Environmental Health: Think you’re on top of it? Not so fast…

I am a self-professed environmental health wingnut. It drives my wife crazy, as I really know how to take the fun out of many pleasures in life: from a nice meal, to a fun toy, to a roaring campfire. I’ve always had these types of leanings, but my subject matter knowledge was greatly expanded as a result of the school environmental health research I led in 2011. Recently, I’ve been self-reflective about these principles and how far I can take my desire for a healthy lifestyle, before it also becomes a miserable lifestyle saddled with fear, constant avoidance and workarounds? I truly believe that the risk of impacts to our health from environmental exposure has been slowly and quietly becoming more severe. But at the same time it may be that, as consumers, we can only take this so far before we turn our lives completely upside-down. As such, I offer you an examination of this slippery slope to reinforce that there are no absolutes, but each person must define the line where they find it worth it to bother changing habits and lifestyles.

Bisphenol A, or BPA, is by all accounts one of the latest villains of public health. A known endocrine disruptor, BPA has been used widely in plastic products and various resins and coatings for decades. Concern has been mounting over how much BPA we are exposed to, as studies have shown its prevalence in the bloodstream and urine of humans, in umbilical cord blood, and in breastmilk; as well as having linkages to various types of cancers and developmental disabilities. We are often exposed to BPA in many ways that we may not realize, as it is commonly found in the linings of canned food (beans, vegetables, fruit) and drinks in metal cans (soda, beer, fruit juice), on thermal paper receipts, in polycarbonate reusable plastic bottles (think Nalgene bottles and the five-gallon translucent blue bottles used on water coolers), and probably other potential sources for exposure that are not often talked about. Combine these frequent exposures with other prevalent environmental toxins, such as PFOAs found in non-stick cookware coatings, TCE in dry cleaning solvents and PBDE flame retardants in many synthetic consumer products (TVs, stereos, fleece  pajamas, mattresses, molded foam cushions in couches), you end up with a pretty serious poison cocktail right in your own home without really realizing it.

We environmental health zealots and over-reactors do what we can to eliminate exposures wherever possible: buying food products fresh, frozen, or in glass jars; replacing Teflon cookware with uncoated wares; trying not to handle thermal receipts, etc. But does this just give us a false sense of security? Our actions seem simple and effective, but the problems we hope to avoid are often much more complicated than they appear. Here are some examples:

Avoid thermal paper? Studies have shown that BPA is present in trace amounts in many types of paper, as a result of often being commingled with thermal paper in the recycling process;

Purchase BPA-free products? BPA is indeed starting to be voluntarily phased out by many manufacturers; however, it is generally being replaced by Bisphenol S, a compound that has not been deeply studied for its relative health impacts compared to BPA;

Purchase organic? Recent revelations have shown that organic brown rice syrup, for unfortunate reasons, can have high levels of arsenic (we found out that organic brown rice syrup was a main ingredient in the baby formula we were feeding our infant, which we have since switched to a non-organic brand)

Prefer glass to metal cans? I have witnessed firsthand one tomato sauce and salsa producer that distributes food in glass jars, but uses imported tomatoes out of #10 cans, most likely lined with BPA.

But the real basis for my case is…restaurants. That’s right, restaurants. Everyone eats out, some of us more than others. We patronize restaurants so that we can cede control and responsibility for preparing meals to someone else. We also implicitly trust that they are preparing food in a safe and healthy manner, but give little further thought to what happens in the kitchen. Out of sight, out of mind, right? Having worked in several restaurants over the years, I can personally attest to the numerous environmental health practices of concern that are standard operating procedure:

• Heavy and sometimes complete reliance on canned ingredients; (Potential BPA Exposure)
• The constant use of polycarbonate storage containers that are frequently exposed to high heat (hot soups, being run through dishwashers); (Potential BPA Exposure)
• Large quantities of plastic wrap that are placed over both hot and cold foods, and sometimes put in microwave ovens; (Potential PVC and Phthalate Exposure)
• The prevalence of industrial-grade detergents and cleaning products like quarternary ammonia; and,
• The industry standard of using thermal paper for customer receipts. (Potential BPA Exposure)

Thankfully, non-stick cookware is seldom used, in my experience; it doesn’t stand up to the abuse of the commercial kitchen environment. Unlike other changes resulting from consumer demand like organic and locally sourced food, there has been little to no pressure on the commercial food industry (including manufacturers, vendors, and restaurants) to address any of these health issues. So is this going to change anytime soon? It’s doubtful, given that there aren’t clear alternatives for all of these avenues for negative health impact, and it would be pretty difficult to turn the food industry upside-down to accomplish these changes.

