A Letter to My Community: Don’t Make the Wrong People Suffer

Context: Unable to afford maintenance costs, Bay City, Michigan leased two of the four bridges spanning the Saginaw River to a private company, United Bridge Partners. Things are not going well. Along with delays and broken promises, UBP installed tolls at a cost of $5 to cross an 200-foot bridge one way, and then announced that the monthly price for toll transponders was doubling from $15 to $30 a month. People are ANGRY—I am, too—and rightfully so. But there’s a not-insignificant amount of people encouraging others to “boycott downtown” and the businesses there. This piece is my response.

Dear Bay City,

So, the bridge situation sucks. No argument there. We SHOULD be angry. But Bay City, boycotting downtown? That’s like taking a swing at your mom because Tommy Terwilliger stole your lunch money in third grade. She worked hard for you, made sure you had something good in this world, and she's the one getting punished? What kind of logic is that? The only possible outcome in that scenario is hurting someone who actually cared about you—while the guy who wronged you? He’s still out there, and still an asshole.

Boycotting downtown doesn’t hit those responsible for this mess—it just kneecaps people trying to keep this city breathing. People who get up every morning and do something for Bay City. They build, feed, create. Talk to any of them and they’ll likely tell you that 2024 was the hardest year as a business since 2020, and your big move in response to a problem they didn’t cause is to make sure they struggle even more?

That’s not justice–it’s careless. That’s not community–it’s cruel. That’s not a protest—it’s abuse.

Is that the kind of community we are? One that becomes so overwhelmed by its challenges that instead of solving them, it recklessly tries to hurt itself even more?

It’s self-sabotage at its dumbest.

That CAN’T be who we are.

Be mad. Be furious. But aim that rage at the right people. Channel it into something that actually moves the needle.

Because let’s break this down:

Not buying Tim’s tacos means fewer tacos for you, one step closer to losing everything for him—and the tolls are still $30 a month.

Protest the pizza at G’s? You eat less pizza, they lose money that keeps them open—and the tolls are still $30 a month.

What if a boycott closed the doors of every business in downtown? That might really show the Bridge Partners, right? No downtown, no Wednesdays in the Park, no riverwalk or Tall Ships or bass tournaments or Third Street Star Bridge or pedal trolley or line dancing or St. Laurent Brothers.

And guess what?

The tolls would still be $30 a month.

Let’s take this lunacy to its logical extreme. The bridges go both ways, right? Why stop at downtown? Let’s go full scorched earth.

Bar the doors of every small business on Midland Street. Destroy any business on Wilder and Euclid that isn’t a national chain. Auburn is toast. Ship all the cheddar from Pinconning to Frankenmuth because its cheese-making days are OVER. Boycott every small business in Bay County and live off Amazon shipments and drive-thru grease.

Burn it all down, and when the smoke clears?

Those bridges?

Thirty bucks a month.

YEAH BUT PHIL I’M SO ANGRY I NEED TO SHOW THE WORLD HOW ANGRY I AM AND WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHINGGGGG

Then fight smart. Boycott Bridge Partners. Don’t buy a transponder. Use the free bridges. Rally people to do the same. Protest in front of their offices. Get other communities dealing with their garbage to rise up, too. Flip double birds at Liberty and Independence when you’re stuck in traffic on Vets. Heck, engage in some civil disobedience—not something I can publicly endorse, but…I may not be mad about.

Do something that makes sense. Do something that actually lands a punch where it belongs. Do something that sticks it to Tommy and not to your mommy—not the people who’ve been feeding us and keeping this town alive.

And while we’re at it, let’s call bullshit on the bullshitters: there are folks in the "boycott downtown" horde who don’t even go downtown in the first place.

You’re not boycotting—you’re justifying apathy, using two bridges as an excuse for your lack of actual, not-just-on-Facebook community engagement. You don’t get to pretend that’s activism. You don’t get to fire torpedoes at people who have spent years trying to build a better life for themselves and for this community because your mindless retaliation against people who aren’t responsible for a problem makes you feel like you’re finally doing something of merit.

“I’ll never go downtown just like I never do!” isn’t the flex you think it is.

I get it—people are angry. I’m angry, too. But the kind of community people want to be a part of—that YOU want to be a part of—can channel anger into action that solves a problem instead of making it worse.

Bay City deserves better. The businesses in downtown—along with those on Midland Street, in the South End, and everywhere else—show up every day and make it better.

You don’t fix a broken system by making sure the wrong people suffer. You don’t protest a scam by punishing the people who aren’t running it.

You want to take a stand? Take it against the right people. You want to fight back? Fight where it counts. Because if your grand act of rebellion is screwing over folks trying to keep your city afloat, you’re not sticking it to the man—you’re setting fire to your house while the landlord raises the rent.

At the end of the day, you’ve got two choices: You can punish the people who help make your city worth living in, or you can punish the ones trying to bleed it dry. One of those options makes you part of the problem. The other, part of the solution. Pick a side, but don’t pretend both are the same.

Bay City Bridge Partners is hurting our community.

Helping them do it?

That's on us.