HDAB, Arab & Chaldean Underrepreseted Communities History Project

2:47PM Feb 22, 2024

Speakers:

Keywords:

detroit

grant

city

project

community

historic

national park service

people

building

kelty

moved

years

arab

history

write

historian

evening

office

meeting

register

Okay, again, my name is Denise Chapman, I'm the director of the district destination advisory board. Next we have Lisa de cara, who is the Deputy Director right behind you. Next we have Rebecca Savage, who is our lead architectural preservation this. Then we have Kelsey Moss, who also is our current coordinator, as well as our on our preservationist, and then our special project influent. We have in in Fisher here. So that's our office. Feel free to and this project basically is be with. We also have our board member here, and I would like to have her acknowledge her, Dr. Carolyn Carter. Thank you, Dr. Carter, she sits on the advisory board, she's been very helpful in a number of projects, including the designation of the one of the only site for the Underground Railroad here in the city of Detroit. So Carolyn is a historian she used to teach here, she is very active. And she's been very helpful in our numbers on numerous projects. So again, thank you. I also would like to introduce some our special guest, we have Katie and Katie, I'm going to ask him to come off and pronounce her last name because I never get it right. She's with the Shippo. And for those of you are not familiar with the ship was the State Historic Preservation Office. And they are our state's sister agency and skating failure with you to say a few words. Hi,

I'm Katie Cole akitas. I'm the survey coordinator for the State Historic Preservation Office, also known as Shippo. Happy to be here and help we have been working with HSM for a number of years on a variety of these projects. We also have grant projects that are kind of bouncing all over the state. So that cover not nearly as much as you all have in the last few years. But we're trying to catch up at this point. But we are the state agency that is charged with protecting, preserving and documenting historic structures around the state. So we have 12 different program areas that we work with everything from archaeological sites, to tax credits to above ground sites. And we're happy to be here and happy to support each debt in their efforts.

Thank you, Katie. The last thing I want to say is that this particular grant, and I just want to make my point and kind of tune our own horn isn't, you know, the city of Detroit, and also, the Advisory Board staff, because they've worked so hard on this is that this is the first and only granted, you know, that is looking at air quality and communities in the nation. It is the first it has not been done before. And it's being done right here in the city of Detroit. So we are going to go to this. At this point, I you know, and like I said, this is a this meeting is about you guys and gathering documentation and history and meeting folks and connecting networking. So at this point in time, again, you will be working with our staff. But our consultants, I'm going to ask where is Ruth meals? With Quinn? Author Andrew, excuse me, Sandra little Can you come up with the queen Evans? I'm sorry, Council. Council floor? Could you come up and say a few words? Please? I apologize. I didn't see you sitting back there. How are you? Good to see you. I'm good.

Hi, everyone. Good evening. I'm here to support to learn more about their project just as you are as well. If you don't know me, my name is Deborah and less than Thiago middle, and the proud councilmember here in District Six. And we're very supportive of making sure that we are preserving our history. So we're working together to look at some policies that can potentially give us some more protection, some more review for any of our properties here in the city that should be protected if they have any historical significance. So incredibly proud of the work that we're doing here to support and just listen and see what else I can do to help. So thank you.

Thank you, Councilwoman, and she has been very helpful throughout again, she's worked with our office and with the Latin X community and that grant, which is not your representative grant, and here we are back in the community working on this grant. At this point, I would like to introduce Cassandra Luna, who is with Quinn Evans, who are our consultant team, and she can introduce her teammate.

Hello, everyone. Excited to be here with this wonderful grant. So Quinn Evans, we have a strong team of architects and historians that work with us. I am like Sondra Liddell. I'm the director of diversity, equity inclusion and codename is also a principal. We have our main historian Ruth Mills who was a part of the project team as well as Valerie, from our office. And then we're working alongside a wonderful historian, Sally from University of Michigan is working with us who has been researching this question for quite some time. So we just really enjoy coming together as a team to help out to city help out your community, tell the stories with something we love to do. So appreciate the opportunity, you know, roofie will come up and say anything.

