The Carbondale Observer

The Southern Illinoisan has an article on the five mayoral candidates ideas for economic development. Goldman and Maroney seem pretty close on economic development, with both citing the airport as a development opportunity and both suggesting that unnecessary regulations have driven business to Williamson County.

I generally agree that Carbondale is over-regulated. Check out the city code (navigation on the left). My favorite silly regulation, which I’ve cited before, is in Title 5, Chapter 8. This regulation fixes the hours of pushcart operators. Did you know a pushcart operator can’t open until 1:00 PM on a Sunday? I’m sure the sky would fall if someone got a Winston Bagel at noon on a Sunday.

I’m not so sure about the airport as an economic development opportunity. The airport isn’t adjacent to an interstate or even a state highway; it’s located on a back road. It doesn’t carry commercial flights. True, SIUC is building a transportation education center at the airport (assuming the Illinois Supreme Court doesn’t overturn the law appropriating the funds), but I don’t see how that would lead to much economic development.

Goldman and Ritzel both cite entrepreneurship as a route to development. That’s a worthy goal, but entrepreneurship is a private sector activity and I’m not sure how much the mayor can do to increase entrepreneurship. Revising and eliminating unnecessary regulations would be one good step, as Goldman mentions.

Fritzler and Haynes both defended the city’s economic development efforts, citing T.J. Maxx and Chili’s as evidence. I found this quote from the article particularly amazing:

“I think, compared to other communities, we have been pretty active,” Fritzler said. “Look at the businesses that have been opening. I think we’re on the positive end of that.”

I’m really not sure what he’s talking about. What other communities? Marion? How many new businesses opened in Marion in 2010, and how many opened in Carbondale? Like it or not, Marion is our competition for outside investment. A new chain store or chain restaurant interested in opening in southern Illinois will either open here or in Marion. Can anyone seriously argue that we’re winning that competition?

And what about the businesses that aren’t here? The former Office Max and Rex electronics buildings have stood empty for years, aside from seasonal use as Halloween stores. Ditto for the old K’s Merchandise space at the mall. Two Doves Photography and Mr. Tuxedo recently moved to a field in Crainville.

Chili’s and T.J. Maxx are nice developments if sales tax collection is the only standard of evaluation. Aside from a few managers, chain stores don’t really provide good incomes. I’d rather have them here than in Marion, but I don’t think we can consider chain stores a substitute for economic development.

The most unusual – and most interesting – idea came from Steven Haynes. From the Southern Illinoisan article:

…Haynes said by offering tax incentives, the city could have a downtown area that combines business and residential buildings, creating a neighborhood that would encourage local shopping.

“They’d walk, they would go to other businesses downtown,” Haynes said. “They would be there during the daytime, the afternoon and the evenings, and you would have a focus on walking traffic and individuals that would promote that particular area.”

If it were well designed, a revitalized downtown with unique local businesses mixed with residences would be a great addition to Carbondale. To actually accomplish this goal we’d have to make a clean break with the past. So far, Carbondale has not been willing to tolerate the density, mixed uses, and publicly subsidized parking that would be necessary to build the downtown Haynes describes.

The developments in the downtown TIF district (First Southern Bank, Advance Auto Parts, Sav-A-Lot, and Stadium Grill) are all auto-oriented, single story, single use buildings. We would have to completely change our development policies – and our zoning – if we wanted the walkable, mixed use downtown Haynes describes. I’d love to see it happen, but I’m not holding my breath.

Comments are welcome.

Food Works is having a benefit dinner at Harbaugh’s Cafe at 6:00 pm on Friday, November 5. Chef Bill Connors of University Residence Dining is the chef for the event, and most ingredients are locally sourced. The suggested donation is $35 for a five-course meal. All proceeds will go to support Food Works’  farmer training and networking programs. Reservations are required, and the deadline is Wednesday, November 3.

Food Works seems like a worthwhile organization. According to their “About” page, their mission is “Local, sustainable food systems development for Southern Illinois.” They’re working on a “regional branding program to draw attention to the bountiful produce, meats and dairy products grown and produced in the region.”

Local food is good for the environment because less energy is used in transportation. Local food production is also a growing industry. Farmer’s markets are becoming more common, and sales at farmer’s markets hit $1 billion in 2006.  Restaurant customers are willing to pay more for locally sourced food.

The Illinois Department of Agriculture recently gave Food Works a $25,000 grant for their Southern Illinois Farm Beginnings program. The goal of the program is training new farmers and farmers transitioning to specialty crop production.

The Southern Illinois Farm Beginnings program includes training in business and marketing, which is a necessity if local food production is going to be profitable.

