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Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Organizations and Activism
OCEAN
PODER
East Side Social Action Coalition
Barrio Unido Neigh. Assoc.
Buena Vista Neigh. Assoc.
Central East Austin Business Owners
CANA
El Concilio-Coalition of Mex.-Amer. Neigh. Assoc.
Our East Side Neighborhood Assoc.
Save Our Neighborhoods, Inc.
Greater East Austin Youth Assoc.
Also, here is an Austin Chronicle summary of organizations trying to “revitalize the area”.
http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/Issue/story?oid=oid:175335
I will do more research and go more in detail about these organizations later. We definitely do not have to interview all of them. Other things of interest are the McMansion ordinance (for history, or displacement story?)
I would also like to get a hold of “Hollywood” Henderson, an East Austin resident involved in the community who we could interview for our project.
PODER
East Side Social Action Coalition
Barrio Unido Neigh. Assoc.
Buena Vista Neigh. Assoc.
Central East Austin Business Owners
CANA
El Concilio-Coalition of Mex.-Amer. Neigh. Assoc.
Our East Side Neighborhood Assoc.
Save Our Neighborhoods, Inc.
Greater East Austin Youth Assoc.
Also, here is an Austin Chronicle summary of organizations trying to “revitalize the area”.
http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/Issue/story?oid=oid:175335
I will do more research and go more in detail about these organizations later. We definitely do not have to interview all of them. Other things of interest are the McMansion ordinance (for history, or displacement story?)
I would also like to get a hold of “Hollywood” Henderson, an East Austin resident involved in the community who we could interview for our project.
Education and Culture
I am researching education and culture in east austin. I found an organization, KIPP Austin College Prep, that works to prepare kids in the area for college and has also opened a charter school. As far as culture goes, i think i will have to get in there and ask locals what they think the culture consists of. Google can only take you so far so i think that is the next step in reasearch.
The business scene in East Austin
Business owners in the construction, food, retail, manufacturing, and professional services
industries report a generally positive outlook for the future. Businesspersons anticipate
moderate to rapid growth for their businesses. For the food and retail industries, that growth
comes as businesses report serving a larger client base with higher disposable incomes than in
the past. Construction and manufacturing firms should also benefit from local East Austin and
regional population growth.
For firms closely tied to local customers, adapting means integrating new, comparatively affluent residents into their client base. For firms that service the greater area, adapting means countering higher property values. Each business must decide if its current location is integral to economic growth. If higher property taxes and rents are offset by the higher value of conducting business in East Austin, these firms will remain and prosper. If not, they may need to relocate to pursue less expensive property or an adequately skilled labor force. The ethnic and racial diversity that has long been a hallmark of East Austin is being transformed by diversity along socioeconomic lines. Wealthier Austinites are crossing the I-35 barrier. Nimble businesses able to adapt will benefit from this transformation.
This is the state of businesses in some of the East Austin corridors:
Commercial Dearth on MLK
Boom and Stagnation for 11th and 12th Streets
Construction as a Mixed Blessing for 7th Street
In terms of the changes that are occurring in Central East Austin, it is the activity of the construction industry that is perhaps most visible. As old structures disappear, developers are replacing vacant lots and warehouses with new homes and stores. Financial businesses designed to serve a specific population, such as low-income Hispanic families, rather than the wider East Austin community, are struggling. These businesses on the fringe of the mainstream economy may no longer have a solid customer base in the area.
Business owners in this sector will certainly experience more pressure as changes continue in
East Austin. Those that can absorb the pressures of rising property values and adjust to the
demographic change—or those who can rally enough business support around them to produce
aid from city hall—will continue to thrive. Those who cannot do these things will ultimately
suffer.
Most firms are content to provide a service for the surrounding community rather than simply
make a large financial return. None of the owners reported plans to expand their business beyond East Austin, stating that they generally just want to survive, live within reasonable means, and be a part of the surrounding community. The greatest concern for East Austin food service business owners is the emergence of large-scale real estate developers who are focused on maximizing profits and whose existence alters community character.
industries report a generally positive outlook for the future. Businesspersons anticipate
moderate to rapid growth for their businesses. For the food and retail industries, that growth
comes as businesses report serving a larger client base with higher disposable incomes than in
the past. Construction and manufacturing firms should also benefit from local East Austin and
regional population growth.
