November 2008

  • Food Banks: Another Crisis Casualty?

    Last week, when a prominent and long-standing central New Jersey soup kitchen went to the newspapers as a last resort to inform the public that demand was up, donations were down, and that it would have to cut back on…

  • Community Stabilization: Are CDCs Up To The Task?

    Imagine that it’s hurricane season, and 150 Katrinas are pounding poor neighborhoods—and the federal government response is totally inadequate. The community development movement faces two challenges: first, that 30-plus years of solid, successful community revitalization work could be wiped out…

  • Don’t Put All The Dollars Into a Few Streets?

    In a new, substantial post on planetizen.com, Charles Buki suggests that the foreclosure crisis presents an opportunity for community developers to re-assess where they allocate their limited resources. He says we should be fighting to protect the gains made in…

  • Talk About Aging In Place…

    Aging in place for some is the ultimate ideal. Elderly individuals, with their faculties in tact, and who are physically sound, stay in the houses where they raised their families, and remain in the communities where they have roots, paid…

  • In From the Margins

    Well well well—Wall Street goes into the dumper after years of “free market” worship and Congress and newspapers and all begin fumbling for advice, new sources. Someone to make sense of it. Suddenly others beyond Greenspan acolytes are invited into…

  • Gloomy Outlook for Nonprofits

    It’s going to be a while before we begin hearing some good economic news, particularly as the current economic landscape reverberates within the non-profit world. And with that, a forum held Wednesday on the impact of the crisis on nonprofits…

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    Infrastructure Woes or Opportunities?

    Anyone who has wasted hours each day commuting to work, sat in traffic for an hour as a freight train inched by, waited endlessly for a bus only to have four arrive at once, or paid a week’s wages for…

  • Dead House Walking

    A few months back I wrote about two pieces of vacant property legislation making their way through the Pennsylvania General Assembly. I’m happy to report today that one of these bills has passed, with exciting implications for the commonwealth’s dozens…

  • What We Talk About When We Talk About…Voting Machines

    I suppose post-election time is as good a time as any to talk about voting machine flaws, particularly following a decisive presidential election. But, just like falling gas prices in the short-term are no indication of an ebbing crisis, decisive…

  • The Trials of Grass-roots Community Planning

    Tom Angotti’s new book, New York For Sale shows just how frustrating it can be to achieve true community-based planning. He writes that after the city government gave the power to plan to community boards, elected at the neighborhood level,…

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    Hope…of Curbing Climate Change

    When the Environmental Law and Policy Center was founded in Chicago 15 years ago, cell phones that could get clear reception or send images halfway across the globe were a novelty. Now, this and even more advanced communications technology are…

  • No Road Home for New Orleans Minorities?

    Two fair housing organizations are alleging that HUD’s Road Home program valued homes in white neighborhoods in New Orleans higher than similar homes in minority neighborhoods. From yesterday’s press release: Civil rights and fair housing groups filed a federal lawsuit…

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    News in the Future Tense

    What a great attention-grabber. Dated July 4, 2009, the lead story in the edition of The New York Times handed out to commuters in New York City yesterday morning trumpeted in giant type “IRAQ WAR ENDS”—alongside the other above-the-fold headline,…

  • The Biggest Winners

    Obama’s election. For those under 30, it was a landslide. Despite the news that Obama is considering the neoliberal Larry Summers for Treasury Secretary and former Senator Sam Nunn is aiding the transition process at the Pentagon, I am overjoyed…

  • The Urban (Policy) President?

    We anticipated this, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that an Obama administration will contain a Department of Urban Policy. According to a Washington Post blog, plans are in the works to establish an urban policy department “in order to better…

  • Sorting Through What Sustainability Means

    It’s interesting how language shifts slightly over time to reflect new ways of thinking. I recall a few years ago reading that some people interpreted “smart growth” to mean government telling people what they could and could not do with…

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    Bagging the Big Apple

    In Amsterdam, at a Super de Boer, imagine my surprise when I had to pay for a grocery bag because I didn’t bring my own. In the U.S., I buy those biodegradable poop bags for my dog, so I don’t…

  • Community Organizing: The Sequel

    Election Day’s over, we’ve already blown past “Yes We Can!” to “Yes We Did!” Now we’re on to watching President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team and his potential appointees. But can we please indulge one last fond backward glance to his…

  • Prescription for Progressive Change: Inspire and Mobilize

    Barack Obama is going to need all his organizing skills to be an effective leader. As I write in an article in the Huffington Post, Shifting Gears: Transforming Obama’s Campaign Into a Movement for Change, to achieve a progressive agenda,…

  • After Nov. 4: Bringing It All Back Home

    Interviewed on “The Takeaway” this morning, Emory University psychology professor Drew Westen, author of The Political Brain, had this to say about how President-elect Barack Obama can deliver on his promises to bring change we can believe in: ”...think like…

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