Continuing with the trend of housing incentives, the city plans to use federal stimulus money to move Detroit police officers into inexpensive houses within the city limits (Detroit Free Press). The funds will cover basic renovations, and the houses will cost between $500 and $1,000 a month with a $1,000 down payment. A test version of the program is going to start in two fairly stable neighborhoods, Boston-Edison and East English Village.
When my family lived in East English Village twenty years ago, police officers were required to live in the city, and quite a few lived in our neighborhood. In 1999, the residency requirement was dropped by the state, and at least half of Detroit's police officers and firefighters now live in the suburbs. East English Village is still a strong neighborhood with few vacant properties, which is why it could be one good starting point for getting people to move back to Detroit. I think providing these incentives for officers to live in the city can have a number of really positive effects - it would ideally improve relationships between officers and residents of Detroit and will cause officers to become more invested in the neighborhoods they serve. And, outside of police-citizen relations, it can help the city as it continues to try to fill in gaps in these relatively stable areas.
We are definitely seeing a trend in both the city and employers attempting to entice people to move back into the city or to move into the city for the first time. The hope is that once these core neighborhoods start to fill in, the progress will be exponential as an increasing number of people become personally interested in the city's well-being.
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