Hey BridgeDetroit readers!
Thanks for sticking with us as we continue to tell stories that matter the most to Detroiters.
When I think about the topics we covered in 2024, they fall under two major buckets: housing challenges and the vulnerable communities caught in the middle and ambitious programs to tackle systematic issues.
Metro Detroit residents told me about rising rents in their mobile home communities. A Detroit mom worried about becoming homeless again if a housing subsidy didn’t work out for her.
At the same time, I spoke to Detroit twenty-somethings who became homeowners thanks to a down payment assistance program. I followed a street medicine team and saw firsthand why it’s important to get health care out to a hard-to-reach population — Detroit’s homeless.
This year of journalism taught me to not only look at the problems, but also potential solutions that can help Detroiters, and Michiganders, thrive.
This monthly newsletter will be back in your inbox in January. We have a mayoral election coming up and so I’ll be monitoring candidates’ plans for housing costs, home repair and other issues impacting Detroiters every single day.
Let me know what else I should focus on in 2025!
In the meantime, as you wind down during the holiday break, here are five big stories to revisit from this year.
Nushrat’s Year in Review
CASH FOR MOMS: Detroit Free Press photographer Ryan Garza and I went to Jackson, Mississippi, to learn about a program that provides cash each month to low-income moms living in subsidized housing. I wanted to understand the dent cash in hand makes for families as a similar program ramps up in Michigan. What happens when households have an extra $500 or $1,000 a month to spend how they see fit?
I’m going to continue reporting on cash aid and child poverty across Michigan. Watch for those stories in early 2025. In the meantime, dive into my dispatch from two cities across the country — Jackson, MS and Flint, MI. Read more.
RENTERS TO HOMEOWNERS: What would it mean for Detroit renters to get as much as $25,000 to become first time homeowners? We explored a down payment program offering just that. The initial round helped more than 400 residents buy homes.
“I just want to keep my roots in Detroit,” one lifelong young Detroiter told me.
VOUCHERS ON HOLD: We wrote about why Michigan’s largest distributor of housing vouchers hadn’t pulled a name off its general waitlist in nearly a year.
Some 85,000 people were on the Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA) waitlist for a coveted federal housing choice voucher, formerly known as Section 8. Among those on the list were 5,000 who were unhoused.
We reported that rising rents have forced agencies that administer waitlists for federal housing subsidies to indefinitely stop issuing vouchers, leaving tens of thousands of Michiganders waiting for help as they struggle to find permanent homes. Read more.
STREET MEDICINE: A medical team let us tag along as they cared for homeless residents living out on the streets of Detroit. The idea is to deliver primary medical care to people facing unsheltered homelessness. The program received more than half a million dollars in pandemic relief aid to expand and it’s also the first time the city of Detroit has funded street medicine outreach.
“You bring care to where people are at,” one doctor said.
MOBILE HOME HURDLES: Michiganders living in manufactured homes told us about the challenges they faced, from sky rocketing rents to shoddy conditions. Mobile homes are typically regarded as a more affordable housing option, especially for low-income families and seniors. But advocates said manufactured housing is quickly becoming unaffordable as private equity firms buy up parks and raise rents. In some cases, it’s unclear who owns the lots, making it easier for maintenance problems to go unaddressed.
“We’re human beings. Just because we’re low income doesn’t mean they get to walk all over us. … We shouldn’t have to live like this,” one resident living with her family in a Warren manufactured housing community told me earlier this year.
On Your Radar
FOOD PANTRIES NEED HELP: Across the region, metro Detroiters need food assistance. Pantries and nonprofits have reported high levels of need all year and that’s growing in the winter. Agencies say they need volunteers, warm clothes and money. We spoke to four organizations to find out what they need, why need is acute and how readers can help. Learn more.
Catch you in 2025. As always, you can reach me at nrahman@freepress.com
Nushrat Rahman
Economic Mobility Reporter, BridgeDetroit and Detroit Free Press
