by Smart City Memphis (RSS) Poverty | September 30th, 2011 12:26am CDT | 4 Comments
What Memphis needs now is a balance of realism and optimism. We should all feel upbeat about developments that have positioned Memphis positively in the last couple of years: the convergence of important national initiatives in Memphis, the fact that our MSA in 2010 had a larger increase in GDP than the Atlanta MSA, [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 29th, 2011 2:00pm CDT | Comments Off
From Sustainable Cities Collective: Don’t count the Motor City out just yet. Companies are now fleeing its suburban office parks for downtown, writes Louis Aguilar in The Detroit News: “When MyInsuranceExpert.com announced last week it is moving its headquarters and 85 workers from Troy to one of the downtown Detroit office buildings bought by entrepreneur [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 28th, 2011 2:00pm CDT | 10 Comments
In light of yesterday’s post and emails we received, the following is a July 31, 2011, sermon by Rev. Steve Montgomery of Idlewild Presbyterian Church that was particularly insightful: Levistiscus 18:19-30s; Acts 8s:26-4s0 (NsRSV)s Seventh in the sermon series “Passages I Love to Hate” Prayer Bless us, O God, with a reverent sense of your [...]
by Smart City Memphis (RSS) Planning and Urban Design | September 28th, 2011 12:30am CDT | 3 Comments
First, updates: Memphis Police Department, with the encouragement of the Downtown Memphis Commission, is making a valiant effort to end the years-old practice of drivers who park their cars in no parking zones. There seems to be progress being made, because just a few days ago, we saw several drivers who were able to drive [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 27th, 2011 2:02pm CDT | Comments Off
From The Urban Child Institute: These last few weeks, the 8,000 members of the Class of ‘25 took their first tentative steps along their journey into school, toward high school graduation and beyond. Today, they’re just five years of age, and are learning about cubbies and backpacks, kindergarten schedules, and successfully navigating naptime. But in [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 27th, 2011 2:00pm CDT | Comments Off
From New Rules Project: The results of a new study suggest that the key to reversing the long-term trend of stagnating incomes in the U.S. lies in nurturing small, locally owned businesses and limiting further expansion and market consolidation by large corporations.Economists Stephan Goetz and David Fleming, both affiliated with Pennsylvania State University and the [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 26th, 2011 2:00pm CDT | Comments Off
From Education Week: Why educators should stop forecasting 21st-century skills and get on with teaching By Christopher L. Doyle Educators make bad prognosticators of the future. There is no shame in that. Politicians, stock-market players, CEOs, and gamblers, people with a lot at stake, routinely fail in their predictive efforts. But when school “reformers” try [...]
by Smart City Memphis (RSS) Uncategorized | September 26th, 2011 12:28am CDT | 69 Comments
I remember sitting as a child in my family’s Southern Baptist Church while the preacher interpreted Bible verses to justify segregation and discrimination of African-Americans and how God was fine with the way things were. I remember sitting in a congregation while the preacher quoted Scripture to prove that Catholics should never be elected president [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 23rd, 2011 2:00pm CDT | Comments Off
From State Science & Technology Institute: Last week, the World Economic Forum released its annual Global Competitiveness Report, and once again, the U.S. fell in the rankings one more position to fifth place, representing a four-year decline from fourth place in 2010-11, second place in 2009-2010 and first place in 2008-2009. Switzerland held the number [...]
by Smart City Memphis (RSS) Economic Development, Neighborhoods, Regionalism | September 23rd, 2011 12:05am CDT | Comments Off
About 50% of the metro population lives in Memphis, dwarfed only by San Antonio’s 62%. The population density of Los Angeles, is four times more than Memphis – 8,092 people per square mile compared to 2,053. The density of the L.A. MSA is 10 times greater than the Memphis MSA. The cost of transportation and [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 22nd, 2011 2:00pm CDT | Comments Off
From Glenwood Springs (CO) Post Independent: GLENWOOD SPRINGS, Colorado — A new economic study commissioned by a regional land planning institute says local governments have the potential to get more bang for their tax-return buck down on Main Street than at the big-box retail centers. When compared on a basis of tax revenue per acre, [...]
