“There is a beauty here in the unyielding way. Our people…have decided we shall survive. We will live on” — Kalamu ya Salaam, Tomorrow’s Toussaints
On January 12, the most violent earthquake to rock the Caribbean in two centuries struck Haiti, crippling an already socio-economically struggling nation. More than 150,000 bodies have been recovered from the rubble with thousands more feared buried. While the media continue to provide statistics and images of the devastating effects of the quake, their focus is already waning. That’s why I’m inviting you out on Wednesday, Feb. 10, as the Kentucky writing community gathers for a benefit event called “(Still) Here for Haiti.”
The Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning is providing space for this literary fundraiser on Wednesday, February 10, from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. As the coordinator of the event, I invite you to join us as KY authors read in solidarity with our Haitian brothers and sisters.
We will be asking for a $20 donation from audience members, all of which will be go to Doctors Without Borders for its Haiti relief efforts. Each $20 donor will receive a handmade copy of the (attached) “Here for Haiti” print designed by John Lackey of Homegrown Press. We will also donate proceeds from any book sales that night to Doctors Without Borders.
Our readers are:
Gurney Norman
Ed McClanahan
Nikky Finney
Crystal Wilkinson
Richard Taylor
Lynnell Major Edwards
Erik Reece
Frank X Walker
Neil Chethik
Jeremy Paden
David Cazden
Leatha Kendrick
George Ella Lyon
Jan Isenhour
Katerina Stoykova-Klemer
Matthew Haughton
I cannot begin to express how much your presence and time would add to this event. We would love to have a packed house.
Thank you in advance for your consideration, and in the words of a Haitian proverb, “Many hands make the load lighter.”
Ugh. The ‘Creative Class’ (again)
by Dr. Nick Kouns
So yeah. Lexington is having a ‘Creative Cities Summit’ right here in Lexington. While I’m all for it, I can’t help but be a little rankled by it. First of all, it tickles me to death to know that Lexington’s Ben Self is one of the keynote speakers. This guy is a real powerhouse in INTERNATIONAL politics, particularly regarding new media. He and his wife, Becca, are prime examples of authentic and engaged citizens of passion and accomplishment. Becca works with Seedleaf and if you’re not familiar with this organization, do yourself a favor and look into it.
But back to the Creative Cities Summit—I appreciate the hard work that has gone into landing the forum. As part of a group of interested citizens called ‘ProgressLex’, I’ve been privy to some wonderfully exciting discourse on the event. Some are all for it, and some are vehemently opposed to it. The argument goes that Richard Florida’s ‘Creative Class’ theory has been discredited while he continues to make a killing from the lecture circuit. What always seems to to get almost everybody’s hackles up is the ‘creative class’ designation. Oddly, it’s members of the conventionally defined ‘creative class’ who seem to have the biggest issues with it.
For those of you not familiar with the ‘creative class’, it was first “described by” Richard Florida, one of the speakers at the Creative Cities Summit. Personally, it sounds like a retread of the “yuppies” and “guppies” and “bobos” from a decade or two ago. I’ve never made much of it, although by conventional definitions, I would fall into all of these categories. As such, I will forgo every modicum of decency and humility, and speak as a member of the ‘creative class’ simply within the confines of this post. I will name names.
In my realm of existence, the creative class is (and has been thriving) for some time in Lexington. Collectively, I believe we’ve endeavored to make changes in ways that we can and simply go about our business. You can find us on boards of every non-profit in town, on state committees, national, and international boards. You may have read some of our blogs. You may pick up our newspapers. You can find them in think-tanks like ‘Progress Lex’ and you can read their writings in Ace. You will find us on twitter, facebook, and LinkedIn.
