Winds Howling

A new little park has been proposed for Clinton Township, just a couple miles down the road from me. Called “Unity Park,” it’s supposed to be something that heals a “disconnect” in the community and brings people together, according to the developer.

But what “disconnect” are we healing, exactly?

The Columbus Day vs. Indigenous Peoples Day argument.

And how is the park going to bring these two sides together?

With a big sculpture and historical placards commemorating explorers who “discovered” various lands around the world, of course!

The park seems well-intentioned enough, but I had to laugh at that.

It’s being proposed by the Moceri family, big-time developers and home-builders in this area stretching back several generations. Their inspiration to honor the world’s explorers has its origin in a particularly feisty 2022 meeting of the Clinton Township Board of Trustees, where the hot controversy was the board’s decision to rename Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples Day on its calendar. Italian Americans make up about one-fifth of Clinton Township’s population, according to our local newspaper, and more than a dozen of them showed up and spoke for nearly an hour in defense of Columbus Day, punctuated by frequent bouts of clapping (including a disgraceful standing ovation from then-township supervisor Bob Cannon, who was promptly and correctly reprimanded by the trustee seated next to him). The speakers included Dominic J. Moceri, a current elder of the building family, who explained why the issue was “very personal” to him.

My father celebrated his last birthday on Columbus Day. … Our whole family went to the state capitol to receive the Columbus Day award for the entire family. … Probably 65% to 70% of the households constructed in Clinton Township, of which we reside in, were built by my direct relatives. … But it’s not about our family. It’s about everybody. It’s about everybody that’s come to this country, not just Italians, everybody that’s immigrated that found a new way and a new course.

The hullabaloo carried over into the next meeting, where the board voted down a proposal to mark all of October as Italian American Heritage Month, then unanimously agreed to reinstate Columbus Day on the second Monday in October and put Indigenous Peoples Day on Aug. 9. The Italian Tribune, a more-than-100-year-old Italian newspaper based in Detroit, got a photo of Moceri kissing another attendee on the cheek in celebration.

It was earlier during this meeting that Moceri announced a “gift” his family would give the community. Instead of going through with already-approved housing units on a strange little parcel next to the Italian American Cultural Society, they would build Unity Park, “a place to celebrate the collective traditions of indigenous peoples and all immigrants from around the globe in the spirit of one people.”

Here’s the originally proposed logo for this shrine to unity:

Trustee Julie Matuzak had a suggestion. If the park is “truly about unity,” she said, then it might somehow acknowledge that “there were folks that don’t meet the definition of immigrants, that were brought here in chains. We need to recognize that history if it’s really going to be a unifying thing.”

“If they’re Americans, they’ll be included,” Moceri said. “If they’re guests, they’ll be included. We’re all included in this.”

Tammy Patton, the only black member of the board, remarked on what she observed in the audience when the word “slavery” was mentioned.

“I looked around, I heard people go, oh, here we go again. I saw people put their face down and say, here we go,” she said. “That was disappointing to see when everybody’s here speaking of inclusivity. … I heard it, and I saw it, and I know some of you, so that let me know where you stand with me.”

Flash forward to 2026, and Moceri’s nephew, also named Dominic Moceri, is before the Planning Commission presenting Unity Park. As proposed, it consists of brick pathways and a 25-foot abstract sculpture by local artists Erik and Israel Nordin.

Erik explained that the seven-sided base represents the seven continents, while the protruding circle is supposed to “look like you were looking through a telescope and saw a sail in the distance. It could be any kind of ship from any country.”

The younger Moceri said they’re still planning for the park to provide historical information.

“There’ll be some signage with a QR code — hey, this continent was discovered by so and so, these countries are part of it,” he said.

With furrowed eyebrows, Planning Commissioner Rodney Harris asked: “Who’s making the decision on what explorers are going there?”

“There has not been yet,” Moceri said, sidestepping the “who” part of that question.

“Okay.”

No further questions on that matter.

For his part, the head of the planning commission — himself a former president of the Italian American Cultural Society — thought the park would “enhance that little area.”

After a slightly tedious back and forth with the couple who live next door, the site plan passed unanimously. It’s set to be considered by the Board of Trustees on June 29.

I went over to take a look at the site the other day. The couple next door had been concerned about protecting this “very nice green space” — I guess it’s technically green, and a space, and probably a nice place to kick a soccer ball or plop a picnic blanket (if you can manufacture some shade), but it’s not a particularly inviting expanse of grass at present. It seems like a path and a sculpture would probably be an improvement here, regardless of what the Moceris write on the placards.