1960’s: Model Cities Not Such a Great Model

In 1966 the federal government enacted the Demonstration Cities and Metropolitan Development Act, commonly known as model cities.  In large part, the federal program was based on programs being tried in New Haven Connecticut by Mayor Richard “Dick” Lee (1954-1970).  Mayor Lee championed the efforts of urban renewal and creating a model for other cities to follow.  Sadly, many cities did.

A few years ago Yale did a nice look at the era and produced an exhibit and website.  From the site:

The Ideology of Redevelopment

Urban renewal offered a chance for architects, city planners, and other experts to enact their ideal vision of a city. New Haven became a testing group for top-down, Modernist theories of urban design. Instead of neighborhoods in which the people lived, shopped, and worked, planners wanted to separate housing, retail, and industrial uses. Dense, irregular city streets gave way to highways to accommodate the automobile.

Especially in the first years of urban renewal, planners thought that new buildings would make new people: that renewing the city physically would solve the problems of poverty, unemployment, and racial antagonism. As the 1960s progressed, it became clear that these difficulties would not be overcome solely with new construction alone, and the Lee Administration pioneered a number of social programs.

The arguments were pretty much the same from city to city.  To solve problems we must erase the past.  To many the slums were home. One of those interviewed for the exhibit said this, “You could classify Oak Street back then as a slum, but it was a thriving slum…”

This was the part the planners and architects of the era failed to understand.  These slums may not have had hot water or toilets but they had good human interaction, an economy, and local services for residents.  The slums were functional, unlike the projects that replaced them.

The Yale site, in one section, said:

President Lyndon Johnson’s Secretary of Labor called New Haven’s efforts “the greatest success story in the history of the world.” But by the end of his tenure, Lee said regularly, “If New Haven is a model city, God help America’s cities.” 

Indeed.  Mayor Lee realized, by 1970, the failure of the urban renewal programs in New Haven yet they continued throughout the USA.  In the early 1970s, the model cities program was folding into the new CDBG (Community Development Block Grant) program.  Unfortunately, many planners and architects trained in this way of thinking are still in positions of power.  We’ve not fully learned the lessons of the past.

The Yale site called, Life in the Model City: Stories of Urban Renewal from New Haven, is highly recommended.

Jane Jacobs: A Year Ago Today

It was a year ago today that the world lost one of the greatest urbanists, Jane Jacobs.  She died just before her 90th birthday (May 4th).  Jacobs was not a professional planner, most likely a good thing in my view.  She authored the classic 1961 book, Death & Life of Great American Cities, as well as a number of other books on urban economics and planning.  Again, not a planner by training but by instinct and observation.  For much of her life she worked against the urban experiments being tested by the professional planners and traffic engineers.

Jacobs had her fair share of critics over the years, but I am not one of them.  I’ve got all over her books neatly stacked on my desk as a reminder to reach each of the in order this summer.  To me she is a hero, the lay person turned international urbanist.  Click here to read my post from last year.

Clear the Downtown Streets, It is Time for the Mayor’s Mardi Gras Ball

A year ago a motorcade with flashing lights whizzed through stoplights as aldermen went from a hotel party sponsored by Anheuser-Busch to City Hall for the annual Mayor’s Ball. The story was first told in the St. Louis Business Journal by Dave Drebes of the Arch City Chronicle, expanded upon by the RFT. From the RFT story:

So was Dave Drebes, editor and publisher of the local political tabloid Arch City Chronicle. Drebes, who also writes a weekly column for the St. Louis Business Journal, referenced the soirée in the March 3 Business Journal. Noting that pomp reigns as power wanes among city lawmakers, Drebes described “whizzing through stoplights” with three (unnamed) aldermen in a motorcade from the hotel to city hall as sirens and flashing red lights attached to the caravan’s lead car helped clear a path through traffic.

Gregali, Florida and Kirner say the February 24 motorcade was orchestrated and led by the private security firm Special Services Inc. The aldermen and Drebes followed in Gregali’s Mercury minivan, with Gregali behind the wheel. The aldermen say they don’t know who else was in the procession.

Here is a bit from Drebes’ story talking about the waning power of aldermen:

So what has the job become? Visit an alderman now and you’ll most likely find a yellow legal pad — a running list of calls from constituents about the most inane and yet pressing matters — a street light that’s not working, an overflowing trash can or dumpster, an alley that needs repaving, a sidewalk that need to be reset. That is the bulk of their day.

