Outside Erie

The images of the hundreds of blue-shirted volunteers who have flocked to the East 21st Street home of Clara Ward are truly heartening.

The Erie community has certainly come together under the bright lights of “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” to help a neighbor in need. The event has created a spirit and buzz that will certainly make an impact for one of Erie’s unsung heroes.

Even better, Grace Church has mustered a small army of volunteers to complete smaller home-improvement projects in the east side neighborhood surrounding Ward’s home.

But for all of the hoopla, part of me wonders where all of these people were before the TV cameras rolled into town.

There are hundreds of homes on Erie’s east side that have fallen into disrepair. Hundreds of families with limited resources who could have used a jump start in rebuilding their neighborhood. Dozens of public parks and vacant lots that have gotten almost no attention for decades.

We’ve addressed this problem on this blog in the past.

We’ve seen community leaders such as Gary Horton speak up about the neglect on the east side.

Perhaps all Erie needed was a catalyst. And perhaps TV personality Ty Pennington and his bullhorn can rally the community in ways that Erie’s home grown leaders have been unable to in the past.

My fear, though, is that once the cameras leave town, all of the volunteers will go back to their daily lives with warm memories of this experience.

And that will be it.

My hope is that someone who is truly invested in Erie will instead pick up the bullhorn and rally this army of kind-hearted people to continue what’s been started.

My hope is that we’ll see an influx of energy into the east side that will boost the spirit of those who live there and improve its value.

It sounds a bit pie-in-the-sky, for sure.

But the producers of Extreme Makeover are selling a package filled with hope and warm feelings. They are selling the idea that they can inspire change and improve lives.

Unfortunately, the show will soon move on to another city — creating the same wave of energy and excitement for another family with another compelling story.

When that happens, it will be up to those left behind to continue this work.

Otherwise, Erie will have little to show for this spectacle.

This doesn’t relate directly to Erie, but it might be of interest to those who work in the nonprofit community in Erie.

In my day job at the Chronicle of Philanthropy, we gave birth today to our latest podcast series, Philanthropy This Week.

I’m hosting the show — and each week we’re talking about some key issues and trends in the nonprofit world.

In our first podcast, we talk about the parallels between the recession of 1974 and our current recession — and we preview the new NBC Show, The Philanthropist.

Former Erie County Executive and current candidate for Lt. Governor Rick Schenker chimed in this week with this interesting take on the state budget process.

We need to remember what Ronald Reagan said: “The nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on this earth is a government program.”

This is the annual dance between the propaganda machines of the Democrats and Republicans. It’s like a reoccurring nightmare. Rendell and the Democrats in the House are saying that cuts made in the Republican Senate version of the budget are too deep—too many people will be hurt. The Republicans are saying the democrats have been on a spending frenzy under Rendell who want to increase taxes to pay for more government programs. Unfortunately, both are right.

In the end, we will probably see the Republican controlled Senate give in to Rendell and the Democrats to two reasons: The first reason is it time for legislators to go on summer break. Just like high school kids—they don’t want to stay around all summer. Rendell has the upper hand on this one saying he would hold out until Labor Day if necessary. The second, and more important, reason is that neither Republicans nor Democrats want to be responsible to their constituents for the cuts in government programs.

Once a government program exists it builds up a following of people that cry foul as soon as they try to cut it. In many cases these are good programs that help a lot of people, and it really does hurt when they are cut. As an example, I serve on the board of a small private school. Board members received an urgent email that funding of the Educational Improvement Tax Credit (EITC) program was in jeopardy. The program gives scholarships to families in need, and this year the need is greater due the economy and job losses.

The tough part for legislators is that constituents in their districts don’t want their programs cut, but neither do they want their taxes raised either. So legislators will continue to fill the budget hole like they did last year with one-time sources of funding (which creates a deeper hole next year), or they will need to look for new sources of revenue.

My guess is that the Senate Republicans will throw up their hands by the second or third week in July and say, “that’s it, we did all we could.” They will then go home to tell the story of how they tried to stop Fast Eddie Rendell and his insatiable need for more money. Then they will put out lots of taxpayer-funded mailers to take credit for saving the pet projects important for their constituents.

Faced with a $3.2 billion deficit, Gov. Ed Rendell is proposing a “temporary” hike in the state income tax to bridge the gap.

I don’t have to tell you the conventional wisdom about raising taxes during a recession.

