The ARTS Schoolhouse Incubator blog-site has been created to facilitate design work by students of the "Design for Massive Change" Masters in Architecture Program at Lawrence Technological University. Operating from and focused on Detroit's oldest Schoolhouse.
Attracting young professionals to Detroit is a key piece to revitalizing the city and improving the economy, Mayor Dave Bing said Friday during his annual address to the business community.Even as the city continues to lose residents, Bing said, young people are moving in and bringing creative ideas, fresh energy and investments with them.That’s why Bing said he plans to make Midtown, a popular spot for young professionals and artists, an important component of his ambitious plan to reshape the city by creating denser neighborhoods with better services.“Midtown is going to be the hot spot,” Bing said at the Westin Book Cadillac hotel. “We’ll see a lot of activity there.”The idea of attracting young people has been tried before on the state level. Former Gov. Jennifer Granholm created so-called “cool cities” in an attempt to improve the state’s economy.But Midtown has something most areas don’t — colleges, art galleries, bike paths, theaters, condos, boutiques and an eclectic assortment of bars and restaurants, all within walking distance of each other.Home to Wayne State University and Detroit Medical Center, Bing said the Midtown area is safe and stable and has room to grow.“Detroit is the place to be,” said Casey Jones, a 31-year-old welding artist who recently moved from Auburn Hills to a flat in Midtown. “I can’t imagine living anywhere else.”As Bing continues to fill empty buildings with business and encourage growth in the health care sector, young professionals will play an important role, he said.“There are a lot of young people moving to Detroit because they see a tremendous opportunity and future,” Bing said. “I think we’re going to see a boom in young talent in the next two to five years.”Bing also hopes to attract another group — foreign investors who are creating jobs in Oakland, Wayne and Macomb counties.“With all of this cheap land, we can cut some deals,” Bing said.The mayor plans to meet next week with Chinese business leaders who are scouting the area for potential expansions.To reverse the half-century population and economic decline, Bing assured those in attendance that the city is business-friendly.“Traditionally, Detroit has been looked upon as a city not friendly for business,” Bing said. “What I think has been missing in the past is good leadership. You can trust this administration.”Business leaders welcomed Bing’s words.“There is a new feeling of optimism” in the business community, said Sandy Baruah, president and CEO of the Detroit Regional Chamber, which hosted the event. “We now see the makings of a great city and state.”• CONTACT STEVE NEAVLING: 586-826-7255 OR SNEAVLING@FREEPRESS.COM
REGINA H. BOONE/Detroit Free PressMayor Dave Bing participates in a question-and-answer session with Sandy Baruah, president and CEO of the Detroit Regional Chamber. “Midtown is going to be the hot spot,” Bing said at the Westin Book Cadillac hotel.
I am an American, not by accident of birth but by choice. I voted with my feet and became an American because I love this country and think it is exceptional. But when I look at the world today and the strong winds of technological change and global competition, it makes me nervous. Perhaps most unsettling is the fact that while these forces gather strength, Americans seem unable to grasp the magnitude of the challenges that face us. Despite the hyped talk of China's rise, most Americans operate on the assumption that the U.S. is still No. 1.
But is it? Yes, the U.S. remains the world's largest economy, and we have the largest military by far, the most dynamic technology companies and a highly entrepreneurial climate. But these are snapshots of where we are right now. The decisions that created today's growth — decisions about education, infrastructure and the like — were made decades ago. What we see today is an American economy that has boomed because of policies and developments of the 1950s and '60s: the interstate-highway system, massive funding for science and technology, a public-education system that was the envy of the world and generous immigration policies. Look at some underlying measures today, and you will wonder about the future. (Watch TIME's video "Why Cities are Key to American Success in the 21st Century.")
The following rankings come from various lists, but they all tell the same story. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), our 15-year-olds rank 17th in the world in science and 25th in math. We rank 12th among developed countries in college graduation (down from No. 1 for decades). We come in 79th in elementary-school enrollment. Our infrastructure is ranked 23rd in the world, well behind that of every other major advanced economy. American health numbers are stunning for a rich country: based on studies by the OECD and the World Health Organization, we're 27th in life expectancy, 18th in diabetes and first in obesity. Only a few decades ago, the U.S. stood tall in such rankings. No more. There are some areas in which we are still clearly No. 1, but they're not ones we usually brag about. We have the most guns. We have the most crime among rich countries. And, of course, we have by far the largest amount of debt in the world.
