STRATEGY FOR IMPROVING CITIES.

The problems of poverty, jobs and sub-standard housing, are ills currently used to categorize our cities. These are symptoms of a much larger fundamental problem--one that is much more subtle and sophisticated. It centers on the inability of minorities, to gain entrance into the mainstream of the city's economic and social life. There has always been various ways for groups at the lower end of the social and economic scale to improve, to get ahead and to function in an advancing society. Clearly, this problem is related to jobs and income, but providing jobs or guaranteeing an annual wage will not insure that the basic, fundamental problem of status is resolved. Unless we are able to find ways to resolve the issues of status in the urban community, the cities will continue to be the source of substantial tensions, threatened by an increasingly difficult climate for it's residents.

Sociologist, anthropologists and others have devoted their lives to developing a basic understanding of the fundamental problems of people and their needs. The breakdown in the status advancement system as we experience it today is rooted in :

1. The basic structure of the family
2. The various egos, eccentricities and prejudices.
3. The status situations, of lower income groups
4. The middle class whites in the cities who hold the key to whether low income minorities are able to participate and advance.
5. The nature of communications among people living in the city
6. The lack of economic and social security, among the population immediately above the lowest status minorities

An analysis of what the problems are in the breakdown of status advancement is key to determining the solutions. Without this analysis we will always give solutions but will they be the right ones. We will continue to waste money and energy, and we will continue to frustrate not only community people, but the people and those involved in government as well. We need to develop comprehensive methods for defining the fundamental problems and issues that are at the root of the city's problems as an essential part of the process of making governmental decisions. What are these problems and how do we go about looking at them?

It is important to point out that the way I am defining this problem creates a unique situation for governmental planning. I believe, the major threat to the future welfare of minorities who, if they can get ahead in society, will ease the problem; but if they do not, can cause a major breakdown in the operation of the city and the broader society of which it is an instrument.

Concentrating on this segment of the city's population is our most important task in insuring a safe future for others. In a very basic sense, the problems of status advancement cannot be categorized or analyzed simply. Governmental programs must be designed out of an analysis of what problems need to be addressed. Programs are created without a careful analysis made of what the real problems are. Poorly defined problems lead to poorly defined solutions. This is a situation we must avoid. Let me give you a few examples of how this works:

Housing programs and policies were created fundamentally, to overcome the problems of poor structural conditions. A Large segment of the housing stock across the country was in poor physical condition. The policy to rid the community of sub-standard housing was developed to eliminate sub-standard housing and rebuild. The results of this particular definition and the solutions that sprang from it are obvious and only marginally helpful. We provided some new housing, but we have hardly housed the needy population , and in many instances, the physical conditions have not even improved. The problem definition did not take into account the frightening social costs of involuntary relocation, the effects on rents, the ability of families to use housing as a tool for their own social and economic achievement.

When defining the problem of jobs for urban residents, we continually hear that the insufficient number of jobs and high unemployment rates can be remedied if we can get more job opportunities into the urban areas. If we were to build more factories, office buildings, in and around the urban areas, the residents would have job opportunities close at hand. Here again, over simplification of this particular problem may lead us to solutions that do not get to the root causes. Providing new factory jobs in urban areas for urban residents may not be the best way to get them into the mainstream of the city's economic life. This is not the growing segment of job opportunity, and to build our plans for job development on this basis can be misleading and potentially destructive.

In the area of education, we have done a relatively poor job of problem definition about the urban areas. We explain this situation by saying schools in the urban areas are bad, and as a result of this we must integrate and change everything around, including throwing out the boards of education and the existing teaching staffs. This is a response to a poorly defined problem and does not necessarily lead to the basic solutions that are required. Integrating the schools may not necessarily mean the children who need to grab on to some kind of learning experience are really going to get it. Substituting a local group to run a school instead of the remote board of education may well improve the relationships between the local community and its educators, but there is no guarantee that the children will benefit.

I want to share with you the problems of developing a program based on a strategy that defines the major goal for the city as improving this complicated system through which people move ahead and advance into the mainstream of the city's social and economic life. There are four major "actors" who are dealing in one way or another with this problem. First, there is city government. This is the government that most city dwellers look to for the solution of their problems, both real and imaginary and holds itself out to be the intimate solvers of the so-called nitty-gritty problems of the city. Faced with today's situation, city government's orientation to its traditional service functions and delivery systems is its major draw back. The systems for delivering welfare, education, housing and other massive services that have a tremendous affect on the future of individuals who meet with them and use them are really out-dated. These all have good motives, but their operations are designed to deal with situations that are not necessarily those that are most important today.

The laws under which the city governments operate are also major restraints. Very often there are limiting ground rules that restrict the scope and type of operation that city government agencies are able to undertake. In housing, there are many good examples of this. For instance, eligibility rules for who may get into public housing projects have traditionally made it difficult to house many needy families.

Bureaucratic problems are another major restraint. The petty competitiveness of city agencies fighting with each other for a share of the lime-light takes up a surprising amount of the energy of government. This phenomenon, well known to all who have ever worked in agencies where narrow-minded competition to operate a particular program or to support a particular function consumes large amounts of everyone's time. Basic leadership, guidance, support and good city management can do a lot to overcome this particular problem, but in very few governmental set-ups does this situation exist today.

