Hundreds of workers and young people turned out for the funeral of nine-year-old Darnell Currie and two-year-old Amillah Currie in Detroit on Thursday, in an outpouring of public sympathy for the two homeless children who froze to death on February 10. The children were sheltering with their family inside a van parked in a downtown casino garage.
The mother of the children, Tateona Williams, a 29-year-old unemployed medical assistant, had repeatedly called the city’s homeless agencies for assistance, but her pleas for help were ignored. At the funeral service, Williams was surrounded by family and friends expressing their sympathy and support for the young mother as she sat grieving with her surviving two children, just a few feet away from the open caskets of the young son and daughter she lost.
The memorial, held at the Triumph Church near midtown Detroit, was attended not only by relatives and friends but other metro Detroit residents, who were shocked by the tragedy and wanted to express their solidarity with the homeless family. “I felt I had to come,” a retired worker told the World Socialist Web Site. “You just don’t know what these kids are going through.”
The number of children and young people in the audience was also striking. They included several of Darnell’s teammates from the Detroit Titans, a nine-and-under football team, who, after the service helped carry Darnell’s blue coffin to the hearse. A collage of family photos for Darnell, affectionately known as “Fatty,” and sister Amillah “YaYa,” were on display and included in the memorial program.
A father brought his young son, one of Darnell’s teammates, to the service. Holding his crying son, the father remarked, “Today is not what children should be experiencing.”
During the service, a relative read several condolences, including from Tateona’s co-worker and others. Particularly moving was the tribute from the Ecorse Public Schools officials, which noted that Darnell’s teachers and classmates at Bunche Elementary School were all struck by the young boy’s “resilience and eagerness to learn,” and that he would live on in their memories.
The popular anger over city officials’ indifference to the plight of this homeless family was palpable in the audience. Aware of this, Democratic Mayor Mike Duggan sent flowers and helped coordinate the funeral services; City Council President Mary Sheffield attended and her condolences were read. The eulogy was delivered by Triumph Church Senior Pastor Solomon Kinloch, the pastor of the multi-site megachurch, who the night before announced his candidacy for the November mayoral elections.
Sheffield, who is also running for mayor, wrote that the deaths of the two children had “deeply shaken the city,” and, after grieving, she hoped “we could come together as a city to make sure everyone gets what they need.” Kinloch similarly said, “What happened to these children with the resources we have should never happen to anyone again.”
These brief references are an indication that the Democratic Party establishment knows it is sitting on a social powder keg, which could be ignited by any number of tragedies like this, exposing the brutal social reality behind their endless talk about the so-called “turnaround” of Detroit.
But the Democrats and Republicans are directly responsible for the social catastrophe in Detroit. The 2013-14 bankruptcy restructuring, overseen by the Obama administration, a Republican state government and local Democrats, has been a boon to billionaire real estate tycoons and other wealthy investors. Meanwhile, the working class, the majority of the population, is struggling to pay ever higher housing costs and is mired in low-paying jobs or being unemployed.
Detroit remains one of the poorest big cities in America with an official poverty rate of 38 percent and child poverty hitting 44 percent.
In comments to WSWS reporters, workers expressed their sympathy with the mourning family and anger over the chronic homelessness and inequality in the city.
Marcella Benton, a young autoworker and close family friend, said, “This is really sad. Tateona loved her kids and did her best for her kids. She needed help and asked everyone for it. They say there are lot of resources out here, but a lot of people I know, who I came across who were homeless, aren’t getting help. In the homeless shelters there is a longer waiting list than for an apartment. She needed help, and this is what happened.”
Danielle Stevens, a former Detroit public school employee, said she came to the funeral because she identified with the young mother. “I have children, and this isn’t something the mother is going through alone. There are a lot of mothers going through the same thing. She doesn’t deserve to have to bear this pain alone. But today, the world hears us. I don’t know her by blood, but I live in the same city and want her to know, I’m with her.
“We’re all just one breath away and could be in the same situation, between credit, the fact that the city and state are not helping, and the fact that the government is failing us.
“We are doing the best we can out here. I guarantee you, if you go to a school, you’ll find four or five women literally living out of their trunk. From housing to daycare, everybody is trying to make it. You got grandparents having to go back to work. So, who’s going to protect the children? People are choosing between their children’s safety and health versus getting a couple of dollars to care for them.”
Raenelle, a bus driver, said, “I don’t want the city to keep lying and saying there’s help out there. It is not true! I know a mother with four children who has been trying to get shelter or housing for two years. She has gotten no results, and no one has called back. It’s the same response as Tateona got. Now we are here after we’re burying our children. Then it’s too late, this funeral shouldn’t have happened. We are failing our children.”
Charles Payton, the cousin of the two small children, said, “The government dropped the ball. What are we paying taxes for if you aren’t distributing the money to the people? The rich are taking over. We’re building up the city on the backs of the people and the poor, but why are we struggling so much? At the bare minimum, we should have adequate housing, adequate food, adequate transportation and adequate healthcare. But we don’t have any of that.
“Capitalist society is bad for the community. These people are price-gouging and fleecing us. The government will bail a billionaire out, but they won’t bail a struggling family out. They won’t help kids, homeless people, but they will give the money to a billionaire who doesn’t need it.
“What happened here has been done to us too many times. I feel like I’ve been cheated,” he said, holding back tears about his small cousins. “And society is being cheated too. If this doesn’t bring the city out, nothing will. Everybody needs to stop what they are doing. We need to connect with each other online and do what we need to do.”
Another family member, Rick Drew, a disabled worker, said, “This is a tragedy that should never have happened. It’s a tragedy for the whole community. We need to stop homelessness and put a shelter over these people’s heads. We need to come together and make it happen for our kids.
“Who knows why people become homeless; it could be their work, no money, or just misplaced in this world. We need to make sure this doesn’t happen again. The government should step up and help people. Now, they want to cut Social Security, disability, so the money can trickle down and they can put in their own pockets. We have to unite people together to fight this.”
Many of those attending the funeral took copies of the Socialist Equality Party statement, “Tragic deaths of 2 homeless children in Detroit must sound alarm for workers to end poverty and inequality.”
The statement calls for the formation of rank-and-file committees in the factories, schools, hospitals and neighborhoods, free from the union bureaucracies and the two capitalist parties, to mobilize workers in collective action, including mass protests, demonstrations and strikes.
These committees should demand the provision of emergency housing for the homeless, the use of eminent domain to seize the unoccupied office buildings, luxury homes and upscale apartment complexes owned by billionaire Dan Gilbert and other wealthy investors, the ending of all evictions and utility shutoffs and a crash program to hire tens of thousands of construction workers and build thousands of affordable housing units.