The Rise of the Rest
Many of these changes have taken place not because of America's missteps but because other countries are now playing the same game we are — and playing to win. There is a familiar refrain offered when these concerns are raised: "We heard all this in the 1980s. Japan was going to dominate the globe. It didn't happen, and America ended up back on top." It's a fair point as far as it goes. Japan did not manage to become the world's richest country — though for three decades it had the second largest economy and even now has the third largest. It is also a relatively small country. To become the largest economy in the world, it would have to have a per capita GDP twice that of the U.S. China would need to have an average income only one-fourth that of the U.S. to develop an economy that would surpass ours. (See how some Americans are facing the prospect of long-term unemployment.)
But this misses the broader point. The Harvard historian Niall Ferguson, who has just written a book, Civilization: The West and the Rest, puts things in historical context: "For 500 years the West patented six killer applications that set it apart. The first to download them was Japan. Over the last century, one Asian country after another has downloaded these killer apps — competition, modern science, the rule of law and private property rights, modern medicine, the consumer society and the work ethic. Those six things are the secret sauce of Western civilization."
To this historical challenge from nations that have figured out how the West won, add a technological revolution. It is now possible to produce more goods and services with fewer and fewer people, to shift work almost anywhere in the world and to do all this at warp speed. That is the world the U.S. now faces. Yet the country seems unready for the kind of radical adaptation it needs. The changes we are currently debating amount to rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. (Comment on this story.)
Sure, the political system seems to be engaged in big debates about the budget, pensions and the nation's future. But this is mostly a sideshow. The battles in state capitals over public-employee pensions are real — the states are required to balance their budgets — but the larger discussion in Washington is about everything except what's important. The debate between Democrats and Republicans on the budget excludes the largest drivers of the long-term deficit — Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare — to say nothing of the biggest nonentitlement costs, like the tax break for interest on mortgages. Only four months ago, the Simpson-Bowles commission presented a series of highly intelligent solutions to our fiscal problems, proposing $4 trillion in savings, mostly through cuts in programs but also through some tax increases. They have been forgotten by both parties, in particular the Republicans, whose leading budgetary spokesman, Paul Ryan, praises the commission in the abstract even though he voted against its recommendations. Democrats, for their part, became apoplectic about a proposal to raise the retirement age for Social Security by one year — in 2050.
Instead, Washington is likely to make across-the-board cuts in discretionary spending, where there is much less money and considerably less waste. President Obama's efforts to preserve and even increase resources for core programs appear to be failing in a Congress determined to demonstrate its clout. But reducing funds for things like education, scientific research, air-traffic control, NASA, infrastructure and alternative energy will not produce much in savings, and it will hurt the economy's long-term growth. It would happen at the very moment that countries from Germany to South Korea to China are making large investments in education, science, technology and infrastructure. We are cutting investments and subsidizing consumption — exactly the opposite of what are the main drivers of economic growth.
So why are we tackling our economic problems in a manner that is shortsighted and wrong-footed? Because it is politically easy. The key to understanding the moves by both parties is that, for the most part, they are targeting programs that have neither a wide base of support nor influential interest groups behind them. (And that's precisely why they're not where the money is. The American political system is actually quite efficient. It distributes the big bucks to popular programs and powerful special interests.) And neither side will even talk about tax increases, though it is impossible to achieve long-term fiscal stability without them. Certain taxes — such as ones on carbon or gas — would have huge benefits beyond revenue, like energy efficiency.
It's not that our democracy doesn't work; it's that it works only too well. American politics is now hyperresponsive to constituents' interests. And all those interests are dedicated to preserving the past rather than investing for the future. There are no lobbying groups for the next generation of industries, only for those companies that are here now with cash to spend. There are no special-interest groups for our children's economic well-being, only for people who get government benefits right now. The whole system is geared to preserve current subsidies, tax breaks and loopholes. That is why the federal government spends $4 on elderly people for every $1 it spends on those under 18. And when the time comes to make cuts, guess whose programs are first on the chopping board. That is a terrible sign of a society's priorities and outlook. (See the recession of 1958.)