Yeah, so my name is Ruth Mills, and I am a historic senior historian at Kona ovens, and also the project manager. And we're working with Valerie Rice, who is from Detroit as well, originally, and she's living here now. And yes, very excited to have Sally on the team. She is like making connections and helping us to understand the historic context. So I think there was another Yeah, okay. So just to kind of mention a couple of the projects that we have worked on, in the city of Detroit that are related to this, Sondra actually did some design of facade design and community engagement for the African American Museum. So we're quite familiar with that. But we recently completed a historic context study and survey for 20th century African American African American civil rights sites in Detroit. And so very similar to this type of project citywide looking at important sights. We also recently completed a historic context study for the eight by Wyoming neighborhood, which was one of the early 20th century African American communities in Detroit. And then finally, this is a little while ago. But we also did a historic context and survey of apartments and branch bank buildings in Detroit. And as you can see, branch banks in Detroit have many Post Bank lives, including this this market. So hopefully, this will be one of our sites. So that's all I have who's next.

Very quickly, I just would like to just kind of conclude from my portion, because it's going to be turned off the staff. And they're going to walk you through how the rest of this evening is don't go. Again, please sign in. I like to do the homework stuff, please sign in both for the way. Wayne County Community College District they have offered and allow us to meet here for free, so please, and they just need to keep a track record of how many people are coming in. And there's our sign in sheets, there is food in the back. So while we are, you know, our brains are functioning, we want to keep our minds you know, healthy and keep going. There's plenty to Nacion. So, you know, have some food, do some thinking and share with us your story's at this point if the rest of the evening will be turned over to staff and they will help walk you through how the rest of the evening will go. Thank you. And thanks again for coming.

All right, as Jenny said, I need to remind you again, really drive home, please sign in. Usually when I give when I talk and at museums, and I'm asking for donations. So this is even easier. I'm not asking you to give us any money. Just sign your name on a piece of paper, because it helps us and the college. So my name is Ian, I'm the project coordinator for this unique project. And Jenny's kind of gave a very high level overview of what we're doing. But today I want to I'm going to get into what we're going to be doing here tonight. And I do want to know before we start from all the non present preservationist in the room, who here has heard of the National Register of Historic Places? I see a few hands up. That's good. So when you think of the National Register of Historic Places, what do you think of? Usually it's a it's a pretty big building, it's a Victorian mansion or something like that. What is that? That what comes to mind? First, you know, George Washington's house or something? Something with a big sign? Yes, exactly. Well, so the National Park Service runs the National Register of Historic Places. And what it basically is is a federally organized list of all of the country's most important historic landmarks. They really realized quite a few years ago that those landmarks were these big giant buildings built by influential people in you know, over 100 years ago, and none of them were representative of the people that live in our cities or the people that live in our country. So back in 2014, the National Park Service service started the underrepresented communities grant program to diversify the National Register of Historic Places. To start talking to communities of color, minority communities and cities around the country, and really ask them, what is it that what does Historic Preservation mean to you? What does it mean? What are the landmarks that are important to your community? Who are the people that have shaped the cities that you live in from your community? And how can we do a better job as the National Park Service of protecting those places so that people can learn from them learn about the impact that different minority groups have made on cities just as much as the big influential, rich people from the 1800s did. So again, as Ginny said, Detroit has gotten several of these grants, we are the first and only city so far to get this grant to look at Arab and Chaldean communities in their city. So again, I can't toot our own horn enough, because they, the National Park Service is really excited about this. So and we're excited to do it. And we welcome and you know, thank all of you guys, for coming out today. If you're not here today, or if you think of somebody that you think would want to participate in this program, we put up our grant timeline here, just to show you that we are just in the very beginning stages of this grant, this project will be going through 2026, perhaps 2027, in a broad sense of the word. So if there's someone here tonight that you know, that would want to participate in this project, feel free to pass that along. Because we will have future public engagement meetings we're going to have, you know, we're willing to speak with anyone that wants to learn more about the project at any time. And this will not be their last opportunity to learn about it. So this grant, basically has two deliverables. And yes, yes, I can. Problem. And if you if you want, we can send you a copy of these slides as well. Thank you. Um, so, going real quick to what our deliverables are, as a city department. After getting this grant, we are going to have to produce two things for the National Park Service and the State Historic Preservation Office. One of them is a historic context report. This is basically a really long document that outlines the history of Eragon County and communities in the city of Detroit, in Metro Detroit, in a sense, but mostly within the city of Detroit. Obviously, people move around Detroit does not live in a bubble, this and urban county in history does not only live in Detroit. However, the purpose of this grant is to recognize sites within the city of Detroit that are significant Arab and Kelty in history, even if this goes back, you know, to groups of people that moved out of the city many years ago. So the first deliverable is going to be that written report. And the second thing we need to do is list at least one building or site in the city of Detroit on the National Register of Historic Places for its significance to Arab and Kelty. In history, that's at least one, it could be a district with meaning many buildings, it could be just one building. National Register listing does not restrict what a person can and can't do with their property. But it does make a historic property owner eligible for federal tax credits to rehab those buildings to renovate them and use them in a new way, as well as honor their historic fabric while doing those renovations. So the net and of course, the National Register is a pretty cool thing to brag about being on the National Register of Historic Places. So those are the two things this grant that we as a department will have to be producing by 2026. What we really need is your help. We can't do this in a bubble. And we believe that, you know, the history of Detroit's Arab and counting in history lives in these communities. It hasn't been written down in a lot of places. And in many, at least, you know, in many senses of the word, we're one of the first public institutions to be writing down this information. And because of that, we want to hear from you and everyone who may be in this room and may not be in this room at some point or another on some of these historic themes that are reported will have to be will have to cover what are some of the important religious sites in the city of Detroit? You know, relating to to Arab and Chaldean communities? What are some important businesses that were founded by influential or passionate Arab or Kelty and immigrants? What are some of the organizations and clubs that these people participated in? What are some of the who are some famous individuals are influential individuals that grew out of Detroit's Arab and Chaldean communities? We need your help. And the really the purpose of this this entire meeting is to We'll try to engage with you. So as soon as I'm done answering questions here, I'm gonna put down the mic. And we're hoping that any or all of you will come up and want to tell us something that you know about Arab or county in history, or ask about a way that you can get involved or, you know, learn more or plan something else down the road. But before I do that, are there any questions on anything that I just talked about? Yes. You

