Smart Communities

Steel Still Exists

I grew up in Birmingham, AL, an iron and steel town. I described Birmingham just this week to a group of friends and told of the beautiful residential sections thanks to steel money. Though steel production in Birmingham is pretty much has long gone, the residual is still to be seen. But not just in homes but in museums, park, you name it. The same is true in Pittsburgh where steel reigned supreme for a long time but is losing ground. Well it ain't over yet folks.

It seems that Pueblo, CO, a large western steel town is retrofitting and will retain manufacturing through its energy production. While it might not be steel as it once was, new opportunities are moving into town. A Danish company will make windmills for one example. Long a state that was an energy leader, Colorado is getting in the act of energy production in a big way. The wind is blowing differently in Pueblo and that is a good thing for lots of workers.

Other places are creating new futures for steel towns like two Pennsylvania towns and Great Britain's Corby. Steel will likely not come back the way it was but there is a future for steel towns.

Doing What You Love--Brains to Horses

Normally this column is about the mechanics of community development. Don't worry I am not changing that. But today I want to call your attention to a great story about a former neuroscience professor who has become a horse trainer. Having grown up with horses, Michelle Nihei got her Ph.D. at the University of Kentucky and taught at Johns Hopkins University. Her early life with horse kicked in however when she visited Keeneland Track in Lexington, KY. She knew where she needed to be. She is now at Saratoga and successfully learning the ropes as a trainer.

This article illustrated once again that it is where you end up that matters not where you start. I am impressed and inspired that she has the courage to change her course. Often people and the communities they live in are reluctant to change courses. They are scared to change or just plain stubborn. While I don't advocate moving from job to job or program to program in the community sense, I do think we have got to be open to the changes that feel right. When I asked a number of the interviewees for Smart Communities how they knew their direction for the community was right, they all said that they just knew.

Housing Looking Up

Today's news had two conflicting articles. One describing the lack of consumer confidence despite the improving economy and the other describing the improving housing market.  I myself prefer the second one. 

I am hearing more and more about people who have sold their home and are buying another. One family from Northern Virginia, typically a hot market, had their home for sale for almost a year with lots of lookers but no buyers. Almost to the day when they gave up and rented a house in city where they were moving--it sold. This seems to be happening a lot.

While I don't want to be accused of the "head in the sand" phenomenon, I do think we are beginning to see a little light here. People are still hurting and the unemployment numbers continue to be heartbreaking. That is where the focus should be now. Here is how it looks from Los Angeles county. Housing may just be playing out the supply and demand principle once again.

Public Housing Get a Second Chance

Public housing developments in many locations are getting an overhaul. In some cases wearing the age of 30 years or more, they are in need of repair and have not delivered the kind of home environment for which they were intended. Atlanta is one of the first cities to tear down all their developments but many others are re-evaluating and reassessing the next steps for low-income housing. Actually public housing makes up a relatively small percentage of the funds going to low-income housing so it has not been front and center for some time on the policy front. In fact Chicago, the city with first public housing, now has a museum to document its beginnings. Where public housing is front and center is with the residents who still live there. Many are wondering what next? Is this re-assessment phase the modern word for urban renewal again. Will they be displaced from their neighborhoods again?

People deserve safe and affordable housing but they also need connections to friends, job, and networks of all types. The first urban renewal destroyed some of that in the name of progress. Let's not do that again.

Zip Codes Matter

My friend, Ralph Smith of The Annie E. Casey Foundation, posed this question to a Pew Partnership gathering some years ago: "What is the one statistic that tells you more about poverty than any other?" The answers were predictable: race, socio-economic status, pre-K experience... you get the drift. The answer Ralph gave us: zip code. You can predict certain characteristics based on where people live. That fact has not been lost on Kansas City. An article today in the Kansas City Star identified one area of Kansas City where educational attainment is low and poverty is high. They are beginning their change for the future in that neighborhood. A new study from the Pew Center on Economic Mobility confirms that the children of middle class Blacks who live in high poverty are disadvantaged in education and other outcomes. Zip code matters folks and it is a great organizing point to start the process of providing equal opportunity to all.

