http://www.rooflines.org/ Blogging beyond bricks and mortar en Copyright 2009 2009-07-13T21:41:00-05:00 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/EID9QOCYHhI/ http://www.rooflines.org/1645/short_term_stimulus_and_planning_for_the_long_term/#When:20:41:00Z Everyone’s excited about the money pouring, or rather trickling, out of the federal government in the form of economic stimulus. As is the case with many grants, loans and other funding sources, the money is meant to be used within a certain time and concrete results must be reported. Also, the whole point of this stimulus is that cities are desperate to spend money to create jobs and get stuff done. All of which is great, except that the mad rush to spend the money may mean that planning wisely for communities’ future needs doesn’t happen. Cities and towns won’t prioritize planning first if their mandate is to spend and build now. So much for the idea that a deep recession and economic slow-down provides the opportunity to do serious long-term planning. In a recent opinion column on Planetizen, a group of writers point out this potential problem in the Energy Efficiency Block Grants, which were authorized in 2007 but are only being distributed for the first time through the stimulus package. They note, though, that cities do have a window of opportunity to do some real planning for long-term energy use (and carbon reduction). It’s not much of a window – they have to write and implement their plans within four months – but it’s better than nothing. Anyhow, if you are reading this and you work for a city or town interested in getting access to this energy efficiency money, note that the deadline for applying has moved back to August 10. See here for details. Advocacy 2009-07-13T20:41:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1645/short_term_stimulus_and_planning_for_the_long_term/#When:20:41:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/0D4YlG7NR3o/ http://www.rooflines.org/1643/urban_policy_just_getting_started/#When:19:08:00Z Xavier de Souza Briggs, the Associate Director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, and the subject of an upcoming Shelterforce interview, wrote in Shelterforce last fall that “Urban policies are the rules and incentives that shape the prosperity, equity, and environmental sustainability of the metropolitan regions in which 8 in 10 people live.” So, if that’s the case, it’s somewhat interesting to witness the White House’s quiet unveiling of its Office of Urban Affairs. Why the muted fanfare? Will this office, as Next American City Editor Diana Lind told The Root’s Dayo Olopade, not “be as serious and as powerful a role as many urbanists had hoped”? Olopade’s piece goes on: “Under the Recovery Act, federal funding is flooding state governments—by formula and through competitive grants. A robust and powerful Office of Urban Policy, local leaders say, could handle city-specific conflicts that currently fly under the White Houses radar.” As Briggs says, urban policy “cannot be airmailed from Washington via one-size-fits-all blueprints. It requires local adaptability as well as public/private coordination, operating under clear standards and oversight.” Hopefully, Director Adolfo Carrion Jr. and his Office of Urban Affairs (once referred to as Urban Policy), will take this slow roll out, with its seeming impressive list of attendees, and create the aggressive, promising office it has the potential to be. Policies 2009-07-13T19:08:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1643/urban_policy_just_getting_started/#When:19:08:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/uJL6yZjl_Cc/ http://www.rooflines.org/1640/national_work_among_community_organizing_groups_is_growing/#When:17:04:00Z Editor’s Note: This is in response to Randy Stoecker’s earlier post on community organizing on the national level. ACORN, PICO, and US Action are among the community organizing groups mobilizing people around health care reform. They are part of a broad coalition, spearheaded by the labor movement, to push Congress to adopt a progressive universal health insurance plan that includes a “public option.” This led Randy Stoecker, who coordinates the Comm-Org Web site, to ask whether a growing number of community organizing groups are now working on national issues. One way to think about Randy’s question is to re-read Karen Paget’s 1990 essay in American Prospect, Citizen Organizing: Many Movements, No Majority. Paget argued at the time that despite the increasing number of citizen organizing groups around the country, the overall impact was relatively marginal—the whole didn’t add up to the sum of its parts. This is because the community organizing world was too fragmented and localized. If we were writing that essay today, what parts would be the same? What parts would be different? Advocacy 