mentioned specifically the city of Detroit, but also Metro Detroit. Yes. Because the community that I represent, to be honest, they came to Detroit, they were in the shadow of the Fisher building, that's where they live. But then, after 1967, and 1970, they all everybody moved, just as close, everybody moved out to Royal Westland. Now our national headquarters is in west central, I'm not sure how that fits with what you're trying to

do, actually fits because of exactly what you just said that, you know, people that the community you represent, lived in the city of Detroit and then left for, you know, one reason or another, like so many people did. Well, we're not recognizing any current sights, well, at least with this grant project, we're not recognizing any sites outside of the city of Detroit. We feel that the, you know, the history of the city of Detroit, stayed with the people that left Detroit and moved to suburban communities. So as you know, even though you may not live in Detroit now, or a group of people may not live in Detroit now, we believe that they're, you know, they have numerous ties to the city, as you just said, that is the story, the fact that they lived in the shadow of the Fisher building and laughed after the riots. That's part of the narrative of this, this grant project.

migration of groups of people with ethnic groups as they make their way to the city of Detroit, that may have been important, call it a political issue for many again, they set up shop here, for families, who may be waiting for that first generational thing did the so called American dream, it could be that, you know, you thought you moved to the suburbs afterwards. So all those things are in transit, and are part of the largest contextual history of the city of Detroit, but also part and parcel of that, you know, we're not isolated. So it really is, you know, the connectivity between that, and the fact that your family, and as part of the other families has moved from the east side to the west side. Or they may still be the businesses may have expanded, you know, started as a small shop, and those shops expanded. So those are those kinds of stories and details that we're looking for. But, you know, many of the families originated here in the city of Detroit, and how that impacted the handle on what makes Detroit, Detroit. And what makes southeastern Michigan, even though we're concentrating, what wouldn't fix it, and how did that impact in other departments.

The other thing I'll say is that one of the benefits of h&m and Shippo having a close relationship and us being involved in if there are places outside of the city limits, where you all are limited. You know, maybe there's another maybe there's future great opportunities that Shippo can African can pursue, because we are we do cover the entire state. So, you know, there's the city of Detroit very much has the city of Detroit history handled. So we're kind of at this point, they're in the driver's seat on that. But we have, you know, plenty of opportunities to apply for other grants, if there are other communities that we identify. And this, this helps get a really good step forward in helping us figure that out. And the other thing I wanted to say, while you were talking to you was just that us, providing this information in this way helps us when we're making decisions, and one of the duties of our offices to review federally funded projects. And, you know, right now, we have no information on any of these historic resources that are out there. So those aren't taking into account when we're making big decisions on federal projects. And so having this information really helps us make better decisions. So it's very helpful for everyone.