The restaurant environment is merely one example of the way chemicals can infiltrate our lives and our bodies without us even realizing. Just imagine all of the other hidden exposures from the places where we live, work and play. As such, I have come to the conclusion that the real change needs to happen through legislation and policy change (there are already several organizations working on this), which is a long and protracted process with no clear expectation of complete success. BPA happens to have been one that has been studied in great depths, which has been the basis for the legislation that exists in places like Connecticut and California. The real challenge with environmental health is that the real damage to our health results from long-term, low-level exposure, which makes it very difficult to pinpoint specific toxins and to build science and legislation around it.

So while we’re waiting for science and policy to catch up, I suggest we all adhere to some basic words of wisdom: 1) everything in moderation, 2) use common sense, and 3) you can’t control everything (even if you would like to), so sometimes you just need to relax and go with the flow. And, it is okay to eat in restaurants…

The Future of Urban Farms… or Community Gardens… or Are They One and the Same?

Urban farming is certainly an emerging trend across the country, and has been implicated as a means of addressing community problems like vacant and blighted land, food deserts, obesity and malnutrition, and food illiteracy. Individuals, community groups, and non-profits are snapping up unused parcels and quickly setting up small, productive agricultural plots. Clearly it has overall benefit for people, communities and the environment. But one has to ask, is this really the traditional community garden paradigm with a new catch phrase, or are there true substantive differences? Furthermore, what is the future of the trend that has been the darling of the environmental movement as of late? Let’s explore this.

A Community garden in Stanton Heights

At its simplest, a community garden is a group of plots, often located on publicly-owned land but also on private land on occasion, that share some basic needs like water spigots, compost piles, fenced enclosures, and very rarely gardening tools. Plots are generally allotted to participants by waiting list, some with fees and some without, and participants are given domain over what they would like to grow in their plot. The basic model here is that a large group of people each contribute a relatively small amount of time to working their own plot, and receive the fruits of their labor as a result. 

The urban farm is not dissimilar, as it might occupy a similarly sized plot as an entire community garden (1/4 to 2 acres) and grows very similar crops. Plots are more frequently located on private land, whether vacant or condemned, or otherwise made available. Labor is often provided by interns, students and volunteers, as well as by paid staff. The fruits of the harvest are typically given away to those who provided labor, given away to people in need (often in the communities where the farms are located), or sold to local restaurants, retailers or the general public. The managing groups, like Grow Pittsburgh, for example, also likely provide liability coverage for individuals that work on the farm plots. Some have told me that what differentiates a garden from a farm is that the bounty from a garden is meant for private consumption, while the bounty from a farm is intended to be sold in some form.

I would argue that the differences between community garden and urban farm are nuanced, and in the end the same basic activity takes place—food crop cultivation— but within different organizational structures. In the urban farm model, you have a fewer number of people spending more time working on about the same area, whereas the community garden has more people working on smaller plots. 

Which brings me to the reason for discussing this topic in the first place: are urban farms, which are often the recipients of operating grants, viable long-term businesses? Or do we need to rethink the urban farm model as being more of a community asset than an enterprise? 