The Perils of Success
Why have our priorities become so mangled? Several decades ago, economist Mancur Olson wrote a book called The Rise and Decline of Nations. He was prompted by what he thought was a strange paradox after World War II. Britain, having won the war, slipped into deep stagnation, while Germany, the loser, grew powerfully year after year. Britain's fall was even more perplexing considering that it was the creator of the Industrial Revolution and was the world's original economic superpower.
Olson concluded that, paradoxically, it was success that hurt Britain, while failure helped Germany. British society grew comfortable, complacent and rigid, and its economic and political arrangements became ever more elaborate and costly, focused on distribution rather than growth. Labor unions, the welfare state, protectionist policies and massive borrowing all shielded Britain from the new international competition. The system became sclerotic, and over time, the economic engine of the world turned creaky and sluggish. (See how Germany became the China of Europe.)
Germany, by contrast, was almost entirely destroyed by World War II. That gave it a chance not just to rebuild its physical infrastructure but also to revise its antiquated arrangements and institutions — the political system, the guilds, the economy — with a more modern frame of mind. Defeat made it possible to question everything and rebuild from scratch.
America's success has made it sclerotic. We have sat on top of the world for almost a century, and our repeated economic, political and military victories have made us quite sure that we are destined to be No. 1 forever. We have some advantages. Size matters: when crises come, they do not overwhelm a country as big as the U.S. When the financial crisis hit nations such as Greece and Ireland, it dwarfed them. In the U.S., the problems occurred within the context of a $15 trillion economy and in a country that still has the trust of the world. Over the past three years, in the wake of the financial crisis, U.S. borrowing costs have gone down, not up. (Comment on this story.)
This is a powerful affirmation of America's strengths, but the problem is that they ensure that the U.S. will not really face up to its challenges. We adjust to the crisis of the moment and move on, but the underlying cancer continues to grow, eating away at the system.
A crucial aspect of beginning to turn things around would be for the U.S. to make an honest accounting of where it stands and what it can learn from other countries. This kind of benchmarking is common among businesses but is sacrilege for the country as a whole. Any politician who dares suggest that the U.S. can learn from — let alone copy — other countries is likely to be denounced instantly. If someone points out that Europe gets better health care at half the cost, that's dangerously socialist thinking. If a business leader notes that tax rates in much of the industrialized world are lower and that there are far fewer loopholes than in the U.S., he is brushed aside as trying to impoverish American workers. If a commentator says — correctly — that social mobility from one generation to the next is greater in many European nations than in the U.S., he is laughed at. Yet several studies, the most recent from the OECD last year, have found that the average American has a much lower chance of moving out of his parents' income bracket than do people in places like Denmark, Sweden, Germany and Canada.
And it's not just politicians and business leaders. It's all of us. Americans simply don't care much, know much or want to learn much about the outside world. We think of America as a globalized society because it has been at the center of the forces of globalization. But actually, the American economy is quite insular; exports account for only about 10% of it. Compare that with the many European countries where half the economy is trade-related, and you can understand why those societies seem more geared to international standards and competition. And that's the key to a competitive future for the U.S. If Olson is right in saying successful societies get sclerotic, the solution is to stay flexible. That means being able to start and shut down companies and hire and fire people. But it also means having a government that can help build out new technologies and infrastructure, that invests in the future and that can eliminate programs that stop working. When Franklin Roosevelt launched the New Deal, he spoke of the need for "bold, persistent experimentation," and he shut down programs when it was clear they didn't work. Today, every government program and subsidy seems eternal.
What the Founding Fathers Knew
Is any of this possible in a rich, democratic country? In fact it is. The countries of Northern Europe — Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland — have created a fascinating and mixed model of political economy. Their economies are extremely open and market-based. Most of them score very high on the Heritage Foundation's Index of Economic Freedom. But they also have generous welfare states and make major investments for future growth. Over the past 20 years, these countries have grown nearly as fast as, or in some cases faster than, the U.S. Germany has managed to retain its position as the world's export engine despite high wages and generous benefits.
Now, America should not and cannot simply copy the Nordic model or any other. Americans would rebel at the high taxes that Northern Europeans pay — and those taxes are proving uncompetitive in a world where many other European countries have much lower rates and Singapore has a maximum personal rate of 20%. The American system is more dynamic, entrepreneurial and unequal than that of Europe and will remain so. But the example of Northern Europe shows that rich countries can stay competitive if they remain flexible, benchmark rigorously and embrace efficiency. (Read "The World Economic Forum in Davos: A Changed Global Reality.")
