That the Detroit's City Council rejected "as stupid" the proposed deal between Mayor Dave Bing and Gov. Rick Snyder to have the state take over control of Belle Isle gave me a sense of déjà vu.

More on that later.

"They started celebrating before they gave it to us. I don't understand how Mayor Bing could co-sign this," said council President Charles Pugh.

"This has no benefit to the city, other than some new sheds. Hell, we could buy some new sheds on our own," he said.

No benefit? Really? As one who spends a lot of time on the island, year round, who has been on every bike path and trail, who knows where the raspberries grow in the forest in the middle of the island in early summer and who knows where the secret beach is, the one called Hipster Beach (though I have no claim to hipness), I can only say:

"Mr. Pugh, have you ever been on the island on a Monday morning in the summer to see the pyramids of trash and been back on a Wednesday to see that they remain?

"Have you ever walked gingerly through the fields of poison ivy that no one has bothered to trim back, growing profusely on and along the footpaths the fishermen use to get to their fishing holes on the eastern end of the island?

"Did you ever see the hundreds of trees that the National Football League folks planted on the island in 2006 as part of their carbon offset program? The ones that all fried and died because no city employees ever watered them or removed the plastic tubes the saplings sat in and became death tubes the next summer, when the sun beat down inside them and scorched out all life?

"Did you ever see the old dead trees that blow over during storms and then lay there for months?

"Have you ever been in the woods, walking along the canal where paddleboats and canoes for rent used to float slowly by? The canal that is now clogged by trees that have fallen down over the years and clogged by the garbage that has been thrown in or blown in?

"Have you ever seen the potholes or disintegrating pavement — does the Grand Prix ring a bell? — or been on the bike paths that run through the woods and are nearly impassable in their utter disrepair?