For those of you in the majority who find it confusing to track where the federal stimulus funds are going, Ohio's Auditor has made it a little bit easier for you. Auditor Mary Taylor has set-up the Ohio Stimulus Tracker to track stimulus funds in Ohio by County and allows users to see how much has been awarded to local governments and organizations in each county. This is a great resource to help Ohioans understand exactly where federal stimulus dollars are going, how those tax dollars are being spent and if they are meeting the federal expenditure requirements.
New Blog actively covers Federal Transportation Policy
Streetsblog Capitol Hill is officially up and running.
Smart Growth America is excited to announce the official launch of Streetsblog Capitol Hill. With major transportation, climate and energy legislation coming before Congress in the next year or two, the Livable Streets Initiative felt that it was critical to have a talented journalist down in Washington D.C. covering the issues on a daily basis.
Broadly speaking, the blog will do two things. First, it will aim to make it a high-quality daily source for news and analysis of federal transportation policy and related issues; a daily must-read for the advocates, lawmakers, Congressional staffers, urban planning practitioners, policy wonks and lobbyists who are working to shape the future of America's transportation systems.
The second goal for Streetsblog Capitol Hill is to help bring outsiders into the federal transportation policy-making process. For decades, transportation policy on Capitol Hill has mostly been an arcane, complex insiders game -- a game that's been played best by highway lobbyists. Streetsblog Capitol Hill will put locally-oriented livable streets advocates on the playing field and help them better understand the rules of the game. As the 293 bloggers who are now members of the Streetsblog Network make clear every day, a vibrant, grassroots movement for sustainable transport, smart growth and livable streets is active and growing increasingly powerful in cities and states nationwide. Streetsblog Capitol Hill will help connect these local activists to the important action taking place inside the Beltway.
Enjoy!
Insights into the Restoring Prospertiy to Cleveland Mini-Summit
Greater Ohio, in partnership with Policy Bridge, held the Restoring Prosperity to Clevleand Mini-Summit yesterday, June 8th at the Wolstein Center. The event brought together around 400 of Northeast Ohio's leaders as they discussed Cleveland's urban agenda and how it fit with a greater Regional and State Reform agenda. For more information about the event check out the following articles:
- Ohio needs more investments in big cities, urban advocates say- Cleveland Plain Dealer
- Cleveland Summit Defines Recommendations for Alignment with State Action Agenda
Also, NPR did several audio clips:
Key State Leaders Gather to Develop Strategies to Revitalize Cleveland’s Economic Competitiveness
Contact:
Diane Deane, Greater Ohio
614-258-6200 ext. 22
(cell) 614-633-5773
Key State Leaders Gather to Develop Strategies
to Revitalize Cleveland’s Economic Competitiveness
Cleveland Summit Defines Recommendations for Alignment with State Action Agenda
Cleveland – Greater Ohio convened a summit to examine alignment of the Cleveland urban revitalization agenda with state reforms as part of the Restoring Prosperity to Ohio Initiative. Lt. Governor Lee Fisher, Ohio House Speaker Armond Budish and Mayor Frank Jackson joined over 400 key corporate, civic, political, academic and philanthropic leaders from the Cleveland area here today at the Restoring Prosperity to Cleveland Mini-Summit.
The Restoring Prosperity to Ohio Initiative is a non-partisan research, policy development, and organizing initiative led by Greater Ohio and the Brookings Institution focused on revitalizing the state’s core communities and reinvigorating the state’s economic competitiveness. The summit is building a platform for change to address the multiple crises in Cleveland, and all of Ohio, with state reforms in the drivers of prosperity: infrastructure, workforce, innovation and quality of place.
“Cleveland’s crises mirror deterioration in other Ohio cities, therefore many of the Cleveland fixes can be replicated elsewhere in the state,” said Lavea Brachman, Co-Director, Greater Ohio & Non-Resident Brookings Institution Senior Fellow. “The fixes and replication cannot be done without state reforms – it’s a moment to align state, federal and local policies.”
The Cleveland Mini-Summit builds on the momentum and success of the Brookings/Greater Ohio Restoring Prosperity to Ohio Summit held last fall, which launched the Restoring Prosperity to Ohio Initiative and unveiled a state reform agenda. The Cleveland summit is the first in a local convenings series that Greater Ohio will host throughout Ohio, in conjunction with local partners.
“In this time of economic and fiscal crisis, the state has to commit to targeted, integrated investments in the assets that drive prosperity,” said Bruce Katz, Vice President & Director Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution. “These assets are concentrated in core communities like Cleveland. Ohio’s prosperity depends on the prosperity of its core communities.”
In particular, discussion centered on finding revitalization and stabilization strategies for Cleveland in terms of their job market, their industrial base, their physical footprint, and their ability to build on their existing assets, at a metro-wide, not just city scale. Cleveland, like other Ohio cities with the exception of Columbus, is shrinking in population but its physical size has remained the same, leading to destructive effects on the tax base, the real estate market, and the community fabric. Particularly hard hit by high foreclosures, a specific panel addressed Cleveland’s foreclosure crisis and its aftereffects of abandonment and neighborhood decline, helping to identify a new vision and strategies that will revive its housing stock and revitalize its communities.
