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State of the City addresses are festive annual gatherings, often made up of the city's prominent players. There are lots of hugs and kisses and smiles and laughs before the mayor delivers his upbeat speech.
It's a feel-good event. And there's no reason it shouldn't be. Detroit has a lot to be proud of, despite the many challenges. For one, there's the recent news about plans for a Fiat Chrysler plant on the east side. And there's Ford's plan to revamp the old train station in Corktown. Plus, the mayor Monday announced a $30-million construction trades training center.
But tonight at the East English Village Preparatory Academy on Cadieux Road, Duggan owes Detroiters the truth about public safety — which hasn't improved as much as Detroiters in worse-off neighborhoods would hope. Specifically, he should be honest about police and EMS response times.
In past speeches, Duggan has talked about how greatly they've improved. And though they may have improved from the very terrible times, there's still reason for alarm. It can take more than an hour for help to arrive for some urgent calls.
And the stats the city has provided simply aren't accurate.
I'm not necessarily blaming the mayor. He could just be delivering stats he's given. But there's reason for concern.
In January, investigative reporters Charlie LeDuff and Steve Neavling wrote:
A computer analysis of the records shows police are taking longer to respond to priority one calls, which are for the most violent and urgent crimes. In 2018, the average response times for priority one calls increased to 14 minutes and 18 seconds, up from the previous year’s 13 minutes and 12 seconds.
Response times to priority two calls, which typically involve emergencies such as robberies and hit-and-run crashes, reached a whopping 54 minutes and 42 seconds.
Then WXYZ's Ross Jones followed up with this last month:
At a time when the city touts the fastest response time to 911 calls in well more than a decade — 12 minutes for priority one calls — thousands of the most urgent calls to police each year still leave victims waiting 30 minutes or more for help. Hundreds wait longer than an hour.
A 7 Action News investigation reveals that, over a 20-month period, 650 priority one calls took more than 60 minutes to receive a response. The calls include reports of active shootings, rapes in progress, felonious assaults, armed robberies, armed attacks from the mentally ill and suicides in progress
So, we Detroiters don't want to hear happy news about response times. We want to hear facts and what the plan is to fix a system still riddled with problems.
Hopefully Duggan can at least do that much during his upbeat speech Tuesday night.
