The incredible shrinking city

[jaxnative]

Maybe, they should try to diversify their economy a little harder by offering an insane amount of property tax incentives.

This may shed a little light on the problem and supplement Lake's reasonable and common sense comment:

Ohio’s Tax Challenge 1. “Ohio’s personal income tax is one of the highest in the nation. Ohio families know it, small business owners know it, companies deciding between Ohio and other states know it. Clearly, this high-rate tax is hurting our ability to compete with other states.” Ohio’s personal income tax is one of the highest in the nation, imposing a burden on families during tough economic times. And because most small businesses pay under the income tax, the high-rate income tax impedes job creation. 2. “We also have an oppressive tax on investment. New ideas and new products often require new machinery and new equipment â€" this desire to innovate is not something that we should tax.” Ohio’s tangible personal property tax burden is significantly greater than in any of our neighboring states. By its nature, the tax penalizes the investments we need. Further, tax abatements create disparities between businesses. Larger and more sophisticated companies with more resources are better positioned to take advantage of abatement programs than smaller or established companies, leading to an inequitable system. 3. “Ohio’s corporate tax is a nightmare â€" the worst of all worlds â€" and we’re going to fix it.” Ohio has a high-rate corporate franchise tax, but because of very aggressive and creative accounting collections are very low, and diminishing. Smaller companies that can’t afford high-priced lawyers and accountants pick up most of the tax burden.

www.tax.ohio.gov

[heights unknown]

Anyone know what that population would be right now, that is, within the boundaries of the old City limits in 2008?

Heights Unknown

A few years ago at SSC, I heard 110,000 would have been the 2000 Census number, which is down from the 204,000 it had in the 1960 census.

I could have sworn that 201,030 was the 1960 population number; if that's true (110,000), then Gainesville is truly larger than the population of the "old city limits of Jax."  But I believe we would probably since that time would have annexed more neighborhoods, sections, areas and small towns along the way and we'd be somewhere near or slightly above 200,000.  That's in the top 10 but barely.

Heights Unknown

[heights unknown]

Jacksonville has always been a prideful city, but never really quite knew how to turn that pride into success;

Heights Unknown

Is population growth and only in the center of our city the only measure of success?

We have become a Navy powerhouse now headquarters for the new 4th fleet.

Our metro area has seen tremendous growth.

We have a strong economic base with a good mix of industries.

Very recently we have seen a new interest in core living highrise style.

Two of our three core neighborhoods are in great shape and Springfield has been getting its share of investment.

We acquired a feakin NFL team and the national cred that comes with it.

Retail is racing into Jacksonville.

Our sports  complex area is full of brand new stadiums.

We've put aside 100 million dollars for mass transit.

We have the best children's hospitals this world has to offer.

I'm betting the fastest growing port in the world? (wait till we get Cuba back)

Maybe we have been successful in spite of ourselves many times due to the natural gifts of the area.  We have certainly had our blunders and other cities have been successful where we have dropped the ball.  However this city's success in undeniable no doom and gloom here just some more challenges.

f

In all due respect Jeffery, because people make a City, not buildings, sports complexes, malls, etc.  Without the people, none of this would even exist or be created; so population is very important.  This is one of the reasons why downtown Jax evolved into looking like a bombed out war zone, just like Youngstown, because a huge number of people in the surrounding neighborhoods to downtown (Brooklyn, Lavilla, Springfield, South Jacksonville) left in droves.

Heights Unknown

[heights unknown]

Taking a look at this place on Google Earth, its quite depressing.  Imagine inner city Jacksonville littered all over with abandoned industrial complexes that are at least three times larger than our Ford Plant at Tallyrand.  Imagine downtown completely surrounded by expressways and toxic sites.  Then imagine the St. Johns River the size of Hogans Creek, but its banks filled with abandoned railyards and concrete slabs that were once the foundation to massive steel mills.  That's Youngstown.  Its not a pretty sight from the air, so I can imagine what it looks like at street level.

Gary Indiana is another example of a once thriving City and now is a decayed, bygone industrial waste fart.

Heights Unknown

[thelakelander]

Anyone know what that population would be right now, that is, within the boundaries of the old City limits in 2008?

Heights Unknown

A few years ago at SSC, I heard 110,000 would have been the 2000 Census number, which is down from the 204,000 it had in the 1960 census.

I could have sworn that 201,030 was the 1960 population number

Heights Unknown

204k was probably the 1950 number (I'll look up the exact number later).  During the 50's Jacksonville lost population.

[RiversideGator]

The property appraiser's website used to refer to the old city neighborhoods as "Old City" of Jacksonville to distinguish them from the newer annexed areas.  They have now updated their website and I cant find this listed anymore.

BTW, the Old City suffered during the 60s through the 80s but it has certainly been coming back since at least the mid 1990s.  I have lived here since 1999 and rarely venture outside of the Old City limits.  I would like to see some population figures from the census that compares apples to apples (i.e. the same area over time) but that may not tell the whole story because when areas gentrify they look better but often times the population is reduced as single family homes that had been used as apartments are reconverted to single family homes again.  So, many areas like Springfield or Riverside have gotten nicer in the past 10 years but may have less people living there in total.

[Clem1029]

Amazingly, Youngstown State University is located downtown.  Maybe the young mayor should embrace and plan around the city's center?  Focus on getting a small piece of the pie right to serve as a magnet to attract additional development in adjacent shrinking neighborhoods instead of eliminating them.

