One of the unintended consequences of sustained blogging is readership. Emails pour in daily, mostly asking about Artspace, investment opportunities and various questions about "the old neighborhood" here on the City's East side. Others, like this, slow me down. Always interested in what others are thinking...
Yikes!As a former Buffalonian, I check in frequently to your site to keep an eye on how things are going back home. As an architect, I appreciate your keeping architecture and the built environment in the forefront of your discussions. Keep up the intelligent discourse.Anyway, I moved to Charlotte in mid-2004, and thought you might be interested in another outside view of Buffalo. I looked at my Sunday Observer and was surprised to see "Buffalo Stampede" splashed across the front page. I had seen in previous days the paper was going to be publishing their study of the main sources of Charlotte's population influx, and suspected New York State might be mentioned prominently, but never did I imagine this!A BUFFALO STAMPEDE
UPSTATE N.Y. LEADS CHARGE TO CHARLOTTE REGION, ANALYSIS FINDS
LEIGH DYER, LDYER@CHARLOTTEOBSERVER.COM, DATABASE EDITOR TED MELLNIK CONTRIBUTED.
On the shores of Lake Erie, the city of Buffalo and other communities have withered. Two-thirds of cities and towns in upstate New York lost population this decade. Several games of the region's beloved Buffalo Bills were blacked out locally this season because of unfilled seats. The local Catholic diocese is closing schools and churches. Since its 1950s high, Buffalo's population has declined by more than half, to around 280,000. Meanwhile, since 2000, Charlotte has added 46,000 residents.
And now, an Observer analysis of new data from the Internal Revenue Service shows a significant chunk of upstate New York's population has moved to the Charlotte region. The information, using address changes on tax returns, paints a picture of the migration into and out of the Charlotte region. It shows that Mecklenburg County is the No. 1 out-of-state destination for people leaving Erie County, home of Buffalo. It's the No. 2 out-of-state destination from Monroe County, home to nearby Rochester. read the rest
Could drive this route blindfolded. Very dear friend, Nancy Braun former Buffalo attorney and restaurant owner, now with Alan Tate, keeps inviting me. Give her a call if you're headed down. She's Charlotte's top residential realtor and knows food better than anyone I know...
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Artspace Archive • Annals of Neglect • BAVPA • Where is Perrysburg? • Broken Promises...
Writing the City • Woodlawn Row Houses • faq • my flickr
Artspace Archive • Annals of Neglect • BAVPA • Where is Perrysburg? • Broken Promises...
Writing the City • Woodlawn Row Houses • faq • my flickr
7 comments:
Good question. Don't know.
David,
I miss you! You are one of my most dearest & loyal friends. When are you moving to Charlotte?? Buffalo had its moment and memories.
10 years in Charlotte and loving it! Great weather, friends, economy, opportunity...
Nancy
Nancy,
Always love our phone chats. Advice is always spot on. See you soon...
Anyone Considering the move...get in touch with Nancy, she's the best in Charlotte. I get meal credits for referrals, too!
Rudnick is useless but really what's in his power to do? Merely talking a better game won't improve anything.
You might've seen this, but in case not...
NorthCoast Craig also discussed that Charlotte article
Little excerpt from him:
... We gotta turn this thing around now and I haven't heard or seen anything that's been proposed lately that's likely to do that. Governor Spitzer's best suggestion is to hire a salesman that's better than Pataki's salesman at convincing businesses to do business in a business-unfriendly state. I just don't see the genius there.
We could try what the prosperous states have tried: here's a hint -- imitate Charlotte's tax and business regulation structure. Of course, that would mean that the public employees wouldn't get everything they want and in the end, I suppose, a story in the New York Times about unhappy New York State employees would trump an article in the Charlotte Observer about former New York State residents any day.
b,
Hope is not a plan. Never has been. Slog on!
David
True, but it's so crazy that hope (or as Spitzer's commercials called it - passion) really seems the only "plan" for turnaround in this area as far as majority of voters seem to feel. IMO, they'll just never vote for any candidate who proposes to significantly chop taxes and regulations down to size.
True reforms to bring us in line with more successful areas such as Charlotte are almost never even spoken by our politicians because it's near certain electoral suicide for them in all but a very small number of districts.
John Faso actually offered ideas that'd move us I'd say about half way toward reforms we'd need, and for those he was attacked (successfully) as a right wing extremist. In Charlotte he'd likely be considered a moderate!
b.
Our system is set up with the politicians we elect. They are players at the table along with biz and various other groups.
We can only use the tools that we have. Sometimes, most often these days, I think of myself as the frog in the pot of water that is coming to a boil. You know the one that just got used to the water temperature and suddenly found himself dead as the temp. got to hot.
I return to awareness and education. Can't tell you how many people I meet during the course of the day that tell me they only learned about Coe Place and Artspace from my blog. I mean these are people living on Elmwood who only now are beginning to explore what's happening in the whole City...
Same with politics. There is a reason why we pay taxes on in April and elect those who spend our tax money about six months later. Any closer, we'd make the connection.
Slog on...
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