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By Bobby M. Reyes
Part Two of a Series on the "Politics of Economic Development" for Detroit and Other Financially-distressed Cities
I did not go to Detroit, Michigan, in August 2011 just
to attend a journalists' convention or meet long-time friends or see
face-to-face some of my corporate contacts. I went to Motown on a
mission. I told my friends and new acquaintances that I was delivering a
vision on how to save the city from financial ruin.
Now that
Motown has officially sought the protection of the Bankruptcy Court,
perhaps the policy-and-decision makers of Detroit may revisit the
visionary ideas of economic development that I tried to "sell" to them
-- as coursed through Detroit's Fourth Estate and my contacts at General Motors.
The first step I thought was to persuade the two major newspapers of
Detroit to help me spread the vision. So I looked for the proper
contacts at the Asian-American Journalists Association (AAJA) convention. Then
after talking briefly with the media powers-that-be about my visionary
proposals, I sent them this e-mail on how to "reinvent" newspaper
publishing, so as to begin the first step of rescuing Motown from the
coming bankruptcy.
Here are excerpts from a letter that I sent:
QUOTE.
Mr. Paul E. Anger
Editor and Publisher
Detroit Free Press
Dear Mr. Anger:
It was a pleasure to have met you and Madame Anger
at tonight's Awards Banquet of the Asian-American Journalists
Association (AAJA). As I told you, I had the pleasure of meeting your
Ms. Julie Topping at the AAJA function at the COBO last Thursday. I
immediately sent her an e-mail, as a summary of what I told her. At the
end of this instant correspondence is a copy of the said e-mail to Ms.
Topping, who has not yet acknowledged receipt of it.
RE: "Reinventing" the Newspaper Publishing Industry
and even Journalism as a Profession. As I told you last night, the
business model is the Green Bay Packers NFL Football Team. My idea is to
turn the newspaper's subscribers into stakeholders, along (or in
partnership) with the publisher, editors, writers, photojournalists and
employees. It would be easy actually to adopt revised Corporate Bylaws
(and even what I call a Covenant with the Public) of, and for, the
"reinvented" business operations. (This will be the job of internal
lawyers and/or outside attorneys plus financial advisers who will be
hired for the said purposes.) Here is a brief description of a
conceptual framework of approach for saving the newspaper and its
employees, while protecting the interests of the public, as represented
by the subscribers (AKA stakeholders), and Ombudsman -- and helping
jump-start the American economy as a bonus:
1.0 Ownership. The newspaper, as a corporation,
will have to be turned into a Fourth-Estate version of the Green Bay
Packers (as explained above and further amplified below).
1.1 There will be no conflict between
editorial and business functions. The Editorial Department can still
have its full independence (or autonomy) and the Business Office,
as empowered by the Board of Directors (or Trustees), can run the
various enterprises (business operations).
1.2 Many ethnic groups will find an
opportunity to become part of the ownership of a media company quite an
attractive option, considering that they will have a stake in it, plus
some fringe benefits, the details of which can be amplified further on
your request.
2.0 The stakeholders, namely the publishers,
editors, writers, photojournalists, newspaper employees, subscribers and
other shareholders or members will then form a consumers' cooperative
and a credit union (or take over or join an existing small credit
union). There will be of course incentives for subscribers to become
stakeholders, as part of their subscription payments can be credited to
the payment of their shares of stocks (or membership) and other benefits
-- from share of profits, referral commissions, etc.
2.1 The
co-op and/or a credit union will then have to buy on group rates the
members' needs for insurance (auto, life, disability, homeowners, etc.),
cellphone service, Internet service, cable or satellite
connections and/or even their purchases of major items such as
appliances and motorcars/vehicles, and/or travel or vacations. This will
enable the members to save money on their purchases for goods (at
almost wholesale prices) and/or services with the co-op and/or credit
union earning over-ride commissions from the vendors or suppliers.
(Actually this practice is being done now by banks, credit unions and
other financial institutions.)
2.1.1 As in my plan to "reinvent"
the Filipino-American media and the Filipino Fourth Estate (as conduits
for constructive changes in the Overseas-Filipino communities and in the
Philippine homeland), we have offered to market the vehicles of General
Motors. We told GM executives that with the right advertising and
promotional support, we can sell a million vehicles to Overseas
Filipinos and in the Philippines in about 15 years or earlier. At an
average marketing fee (or rebate/income of $1,000 per vehicle), we can
actually generate a minimum of a billion dollars (that can surely fund
proposed activities such as real-estate development, putting up
a Filipino alternative press, pay-TV operations in the USA, Canada and
the Philippines, reforestation, cleaning of bays and rivers,
student-loan funds, setting up of a Filipino HMO, charter schools and
other relevant social services). This will be in addition to building
other profit centers such as a movie studio with a nearby international
airport and what we call the "Las Vegas-Caribbean Cultural and Gaming
Resorts of the Orient." All our proposed projects will also generate the
support of, and investments from, our American, Taiwanese-American and
Italian-American partners/investors and Overseas-Filipino stakeholders.
Filipino-American households earn collectively more-than $92-billion
(spelled with a B).