American companies are, of course, highly efficient, but American government is not. By this I don't mean to echo the usual complaints about waste, fraud and abuse. In fact, there is less of those things than Americans think, except in the Pentagon with its $700 billion budget. The problem with the U.S. government is that its allocation of resources is highly inefficient. We spend vast amounts of money on subsidies for housing, agriculture and health, many of which distort the economy and do little for long-term growth. We spend too little on science, technology, innovation and infrastructure, which will produce growth and jobs in the future. For the past few decades, we have been able to be wasteful and get by. But we will not be able to do it much longer. The money is running out, and we will have to marshal funds and target spending far more strategically. This is not a question of too much or too little government, too much or too little spending. We need more government and more spending in some places and less in others.
The tragedy is that Washington knows this. For all the partisan polarization there, most Republicans know that we have to invest in some key areas, and most Democrats know that we have to cut entitlement spending. But we have a political system that has become allergic to compromise and practical solutions. This may be our greatest blind spot. At the very moment that our political system has broken down, one hears only encomiums to it, the Constitution and the perfect Republic that it created. Now, as an immigrant, I love the special and, yes, exceptional nature of American democracy. I believe that the Constitution was one of the wonders of the world — in the 18th century. But today we face the reality of a system that has become creaky. We have an Electoral College that no one understands and a Senate that doesn't work, with rules and traditions that allow a single Senator to obstruct democracy without even explaining why. We have a crazy-quilt patchwork of towns, municipalities and states with overlapping authority, bureaucracies and resulting waste. We have a political system geared toward ceaseless fundraising and pandering to the interests of the present with no ability to plan, invest or build for the future. And if one mentions any of this, why, one is being unpatriotic, because we have the perfect system of government, handed down to us by demigods who walked the earth in the late 18th century and who serve as models for us today and forever. (See how to restore the American dream.)
America's founders would have been profoundly annoyed by this kind of unreflective ancestor worship. They were global, cosmopolitan figures who learned and copied a great deal from the past and from other countries and were constantly adapting their views. The first constitution, the Articles of Confederation, after all, was a massive failure, and the founders learned from that failure. The decision to have the Supreme Court sit in judgment over acts of the legislature was a later invention. America's founders were modern men who wanted a modern country that broke with its past to create a more perfect union.
And they thought a great deal about decline. Indeed, it was only a few years after the Revolution that the worrying began in earnest. The letters between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, as the two men watched America in the early 19th century, are filled with foreboding and gloom; you could almost say they began a great American tradition, that of contemplating decay. Americans have been concerned about the health of their country for much of its existence. In the 1950s and '60s, we worried about the Soviet Union and its march toward modernization. In the 1980s, we worried about Japan. This did us no harm; on the contrary, all these fears helped us make changes that allowed us to revive our strength and forge ahead. Dwight Eisenhower took advantage of the fears about the Soviet Union to build the interstate-highway system. John Kennedy used the Soviet challenge in space to set us on a path toward the goal of getting to the moon. (Comment on this story.)
What is really depressing is the tone of our debate. In place of the thoughtful concern of Jefferson and Adams, we have its opposite in tone and temperament — the shallow triumphalism purveyed by politicians now. The founders loved America, but they also understood that it was a work in progress, an unfinished enterprise that would constantly be in need of change, adjustment and repair. For most of our history, we have become rich while remaining restless. Rather than resting on our laurels, we have feared getting fat and lazy. And that has been our greatest strength. In the past, worrying about decline has helped us avert that very condition. Let's hope it does so today.
Restoring the American Dream: Getting Back to No. 1 — a Fareed Zakaria GPS Special premieres on CNN at 8 p.m. E.T. and P.T. on Sunday, March 6, and airs again at 8 p.m. E.T. and P.T. on Saturday, March 12
So this is to confirm our meeting at the ARTS schoolhouse (453 MLK) this Thursday, March 3 from 6pm to 9pm.
We will have 8 students in attendance; four on the "greenhouse", two on school, one on timebank, and one on transit.
