I only have experience working with the Como NRP, but when Gregory Luce said,
>To put it in a more startling pespective, consider that, of all the home >improvement loans and grants that neighborhoods gave out through the NRP >program from 1993 to 2000, 88% went to white homeowners, at a time when >the white population in the city declined from 78% to 65%. I'm on the Housing Committee of the Como NRP, and have been so since our first Town Hall meeting when the Cttee was a task force. We can't get people to come to our meetings, no matter where we announce. I have gone out and asked people of color to please come and talk (AA, Vietnamese, Chinese and a couple of Latinos). They say they'll think about it and then they stay away. Our housing money is given out by an independent (non-neighborhood) organization on a first-come-first-served basis. The white homeowners 1) come to the information meetings; they 2) fill out the applications and 3) follow through with the lending organization; they 4) use the money. Others don't show up, and as Woody Allen may have pointed out, a great deal of success is just showing up. That's the only clue I have to your 88% If you know of a way to get others to apply, please share it. We have not found the secret. Emilie Quast SE Como _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