by Jimmie Covington (RSS) Uncategorized | September 21st, 2011 2:00pm CDT | 1 Comment
The results are largely negative and I guess that is the reason the news media and local politicians have pretty much ignored the results of the 2010 Census. At least two of the results are historic: –For the first time in history, a census showed a decline in Memphis’ population during a decade in which [...]
by Smart City Memphis (RSS) Economic Development | September 21st, 2011 12:26am CDT | 3 Comments
So, how many jobs have been created during Memphis Mayor A C Wharton’s two years in office? His television ad says 10,000. Channel 3 TV’s “truth test” says 7,320. The number of jobs created in the past year exceeds 15,000 jobs at least. In this regard, the Wharton campaign is modest in its claims. The [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 20th, 2011 2:00pm CDT | Comments Off
From the Progress Report: Following a six-month long investigative research project, the Center for American Progress released a 130-page report on Friday, which reveals that more than $42 million from seven foundations over the past decade have helped fan the flames of anti-Muslim hate in America. Titled “Fear, Inc.,” the report conclusively finds that there [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 19th, 2011 2:30pm CDT | 2 Comments
We’ve written before about how the U.S. became a gambling nation almost overnight and without any real debate about the pros and cons. That’s why Neal Peirce’s recent column for Citiwire caught our attention: What if all America were like Las Vegas, with gambling as near as the closest convenience store? Or if states offered [...]
by Smart City Memphis (RSS) Uncategorized | September 18th, 2011 12:13am CDT | 2 Comments
For this episode of Urban Indifference, we return to a regular source of irritation – repairs to Main Street. As we’ve noted before, for years, city government’s idea of repairing grates crushed by vehicles driving up and down the supposedly vehicle-less street makes our home repairs look sophisticated. All that’s missing is the duct tape. [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 16th, 2011 2:14pm CDT | Comments Off
From Los Angeles Times: No one could argue that the latest green spaces to grace The City are a far more modest proposal. The two bright-red dumpsters, 16 feet long by nearly 6 feet wide and filled with greenery, have been placed in a busy downtown neighborhood where they throw a little shade, elicit regular [...]
by SCM (RSS) Arts and Culture | September 15th, 2011 2:31pm CDT | Comments Off
Congratulations to our colleague Carol Coletta upon the launch of the new program which she leads, ArtPlace: From New York Times: In the two years since he became chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, Rocco Landesman has been trying to make the case that art is an effective linchpin to economic development. Now [...]
by Steve Bares (RSS) Uncategorized | September 15th, 2011 12:49am CDT | Comments Off
Dr. Jerry Caulder, the managing director of Finistere Ventures, a leading life science venture capital firm based in San Diego, has an unparalleled record of success in the life sciences industry. Many people refer to him as the “father of agricultural biotechnology,” so it was an honor to welcome him recently in the Memphis Bioworks [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 14th, 2011 2:11pm CDT | Comments Off
From Salon: Increasingly the battle between left and right in the United States has become a second War Between the States. Red states claim they are picking up domestic migrants and industries from blue states because the latter are too liberal in their tax, welfare and regulation policies. Blue states argue that the red state [...]
by Smart City Memphis (RSS) Uncategorized | September 14th, 2011 12:02am CDT | 4 Comments
Shelby County Commissioner Terry Roland is no doubt right. He does represent the views of his constituents in District 4. The real question these days is whether they think he does it well. His bludgeoning of potential unified school board members last week had as much aplomb as former Soviet Union Premier Nikita Khrushev [...]
by SCM (RSS) Uncategorized | September 13th, 2011 1:50pm CDT | Comments Off
From City Journal: Central Park in spring may be the most glorious public space on Earth. Flowering dogwoods and lilacs scent the air as children, sprung from being cooped up all winter, pack the playgrounds. Bicyclists and runners swirl around the six-mile grand loop, battling through the steep hills of Harlem to take in the [...]
by Bill Day. Memphian Bill Day is two-time winner of the RFK Journalism Award in Cartooning. His cartoons are syndicated internationally by Cagle Cartoons. Cartoons Archive →
Photograph by Amie Vanderford
This ongoing series of photographs is intended to show the daily lives of these single mothers in order to invoke recognition of their similarities to all mothers, along with understanding and empathy from the viewer of the strengths that these single mothers possess within the challenging situations they face. My hope is that newfound empathy with these mothers’ lives will give people some pause before they condemn single mothers when discussing issues such as welfare and other politically charged hot buttons.