Back to School Needs Increasing

I wrote last week about the need for Back to School supplies but a conversation I had yesterday and this article from the Atlanta Constitution or this program from Snohomish County, OR, encouraged me to bring it up again. Not only are the needs greater I am told but the need for basics like pencils and paper are going up. We used to be concerned that children would not have new shoes or new backpacks but now we are told that they may not have anything unless the community steps in to help. I am also told that stores have good deals on supplies right now. Find out what your community is doing today. Even if you can spare only a dollar or two, you can make a difference.

Salisbury Gets it Right

You cannot imagine how discouraging it is to give a speech and/or a workshop on what you know to be true and people not do anything. This was not the case in Salisbury, NC> You read a few postings ago about the Salisbury reading program. This is a great community that has too many children left behind. They decided this spring to do something about it. Thought you might be interested in what happened. I think this work and what is happening is Richmond, Indiana, are models for all communities. Most places need to just get started. Here are two ways. 

Brown v. Board of Education--Sumner School has a Story

Sumner Elementary School in Topeka, KS, has just been purchased. This is the white school that third-grader Linda Brown's father, Oliver, sued the Topeka School Board in 1954 so she could attend. The school was closed some years back and was recently put up for bid. A church group bought it in hopes of making it a museum. I applaud the group and am glad the school is in good hands but I do wonder what the Topeka community is thinking. The National Park Service features it in sites related to Topeka. Monroe Elementary, the all-Black school where Linda Brown attended before Sumner, was selected to house the historical museum because Sumner was still in use at the time. Why has this not been a museum since 1996 when it was closed? The city says it is simply money--they could not afford to renovate it so it was used for storage. This just doesn't work for me. The Civil Rights Movement is something to be learned from and this court case and this school are front and center. Little Rock has done that with Central High School. Birmingham has done that with the Civil Rights Institute. Memphis has done that with the Lorraine Motel.

Topeka has missed a tremendous opportunity I think to include this school in its heritage.  I could see a walking tour between the two schools--Monroe and Sumner--with students talking about their experiences from 1954. Maybe all that is being done over at the museum at Monroe but I just wish the community had stepped up on this one. 

Community Colleges Can Be the Engine

President Obama's community college bill is a win-win as David Brooks suggests. It gives students hope and it gives the country a concrete way for localities to blaze the trail to the global economy. Community colleges provide lower cost tuition for the first two years of higher education but, in addition, they offer technical training that is essential to our long-term future. Many nurses get their start in community colleges as do HVAC technicians and a whole array of specialties that community colleges can offer before the skill is obsolete. Read a proposal out of Michigan that gives them a broader reach. Interesting.

The challenge for community colleges is to be cutting-edge, be the engine not the caboose. While faced with enormous cuts at the state levels that threaten their programs, these institutions still have to be on the front lines of technology and offerings. This is what this new money will help them do. But it won't be enough. They will need local support, business partners, and high schools collaborations. Community in their name means something.

Higher Education Cannot Be Forgotten

E.J. Dionne's column in the Washington Post (7/16/09) on the "quiet" crisis of higher education funding was an eye-opener for me. While we tend to get caught up in the challenges posed by K-12, Dionne reminds us that many students do not go on to higher education for one reason--money. President Obama's action regarding community colleges can help alleviate some of this financial strain but not enough says Dionne. We have to do more and do it now if we are not to fall behind in the global economy even more. 

As vice chair of the board at our local community college, I think Obama has picked a good place to invest. But what E.J. Dionne's challenge suggests to me is less about pieces and more about somebody, somewhere thinking about a system of education--pre-K through baccalaureate--and devising a plan to make that happen as efficiently and as effectively as we can. Now who might we need to help us think about this? I would suggest college and university presidents who can be the link throughout the system and help recommend programs and priorities at all levels so this will happen. While we may be heavy on commissions and "Special Assistants for" in this administration, this is one place where a Blue Ribbon group with some teeth can make a difference. I have been calling on college and university presidents to get in the policy game again for some time, here is their chance.