2.1.2 It may be easy for our
proposed plan to entice the more-than 500,000 Filipino nurses, 22,000
Filipino physicians and tens of thousands of other Filipino medical
professionals in the United States to join, and invest in, the ventures
-- once our international consortium is formed. As I have been telling
fellow Filipinos, "it takes now more-than a village to do anything good;
it now takes an internation consortium to do it".
2.2 The newspaper corporation (as
reorganized) must then diversify into other collateral enterprises (such
as hardcopy/e-books, script writing and production of films, especially
documentary films), Pay-TV operations for selected minorities in the
United States and Canada, provided the feasibility studies done for the
ventures will show excellent chances for modest returns on investments
(ROI).
2.2.1 There are other economic
activities that the reorganized newspaper corporation can do (such as
ethnic festivals, book and/or travel fairs, concerts, ethnic
church-choir competition, etc.) All of these activities can easily
attract corporate sponsors because the newspaper itself is the major
organizer or co-sponsor.
2.3 There are other activities that
can be chosen as short-, medium- and long-term goals and objectives.
These can all be treated like items in a conveyor belt of an assembly
plant, with projects being accelerated (from long-term to short- or
medium-term, if the right circumstances or favorable factors are
present) or put back on the drawing board.
It you and/or your Business Department are interested in discussing the
ideas, I can drop by at your office on Monday, August 15, 2011, at any
time at your convenience. I will be returning to Los Angeles, Californa,
on Tuesday morning. Or we can discuss more the ideas by e-mail and/or
telephone and if we can arrive at a meeting of minds, then I can discuss
them personally with you when I return to Detroit to conclude my
negotiations with the General Motors executives late this month or early
next month.
Thank you for the attention.
Best wishes,
Bobby M. Reyes
==========================================
-----Original Message-----
From: mediabcla <mediabcla@aol.com>
To: jtopping <jtopping@freepress.com>
Sent: Thu, Aug 11, 2011 11:17 pm
Subject: RE: Rev. Leon Howard Sullivan (1922-2001)
Ms. Julie G. Topping
Managing Editor
Detroit Free Press
Dear Ms. Julie:
Thank you for your courtesy during our meeting at
the 22nd Convention of the Asian-American Journalists Association at the
COBO today.
As I told you, it might interest you and your media
organization to know that our group of Filipino-American writers and I
have been working on a new biographical book on Rev. Leon Howard
Sullivan, who made history by becoming the first Black-American member
of the Board of Directors of General Motors in 1971. He was also the
first Black-American leader to become a Director of any major American
corporation. Our research on the life of Rev. Sullivan is based partly
on the recollections and notes of a Filipino-American community leader,
Ernesto Gange, who was one of his best friends in Philadelphia, PA. Mr.
Gange is our chosen chairman of the budding American-Filipino Public
Affairs Council. It is also possible that our book project may lead to a
full-length film about Rev. Sullivan, which movie project we discussed
with our associate, Francesco Quinn, the actor son of Hollywood legend
Anthony Quinn. (We met, however, a set back on the film project as
Francesco Quinn died on Aug. 5, 2011, of a heart attack while jogging
with his son near his home in Malibu, California. We will talk with the
Quinn Family after the customary period of mourning if it still wants to
join our film project.)
Rev. Sullivan visited the Philippines after he was
introduced by Mr. Gange to Filipino Foreign Affairs Secretary Raul
Manglapus during an event at the United Nations. Rev. Sullivan started
also a job-creation project in the Philippines.
Mr. Gange has also assured us that the Sullivan
Family will assist our book-and-film project about the life and
achievements of Rev. Leon H. Sullivan. If we succeed with the Sullivan
book-and-movie projects, then they could facilitate our proposed new
historical book and a 13-part series of documentary films about the
exploits of some 6,000 Buffalo soldiers that the U.S. Army sent to the
Philippines from 1899 to 1901. Twenty of the Buffalo soldiers defected
to the Philippine Revolutionary Army and more-than 1,200 of them married
Filipino brides after peace was declared by then-President Teddy
Roosevelt on July 4, 1902.
Perhaps you and your esteemed newspaper may be able
to assist us in completing the new book and possible movie about Rev.
Sullivan and eventually those about the Buffalo soldiers..
UNQUOTE.
P erhaps Paul E. Anger and/or Julie G. Topping and some officers of the Detroit Media Partnership (whom I met also during the AAJA convention and who were provided copies of my e-mail to Mr. Anger) thought that I must have been crazy for
sending such a proposal that would make Detroit the "New Hollywood" and
the "New Las Vegas" of the Midwest and/or replace New York as the center
of the American media. They never bothered to reply to my e-mails
although Mr. Anger left a voice mail in my cell phone that he was sorry
that he could not see me as he was just very busy at that time.
My
contacts at General Motors did not also bother to reply to my proposals
about "reinventing Detroit." Although they did invite me to be their
guest at the AAJA convention. (I traveled to Detroit at my expense.)
(To be continued ...)
To read Part One, please click or copy and paste to the browser this URL:
http://www.mabuhayradio.com/politics/how-motown-can-deliver-the-big-mo-for-the-american-economic-renaissance
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