When you call 911 in Detroit, who’s paying for the ambulance? It’s a question that’s tripped up the Detroit City Council twice in two years… and the answer goes to a vote this afternoon.

Detroit pays three private ambulance companies between $500,000 and $600,000 each per year. That’s to keep a guaranteed number of rigs staged in the city.

Those same companies can also bill you — or your insurance — when they pick you up. Councilmember Angela Whitfield Calloway has called that “double dipping.” But The Detroit Documenters pulled the original 2023 contract documents and confirmed: that is how the deal is written.

So what is Detroit paying for? And what does it say about American healthcare that a city has to cut million-dollar checks just to guarantee an ambulance shows up?

Noah Kincade, coordinator for Detroit Documenters, joined Robyn Vincent on The Metro to walk through what’s in the contracts and what’s at stake in a city council vote on the matter.

Editor’s Note: After this segment aired, the Detroit City Council voted 4-3 to send the ambulance contracts back to committee rather than vote on them directly. Council President James Tate was absent, and President Pro Tem Coleman Young II presided. Young, Scott Benson, Latisha Johnson and Denzel McCampbell voted to send the contracts back. Mary Waters, Angela Whitfield-Calloway and Renata Miller voted no. The Public Health and Service Committee will take the contracts up May 4 at 10 a.m.

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Detroit’s police department has been collecting wins. Homicides in 2025 hit their lowest point since 1965. Carjackings dropped by nearly half. 

But over the past two weeks, another picture has emerged from inside the department’s own forensic operation.

At recent Board of Police Commissioners meetings, former forensic technicians came forward to describe conditions within the Crime Scene Services unit. What they described raises questions about safety, evidence handling, and whether the integrity of criminal cases has been compromised.

A state workplace safety agency has already cited the unit. A resident has sent those findings to city councilmembers, police commissioners, and the Wayne County Prosecutor. And a commissioner who tried to visit the facility says she had to wait two weeks — and was still unsatisfied with what she saw.

Outlier Media’s March 31 newsletter first reported on these complaints. 

Noah Kincade coordinates the Detroit Documenters program at Outlier Media. He joined Robyn Vincent to discuss conditions inside the Detroit Police Department’s Crime Scene Services unit and the response from community members and stakeholders.

Editor’s Note: The Detroit Police Department is pursuing accreditation from the Michigan Association of Chiefs of Police. The broadcast version of this story said the accreditation was national.

Hear the full conversation using the media player above.

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Detroit Mayor Mary Sheffield is prioritizing anti-poverty measures in her 814-page proposed budget. 

The budget comes as more than a third of Detroit residents experienced poverty in 2024, the highest rate the city has seen since 2017. More than half of Detroit’s children are living in poverty, and the poverty rate among seniors reached its highest point in a decade.

Sheffield’s budget responds with new spending on multiple fronts. It promises free year-round bus rides for kids to reduce chronic absenteeism, higher pay for bus drivers, and a new office for senior affairs, with a $750,000 food access program for older Detroiters. It includes $2.2 million for after-school programs, a $500,000 increase to the Grow Detroit’s Young Talent summer jobs program, and a new $40 million Human, Homeless and Family Services Department. It also expands the city’s affordable housing fund, and provides a living wage for city workers.

But the city has 34 million fewer dollars than it did last year. So what makes it in, and what gets cut?

Detroit Documenters are sitting in on all 47 budget hearings alongside reporters at Outlier Media and Bridge Detroit.

Noah Kincade, coordinator of the Detroit Documenters program at Outlier Media, joined Robyn Vincent to discuss.

Editor’s note: The Public Lighting Authority director who used ChatGPT to respond to councilmembers’ budget questions is Beau Taylor. The broadcast version of this story misidentified him.

Hear the full conversation using the media player above.

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Communities across Michigan are asking how, exactly, local law enforcement is working with federal immigration agents as the Trump administration steps up aggressive enforcement, including the killing of two Americans in Minneapolis. In Detroit, that question is playing out on the pages of two police personnel files. 

Detroit Police Chief Todd Bettison vowed to fire two officers who broke department rules by calling U.S. Border Patrol during traffic stops, handing people over to federal immigration agents. Then he dropped the terminations.

In one stop, an officer called Border Patrol, believing the person was undocumented. In the other, a sergeant called for help communicating with a driver who didn’t speak English, though the department runs a 24-hour translation hotline.

DPD policy — stemming from a 2007 anti-profiling ordinance and a 2020 internal directive — bars officers from contacting Border Patrol, ICE, or any federal agency for translation or immigration enforcement. 

Outlier Media’s public records requests turned up at least two more incidents the chief did not disclose.

Ahead of the Board of Police Commissioners’ vote on the suspensions, The Metro’s Robyn Vincent spoke with Noah Kincade, who runs the Documenters program at Outlier Media. 

The Detroit Documenters helped surface these cases at police commission meetings. 

ICE and CBP did not respond to WDET’s requests for comment about this story.

Hear the full conversation using the media player above.

Editor’s Note: After this interview aired, the Board of Police Commissioners voted 10–0 to suspend both officers without pay for 30 days. Bettison, who said he would terminate them, backed off the next morning. His reversal comes after one officer sued in federal court, claiming her lieutenant ordered the call, and Michigan Republican House Speaker Matt Hall threatened to review Detroit’s state funding in response to the case.

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The price of water has been steadily rising in Southeast Michigan. Now, one of the steepest rate increases in the Great Lakes Water Authority’s decade-long history is up for a vote.

GLWA is proposing roughly a 7% water rate hike and a 6% sewer rate hike for the fiscal year starting July 1 — the second straight year exceeding the 4% cap the authority held for its first decade. GLWA says the money is needed to replace aging infrastructure: 83.6 miles of transmission main are past their useful life, and the system is largely funded by ratepayers.

At the authority’s January board meeting, residents pushed back. A GLWA representative acknowledged that 155,000 Detroiters are already enrolled in water assistance programs, roughly one in four residents.

Noah Kincade, who leads Detroit Documenters for Outlier Media, joined Robyn Vincent to break down what’s driving the increase, how rates are set, and what residents can do.

Listen to the full conversation above.

How to get involved

Residents can contact state lawmakers about Senate Bills 248–256, which address water affordability, or call We the People of Detroit’s water hotline at 1-844-429-2837. The GLWA board holds its public hearing and vote on Feb. 25 at the Water Board Building (735 Randolph St., Detroit) and via Zoom. Last year, public testimony led the board to reduce its proposed hike before the final vote.

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After years of pandemic disruption, driver shortages, and declining public trust, Southeast Michigan’s transit agencies say they’re finally back on their feet.

There are new labor contracts. New buses on the way. On-demand service pilots. Even a regional transit app designed to knit a fragmented system together.

But recovery doesn’t always feel like progress… especially if you’re still waiting 40 minutes for a bus that’s supposed to come every 10.

At a recent State of Transit meeting hosted by Transportation Riders United, transit leaders struck a cautiously optimistic tone. They said the crisis is over. But questions remain about access, equity, and reliability.

Noah Kincade leads Detroit Documenters, a civic journalism program where trained residents attend public meetings and take detailed notes to help the rest of us stay informed. He joined The Metro’s Robyn Vincent to examine how transit officials are framing the system’s rebound and how those claims compare with riders’ experiences.

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

Subscribe to The Metro on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

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