As their stars fade, is there some outrage, some pang of despair at the lack of power? No. Some itch for rebellion, some wish to put the mayor on notice that they still matter? No.

They’re content with their place. They’re zooming through red lights on the way to the Ball.

Click here to read my story from 2006 with links to the RFT article and the Business Journal commentary by Drebes. Party safely and watch out near city hall.

‘Roger & Me’ Raises Old Questions That Are Still With Us.

In class on Saturday we watched the classic Michael Moore documentary, Roger & Me. You may recall this was Moore’s first film and it focused on his hometown of Flint Michigan. The topics covered are wide-ranging from corporate greed (GM was making a big profit in those days), outsourcing jobs, a community’s heavy reliance on a single employer, and the costs to lure tourists to town.  A short sequel, called Pets or Meat, is online.
Flint, located an hour or so from Detroit, was the auto capital of the world at one time and was closely tied with General Motors. Between GM and associated suppliers the auto industry was the employment base. The town, like so many, had a downtown that had seen better days. Hoping to bring new life, in 1981 they opened a luxury Hyatt Regency Hotel w/convention center and a “festival marketplace” known as Water Street Pavilion. In 1984 they opened a theme park called AutoWorld which, I kid you not, had a reproduction of their old main street. All were intended to bring in droves of tourists.

The $100 million AutoWorld theme park wasn’t even open a year. The hotel & marketplace both eneded up closing within a decade. All three were internally focused projects with little relationship to each other or the real city. Instead of returning their main street (Saginaw St. btw) to its former glory they went for the big splash projects popular in the times.

Around this same time St. Louis had followed much of the same formula. We already had our convention center in place in the 1970s but we’d see new hotel projects and expansions of the center on the boards in the 80s. We also went crazy with two competing shopping destinations downtown; St. Louis Union Station and St. Louis Centre.

Each time our convention facilities failed to produce the desired revenue, the answer was to expand. Either we needed more floor space to attract larger and larger conventions or the answer was a dedicated convention hotel. Many conventions I have seen both in town and in other cities fit comfortably within the context of a hotel — the days of the mega convention are coming to an end. In reality, the convention route for tourist dollars may never have been as hyped. Here is the executive summary from a 2005 Brookings report titled ‘Space Available: The Realities of Convention Centers as Economic Development Strategy:’

To cities the lure of the convention business has long been the prospect of visitors emptying their wallets on meals, lodging, and entertainment, helping to rejuvenate ailing downtowns.

However, an examination of the convention business and city and state spending on host venues finds that:

• The overall convention marketplace is declining in a manner that suggests that a recovery or turnaround is unlikely to yield much increased business for any given community, contrary to repeated industry projections. Moreover this decline began prior to the disruptions of 9-11 and is exacerbated by advances in communications technology. Currently, overall attendance at the 200 largest tradeshow events languishes at 1993 levels.

• Nonetheless, localities, sometimes with state assistance, have continued a type of arms race with competing cities to host these events, investing massive amounts of capital in new convention center construction and expansion of existing facilities. Over the past decade alone, public capital spending on convention centers has doubled to $2.4 billion annually, increasing convention space by over 50 percent since 1990. Nationwide, 44 new or expanded convention centers are now in planning or construction.

• Faced with increased competition, many cities spend more money on additional convention amenities, like publicly-financed hotels to serve as convention “headquarters.” Another competitive response has been to offer deep discounts to tradeshow groups. Despite dedicated taxes to pay off the public bonds issued to build convention centers, many—including Washington, D.C and St. Louis—operate at a loss.

This analysis should give local leaders pause as they consider calls for ever more public investment into the convention business, while weighing simultaneously where else scarce public funds could be spent to boost the urban economy.

The full report is worth the read because several pages focuses on St. Louis as a case study. It goes through all the history from the 1970s through to a few years ago. Concluding with:

St. Louis used the vast bulk of its $130 million in federal empowerment bonds authorization, fully 75 percent, in pursuit of its convention hotel dream. It also took on the obligation to repay another $50 million backed by its HUD community development block
grant funds. The commitment to the hotel, rather than some other form of job creation or economic development, thus represents a substantial opportunity cost. Now, with the hotel failing to meet its operating costs or debt service, the city of St. Louis will be forced to use $500,000 in federal aid to meet the debt service cost this year.

