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Hartford
Memorial
Baptist
Church
and
Presbyterian
Village
of
Michigan,
two
notable
organizations
joined
together
to build
the
first
upscale
senior
living
community
in the
city of
Detroit.
Housing
and
Urban
Development
Secretary,
Dr.
Benjamin
Carson
attended
the
Ribbon
Cutting
Ceremony
on
Thursday,
March
16, at
Hartford
Village.
(Photo
by HB
Meeks/Tell
Us
Detroit) |
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HUD
Secretary
'Listening
Tour'
road
show
launches
in
Detroit
By Karen
Hudson
Samuels/Tell
Us
Detroit
DETROIT
(Tell Us
Det) -
U.S.
Housing
and
Urban
Development
(HUD)
Secretary
Ben
Carson
launched
a
national
7 city
listening
tour by
spending
three
days in
Detroit,
his
hometown.
The HUD
Secretary’s
first
stop in
the city
was
Wednesday
afternoon
at the
Benjamin
Carson
High
School
of
Science
and
Medicine
in
Detroit.
Parents,
students
and
staff of
the
school
listened
attentively
as
Carson
delivered
a
personal
narrative
of his
life and
answered
questions
from
students
about
housing;
the
media
was not
able to
make
inquires.
The HUD
Secretary
recounted
growing
up in a
750
square
house on
Deacon
Street
in
Southwest
Detroit,
the son
of a
single
Mother
and how
proud
the
family
was in
carrying
for
their
small
home.
Carson
would
later
fuse
that
experience
of pride
in home
ownership
when
acknowledging
a need
to rehab
what he
called
“rundown
uninhabitable
housing”.
“How we
keep
them
from
getting
back in
bad
condition,
gets
back to
ownership.”
Carson
said
there is
a need
to
“Create
a
mechanism
whereby
the
individuals
in those
units
develop
progressive
ownership,
so they
begin to
take
care of
it in a
proper
way and
we can
do that
in ways
that
does not
increase
our
costs.
We have
to start
thinking
about
root
causes
of
problems
and
dealing
with
them
beyond a
patchwork
approach.”
Personal
accountability
was a
recurring
theme.
Carson
said
housing
is part
of the
nation’s
infrastructure
that
needs to
be
rebuilt
with a
responsible
mindset.
The
refrain
came up
again in
response
to a
student
who
asked,
“How
will low
income
households
have
quality
housing?”
Carson
replied
by using
the
analogy
of a
family
shopping
for
groceries
and
facing a
choice
between
buying a
sirloin
steak or
hamburger
on a
limited
budget.
“It’s
okay to
have
hamburger,
you
don’t
always
need
sirloin
steak,
maybe
now and
then,
not all
the
time.
And if
think
about it
that way
and you
take
advantage
of the
other
things
in your
environment,
maybe
you can
get to
the
point
where
you can
have
sirloin
steak.”
On the
question
of “How
will you
improve
on the
housing
government
provided
now?”
Carson
responded
that a
“Big
picture”
is
needed
by
government
agencies
working
together
across
silos.
He said
that
means
HUD
working
with the
Departments
of
Labor,
Education,
Justice,
Transportation,
and EPA
to
develop
overall
programs
that
develop
all of
our
people.
Gathering
information
and
collecting
insights
from
stakeholders
is the
goal of
listening
tours.
Carson’s
three-day
visit to
his
hometown
also
took him
to a
restaurant
on 7
Mile in
northwest
Detroit
to where
he met
with
local
and
regional
HUD
officials
at
Louisiana
Creole
Gumbo.
Restaurant
owner
Joe
Spencer
said
Carson,
who is a
vegetarian,
enjoyed
one of
the
restaurant’s
vegetarian
dishes.
Spencer
said
Mayor
Mike
Duggan
approached
him
about
the HUD
Secretary
making
stop at
the
restaurant
as part
the
listening
tour.
The
remaining
cities
on
Caron’s
tour
were not
known
when
Tell Us
Detroit
went to
press.
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