Mayor’s Plan: Tear Down 1,500 Buildings In 90 Days

Mayor Dave Bing is on a mission to tear down 1,500 homes by the end of September.

They’re among the more than 60,000 abandoned buildings in the city, and many of them are near schools.

The Mayor made the announcement on Tuesday afternoon in a neighborhood near Denby High School.

An abandoned home in the shadow of Denby High School became the first of the 15-hundred structures that’ll be torn down within 90 days.

More than 350 of the homes are in neighborhoods like this one around Denby, and around Osborn and Cody High School.

Just last month, Detroit 2020 highlighted the problem of abandoned homes near schools, and when we showed the Mayor two vacant homes across from the school…he immediately ordered them boarded up.

Under Bing’s watch, more than 45- hundred abandoned buildings have already been torn down.  He’s pledged to demolish 10- thousand by the end of his first term.

The demolitons are part of the U-S Justice Department’s Youth Violence Prevention Initiative and Safe Routes to School campaign.

And the Mayor is trying to get more funding from Washington—to tear down more houses.

“We’re gonna be strategic in what we do…we’ll listen to people in neighborhoods,” Bing said.

The Mayor says 17 contractors will be doing the demolitions.

He says it will cost about $8,500 to tear down each home.