For its voters, hosting the second debate of the 2020 Democratic primaries is an opportunity to shed light on systemic issues

For Detroit resident Jerry Hebron, gun control and criminal justice reform issues are personal.

In June, her cousin, who was about to graduate from high school with honors, was gunned down with a high-power rifle. Meanwhile, her only son sits in prison for life without parole for a police murder she says he didn’t commit. His real crime was being a black drug dealer in a corrupt district, Hebron said.

With the second Democratic televised debates taking place in Detroit this week and 20 presidential candidates coming to town, Hebron wants to hear them discuss real ideas on gun control and reforming a justice system she says discriminates against black men.

“They look at these young men as not being salvageable, but [my son], he was a good kid,” said Hebron, a former circuit court employee who runs an urban farm in the city’s North End. “They put them all in one bucket. It’s systemic and they have to make changes, and it takes policy at the top to make changes, and it takes reform.”

If Democrats are hoping to avoid a repeat of 2016’s defeat by Donald Trump, turning out voters in Detroit – a city that is more than 80% black – is essential. Between 2008 and 2016, the number of Detroit voters who cast a ballot during presidential elections dropped from 335,000 to 247,000. The change helped swing the last election to Trump. Democratic candidates typically receive more than 95% of Detroit’s vote, and Trump won Michigan by a slim 10,000 votes.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Democratic presidential candidates from the second night of the Democratic primary debate. Photograph: Byrnn Anderson/AP

Some voters in the city say motivating black voters there requires plans for addressing structural problems like those with which Hebron contends.

Detroiters want to be “inspired” and hear about “systemic change”, said resident Justin Onwenu.

“What a president does that lawmakers can’t do is shift the dynamic and change the conversation,” Onwenu added, noting how effectively Trump has dictated the conversation around immigration. “It really became an issue because the president set the tone aroundit.”

Though the media frequently represents Detroit as a “comeback story”, the reality is different. Downtown areas are rapidly gentrifying while many black neighborhoods continue down a long economic slide, partly because city hall directs the bulk of its resources to areas where white residents from the suburbs are moving to and investing in. Despite all the new development, the city’s tax base is barely growing as residential property values drop and politicians continue to hand wealthy developers tax incentives.

Meanwhile, the city’s median household income of $39,000 is among the nation’s lowest, and about half the city’s children live in poverty. Black residents receive only 34% of the dollars loaned in Detroit despite making up 80% of the population. That is high because some of the most dire neighborhoods have been ignored by city hall.

“If the candidates are gonna come and use Detroit, don’t use it for a backdrop – paint a picture of what you will do so we can be inspired,” said the Rev Charles Williams II.

Keith Williams, the chair of the Michigan Democratic Party Black Caucus, said local government is often focused on helping big business instead of residents: “We can’t get access to capital, the credit scores to hold us back. I don’t want to beg nobody, but level the playing field so I can make it for myself.”

The city’s financially struggling school district spent nearly two decades under state control, and recently had to cut off drinking water in many buildings after finding it contaminated with lead. Corporate donations funded the fix.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A commissioned mural painted by Antonio Cosme, one of two Detroit artists who went to trial for painting ‘Free the Water’ on one of Detroit’s water towers. Photograph: Garrett MacLean/The Guardian

The district’s struggles not only highlights problems with school funding but with segregation: “We have schools that are more segregated than when my mother went to school there. At least there were some white kids when she went,” said Donna Givens, CEO of the Eastside Community Network.

Several voters pointed to Bernie Sanders’ public school proposal as the type of plan needed in Detroit. It would pump federal money into public districts and double starting teacher salaries.

Others raised concerns over the loss of affordable and public housing, including Detroit People Platform’s Linda Campbell, who said research shows some Detroiters are spending 60% of their income on rent. “Yet we’re investing hundreds of millions of dollars on real estate developments that include the build out of luxury housing that most families can’t afford,” she said.

Among the housing proposals that caught Detroiters’ attention is Senator Elizabeth Warren’s American Housing and Economic Mobility Act that would put $450bn to help communities of colorharmed by deliberate segregation, and fund a massive subsidized housing expansion. Senator Kamala Harris recently rolled out a similar plan meant to boost black home ownership.

As the city deals with the nation’s second-highest violent crime rate, a strained relationship exists between black residents and the police. Hebron praised senator Cory Booker’s criminal justice reform proposals, which include clemency for marijuana offenders and a “Second Look” program to re-evaluate the sentences of those over 50 years old with more than 10 years in jail

While some have expressed reservations about Harris’s tenure as a prosecutor for which she has been criticized as being too hard on communities of color, others, like Hebron and Roland Leggett, who is part of the Michigan Democratic Party’s LGBT and Allies Caucus, see her as a reformer: “She pushes back against the injustices that have happened in the past,” Leggett said.

While no voter the Guardian spoke to said they had settled on a candidate, one name came up nearly across the board – Warren.

Attorney Robert Burton-Harris said Warren and Sanders are offering “ideas that are big but feasible, and more than lip service”.

“You can say ‘Oh, we need to change the criminal justice system.’ That could mean anything, but they have specific ideas and are offering specific solutions,” said Burton-Harris. “If you live in Detroit, you can see the problems they’re identifying and how their proposed fixes could work.”