cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/5226450
When Jaike SpottedWolf saw empty lots on Tillman Street she envisioned a sacred space for Detroit’s Indigenous community — a powwow ground, smokehouse, garden, church, and gathering place. The Thečhíȟila Collective, which she co-founded to support community needs, hoped to buy the land for its listed price of $7,000.
“Making sure there’s a space for native youth, native elders for them all to come together if they want, that isn’t gatekept. That doesn’t exist for us in the city,” she said of the approximately 30,000 Native people living in metro Detroit.
But months after the group expressed interest in 4751 Tillman, the Detroit Land Bank Authority raised the price of the parcel, which included seven lots, by nearly 2,000% to $136,500 — putting it far beyond the collective’s budget and raising questions about how land is valued and who gets access to it in a city with deep histories of displacement.
Because of racism, greed, or both?
I mean, in general it’s almost a sure bet that the land bank is corrupt.
But the high price is low six figures, shit like this the juice isn’t worth the squeeze.
It sounds like 7k was the price, and didn’t include demo costs because when developers buy they do it in house.
So that gets tacked on, and Detroit real estate actually has increased in price significantly.
This would have happened to any group of private citizens, which is the problem. Even working together you can’t compete with corporations, because they built the system.