Neil Fraser
July 11, 2003
Those of you who regularly read this newsletter will know that I try to keep readers up to date with the considerable positive progress that has and is being achieved in the revitalisation of the city.
However, I have also raised the negatives when necessary and a couple of weeks ago I did write regarding the disgusting state of the Beyer's Naude Gardens (previously Library Gardens). I received a number of e-mails from inner-city supporters equally expressing their concern but also raising other problematic issues with which we appear to make little progress.
These seem to fall into two areas, social ills and 'other'. Social ills include littering, urinating in the streets, open dispensing of drugs, road rage, noise pollution, a complete lack of respect for other people's property, ever pervasive corruption and the apparent lack of concern and lack of a plan for homeless people. (There seems to have been a sharp increase in homeless people living on the streets and the current winter weather makes this issue even more pressing)
'Other' includes the almost complete absence of public toilets, lack of adequate greening of city spaces, illegally occupied and decaying, unsafe properties which are nothing more than cess pools, slum-lording, water wastage due to broken water mains, bad street lighting, the poor state of recreation facilities and streets/pavements. Compounding all of this, almost non existent enforcement of municipal bylaws and contempt for the law generally.
As so often seems to happen when one starts considering such issues, a whole number of complementary 'things' materialise which helps to focus one's attention on the problems and possible solutions.
The first was a column in last weekend's Sunday Times by David Bullard. I really enjoy his writing and particularly his acerbic wit used against all and sundry without favour.
This past weekend his column was unusually subdued as he wrote about a visit he had made following an invitation to tour Yeoville and Hillbrow "in an attempt to highlight some of the huge problems facing the Johannesburg municipality."
There is nothing that Bullard wrote about that isn't known or that hasn't already been highlighted. He didn't attempt to offer solutions, that isn't his expertise, but somehow, in comparison to his normally ebullient writing, the sheer extent and magnitude of the problem and the lack of adequate response, was starkly exposed.
Then I received a copy of a recent front-page article from the Cincinnati Post entitled 'Culture of Personal Responsibility Pushed'.
The article, by a Post reporter, Barry M.Horstman, highlights the improvement in Cincinnati's downtown environment through a 'back-to-basics drive' being spearheaded by City Hall and Downtown Cincinnati Inc. (DCI - apparently a downtown lobbying group but also providing similar services to my own organisation the CJP).
Amongst a number of initiatives there has been pressure to get badly cracked sidewalks repaired more quickly and a new crackdown on littering (littering fines have been raised to $1000 an incident!).
Those who are unable to pay the fine will be assigned to doing community service - a laudable trend in some American cities that I wrote about some three years ago.
A Cincinnati City Councillor comments; "It's all about creating a culture of personal responsibility that leaves downtown and our neighbourhoods looking cleaner and safer."
The President of DCI, David Ginsburg, adds; "I think there is a growing recognition that if we do the small things, the big things will follow. Making people feel welcome in a cleaner, safer downtown lays the groundwork."
A citizen comments; "It's almost like the feeling you get in a neighbourhood where all the homes have lights on at night and people are out on their porches or walking around. You know people are home, watching, caring about what goes on. When you do that often enough, the bad guys tend to stay away."
Doing the small things, hmmmm.
Keywords: creating a culture of personal responsibility
Thirdly, I, at last, found time yesterday to read two new CDE (Centre for Development and Enterprise) publications, "The New Urban Paradigm" and "Creating Urban Citizens" both written by Dr. Robin Lee.
The former is an overview of a book entitled "The millennial city: a new urban paradigm for 21st century America" which is a collection of articles from City Journal and from "The entrepreneurial city: a how-to book for urban innovators" a collection of essays by several of America's supermayors and others.
I'm not going to review a review except to highlight one of the seven conclusions that Dr. Lee offers of issues we can learn from American cities, "show zero tolerance to a small set of behaviours that trigger off cities' decline."
Keywords: Zero tolerance to certain behaviours
Everyone knows what is meant by zero tolerance, it has become a mantra for many politicians and others yet it is not put into practice. The worst offenders are our Metro Police - a start would be to give every officer a copy of "Broken Windows" and ensure they read every page!
The second publication, "Creating Urban Citizens" is an overview of the work of Stephen Goldsmith one of the most successful of US Mayors (Indianapolis 1992 - 2000) and more particularly from his books "The twenty-first century city: resurrecting urban America" (1997) and the more recent "Faith in neighbourhoods."
Goldsmith strongly believes in a healthy civil society "Civil society ... is often called upon to develop all kinds of solutions that government and the market seem incapable of providing. But its chief aim is making citizens. And it does this by helping citizens take greater responsibility for their communities and by making communities more receptive to the efforts of citizens. In reality, if it is working well, civil society is solving problems by making citizens - all at the same time."
"In addition to family, educational and religious influences, the key ingredient to successfully applying the two principles of responsibility and citizen participation is an active culture of community-based organisations."
Keywords: civil society; communities, citizens, community based organisations.
What has happened to our community organisations? After the democratic elections of 1994/5, many disappeared as their leaders were drawn into various levels of government and we seem to have never regained that 'pre-democracy' impetus. I see new energy from some of the emerging precinct business and residents associations but these are quite correctly narrowly focused and the development of citizens is usually not on their agendas.
Faith based organisations, such a strong part of American civil society, play an important role in the city but again, are more focused on the specifics such as HIV/AIDS abuse treatment, etc.
Then there was an article published in Tuesday's Star written by Johan van Zyl and Norman Reynolds, "Ending poverty lies in people's hands" and again there was an emphasis on the role of community-based organisations.
Keyword: community
These are just some of the more recent books and articles that emphasise an active civil society, involved community, personal responsibility, zero tolerance, etc. in the building of strong, functioning cities. Clearly the core problem that has led to the high levels of urban dysfunctionality we are experiencing is to be found in our historical past which was based on the antithesis of all these things - disenfranchisement.
As we approach the tenth anniversary of our country's democracy we can look at what has been achieved here in Johannesburg with a great deal of satisfaction.
But unless we deal now with the dysfunctionality of so many of our citizens - which demands their re-enfranchisement - then all of our efforts may prove to be in vain. This doesn't require a change of direction, if anything it is a re-affirmation of where we are going, but it does mean taking with us those that we have left behind. It's time to rebuild community.
Certainly Council should not be alone in addressing the issues which give rise to David Bullard's conclusion of a "heart of darkness in a once-shining city of gold."
Keyword: action
