Graduation time in Detroit is filled with joy. It is a time of personal accomplishment and public celebration. High school and college grads walk around sporting their new robes, flat hats at jaunty angles. Yard signs offer individual congratulations, often picturing the grad and naming the school and year. Families, friends and neighbors gather to celebrate. This is the first time since the beginning of the pandemic that people have been able to come together.

Over this last week Congress convened hearings into the Jan 6 insurrection. Earlier, the House passed sweeping gun control legislation after riveting testimony by victims of violence. Most commentators agree that these actions, taken mostly by Democrats with a few notable, courageous Republican exceptions like Liz Cheney, will not amount to much. It is now commonplace to view the political landscape as intensely polarized, with little chance of moving people from rigid, ideological positions. Among the many tragedies of the overwhelming violence, grief, and isolation of these last few years is a growing cynicism and despair. Many of us are beginning to think that the possibilities of moving toward a more just, life sustaining culture is impossible.

Across the country, in countless ways, people are reckoning with the truth of violence in our land. For the first time in our history, the majority of people can no longer pretend that they do not know the depth of brutality that is routinely required to protect an ever smaller number of white, privileged, powerful people.

Almost everyone I know is filled with a deepening sense of grief. After watching the daily brutality of war in Ukraine, we were still stunned when thirteen people in Buffalo were shot by a young man who opened fire in a supermarket. Ten of the victims died. Eleven of the victims were African Americans. The shooter, a young, white man, was motivated by a hate filled, white supremist ideology.  Within days, another young man walked into an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, killing 19 children and two teachers. The bloodshed in Ukraine seems to be fading  from public consciousness as the bloodshed at home overwhelms us.

The Coalition for Police Transparency and Accountability (CPTA) indicted the Detroit Police Department (DPD) for what the coalition identified as “a pattern of killings and excessive force.” The group of 20 community organizations selected the 97th Birthday of Malcolm X to call upon the federal Department of Justice to investigate the practices of DPD. The decision to ask for a federal investigation came after the Coalition concluded that all the mechanisms established by the city and state to monitor police are ineffective.

The Mayor and some members of the Detroit City Council are attempting to get control of our libraries. This move is not motivated by a love of books, but by the desire to control more public money. Over the years, mayors seeking to increase public funds know Detroiters will support our libraries. Over the last 50 years, every single mileage increase has been approved by an overwhelming majority of voters.

As the war in Ukraine intensifies, the only solution being offered by most western powers is to provide more weapons. The Biden administration has now pledged $3.8 billion in military weapons of various sorts. Meanwhile, Russia is glorifying its invasion as a triumph of military force. There are few voices for peace as the US and much of the world justifies accelerating arms in a conflict that is dangerously close to engulfing the globe.

We are moving closer to some measure of justice for the family of Patrick Lyoya. Michigan State Police have finished their investigation and Grand Rapids awaits the decision by Kent County Prosecutor Chris Becker on charges against Police Officer Christopher Schurr. Schurr shot Mr. Lyoya in the back of the head after a routine traffic stop on April 4th.

Earth Day is an opportunity to challenge and expand our thinking, to draw connections between people and issues that are often seen as separate.

In the past five years more than 400 people have been killed by police during traffic stops. None of these people posed a risk to the police or the public. None had a gun or knife. None were involved in criminal activity. All of these people were stopped for minor issues such as expired registration, cracked windows, or air fresheners dangling from mirrors. All were on their way doing ordinary, everyday things. Then a cop pulled them over. All lost their lives because of police violence.

For more than twenty years I have spent April 4th with Dr. Martin Luther King’s speech Beyond Vietnam: Breaking the Silence. This year marked the 55th anniversary of the evening at Riverside Church where King called the US the “greatest purveyor of violence” on earth. He identified militarism, materialism, and racism as the cornerstones of a culture of violence moving us toward “spiritual death.”

It has been two years since Breonna Taylor was killed by Louisville police when they burst into her apartment in the middle of the night. This week the Washington Post published a study about the controversial police strategy that was linked to her killing. This strategy is being encouraged around the country and here in Detroit. It is behind the efforts of Detroit police to increase their reliance on technologies such as Project Green Light and ShotSpotter.

This week there were two important actions related to police violence. The first was the announcement that the Detroit Police Department has identified 128 officers who reflect “high risk” behaviors. The identification of these officers is the result of the work of a new unit created by Chief James White in an effort to hold officers who receive multiple complaints to be disciplined. White announced the identification of problem officers, acknowledging that until recently officers with records of repeated abuse and multiple citizen complaints have “slipped through the cracks.”

As the war in Ukraine turns increasingly brutal, those of us who work for peace need to ask some questions. What have we learned about our capacities to stop the drive toward military solutions to human problems? What is the difference between being against a war and building a peace?

I have chronicled every State of the City address since 1993,  beginning with Coleman Young. Of the long list of mayors that followed, some speeches have been memorable.  Dennis Archer got a standing ovation when he promised to pick up the garbage. Most have been fairly predictable efforts emphasizing “redeveloping” the city, providing better services, and creating jobs. One mayor after another has framed a vision of the city providing jobs, housing, services, and safety.

The images of war coming from Ukraine are all too familiar. People, mostly women and children, fleeing their homes in search of safety. Young people holding guns, in the hope of defending against fire power deadlier than they could have imagined just a few weeks ago. Bodies left in streets filled with the rubble of bombed out buildings. The reality of war has been with us somewhere in the world my entire life of more than 75 years.

As Russia moves armies into Ukraine, these basic truths are on full display. There is no question that whatever Vladimir V. Putin’s motivation, military force is wrong. The devastation of the Ukrainian people is a tragedy and an action invoking the specter of nuclear war. The Russian people do not want war. Their protests are being put down brutally.

Police departments are strategizing on how to blunt efforts at serious conversations about the role of policing in our country. They also want to get their hands on some of the stimulus money flowing into cities and states as part of the efforts to help local and state governments recover from the ravages of COVID 19.

Recently the Washington Post released its annual count on the number of people killed by police in 2021. At least 1,055 people died at the hands of police last year. This is the highest death toll since the Post began carefully compiling the people killed in 2015. Despite years of sustained public scrutiny aimed at controlling police violence, the report notes, “Police have fatally shot roughly 1,000 people in each of the past seven years.”