I donât know if Iâve ever done an intro here. Iâm Diane Gerth, current
prez of the West
7th/Fort Road Federation, the District 9 Planning Council. I lurk mostly these
days.
Moved to St. Paul in 1983, moved to the West End in 1988. Married, two kids.
Earn my
keep as a lawyer.
The biggest issues facing the city are the result of forces sometimes beyond
our control,
and Iâm going to mention only one, because I think so much else flows from it.
The problem is one that is subtle, and involves a trending toward what Warren
Buffet
recently characterized as a movement toward a âsharecroppersâ society,â
one where our
citizens are either rich or poor, with few in between. We see forces just this
week that
will exacerbate this shift: proposals to begin the elimination of social
security, undo
minimum wage protections for millions of Americans, and a cruel bankruptcy bill
that
will limit the fresh start available to individuals, trapping many in debt for
much of their
lives. The dwindling number of people with health insurance, the slow
elimination of
defined benefit pension plans, the decline of manufacturing jobs and the unions
that
worked to improve those standards of living, and the stealth erosion of public
education
all contribute to this scary future.
What does this have to do with St. Paul? Lots. We live in a city that has
survived many
changes and has retained residents (although population is down from its peak
of decades
ago), kept its schools mostly intact, and has maintained its housing stock.
Those things
are only possible with a middle class. The people who work decent jobs, raise
decent
kids, pay their taxes, all that boring stuff. With the decline of that segment
of the
population, our neighborhoods â and by extension our city â will go up or
theyâll go
down. Theyâll become either gentrified and expensive enclaves or theyâll
falter and fall
into disrepair, drugs, violence and our own version of Detroit. The slow
elimination of
federal and state funds that pay to solve uniquely urban problems will only
make things
worse.
Everyone has a favorite Wellstone quote, and mine is the one that recognizes
that weâre
all better off when weâre all better off. How we face the fallout from the
fact that our
country is run by people who donât buy into this philosophy is the biggest
issue that will
face St. Paul in the future.
Diane Gerth
Ward 2
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