I also know that it’s difficult to make $3.2 billion vanish from the state budget.

So what’s the answer?

Cuts are definitely in order — and Senate Republicans are already proposing to lop $1.7 billion out of the budget.

But cuts also bring their own form of economic pain. A smaller state budget, for example, means less money for nonprofit organizations that are already struggling to raise money in this difficult economy.

As demand for these services increases, nonprofit groups are facing their own shortfalls.

Charitable donations declined by nearly 6 percent in 2008 when adjusted for inflation, according to the recently released study by Giving USA. And many organizations say they are expecting a similar drop in 2009.

In Erie, the budget situation has already claimed five jobs at WQLN, the result of the state cutting funding for public media.

And that’s just one example.

Pennsylvania, of course, is not alone in this situation. Many other states, including California, are facing similar, if not worse, circumstances.

But we should be prepared for the economic situation in Pennsylvania to get worse before it gets better.

Dale Hannah at What If? has an excellent take on Erie’s effort to gain ‘All America City’ status.

I had been considering a post that asked whether Erie should be spending taxpayer money to send public officials down to Florida to make their case for this designation.

Dale’s post raises many of the questions I was considering.

He writes: “If the city truly cared about its “All-American” image, wouldn’t it make sense to put a large emphasis on creating a livable city, where residents could feel safe and have a sense of pride in their homes and neighborhood?”

Just for grins, I checked out which cities won the designation in 2008. Here’s the list:
* Goodyear, Arizona
* Cerritos, California
* Aurora, Colorado
* New Haven, Connecticut
* Kissimmee-Osceola County, Florida
* Gladstone, Missouri
* St. Louis Region (Missouri-Illinois)
* Lenoir, North Carolina
* Reidsville, North Carolina
* Akron, Ohio

Let’s get a show of hands here: How many of you knew that any of these cities had won the honor?

Another show of hands: How many of you would spend any time or money in these cities as a result of the designation?

To me, this seems like a rather empty exercise, along the lines of winning a “Who’s Who Among American High School Students” designation. You get your name in printed in a hardcover book and you can put a little line about it on your resume, but it really means, well, nothing.

Wouldn’t Erie be better served by spending its time and resources on more meaningful efforts that would actually help bring more business to the community, strengthen the community’s current business base, and improve living conditions in its neighborhoods?

Wouldn’t the energy and time we’re spending to send officials from the city, county, Erie Regional Chamber, and Visit Erie to Florida this week be better used in other places?

This is misplaced energy, especially at a time when Erie has so many other concerns.

People, you need to speak up about efforts like this and let folks know that now is not the time for ego strokes and for competing for the right to put a red-white-and-blue logo on “Welcome to Erie” signs.

We need creativity. We need to be looking at creating real solutions to real problems. We need to be looking at ways to make Erie stand out from the crowd.

Instead, we’re watching community leaders travel to Florida for three days this week to compete for the right to be listed next to Gladstone, Mo., and Reidsville, N.C.

Erie’s people deserve better in times like these.

Laura Marinucci, who is leading the Erie-based Save Our Shriners campaign, was a guest on the syndicated public radio program The Takeaway this morning.

Shriners Hospital on The Takeaway

Moody’s and Economy.com offer an interesting perspective on Erie’s economy.

While many complain about the cost of doing business in Erie, the rating service has actually calculated that business costs in Erie are about 7 percent below the national average.

Not as surprising: The cost of living in Erie is only about 83 percent of the national cost of living. That’s the good news, although the profile also points out that lower wage levels in Erie tend to keep skilled workers away.

Erie’s strengths, according to the report, are GE Transportation and the fact that is has “one of the best hospital systems in the nation.”

Is this report on target? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

I’m bringing back the Comment of the Week feature, with loyal reader Jim’s analysis of the financial projections for the community college plan.

Jim offers a rather reasoned critique of why he doesn’t think this is a wise investment for Erie. The bottom line: we’ll be spending a lot of money to further Erie’s so-called “brain drain”. Do you agree — or is there a counter-argument that should also be heard here?

Here’s what he had to say:

I hope that this morning’s paper gives pause to some of the irrational exuberance for the establishing of a community college. $1.7 million initial operating costs in the first year, increasing to $6.6 million per year by 2015, on top of a $109 million dollar bond issue to cover the capital costs. This leads to real estate tax increase estimates of from $16.29 to $59.62 per year, per $100,000.00 of assessment. This is beyond a rather expensive want versus need.