Market conditions do not favor the urban farming enterprise model. Rural farms already face difficult economics in running profitable businesses in places, even though the cost of living is low and the land is plentiful and fertile. Urban environments where farming might be considered are the exact opposite: the cost of living is high and the workable parcels of land are very small, scattered and have low-quality and heavily compacted soils. The distributed nature of urban farming inhibits the ability to use motorized farm equipment like tractors, reduces the economy of scale of providing infrastructure like fences and water supplies, and creates inefficiency by moving tools and labor from parcel to parcel. Furthermore, the staff time needed to take produce to market destinations (restaurants, grocers, soup kitchens, etc.) is approximately fixed regardless of the quantity delivered, meaning that the per-unit labor cost is higher for smaller quantities of produce versus larger quantities, further driving up costs. Obviously there are exceptions to every rule, but with all else being equal, urban farms face problematic economic conditions in an already challenged industry. 

So far, foundations have stepped in to fill the funding gap, but is this trend going to last? That remains to be seen as to what the long-term appetite is for underwriting urban agriculture. One blogger on Next American City expressed this concern in a recent post. He likened the urban farm trends to the unchecked growth of the dot-com era, complete with looming bubble. 

But instead of throwing out the baby with the bathwater, maybe we just need to rethink the ownership and operating structure of urban farms. In the end, the amount of food that urban plots can produce is paltry compared to the volumes moving through rural farms and supermarkets. It will hardly make a dent in the hunger or nutrition problems, or even the massive amount of food imported from far-flung locales. If our goal was to change how much food was produced locally, we would instead attempt to shift some of the one million acres of farmland in Western Pennsylvania from commodity crops, like soy, corn and hay, to fruits, vegetable and grains.

Garfield Community Farm in Garfield Heights neighborhood of Pittsburgh.

But in the end, food production shouldn’t be the goal of urban farming. The real value of urban agriculture is as a tool for education, community engagement (especially with young people), and imparting in people the value of hard work, with the self-esteem and sense of accomplishment that come with it. So perhaps we should re-position these farms as community center gardens, similar to what the YMCA has done in Homewood and Hazelwood. And we could take it one step further, and help the abundance of churches and other similar community organizations, both formal and informal, to start their own gardens. This is how Garfield Community Farm came to be: as a project of the The Open Door ministry that aims to help the community of Garfield through goodwill and volunteerism. We can borrow this model, which by the way is significantly underwritten by the generosity of a number of Pittsburgh churches, to establish community-driven agriculture in other communities, while also helping to connect these groups with existing volunteer networks, food and cooking education programs, and other community outreach mechanisms. 

One of the benefits of this approach is to transform the tasks of toiling in the garden from being an enterprise activity into one that is a civic duty, much like caring for a local park or a flower box located in a public space. We can still get all of the benefits associated with urban farming but aren’t relying on one entity to take ownership of them, shifting away from relying on the sales of actual produce grown to help bankroll the entire effort. 

Either way, we need to refocus our goals on all the benefits that come from growing food, except for the food itself. The long-term presence of food production in our communities should not be overlooked, but should be done in a way that provides long-term sustainability and is in tune with the hard realities of business.

Have you ever been to Summerset at Frick Park in Pittsburgh? It’s been heralded as an absolute model of infill development, being built on a slag heap and what not. If you haven’t been there, it’s worth a drive-through, or you can take a look at their website. Back in my college days, friends and I used to bike around at the base of the slag heap along Nine Mile Run. It was a pretty desolate place back them, complete with skeletons of burned-out cars, and you always had the feeling there was something unseemly happening when you weren’t around to see. The new development has all the trappings of New Urbanism, sidewalks and back alleys, on-street parking, some nice public spaces, a community center (of sorts) and a mix of housing sizes and types. It has also helped to restore Nine Mile Run and eliminate acidic runoff from entering the stream and the Monongahela River.

But for all of its neat features and formulaic traditional neighborhood development (TND) qualities, Summerset still has an eerie feeling about it, and I just can’t bring myself to like it. The best I can describe it is like a body without its soul; the place just doesn’t have any vibrance or energy. This may be the result of the relatively homogenous population that is mainly white and middle-class (from what I could see), perhaps along with the total absence of any type of commerce. Furthermore, the neighborhood is walkable within its own confines, but way too isolated for allow residents to get anywhere by any means other than driving, especially shopping (the Waterfront is by far the closest commercial center), child care or schools. As one Squirrel Hill denizen noted, despite its geographic proximity it’s really not a part of Squirrel Hill. Despite the short-lived bus line that terminated at Summerset, public transit is not very viable for this small and affluent community. The community center, although it sounds nice, seems to be more of a pool house and rental facility for residents, and less of a node of activity. Overall, Summerset has the quality of being manufactured, albeit based on a checklist of characteristics found in vibrant neighborhoods. All buildings are subject to pre-established design standards enforced by the developer, and the building types on each lit have all been pre-determined.