2009-07-08T17:04:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1640/national_work_among_community_organizing_groups_is_growing/#When:17:04:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/0owplp_A6LY/ http://www.rooflines.org/1639/how_much_is_too_much_neighborhood_data/#When:15:59:00Z Individual behavior plays a significant role in perpetuating residential racial and ethnic segregation. Illegal discrimination, including racial steering, and housing affordability both play a role, but neither can fully explain the severe segregation that plagues so many of America’s metropolitan regions. With a large majority of housing seekers now beginning their search online, how Web sites organize and display listings and data is becoming increasingly important. In the bluntly-titled and disturbing Web Tools Whites Can Use To Avoid Accidentally Moving Into A Black Majority Or Latino Majority Neighborhood In The United States, a white supremacist blogger details precisely how a number of popular Web sites can be used to identify segregated neighborhoods and school districts. As he notes in the post, “You’re the head of a white family. You’re moving to a new city, and you’ve just found a home you think you can afford. What’s the next question you want to ask the estate agent? Yeah, you know what question I’m talking about. The question, “How many of THEM live in this neighborhood.” As disturbing as the post might be, it is largely preaching to the converted; I doubt many housing seekers outside of the white supremacist movement will rely on its advice. This is an audience that would likely find a segregated neighborhood even without the Web. But it does raise some difficult questions about how demographic data is presented to housing seekers online, questions that might best be answered by drawing parallels to the offline housing search. Housing 2009-07-08T15:59:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1639/how_much_is_too_much_neighborhood_data/#When:15:59:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/XmkI9BpSBBU/ http://www.rooflines.org/1638/franken_the_fourth_of_july_and_workers_rights/#When:18:46:00Z Finally: Al Franken has been seated in the US Senate. After a grueling recount process, former Sen. Norm Coleman finally conceded defeat and congratulated Franken on his Senate victory in Minnesota. With the Democrats securing 60 Senate votes, the media has focused on how important this is to the passage of national health care reform. But it means a lot more. With the Fourth of July having just passed, the union movement reminded us not only to celebrate the freedoms we have, but also the freedoms for which we are still fighting. One place Americans could use more freedom is in the workplace. We need to balance the worker’s right to be treated with dignity versus the authority an employer needs to run the business profitably. For a generation the balance has tipped far too heavily in favor of the employer. 
Millions of workers don’t have health care, pensions and sufficient salaries to make ends meet. It seems only CEOs and investment bankers get to enjoy these necessities. 

 Advocacy 2009-07-07T18:46:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1638/franken_the_fourth_of_july_and_workers_rights/#When:18:46:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/RYAW2ujyYAY/ http://www.rooflines.org/1637/community_organizing_going_national/#When:13:50:00Z There are several things that I’ve been noticing out in the community organizing world that I find increasingly intriguing. I first noticed it over the past year with PICO’s push on national health care legislation. Now I am also noticing it on ACORN’s foreclosure campaign. And the Virginia Organizing Project is now also working on national health care access issues. Now, I realize that a number of groups, particularly ACORN in my experience, have always worked on national issues. But the promotion and visibility of this national level work is unlike anything I have seen in the 13 years I have been moderating this list. Is it just me, or is something changing? Organizing 2009-07-07T13:50:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1637/community_organizing_going_national/#When:13:50:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/FrS6q-keRv4/ http://www.rooflines.org/1636/extra_major_funding_is_provided_bycongress/#When:03:38:01Z The print media industry, we all know, has been in rapid decline over the past few years, but recently, we’ve truly begun to see the manifestation of that decline as regional newspapers from around the country are drastically changing their business models, or going out of business altogether. Forget laying blame (one last blame: I’ve blamed an unwilling newspaper industry for not embracing the new ways people access their news sooner), but instead, look at, as we’ve done in the past, the potential impact fewer news sources has on communities. Right now, we can only speculate: from not knowing that your local city council passed a bond ordinance to repave a