A Detroit mother of five reached out to the city’s homeless response team in November, nearly three months before two of her children appear to have frozen to death on Monday while they slept in a van in a downtown casino parking structure.
“In the course of that conversation, there was no resolution reached on where they would go,” Mayor Mike Duggan said during a Tuesday press conference.
Just a few miles from the Hollywood Casino in Greektown, where the mother parked the van on Monday, family beds were available at a shelter, Duggan said.
The family did not call the city’s homeless response team back and the city never followed up with the family after the initial call, he said.
“For whatever reason, this wasn’t deemed an emergency,” Duggan said.
It’s a tragedy that must make the city rethink everything it’s doing to combat homelessness, Duggan said.
He asked for an investigation by Deputy Mayor Melia Howard and the city’s housing department that would determine what went wrong and what is needed to make sure nothing like this happens again. That report is due in two weeks.
“The full strength of this administration is behind this effort,” Howard said.
“No parent, no family, no mother should ever have to endure such hardship and heartbreak … As Detroiters, I know that we will lift them up in our hearts.”
The mother, her five children, and their grandmother were living in the van, according to Detroit police Capt. Nathan Duda. He said they were evicted from the apartment on the east side, then lived with family until November, when the mother called the city’s homeless response team.
Police said the mother pulled a van into the Hollywood Casino at Greektown parking garage at about 1 a.m., drove up to the ninth floor, and parked.
But car stopped running in the middle of the night due to some sort of mechanical error, so the mother called a family friend to come help, Interim Police Chief Todd Bettison said on Tuesday. The family friend was there when, shortly after noon on Monday, the mother noticed one of her children, a 9-year-old boy, was not breathing and called police.
The family friend took the child to the hospital. But then police said the children’s grandmother reported that another child, a 2-year-old girl, was also not breathing. The friend returned to the parking structure to take the girl to the hospital.
Both children died. Cause of death hasn’t yet been confirmed by the Wayne County Medical Examiner’s Office, but police said it appears the children froze to death.
The temperature early Monday was in the low- to mid-teens.
The three surviving children were hospitalized and are in stable condition, police said.
Bettison said police are investigating, but that doesn’t mean there will be criminal charges against anyone in the tragedy. He said his department will present the facts to Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy, who will decide whether charges are appropriate.
Hollywood Casino referred calls to Detroit police and said through spokesperson Jason Brown they would not be providing a statement at this time.
Duggan said 400 more shelter beds and additional 100 beds for drop-in emergencies were added in Detroit this winter. Homeless response teams were also made available 24/7. But he wants the city to ramp up its response when children are experiencing homeless by requiring immediate on-site visits, and he said the city needs to do better in relaying information on resources to those who need it the most.
Frigid temperatures can be deadly for people experiencing homelessness and out on the streets. In the Detroit area, and across the country, homelessness has been on the rise.
Last year, there were 1,725 people facing homelessness, both sheltered and unsheltered, in Detroit, Hamtramck and Highland Park – a 16% increase from the year before, according to a one night count conducted in January by the Detroit Continuum of Care, the Homeless Action Network of Detroit and the city of Detroit. Among those tallied, 728 were families. About 300 people, including 28 families, were unsheltered, meaning they were sleeping in places not typically meant for human habitation.
Across the country, the number of people experiencing homelessness on one night last year set a record high, according to a U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development report to Congress. Roughly 23 out of every 10,000 people in the U.S. faced homelessness, likely because of a lack of affordable housing and rising inflation, among other reasons, HUD said. Nearly 150,000 children were unhoused on that single night – a 33% increase from 2023. The one night tally is likely an undercount of the homeless population.
Homelessness, housing experts have said, is not a monolith. It has multiple root causes, from mental health challenges and substance abuse to evictions and affordability hurdles.
Where to find resources for shelters, warming centers
Warming centers and respite locations are available across metro Detroit. Wintertime and frigid conditions can be fatal for those who are homeless and living out on the streets.
Detroit: To get into shelters and warming centers, families and individuals must call the Coordinated Assessment Model, or CAM — the main way for people facing homelessness in Detroit, Hamtramck and Highland Park to access housing help. To reach CAM, those in need of shelter can call at 313-305-0311, from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, according to its website.
People can also go to an in-person CAM site at the following locations:
- Cass Community Social Services: 11850 Woodrow Wilson St., 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday
- NOAH at Central: 23 E. Adams Ave. (second floor), 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday
Outside of CAM’s hours, people experiencing homelessness can go to three warming centers. Space is limited, according to CAM Detroit.
- Cass Community Social Services (families and single women): 1534 Webb St.
- Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries (families and single women): 12900 W. Chicago
- Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries (single men): 3535 Third Ave.
For more information, go to camdetroit.org.
Detroit recreation centers and public libraries are available during regular operating hours. The Detroit Public Library main library in Midtown is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday; noon to 8 p.m., Tuesday and Wednesday and 1-5 p.m. Sunday. For neighborhood library branch hours, go to detroitpubliclibrary.org. For a list of City of Detroit recreation centers and when they are open, go to https://camdetroit.org/code-blue/.
Detroiters who are facing homelessness or housing insecurity can also call the city of Detroit’s Housing Resource HelpLine at 866-313-2520. The hours are 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 9 a.m. to noon Saturday. Outside of the helpline’s hours, city officials urged residents to go to the nearest police precinct.
Wayne County: For a roundup of warming centers, go to https://bit.ly/WayneCountyWarmingCenters.
Macomb County: For a list of warming centers in Macomb County and resources for those facing homelessness, go to bit.ly/MacombCountyWarmingCenters and download the list. The list was updated in November 2024.
Oakland County: For a map of available warming centers, go to bit.ly/3CjF2Zi.
To find an emergency shelter and other resources by ZIP code, call the Michigan 211 service or go to mi211.org/.
Andrea Sahouri covers criminal justice for the Detroit Free Press. Contact her at[email protected] or on X:@andreamsahouri.
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