The Detroit City Council Public Health and Safety Committee met on Monday, September 21, 2026, at approximately 10:00 AM. The meeting began without a quorum; Chair Gabriela Santiago Romero proceeded with public comments until quorum was achieved. The committee addressed a range of items including demolition contracts, a new airport hangar lease, an HVAC replacement contract, and several resolutions. Public comment was dominated by testimony opposing a proposed Kratom ban resolution.
For today, Monday, September 21st, 2026. May the clerk please call the roll. Councilmember Gabriela Santiago Romero. Present. House Member Denzale and Tom McCampbell. Member McCampbell did indicate that he is running late, so his heartiness is excused. So noted, Madam Chair. Councilmember Mary Waters. Madam Chair, do not have a quorum present. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Understanding that I do not have a quorum. I will just go uh into public comments for today to get committee started and to also respect people's time that might be here this morning for public comments. Everyone will have two minutes for public comment this morning. And I'll cut off public comment at 10.05. So if you are online and you would like to make public comment, please raise your hands now. If you are here in person, if you have already spoken with Hira, you are all set. And we're going to begin to take public comments with the folks that we have here in person. And then once we uh have quorum, I will notice notice quorum. But with that, we can go right ahead with public comments. We'll begin with the folks that we have here in person. We'll begin first with Melody Wolf, followed by David Wolfe. And if you don't mind, uh our EPU officer will direct you to your seats, and we can go two at a time. And again, public comment will be cla cut off at 10.05. So please raise your hands now if you are online. If you would like to make general public comments. Whenever you are ready, ma'am, the time is online. Make sure you're looking at the time. Everyone will have the same amount of time. And when you are ready, you can begin. My name is Melody Wolf, and I'm here to speak about Kratom. There are 75 million chronic pain patients in the United States, and I'm one of them. Thousands of chronic pain patients suffer every minute of every day, and after years of that, it becomes pretty debilitating. I was bedridden for eight years, needing a walker in wheelchair. And this is when I had three kids in elementary school. Um they were all some of them, a couple of them were in lower L even. Um life was pretty dismal for us. You can imagine with Edward and mom. The kids had to have a fan on the room at night so they could go to sleep because they would hear me crying downstairs. Um they didn't get to just because I didn't get to have their mom out in the audience at their concerts waving at them and clapping like that. Um, and that's what that was that's been the cost of chronic pain to my life. And we have an opioid crisis, a lot of people aren't talking about, and that's the under treatment of chronic pain. Now the opioid crisis has taken countless. There were pill mills, there was an expansion of prescribing, and rightly so. We needed to take care of that. And then what happened? The pendulum slung exactly in the opposite direction, too far again. To where now we're dealing with thousands and thousands of chronic pain patients like me who don't have any um who don't have have any relief. And so we need really need to keep this in the toolbox. Um creato has changed my life so much and that of my family. I'm able to be there for my children now.