Cleveland has been engaged for a few years in several local economic development practices that align with the Restoring Prosperity Initiative “playbook,” helping it regain competitiveness, including leveraging anchor institutions, such as University Circle; building on assets, like the Lake Erie waterfront; and targeting resources with market potential, like the Euclid Corridor.
Participants agreed that there is a critical need to “reimagine” Cleveland and the state and institute governance reform, creating a new political culture of collaboration and consolidation across jurisdictions. Discussants recognized that the state is not taking up this urgent charge yet. The state plays a critical role in how these new strategies ultimately advance the urban revitalization agenda in Cleveland.
The summit was co-hosted by Greater Ohio, a non-profit research and advocacy group based in Columbus and Policy Bridge, a nonprofit policy organization based in Cleveland, in partnership with the Maxine Goodman Levin College Forum Program. Sponsors for the event included: Fund for Our Economic Future, The Cleveland Foundation, RPM International, Inc. and the Cleveland Clinic.
Comments from today’s gathering, along with upcoming convenings in other Ohio communities, will help to shape a final report to be released in late 2009 by Greater Ohio and Brookings. Additional information is available at www.greaterohio.org.
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Greater Ohio (www.greaterohio.org) is the state’s “smart growth” organization. We promote – through research, public education and grassroots advocacy – public policy to grow Ohio’s economy and improve the state’s quality of life through intelligent land use. Toward this end, Greater Ohio works to advance policies and programs that revitalize urban and metropolitan areas, strengthen regional cooperation, and protect Ohio’s open space, natural resources and farmland. We are non-partisan, non-profit, and foundation–funded. Greater Ohio’s office is located in Columbus, Ohio.
Another Perspective on Cincinnati: Does it have what it takes to revitalize?
Yesterday I posted comments regarding a blog that described the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood in Cincinnati. Today, I offer an alternative and a little more disheartening view on Cincinnati. Although the article, Ground Zero in Urban Decline claims that there is still hope for the cities like Cincinnati to revitalize, they are a lot of barriers in the way: "Yet cities such as Cincinnati make such development more difficult by continuing to focus on white elephants rather than the basic reforms that can help generate a broad economic base. Developers complain that many building inspectors are too narrowly focused on minimizing any risk when they should be letting the market innovate and diversify. Inspectors are focused on the narrowest interpretation of the law, and many rulings are arbitrary. Many developers in Cincinnati think of this as the cost of doing business, but it makes those areas less competitive than their suburban counterparts. Red tape shouldn't be considered simply another cost."
Ohio's economy has take some severe blows recently and it is obvious to most, that in order to recover we will need to change the way we do business in Ohio and think outside of the box. The Cleveland area has already started this process with the upcoming "Restoring Prosperity to Cleveland Mini-Summit" that will be held at the Wolstein Center this Monday, June 8th. The Mini-Summit will focus on addressing Cleveland’s plans for establishing and coalescing around an urban and regional revitalization vision, and the importance of the state’s role and federal resources in achieving that vision. Breakout sessions will engage participants in discussing local actions in five areas – quality of place, housing, infrastructure/transportation, economic engines/innovation and workforce – to help flesh out the state action agenda that was framed in the fall.
For more information or to register click here.
Over-The-Rhine: an indepth look at Cincinnati's neighborhood
A lot of attention is focused on Cincinnati's Over-the-Rhine neighborhood and some even say that it is exemplary of sustainable development efforts. For those of you who do not know about this neighborhood, here is a little background information extracted from Wikipedia.
- Over-the-Rhine is a neighborhood in Cincinnati, Ohio, located north of Downtown, south of CUF, south-west of Mount Auburn, west of Pendleton, and east of the West End. Over-the-Rhine is a historic district, treasured for its massive collection of 19th century Italianate structures, By the end of the 20th century, Over-the-Rhine had become one of the most economically distressed areas in the United States. In 1990 the neighborhood had an extremely high poverty and unemployment rate, with the median household income of about $5,000 a year. Since 2006, about $93 million has been invested in the development and creation of the Gateway Quarter, starting with 12th and Vine Streets immediately outside of downtown. The redevelopment project has been largely successful in its attempts to attract empty-nesters and young professionals into the neighborhood.
Kaid Benfield, Director of a Smart Growth Program in Washington D.C. has decided to take the analysis of Over-the-Rhine and step further and is issuing a three part blog, the first of which is titled, Revitalizing Over-the-Rhine (Part 1: The legacy and the challenge). The three part series will descirbe the historical significance of the area, examing current redevelopment activities, and look at the challenges the neighborhood faces before it can become a beacon of Smart Growth.
Reclaiming Vacant Properties Conference Begins...
Second Reclaiming Vacant Properties Conference begins today
June 1st, 2009
Today in Louisville, Kentucky, hundreds are taking part in the opening day of the second Reclaiming Vacant Properties Conference. The conference is a ray of hope in the midst of our housing and economic crises — and an incubator for the ideas and solutions that can bring prosperity back to the cities, communities and neighborhoods hit hard by abandonment and vacancy.
Insight into Belmont County: A Greater Ohio video
Greater Ohio's Gene Krebs talks with Sue Douglass, Belmont County Department of Development's Associate Director, about ongoing development activities in the area and road blocks it is facing.