In the many years I've been here I've written this Diary multiple times in multiple ways. The reason? I think it is important people know what is possible.
I read here and elsewhere about the terrible state of the towns and cities folks live in and think to myself, "it doesn't have to be that way." Instead of just bitching I like to use my "little" town as an example of what is possible.
Some background before I go into the details below the fold.
I live in a small rural town in southern Illinois, not that far from St. Louis. A moderate Republican to "Blue Dog" district. Generally speaking our industry is we grow shit. Here is the view outside my front door the other day during a hail storm.
If I would have swung the camera to the right a little you'd see about a 10,000 acre soy bean field. We don't have a lot of industry. We don't have dot com companies here. But somehow from 2000 when we had 5,500 citizens, we had 8,700 in 2010.
I want to tell you what is possible (yes I know I keep using that word). What my little town is doing, cause I am sure you folks in larger towns want what I have and you could/should have it.
I will never forget a debate at a town hall meeting. Our city manager said to this woman that was unhappy about some of the things I will talk about below the fold, he said:
Everybody likes nice things. Nice things cost money.
Infrastructure
For me this is key. I don't even know where to start ....
So let's start with how I get my power. We don't buy power from Illinois Power/Ameren like most people in this state do. We are a member of what I like to think is a "hippie" co-op of small rural towns that buy our power in "bulk" from whoever has the best prices. To stay a member of this group we had to upgrade some of our transformers this past year. So we did. But we went beyond that, cause while we were at it why not rerun all our power cables in the city. And cause we have millions in surplus budget money we did.
Also, and this is my favorite thing as a tech geek that works out of my house, unlike some states we can figure out how to fill out grant requests from the Federal government. We filled out said forms and got $750,000 in Federal funds to wire, and this was last year so it is done, all our schools and government buildings (Post Office, library, community center, and City Hall) with direct fiber. Literally we ran fiber directly in a + manner throughout entire town. The grant also includes money to study if spending more money, to wire every business and house with fiber would pay off (I bet it will).
Oh and in 2001 we voted to raise our taxes, I kid you not to expand and improve and build more parks. In my little town it is hard to walk more than a few blocks in any direction and not find a park or just a small space of public land. We paid local artist to paint murals. Do sculptures. We bought some rundown building on Main Street and torn them down and built parks. Just open spaces. In one we built a food pantry that has, I think, won every award the state of Illinois can give out.
A few months ago I had a co-worker, not really a friend call and say he was going to ride his motorcycle across the country. Could he grab a couch for night. I was like sure. She spend several days here, stunned.
Schools, Schools, Schools
It is the chicken or egg thing. Do we have good schools cause the city is doing well or is the city doing well because of the schools?
I don't know which it is but we have some of the best schools not only in Illinois but in the nation. I often mention that in 2008 we voted in my city 57% for McCain and 63% to raise our property taxes to build a new $60M high school. It opened about 14 months after that funding was approved. I don't have any kids but went to the open house and it was like something from a space movie. I am betting if you pay $30,000/year for your child to go to a private school and you saw my school, you'd move them here .... and of course my school is FREE.
And my favorite part of the school is the huge greenhouse and all the "shop" facilities. Next year the students expect to have built their first car, electronic, from scratch.
Public Transportation
This is where I have to give a shout out to my local congress critter. Well all of them actually. I have a bus I can get on two blocks from my house. I have a light metro rail line four miles away (free parking BTW). I often say I am a "hippie liberal" and I love my VW Passat, but well over a year ago I wondered if I could get by not driving. I didn't drive much when I lived in DC. I found it was very easy. I've not driven in more than a year.
Oh and if you are a lower income person and have approval from the state or a Senior citizen, well public transportation is FREE. Let me say that again, it is free. For any IL resident not in my district that is confused by that, well the folks from my district about a year ago said they'd shut down anything happening in Springfield if they tried to change this.
Conclusion
Now when I have written this Diary in the past folks note or say that I live in a town that is about 96% white, and us white folks don't mind spending money on ourselves. At some levels I don't disagree, and at the same time have no idea how to respond to that.
But the best thing we did was about 15 years ago was hiring a City Manager. He is not elected. Not political. The dude seems to have a clue. And he keeps improving things. Maybe this is wrong but he just runs shit. Our Mayor and City Council, which are part time, literally do nothing that I can gauge. But everything and everybody seems to be happy.
I know without a doubt, cause so many of my friends that live in DC have come to see me, if you saw where I lived it would bring a tear to your eyes. I recall this video I saw in 2008 of this young lady waiting in the rain to see Obama in Austin. She said, "we're an island of blue in a sea of red."
I feel like I live in an island of "good" in a sea of not so "good." Heck in the last six months, two companies I am not a huge fan of, Boeing and Monsanto, have opened shop here. 375 new jobs. I have to think that maybe they came here, well because of the things I talked about above!