nearby throughway, or, in the worst case, corrupt governments taking full advantage of the news vacuum. As I said in a previous post: “We are losing a very valuable component to sustainable communities when we see the demise of treasured local newspapers. Time will tell as to how this loss affects good government. But could government be the answer to saving this fledgling, but absolutely necessary industry? Sustainability 2009-07-07T03:38:01-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1636/extra_major_funding_is_provided_bycongress/#When:03:38:01Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/eShWQqnzBk8/ http://www.rooflines.org/1633/compost_bins_on_the_south_lawn/#When:18:49:00Z According to the Sierra Club, of the 31 million tons of food waste tossed each year in the United States, only 3 percent is actually recycled, so I was particularly happy when I read the report on Ecorazzi.org that the vegetable garden being grown on the south lawn of the White House will benefit from composted soil next season, rather than having it shipped in this year. The waste compost bins will hopefully be used to underline the increasing importance of sourcing one’s food, learning about slow foods, and, of course, putting to use some of that unused space in your yard or neighborhood. But what’s particularly encouraging about this is that endeavors like these make the concept of community gardening less foreign, more engaging, and, most important, more mainstream, as we’ve discussed here on Rooflines. Communities 2009-07-02T18:49:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1633/compost_bins_on_the_south_lawn/#When:18:49:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/yGpMhq8iggo/ http://www.rooflines.org/1631/gary_never_forgot_a_suffering_steel_town_clings_to_jackson_legacy/#When:01:45:00Z The eyes of the world were focused on Gary, Indiana in the days following Michael Jackson’s June 25 death. People marveled at the tiny house where Michael spent his first 11 years. Spending the two days after his death in oppressive heat and swarms of mosquitoes outside the Jackson home while on assignment, I was personally intrigued to learn more about the King of Pop’s childhood; and just as much to get a closer look at Gary and the ways it has changed since the Jacksons moved out four decades ago. Gary, Indiana was a city alive with music when the Jackson Five were starting out in the 1960s. It was a gritty but stable working class steel town on Lake Michigan where the public schools had a lively arts program that encouraged youth to perform on stage. Communities 2009-07-02T01:45:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1631/gary_never_forgot_a_suffering_steel_town_clings_to_jackson_legacy/#When:01:45:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/kMKh5It0NrE/ http://www.rooflines.org/1627/neighborhood_schools_that_work_for_kids_communities_the_environment/#When:14:24:00Z Smart Growth Schools expert Nathan Norris lists eleven key principles for measuring how well schools and school policies fit in with their communities. I really like them: Restoration Preference: Will old schools be restored rather than replaced so long as the cost is less than a new school? Holistic Planning Is school planning done in conjunction with land planning and transportation planning? Community buy-in: Is the school planning process designed in a way to secure meaningful community input? Elimination of design constraints: Do you have the flexibility to design the school efficiently for the site and the community? Communities 2009-06-30T14:24:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1627/neighborhood_schools_that_work_for_kids_communities_the_environment/#When:14:24:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/DBX94nLdrw4/ http://www.rooflines.org/1628/tracking_job_creation_in_the_nonprofit_sector/#When:17:20:01Z Rick Cohen, a long-time Shelterforce contributor and editor of The Nonprofit Quarterly’s “Cohen Report” wrote last week on the importance of nonprofits tracking their own industry’s job growth as a result of additional funding from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act, better knows as the Stimulus. Cohen points to potential employment increases in city and county summer jobs (where nonprofits would likely play roles in placing those jobs), and new positions created in health care, housing, and in the service industry. Cohen then calls on the sector to track any growth: “What the sector needs is better record-keeping and monitoring about what it is accomplishing and what hurdles it is facing. Otherwise, when the history of the stimulus is written, one might have a difficult time fully appreciating what the nonprofit sector was prepared to deliver to revitalize the U.S. economy.” Economic Development 2009-06-29T17:20:01-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1628/tracking_job_creation_in_the_nonprofit_sector/#When:17:20:01Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/u5QXXClBOwA/ http://www.rooflines.org/1626/joint_centers_housing_report_points_to_challenges_ahead/#When:14:21:00Z Describing the problems facing the housing market today as “hard to overstate,” representatives from Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies last week announced the release of the 2009 “State of the Nation’s Housing” report. The report, which acknowledges the depressed state of the housing market, points to negative macro forces that are still in play, despite “unprecedented federal efforts to jumpstart the economy and help homeowners keep up with their mortgage payments.” With 3.2 million homeowners entering foreclosure in 2007-2008, the report states that any recovery will likely be prolonged. Affordable Housing 2009-06-29T14:21:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1626/joint_centers_housing_report_points_to_challenges_ahead/#When:14:21:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/OASjg63lwCY/ http://www.rooflines.org/1621/revitalizing_cincinnatis_over_the_rhine_series_conclusion_making_it_green/#When:14:46:00Z This is the final installment of my miniseries (Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3) about Cincinnati’s remarkable Over-the-Rhine neighborhood, potentially a national model for smart, green revitalization. The reason that revitalizing Over-the-Rhine should be just as important to environmentalists as it is to historic preservation, economic recovery, and social equity is that revitalizing such a centrally located district is inherently green, even if you aren’t trying to make it so. Centrally located neighborhoods almost always have lower carbon emissions, simply because per-capita driving rates are so much higher in outer, spread-out locations where driving distances are longer, transit less convenient, and little within walking distance. In fact, census data indicate that Over-the-Rhine residents drive alone to work only about a third as much as residents from the state of Ohio as a whole; OTR residents are 12 times more likely to take transit to work than residents of the state as a whole. Neighborhood Change 2009-06-23T14:46:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1621/revitalizing_cincinnatis_over_the_rhine_series_conclusion_making_it_green/#When:14:46:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/O1eYt4eMOAM/ http://www.rooflines.org/1620/a_third_strand_of_sustainable_housing/#When:20:44:01Z There’s quite a jumble of tools out there for people who want to make their houses into models of energy efficiency. As far as the best way to go about achieving higher levels of sustainability at home, I’ve been aware for some time of at least two competing philosophies. First, you have the pro-conservation camp, that calls for wearing more sweaters in the winter time, but also sealing homes tightly with weatherstripping and heavy-duty insulation. Then there is the renewable energy camp, which is bullish on solar panels and wind towers as the answer to peak oil and dirty coal. The second camp is banking on major investments in solar and wind in the next few years, while we have a pro-sustainability administration. The pro-conservation camp isn’t holding its breath. Such investments are not feasible today for most individual property owners, and many things can be done now that are way cheaper. Sustainability 2009-06-21T20:44:01-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1620/a_third_strand_of_sustainable_housing/#When:20:44:01Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/8jHXN9b1fQo/ http://www.rooflines.org/1618/tracking_the_recession_and_the_recovery/#When:23:37:01Z The Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings announced today the launch of its MetroMonitor, a tool that measures the health of 100 of America’s largest metropolitan economies. The tools aims to look “beneath the hood of national economic statistics to portray the diverse metropolitan trajectories of recession and recovery across the country.” The MetroMonitor looks at the overall performance of these economies as related to each other, using various indicators such as employment (and unemployment) rates, wages, REOs, housing prices, You can view it here. Economic Development 2009-06-18T23:37:01-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1618/tracking_the_recession_and_the_recovery/#When:23:37:01Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/81PSnm1wDwc/ http://www.rooflines.org/1616/revitalizing_cincinnatis_over_the_rhine_part_3_the_progress/#When:19:01:00Z This was going to be the final installment of my miniseries about Cincinnati’s remarkable Over-the-Rhine neighborhood, but I’m on too much of a roll to finish today. (Or, as my man Van would put it, “it’s too late to stop now.”) But this is a nice problem to have, really. Nothing is more important to urban sustainability than revitalization and I love that this story is so rich with