But the bill for the convention center and headquarters hotel in a highly competitive market does not stop there. The Moody’s assessment of the hotel’s financial prospects argued that its future success “will depend in part on continued redevelopment of down-
town,” with the city seeking to “fast track certain downtown redevelopment efforts.” The likelihood is that St. Louis and the state of Missouri will continue to pour public capital investment and tax subsidies into the downtown area and convention competition, despite
the limited returns. The city is thus regularly subsidizing the convention center at the expense of other public services or other revitalization strategies.

So when you are wondering why we don’t have money to maintain Forest Park just keep failed projects like the $90 million St. Louis Centre (now with a new round of funding backed by the city), St. Louis Marketplace (costing us $1 million a year) and the convention center fiasco. Elected officials continue to pour money into mega projects with promises of big returns.

Ville Phillips Estates Latest Victim of Decades Old Feud in City’s 4th Ward

For decades the history-rich Ville neighborhood has struggled to retain residents, fight off crime and rebuild decaying properties. The same can be said for most St. Louis neighborhoods and the city as a whole. What seems to be different, are the very deep political factions at worth within the 4th ward.

Current Alderman and former State Rep, O.L. Shelton recently appeared on camera as the focus of an Elliot Davis “You Paid For It Segment.” Now I know many of you out there are probably rolling your eyes but I don’t know that anyone who saw this segment had any sympathy for Ald. Shelton. At issue is an unfinished housing development known as Ville Phillips Estates. Click here to watch the segment. The video was brought to my attention by two sources, one was the blog known as Brick City and earlier the same day via email from a frustrated resident of Ville Phillips Estates.

So basically O.L. Shelton is washing his hands of a project started by his predecesso and political rival, Peggy Ryan. Ryan, you may recollect, was recalled by 4th ward voters in 2005. But the real story goes back much further, roughly 1973 when Daisy McFowland was appointed alderman by the committeepersons after then alderman Joe Clark became the city’s director of public safety. I’ll attempt to explain the three decade trail of aldermen in the 4th ward later in this piece, but first let’s get back to the Ville Phillips Estates.

At the ground breaking on June 26, 2003 everything was all smiles. Below is from the city’s press announcement:

The caption reads:

June 26, 2003 — Mayor Slay participates in the ground breaking ceremony by Mary “One”/Taylor-Morley for Ville Phillips Estates, a new housing community in the Ville neighborhood. Ville Phillips Estates is Taylor-Morley’s first City housing project. (Photo by Charles Morris Jr.)

The project team included suburban home building Taylor-Morley and well-known REALTOR® and developer Mary “One” Johnson. I’m not sure why Elliot Davis didn’t question either the Taylor-Morley firm, Ms. Johnson, the city’s Community Development Agency or the mayor’s office as to why the project has not been finished. All received good press early on and apparently none of the bad press now that things have gone wrong.

The St. Louis Business Journal joined in the praise on June 26, 2003:

City officials and developers kicked off construction of a new housing development in The Ville neighborhood Thursday that will provide 50 homes in the city’s Fourth Ward.

Ville Phillips Estates is a joint housing development of Mary “One” Johnson and Taylor-Morley Urban Development LLC. It is Taylor-Morley’s first development in the city.

The next month, on July 24, 2003 the Business Journal ran a puff piece on Mary One Johnson, referencing the project which is now listed as 100 homes rather than 50 homes the month before:

In 1999, Johnson was recognized as the first minority woman to own her own development company in the St. Louis area, according to the St. Louis Minority Business Council. That company, Mary 1 Enterprises Real Estate Development, is building more than 200 homes in St. Louis city, including St. Louis Place Estates, the Gate District, and the Ville Phillips Estate, a 100-home development.

The Business Journal ran another story on Mary “One” Johnson as part of a series the ‘Most Influential Business Women in 2005.’

Some of the largest projects pending in St. Louis include the construction of 100 homes in St. Louis Place Estates at 2716 N. 21st St., 200 homes in Ville Phillips Estates at 1926 Whittier, and 60 homes in the Gate District, which is bound by Jefferson, Chouteau and Grand avenues and Interstate 44. Johnson said the support from city officials has been tremendous. “It takes a village to rebuild the city.”

Several of the developments Johnson took on were at odds with people’s belief that they could be done, one example being the Ville Phillips Estates. Initially, real estate in the area was appraised at $5,000, but is now $160,000, she said.

Now the year that Peggy Ryan is recalled the project, in the Business Journal at least, has grown from 50 homes to 100 homes and now to 200 homes. Keep in mind that only the first 10 were ever completed at a reported cost of $2.4 million to tax payers.