Given all of Summerset’s shortcomings, could it have been done any better? What one might have expected is an attempt at a more mixed-income community, but could that even really have worked? Can a New Urbanist development, which is built entirely by one developer, ever have the character and soul of truly vibrant community that is being sought? Or is this an urban incarnation of a typical suburban subdivision? Perhaps true mixed-income communities either doesn’t exist or are extremely rare (see sidebar below), nor can we replicate the social fabric we find in other places. Could this development have been as successful if it were allowed to grow organically, giving it a unique character of its own? Would the city have been able to undertake this all themselves creating the “shovel-ready” parcels for developers and homebuilders to come in? How could this development have turned out any differently? All questions, few answers. Sorry, folks. If you have any answers, let me know, I’d love to hear them!

[relevant sidebar] I believe that the only mixed-income communities that can live harmoniously in perpetuity are those that are one, and at most two, income levels from each other (think three sub-levels within each of lower, middle and upper classes). For example, solid middle class families can coexist long-term with either lower- or upper-middle class families, but lower-upper class families will not mix well with upper-lower class families. These drastically different classes may actually live in the same neighborhood at the same time, but this is often taking place while the community is responding to market demand of being a more or less affluent place. {/sidebar]

Green Jobs, Where Art Thou?

The quest for green jobs in our region, state, and country seems so close, but yet so far. Perhaps the reason these jobs are so elusive is because we are looking for them in the wrong places. The term “green jobs” has been a buzz word for three some-odd years that is essentially a catch-all for any job that is directly or indirectly linked with saving energy, for the most part. It has been explained to us as a set of careers that will not only power our economy in the 21^st century, but be good for the planet to boot.

While this may well be true, we really to look at the “green economy” from a broader perspective. The green economy is not really a new sector unto itself, it’s more of a transformation of certain critical sectors of our current economy to meet larger sustainability goals. These sectors are: energy, construction and building trades, water management, waste reduction, food production, and transportation.

Each of these sectors must undergo a slightly different transformation based on three key factors, the three legs of the stool if you will: availability of skilled workforce, changes in policy and regulation, and a shift in consumer preferences and demand. Thus far, the green jobs discussion has focused almost exclusively on workforce development. This approach of pushing new skills out into the workforce is unprecedented. This was certainly not the approach in either the Industrial Revolution of a century ago or the Digital Revolution of twenty years, and that’s because of two reasons. First, the demand for products and services itself created the demand for jobs, and the necessary skills were taught either by employers or by entrepreneurial agents in the private sector (think third-party training workshops for the plethora of programming and networking certifications). Second, it didn’t make sense to train people when you aren’t sure exactly what skills they will need. We could have dumped tons of resources into training people on programming in the AIX operating system (never heard of it? There’s a reason for that) because we thought it was the next big thing, when in fact .NET and Linux programming would emerge as the skills in demand.

The same is true today with the green economy; it still doesn’t make sense to take this preemptive workforce development approach. With all due respect to the organizations working on green job training, we don’t know and can’t know exactly what our transformed economy will look like, so why would we build up a skilled workforce that may end up being irrelevant? Are solar and wind production Pennsylvania’s wave of the future? Maybe, maybe not; we certainly won’t be the ones to dictate that, it will be the new and existing businesses that will determine our economic future. Furthermore, the battle cry for green jobs has enticed people into these training programs, but has created a glut of workers in the marketplace that, for the most part, isn’t hiring yet. This glut can have the opposite effect of bringing down the wages of some of these positions without making new positions, not exactly the intended effect.

