An Effort to Save a City by Shrinking It

[Pale Blue Dot]

LINT, Mich. — Dozens of proposals have been floated over the years to slow this city’s endless decline. Now another idea is gaining support: speed it up.

Instead of waiting for houses to become abandoned and then pulling them down, local leaders are talking about demolishing entire blocks and even whole neighborhoods.

The population would be condensed into a few viable areas. So would stores and services. A city built to manufacture cars would be returned in large measure to the forest primeval.

“Decline in Flint is like gravity, a fact of life,” said Dan Kildee, the Genesee County treasurer and chief spokesman for the movement to shrink Flint. “We need to control it instead of letting it control us.”

The recession in Flint, as in many old-line manufacturing cities, is quickly making a bad situation worse. Firefighters and police officers are being laid off as the city struggles with a $15 million budget deficit. Many public schools are likely to be closed.

“A lot of people remember the past, when we were a successful city that others looked to as a model, and they hope. But you can’t base government policy on hope,” said Jim Ananich, president of the Flint City Council. “We have to do something drastic.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/22/business/22flint.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss

[imdjh]

1. k&R for good judgement

Despite her pride in her home, the calculation takes Ms. Kelly about a second. “Yes,” she said, “I would be willing.”



Smart lady

[liberal N proud]

2. Youngstown Ohio has been doing something similar for a couple of years

I think when the neighborhood has one or two houses they buy the owners out, tear down the house and shut off the city utilities and close the street.

[Jkid]

3. Closing the street?

They're going have to tear up the street to remove the asphalt and replace it with grass.

[Delphinus]

4. This is intriguing.

Thanks for sharing.

My neighborhood is in decline and I can't get my city to even pay attention.

[itsrobert]

5. I see they shrunk the name of the town

From "Flint" to "Lint"?

[notesdev]

6. It's part of the new

"pocket-sizing" strategy

[Pale Blue Dot]

7. They're collecting the entire town

in the belly button of Michigan.