Want something even more amazing about YSU? Last I checked, it's the home of NEOUCOM - Northeast Ohio Universities Colleges of Medicine. Northeast Ohio has a unique scenario where I think there's 4 or 5 neighboring counties with a state university in them (off the top of my head, Cleveland State, Youngstown State, Kent State) and quite a few independent schools (Case Western being the big player, UAkron another). NEOUCOM is basically a regional university collaboration for medical degrees - it's supposed to be super high quality and a pretty big deal, particularly with the Cleveland Clinic (one of the premier medical facilities in the world) involved. Would seem to make sense to worth off of that a bit, no?

Youngstown is basically Cleveland and Pittsburgh Junior - had it's heyday with it's industrial production, economy got devastated when that industry fell off, and unlike Cleveland and Pitt, it wasn't big enough to hold onto it's momentum and try and figure something out (also, alternative explanations might include those two larger cities sucked what Youngstown did have when they started to hurt). And it's even possible they haven't seen the worst yet - there's been talk for years of major cutbacks at the Lordstown plant (The major car plant that's in a Youngstown suburb). If Lordstown goes down, Youngstown is finished.

And with all that said, jaxnative's point about Ohio's tax policies is 100% accurate - it's destroying business left and right. Although, just as important to note is that is strictly the STATE'S tax policy. Tax season in Ohio requires 3 returns - the federal chunk, the major state chunk, and a city/regional level tax, and that's just income tax. Corporations are just getting hosed. And the state wonders why it can't attract new business to replace the industrial losses.

So basically Youngstown has the worst of all worlds - inept state leadership, inept local leadership, no economic base, no innovation, and no incentive to bring in help to turn things around. And who knows...maybe the idea of shrinking might work - it's your typical corporate handling of things...if you get too big to handle and you're hemorrhaging money, you cut back the areas you service, reorganize, and try and put yourself in a position to expand again in a more logical way when you can handle it. Not the way I'd approach it, but then, I'm just a message board commenter.

(Disclaimer if everyone hasn't figured it out: I was born and raised in Cleveland for 25 years before moving to Jax a few years back)

[Lunican]

Well, maybe they are on to something afterall. In LaVilla we could rip up the streets and plant trees. This would return the area to its super-historic and original use as a forest.

[thelakelander]

Then LaVilla would be an urban park.  That's still a better use then what it turned out to be.

[Steve]

A plan in Youngstown aims to move residents out of the city's most deserted areas. The hitch: Home owners won't budge - even for $50,000.


YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio (CNNMoney.com) -- When the city of Youngstown, Ohio, proposed incentives to move people out of declining neighborhoods, it sounded like a good idea - in theory.

The city hoped to lure holdouts living on nearly empty blocks and relocate them to more lively areas, as part of its plan to remake itself in the wake of the steel industry's departure and the foreclosure crisis. It's already cleared some lots for things like playgrounds.

Now Youngstown wants to close entire streets and bulldoze abandoned properties so it can shut down city services like street lighting, police patrols and garbage pick-ups that it can no longer afford to maintain.

To do this on a large scale, the city needs to get about 100 residents to relocate. Each is eligible for $50,000 in incentives - plenty, in this town, to buy a new home and move. The hitch: Youngstowners don't seem to want to leave their homes, no matter how blighted or abandoned the neighborhood may be.

"I'm East Side born and East Side bred and when I die, I'll be East Side dead," said Rufus Hudson, a director of work force development at Youngstown State University. "We love our side of town. The same people who watched me grow are watching my children grow."


http://money.cnn.com/2008/04/15/real_estate/Youngstown_plan_roadblock/index.htm?postversion=2008042411

[Steve]

Sounds like this isn't working all that well...

[Jason]

Talk about going to extremes.  Man, that city is really going through some serious pains.

[raheem942]

sorry ohio but sounds like a personal problem

[sheclown]

Isn't that "urban renewal"?

[heights unknown]

Jacksonville has always been a prideful city, but never really quite knew how to turn that pride into success;

Heights Unknown

Is population growth and only in the center of our city the only measure of success?

We have become a Navy powerhouse now headquarters for the new 4th fleet.

Our metro area has seen tremendous growth.

We have a strong economic base with a good mix of industries.

Very recently we have seen a new interest in core living highrise style.

Two of our three core neighborhoods are in great shape and Springfield has been getting its share of investment.

We acquired a feakin NFL team and the national cred that comes with it.

Retail is racing into Jacksonville.

Our sports  complex area is full of brand new stadiums.

We've put aside 100 million dollars for mass transit.

We have the best children's hospitals this world has to offer.

I'm betting the fastest growing port in the world? (wait till we get Cuba back)

Maybe we have been successful in spite of ourselves many times due to the natural gifts of the area.  We have certainly had our blunders and other cities have been successful where we have dropped the ball.  However this city's success in undeniable no doom and gloom here just some more challenges.

f

In all due respect Jeffery, because people make a City, not buildings, sports complexes, malls, etc.  Without the people, none of this would even exist or be created; so population is very important.  This is one of the reasons why downtown Jax evolved into looking like a bombed out war zone, just like Youngstown, because a huge number of people in the surrounding neighborhoods to downtown (Brooklyn, Lavilla, Springfield, South Jacksonville) left in droves.

Heights Unknown

But you know, Heights, there were reasons that they left.  Policy decisions and developments that make you wonder in hindsight:  What the hell is wrong with people?"

It wasnt just the screaming masses of Whites fleeing the city in cold terror after the race riots on the Eastside and the Klan Terrorist Attacks in Hemming Park.

The policies which created suburban sprawl are still in place.

I agree Stephen, I agree wholeheartedly; however, once the City started losing population, that should have sent an alarm bell throughout the City Government that the entire City, not just downtown was deteriorating and decaying, to put it bluntly, someone should have done something to stop it or alerted others in leadership so a plan could be initiated to stop it.

Heights Unknown