And I just wanted to add to its historical context, and there's a lot of jargony things that happened with the National Register, but there's a general rule of 50 year rule, it's not set in stone, but that helps when framing of you know what to consider historic, generally, it's considered 50 years. And so, right people have been moving but they may have moved only 40 years ago. So that's, it's about patterns. It's about, you know, community. It's, it's this larger network, and people aren't static. But be thinking as we break out later in the evening, you know, A historic so a little bit, you know, 50 years plus is a good starting point. 1974 Which I don't know how that's possible, but

I just want to add so I'm think I can read your name tag your anatomy. Absolutely as loony I was really? Okay, so you're definitely from Ramallah. Right? So

I've actually met you, you don't carry

a turn. But the point is that the Ramallah club, I don't know, when it was founded, it might have been founded in the city of Detroit. It was 1959. So see, that's a part of the story of the city of Detroit.

Be honest, none of those sites, they they only exist anyway.

So yeah. So So we're, that's why we have, you know, we're not just talking about buildings, we're talking about neighborhoods, we're talking about spaces. Like if you think about the county in town community, very few Chaldeans or businesses are left in that community. But it's still a really important neighborhood for the city of Detroit. So that's why we want people like you here. So you can help us think creatively about how to tell that story.

Or photograph, if we don't take your photograph, we do expand it. Right back to you. It's really neat with that. We've had to send it to us, but we have historic photographs, as well, we'll get back to you. And so, you know, can we just said the building the wall was there, but they probably have some of the property that photograph. So that is part and parcel of our documentation. So we have the building there, if we have a photograph with these activities a place that that for sure.

Thank you. That was a really, really important question. Are there any other questions that anyone wants to ask to the whole group here? Before we break out? Yes, it's curious for this particular grant, was

there a lot of competition? Were there other cities who want you to have this grant for urban county and communities? I mean, it seems like Detroit would be unnatural. But were there others. So this grant is we pick the specific topic. So it's the underrepresented communities grant. So the main thing that this, the one checkmark you have to do is you have to diversify the National Register of Historic Places by getting a new listing or amending an existing listing in the National Register. So again, complicating or complicating, telling the full story of what has been in the US so we're the first community ever in the nation to get this grant for for this community, please let us

know, we were to identify.

So I think that in and of itself, that nobody else in the country was saying, we want to document this history. Those of us who are saying this history has to be documented, we wrote a grant that was strong enough, because there was competition, and you know, from all over the country, but it just received an underrepresented. So a lot of times, they tried to make sure that we can move them around. But yeah, and what we were told that, you know, you guys are doing cutting edge, that kind of stuff that we want to. So that was also part of so get no money. You know, we identified that this is something that is has a big hole in the National Park Service, resources and documentation. So that can if we are saying we as a city, we should feel that at least from our perspective to now other city probably. And that's the good thing. So so we're leading the way

Yeah, I was just wondering, when you say the first one that's been done as a first Arabic Chaldean Are you saying it's the first one it's been done? In Arab community in the city? nationally?

It's so with this particular grant the underrepresented community grant, there's been no Arab or Chaldean grant. So it's not the combination of the two it's either Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we, I was told by my contact at the National Park Service, they're gonna have to create a new category because they have not had anyone apply. So you know, it's it's different, you know, different cultural groups. And so this is they're super, super excited that

we're representing underrepresented communities.

You could find other grant programs are much more rights and much more specific. This is this one is supposed to be several others so there isn't another student