You will see us working with organizations like Seedleaf, and you’ll have seen us at Farmer’s Market for years and years. We get together for brunch, we text one another until our fingers are numb, and you’ll see us at just about every LFUCG council meeting. I’d say just about every single one of us votes and many of us slog up and down the streets during campaign season. Some of us stuff envelopes while others of us either host or attend fundraisers. We do our homework and, more often than not, we are the voice of the informed opposition. Some of us leave Lexington (Lexpatriates) and some of us stay. The fact is that most of us are not much affected by the designation one way or the other.
When the city landed the summit, we were all, I believe, scratching our heads a little bit. When people continue to carry on (and on and on) about the ‘ever elusive creative class’, I, for one, want to throw myself off the roof. The fact is that particularly astute leadership has been working with us all along. To whit:
1. Diane Lawless
2. Jim Gray
3. Kelly Flood
These three elected officials should serve as paradigms for the folks who appear to be out snipe hunting, or serve as the collective ‘Johnny-come-lately’. These three, as far as I’m concerned, set the bar for community engagement—and they all started the dialogue LONG before they ran for office. It seems like the ‘Creative Cities Summit’ is more of a political move than an honest attempt at engagement. That’s not to say that it won’t be enlightening or worthwhile. It just seems a little contrived.
There’s also the argument that the ‘creative class’ designation smacks of elitism. I’m not really sure what I think about that argument. Most of my friends are not particularly wealthy. Very few have positions of power, but almost ALL of them have positions of influence. Personally, that simply defines an ‘activist’—people who are trying to get other people to look at things in a different way; ostensibly, a ‘better’ way. If we were to substitute the words ‘activist class’ for ‘creative class’, I suspect everyone would feel better about the designation. Right now, nobody even wants that label, me included. It just seems a little bit snotty.
So to re-frame, I have TONS of activist friends. Most of them are creative. I don’t agree with them all the time, but I always take the time to listen to their ideas. There are Progressives, Marxists, Libertarians, Republicans, and Democrats; some are foodies, some are academics, and some are unemployed; there are doctors, lawyers, laborers; housewives, economists, and chefs; marketers, business owners, waiters, and students. The thing that binds us together is a real and dedicated interest in making our own part of the world a better place. It really is as simple as that.
Am I happy that Lexington is hosting the summit? I suppose I am. It’s bringing an estimated 600 people to Lexington, and that’s good for business. However, the Lexington Art League brings out over 60,000 people to the Woodland Art Fair every year (and all the revenue that follows). Unfortunately, we don’t see everyone touting it every year all over the airwaves; yet it brings out 1000% MORE people than this summit.
The Kentucky Classical Theatre Conservatory brings out around 25,000 people to the Arboretum for some great live theatre in July alone. Most of those people have gone out and bought provisions to bring to an evening of theatre under the stars—food, wine, utensils, etc. The ‘creative class’ writes about it and, more often than not, sponsors it on our own dime. (I should note here that Diane Lawless was on the original Board of Directors of KCTC, and Jim Gray showed up at the ACE press launch because Mayor Newberry ‘couldn’t make it’.) Representative Kelly Flood was so impressed with the Lexington Art League’s ‘Side by Side’ variation that she is putting up a piece of legislation in front of the General Assembly during this legislative session to fund a statewide initiative for arts programming for children and young adults with special needs.
The ‘activist class’ has been here all along. I’m not crazy about the ‘creative class’ designation, but it seems that it’s one we’ll be dealing with for some time. I can only hope that the ‘activist class’ doesn’t throw itself off of the nearest roof from the ‘done to death’ panacea that the label implies.
That’s what they’ve always said about us, heck, Ace has been saying it for 20 years. Today Gov. Steve Beshear and Mayor Jim Newberry announced that, in April, we will have the 600-person interdisciplinary, international Creative Cities Summit conference in town to prove it.
Richard Florida, the author of “The Rise of the Creative Class,” will be one of the conference speakers for the April 7-9 event. Gov. Beshear himself is scheduled to speak at the conference, with the announcement coming in the same week that his State of the Commonwealth address highlighted developing new economic strengths.