A new trajectory

We need to focus our efforts on demand-driven job creation (aka the “pull” model) instead of the supply-driven approach (aka “push” mode) we are pursuing now. Despite all of the positive impacts and stabilizing force ARRA provided, in the end it was still a push approach, as it didn’t fundamentally change any of the market conditions that have set the tone for our economy. If we’re really truly committed to transforming our economy, we need to take a hard look at long-held policies that hold down the cost of energy, encourage wastefulness, and stifle innovation. We’re trying to have our cake and eat it too. Renewable energy is a prime example: for wind and solar to be cost-effective and demanded in the marketplace, we must allow the price of coal-powered electricity to rise, while also providing incentive for new installations by way of the state’s renewable portfolio standard (RPS). As it stands, Pennsylvania’s RPS, a mandate that requires utility companies to provide a certain percent of their total energy delivered from renewable sources, is a good first step but is lacking in many ways. The requirement for solar photovoltaics is currently a measly 0.02% and will max out at 0.5% in 2021, and utilities may purchase that solar energy generating anywhere within thirteen mid-Atlantic and midwestern states and the District of Columbia. This does very little to create jobs or even stimulate construction of new renewable sources. By contrast, New Jersey has taken a very proactive approach, where their RPS is currently over 0.3% on its way to a peak of nearly 5% by 2026, ALL of which must be purchased from within the state.

How does this manifest itself in the market, you might ask? Well, the price for Solar Renewable Energy Credits (SRECs), the means by which renewable energy commodities are traded, are just above $200 for one megawatt-hour (MWh) in Pennsylvania, while they are trading at over $600/MWh in New Jersey. On a practical level, this means that if I were to install a solar electricity array on my roof and Pennsylvania adopted New Jersey’s level of incentive, the payback period on my investment would be cut approximately in half, from 9.3 years to 4.7 years. This larger incentive would be the difference in executing this installation for myself and many others, which in turn means…JOBS! Perhaps our elected officials are starting to hear this. There is currently a bill up in the Legislature to modify the RPS to increase the demand for Pennsylvania solar. This is a step in the right direction, as bill sponsor Chris Ross (R-Chester) has explained that we’re oversaturated with supply.

So, let’s keep the discussion about green jobs going, but we must really shift our focus to “green businesses.” What are the barriers preventing these businesses and industries from burgeoning? My belief is that they are primarily policy barriers reinforced by the cozy relationship between industry and politics. We will need to have some hard conversations, but it is crucial that we start and keep talking about this dark side of the issue. I can guarantee that some very powerful industries will not be happy about it, but this is the proverbial omelet; and it’s time to crack a few eggs.

Explorations in Community Development Part 1, Let’s Call a Spade a Spade: Community Development, or just Non-Profit Real Estate Development?

Most projects associated with the concept of “community development” engage in activities like clearing abandoned and condemned properties, cleaning up weed-covered and rubbish-strewn lots, planting trees and establishing green spaces, promoting home ownership, remodeling or building new homes and/or apartments, and establishing programs to keep streets safe and free of ill-intentioned persons. Most people would consider many or all of these activities as having positive impacts and being of overall benefit to a particular neighborhood. These actions are the physical manifestations of the concept, “if we improve the appearance of a neighborhood, the neighborhood will continue to improve in other ways.” Sounds good, right?

Well, no. I posit that these actions undertaken on their own can overall be detrimental to the health and vitality a town, city, or cluster of neighborhoods. My reasoning is this: physical deterioration and visible blight are themselves not the problem, they are merely symptoms of much deeper social ills. I strongly believe that healthy neighborhoods can and will take care of the physical appearance on their own without outside intervention. What determines a neighborhood’s level of health is the well-being of its residents. If residents are mired with problems like substance abuse, lack of education, absence of or inability to keep jobs, broken families, physical and emotional abuse, or institutional discrimination, these scourges will bubble to the surface in many ways, including in the appearance of their surroundings. As described by Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, economically disadvantaged people must first address their core needs of food, shelter, and safety before they can truly concern themselves with the needs of the community.