we going on maybe 27 other plants

Yeah, so we have on the side here, I know at least one person is here from what we have built called a community advisory group, we have about 12 people that from different interests in the Arab Ricardian communities, we have someone from the Chaldean American Chamber of Commerce, we have someone from the district seven Business Association that's up on Warren, we have someone from the Arab American National Museum. And our goal is to have future community meetings, not necessarily in downtown Detroit, we'd like to have meetings out in you know, various suburbs, or in areas of Detroit that might have, you know, like Kelty in town right at the intersection of seven mile with Woodward, that would be an area that we would hopefully be will hopefully be arranging a community meeting there are hopefully going to be community great arranging a community meeting at the Islamic Center of Detroit, which is on tyerman, Detroit's west side. So we are, we're navigating that as we go along as opportunities for community engagement come up, or we're going to seize them. So if you are interested in engaging with us in the future, we also have a, we have an Instagram and Facebook page, as well as an email, we'd love for you to follow us because you will see, you know, notices for these upcoming meetings. So just or if you know, someone that wants to get involved with this, again, our contact information is up there, we would love to hear from them. So that pretty much wraps up the presentation we had we had concluded, you know, we had designed for this evening, we're really hoping to kind of have a bit of a community conversation here and engage with someone you some of you one on one about different topics, you know, why did you come out? What What made you interested in this? What do you want to tell us? So we're gonna put down the mic and move into our conversation portion of the evening, Kelsey.

So we have we have a map of the city on this table over here. So you're gonna see lots of post, it's pencils, pens, feel free to use? Don't Don't be shy. You're not wrecking anything, nothing is any don't write on the table, I guess. But right in the paper. And I left in the back, but we have a little worksheet, essentially, that we'll have available. Oh, yes, Ruth, thank you. Maybe Anna White will be. So it has some. It has some prompts and some themes that we've identified. But we, you know, we don't know everything. And this is exactly why we want to be speaking with with you all, we want to make sure that the questions that are important to your communities are being addressed that, you know, we're telling a full story that is by the community. And so we are going to break out into different areas that will have little scribes writing ideas down if you know, if you're showing and you just want to write something down and not talk, that's totally fine. We'll have one on one conversations. But again, over here on your guests, your left is a big map of the city. So this is all for us. If you're like me, I'm a map minded person. So identifying places, even if you're like, I think there was something there. I don't really remember. I went there as a kid, you know, vague things that is fine. We we have researchers, we will dig in more to that, but we need to know where to start. So these types of memories are what we're trying to capture. And up here we might move these out a little bit more but we'll we'll write down the different themes and so things to think about important people, you know, places what kinds of like holidays or, you know, traditional events is there. I don't know like a political like activity that you so I will will help prompt your your noggins for ideas. And, and then yeah, there's so anyone who's staff or with Quinn Evans, can you raise your hand again? So we are all here. So you do so feel free to grab us and we can explain anything in more detail. And please eat food because it's here. I and also sign in, if you have not signed in sign in sign in sign in anything else, you

know, if you don't write down the name of it, as you know it was located, then we will go in and do some further investigation. If you have a question USA, well, I don't know if it's important or give it to us anyway. So we want your I want you to usual, I just kind of, okay, I know that on this tree, or this, this, this commercial stood this, you know, these kinds of activities will take place. I know, there used to be a mass here, I believe it was a church here, I know that back kids attended physical, just kind of if you just identify those by title or the locations, we will do that, we will continue to do that for today. So nothing is off limits, I have to say for people, you know, and like these, like no quit. Kelsey and Ian both, you know, thanks so very much for kind of summarizing all of this, but we're here, grab one of us with Evans suffixing, they will be able to help, they are also going to be doing evaluations. So just kind of let us know. And if you use the map and know where it is located or what look at even if it's not there anymore, who posted it prior to posting on a map location that will give us an idea of how the various communities develop. So one

other thing oops, sorry.

We're looking at what you're looking for people who are looking for

organizations who are looking for events

basically, like, Oh, my grandfather did this, right,

let us know, we have to argue for

rights, and her motivation.

So

one last thing to add is that we're planning to do interviews as well. So we're having a formal report, but we'll also have a more interactive public facing story map that will be available to the community. And so you know, if your grandma is, you know, part of the community one of my friends at school, she's like, he's like, Oh my gosh, my grandma, my favorite person you know, is from Syria and is so excited about this project. So we're going to interview her down the road so you know if you have a neighbor or anything like that if there's someone we should be talking to that's not here tonight. Yeah, make sure to let us know and we're happy to to do the digging and go reach out to them as well. So I think with that we've talked enough at you it's evening so maybe grab some more snacks. Yeah and then yeah, we'll we'll break up the tables and won a little birdie but all you know this you didn't want to pan things out and we'll get started so and again thank you so much. I know it's it's an evening meeting and you came here and we really appreciate it so thank you for your time. Yeah and commitment to this project.

To start off with

means

no further, actually have eight or nine buildings and paper integrated yet