Inauguration

The Detroit Free Press did a nice job on their coverage of yesterday's inauguration. A few highlights:

Romain Blanquart's inaugural crowd portraits.
And Diane Weiss's excellent panorama from within the crowd.

An Assignment

Hugh Grannum/Detroit Free Press

I'm going to try my best not to repeat myself every time a cliche filled story about Detroit appears. From here on out, I'll just post links as I become aware of them. And with all the focus on the Big 3 and Detroit, I'm sure more are on the way. The latest is from the Times in London.

I have an assignment for all journalists coming to Detroit to report on the state of the Big 3 - have a look at the Driving Detroit series that the Detroit Free Press put together last year. It was a months long, in depth look at the city, so I realize that most agencies can't commit to something like the scale of this, but the tone is right. It's not all bombed out post apocalypse wasteland. There is life here. As Bill McGraw says, "it's worse than you think, but better too."

Christ Child House - Where Children Find Hope

A five part documentary was published today by the Detroit Free Press/freep.com. It tells the story of kids in the foster care system in Michigan. I'm not entirely unbiased, my wife Kathy is executive producer of the project, but having said that, I believe it's the best of what journalism can be - compassionate, honest, and gives a voice to kids who are often overlooked. Photographer Kathleen Galligan has been working on this for three years, photographer Regina Boone has been involved for three years and videographer Brian Kaufman has been on the project for the past year. Check it out here.

The Fall

That's What The World Is Today

A strange and somewhat depressing time to be in Detroit. Yesterday I saw this example of wasted resources (here are more photos) and today a story in the Detroit Free Press about a mayoral perjury scandal which cost the city millions of dollars. Unfortunately, I'm not really surprised by any of it, and that may be the most depressing aspect of all.

Driving Detroit

Today is day 5 (the last day) of Driving Detroit, The Detroit Free Press' most ambitious project in recent memory.

http://media.freep.com/drivingdetroit/stories.html

Columnist Bill McGraw drove every block of the city, more than 2700 miles, over the course of four months to get a snapshot view of the surface of Detroit. I personally find this project so interesting for a few reasons. Lots of folks talk about the city's Renaissance, but Bill went into the neighborhoods to see if the reality matched the hype. He took notes on the condition of each block and from those notes created a color coded map.

Another really interesting part of the project is the interactive map. It's integrated with a Google map of the city and has different pinpoints for photo galleries, panoramas and videos.

I'm sure there are people who would have liked a rosier picture, but in terms of showing hope versus decay, I think they hit the balance squarely. The city *is* seeing some exciting things happen downtown and in small pockets within the city, but there are large areas of blight, decay, and abandonment. And despite this, and the fact that jobs are leaving the area, Detroiters are still optimistic. What a city!

Disclosure - I have many friends who worked on this project, so my objectivity is a little compromised. And objectivity is completely out the door because my wife Kathy was a big part of coordinating the photos and video on this project.

Where We Live

By now, everyone knows what's going on in the American housing market. In Detroit, it's particularly grim. According to a story in today's Detroit Free Press, Metro Detroit prices have fallen almost 10% during the past year.

©Brian Widdis

Above is a photo of a special insert in this past Sunday's Detroit Free Press. It lists all the foreclosed homes in Wayne County, where Detroit is located. And unfortunately, that's not the classified ads or the funny papers underneath the top section. There are eight full sections, 121 pages of want-ad size print, listing these homes in foreclosure.

David P. Gilkey - Window on Iraq

Since David Gilkey is leaving the Detroit Free Press, I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to show a series of his from 2004 that was a personal favorite of mine. And you may remember, he was part of the team at the Free Press who won a national News and Documentary Emmy this past September for a different series, Band of Brothers, about National Guard Soldiers from Michigan. See the story at freep.com - Columbia Journalism Review also had a nice piece here.

Story and Photos - David P. Gilkey, Detroit Free Press. September 2004.

BAGHDAD - This neighborhood is divided into two worlds: the one Iraqis live in and the one U. S. soldiers drive through.

The people in both understand the dangers of interacting with each other. Iraqis seen talking with the Americans could be killed by their neighbors. Soldiers must regard all Iraqis as potential armed enemies.

The troops with the Army's 1st Cavalry Division, Apache Company 1-12 Cavalry from Fort Hood, Texas, make daily patrols through the Al Tamar and Al Oubaidy sections of Sadr City. Everyday scenes are framed through the bulletproof windows of their armored Humvee -- from men gathered in front of posters of Muqtada al-Sadr, the radical Shiite cleric who has led a bloody resistance to the Americans in Iraq, to the gentle site of his-and-hers comforters hanging on a line to dry.





As the soldiers pass, the Iraqis signal their feelings in an instant, from disgust to excitement, from curiosity to indifference. The only constants on this tour are the walls, steel and glass that separate the two worlds.

Free Press staff photographer David P. Gilkey has spent more than six months in Iraq since covering the initial U.S. invasion with the Army's 3rd Infantry Division.




David is off to Washington to shoot video for National Public Radio, where they are making serious efforts at producing high quality video content for the web. Best of luck, David.

The Finish Line - Romain Blanquart

Photos © Romain Blanquart. Detroit Free Press.

The moment of glory: faces of ecstasy and agony as marathoners cross the finish line.