The Metro

Detroit's Avenue of Fashion is home to some of the city's most iconic businesses and shops.

Every year on the first Saturday in July, the “Light Up Livernois” fashion, art and design festival takes over Livernois between Six and Eight Mile roads to highlight all the business and entertainment district has to offer. 

Alysyn Curd, one of the event’s organizers and co-founder of the Independent Business Association headquartered on the Avenue of Fashion, joined The Metro to share more about the event this Saturday.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

The inaugural Electric Avenue International Jazz Festival will take over the WindsorEats Food Hall on Erie Street in Via Italia July 4-5. The free event will infuse the city’s food and art scenes to create a cross-border celebration of blues, soul, and of course, jazz.

Russ Macklem, a Detroit/Windsor-based trumpet player, composer, educator and artistic director for the Electric Avenue International Jazz Festival, joined The Metro to share more about the two-day event.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Volunteers with the Michigan-based nonprofit Rank MI Vote have been working hard to get ranked choice voting on the general election ballot in November.

Their effort just passed the state board of canvassers on Friday. Now they need to get hundreds of thousands of signatures over the next 180 days to get the initiative on the ballot. If passed, voters would be able to rank political candidates by their preference.

Pat Zabawa, executive director of Rank MI Vote, joined The Metro on Wednesday to make the case for ranked choice voting and why he says it would more accurately reflect the will of Michigan voters.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Many people living and working in Hubbell-Puritan-Schaefer are trying to change that. Among them are Jerjuan Howard, founder and executive director of  Umoja Village and the Umoja Debate League; and HUG Haven Founder Chelsea Walker, who will be leading Peace on Puritan yoga classes at Umoja Village this summer.

Umoja Village will be hosting "7-2 Day" — an annual event celebrating community pride on Puritan Avenue — on July 5-6, featuring a 5K run, a neighborhood cleanup, little library installations, mural painting and more.

Howard and Walker joined The Metro on Wednesday to talk about 7-2 Day and their shared goals of driving positive change and unity within their community.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Last week, Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin gave a speech at a progressive think tank where she gave a stern warning about America’s shrinking middle class.

She says the middle class has been shrinking since the '70s, making it more challenging for young Americans to become as affluent as their parents. Part of the reason for that, she says, is how much the economy has changed structurally, and the failure of government to change along with it.

"We were already taking on water as the middle class, and now we're about to hit a Category 5 hurricane in the form of artificial intelligence," she said. "We gotta reset on how we do the basics of government and of our lives and focus on those essential things."

Slotkin says part of the solution is to build more housing, expand access to health care, invest more resources in small businesses and to ban donations from corporate Political Action Committees. 

Metro Producer Sam Corey spoke with the senator about her "economic war plan" to build up the middle class, and why she says Democrats should be on the offense right now. 

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Boyd, the founder of a school bus transportation company, launched his campaign in May and was one of the last to join the packed field of candidates facing off in the upcoming Aug. 5 primary.

Running on a platform of expanding skilled trades, making it easier to start a business, offering legal aid to senior citizens facing foreclosure and more, he says he would bring something new and different to the city.

"I'm running for mayor because I feel the city...all too often we vote for people that have name recognition or people that are career politicians," Boyd said. "It's time for the city to vote for people that come from their own."

Boyd joined The Metro on Tuesday to share more details about his vision for Detroit and how he plans to achieve it.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Longtime musician and event promoter Hugh Leal has been curating jazz events in the Windsor area since 1976.

Thanks to his efforts, established jazz artists from Detroit, New York, Chicago and beyond came to Windsor to perform, including some of the last surviving jazz musicians of the 1920s and '30s.

Leal has continued to promote jazz performances in Windsor over the years, going on to help launch the nonprofit Windsor Jazz Concert Series — the latest in a string of jazz concert series that have taken on various names — now considered the longest-running jazz concert series in Canadian history.

He joined The Metro on Tuesday (Canada Day!) to talk about his extensive efforts to bring live jazz music to Windsor, and to discuss the upcoming Port Windsor Jazz & Arts Festival in Sandwich Town this Sunday.

