Detroit residents are burdened by the cost of living in the city.

A majority of Detroiters spend 30% of their pre-tax income on housing. And while the city is working to increase affordable housing in Detroit, residents are trying an approach that they say keeps prices low and gives them more say in how their communities develop.

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Neighborhoods across Detroit are starting community land trusts, a nonprofit organization run by community members that owns property in the area. Jerry Hebron is the executive director of Detroit Cultivator Community Land Trust in the North End neighborhood. 

Hebron’s organization is one of five groups partnering with the nonprofit law firm Detroit Justice Center to establish community land trusts. Hebron and Mark Bennett, a staff attorney at the firm, join Created Equal on Thursday to explain how community land trusts work and what they might do for Detroiters. 

Guests: 

• Jerry Hebron is the executive director of Detroit Cultivator Community Land Trust. 
• Mark Bennett is a staff attorney at the Detroit Justice Center.

Listen to Created Equal with host Stephen Henderson weekdays from 9-10 a.m. ET on 101.9 WDET and streaming on-demand.

One year since the Hamas attack that killed over 1,200 Israelis, more than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel in Gaza, countless more displaced and injured. More than 1,000 Lebanese have been killed in Israeli airstrikes. 

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Arab and Jewish Americans in metro Detroit have been processing grief, frustration and anxiety since the war started.  

For Lebanese Americans in metro Detroit, the expansion of the war into Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah brings back memories of war and occupation of years past. 

“The trauma is unimaginable. It’s affecting people’s lives daily. We’re all in grief and shock and horror,” said Diana Abouali, the director of the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn.

“Everyone that I interact with in Dearborn, in the Arab American community in southeast Michigan, I find a deep sense of community.” 

James Zobgy, the co-founder of the Arab American Institute, says that sense of community and collective grieving is difficult to find. 

“For the most part, we walk alone with our pain, and it’s a difficult one to explain,” Zogby said.

Use the media player above to listen to the full conversation with Abouali and Zogby.

Guests: 

• James Zogby is the president and co-founder of the Arab American Institute. 
• Diana Abouali is the director of the Arab American National Museum. 

Listen to Created Equal with host Stephen Henderson weekdays from 9-10 a.m. ET on 101.9 WDET and streaming on-demand.

Exactly one year ago, more than 1,200 Israelis were killed by forces of the terrorist organization Hamas, and more than 200 were taken hostage into Gaza.

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It was an act of violence that had been unheard of for decades in the Middle East, and it has changed everything in the region’s geopolitics. The war in Gaza that grew out of the Oct. 7, 2023 attack has claimed more than 40,000 Palestinian lives, and now spread to multiple fronts — enflaming tensions between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Metro Detroit is home to a large and flourishing Jewish community that is still trying to make sense of what happened last October and the ongoing violence and growing humanitarian crisis in the Middle East.

Today on Created Equal, host Stephen Henderson was joined by two local leaders within the Detroit Jewish community to talk about what happened, what has happened since, and what struggles the region and the global Jewish community may be facing as a result.

Guests:

• Ariana Silverman has served as the rabbi of Detroit’s Isaac Agree Downtown Synagogue since 2016. 
• David Kurzmann is the senior director of community affairs at the Jewish Federation of Detroit

Listen to Created Equal with host Stephen Henderson weekdays from 9-10 a.m. ET on 101.9 WDET and streaming on-demand.