Thirty five bucks is a good price to support local economic development and eat a five course meal. If you’re interested, check out the menu (pdf) or make reservations.

Comments are welcome.

Construction of a new gated community is under way on New Era Road. The Villas of Carbondale will contain fifty retirement residences. Ten percent of the residences will be reserved for extremely low income seniors, 86 percent of the units will go to low income seniors, and the remaining four percent will be available at market rate. Read the rest of this entry »

WSIU and B(ee)TL(e) Juice both had articles Monday on Don Monty’s official announcement that he’s running for city council. B(ee)TL(e) Juice also had a link to the press release. Check out that article for the link. Monty is the first candidate to officially announce his candidacy for city council.

I’m going to pull a couple of quotes for comment:

1. The primary function of the City is to protect the public health, safety and welfare. Police and fire protection are the most basic services. The City also has a responsibility to protect neighborhoods and the public by enforcing codes and ordinances and by following the Comprehensive Plan. The City must maintain a safe system of streets and sidewalks. The City must retain ownership of the water and sanitary sewer systems and assure continued high-quality service. Likewise, the City must continue to operate its own refuse and recycling programs in an environmentally sound and cost effective manner. Read the rest of this entry »

The Southern Illinoisan had an article Tuesday on George Maroney’s official announcement for mayor. From the article:

The first-time political candidate said he would work to improve the city’s business climate, lead the discussion on consolidating elementary school districts to save money and attract young families, and more closely follow Carbondale’s city manager form of government.

I’m guessing the talk about consolidating school districts refers to District 95 (elementary) and District 165 (high school). Or maybe he’s talking about consolidating the various elementary school buildings into one. I assume he’s not talking about consolidating with the Unity Point and Giant City districts.  Consolidating 95 and 165 would be a great idea, but I wouldn’t want to see the elementary school buildings consolidated.

As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t like the talk of a restoration of the council-manager form of government.  An active mayor is an important source of political leadership. The functions of a mayor and city manager are different, and both are important.

But I’m not sure Maroney intends to be a weak mayor:

Maroney said he believes Carbondale’s city government has strayed from its original design and he would act as a CEO, delegating authority to its proper recipients.

Castle Perilous owner and blogger Scott Thorne had a post on the Carbondaze Gazette commenting about this:

Delegating authority to proper recipients is much easier when you are the ultimate authority, as Maroney was during his tenure at Memorial Hospital. The mayor, first, has to respond to a number of different publics and, second, has to convince the rest of the city council to agree with any initiatives he wishes to implement.

Exactly.  I would add that under the council manager system, the mayor is not the CEO. Title 1, Chapter 2, Article A of the city code (navigation on the left) addresses this. The mayor is head of the city for legal purposes in relationship to the Governor and presides over city council meetings.  Title 1, Chapter 3, Article A assigns most executive functions to the city manager.

As Brad Cole has shown, there is room in the council-manager form of government for an active mayor providing political leadership. If people don’t like the direction in which Cole led the city, they should elect someone who will lead in a different direction. We shouldn’t just decide that leadership itself is the problem. I hope voters will make this an issue in the 2011 election.

I’m wondering if a clear Cole successor candidate will emerge.  I also wonder if Cole will endorse anyone.

Comments are welcome.

The Daily Egyptian had a great article last week on the nearly rebuilt Hangar 9. I walked past the new building a few days ago and it looks like the exterior is coming together.  I couldn’t see inside but I did notice the floor for the upstairs mezzanine was in place before the front wall was finished. The D.E. article said Hangar’s goal is to be open before the end of November.

I’m really glad Hangar is coming back. The old pole barn was ugly on the outside, but it was a good size to see a live show and a lot of good touring musicians played shows there. The new building is going to be larger and it won’t be a pole barn so I’m going to call that an improvement.  You can see drawings and floor plans for the new building in the Hangar 9.2 folder on Hangar’s Facebook page.

On the other hand, I don’t like the fence enclosing the beer garden.  In the drawings it looks like there will be slats (of wood?) facing the street and a chain link fence behind that, with vines trained to grow up the wall.

It looks pretty cool viewed from the inside, but I don’t know if it’s a good idea to build a wall between the street and your business.  I realize they had to enclose the beer garden, but it would have been nice to have an enclosure that allowed patrons to see out and pedestrians to see in.

Maybe the city council/liquor control commission  wouldn’t permit a more “open” fence like the one enclosing Booby’s beer garden.  I have sometimes wondered whether the wall between Melange and the street contributed to its downfall.  A wall or an opaque fence says “you aren’t welcome here.”