We'll meet briefly as a large group, then break down into smaller groups for review and brainstorming.
Our goal is to look openly, objectively, and creatively at all the "stuff" in front of us and develop a clear path forward.
We'll try to make everything do three things at once and weave a tapestry of performance and ideas.
Oh, and also keep it simple and beautiful.
The LTU tudents will bring a number of 11x17 sheets of paper with words and images that can aid in our creative action.
Is there wall space where we can pin up, or tape up the paper? Sharon?
Also I was thinking of picking up some food and drink for all. Any suggestions? Send me an e-mail if you want food/drink so I can get a head count.
Looking forward,
--Ralph
"i imagine yes is the only living thing"
eecummings
Good Morning Ralph:
Sounds right to me. Looking forward to the continued unfolding and creative discovery inherent in the design process you have described. Food, the simpler the better. Perhaps Sharon has some ideas from nearby local sources.
Fox News commentator Glenn Beck makes a living expressing opinions, the more extreme the better. But Beck’s unfavorablecomparison Monday of Detroit with Hiroshima, the Japanese city destroyed by the first atomic bomb in World War II, is worth a little truth-squadding.Beck says Detroit lies in ruins while Hiroshima has rebuilt, thanks to a free-market spirit. But Beck brushed off the government money spent to rebuild Hiroshima, Japan’s policies and the 4-million-plus population of metro Detroit. The city of Detroit today is home to about 800,000 people. That means Detroit remains one of America’s biggest cities, with twice the populationof Cleveland or Pittsburgh, and roughly the same as San Francisco.Urban planners around the globe sometimes say, “Detroit is the new Berlin.” They mean that Detroit is the place with the best chance of creating a new type of 21st-Century city — environmentally sustainable and producing much of its own energy and food. Whether we’ll get there is unclear, but Detroit today is the world’s best laboratory for urban reinvention.Huge numbers of academics, journalists and designers are following Detroit’s efforts to reimagine itself. In recent weeks, separate planning conferences on Detroit’s future were held in England and Denmark.Though clearly distressed, Detroit has been rebuilding for years, at least in some key areas. Billions of dollars have been invested in amenities such as the RiverWalk, new housing, urban farms, casinos, stadiums and, soon, a new light-rail system on Woodward.The Midtown district is thriving. Southwest Detroit is growing again, thanks to an increase in Latino immigrants.And Detroit is rebuilding its riverfront after more than a century of industrial uses there.Beck also is wrong about the causes behind Detroit’s decline. He blames unions and liberals for making Detroit uncompetitive. It had more to do with suburban sprawl and flight, and federal efforts to subsidize suburban growth with everything from road construction to tax breaks.Mayor Dave Bing lambasted Beck.“Like many national media members, Glenn Beck has probably never been to Detroit, understood Detroit, and doesn’t care about Detroit,” Bing said. “We welcome him to see and experience Detroit for himself so that he can deliver facts, rather than repeat fiction.”• CONTACT JOHN GALLAGHER: 313-222-5173 OR GALLAGHER99 @ FREEPRESS.COM . STEVEN NEAVLING CONTRIBUTED TO THIS REPORT.
Photos by MIKE BROOKBANK/Detroit Free PressJoyce Sims of metro Detroit said Kid Rock should show Fox News commentator Glenn Beck “the good people of Detroit.”
Tim Mahoney of West Bloomfield said, “It’s pretty easy to criticize something when you don’t … have the feel of the city.”
Martha Lyford of Detroit said, “Those who want to believe it will believe it because Glenn Beck has a following.”
Steve Wilson of Ann Arbor said he was disgusted by the comparison to Hiroshima, Japan. “It really oversimplifies the issue.”