The City Development website for the project, not updated since July 2005, still reads:

A major initiative is underway in the historic Ville neighborhood for a new housing development called Phillips Estates. Taylor Morely Simon is teaming with Mary One Johnson to construct at least 10 new for sale homes annually. The long term vision is that up to 200 homes will be built.

The city’s CDA (Community Development Agency) 2004 Consolidated Performance and Evaluation Report talks about the project getting started. One could possibly suggest the project was a failure and that it shouldn’t be finished, better to cut & run? However, the 2005 Consolidated Performance Report goes further, proclaiming the project a “resounding success”:

Investment in site assembly for large-scale residential redevelopment continues to be an important use of CDBG dollars. Acquisition and site preparation continue in the Near North Side, the Ville, the Garden District, the old Gaslight Square, and along Delmar on the north edge of the Central West End. The resounding success of CitiRama, Botanical Heights, Ville Phillips Estates, North Market Place and Mullanphy Square attest to the importance of this program, as does the commitment of the St. Louis Homebuilders to a second CitiRama.

However, the CDA’s ActionPlan2006 does recognize the project was unfinished, indicating an intent to “focus on the next phases”:

CDA will continue construction of several large subdivisions in minority communities. In particular, attention will focus on the next phases for Ville Phillips Estates. This new single-family development, aimed at low and moderate income households, is the first newly constructed for-sale housing in the Ville neighborhood in many decades. The Ville is the historic heart of the African-American community in St. Louis, containing many of its premiere institutions and landmarks.

Keep in mind the above “ActionPlan” was prepared after Ald. O.L. Shelton won the special election. In what looks like an example of cut & paste, the CDA’s current ActionPlan2007 sounds much like the year before:

CDA will continue construction of several large subdivisions in minority communities. In 2007 CDA will launch a new Major North Side Initiative designed to provide financial support to affordable and mixed-income homeownership projects of scale on the City’s North Side. CDA will also work with the neighborhood housing corporation and elected officials in the Ville neighborhood to continue the new construction of owner-occupied units there that began with the first phases of Ville Phillips Estates. This new single-family development, aimed at low and moderate income households, is the first newly constructed for-sale housing in the Ville neighborhood in many decades. The Ville is the historic heart of the African-American community in St. Louis, containing many of its premiere institutions and landmarks.

What a mess huh? It is a shame this project has gotten caught up in a political fight, but like I said earlier this is nothing new for the city’s 4th ward. Here is a little history lesson for you. Pay close attention because this one has lots of twists and turns and many repeat players.

So Daisy McFowland was appointed in 1973 to finish out the term of Joe Clark who left to take a city position. McFowland was re-elected in 1975 but defeated in 1979 by Clifford Wilson, Jr. In 1983 she ran again for Alderman and won (and again in 1987).

However, in October 1990 Ald. McFowland passed away. Following her death were eight candidates to take her place, including ally and committeewoman Bertha Mitchell as well as her son, Ed McFowland. From the St. Louis Post-Dispatch 2/24/1991:

All the candidates promise to mend the ward politically. But it’s likely to take more than a needle and thread. Bad blood between Daisy McFowland and Shelton, which dates back to about 1980 when Shelton became committeeman, led to Shelton forming a splinter group. Since McFowland’s death, committeewoman Mitchell and committeeman Shelton have been unable to come together. When Mitchell, who was aligned with McFowland, told Shelton she would run for the seat, he did not react favorably. Shelton is supporting Pointer, a 25-year-old student at Harris-Stowe State College who also works in his father’s appliance store on North Grand Boulevard. Pointer has worked as Shelton’s administrative assistant. Pointer said that if he is elected, the ward’s alderman and its state representative would be working in tandem for the first time in a long while. He said the split had hurt residents. ”In dealing with getting things done in the ward, it came down to whether you were a McFowland person or a Shelton person,” Pointer said. ”Most times the ward in general lost out, because a lot of people didn’t want to get in the middle of it,”he said.

For the record, most people in the ward still don’t want to get in the middle and they are still losing out. Back to the article, former one-term alderman Clifford Wilson was among the eight candidates seeking the office:

Wilson, 60, unseated Daisy McFowland in 1979 and served as an alderman four years until 1983, when the tide turned and McFowland beat him. He said he wants to finish several development projects he started and was urged by leaders of several community-based groups to get in the race.

