Flashpoint: Conversations with Mike Duggan, Lester Holt

New NBC Nightly News anchor talks about his role

DETROIT – This week's episode of Flashpoint began with a conversation with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan. Devin Scillian asked the mayor about public safety and the increasing rate of crime in the city.

"We're not doing enough," Duggan said. "If you look at what's happening, the great majority of these shootings are people with beefs with each other. Sometimes it's over drug turf, but many times it's over disrespect or an argument over a boyfriend or girlfriend."

Duggan said that in most cases, the shootings are between groups that have disputes with each other and use gunfire to try to settle those disputes.

"We need to put more officers on the streets," Duggan said. "Because one of my responsibilities is to give Chief (James) Craig more resources. And he and I and our teams now sit down every week, and we have a plan to put 400 more officers on the street over the next year. We've got 250 officers behind desks who can have their job handled by the retired officers or civilians to move them to the street. We're starting a new police academy class of 30 new officers next week.

Duggan said the plan is to take new officers and to deploy them in the areas with the most gunfire as they come on line.

He also talked about his work with Kym L. Worthy, who is gaining more resources and working alongside the Mayor to tackle crime in Detroit.

Devin spoke with Mayor Duggan about a range of topics surrounding Detroit. You can watch the whole conversation in the video above.

In the second segment, the conversation turned to blight in Detroit. Duggan talked about the massive challenge facing him with blight in Detroit and the progress that his administration has already made.

"We knocked down 4,000 houses in the latter part of last year," Duggan said. "We're knocking down another 4,000 houses this year. And I was on the phone today with the governor's staff and with federal officials to get another batch of funding for when we run out of money this December, how we keep going in January."

He said the demolitions have been targeted toward the strongest neighborhoods in Detroit, aiding the increasing sales prices for housing.

Duggan also touched on the remaining blight in the city and what the next steps are.

Near the end of the conversation, Duggan talked about the new hockey arena and entertainment district and its connection to the blight in the city.

You can watch the second segment in the video posted below.

34243092

Finally, Devin was joined by new NBC Nightly News anchor Lester Holt, who's making his first stop in his tour of NBC affiliates.

Holt said his grandfather lived in Inkster working on aircraft engines and talked about what Detroit means to the rest of the country.

Devin asked Holt if he had to restore the station's credibility as the new anchor.

"I reject that, I was asked that a lot when we did the first round of interviews after I was given the job," Holt said. "The question was 'how do you restore NBC's credibility?' I said 'we never lost it.' We went through a tough time, there's no doubt about it, and an unfortunate period. But the audience stayed with us. We're extremely grateful. They understood that we kept our heads in the game as a newsroom."

Devin asked Holt about his thoughts about the Confederate Flag controversy and the impact of his anchoring of the NBC Nightly News as an African American man.

You can watch the conversation with Lester Holt in the video below.

34243094