Wow. That sucks.

\\also, it's nit hundreds of homes subtard, it's maybe 90

Well, at least this will clear the land for Delta City construction.

Fire it up.

A house is not a home.

I swear the Halloween hoopla starts earlier every year.

OK, maybe I'm new to msnbc.com but I clicked the link and the two stories were about Obama tax cuts and Colorado wildfires.

Am I missing an incredibly clever joke?

RayD8: cretinbob: Wow. That sucks.

\\also, it's nit hundreds of homes subtard, it's maybe 90

Haha, classic.

Yeah, I see what I did there.

This is Detroit people, home of Devils Night.
FTA:

"Our priority was trying to save the occupied homes," Williams told The Detroit News, adding the number was not unusually high but seemed so because they were concentrated. "We've had five to six pockets that have experienced multiple dwelling fires because of winds."

Yeah, the link is farked too.
More proof the modmins don't read the articles either.

Damages estimated to be in the tens of dollars.

I'm surprised anyone noticed, it being Detroit and all.

Bad link, repeat, everything is f*cked up with this submission.

Where is Brandon Lee when you need him?

80+ fires last i'd heard, with around 30 houses destroyed, and some formerly commercial properties, too. None of the big stuff, but still a lot of area.

This article says the number is more like 85.

I feel like if this was happening in just about any other large city, it would be getting a lot more coverage. But it's as though reporters are like, "hey, it's Detroit...it's a hellhole anyways."

I submitted this with a better headline that was greenlit, delisted, but went to the right article. Dammit.

I think it was last week that someone linked a great (but very sad) article in one of the Detroit threads. It followed one of the fire companies in the city, and how they're badly understaffed, underfunded, and undersupported. IIRC, at one fire (an arson), someone tried to steal the fire truck. A different time, they got a call during dinner, and when they got back, their food had been stolen. The city government doesn't give a rat's ass, and despite frequent pleas to get these abandoned homes torn down to prevent further fires, especially the ones that have already caught fire once, they are rebuffed with excuses of "a lack of funds" or "the paperwork is still in process."

It was extremely depressing because these people are trying so hard to save a city that just doesn't give a fark anymore. They were happy that they only had 60 (I think) arsons at Halloween one year. Only. That's goddamn scary. :(

I'd dig for the link to post, but I can't remember the name/title, and it's in the history of my home computer, not work. I needed a heavy drink after reading it.

Detroit is really just a case study for Life Without People at this point.

Genju: Were they just burning the junk down to put farms up? Are they still doing that to parts of Detroit? It was a great idea anyway.

They're going to try to consolidate neighborhoods, but on a *voluntary* basis, instead of forced.

Which is probably good. Plenty of people still have bad memories of certain neighborhoods getting the axe for the freeway, plants, etc.

However, lots of the sites are somewhat dubious re: turning into farmland. The soil underneath isn't exactly pristine, and everything in SE Michigan is hard effing clay. You can make it into something decent, but it takes time.

If they started homesteading - say, you can't leave for 5 years but you get a house to rehab and land to work, and if you keep up both decently at the end of 5 years it's yours - it'd be a lot better. This has to include a waiver of all owed taxes... there's lots of cheap land in Detroit until you look at what you're gonna owe the city as soon as you sign the deed.