Here’s the rub: in mixed and “edgy” neighborhoods, improving the appearance of a place has the effect of serving the “haves” and not the “have nots.” Improved appearance causes the neighborhood to be more desirable, which is reflected through increased property values, which itself is a reflection of consumer preferences and demand in the marketplace. This increased property value has the power to displace the “have nots” in three ways: 1) by low-income homeowners being priced out a neighborhood because of increased property taxes; 2) by increased rents to non-homeowners, again due to increased taxes, but also to changes in consumer preferences that attract higher-income renters; and 3) by direct real estate speculation of renter-occupied homes shifting to owner-occupied homes. Without having dealt with any of the core problems of the have-nots as described above (lack of education, mental health problems, substance abuse, etc.), these displaced residents are forced to move to more affordable places, which are frequently already-low-income areas (in Pittsburgh, think Homewood, Larimer, Beltzhoover). This increased density of disadvantaged people exacerbates the social problems that already exist in poor neighborhoods by concentrating poverty, whilst the gentrifying neighborhood sees an influx of more middle-class homebuyers (the “haves”).

This phenomenon can happen very slowly and often goes unnoticed. In fact, the traditional physical improvement efforts generally have great outcomes on the surface, which gives the appearance of success when looked out through a narrow aperture. What happens is that most of the undesireables have moved out of the neighborhood, and in turn the physical degradation has abated, while the “upstanding” residents are busy planting trees, setting up community watches, and establishing community parks. But what has really happened on the larger view is that the neighborhood’s problems have been moved, not solved. This is a very troubling trend, especially since the aforementioned actions are often initiated by non-profit “community development” corporations (CDCs).

In Pittsburgh, some specific examples of this can be found in the East End. Both East Liberty Development Incorporated (ELDI) and Friendship Development Associates (FDA) have engaged in programs to acquire, broker, improve, or construct new property in their respective target areas. ELDI has cleared and re-built nearly an entire block on North St. Clair Street, with new “green” homes that appear to be marketed to my demographic (young, middle class, concerned about environmental issues) based on style and pricing. The infill approach to development is admirable, but the long-term outlook is worrisome. Similarly, FDA has brokered redevelopment of numerous properties through its Penn Avenue Arts Initiative, with the goal of fostering the burgeoning arts district by attracting more artists. They have also directly purchased and developed several properties, including the Quiet Storm, new residences at the corner of Penn & Gross, the Glass Lofts, and the forthcoming Bride’s Row redevelopment. The common thread between these two organizations is their exclusive focus on building-based programs for community development, without implementing social programs to complement. The Bloomfield-Garfield Corporation has taken a mixed approach, initially focusing on social programs, but recently expanding into building-based programs by partnering with the URA on the demolition of public housing blocks in Garfield Heights and their replacement with modern-style public housing and alleged mixed-income developments.

It is unclear to me why social programs have not gained traction in the CDC world. Perhaps it is because of socioeconomic discrimination, where lower-income residents are considered a blight on the community and not a part of it. Perhaps it is because it is a more difficult sell to government agencies and grantmakers, with outcomes that are less measurable and can take much longer to show results. Physical improvements are visible and provide instant gratification, and therefore may also be a favorite of politicians as a faster way of proving their commitment and value to the community. Whatever the origin of the dysfunction, community development agencies that focus exclusively on physical appearances are doing a disservice to their community and the communities around them. In fact, the term “community” directly implies people, but often gets mistaken for the streets and buildings that people occupy. To focus on the well-being of buildings is essentially real estate development, and should be disassociated with the word community. So why don’t we call it what it is, and instead of dumping so much public money into these so-called “community improvement projects”, let’s redirect all of that public money into real programs that can make real changes in the lives of the people that need it, not the stable middle-class homeowners.

Coming soon: Part 2, Disrupting the Conventional Model, a New Paradigm

Wealth Creation in Rural Communities: A Framework for Holistic Community Revitalization & Empowerment

I attended a workshop several weeks ago on Wealth Creation in Rural Communities conducted by Yellow Wood Associates out of Vermont. The exploration of this concept was supported and championed by the Ford Foundation, who is keenly interested in finding a framework for measuring social programs and ensuring that their investments in programs have a lasting impact. In particular, the Ford Foundation has focused on a few key areas of intense poverty: Appalachia, the Deep South, and the Lower Rio Grande Valley.

