Obama officials rush aid to Metro Detroit

Detroit Police to get $10M grant, state workers hurt by global trade receive $49M

Mark Hornbeck and Jennifer Chambers / The Detroit News

Obama administration officials fanned out across Metro Detroit on Tuesday, offering $59 million in federal money, advice about jobs and a vision for the future in the wake of General Motors Corp.'s bankruptcy filing.

At a stop in Detroit, Associate U.S. Attorney General Tom Perrelli told police officials that their department will get a $10 million grant to put 100 police officers on the street and buy equipment.

Earlier in Romulus, Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis and Ed Montgomery, the federal auto recovery czar, announced a $49 million infusion from the Labor Department for workers affected by international trade. The state may be eligible for tens of millions more in competitive grants, she said.

And in Pontiac, Gov. Jennifer Granholm joined U.S. Rep. Gary Peters, D-Bloomfield Township, and Montgomery to talk about diversifying Oakland County as ground zero for the motion picture industry.

"This administration will fight like the dickens to do everything we can to make families whole," Solis said after touring the GM Powertrain Engine Romulus plant with Montgomery.

At her stop later at Eastern Michigan University to discuss job retraining, Solis was challenged about GM's announcement this week that it will close the Willow Run plant as part of its restructuring -- even after the union made concessions, played by the rules and made a low-cost transmission.

"We can no longer stand idle and let GM decide to move jobs to foreign countries," said Don Skidmore, president of UAW Local 735, which serves the Willow Run plant.

Solis said she understands the hardship but said those are questions that need to be asked of GM.

"I am very moved by what I've heard," she said.

Job retraining and economic redevelopment in green technology are keys to the revival of Ypsilanti and other areas hurt by auto plant closures, Solis said.

Mark Gaffney, president of the Michigan AFL-CIO, urged Solis to relay to the Obama administration that the 79 weeks of unemployment benefits available to jobless workers "may not be enough."

He said 70,000 laid off workers in Michigan exhausted their benefits last week alone.

The GM bankruptcy plan includes shuttering seven plants in Michigan, putting 8,600 employees out of work over two years.

"The president yesterday made a commitment to stand behind GM and to invest in its future because he's convinced it can be an ongoing, viable entity," Montgomery said. It was his fourth visit to Michigan.

Part of that new company should be the Orion Township plant in Oakland County, which is slated to be closed, officials said. Peters and Granholm are pushing GM to produce a new compact car there.

"We are not giving up on the Orion plant," Peters told the crowd gathered at Lighthouse of Oakland County, which provides human service needs. "We are making a business case to General Motors that this is where all the suppliers are and we need to keep those jobs here."

Said Granholm: "We are going to fight tooth and nail to have that small car factory built here."

Montgomery toured a former GM facility in Pontiac that is the proposed site of the Motown Motion Picture movie studio.

Pontiac Mayor Clarence Phillips said the motion picture studio and its expected 3,000 jobs held the most hope for the city.

"We got all our eggs in one basket and we have no more goose to lay the golden egg," Phillips said.

Montgomery agreed that the state's future is in diversification and new markets, such as energy efficiency and wind turbines.

Creating jobs, Perelli said at Detroit's southwest police station, is the best way to cut down on crime. Perelli met with Detroit Mayor Dave Bing and Police Chief James Barren.

"There's a direct correlation between unemployment and crime," Bing said.

The $10 million police grant will come from a $41 million Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant awarded to the state. The rest of the money will be used statewide to create or save jobs in law enforcement.

The worker aid comes from the Labor Department's Trade Adjustment Assistance program, which provides training, education and other help to workers who have lost their jobs because of international competition.

mhornbeck@detnews.com (313) 222-2470 Detroit News Staff Writer George Hunter contributed to this report.