It's a chilly Monday morning in Detroit, capital of US auto industry. Ricky Martin, a 7-year-old boy, is playing basketball with his brother in front of an abandoned house in downtown Detroit.

Like the little Martin, as many as 7,500 kids, may not have a chance to go to school next month as the local government is planning to shut down more than 20 public schools.

Detroit Public Schools' emergency financial office announced last week that 600 teachers will be laid off in an attempt to reduce a projected US$303-million deficit. A final decision on the closings of 23 schools would be released by May 8.

"It's ridiculous, no body cares about our kids, they are the future of Detroit, the future of America," Sarah Bell, a retired public school teacher told Xinhua.

"I don't know what's going on with the government, they rescued AIG, but leave the working people in the big D (Detroit) struggling for their lives and kids. That's too bad," she complained. "I grew up here and have served for 40 years in the city. This is the worst time I have even seen in my life."

"It's really hard to get a job here, half of graduate students leave the city. If you are lucky enough to get a job, you'd better not expecting any pension or welfare," the African-American lady added.

Detroit, a city founded in 1701 and became the world's automotive capital in last century, is experiencing the toughest time in its history as the US auto-industry is reaching a life-and-death juncture amid the most severe financial crisis since 1929.

"The city has been in trouble in the past 50 years," said Sridhar Lakshmanan, a professor at University of Michigan, who witnessed the city's ups and downs.

"You can see abandoned houses everywhere in the urban area, people would no longer to live here. They could not afford the mortgage payment after the housing prices have been cut to half in the last three year, and they are losing their jobs, so they just leave. This town has become a ghost town."

The population of the auto-town has fallen from a peak of roughly 1.8 million in 1950 to about half that number today. While the unemployment rate rose to more than 16 percent in 2008, the highest since 1980s, abandoned structures created havens for drug dealers and criminals.

The city has been under deep water as the largest US auto-maker, General Motors Corp. may go into bankruptcy if it fails to make a quick and deep restructure.

"I hope that the big three will never go under, otherwise it could be a disaster for the city and people living here," said H Derrick Alexander, whose father had been working for GM since 1970s.

"My father is retired, my mother is in poor health condition, if the company files for bankruptcy, oh my God, the pension, healthcare, we don't know what can we rely on," said the young African-American.

About 7,500 GM workers have signed up to take buyout and early retirement incentives to leave the company last month. The latest round of buyouts and early retirements at GM was the third for the company since 2006. From all three offers, more than 60,000 workers have decided to leave the company.

"We could not just let the auto-industry fail. It has been the heartbeat of America, it is the heartbeat of Detroit. Now it seems that it's losing the heartbeat," he added. "We need to be helping out."

(Xinhua News Agency April 14, 2009)