Piggybacking Suburbanites

There has long been a philosophical divide between urban and rural dwellers. The conservative-minded "king of the castle" suburban dwellers vs. the more idealistic liberal minded urban dweller. There are always going to be exceptions to the rule, but this generalization will stand up to scrutiny.

There's always those who feel that they are being asked to contribute more than everyone else.

That was the sentiment articulated in this letter to the editor printed in the Windsor Star yesterday. It captures the urban/suburban divide quite nicely:

Let those who benefit pay for the new watermains
Monday, June 25, 2007

Re: Watermain replacement levy.
This recently enacted additional charge on every water bill in the City of Windsor is a gross abuse. This practice applies a financial burden upon all its water users, not just upon those who actually require the upgrading of water delivery lines due to age, damage or impaired operation. Some (in fact many) citizens reside in homes built within the past 25, 15, 10 or five years upon which hefty development charges were levied before their respective dwellings were constructed and occupied.
To now apply additional levies each month constitutes double taxation. These citizens are being assessed on the water bill as if they lived in homes that now need new waterlines. This is not the case.
If the city needs to replace watermains, as I suspect it must, the appropriate mechanism would be a local improvement charges bylaw under Ontario Regulation 586/06 and the Municipal Act 2001. When a watermain or mains and feeders require maintenance or replacement, it would be appropriate that the charges for such works be raised from those in the areas concerned who have enjoyed the benefit of delivery through those mains being replaced for periods (according to public works) of 60, 80, 100 or more years. These costs should not be collected from others who have received no advantage or service from those pipes nor will enjoy the benefit in the future. Such costs are rightly collected from those who will profit from the improvement.
Bruce R. McLeod
Windsor

Mr. McLeod should be careful what he wishes for.

The subsidization that urban sprawl receives is well documented. The late Jane Jacobs, Toronto's pre-eminent urban theorist, warns "Suburban sprawl is far more costly than anyone imagines". That new raised ranch out in the suburbs might not seem to be a bargain if the hidden costs incurred by a few people -- but paid by everyone-- were added to the price. "Beware, there are always side effects," said Ms. Jacobs, whose new book, The Nature of Economies, is making analysts rethink how important human potential is in economic growth.

All taxpayers are subsidizing sprawl to the collective tune of at least half-a-billion dollars a year, concluded the Greater Toronto Area Task Force headed by consultant Pamela Blais. The further utilities are extended and the busier the highways, the more expensive they are to build and maintain. But these costs are shared by everyone through utility rates and taxes. More difficult to tally are the costs of air pollution, deterioration of the environment and traffic chaos. Ms. Blais estimated the suburban sprawl is adding as much as $1-billion each year to the costs that have to be covered by taxpayers for health care and law enforcement.

Sprawl is subsidized through infrastructure funding

Leslie Parrish, of Corporation For Enterprise Development writes that when development occurs on the outer fringes of town, the local government must re-create a system of roads, schools, and public safety services, while having to continue to support an underutilized set of older ones in the center section of town. Development that occurs in these outlying areas has far higher marginal costs than infill and renovation in developed areas. This cost rises even higher when new developments are low density. Since in low density developments residents are spread out on larger lots, the same amount of sewer line, roads, and other services are used by fewer people, reducing economies of scale.

Utility companies also subsidize sprawling, low density development. Telephone, cable, and electric companies often charge customers on an average cost basis, with the same rate collected for all customers no matter where they live within the metropolitan area. Compared to a customer in the downtown area, a household in a fringe suburb costs 10 times as much to serve. Therefore, residents living closer in subsidize those living farther away. Though many local officials encourage new growth, citing its economic development potential, the services these communities must provide often outweighs the benefits they receive. Commercial and industrial uses do tend to pay for themselves, however, these developments usually spur more residential development, which make their benefit questionable from the sprawl perspective as well.

Sprawl is subsidized through automobile and highway subsidies

A majority of federal transportation spending has traditionally always gone to highway funding. These new highways open up additional development potential on newly accessible, undeveloped land. Driving is also heavily subsidized. Despite recent complaints of rising fuel costs, these prices are much lower than they would otherwise be if the full environmental and health impacts were taken into account.

Data gleaned from Canada's 2003 census helps to shine a spotlight on the current imbalance between urban infrastructure spending and the expense of supporting suburban development. For every dollar that suburban dwellers received in municipal infrastructure upgrades/installations and services, they only paid 86 cents. That leaves the cities established neighbourhoods - those who have been paying for their infrastructure for decades - to pick up the tab. This includes fire, ambulance and police services, as well as all the hard infrastructure that is provided to these fringe developments.

