up and educate themselves in the environment which has been so carefully created for them by local leaders of business and industry. Already handicapped by the racism which permeates every area of American life- education and employment most significantly- and by their economic status, Detroit youth is now being stripped of its remaining opportunities for advancement in sports, music, and the arts.

This is an intolerable situation, made worse by the inability of the rest of this economically depressed community to come up with the solutions-and the hard cash- to keep the schools alive. More police, the panacea promoted by local news media and the white business establishment in general, will only exacerbate conditions to the point of all-out street warfare. Somebody has to come up with some money.

The millage proposal, which will increase the taxes of that minority of city homeowners still able to pay them, will go on the ballot again in November, and it must be passed as a stop-gap measure. But the community must also turn its attention more closely to the auto-makers and their super-profits, and it must demand that some of the profits extracted from Detroit workers go to pay for the education of their children. How about that for a strike issue Mr. Woodcock?