PHILADELPHIA — Many of the streets of this part of West Philadelphia used to be considered mean, despite the proximity of the University of Pennsylvania, an elite Ivy League institution. The advice was: Don’t go west of 40th. In the last 15 years, that’s all changed, thanks to a program of homeowner incentives and investment like one being attempted in Midtown Detroit. In West Philadelphia today, restaurants bustle and coffeehouses abound along tree-lined streets as trolleys whoosh past toward Center City.Similar efforts are under way in other places — Baltimore, Cleveland — but the Midtown effort is a direct descendant of the Philadelphia example. The top consultant to the Detroit project was part of Penn’s program to improve the surrounding area and the first to take the incentive to move in. He still lives in the neighborhood.So what could it mean for Detroit’s Midtown, where employees of the Detroit Medical Center, Henry Ford Health System and Wayne State University are being offered incentives to move in? If the outcome in West Philly is an indication, it could result in higher property values, a drop in violent crime, better schools and a neighborhood where former suburbanites are eager to move.Doug Jerolmack, a 32-year-old geophysicist at Penn, bought into the neighborhood just four years ago, continuing a trend that started in the late 1990s, when homeowner initiatives were launched to bring professors and other employees in. He walks to work and has all the services he needs — plus dozens of friends — within a few blocks.“Now that we’re there,” he said, “I don’t want to live anywhere else.”
Photos by JOAN FAIRMAN KANES/Special to the Free Press This block of Spruce Street has both homes and businesses, including a restaurant called Rx housed in a former corner drugstore.
Doug Jerolmack, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania, bought a home in University City with help from financial incentives offered to Penn staff.
Philadelphia story
Detroit’s Midtown is studying success for its rebirth
By TODD SPANGLER FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER
PHILADELPHIA — In a way, the effort under way to remake Midtown Detroit started near a corner on Larchwood Street in West Philadelphia on Halloween night 1996.Vladimir Sled, a Russian biochemist at the nearby University of Pennsylvania, was walking home with his girlfriend on the tree-lined street when someone tried to snatch her purse. Sled fought with the assailant and was stabbed to death.For years before then, community activists and urban pioneers in the West Philly neighborhoods that had sprung up generations before as suburbs linked by streetcar to Center City had pleaded for civic involvement to address crime, garbage and a lack of services.Sled’s death changed everything: Penn employees, parents and students were outraged; the mayor, Ed Rendell, got involved. And Judith Rodin, then president at Penn, began an effort that, 15 years later, continues to remake the area surrounding the university.With homeowner initiatives like those being offered now in Midtown Detroit, as well as a host of other investments, Penn and other institutions turned their focus west of 40th Street toward the neighborhoods there — Spruce Hill, Walnut Hill, Garden Court and others. They attracted new residents from their employee base, not only with down-payment cash but with easy-to-get loans and new services, such as a supermarket and cinema that the university developed.A new improvement district organization was created — the University City District — which spends more than $5 million a year not only on foot and bicycle safety patrol crews and graffiti cleanup, but on marketing and development.The change has been evident: There are dog-walkers and block parties. Victorian mansions have been rehabbed. And it’s not just institutional workers with incentives available to them who are filling the neighborhoods. Bill Meinel, 51, is a marketing consultant who moved into a Garden Court home in 1998. A year later, he was robbed at gunpoint outside his new home.“I was freaked out,” he said. “My wife wanted to leave. I said, ‘Let’s give it some more time.’ ”Now, he doesn’t hesitate to walk his dogs at 2 a.m.Drop in serious crimesDriving north on I-76 past industrial yards and freight lines, then crossing the Schuylkill River and turning left onto South Street (which quickly becomes Spruce), you are surrounded by Penn, one of the oldest institutions of higher education in the U.S., founded by Benjamin Franklin. Renowned for its business, medical and communications schools, the university and its neighborhoods are home to 25,000 students.Unsurprisingly, like Midtown, it’s a big rental market.Plunge into those neighborhoods today and you find newly rehabbed apartment buildings, coffeehouses, chic restaurants and international bakeries, posh hotels and a supermarket, developed by the university. You also find block after block of three-story residences, and a trolley line along the southern end of the area toward Penn and beyond, Philadelphia’sCenter City.According to records, serious crimes in the University City District have declined, and the median sales price of homes have increased, as of 2009 (even after a slight downturn, as experienced nationally), by 154%, over 2000.In Detroit, the three anchor institutions — Detroit Medical Center, Henry Ford Health System and Wayne State University — along with the University Cultural Center