So in 1991 Wilson wants to finish projects he started somewhere between 1979 and 1983? That is a long time for project to go unfinished. As I mention above, McFowland’s son was also among the 1991 candidates. First time running for office, oh no:

Ed McFowland, 34, mounted an unsuccessful challenge to Shelton for his House seat in 1988. He recently quit his $21,000-a-year job as an assistant manager at the St. Louis Housing Authority to run for his mother’s seat.

Yes, the McFowland-Shelton feud is a family affair with Ed having tried before to unseat Shelton, and now seeking to become alderman. And while Wilson wants to finish projects from the early 80s, apparently projects started by McFowland herself were up in the air following her death:

Jack Saunders Sr., a consultant for the non-profit Greater Ville Historic Redevelopment Corp., said a redevelopment plan for the Ville hangs in the balance in the 4th Ward race. The plan includes construction of single-family homes, creation of a light-industrial corridor and a movie theater for the old Homer Phillips Hospital complex. Saunders said city officials already have vacillated on their commitment to the project since Daisy McFowland’s death. He said to get it back on line, the ward’s alderman would have to support efforts to get incentive money for homebuyers and money to rehab the buildings. Most of the candidates said they supported the plan or some variation of it.

Bertha Mitchell, the committeewoman at odds with committeeman O.L. Shelton, won the election in 1991, and re-election in 1995. In becoming Alderman she would have had to resign as committeewoman. In 1996 she passed away while serving as Alderman.

Upon her death O.L. Shelton brought back 1991 candidate Sam Pointer, who was now nominated as the democratic candidate in the special election. Bertha Mitchell’s son, Mike, ran as an independent to fill the vacancy due to his mom’s passing. Mitchell won.

I need to explain something here which I just learned. When a special election is called the winner doesn’t necessarily finish out the balance of the 4-year term. The special election is only until the next municipal primary. So, if a term has say 3 years remaining you’ll have a special election which will be good for a year as municipal elections come around every two years. However, when you are after a mid-term municipal election the winner will finish out the term. Make sense?

So in 1997, the next regular municipal election only a year later, Mike Mitchell won again but this time as a Democrat. In 1999, the normal year for even wards to hold elections, Mitchell was re-elected. All the while, O.L. Shelton was serving as the state representative and ward committeeman. But even that was about to change.

State level elected officials and even those holding “county” seats such as License Collector and Recorder of Deeds can be committeeman or committeewoman. However, those in city offices such as Alderman, President of the Board of Aldermen or Mayor, cannot. Despite this fact, 4th ward Alderman Mike Mitchell runs for committeeman against O.L. Shelton in August 2000. Sources tell me that then President of the Board of Aldermen Francis Slay and others warned Mitchell that if he won he would be forfeitting his aldermanic seat as a result. Well, he won the election to become 4th ward committeeman and the Board of Aldermen immediately notifed the Board of Elections the 4th Ward Aldermanic seat was now vacant and to call a special election. Interestingly, as the newly elected committeeman Mitchell gets himself nominated as the democratic nominee to replace himself, winning back the seat in November 2000.

Remember that Mitchell was elected in 1999 for a 4-year term. However, because a special election was held to fill the vacancy he created winning the race to be committeeman, another election was held during the next municipal primary in 2001. In March 2001 he lost to Peggy Ryan, just a few short months after winning back the seat in November 2000. Again, had he not ran and won as committeeman, he would have been in office at least through April 2003 (unless he was recalled).

Ryan was re-elected in the regular even-ward election in 2003 but in 2005 she was recalled. In the recall election O.L. Shelton, now presumably termed out of the Missouri house, ran for the office himself. Ryan also ran again but she came in third, behind Sam Moore with Shelton winning the seat. Despite the city’s ActionPlans, work on the Ville Phillips Estates seems to have stopped after Shelton finally took charge of the aldermanic seat he had tried for decades to control.

Now it is 2007 and time for the even numbered wards to select their alderman. This year we have incumbent O.L. “Get a Lawyer” Shelton and his runner up from the 2005 special election, Sam Moore.

While the Ville Phillips Estates remains unfinished, other housing developments are slated to begin soon. Additionally, separate local groups are working on an open-air produce market and business incubator for the Ville. As has been the case for a good thirty years, it seems future development projects may hang in the balance of the March 6th election. This is what happens, or doesn’t happen, when you allow aldermen to operate their own little fiefdom.