The change in direction of welfare services is a good example; we are slowly beginning to move the welfare bureaucracy from its traditional role of handing out checks to the needy, to an agency that provides services to help dignify and improve one's lot in life. This has not been an easy process.

Private business and industry are also major actors. In earlier eras in the development of the city, private industry was the initiator of most things that happened. Today, this is not necessarily the case because most of the problems faced by the city are not those in which private industry has the interests or incentives for getting involved. Governmental policies are designed to encourage private industry to do public jobs and to assume the responsibilities of what was once a public responsibility.

Our methods for subsidizing housing have clearly been aimed in this direction; however, there is a real problem of whether the fundamental motives in private industry are consistent with solving the problems of the city today. This is not to say that the motives are not legitimate. To make a buck is an acceptable, necessary and fundamental part of life, but the modus operandi of private business doesn't seem to be appropriate for solving city problems or capable of providing leadership, resources and programs for such problem solving.

This is not to say that private industry cannot play a key role, it can and must. The hiring practices of industry; investment practices, such as the local banks will grant mortgages; and the practices of the white collar industries in particular in absorbing a new labor force into their important career creating opportunities, are all places in which private industry must help the city overcome these problems. If it was able to do this on its own without any prodding from government this would be fine, but this has not happened to date;and government, through its own incentives and programs, must provide more direct and pointed leadership in this regard. .

Local community groups and organizations are a third actor. These may be the great hope for the future improvement of the status advancement in the city, but right now these groups present a chaotic picture and a diffuse ability to act. Our current experience of this program in the community action program has really helped to create an important new thrust by setting up local community corporations that are able to organize and promote local and ethnic interests. These community corporations have responded to the gaping hole that has been left for the current generation of low income people who in previous generations in city development were helped by the church, major ethnic organizations and major governmental institutions like the local political boss, ward healer, police and fire departments and other agencies of government. The major drawback to these efforts right now is that no very large scale and concerted programs of action have resulted.

In most instances, the poverty programs have concentrated on political battles, fighting the bad guys, beating up the establishment, and otherwise developing what may be a much needed and important part of the process -- local energy and enthusiasm. This is all well and good, but eventually, hopefully sooner, a specific and pointed program of action has to emerge from these efforts. If this were to happen quickly, a major solution to the status advancement problem could result.

The fourth set of actors on the scene is the federal and state governments. These are critically important from two points of view: first, for setting the moral tone for national policies and program priorities; and second, for providing the resources. Right now we are handicap on both counts. The moral leadership of government has been put to serious and justified question. Part of this problem is that the major resources for the programs we have been talking about are not forthcoming from the only source that there is. Even if this atmosphere changes', there is a real problem of enabling state and federal governments to deliver the kinds of intimate services and programs that are needed to get this status advancement system working properly.

* We need new sets of institutions directly aimed at the problems of status advancement. These must be organizations that have the energy and motivation of the Community Action Programs of the sixties and seventies.

* The action and organizational drive of private enterprise, especially the best private businesses who have the ability to achieve, not only what they talk about, purposeful action.

* The power and knowledge of municipal government which still sits astride the most important areas of concern, even though it's slow and it's credibility is nonexistent when it comes to dealing with these problems.

* The resources and support of federal and state governments where the dollars are.

In addition, we clearly need individual initiative particularly on the part of people who are struggling to get ahead. They cannot operate effectively alone, as individuals. Low-income groups of any society have always had to have some kind of organization to get ahead. We need new forms, of organizations and institutions that has an urban focus but, who are not tied to vested interest. Where appropriate, some of these organizations must and should have a neighborhood focus, but there needs to be more than this. Many organizations need a client or functional focus, such as organizations to train or educate people of various ages. We need many different organizations, not one huge monolithic structure. These new corporate entities must direct their energies toward the major areas of concern:

We need a new and innovative educational system in the urban areas with a new curriculum and new relationship with other institutions such as libraries, for example, which are underutilized in most urban areas and could easily become adjuncts to the basic educational system in the neighborhoods. We need schools with dormitories attached to them in the urban areas so that the children with family problems could have some alternative living arrangements. We need a complete revamping of the educational system to tie in day camps, personnel training and a whole battery of programs to give new and tailored experiences to children whom other wise do not have such benefits.

We need to develop new patterns of home ownership. We also need new ways of constructing housing with locally based organizations being a major force in the decision making process. We need new organizations, block associations, etc., that has developed the muscle to improve the local environment and who have a clear cut stake in the nature and quality of local urban neighborhoods.

We must orient current job development programs towards real career opportunities, not just jobs. We must concentrate on providing through welfare or a guaranteed annual income the type of economic assistance, families in urban areas need to develop strategies that will develop careers. The minority population, must be oriented towards permanent placement in the economic and social life of the city. We need to develop minority businesses from emerging public policy programs.

Low income people are still dependent on public welfare and health services to supply many of their daily needs. This situation for many citizens will not diminish soon. The delivery of services must not be provided in such a way that people are made to feel the worse for it. The status advancement process must remove the stigmas attached to people who apply for these services.