In spite of the opaque wall around the beer garden, the new Hangar will fill a void on the strip and it will be a great venue for live music.  That’s good for Carbondale.  Here are two more photos:

Comments are welcome.

If you’ve been on the strip lately I’m sure you’ve seen this sign at the site of the former Animal Crackers building. The city tore the building down in August. Apparently we’re making way for progress, but I haven’t seen much information on the plans for the site.

Brad Cole had a letter to the editor in the Southern earlier this month in which he wrote:

The city just finished demolition of the former Animal Crackers building at 315 S. Illinois Ave., to make way for the future development of an inter-modal transportation center that will accommodate an expanded Amtrak rail station and other services.

Local blogger and businessman Scott Thorne posted in the Carbondaze Gazette that the city is going to put in “…more parking lots to service a planned intermodal transportation center…”

I couldn’t find an article directly about the city’s plans for the lot on the Southern Illinoisan website, though there are two pictures of the demolition in progress. The Southern did have an article about Amtrak in August that mentioned a station expansion, but it wasn’t really clear:

And Amtrak is looking at ways to keep growing its presence in Southern Illinois. Baity said the city has a proposal from the country to renovate and expand the station on South Illinois Avenue – a move Baity said is necessary.

I assume “country” is a typo, but was it meant to be “company,” or “county” or something else? The article doesn’t mention a timeline and no site or building design plans have been released as far as I can tell.

If it is done well, an intermodal transportation center would be a good thing for Carbondale and for the strip.  107,000 people came through the Amtrak Station in FY 2009, and a nice station would make a good impression. It would also be nice if the space was shared with Greyhound.

Site and building design would be critical.  I’d like to see a brick building with lots of windows built at the front lot line with any additional parking behind the building.  I’m not sure that new parking in really necessary.  The city operates a large lot along the tracks to College Street.  If anything, the strip has too much surface parking and too few buildings.

The worst thing they could do would be to put up a shabby windowless building at the back of the lot with parking in front. If we want the strip to be attractive and pedestrian friendly, we need to employ good principles of urban design. We can accommodate cars without turning over all of our public space to them.

At least on the strip, parking lots aren’t progress.

Comments are welcome.

Local journalism student, blogger, and Carbondale Times columnist Barton Lorimor has a column in the September 29 issue of the Times advocating the creation of a Metropolitan Statistical Area for Southern Illinois.  Lorimor says, in reference to MSAs, “Despite it being one of the larger communities south of Springfield, Carbondale and its surrounding area is not within one of those designated areas.”  Later, he says “Why not try to change that and push federal regulators to designate southern Illinois as its own MSA?”

As Lorimor notes, this would require a change in federal policy.  The U. S. Census Bureau sets the rules for designating metropolitan statistical areas and their newer, smaller cousins called micropolitan statistical areas.  Carbondale and Marion each fit the definition of micropolitan areas, but no city in Southern Illinois has the minimum population of 50,000 necessary to establish a metro area under current rules.

The idea that the distinct communities of Jackson, Williamson, Perry, and Franklin counties should be considered a single “dispersed city” isn’t new.  In 1954, Oliver Wendell Beimfohr, an SIUC professor, published a document arguing for the model and coining the term “dispersed city.”  In 2005, SIUE professor Donald W. Clements published a paper questioning Beimfohr’s concept.

More recently, some locals have coined the term “Metro Lakeland” to describe the area.  Their “metro” area includes the four counties making up the “dispersed city” along with Saline County.  A Google search for “metro Lakeland Illinois” turns up several pages of results.  This seems to be a local economic development initiative aimed at attracting outside industry to locate in Southern Illinois.  The term “Lakeland” seems troubling because no community in the proposed metro area is actually named Lakeland.

If we want a metro area for Southern Illinois, the rules will have to change.  If the Census Bureau could be persuaded to change the rules to include conurbations lacking a core city but having a total municipal population of over 50,000, the Murphysboro to Marion corridor could qualify.  I’m pretty sure all the Highway 13 frontage in that corridor has been annexed by one town or another, making the towns contiguous.  The exception might be the section of 13 that crosses Crab Orchard.

Convincing the Census Bureau to change its definitions would likely require a level of regional cooperation that the communities of Southern Illinois may not be capable of.  Some local communities and their leaders would rather use subsidies to poach businesses from their neighbors or annex land obviously within another community’s planning area than cooperate for the greater good of the region.

Before beginning any effort to change Census Bureau regulations, it is worth considering whether establishing a “metro” area for Southern Illinois would benefit the region.  Comments are welcome.