Use the media player above to hear the full conversation.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Ever since President Donald Trump started floating the idea of making Canada the 51st state in the U.S., the relationship between the two countries has been on a downward trend. Then came the tariffs that President Trump put on foreign goods.

These moves made national headlines, but their effects will likely be felt first here in Detroit and across the river in Windsor-Essex more than anywhere else. WDET’s Senior News Editor Russ McNamara has been paying close attention to the relationship between Canada and the U.S.

He joined The Metro on Tuesday to discuss how the strained relationship could affect summer tourism in Detroit, and what changes local businesses have noticed.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order to eliminate funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) due to alleged bias. Now, in the House Rescissions Act of 2025 — which narrowly passed the House last month — he's asking Congress to claw back CPB funding that has already been approved.

The Senate Appropriations committee held a hearing on the bill last month, and the Senate will need to vote on the package by July 18.

If passed, local stations — including WDET and the programs you love — would face profound impacts. At WDET, about 6% of our annual budget comes from CPB.

Kelly McBride, senior vice president at the Poynter Institute, serves as NPR’s public editor. She says in her role with NPR, she serves as an independent critic of NPR reporting, engaging with listeners and critiquing public media stations when appropriate.

McBride spoke with Metro co-host Robyn Vincent about how public editors at major media outlets help hold journalists accountable, and how NPR could improve its coverage of federal funding cuts to public media and allegations of bias.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

In Detroit, three of the city’s seven city council districts have a community advisory council (CAC). The body helps advocate for residents’ issues and gives them direct access to city council members. 

Unfortunately, due to confusion around filing deadlines in the city clerks’ office, anyone who wants to run for  a CAC  will have to run as write-in candidate because their names won’t appear on the ballot. This includes incumbent candidates who have been serving on these councils for several years. 

To help us break down what CACs are, why only some districts have them and what exactly happened that led to candidates missing the filing deadline, Metro Producer Jack Filbrandt spoke with Detroit Documenters Coordinator Noah Kincade and Outlier Media Civic Life Reporter Briana Rice.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

A judge is set to decide whether low-level radioactive material left over from the creation of the first atomic bomb can find its forever home in a metro Detroit landfill.

The state of New York wants to send about 6,000 cubic yards of tainted soil and 4,000 gallons of contaminated groundwater to a waste disposal site near Belleville, Michigan.

It’s one of a handful in the country licensed to dispose of such waste.

Communities near the site, including Canton Township, filed a lawsuit to stop shipments of the toxic material from New York. WDET's Quinn Klinefelter spoke with Canton Township Supervisor Anne Marie Graham-Hudak about the lawsuit and why she says the shipments put public health at risk.

Also, Metro producer Cary Junior II spoke with Carol Miller, a professor of engineering at Wayne State University, about how landfill sites are built and how they attempt to prevent contaminants from impacting its surrounding areas.

Divine Magazine highlights Detroit’s creatives and fashion designers, at a time when the fashion world is paying more and more attention to what’s being made in Detroit. 

Charde Goins, Detroit native and editor-in-chief of Divine Magazine, says she has always expressed herself as a creative through her clothing, and she got the idea to start a fashion magazine after graduating from Central Michigan University. 

Goins joined The Metro to share what inspires her about Detroit's fashion scene and the journey of launching her own fashion magazine.

Use the media player above to hear the full conversation.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

The annual Ann Arbor Art Fair — one of the largest juried art fairs in the country — will attract nearly half a million visitors to downtown Ann Arbor later this month.

The three-day event,  set for July 17-19, spans about 30 city blocks with approximately 1,000 artists participating. 

Frances Todoro-Hargreaves, interim executive director of the Ann Arbor Art Fair, joined The Metro on Monday to discuss the history of the event and what to expect this year. Brian Delozier, one of the featured artists at this year's fair, also joined the program.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Ray Lozano, executive director of the Mexicantown Community Development Corporation, joined The Metro to talk more about Concert of Colors, Tejano music and the importance of amplifying immigrant voices.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Two groundbreaking leaders of Detroit's arts and culture scene will be honored at the GhostLight Arts Initiative's inaugural GhostLight Gala, taking place this Sunday at the Garden Theater.

