albanyweblog.com
Updated
March 4, 2007
A rising tide of poverty
Tech Valley's economic gains bypassing inner citiesBy KATE GURNETT, Staff writer
First published: Sunday, February 25, 2007
The census numbers are clear. The contrast is stark. Increasingly, the Capital Region is developing into a place populated by haves and have-nots.
While suburbs and many city neighborhoods have mostly prospered, some inner-city sections of Albany, Schenectady and Troy are like doughnut holes -- up to 10 times poorer than areas surrounding them, according to U.S. census data.
And experts say there has been no trickle-down effect for poorer households here. Urban poverty is rising while upstate growth centered on Tech Valley continues.
Economic integration is so lacking that roughly a third of Albany, Schenectady and Troy residents currently survive on less than $20,650 a year, the federal poverty level for a family of four, according to recent census estimates.
"The numbers keep climbing," said Harris Oberlander, CEO of Trinity Institution, a social service agency in Albany. Oberlander saw Trinity's food pantries in Arbor Hill and the South End serve 4,700 people last year -- a mind- number, he said.
In Albany's West Hill, impoverishment rose from 21 percent 31 percent from 1980 to 2000, census data show. One South End tract jumped to 45 percent poverty during that time.
That compares to less than 10 percent poor in adjacent Bethlehem. Bethlehem's median household income was $63,168 in 2000, compared to $16,158 in the South End neighborhood between Madison and Fourth avenues.
Exacerbating the problem locally, experts say, is a severe housing shortage.
"There's a real big disparity between what people make and what the rents are," said Maria Markovics of United Tenants of Albany. "A lot of people just aren't making it."
Investors who might make a difference aren't coming into areas like Schenectady's impoverished Hamilton Hill, observers say.
Instead, scores of two-family homes have been chopped up into smaller apartments to make quick profits for nonresidents, Schenectady Mayor Brian U. Stratton said. "Absentee landlords are our worst nightmare."
But if, as some economists argue, a "rising tide lifts all boats," why haven't the Capital Region's inner cities benefited from wealth that surrounds them?
Exchanges are rare, experts say, and often restricted to suburban commuters driving through poor neighborhoods on their way to work.
"There's really no connection between the suburbanite and inner city," said Robert Jones, associate professor of economics and chair of the Economics Department at Skidmore College.
Suburbanites "don't shop, except for lunches. In the older days, the big department stores were downtown."
Trickle-down economics holds that "if you give tax breaks to the rich, it trickles down to everybody else. That view is wrong," former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich said last month on CNBC. "What we need to do is have bottom-up economics. We've got to invest in people, in education, in job skills and job training. Make sure that people can be productive enough to share in the bounty of this economy and grow the economy."
And as federal and state leaders erode social safety nets in favor of tax cuts for the wealthy, despair rises, particularly among young people, said Elijah Anderson, the University of Pennsylvania's Charles and William Day Distinguished Professor of the Social Sciences.
And with the United States moving from manufacturing to service and higher-tech jobs, corporations send work to rural or suburban America -- or overseas, Anderson said. That creates an employment vacuum in the cities.
Urban poor, meanwhile, have limited human capital, said Anderson, whose book, "Code of the Street: Decency, Violence, and the Moral Life of the Inner City," examines concentrated and racial urban poverty.
"They don't have the education, the skills and they're suffering from social isolation. Many of them are black, Hispanic and poor white, too. And they're effectively competing with (lower-paid) people living in China or India or Latin America, or right here in this country as illegal aliens, who help depress the wages."
The result? "They're frustrated. They can't make a living. So the drug trade is rampant," he said. As is gun violence.
Unfortunately, many of the victims are children, Anderson said. "Their families are weak. And the forces arrayed against them are powerful."
Working harder -- the traditional American recipe for advancement -- isn't always working.
Already, 80 percent of low-income children have parents who work, according to the National Center for Children in Poverty. Those working poor often lack health insurance, child care, advanced education and cars.
"We need a Marshall Plan for the cities," Anderson said. "Public service jobs to keep people from shooting and killing each other the way they are. We're in bad shape."
One concern of local officials is that more poor people are coming north from New York City as affluent residents move to the suburbs.
"The upper middle classes are largely leaving," Mayor Stratton said. "And that's why it's so important that cities stabilize neighborhoods and stabilize schools to make them more attractive to the middle class and the upper middle class."
Stratton's top priority? Reinvigorate the downtown tax base. Schenectady's plan will mix upper-end housing and a hotel with technology firms, shopping and theaters to draw people, he said.
That's helping in Troy, Mayor Harry Tutunjian said, as higher-income residents move to downtown's Little Italy and Washington Park neighborhoods. "They're creating the need for smaller boutiques and restaurants that we see popping up."
The city also is steering federal cash to help low-income families buy homes, he said. "For many, the biggest challenge is getting the down payment."
In Albany, where the 2000 census showed 18,882 impoverished residents in a population of 95,658, Mayor Jerry Jennings said he plans to reduce vacant buildings, a long, unmet goal.
His "Albany CARES" program, announced this year, is a campaign to reach "every family in need in the city" to teach financial management, debt reduction and boost homeownership. This year, operators say they'll let families know if they're eligible for the federal Earned Income Tax Credit.
Jennings also said he'll ensure that construction work and other jobs at the proposed convention center go to "properly trained city residents." "We need a training center," he said. "We have a chance to knock those (poverty) numbers down."
It would also help if wealthier neighbors who surround poorer cities realize that urban poverty is their problem, too, experts say.
"A lot of them don't see it," Anderson said. "As a caring society, we must take control and break this cycle with firm and loving mentors and persistent demands for better education and decent jobs."
Gurnett can be reached at 454-5490 or by e-mail at kgurnett@timesunion.com.
Have-notsInner-city residents face a lack of housing and jobs, leaving them worse off, despite the area's technological and economic growth. Census data show:
* Children comprise a large portion of the impoverished population, nearly 12 percent of the Capital Region poor.
* Minority neighborhoods in the region's three cities are home to the greatest concentrations of poverty.
Free or reduced-price lunches for poor children in public schools
Albany 71.3 %
Bethlehem 4.7 %
Schenectady 68.7 %
Niskayuna 5.4 %
Troy 62.2 %
East Greenbush 11.6 %
Saratoga Springs 14.8 %
Clifton Park 9.4 %
Source: New York State Education Department
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