Freedom festival

The Detroit Fireworks display is a highlight of the city, marking the beginning of summer. Families and friends gather at the river’s edge to watch what is often billed as the world’s largest fireworks display. Most summers, more than a million people gather to enjoy Hart Plaza and neighborhood parks.  The fireworks are an international celebration of freedom, honoring the independence days of both the United States and Canada from colonial rule.

Over the years, this Freedom Festival has become increasingly less free. It has even been renamed. The fireworks promoting the names of various corporate sponsors.  Since 2013, the Freedom Festival has given way to Ford Fireworks. And public access has become increasingly concentrated to downtown. While City Council President Mary Sheffield questioned the massive park closings and curfew surrounding the festival. She was concerned about how many residents were closed off from public areas and unable to view the event. As Mayor, she has proved to be less concerned. This year, we again saw massive park closures, a strict curfew, accompanied by checkpoints and metal detectors. 

As a result, amidst all of the joyous celebrations of summer, 180 young people were arrested by police, had their hands zip-tied behind their backs, and were taken into custody on city buses. Their parents faced $250 fines for the release of their children. Detroit's 36th District Court Chief Judge William McConico is enforcing curfew rules and lecturing parents about their responsibilities. Thousands more young people were forced to show IDs to police officers as they were herded through checkpoints.  

For those 180 young people, this festival will be seared in their memories as a traumatic experience. 

Yet the Mayor and Police Chief called it a “success.” Chief Bettison said the curfew worked and the event was "one of the more peaceful fireworks." 

Certainly, there were a few “disruptions.” Usually, these are caused not by teens but adults who get into arguments that escalate into physical violence.  This year, there were hundreds of volunteers who accompanied police in providing a peaceful presence amongst the crowds.  In fact, the only gunshots fired that night were by police, under questionable circumstances.  A police officer, not a teenager, put a young man in the hospital with a gunshot wound.

Underneath this veneer of safety and peace is a deeply flawed and dangerous view of our young people.  They are being characterized by city officials as “dangerous problems.” Using loaded language like “teen takeovers,” our young people are told their very presence is a threat to peace. 

According to this way of thinking, areas of the city free from “firearms, alcohol, drugs and teens are the route to public safety.  Such ideas only further push young people into feelings of alienation. It fuels the tensions and misunderstandings among generations that impoverish our communities.

Mayor Sheffield and Chief Bettison have an opportunity to do better. They need to ask themselves why we are not opening all parks, as we do every other day. Why are we not helping more people come together to enjoy the bonds of community? Who are we protecting? Who are we hurting? How can we embrace our young people? What makes them feel safe?

I suggest they start by visiting with those 180 young people and asking them what they would have liked to be able to do that night.  What would they have needed to be able to participate along with all the other people there? How can we help?

Until we understand that young people can only grow into socially responsible adults if they are included in the full life of our community, we will be locked into acting in ways that increase trauma, conflict, and harm. This summer, we have an opportunity to rethink who our city is for and how we can create truly safe and joyful places together.