The ultra-distilled version of the framework is as follows:

Problem

The term “wealth” need to be rethought in a broader sense that the traditional financial definition. The types of wealth defined in this framework are: individual, social, intellectual, natural, political, built, and financial. Furthermore, income is not the same as wealth.

The core problem is that many, if not all, of the types of wealth are extracted from rural areas and moved into urban and suburban areas. Think of things like food (commodity crops, livestock, produce, etc.), energy (coal, petroleum), timber, but also the labor force (leaving to find education and jobs). This extraction could also be described as exploitation, similar to what we witness in many developing countries.

Goal

Create wealth that “sticks”. How can we stem the flow of wealth out of rural areas and then set in place the building blocks for the communities to improve themselves?

All types of wealth must be addressed in any concerted effort. One type of wealth shall not be gained at the expense of another.

Approach

Collaboration is a must. Given the wide range of problems facing these communities and the variety of various types of initiatives needed, no one agent will be able to handle it all. All investments made should be made in the context of a larger wealth creation initiative.

Programs and initiatives must use a “pull” model instead of a “push” model. This is the difference between demand-side and supply-side interventions. The conventional approach to community development is to push programs onto communities without first determining whether it is needed, and whether the community is in a place where it can utilize the program or service effectively.

We must develop and leverage the idea of “value chains”, which are the counterpoint to traditional supply chains. In a traditional supply chain, one company in a step in the supply chain only interfaces with the next step upstream and downstream and the relationships are purely transactional. In a value chain, all of the steps in the chain collaborate, and thereby share in both the risk and the reward. A limited example of this would be consumer-supported agriculture (CSAs), where the farmers and the consumers share in the cost but also in the fruits of the harvest. This model is less transactional and more communal.

Rural communities and urban areas must be understood as being part of the same system, and that they depend on each other. The relationship between the two must be strengthened and equalized.

I found this presentation to be, well, mind-blowing. This truly is a disruptive concept to the traditional model of community development, and transforms it from the piecemeal approach to a comprehensive and holistic methodology that is truly invested in successful and measurable outcomes. This is the change we need!

As described at the outset, this concept was specifically developed around rural communities. But is there is a way to utilize this same framework with poor inner-city neighborhoods? These distinct types of communities share many of the same challenges of disenfranchisement and public health, though the problem of resource exploitation is typically not as prevalent in urban communities. In fact, inner-city communities have a stronger foundation to build upon, with better access to jobs, health care, and schools to certain extents. So this should be easier, right? We shall see.

Let’s consider the community of Larimer in the East End of Pittsburgh. Here is a matrix of the status of the seven types of wealth in the community:

Type of Capital	Community Strength	Community Challenge
Individual		Adverse health effects
Social	Strong religious institutions, community organizations like Kingsley Association	High rate of ex-offenders, High percentage of elderly residents.
Political	Lots of publicity recently, strong support and attention from State Sen. Jim Ferlo and US Rep Mike Doyle.	Disenfranchisement due to high number of felons.
Financial		High percent of residents below poverty line. Low property values.
Built	Generally flat topography, higher quality building stock than many neighborhoods. Good access to public transit and business centers.	Numerous abandoned and derelict buildings and empty lots
Natural	Limited environmental contamination.
Intellectual		No schools within the boundary of the neighborhood

This lens offers an important perspective on the assets and challenges of the community. But how do we interface and overlay this with the oft-building-focused community strategic plan, which typically focus on streetscapes, green space, land use, and building types? Does one inform the other? Should they overlap or should they complement one another? Are they sequential? Should they be developed together? Are both really necessary? These are hard questions to answer, but the ability to reconcile these two concepts is crucial to their adoption. We need to build the framework by which the wealth creation model can be understood and digested by the designer and planner types, as well as everyday people. Perhaps Yellow Wood Associates has already grappled with this, but I look forward to bringing these two worlds into alignment. More to come on this...