Mayor Duggan shares plans for rehabbing vacant Detroit houses

DETROIT (FOX 2) - Mayor Mike Duggan discussed the future of vacant properties in Detroit during a Wednesday press conference.

The first round of contracts under Proposal N have been awarded to companies that will rehab houses that can be salvaged.

City of Detroit reveals first Proposal N contract winners in bid to clear blight

After Detroiters backed Proposal N on their ballots in November, six months later the city of Detroit is announcing its first Proposal N contracts. Most of the contracts have gone to Black-owned, Detroit-based companies, the city said on Wednesday.

Five of the six winning bidders are Detroit-based, Black-owned businesses. The sixth is a joint venture between a Black-owned Detroit company and a St. Clair Shores business.

Twenty-three contracts that each have 12 properties have been awarded to the six bidders. The contacts are valued at nearly $700,000.

The contracts will be submitted to city council for approval as soon as this week.

Duggan said that the winners will hire well beyond the required 51% Detroit resident workforce to rehab houses. All six companies have staffs made up of between 63% to 100% people from Detroit.

"We said from the beginning that Proposal N was going to be about two things: a greater emphasis on saving vacant houses by rehabbing them and putting more Detroiters to work," Duggan said. "Like the demolition contracts we awarded in January, these contracts show that there is the talent right here in Detroit to rebuild Detroit."