This essay explores renewal opportunities for a fictional town called Mudville. Prices cited are deflated to accurately reflect 1999 levels, further demonstrating structural challenges the have existed for decades, spanning generations. The long-term goal of this piece is to use data from USAFacts to demonstrate the rapid, increasing polarization of these issues in American communities.

Intro

Six months ago, the office of the mayor undertook efforts to evaluate and draft remedies for several challenges facing Mudville: structural racism across education, housing and district development.

Analysis

With a population of 1,096,436, Mudville began as an industrial powerhouse. With an economy historically driven by manufacturing, Mudville's once busy factories lie dormant with joblessness on the rise. The citizen's faith and hope in equality have plummeted. Recent figures suggest declining education and employment opportunities are are too often the norm. Minority communities are dispoproptiatneay affected. [See Table 1]. Statistically, Mudville's challenges are polarized around racial lines.

Race****| High School Drop Out Levels****| Unemployment levels****
---|---|---
White (Overall)| 4%| 3%
Minority (Hispanic, Black)| 60%| 42%

Table 1. Race vs. HS Dropout and Unemployment Levels in Mudville.

As decreasing economic opportunities continue to affect the general population, social classes become more pronounced. These widening differences have been called the "Heights, Mids, and Pits" by city planners. Over-determined social expectations give rise to apathy. Each group, in an effort to hold ground, becomes increasingly inwardly focused. As challenges grow and tribal behavior intensifies, community fabric begins to fray. Mudville is manifesting the first such signs with the recent headline-grabbing hate group - The Rope.

When fear and apathy combine, class isolation often turns into class warfare. Disconnection breeds resentment. These are grave concerns for any community, as matters of both equality and opportunity.

This paper considers an action plan to address these challenges, in the following order: zoning, housing, neighborhood, education, employment and legislation. The design pattern is simple - to start with the home and work outwards to the community.

Zoning

Each of the following recommendations will be detailed in context.

• First, we recommend that Mudville begin a phased retirement of the so-called Honky-Tonk district through a combination of legislation and increased policing. The objective of the legislative agenda ought to be to remove "sleeze services" through re-zoning and permit restrictions. Remaining businesses will be grandfathered into pro-business incentives and considered part of the mainstream commercial district.

• The Commercial District will be re-zoned to include the undeveloped land sitting between The Works and The Heights. This will create a centralized business district. In addition, the zone will be extended and claim some of what is now the Industrial District. New commercial real estate will be offered at a discount, and/or with tax breaks, to attract new businesses.

• With the undeveloped land remaining between the The Mids to The Pits , it is recommended that Mudville begin community revitalization efforts, including demolishing vacant homes and subsidizing affordable housing.

• Mudville ought to promote the growth of green space and community parks. Natural resources beautify, provide gathering spaces and foster a sense of community well-being.

Housing

Affluent communities and their correspondingly high priced homes have prospered on the north side of town while the commercial and low-to-mid market have fallen behind. In between, a large block of land remains undeveloped. This presents a re-development opportunity to help break down the strict class lines that have catalyzed around home prices; use new home construction to more equally distribute household income.

We recommend redistricting Mudville to explicitly promote diversity and inclusivity. This would involve the sunsetting of the honky-tonk district (See Zoning) and the development of the Undeveloped Land. Going forward, new housing permits will be focused on construction in the Undeveloped Land. In addition, housing prices should be capped through city incentives to remain affordable. Mudville faces policy challenges in this regard: history shows that high rent, sub-standard education and poor representation have limited the economic mobility of disadvantaged communities. (For education and representation, see Education and Legislation).

Regarding rent, research demonstrates that minority communities, who disproportionately suffer economic disadvantages, often pay more for equal or lesser housing relative to high-income earners. This kind of institutional bias, where economically risky individuals are the targeted for price discrimination, must end. We suggest forming a public counsel on housing rates and residential development. In part, they will aim to cap the power of the private real estate sector.

Neighborhoods

Research suggests social classes across the United States are becoming increasingly disconnected. For the average person, this might mean their own community feels foreign. We see this in Mudville's increased rates of hate crimes. This is supported by both the demographics (See Analysis) and by the political operations running in the city (See The Rope : Legislation). To attack this problem, we propose the city begin by investing in neighborhood rejuvenation programs, such as concerts, townhall and listening meetings, YMCA programs, parks and recreational facilities.

