Re: CDC and resident capacity building program

[Emery Graham <"egraham"@ci.wilmington.de.us>]

Maybe I don't understand what you mean by the community doing development.
Maybe
you could give some examples of what individuals living in a poor community
might be involved in the development process. List the roles that these people
play in the community prior to getting in development and then the roles
they's
play in the development process. Housewives, ministers, homeless persons, just
who are you talking about. Tell us about the source of their investment so
that
they have an economic stake in the project's outcomes. List a sample of the
types of jobs that the unemployed persons in the community would be able to
fill
during the projects construction and in the daily operations of " what"
type of
long term economic activity locating at the developed sight.

Nope, I won't sell community people short; but you will have to identify the
community you're talking about. The ones that I've worked with for the past 30
years have to have dedicated champions to carry them through the process;
professional public servants who find great joy in serving and helping
economically, educationally, and socially disenfranchised people participate,
for once, in the creation, and capture, of wealth and political power. But
that's just the beginning; in a capitalistic society there is the constant
battle of economic survival. How do the people in your community fair on this
point. What processes of human capital development do you employ to prepare
community folk to be ready to operate and maintain the development you
speak of?
Real economic development is a ceasless journey, not a destination.



jrosenthall wrote:

> Don't sell community people short. Community people have been required to be
> creative for years. Opportunity has been the problem. With the proper
> resources, community people can make better decisions about their
> surroundings than others. The government should act as a facilitator and
> make opportunities available for community people to take advantage of all
> the opportunities and challenges presented by brownfields redevelopment
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Emery Graham <"egraham"@ci.wilmington.de.us>
> To: <cpeo-brownfields@igc.org>
> Sent: Friday, July 30, 1999 1:17 PM
> Subject: Re: CDC and resident capacity building program
>
> > Marty,
> > It's tough enough to get good developers from our graduate and
> undergraduate
> > schools. What is it that makes you think that "community" people can be
> taught
> > to do land development? Do you perceive land development as a traditional
> > "volunteer" activity? I'm confused. It has been one of the glaring
> > downfalls of
> > U.S. domestic development policy to expect that a large number of poor,
> > uneducated, undisciplined community folk to do land development in the
> > economically least desireable places for businesses to invest? This is the
> > very
> > same irony in that accompanies the poor's involvement in brownfields. Do
> they
> > have the money, the mind, the motivation to be effectively involved in the
> > process? I don't think so.
> >
> > Emery
> >