Youngstown Praised

[Micky]

After reading several articles on commuter towns (bedroom communities), I'm concerned about where our city is actually going.  Research documents the fact that long-time residents are often displaced by new commuter residents due to rising house prices.  Commuter towns create disparities in municipal tax rates because they collect few business taxes and individuals are often forced to pay the brunt of the public operating budget in higher property or income taxes. 

Does the Youngstown 2010 plan address how new substantial businesses come into the plan or will Youngstown lose more businesses for pocket parks?

[Towntalk]

Imagine Youngstown having something larger than something they have in New York. And imagine the Times admitting it. The funny thing is that the same man that designed Mill Creek Park also had a hand in designing Central Park.

[yfdgricker]

Well that is one way of looking at it I'm posting the story here, not because I don't want people going to the NYTimes Magazine section but because I want to have an archive of the story here should the one on the NYTimes magazine page disappear!


Creative Shrinkage

By BELINDA LANKS
Published: December 10, 2006

For decades, depopulated Rust Belt cities have tried to grow their way back to prosperity. Youngstown, Ohio, has a new approach: shrinking its way into a new identity.

At its peak, Youngstown supported 170,000 residents. Now, with less than half that number living amid shuttered steel factories, the city and Youngstown State University are implementing a blueprint for a smaller town that retains the best features of the metropolis Youngstown used to be. Few communities of 80,000 boast a symphony orchestra, two respected art museums, a university, a generously laid-out downtown and an urban park larger than Central Park. "Other cities that were never the center of steel production don't have these assets," says Jay Williams, the city's newly elected 35-year-old mayor, who advocated a downsized Youngstown when he ran for office.

Williams's strategy calls for razing derelict buildings, eventually cutting off the sewage and electric services to fully abandoned tracts of the city and transforming vacant lots into pocket parks. The city and county are now turning abandoned lots over to neighboring landowners and excusing back taxes on the land, provided that they act as stewards of the open spaces. The city has also placed a moratorium on the (often haphazard) construction of new dwellings financed by low-income-housing tax credits and encouraged the rehabilitation of existing homes. Instead of trying to recapture its industrial past, Youngstown hopes to capitalize on its high vacancy rates and underused public spaces; it could become a culturally rich bedroom community serving Cleveland and Pittsburgh, both of which are 70 miles away.

Youngstown's experiment has not gone unnoticed. Williams's office has already fielded calls from officials in a few of the many American metropolitan areas that have experienced steep population drop-offs. When cities hit rock bottom, it seems, planners can find new solutions for urban decay — if they are willing to think small enough.

[Towntalk]

The New York Times praised Yougstown. Yes, you've read right, the New York Times praised our beloved city.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/10/magazine/10section1B.t-3.html

It's really nice to have a major newspaper actually say something nice and positive about our city.