The Republican speaker of Michigan's House was a long way from his birthplace (Grand Rapids) and hometown (Marshall) this week as he rolled through state Rep.Harvey Santana's district on Detroit's west side.
House Speaker Jase Bolger said his biggest surprise was hearing how deeply Detroiterrs distrust Lansing politicians. (WOOD-TV photo)
Free Press columnist Rochelle Riley sketches some of the eye-opening scenes in the Schoolcraft and Warrendale neihghborhoods:
Santana and Bolger drove through a half-dozen neighborhoods, occasionally pulling over to talk to strangers on the street. They walked through the abandoned home in Santana’s neighborhood and visited a crime-ridden neighborhood where police officers once lived when they were required to reside in Detroit. . . .
Bolger said he was moved by a conversation with a mother dropping off cupcakes for her daughter’s birthday at Dixon Elementary, which sits across the street from a string of abandoned and dangerous buildings.
“I’m fueled by this, energized to ensure that we do what’s needed to have a successful Detroit,” he said. “Everybody wants a better life. As you look at the faces of Detroiters, you see tired eyes, you see frustration. . . . We have to make sure they have the support that they need.”
Santana said he asked Bolger to to come to “see what I wake up to every day and see what my constituents are fighting every day so when you hear me or someone in Lansing advocating for certain things, you’re going to be able to see it, touch it, smell it and understand.”
After Monday's visit, Bolger said his biggest surprise was hearing how deeply Detroiters distrust state government and Lansing politicians.
Indeed, one community leader who met with the visitor from Kalamazoo County tells Riley:
“I think it meant something symbolically. But he’s going to tell [fellow Republicans] what he saw, and they’re going to look at him like he’s crazy.”