possibility. Today we’ll look at some of the impressive, hopeful beginnings. Over-the-Rhine may have a long way to go in order to become the model of revitalization that it can be, but one has to be impressed with what’s happening there. In 2002, the city of Cincinnati published a comprehensive plan for bringing the 362-acre neighborhood back to life, with a refurbished city park, streetscape investments, and mixed residential, commercial, and retail development, much of it in rehabbed 19th-century buildings. A streetcar is also in the works. Most of the implementation is being carried out by the Cincinnati Center City Development Corporation (3CDC), a private, non-profit corporation whose latest progress report states that, in the past three years, it has invested $70 million in the revitalization of OTR. Much of that has gone into rehabbing buildings around Washington Park in the south of the neighborhood, now known as The Gateway Quarter. The completed Gateway projects so far comprise 103 residences, plus 7 commercial and live/work units in Phase I, and an additional 20,000 square feet of commercial space in Phase II. (see photos.) Phases III and IV are coming, and count me among those who would love to live there. Neighborhood Change 2009-06-15T19:01:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1616/revitalizing_cincinnatis_over_the_rhine_part_3_the_progress/#When:19:01:00Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/aouw-r5C-mk/ http://www.rooflines.org/1615/kelo_v_sotomayor/#When:18:22:02Z Kelo v. New London remains a sticky subject. (Ongoing debate in Shelterforce and Rooflines is proof of that.) The 2005 Supreme Court case that upheld a municipality’s ability to take private land for private development in the public interest is surfacing again as right-wingers search for ammunition to derail the confirmation of Judge Sonia Sotomayor. Policies 2009-06-15T18:22:02-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1615/kelo_v_sotomayor/#When:18:22:02Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/yejSGMbtvoA/ http://www.rooflines.org/1614/gis_mapping_in_australia_shows_how_transit_reduces_auto_dependence/#When:13:57:01Z GIS mapping in Melbourne, Australia, on patterns of car ownership shows that transit works: the closer one is to a rail transit line, the less need there is for a car. The farther away, the greater the need for multiple cars. In the image accompanying this post, the purple areas – where 50% or more households own no cars or only one – track the area’s rail transit lines. In the dark green areas, which extend from the transit lines, 20-40% of households own no cars or only one. For more maps, including those tracking two- and three-car households, and some explanation of how they were derived, go here. Transportation 2009-06-12T13:57:01-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1614/gis_mapping_in_australia_shows_how_transit_reduces_auto_dependence/#When:13:57:01Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/KXteP4-aavo/ http://www.rooflines.org/1613/seriously_commuting/#When:18:12:01Z May was Bike to Work Month, designed to encourage commuters to step out from behind the wheel and find ways to ride, but did anyone think it could go this far? Watch CBS Videos Online Do you bike to work? Tell us about it! Transportation 2009-06-09T18:12:01-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1613/seriously_commuting/#When:18:12:01Z http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rooflines/~3/YV2cSwz-ivo/ http://www.rooflines.org/1611/revitalizing_cincinnatis_over_the_rhine_part_2/#When:02:48:00Z Last week I wrote the first installment of my miniseries about Cincinnati’s remarkable Over-the-Rhine neighborhood. As I wrote then, this distinct and historic quarter adjacent to Cincinnati’s downtown is full of promise but bears considerable scars from decades of disinvestment, having declined in population from over 40,000 at its peak to under 10,000 today. Much of its splendid 19th-century architecture has suffered serious decay, and it has had all the problems of poverty and crime that plagued too many of our inner-city neighborhoods in the late 20th century. The good news, though, is that I believe OTR can become a nationally significant model of inclusive, green revitalization if everything falls into place. One of the main reasons that I have much hope for Over-the-Rhine is that it has some tremendous neighborhood assets to build a recovery upon, starting not just with historic architecture but also with a resilient existing community of residents. My impression when visiting last month was that, poverty and problems notwithstanding, OTR feels like a real neighborhood and a real community. It will be critical that the neighborhood’s restoration includes these residents at every step. Neighborhood Change 2009-06-09T02:48:00-05:00 http://www.rooflines.org/1611/revitalizing_cincinnatis_over_the_rhine_part_2/#When:02:48:00Z