Economic development
Vision
A city that invests in its residents, public goods which benefit everybody, and businesses that provide good jobs while keeping dollars circulating in the local economy to build community wealth.
Questions
Economic goals: How should we measure whether the local economy is really improving people’s lives? What are the goals — bigger tax base, more jobs for city residents, better jobs, healthier people, a city that produces more wealth with lower carbon emissions?
Resilience: How can we build a local economy that is more resilient and less impacted by downturns in the national or global economy? How can the city adapt to long-term changes caused by the pandemic, such as the shift to working at home?
Plugging leaks: Much of our spending (e.g., for things like energy and food) flows out of the region. What can the city do to keep dollars circulating in the local economy and build community wealth?
Place: What can the city do to help create a physical setting (e.g., vibrant streets and diversity of building types with cheap places to rent) that’s conducive to business start-up and development?
Transparency: How can the city’s economic development activities be more open, transparent, and inclusive?
Recommendations
Think about the difference between community economic development and traditional economic development.
Focus economic development investments and incentives on things — such as housing rehab, energy-efficient housing, transit, and public Internet — that can lower household costs, employ current residents, and build a city of the future. For example, imagine a program that would rehab older homes to make them energy-efficient and lead-safe and also add solar energy, with all the work being done by a local Green Corps.
Follow the economic development recommendations of the 2021 Neighborhood Platform.
Promote a circular economy that reduces waste and keeps dollars circulating locally, as proposed by the Circular Cleveland initiative.
End the digital divide which prevents many residents from accessing opportunities.
Create a public bank or other alternative investment funds so we can raise more capital to invest in ourselves and keep wealth circulating in our community.
Adopt form-based zoning (as the Planning Commission is piloting) to allow flexibility in the use of buildings by a variety of businesses.
Be aggressive about negotiating community benefit agreements to ensure that private developments have broad public benefit.
Be aggressive about monitoring banks’ plans to meet Community Reinvestment Act requirements.
Adjust the city’s residential tax abatement policy so it’s focused on neighborhoods that need redevelopment the most.
Support workers’ rights and the opportunity for city workers to organize unions at city enterprises, such as the airport.
Giant e-commerce and gig-economy corporations strip mine wealth from communities. Consider local taxes, like Portland’s Clean Energy Community Benefits Fund, to retain some of that wealth.
Many issues that shape the city’s economy are not under the city’s control. They are issues at the regional level (such as urban sprawl), state level (such as the minimum wage and limits on local control), or federal level (such as tax policy, labor protections, or health care). The city should work with other cities to lobby for change at all these policy levels.
Resources
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