Detroit tears out King of Grass' yard, leaves sand

DETROIT (WJBK) - A landscaper who dubs himself the 'King of Grass' has been staring at a mess of a lawn for more than a year and it took FOX 2 to get to work to get it fixed.

In December of 2015, a water main broke on Riad, near Denby High School in Detroit. It was abig problem and the city came out and fixed the leak. But they didn't fix everything.

Dino Brown says the city tore up his yard to repair the pipe but never came back to fix his lawn.

It was a big water main break back in December 2015, here on Ry-odd, on Detroit's east side. And the city fixed the Watermain break, but not everything.

"They did come and fix the curb and I appreciate that, but I'm the king of grass around here," Brown said.

The King of Grass was left grassless. Instead, he has sand in his front lawn.

He works for Big Mike's Lawn Service as a landscaper and is very proud of his house on the dead end street that sits right next to Skinner Park behind Denby High School. But he's getting a bit impatient.

"If sand could grow grass I would gladly do it, honesty," he said.

FOX 2 learned that the city said it would replace the sand with grass but that's been a few years now. So what's the hold up?

The City says that it fell behind in property restoration because of low collection rates. Now that collection rates are at 91%, in June, the city will start a new approach to restore concrete and lawns after repairs.

As for the King of Grass, he'll be first in line. The city says it will replace his grass first, in June.