For firms closely tied to local customers, adapting means integrating new, comparatively affluent residents into their client base. For firms that service the greater area, adapting means countering higher property values. Each business must decide if its current location is integral to economic growth. If higher property taxes and rents are offset by the higher value of conducting business in East Austin, these firms will remain and prosper. If not, they may need to relocate to pursue less expensive property or an adequately skilled labor force. The ethnic and racial diversity that has long been a hallmark of East Austin is being transformed by diversity along socioeconomic lines. Wealthier Austinites are crossing the I-35 barrier. Nimble businesses able to adapt will benefit from this transformation.
This is the state of businesses in some of the East Austin corridors:
Commercial Dearth on MLK
Boom and Stagnation for 11th and 12th Streets
Construction as a Mixed Blessing for 7th Street
In terms of the changes that are occurring in Central East Austin, it is the activity of the construction industry that is perhaps most visible. As old structures disappear, developers are replacing vacant lots and warehouses with new homes and stores. Financial businesses designed to serve a specific population, such as low-income Hispanic families, rather than the wider East Austin community, are struggling. These businesses on the fringe of the mainstream economy may no longer have a solid customer base in the area.
Business owners in this sector will certainly experience more pressure as changes continue in
East Austin. Those that can absorb the pressures of rising property values and adjust to the
demographic change—or those who can rally enough business support around them to produce
aid from city hall—will continue to thrive. Those who cannot do these things will ultimately
suffer.
Most firms are content to provide a service for the surrounding community rather than simply
make a large financial return. None of the owners reported plans to expand their business beyond East Austin, stating that they generally just want to survive, live within reasonable means, and be a part of the surrounding community. The greatest concern for East Austin food service business owners is the emergence of large-scale real estate developers who are focused on maximizing profits and whose existence alters community character.
UT involvement
UT has a lot of different initiatives and projects in East Austin geared toward specific areas, ranging from education, environmental justice, affordable housing, economic structure and business development.
The Alley Flat Initiative- architectural project for affordable and environmentally sustainable housing
East Austin Environmental Justice Project- Partnership with UT students, PODER, Zavala Elementary School and American Youth Works
UT Elementary School- UT funded school in East Austin
Check out East Austin Stories. There are a lot of videos covering a range of topics.
The Alley Flat Initiative- architectural project for affordable and environmentally sustainable housing
East Austin Environmental Justice Project- Partnership with UT students, PODER, Zavala Elementary School and American Youth Works
UT Elementary School- UT funded school in East Austin
Check out East Austin Stories. There are a lot of videos covering a range of topics.
Business for Ashwini
The LBJ school published a report about community change in East Austin, addressing the current and changing business environment.
Community Change in East Austin
Community Change in East Austin
History!
Kelly (assigned in absentia) and I will gather information about the history of East Austin, going back to the days of overt segregation. Yay.
Also, I changed the colors back to the legible ones (white background, black text). Let's keep them there, please? Usability before fanciness.
Also, I changed the colors back to the legible ones (white background, black text). Let's keep them there, please? Usability before fanciness.
Displaced
1. Get in touch(hopefully by using PODER) with former east austin homeowners who have been forced out of their homes because of rising property taxes(or are in danger of being forced out). Interview them and the community orgs that help them. Maybe make a trip down to Del Valle, where many of them have ended up.
2. Win Pulitzer.
2. Win Pulitzer.
Impact of current financial crisis on East Austin communities
According to Pew research institute, the unemployment rate for Hispanics rose from 5.5 percent in April 2007 to 6.9 percent in April 2008. The unemployment rate for Mexican immigrants was 8.4 percent in the first three months of 2008, up from 5.5 percent in 2007
Moreover, a combination of plentiful jobs and subprime mortgage loans allowed the share of Hispanics owning homes in the US to rise from 41 percent in 1994 to 50 percent in 2006. However, half of the loans issued to Hispanics in 2006 were subprime. As jobs disappear, many of these new homeowners risk losing their homes, threatening local businesses that cater to them.
It seems when difficult time comes, social minorities are most vulnerable as is the case of Hispanic immigrant communities.
There are four aspects of the impacts on East Austin.
1) Housing
2) Employment
3) Business (Restaurant, ethnic media too, declining of AD from Hispanic businesses forced some media shut down)
4) Education: increasing school drop out
I'll try to come up with detailed stories and sources of visual stuffs, interview sources etc.
Please let me know if you have anything to add or suggest, information .... thank you.
Moreover, a combination of plentiful jobs and subprime mortgage loans allowed the share of Hispanics owning homes in the US to rise from 41 percent in 1994 to 50 percent in 2006. However, half of the loans issued to Hispanics in 2006 were subprime. As jobs disappear, many of these new homeowners risk losing their homes, threatening local businesses that cater to them.
