Sent to the Walkable Eastwood email group and reposted here with the permission of the author:
For the last few days I’ve been staring at this sign on the Steak and Sundae, trying to understand what’s really being said. Mr. Kimatian is a Republican and a former broadcast executive at Chanel 3 TV. At the primary mayoral debate, in part sponsored by Walkable Eastwood, Mr. Kimatian made it clear he would run the City as a business. I think that is an important point and I definitively agree. Over the 30 plus years I’ve called Syracuse my home the City of Syracuse has been operated as a disconnected series of fiefdoms with one part of the City not caring about the others. The political system has always promoted one part of the City at the expense of the others.
Unfortunately, Eastwood has always been left out of City-wide considerations for one overriding political consideration: with one exception, Eastwood has never had it’s own representation. Eastwood is split down the middle by the 1st and 5th Council Districts. The power base of the 1st District is located on the City northside (the N. Salina area). The 5 th District has it’s power base in the 17th Ward (the Salt Springs area). While the 4 Councilor-at Large positions are supposed to represent the entire City, the reality is they represent particular constituencies. For instance, Van Robinson has make it clear to me, personally, he represents “his people”, by which he meant African-Americans.
Over the past couple of years, Kathleen Joy has assisted Eastwood in defending ourselves against the onslaught of Walgreens and mindless development. For this I am immensely grateful.
Kimatian proclamations that he will run the City as a business leave me cold. Yes, the City is a half billion dollar business, BUT it’s more than just that. This City is a community of PEOPLE that rely on politicians to remember that they exist. We the people, need the politicians to understand that we are a series of communities that are bound together to form this City. Yes, we are a City, but we are communities and neighborhoods and individuals who stand together to form this City. Not just customer to serve the welfare of a capitalistic system.
And, therein is the rub with Mr. Kimatian’s proclamation “This will be a thriving business when …” He hasn’t asked us, the people who live here, the people who own this neighborhood. This is OUR turf and you only DO with our permission.
We have just seen the results of 8 years of national laissez-faire politics and it has brought this nation close to economic collapse. Lets not let it happen to our neighborhood.
Chuck Lochner
Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Chuck. That was my first reaction to that sign — How does he figure that’s our preference for the building/corner’s future? He didn’t ask me! I was insulted by the fact that any of these candidates would consider an empty proclamation like this.
Cities are a collective “business” or organization (insert community or collective of communities here if you wish)…In reality we’re all in it together. The success of each small Mom and Pop shop, corporation, non-profit, yearly cultural festival, etc. is just as much in my best interest as it is yours. The failure here is two fold: “Syracuse has been operated as a disconnected series of fiefdoms with one part of the City not caring about the others” and “He (Mr. Kimatian) hasn’t asked us, the people who live here, the people who own this neighborhood…”
I’ll quote City planning academic Paul Davioff…”there is something very shameful to our society in the necessity to have organized citizen participation” (in the form of public meetings that the majority of us cannot even fit into our schedules) [Davidoff, P. (original 1965) Advocacy and Pluralism in Planning (pp.421-432). In: Legates, R. and Stout, F. (1996) The City Reader. New York: Routledge]
City residents like yourself might be involved in actual citizen participation, but for each of you there are thousands sitting back watching TV instead. Politicians like Kimatian can do as they please in a society where this is the norm.
Until we all realize we are all “employees” in the collective “business” that cities are, we will continue to FAIL at solving the problems of urban environments. The business of the city is beyond just economic transactions, but also includes social and cultural transactions as well. When the majority of us sit back and allow others to control the transactions of our business, we lose control of the “business”.
The problem in thinking of the city as a business is the conceptualization of this “business” in similar fashion to the model of corporate organization…in a city, the receptionist is just as important as the president.