With the neighborhood rejuvenation programs, Mudville will trigger discussion of critical common ground issues, such as crime and education, which affect everyone. With citizens coming together on issues that are important to everyone, the hope is to re-ignite community connection.

Education

As much as the problems affect the current generation of Mudville, it's paramount that the youth of Mudville are included as well. Looking at Mudville education, several trends become immediately obvious. First, each social strata has its own elementary school. As a result, the schools are de facto segregated. Finally, the quality of education goes down as income goes down. This is demonstrated by the higher drop out rate among minority high school students. A generation of children are being left behind; abandoned children become abandoned adults.

Several policies must be modified and added. First, the elementary schools must be relocated within each community. The goal would be to create a cross-section of as many different children in each school as possible. In turn, children would have everyday contact with different races and cultures. In addition, we suggest that the school zones be strictly enforced so that students cannot go out-of-district. For example, a student living in The Heights should not be permitted to go to the school that they want rather than the one they are supposed to attend. This will prevent certain communities from clustering/paying-out to avoid integration. Finally, we suggest Mudville adopt successful forms of Affirmative Action (See Legislation) for the teaching pool. It would be a significant help in tearing down negative stereotypes for the children of Mudville to have a diversity of administrators, teachers and leaders in their lives.

Employment

Economics lies at the heart of many of Mudville's issues. For some, the financial barrier has become surmountable. For others, lack of education and low-skills have rendered already disadvantaged communities even deeper in despair. For those without hope, Mudville must intercede.

First, we suggest the town fund a community school and job placement agency. Utilizing the facilities of the elementary, high school and college (See Legislation), adults who wished to further their skills and re-train could take classes and training courses in a night school program. Adults who fell below the poverty line could take an array of these courses for free in exchange for a job placement program that would connect to many of the development suggestions mentioned above.

In fact, the job placement agency will function in a WPA-like manner. In addition to the changes proposed in re-zoning Mudville, this would allow a WPA program to manage thousands of jobs that would benefit the community. The goal would be to combine education and job experience in such a way that people could build skills that allow them to escape the catch 22 of the welfare system.

Legislation

The following laws and ordinances have been researched and proven to be effective in improving disadvantaged communities. We recommend Mudville consider reach:

1. The creation of a "Town Senate". In effect, the function would be to remove administrative power from the upper class and place it equally in the hands of all citizens. In addition, it would create a minority power base that has long been lacking representation.

2. Mudville is also encouraged to city-sponsor the construction of several new facilities, including a college and a hospital. Not only would this create permanent jobs, but it would also provide thousands for the proposed-WPA program in high-paying skills sectors.

3. Mudville must pass laws that outlaw red-light districts. In a community that is aimed at being "friend and neighbor”-orientated, there is no place for sleaze services or the clientele that it attracts. By doing so, Mudville also opens up land for new residential and housing projects. The remaining businesses that do not categorically fit into sleaze would be given assistance in moving their operations to the new business and commercial district on the west side of town.

4. The Rope plagues Mudville with hate crime. Mudville will adopt a resolution to outlaw hate crimes and the dissemination of inciteful material that propagates it, including social media activity. This would include the loitering of such groups to recruit - particularly on public buildings and facilities. In addition, we suggest that civil disobedience crimes such as bottle throwing and beatings be made more severe in the penal code.

5. Mudville must adopt diversity & inclusion (D&I, affirmative action) programs. There is wide-ranging debate as to whether or not these programs are effective in the long-term. That said, after California and Texas repealed their D&I efforts, college graduation rates for minorities saw a steep decline. D&I programs will be particularly important relative to the Education-related recommendations.

6. Finally, it is critical that Mudville invests in its commercial and business district. This will be achieved by fostering new business-to-business incentives that stimulate economic growth. Further, we recommend tax breaks for entrepreneurs that start new businesses in Mudville.

Further analysis

It is critical for Mudville to take action quickly. Structural problems run deep and take time to solve. Among the top issues to tackle - racism, class, prejudice, discrimination and income polarization. In practice, these proposals will just be the start of a long and complex journey.