Writers such as Mr. McLeod have no problem being on the receiving end of municipal largess, yet when it is their turn to contribute to the pot (that they have done their fair share in emtying) they scream foul. I suspect there would be a huge problem with a user-pay system if it was fairly implemented across the board. Then, those $200,000 raised ranches out in the farm fields would easily begin to approach $750,000+. I doubt we would have a problem with urban sprawl then.

Cultivating Windsor’s Creative Class

Cultivating Windsor’s Creative Class
An economic argument for cultural investment

“Want to know where a great place to invest in real estate will be five or ten years from now? Look at where artists are living now.” The reason? It has been proven that artists—defined as self-employed visual artists, actors, musicians, writers, etc.—can stimulate local economies in a number of ways. This is the advice Business Week Magazine gave it’s readers in February of this year.

This may come as a bit of a surprise to the casual reader, but there are numerous tangible economic benefits to promoting and investing in the local arts and culture scene. These reasons were apparently well hidden when our municipal politicians recently made the decision not to extend emergency funding to the Capitol Theatre. For the economic benefits that accumulate when a community values its artistic and “bohemian” constituency are precisely what Windsor needs in times such as these, with our worst economic and employment outlooks ahead of us.

The inertia of our industrial economy

Generations of “living large” off the fruits of the industrial revolution has lead to an economic monoculture in this community. There are presently families in Windsor with four or five generations of employment history with the same company. As any biologist, or economist will tell you, a monoculture will not survive long as it is vulnerable to even the slightest ill-health and change in its environment. All it took for Windsor to experience this market downturn that is sending thousands of autoworkers to the unemployment line is a spike in oil costs. These are global factors which are out of the control of our municipal government, so it is imperative instead to focus on aspects of our local economy which we can have a positive influence on.

This is why we must diversify our local economy if we are to avoid the dust bin we are headed towards. This idea is nothing new – Eddie Francis has made the quest for new information-based investment one of his mayoral mantras. What city council needs to realize is that their firm disregard for the Capitol’s future, and that of the arts community in general, will have negative reverberations throughout the city as a whole.

If we are to achieve the strong and diverse economy that the Mayor states that he desires, then Windsor must build the kind of community that is attractive to the “creative class” - those individuals whose talent is to create meaningful new forms, such as the artists, architects, information technologists and entrepreneurs - purveyors of new ideas, high-tech industry and regional growth. It is the role of creative industries and occupations that are recognized as a driving factor in the development of cities such as New York, finding that networks of artistic and creative individuals are key conduits for investments that result in new ideas, commercial innovation and income growth.

According to CEO’s For Cities, a Chicago-based urban think tank dedicated to speeding innovation in cities, “[I]t is difficult to overstate the impact that the college-educated 25 to 34 year-olds … will have on a city’s future prosperity. With rising demand for their skills and with competition for them now on a global scale, cities must be magnets for these highly-coveted workers or they will fail, because in the knowledge economy, it is the creativity and talent inherent in a city’s workforce that will shape its economic opportunities.”

Artists and bohemians are direct producers of amenities that draw other creatives through what is called the “artistic dividend”: the arts and cultural activities that increase the vibrancy and diversity of metropolitan areas, influencing other industries and generating growth. Several studies document the role of amenities and lifestyle – in the form of entertainment, nightlife, culture, and so on – in attracting educated populations. In fact, an empirical study finds that high amenity cities have grown faster than low amenity cities. So when a community is stagnant in its investment in these amenity-increasing arts and cultural activities, it will be overlooked by the growth-inducing creative class. When a community actually divests in its established arts infrastructure, it is taunting its home-grown artistic community to find a welcoming environment elsewhere. This is precisely the message that our current city council is sending out – that our community doesn't value our cultural institutions.

Entrepreneurs add to and thrive on creativity, the arts and entertainment.

Entrepreneurs are often the most creative people you'll ever meet, and since birds of a feather flock together, they're often frequenting the most artful, entertainment-rich venues, events and movements in their city. They locate in communities with low housing prices and a high quality of life. They gravitate to dense urban cores with a high amenity quotient. They are patrons of local arts and cultural venues. And to top it off, they have the highest earning potential of most of the rest of the population. It's a positive feedback loop - build it, and they will come - to continue building it.

Therefore, we not only need to attract the creative class to Windsor but we need to retain them once they're here. We also need to nurture our homegrown creatives and show them that we understand just how important it is that they grow and prosper here in this community by providing them with the support they need to thrive. Windsor has the low housing costs and access to markets and population that makes it ripe for attracting and “growing our own” creative class. These individuals will play a key role in Windsor's recovery from our economic downturn. However, forcing a landmark like the Capitol Theatre to close its doors forever is not the way to lay the groundwork.