Honoree Njia Kai is a celebrated cultural curator, producer and community visionary. Through her company NKSK Events + Production, the lifelong Detroiter has curated some of Detroit’s most iconic cultural celebrations— from the Charles H. Wright Museum's African World Festival to the Downtown Detroit Tree Lighting.

Dr. George Shirley, who will also be honored on Sunday, is a man of many firsts.

He was the first Black man to teach music at a Detroit High School; the first Black tenor to perform a leading role at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City; and the first Black member of the U.S. Army chorus in Washington D.C. He also received the National Medal of Arts from former President Barack Obama in 2015 for his work mentoring countless Black musicians.

Kai and Shirley both joined The Metro ahead of the gala to discuss their commitment and contributions to Detroit's art scene.

Proceeds from the event will help support GhostLight programming, including its Obsidian Theatre Festival — which provides a platform for emerging Black voices in theater and film.

Use the media player above to hear the full conversation.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

After decades of steady decline, Detroit's population is finally growing. Latest data from the U.S. Census Bureau shows Detroit increased its population by 6,800 residents from 2023 to 2024.

And even more people seem to be moving to Detroit's neighboring suburbs, with many housing investments being made in recent years in the city's outer suburban ring and nearby “exurbs” like Lyon, Milford and Commerce townships.

Ro Harvard, a realtor with Island Realty — an affiliate of Keller Williams Realty — joined on The Metro on Thursday to shine some light on the inner workings of Detroit’s housing scene, and what types of amenities and priorities draw buyers to certain communities — from school districts and walkability to affordability and property value.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

The United Auto Workers union announced last month it would be endorsing Rev. Solomon Kinloch Jr. in the Detroit mayoral race, calling him "a longtime advocate for working-class people."

Kinloch, a senior pastor at Detroit's Triumph Church, is the only candidate in the mayoral race who has not held an elected position. He is currently battling for second place in the race behind frontrunner Mary Sheffield — who continues to maintain a sizable lead. The top two vote getters in the Aug. 5 primary will face off in the November general election.

In Detroit, a political endorsement from the UAW has always carried considerable weight, but membership is down in recent decades, and there are shifting political views within.

Today on The Metro, UAW Region 1A Director Laura Dickerson joined the show to discuss the endorsement and why it matters.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Friends of Rouge Park is hosting a free, three-day festival at the park this weekend, June 27-29, in celebration of the park's centennial.

Many improvements have been made at Rouge Park in the last few decades, offering more services and recreational fun to city residents. At 1,200 acres, it's the city's largest park, and the biggest urban park in the state. It was so popular at one point, it attracted international crowds. But like the city, the park fell on hard times and went into a period of decline and disinvestment.

Despite those challenges, the park remains a staple in the city today thanks to the stewardship of community organizations like Friends of Rouge Park.

Today on The Metro, we play a conversation WDET Intern Lauren Myers had recently with Friends of Rouge Park Trustee Paul Stark about the park's history. Also, Metro producer Cary Junior II and Metro Co-host Tia Graham visit Rouge Park to hear directly from residents about their connections to the park and how it's changed over time.

Later in the show, Friends of Rouge Park's Executive Director Lindsay Pielack and Land Stewardship Manager Antonio Cosme join the conversation and share more about the centennial celebration this weekend.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

On Thursday, Hearn will be headlining WDET’s “What’s So Funny About Detroit?” comedy showcase at The Old Miami. The show, hosted by In The Groove's Ryan Patrick Hooper, is part of a monthly summer series benefitting WDET.

Hearns joined The Metro ahead of the comedy showcase to discuss her career, her approach to comedy and what to expect at tomorrow's show.

Editor's note: WDET is aware of the possibility of rain Thursday evening and is closely monitoring the radar. In the event of light rain, the show will go on. In the event of thunder and/or lightning, we will honor all June ticket holders’ purchases for our July 31 show.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Detroit mayoral candidate and City Councilman Fred Durhal III last week announced his strategic plan for improving the city, including cracking down on blight and implementing a more "equitable tax strategy."