Association (UCCA), which spearheads redevelopment efforts in Midtown, are trying to recreate some of that success. They are offering home-buyers who are employees of those institutions a forgivable loan of $20,000 to move into the area, or $25,000, if taken at a rate of $5,000 a year over five years.Renters, an important part of the market in both places (rental occupancy is about 92% in Midtown), would receive $2,500 toward the cost of their apartment in the first year they lived in Midtown and $1,000 for the second year.When Penn started its programin 1998, it offered employees $15,000 in cash or $21,000 in installments (it’s $7,500 now) to buy in the neighborhood. The first taker was Omar Blaik, who happened to be an integral member of Penn’s planning team and who happens to now be the president of U3 Ventures, which is consulting with the UCCA and others on the project in Midtown.More than 900 Penn employees bought into the neighborhood, and many, including Blaik, are still there.As Blaik tells it, interest in Midtown Detroit is “much, much higher” than it was when the West Philly effort was getting off the ground. And if the necessary elements are successfully stitched together there — as he, the anchor institutions and UCCA President Sue Mosey are hoping — it could create an “eds and meds” model that could be reproduced in cities around the country.K-8 school a big drawKatia Strieck, 38, is a librarian at Penn who got $7,500 toward her second house in the neighborhood a few years ago. When she bought into the area the first time, in 2002, she wasn’t working at Penn — so she got no incentive — but by the second time around (when the incentive had been reduced) she had something more to stay for than money: the Penn Alexander School, a prekindergarten through eighth-grade public school.Penn not only helped develop it but provides an additional $1,330 per student to help educate them.The school comes up routinely as among the top reasons why people have come into the UCD and have stayed.“It’s a great community school,” said Strieck, whose daughter attends.New schools aren’t on top of Midtown Detroit’s list of needs, say Blaik and Mosey, in part because singles between 25 and 34 are most likely to move in. But both noted some of Detroit’s highest-performing public schools are in the area, and there are good charter schools there, too.West Philly’s successes have critics.“It’s led to a lot of displacement,” said the Rev. Larry Falcon, 66, who runs the Toviah Thrift Shop and Covenant Community Church from a storefront on Chestnut Street.Falcon acknowledged that the area may have less of some kinds of crime than it used to, but that’s due to the crack epidemic subsiding. And higher property values are not good news to his flock.A Free Press analysis of the seven census tracts wholly contained in the area showed that while the population appeared to stay largely the same from 2000 to 2009, the number of white residents increased 20% while the number of blacks decreased by 32%.In several of the census tracts, per-capita income has risen more than $10,000 a year during that time.Midtown progressIf Mosey and Blaik are correct, and if the support is there and the commitment from the relevant parties lasts, there’s no reason to believe that Midtown might not someday look and feel like these streets of close-in West Philadelphia.Renters are encouraged to move in and stay, and much of the townhome and loft stock has been constructed in the last 10 years. Neighboring Woodbridge, which is included in the target area, features a number of single-family homes.Mosey cited statistics showing that average household income of new home-buyers in Midtown in 2008 was $144,321, up from $80,000 in 2006.UCCA has crews to clean up graffiti, and, along with WSU security, is looking to add safety patrols. A supermarket is essential, as is other development, some of which is under way. Businesses are committed to hiring and using vendors from the neighborhood. Displacement, the UCCA says, is not an issue. Funding is.Money has been authorized for the first stages of a light rail from Hart Plaza to Midtown, a big plus. But development and rebuilding efforts by the UCCA may count on grants — such as the Community Development Block Grants President Barack Obama’s budget promises to cut. Budget fights in Washington and Lansing could have a huge effect on plans in Midtown.“Financing is critical. I’m just going to be honest about that,” said Mosey. “We need more for the incentive program, and we need more for the rest of the real estate.… The public sector has to play a role in that, too.”John Fry, president of Drexel University, next to Penn, was at Penn as an executive president in the 1990s and helped guide its efforts to address the neighborhood’s challenges. Homeowner incentives, development, a sense of safety, a new public school — it was all essential.So was something else: time.Fry is now looking at improving the areas north and west of Drexel, with a foregivable loan for employees worth $15,000.“There are no quick fixes in any of this stuff,” he said. “Anybody who thinks this is a silver bullet is mistaken.”
Photos by JOAN FAIRMAN KANES/Special to the Free Press Homes along 43rd Street in the Spruce Hill neighborhood of University City, which surrounds the University of Pennsylvania.
West Philadelphia’s Omar Blaik is helping with Midtown’s efforts.
George Carter works for Philadelphia’s University City District.
