Expanding City Boundaries

I suspect that the state of Michigan, perhaps with a sharp push from a federal bankruptcy court, will eventually expand the borders of the city of Detroit.

They can't expand them southward -- that's an international border after all. But I can see Detroit, with the authorization of the federal bankruptcy court, and its state capital, grabbing some of those ["white suburbs"] to the north and west. Rochester Hills, Eastpointe, Voila! wider tax base, solvency (at least for awhile), and public service ads about how "we're back!"

Just to be clear I'M NOT ADVOCATING THAT! This is a reflection about what will be, not what ought to be. I remember New York scraping along at something akin to insolvency, without the help of the bankruptcy courts, in the mid 1970s. There was a good deal of talk about extending the definition of the city into Westchester and Long Island. Nothing came of it. The people in those places would have raised a stink had such a bill been proposed in Albany. But there was talk.
Now, there may well be more than talk.

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