It seems when difficult time comes, social minorities are most vulnerable as is the case of Hispanic immigrant communities.
There are four aspects of the impacts on East Austin.
1) Housing
2) Employment
3) Business (Restaurant, ethnic media too, declining of AD from Hispanic businesses forced some media shut down)
4) Education: increasing school drop out
I'll try to come up with detailed stories and sources of visual stuffs, interview sources etc.
Please let me know if you have anything to add or suggest, information .... thank you.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Meeting tomorrow
Hi everybody! So we are meeting tomorrow 30 minutes before lab to get a start on the project. Also, I set it up so we get emailed whenever somebody posts. Let me know if you want off the mailing list. See you tomorrow!
Monday, September 22, 2008
Some of the players
I've been poking around in the Austin Chronicle's archives, and it appears that institutionally there are several players on the east side. One is the Austin Revitalization Authority, a city-created nonprofit developer whose mission is to spur development along East 11th and 12th streets. Lately they've been clashing with neighbors (such as the Guadalupe Association for an Improved Neighborhood, or GAIN) over the size of a project in the 1100 block of 11th Street. One tension there is the possibility that the Victory Grill, a long-standing blues bar, will be overwhelmed by the new buildings.
GAIN shares some board members with the Guadalupe Neighborhood Development Corp., another nonprofit developer on the east side.
Apparently one of the concerns around gentrification is "vertical mixed-use" development, which locals say tends to raise property values (and thus taxes) and increases traffic. The project mentioned above is an example of VMU.
Another area group is the Organization of Central East Austin Neighborhoods (or OCEAN), which appears to be an umbrella for several neighborhood orgs. Earlier this year OCEAN tried and failed to put some brakes on gentrification by backing an amendment to the building code that would have stopped allowing big McMansions on smallish lots. Former Dallas Cowboy Thomas Henderson lobbied against the change with accusations of racism. (The original McMansion ordinance passed in early 2006.)
It's not clear from my readings so far how these entities map to local ethnic, racial and economic groups.
Here's a graf from last November:
So that's a survey of the terrain in East Austin.
GAIN shares some board members with the Guadalupe Neighborhood Development Corp., another nonprofit developer on the east side.
Apparently one of the concerns around gentrification is "vertical mixed-use" development, which locals say tends to raise property values (and thus taxes) and increases traffic. The project mentioned above is an example of VMU.
Another area group is the Organization of Central East Austin Neighborhoods (or OCEAN), which appears to be an umbrella for several neighborhood orgs. Earlier this year OCEAN tried and failed to put some brakes on gentrification by backing an amendment to the building code that would have stopped allowing big McMansions on smallish lots. Former Dallas Cowboy Thomas Henderson lobbied against the change with accusations of racism. (The original McMansion ordinance passed in early 2006.)
It's not clear from my readings so far how these entities map to local ethnic, racial and economic groups.
Here's a graf from last November:
While investment in a disinvested community is in theory a good thing, on the Eastside it's happening so fast that longtime residents are being displaced. As one speaker put it: "The tidal wave of market forces is rising too quickly, with little or no time to adjust. The dam has broken, and the water is coming over." In the 78702 ZIP code, for example (bounded by I-35 and Airport Boulevard, between the river and Martin Luther King Boulevard), the median sale price of a home in 2000 was $77,000. It since has shot up more than 250% to $195,000 (with a 150% increase just since 2005), with property taxes to match. State Rep. Eddie Rodriguez talked about how the city's Homestead Preservation District (under his House Bill 470) can help East Austin housing values "slow down, so people don't have to move to Pflugerville" -- which has been absorbing Austin's displaced African-American community.
So that's a survey of the terrain in East Austin.
East Austin- not going down w/o a struggle
Hey guys! Sorry for not posting til now. First of all, good job Ashwini and Kelly on your research and ideas! I think gentrification, the Latino and other minorities community, and new local businesses are all good things to include in our project. Maybe our theme could be how East Austin is changing or what East Austin is doing to fight back against its decay. Well, maybe not 'fight' exactly, but what their response is to the change. It could be positive, if we want it to be, but it doesn't have to. It could be very open ended, and we could say we don't know what is going to happen to this area or the people in it, but this is what they are doing in response. What do you guys think?
keep east austin east ......oooohh how's that for a project title?