We still do not have any commitments relative to the ability to absorb the annual graduates into the local economy in any meaningful fashion, and as a community we are in a severe recession and approaching double digit unemployment. This proposal, if implemented, is guarantied to further increase the cost of doing business in Erie.

We still have no comprehensive plan in place to grow employment opportunities, nor hiring commitments from existing business anywhere near enough to absorb the graduate population. So what wold happen to the graduates? A continuation of the current practice of having to leave Erie to obtain access to employment opportunities commensurate with their newly obtained higher education? In other words more brain drain? And what would the impact be on the existing institutions of higher learning? Would it reduce attendance leading to upward pressure on tuition?

I suggest it is time to take a breather, and either commence some comprehensive planning that addresses these issues, or put the whole idea to bed, as simply being beyond our community planning ability. Do it before we end up with another poorly planned public project to pay for, which like the convention center, will be extremely hard pressed to ever meet its overstated potential.

A few things worth passing along today for those who care about Erie:

* Joel Natalie has a nice tribute to Jack Tirak on the 1-year anniversary of Tirak’s passing. Tirak’s blog on Erie media has been archived here.

* Extreme Makeover: Home Edition is coming to Erie in July and the Mayor’s office is trying to make sure the event is more than just a windfall of fortune for one family.

“Five families are being considered and we want to be ready when the ‘door knock’ happens for one special family on June 25th,” writes Laura Schaaf, assistant to Mayor Joe Sinnott. “Our goal is to not only help this one family selected by Extreme Makeover but to impact an entire neighborhood.”

This seems like a great way to use an event as a catalyst to help improve a section of Erie. Schaaf says the city is considering a number of possible efforts — a book drive that provides children with a stocked bookcase, a neighborhood beautification project, or a canned food drive. Those interested in donating materials or services should contact Maleno Development.

Those who have ideas for the neighborhood beautification project are invited to contact Schaaf at lschaaf@erie.pa.us.

* GoErie.com is looking for input on how it can improve its Web site.

* And Penn State-Behrend is launching a new certificate program aimed at helping nonprofit professionals become more effective fundraisers.

Robert Reich had some interesting things to say in a post on Salon.com about the need for a new model for work force education in the U.S. in light of the erosion of the manufacturing sector.

Here’s a snippet of what the former Secretary of Labor had to say in the piece:

America’s biggest challenge is to educate more of our people sufficiently to excel at such tasks. We do remarkably well with the children from relatively affluent families. Our universities are the envy of the world. and no other nation surpasses us in providing intellectual and creative experience within entire regions specializing in one or another kind of symbolic analytic work (Los Angeles for music and film, Silicon Valley for software and the Internet, greater Boston for biomed engineering, and so on).

But we’re in danger of losing ground because too many of our kids, especially those from lower-middle-class and poor families, can’t get the foundational education they need. The consequence is a yawning gap in income and wealth that continues to widen. More and more of our working people finds themselves in the local service economy — in hotels, hospitals, restaurant chains and big-box retailers — earning low wages with little or no benefits. Unions could help raise their wages by giving them more bargaining leverage. A higher minimum wage and larger earned income tax credit could help as well.

Not all of our young people can or should receive a four-year college degree, but we can do far better for them than we’re doing now. At the least, every young person should have access to a year or two beyond high school, in order to gain a certificate attesting to their expertise in a particular area of technical competence. Technicians who install, upgrade and service automated and computerized machinery — office technicians, auto technicians, computer technicians, environmental technicians — will be in ever-greater demand.

Some argue that even if I’m correct about all this, the erosion of traditional manufacturing impedes the capacity of Americans to learn important symbolic-analytic tasks, because such learning depends on an intimate understanding of the manufacturing process.

This is the same argument being put forth by some of those who support the idea of a new community college in Erie.

It’s a valid argument, though the caveat must be that a new institution must deliver education that fills a significant gap in Erie’s work force training system.

We don’t need a school that would train folks in skills that are already being taught at the private post-secondary institutions.

What we should be striving for here is something that would train workers for skilled growth careers. To do that, we actually need to identify some sectors that are likely to have a need for skilled workers 5-10 years from now.

I haven’t yet seen a plan that provides this type of analysis (unless I missed it somewhere). Erie does have an opportunity here — but it must be done right.