NP - Detroit: Massive Evictions (20% of the Population)

[David Morris]

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/10/22/1338490/-Open-thread-for-night-owls-A-fifth-of-Detroit-s-population-142-000-people-could-lose-their-homes

As Detroit seeks to leave bankruptcy behind and get back on its
feet—ramping up development with construction of a light rail and a new
hockey arena that will cost the city hundreds of millions of dollars—it is
simultaneously bearing witness to a process that could evict up to 142,000
of its residents, many of whom are too poor to pay their property taxes.

Detroit is 83 percent African-American, and 38 percent of its population
lives below the poverty line. But the older, blacker Detroit starkly
contrasts with a whiter, wealthier new Detroit that's been wooed in by tax
breaks and living incentives—which gives these evictions a heavily racial
subtext. […]

This year in Detroit, there have been 22,000 foreclosures on properties
whose owners failed to pay property taxes three years in a row. Of those,
10,000 are estimated to be occupied, meaning this year's foreclosures are
set to oust about 27,000 Detroiters from their homes.

That’s a large number in a dwindling city with fewer than 700,000
residents, but the figures are set to get even worse. In the next couple of
months, Wayne County's treasurer will be serving foreclosure notices on
110,000 more properties, 85,000 of which are in Detroit, according to its
chief deputy treasurer David Szymanski. With half of those Detroit
properties estimated to be occupied, this means a further 115,000
Detroiters might lose their homes next year.
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