Rising Poverty in the Suburbs: Another Sign that Priorities in Lansing and Washington Must Change

At the February meeting of the Royal Oak Area Democratic Club, a bright but freezing Saturday morning, members learned about the important work of the Welcome Inn Day Center for the Homeless, which provides warmth, food, medical attention, job search resources and clothes to people in need from the community meeting room of the Unity Church of Royal Oak. Just weeks earlier new data from the U.S. Census Bureau confirmed what people at the Welcome Inn already knew – the number of poor people and struggling families in the suburbs grew dramatically in the last decade. Over 119,000 people fell below the poverty line in metro Detroit’s suburban communities. This is also occurring in the rest of the U.S. but at a much slower rate. For the first time more people are living below the poverty line in Detroit’s suburbs than in the center city.

This does not mean that the suburbs are poorer than the city; Detroit’s poverty rate far exceeds that of its surrounding communities. What it means is that residents of southeast Michigan are suffering like nowhere else in America, and Washington should take notice. But the federal government won’t take action unless we speak with one voice. In 2002 I worked with a group of mayors and city managers to create the Michigan Suburbs Alliance for that very purpose:  to bring communities together to tell Lansing and Washington that the time has come to shift priorities away from subsidizing sprawling development in places where cows recently outnumbered people. Instead of cutting grants that support efforts such as the Welcome Inn, we should be scrutinizing and eliminating tax give-aways that fail to produce jobs. We should insist that state-supported research institutions looking to sell their patented technology give priority to investors who promise to create jobs in Michigan, instead of selling to the highest bidder anywhere in the world. We need fresh ideas and new priorities and we need them now.

Article about Welcome Inn Day Center for the Homeless

Report from Brookings Institution on Poverty in the Suburbs

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