10 GROUNDCOVER NEWS DETROIT 99 Problems & Dr. Bob ain't one! TOMMY SPAGHETTI Groundcover vendor No. 669 Once again the City of Detroit in its infinite ignorance decided to raid Dr. Bob's property and seize seven goats (two were pregnant) from his urban farm on Goldengate near John R and 7 mile. At 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, Feb. 6, Detroit's Animal Control, with a posse of 20 utilizing 13 motor vehicles, took into custody Dr. Bob's goats Smokey, Angel and Perfect. and detained them at an undisclosed location. Not to diminish the burden of U.S. citizens who are being rounded up like animals, it reminded me of an ICE raid!! With all the problems Detroit has, such as 40,000 abandoned homes, 20,000 abandoned businesses, misappropriation of hundreds of millions of dollars, high crime rates, rampant drug proliferation (crystal meth), lowest high school completion rates, how can Detroit justify the cost of utilizing all these city employees to destroy Dr. Bob's goats? I realize I’m begging the question here in Groundcover and not focusing on the legality of “goats in the city.” I feel compelled to remind folks that Detroit suffered the largest demonstrable exodus in human history; over two million people left Detroit from 1967 to 2001. You may not have noticed the economic vacuum because it transpired over 30 years. Detroit has been struggling to lure people (and tax base) back ever since. Robert Pizzimenti, aka Dr. Bob, bought a mixed-use building at 18700 Woodward Ave in 2001 and gradually transformed the decaying location into beautiful flower gardens with two water treatments. He called it The Psychedelic Healing Shack, affectionately The Shack or Dr. Bob’s. Despite being sandwiched between Palmer Park and the extreme Robinwood ghetto, Dr Bob’s stayed a successful commercial establishment offering chiropractic and healing services as well as a vegetarian cafe. For 25 years, The Shack has been a pioneering force in the revitalization of Detroit, particularly the integration of city/farm life, but also in Black/White relations. Yes, race relations. The Shack is a place where folks go to commingle in a unique atmosphere of love and hope. I have known Dr. Bob since 1989 and have been fortunate enough to witness the positive influence he has been in our amazing city. A chiropractor by profession, Dr. Bob is also a master gardener/farmer, herbalist, animal lover, vegan chef (the BEST vegan lasagna), antique collector, community center provider, free food distributor (as well as emergency shelter provider for artists during the freezing months) and patron of the arts. Last but not least, he is a mentor to many young people missing fathers. The noblest endeavor in all of humanity might be "being a father to the fatherless." I don’t agree with everything Dr. Bob says or does, but I do believe his net value is extremely high. There have been many notable people who have found The Shack charming and newsworthy as recently as three months ago. Stephen Colbert's national TV show provided Smokey the Goat his 15 minutes of fame by reporting Smokey's escape and misperceived havoc in the sparsely populated neighborhood of Goldengate. The hilarity of the Stephen Colbert episode has been countered by the severity of Detroit's punishment. Detroit leads the nation in urban farming with the highest number of community farms per-capita. The urban farm renewal projects are essential for Detroit's recovery. Flooding the land with food rather than motor oil, Dr. Bob has been quietly amending the soil by acquiring goats and chickens to remediate it organically. Laws against farm animals need amending. Laws are always slow to accommodate the changing needs of the citizens. The persecution of Dr. Bob is ultimately the result of a personal grudge city attorneys have against him. Here's the story … a young woman named Mahri plus her pet cat moved into The Shack. The problem began when “she refused to clean up her cat’s pissing problem.” Dr. Bob asked Mahri to leave, which she refused to do. Her subsequent forced removal prompted her to say, "I'm going to report you to my parents. They are city attorneys and they will shut you down." That was not the beginning of Dr. Bob's conflict with Detroit; it only exacerbated it. Yes, the city has so much vacant land. Yes, the city benefits immeasurably from being seen as an urban farming city. Maybe, it seems wrong to have petting zoo animals present in the city but IT SHOULD NOT BE A CRIME. Hopefully this is part of the effort to make Detroit farm friendly. Hopefully Dr. Bob’s situation contributes to the struggle to make Detroit farm friendly. JULY 24, 2026 Smokey, Perfect and Angel shortly before their incarceration. 250 YEARS from page 6 The Connecticut compromise is Philadelphia was completed and signed in September 1787. Representatives at the Philadelphia convention debated several issues and made many recommendations to the Continental Congress. Among the recommendations were “The New Jersey Plan” and “The Connecticut Compromise.” The key debate was about fair representation. The New Jersey Plan proposed a “Unicameral legislature,” meaning that Congress would be one House of Representatives, without the Senate. It also proposed that every state would get one vote and that Congress should have new powers to levy taxes and to regulate interstate commerce and foreign trade. Another controversial plan during the Philadelphia convention was “The Virginia Plan” which proposed a bicameral legislature with both the House and Senate being determined by population sizes. This proposal favored large states during the 18th century. described as the proposal which saved the 1787 Constitutional convention from being a huge failure. It helped to resolve the acrimonious debate between small states and large states. The compromise proposed bicameral congressional representation — the House of Representatives apportioned by population, and the Senate with equal representation for all states regardless of size or population. A major feature of the 1878 Constitutional Convention was “The Separation of Powers.” There would be three branches of government and they were expected to be co-equal. Article 1 established Congress. Article 2 established the presidency (Executive Branch). Article 3 established the Judiciary (the federal court systems, including the Supreme Court). The drafters of the Constitution anticipated that in the future, amendments to the Constitution might be needed. The constitution is supposed to be “A Living Constitution” which requires the votes of two-thirds of the states in order to change or amend it. (The first ten amendments are the Bill of Rights.) The Civil War amendments freed slaves with the 13th Amendment, and the 14th Amendment gave birthright citizenship to former slaves and their children. The 15th Amendment, passed in 1870, gave Black men the right to vote. It is noteworthy that in the Dred Scott case of 1857, Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger B. Tanney of Tennessee and his SCOTUS majority allies ruled that Black people were not considered citizens of America; that they were brought to the nation as slaves and there was no intention by the government to accord them the right of citizenship. The 15th amendment was necessary to nullify the effects of this decision. The 19th Amendment gave the right and freedom to vote to American women who prior had been denied full participation in the political process. The rights which conferred the privileges and immunity of citizenship were extended to children of - immigrants in subsequent Supreme Court decisions. This year, we urge our readers to celebrate and reflect on America’s 250year anniversary of constitutional democracy. It is also a time to have conversations with your family, friends and neighbors. There seem to be many levels of contradiction and paradoxes in the American democracy experiment. However, America is still a beacon of hope for many people around the world. Recently, there was a huge gathering in an old theater in Philadelphia. Pennsylvania's governor, Josh Shapiro, retold a story about how one of the founding fathers, Ben Franklin, left the Independence Hall and was walking down a cobblestone street. He ran into a woman who was not at the Independence Hall, but knew that they were drafting the Constitution. She asked Franklin, “What do we have after the delegates signed, a monarchy or a republic?” Ben Franklin replied, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
11 Publizr Home