DETROIT HEAVY LIFTERS!

MISSED BY TIME: Dan Varner of Think Detroit PAL, left, Detroit Public Schools’ Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb and Jamieson Elementary’s Kimberly Kyff, the 2006 Michigan Teacher of the Year. Not pictured: musician Kid Rock. Detroit Free Press 11/08/2009, Page A27

THEY DO THE CITY PROUD  Magazine’s ‘Committee to Save Detroit’ photo left out these proven leaders As part of its inaugural coverage of what’s happening to Motown, Time magazine published a photo of eight people it dubbed “The Committee to Save Detroit.” The group did not include any black males, and I wondered aloud: Why? In more than 1,100 e-mails, readers wondered, too, and said that Time missed an opportunity to salute a black man (besides Mayor Dave Bing, who had his own profile in the issue) who wasn’t dealing drugs, jacking cars or robbing people. (Yes, there were those expected few who said there were no black men in the picture because there are no black male leaders in Detroit. But let’s move on.) Based on reader suggestions and my own reporting, here’s who else could have been in the photo: Robert Bobb, who is cleaning up the Detroit Public Schools as the district’s emergency financial manager, was suggested four times more than anyone else named in your e-mails. Second to Bobb was Dan Varner, chief executive o fficer of Think Detroit PAL. I added a third committee member, without whom Detroit will surely fail. And that is the Detroit teacher — the instructor, counselor, nurturer, nurse, even bank — for thousands of children. With a hearty endorsement from Detroit Federation of Teachers President Keith Johnson, I chose Kimberly Kyff, Michigan’s Teacher of the Year in 2006 and the first Detroit teacher to receive the award in 21 years. Here’s more about them:  ROBERT BOBB: He’s gotten plenty of attention for his work to clean up the corruption at DPS. Robert Bobb, 64, has overseen more than 84 financial audits, held hearings on bad realestate deals and successfully convinced Detroiters, one neighborhood at a time, to pass a $500.5million bond issue for new and better schools. “Robert Bobb is doing an incredible job,” Mayor Bing said in a statement. “He is the change agent needed to help make education and our children a priority.” Gov. Jennifer Granholm extended his contract through 2011. By then, perhaps Bing will have appointed him the city’s permanent schools czar.  DAN VARNER: The headline on the Feb. 2, 2005, New York Times story read: “Shrinking, Detroit Faces Fiscal Nightmare.” The story was about black middle-class flight from a dying city, and its poster child was Dan Varner, who had relocated his family to Ypsilanti Township. It didn’t stick. Varner moved back to Detroit, heeding the call felt by so many of us who haven’t given up on the city. Now the 40-year-old is CEO of Think Detroit PAL, a merger of a mentoring agency and the former Police Athletic League, that reaches 13,000 children every year through learning and sports programs and teaches children that, with hard work, they can be everything they want to be. “I’m so committed to this city,” said Varner. “The fact that people were e-mailing you and saying I should be there moves me personally. It reflects my renewed commitment and return to the roots of my work.”  KIMBERLY KYFF: Kimberly Kyff, 51, grew up in Orchard Lake Village and attended the University of Michigan. She began teaching at DPS’ Jamieson Elementary 14 years ago. By special arrangement, she follows her students from second through fifth grade. Teaching in an urban school is not for the faint of heart, Kyff said. “My philosophy is all children can learn and they can learn at very high levels, provided they are taken from where they are, accepted how they are and nurtured,” she said. Kyff also mentors younger teachers, telling them: “When you don’t enjoy teaching anymore and aren’t excited and looking forward to going to school, you need to find other options.” Time magazine couldn’t pick everyone. Neither could I. But Detroit should know who its leaders are. They aren’t always on the front page of the newspaper. They don’t all have one foot in or out of jail. Sometimes, they work in silence, saving lives and improving Detroit. But always, they deserve our recognition and support.