so i did my usual bang-up job of researching and this is what i came up with:
i think we need to do one piece on the hispanic community. like kelly said in her earlier blog, gentrification is pushing these people out, eating away into their business, culture and homes. i think i talked about this earlier, where i said that looking at the hispanic community and seeing if they are still unified, or are becoming a threatened species, is a good angle for a short video. interviews with hispanic residents, catholic church groups, youth clubs, eateries, community centers in east austin, interspersed with corresponding vibrant images of their everyday life today, would make a nice short. we could talk to a bunch of hispanic oriented groups, activists or associations too in east austin. there are tons of them out there. there's a guy, john langmore, who has spent more than a year capturing on film the lives of east austinites. he's a good source too. i also found the Latinos for Texas blog, who are very active about the whole east austin changing thing.
my second idea has been harped on by me already so here i go again. businesses in east austin - not the ones shutting down, but the ones that couldn't afford to stick around in west austin or downtown so had to move shop to east austin where it's cheaper and rich people are slowly moving into those localities due to gentrification. the austin independent business association is the best place to start, followed by some restaurants i found on the austin chronicle and statesman websites, which recently closed down and moved to east austin. we could talk to residents again, businesspersons, customers, etc. the only thing is, i don't know if this should be a video too. maybe we could make a really cool slideshow of photographs with voiceovers of people interviewed as well one of us doing narration.
i think both the ideas tie into each other. the first one focuses on the problem and one of its symptoms while the second one focuses on a corollary. i think we should also include an interview, or many of them with gene burd. he's been in austin for centuries and knows every nook and cranny. he is a fantastic source. so we should definitely include him.
ok so that's it. bring it on.
i think we need to do one piece on the hispanic community. like kelly said in her earlier blog, gentrification is pushing these people out, eating away into their business, culture and homes. i think i talked about this earlier, where i said that looking at the hispanic community and seeing if they are still unified, or are becoming a threatened species, is a good angle for a short video. interviews with hispanic residents, catholic church groups, youth clubs, eateries, community centers in east austin, interspersed with corresponding vibrant images of their everyday life today, would make a nice short. we could talk to a bunch of hispanic oriented groups, activists or associations too in east austin. there are tons of them out there. there's a guy, john langmore, who has spent more than a year capturing on film the lives of east austinites. he's a good source too. i also found the Latinos for Texas blog, who are very active about the whole east austin changing thing.
my second idea has been harped on by me already so here i go again. businesses in east austin - not the ones shutting down, but the ones that couldn't afford to stick around in west austin or downtown so had to move shop to east austin where it's cheaper and rich people are slowly moving into those localities due to gentrification. the austin independent business association is the best place to start, followed by some restaurants i found on the austin chronicle and statesman websites, which recently closed down and moved to east austin. we could talk to residents again, businesspersons, customers, etc. the only thing is, i don't know if this should be a video too. maybe we could make a really cool slideshow of photographs with voiceovers of people interviewed as well one of us doing narration.
i think both the ideas tie into each other. the first one focuses on the problem and one of its symptoms while the second one focuses on a corollary. i think we should also include an interview, or many of them with gene burd. he's been in austin for centuries and knows every nook and cranny. he is a fantastic source. so we should definitely include him.
ok so that's it. bring it on.
Sunday, September 21, 2008
theme
So has anyone done any research on the eastside and possible overarching themes for this project? I've been looking up stories published in the Statesman on the east side in the last five years, and here are some of the things I found that seem significant:
According to the county appraisal district, property values for an average-priced house in the area, now about $120,000, have increased more than 100 percent from 2000 to 2007
Development and gentrification are driving up property taxes and driving out longtime Latino residents and businesses. Couple that displacement with disturbing education barometers - some East Austin schools are low-performing; Johnston High School closed; Latino students drop out of school at higher rates than all other students
one of the bluest districts in the state
near downtown and Lady Bird Lake; cultural and economic diversity
"I work for the county," Casarez said. "I can't afford my taxes anymore. That's scary."
I think its safe to say that the area is in transition, though I'm not sure if that's a tight enough theme for this project. Thoughts?
According to the county appraisal district, property values for an average-priced house in the area, now about $120,000, have increased more than 100 percent from 2000 to 2007
Development and gentrification are driving up property taxes and driving out longtime Latino residents and businesses. Couple that displacement with disturbing education barometers - some East Austin schools are low-performing; Johnston High School closed; Latino students drop out of school at higher rates than all other students
one of the bluest districts in the state
near downtown and Lady Bird Lake; cultural and economic diversity
"I work for the county," Casarez said. "I can't afford my taxes anymore. That's scary."
I think its safe to say that the area is in transition, though I'm not sure if that's a tight enough theme for this project. Thoughts?
Thursday, September 18, 2008
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