DOWNTOWN ADVANCES CITED

LANDSCAPING, AID FOR HOMELESS PLANNED

JOHN GALLAGHER
FREE PRESS BUSINESS WRITER

March 18, 2008

Downtown Detroit took a bow Monday.

Nearly 1,000 downtown workers and boosters gathered Monday for the annual meeting of the Downtown Detroit Partnership and a celebration of past accomplishments and future promise.

"Downtown Detroit is becoming a destination for every taste and every season," business and civic leader Roger Penske, chair of the nonprofit downtown partnership, told the audience.

After listing a string of successes and plans for the coming year, Penske added, "That's why I've made my top priority downtown Detroit."

By any measure, downtown has seen significant progress during the past year. The Detroit Riverfront Conservancy opened big portions of the planned 5-mile Detroit RiverWalk and hosted the first annual River Days celebration. Two permanent casinos, the MGM Grand Detroit and MotorCity, opened their new hotel-gaming complexes.

Looking ahead, Penske and others cited the renovations under way at the Westin Book Cadillac hotel, scheduled to reopen this fall, the work on the permanent Greektown Casino and other projects.

The partnership also announced a program staffed by the United Way for Southeastern Michigan to help homeless people. Known as 211 On the Go, it consists of two cars equipped with Internet and wireless communications and driven by United Way staffers who look for homeless people to assist.

An offshoot of the United Way's successful 211 hotline for human services, the On the Go version offers people who are homeless prepaid calling cards, state-issued photo ID cards, and help with employment and temporary shelter.

Ann Lang, president of the downtown partnership, outlined other steps planned for this year. Among its efforts, the partnership will extend its Clean Downtown program to include landscaping as well as street cleaning. Some of the next efforts will be devoted to landscaping and planting at Grand Circus Park.

"We're moving from clean to green," she said.

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