In Defense of SAM

I feel bad for the downtown Seattle Art Museum. How were they supposed to know that the oldest bank in town was going to crumble under the weight of subprime mortgages that everyone thought would never lose value? But that’s exactly what happened. When Washington Mutual collapsed, the museum lost $5.8 million in annual rent that was supposed to go toward the $65 million debt it incurred when it build its new space.

Here’s the thing: I’m sure that a lot of real estate projects, bankers and many others have learned some lessons over the past few years, but one of them that I don’t want them to learn is that museums don’t belong in the urban core.  Which is sort of the sense you get from this article.

Obesity: It’s Not Your Fault…Somewhat

We here at the Prosperity Blog have been trying to stay out of the health care reform debate for the most part, except to beat the drum somewhat for personal responsibility in taking care of yourself, so as to reduce the need for health services. But we carved out an exception on the obesity issue for lower income people “who tend to be heavier because of lack of access to healthy food.”

Salt in the Wound, which has been re-opened just so you could put salt into it

Leilani Lanes was the world’s best karaoke bar with a great bowling alley attached to it. Then it got sold to a developer and it closed. It was going to be made into condos. It was a shot to the heart…love progress of course, just so sad to see a great place go.

Leilani then

Now (a few weeks ago actually) word comes that the developer is bankrupt and the property has been taken back by the bank.

Why? Why do I have to die this death over and over? Is it not enough that this icon of all things cool is gone, surrounded by a chain link fence?

Can’t it just become condos and be done.   I mean, highest and best use is great. Progress is great. But closing the old girl down and replacing her with nothing? It’s a crying shame. Literally. I am crying. And it’s a shame.

Leilani now

Curse you, economy. When times are good you take away pleasure, when times are bad you take away lack of pain.  Have you no soul?  No compassion?

Can you at least put a karaoke mic in the parking lot, just for old time’s sake?

Prioritizing Charitable Giving

So, a buddy and I were at the bar on Saturday night arguing about how to improve the federal tax code to better direct charitable giving (nerd alert!). We came up with a scheme that I’d love your feedback on.

The Arts Don’t Matter During a Recession

Or do they?

That’s been a relatively visible debate at the local, state and federal level over the past year, as government struggles to reduce costs and keep taxes down despite falling revenues. It can be hard for elected officials to support even a measly few million dollars here or there for arts when education, health care and everything else is getting slashed and gutted. And we know this is happening with individuals as well, as they shift their giving to different priorities.

Another Chicken Comes Home to Roost

And by chicken, I mean “great idea by Eric Schinfeld.” And by roost, I mean, “happening in the real world.” It’s hard to be such an insightful idea generator…I need to have a secretary that walks around writing down everything I say in case it’s brilliant, like Einstein had at Princeton.

Just kidding about the self love (ish)…but good job, nonprofit community!

Maybe I Don’t Hate Boomers

I’ve been telling people that the boomers have really screwed all us young people with this recession. A couple years ago, when everyone was rich on paper, baby boomers were all about early retirement so they could go kayaking in Alaska, enjoy their grandchildren and take Viagra, not necessarily in that order. That was going to open up their jobs for 40 year olds and then us 30 year olds would move up accordingly. But now the Great 401killer has those same boomers talking about not retiring for ten years, creating this huge logjam of pent up demand for promotions for smart, young economic policy analysts (and others).

But, interestingly enough, that hasn’t stopped a pretty significant leadership transition in our region/state. In the last few months, the economic development community has seen leadership transitions at the state “Department of Commerce,” the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce, the Seattle Art Museum and the Seattle Foundation, just to name a few*. These are all pretty sweet gigs, and they create new opportunities not only for people to move up but also for a significant change in vision and leadership of our region. Of course, with a huge recession and a new presidential administration, the appetite for new vision couldn’t be bigger.

So, how do we coordinate all these new leaders, and make sure that they’re building on each other’s fresh start to create a comprehensive vision for our region’s economic recovery and prosperity? I actually think it would be fascinating to get some of these folks together in the same room and have that conversation. Who knows what might come of it?

I’ll put that on my list of things to do…

*Yes, I’m including arts and philanthropy as part of the economic development community. These are major institutions that shape our region’s quality of life and economic competitiveness!

Seattle P-I Discovers Snarkiness

What is it about becoming online only that turns you sarcastic?  Seriously, all the professional bloggers are cynical wiseacres.  That having been said, very funny title.

I can’t blame Generation Y , though. It’s the American Dream of their parents that has been idealized by the media and popular culture for years, so it’s hard to get the goal of white picket fences out of your system. They’ll learn though. Especially once gas prices go back up in a few years, and living on the farm with your horses and driving into downtown doesn’t seem so fun anymore. Plus you have to shovel horse poop!

Let’s Be Just Like Detroit

Some folks think that our region is on that path already, but that’s a different topic. Regardless, our community needs to have this conversation:

Recently, more than a dozen local foundations gathered to discuss whether to pool their money into an emergency fund for struggling charities and to share ideas about how to use resources limited by the stock market’s plunge…Detroit’s foundations are also prodding the nonprofit groups they support to share resources. “Strategic pooling of resources by foundations and nonprofits is what is going to get us through this crisis,” said Edsel B. Ford II, a Skillman board member. “Living in silos is a thing of the past.”

I know that some nonprofit leaders are concerned about this idea, that it leads to diminished community support or propogates an idea that nonprofits are wasteful when many of them are already pretty lean and mean.  But if there are efficiencies to be had, in terms of combination of back office function or elimination of redundancies, we need to know.  The maintenance of the social safety net is too important not to, especially now.

UPDATE: Great!

More Bad News: The Social Safety Net

We’ve all heard how the bad economy most affects those who were already in trouble, but some of these stats are pretty bad (particularly when we might not have seen the worst of this recession yet):

• Emergency food requests are up 71% on the Eastside
• Calls to 2-1-1 for utility assistance are up 22%
• Job seekers at YWCA Opportunity Place are up 19%

One of the foundations of our economy and one of the ways we stay a place that can attract and retain high quality employees and employers is our sense of community and our ability to take care of one another when times are tough. With budget problems for local government from city, county and state on up, social service providers are going to be asked to more for less public funding. We may need to have a regional conversation about how to bridge the gap.

UPDATE: Less help from foundations too.