His plan emphasizes the importance of cutting taxes and red tape when necessary, reinvesting in communities and “main streets,” creating more affordable housing and expanding Detroit's development authority to Midtown, Corktown and to Gratiot, near Eastern Market. Durhal also wants to see more thriving business corridors, more Detroit enterprises and more city residents.

He joined The Metro on Wednesday to expand upon the priorities laid out in his strategic economic plan for the city of Detroit.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) is the focus of a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on Wednesday. 

The publicly-funded nonprofit, which provides funding to PBS, NPR and its affiliates like WDET, would lose $1.1 billion — two years' worth of funding that has already been approved by Congress — if the bill passed by the House earlier this month gets Senate approval. It would also rescind more than $8 billion in funding for foreign aid programs addressing global public health, international disaster assistance and hunger relief.

That bill passed in the House by a margin of 214 to 212, with four Republicans crossing the aisle to vote against the package. There were also four Democrats and two Republicans who did not vote on the bill at all.

President Donald Trump has already signed an executive order to eliminate CPB funding, claiming all public media is biased, but the Rescissions Act of 2025 would go beyond that, revoking funding already approved by Congress.

Today on The Metro, we break down what it would mean for public media organizations like WDET if the legislation gets Congressional approval.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Since Oct. 7, 2023, the world has felt different for a lot of American Jews.  Antisemitism has risen. More recently, two people were shot dead outside a Jewish museum in Washington, D.C. And a man with a flamethrower in Colorado attacked Israeli hostage advocates. 

At the same time, Israel has expanded its militarism, recently attacking Iran to destroy its nuclear capacity and potentially overturn its regime. Israel has gotten the support of President Donald Trump, as America has now also attacked Iran’s nuclear sites. 

All the while, Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza has continued. There are now at least 57,000 Palestinians who’ve been killed by Israel’s attacks since October 7th, 2023. In conjunction with that, Israel’s months-long food aid blockade has put one-in-five Palestinians on the brink of starvation. 

To find out where this leaves American Jews, and what they’re meant to make of the political moment, Producer Sam Corey spoke with Rabbi Shalom Kantor from Congregation B'nai Moshe, a zionist temple in West Bloomfield. The two spoke prior to Israel’s attacks on Iran, Iran’s retaliations and America’s involvement in the war, but Corey reached out to Rabbi Kantor again to get his thoughts.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Detroit native and “wig engineer” Darnell Davis is making a name for himself in the beauty and entertainment industries.

Designing wigs for major artists like Beyoncé, Niecy Nash-Betts, Mariah Carey and Little Nas X, he has become extremely sought after by celebrities and Detroiters alike for his meticulous hand-sewn and stitched designs.

Darnell joined The Metro on Tuesday to discuss his love for hair and wig-making from an early age, and Detroit's rich legacy in Black hair innovation.

Detroit has come a long way since declaring bankruptcy in 2013, but challenges still remain.

Residents are struggling to find affordable housing, Detroit students are not keeping pace with the rest of the state or the nation, and many long-time Detroit residents feel excluded in Detroit’s transformation. So where do we go from here? And who is the right person to lead the city into its next chapter?

Come November, Detroit residents will make that decision when they elect a new mayor. There are nine candidates, plus two write-ins, that believe they are the right person for the job. 

Life-long Detroiter and businessman Jonathan Barlow is among them. He joined The Metro on Tuesday to share why he decided to run for mayor, and what his priority would be if elected. He says the city's next leader needs to focus on supporting families and legacy Detroiters.

"I'm recreating the family fabric; I want to make Detroit [a] community again, and make sure that we ensure that every home has what it needs to get by," he said.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.

Wayne State University is offering a genealogy workshop focused on the lineage of enslaved Black Americans as part of its 2025 Juneteenth programming.

At the interactive workshop, "Building Forward with Wisdom," participants will learn practical genealogy strategies, like how to trace one's ancestry through digital tools and historical records, under the guidance of professional genealogist, historian and researcher Dr. Carolyn Carter.

WDET’s Bre’Anna Tinsley spoke with Carter ahead of the workshop to discuss what attendees can expect and why uncovering the history of slave holders is so vital to tracing the history of enslaved people.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and streaming on-demand.