“Homesteading Detroit: On Urban Farming”
Sunday, April 5th, 2009“The biggest impediment to urban farming of course, is the City, which sat idly by as land fell into disrepair, neglect, disuse, etc.”
The City of Detroit did far more than sit idly by. Decades ago it implemented ordinances that prevented any home from being sold without being inspected and approved by the City. Every single defect, no matter how minor, had to be repaired to the satisfaction of the inspector before a home could be sold. When people cannot afford to stay in their homes, they surely cannot afford to improve or repair them. They simply walked away in droves and the problem only gets worse as the economy worsens. These city ordinances were a major contribution to the sea of abandoned homes in Detroit. It created countless hiding places for rapists and child molesters to lie in wait for their next victims. Today the abandoned homes are a blight on the landscape.
To think that the City should be in any way compensated for these abandoned properties is atrocious. The City of Detroit should be paying damages to the previous owners to compensate for the loss of previous value, no matter how minor it may have been as well as the pain and suffering that always comes in the wake of government interference in private actions.