Cahalan Street

I realized its been almost a month since I posted anything about what's been going on, and the things I've been doing. Sometimes it feels like there is so much to say that I don't know where to start... and sometimes I feel like I am just moving along, going with the flow, filing the papers and going to the meetings and being the intern. But this morning I am here in the "office" (aka the choir loft of the old church in which we have built our neighborhood center) alone... I can hear the Head Start kids downstairs, singing their clean-up song, and occasionally the phone rings... but for the most part is is quiet. And sunny. It is a nice day today.

Saturday we planted trees on Cahalan street, about three blocks up from the center. The kids call Cahalan the "arson street" and there are at least 6 or 7 houses that have been set on fire and have just been sitting there for years...



But apparently the biggest offenders of this type of arson have either fire-bombed each other out of the neighborhood or have gone to jail... so the community is more or less jumping at the opportunity to revitalize and rebuild the neighborhood right now. So in coalition with a few other organizations, we are taking a sort of four-pronged approach to fixing up this street:
1) Bridging Communities, Inc. is developing "grandfamilies housing" which is tax-credit housing for senior citizens and/or grandparents raising children on the corner of Cahalan street and Mullane street, and broke ground on this development on Saturday after the tree planting
2) We are developing a park/playground across the street from BCI's development and will eventually turn ownership of the park over to them
3) Greening of Detroit organized the tree planting on Saturday, to plant trees that will grow very nicely with big canopies to create that street that feels like you are walking through a tunnel. This is meant to make people feel like their street is special and beautiful and encourage walking and biking.
4) With residents, petitions, and the Nuisance Abatement Task Force we are working to get those burned out homes torn down asap.

So the tree planting was actually a lot of fun and went really, really well. We sort of roped some of the kids who come to the center into helping out, and there is really no way we could have accomplished the task so well without them. I was so proud of all of them for being out there at 8:30 on a Saturday, and did not hear a single complaint from any of them.

And the whole process of planting trees, I think, was incredibly therapeutic for the kids, the neighborhood residents, as us at the center, as well. The way Ashley, the project director at Greening explains it, is that you get a certain feeling after you attend a community meeting... if you attend at all, you sit and listen to everyone air their complaints and express their frustrations with the city, other neighbors, everything. But after planting a flower or a tree with your neighbor, you get a different feeling. The involvement feels good, beautiful, productive. While we were planting we had several neighbors come outside and chat with us (on a relatively cold and dreary day) or pick up a shovel and help. Two homeowners did not even speak the same language as the volunteers they were helping, but of course the trees were planted anyway.

Anyway, I feel good about Saturday. And I feel good about Cahalan street. And part of me is overwhelmed by how much work and how much planning is going into just one street out of the thousands in Detroit that are equally burned and equally stripped of hope. But if I can allow myself to just live in this one happy accomplishment... then I feel like my mission is well on its way...