Rebecca Ryan, of Next Generation Consulting in Madison, Wisc., is also on the bill as is Charles Landry, author of “The Creative City,” Bill Strickland, CEO of Manchester Bidwell Corp. and author of “Making the Impossible Possible.” Ben Self, founder of Blue State Digital will also appear.
Peter Kageyama, who runs the Creative Cities conference, appeared with the governor and the mayor at today’s news conference, which was held at Baker’s 360.
“Peter chose Lexington after the Detroit summit,” said Juli Gaworski, Corporate Citizenship and Inclusion specialist at LexMark, who hosted the afternoon’s announcement event. “Local officials (who had gone to the Detroit 2008 summit) kept on him. They persuaded him that Lexington was a place that fit the mold of a creative city.”
Gaworski said Kageyama’s approach is not to come into a city and tell it what to do, but provide a forum for creativity and creative business that allows resources already in place to “all row in the same direction.”
LexMark is a local sponsor of the event, Gaworski said, providing the printing and other production elements for the conference. Other local sponsors include the University of Kentucky, Insight Business, Belcan, Rubidine, WebMedley, Central Bank, Downtown Lexington Corporation, Lexington Convention and Visitors Bureau.
Gaworski said LexMark is supporting the conference because the company, like Toyota and other technology-based firms, has found that the outlets and diversity of a creative community help it with employee retention. “Lexington is making a lot of great changes,” but there is more to do she said. “We at LexMark need to get behind efforts that highlight that change.”
While $199 for a three-day conference may seem steep, it is a reduction from the $500-1,000 pricetag that the conference usually carries.
The host hotel for the conference will be the Hyatt, with the conference itself scheduled for the Lexington Convention Center, according to the Web site for the conference at http://www.creativecitieslexington.com
[photo, Lexington Flashmob SnowBowl edition, by Keegan Frank, at CentrePointe Paddock]
As Mayor Newberry took the podium on a snowy, otherwise-quiet Friday afternoon to announce LFUCG budget cuts, a flashmob snowball fight was winding down at the site of the “yet to be built” CentrePointe.
Early on, he highlighted his 2007 State of the Merged Government address,
“We have a precarious revenue stream for local government. The primary source of [general fund revenue] is the payroll tax. In fact, 83 percent of [general fund revenue] comes from licenses and permits—the largest portion of which is the payroll tax. So if our local economy has a downturn such that fewer people are employed in Lexington, our revenue stream will go down and services will have to be reduced.”
adding…. “Here we are” (cites Lexington’s current unemployment rate as “unprecedented”—characterizing Lexington as “recession-resistant, not recession proof,” emphasizes the importance of “continued economic development.”)
He then stressed, “It is not wise for our city to hunker down and wait out the current economic storm. In fact, now is, in many respects, a wonderful opportunity for us to make as many investments in infrastructure as we can afford, given our revenue.”
Reflecting again on the 2007 State of the Merged Government Address:
“In light of this situation, it is vital that our community emphasize our job creation efforts, and I am pleased that Urban County Government is working with Commerce Lexington and the University of Kentucky to maximize our economic development resources.”
In terms of specifics, he cited the Bluegrass Business Development Partnership, and his ongoing belief in Horses, Healthcare and High-Tech for Lexington.
Projected Shortfall
*$12 to $13 Million during FY10 (ends 6/30/10)
*State and local governments must balance budgets
*After October revenue results were behind projections, began developing a comprehensive expense reduction plan for FY10
Ways to address Shortfall
*Increase Revenue
*Decrease Expenses
*Rainy Day Fund and other non-recurring sources of funds
*Combination of Above
Goals of Expense Reduction
*No New taxes
*No layoffs or abolished positions
*sharing of burden
*No use of rainy day funds
*balanced budget by June 30, 2010
*Use FY10 reductions to help 2011
The Mayor surmises that “friends in the private sector” would recommend layoffs. Response:
*already reduced workforce by 201 employeees through attrition
*Human cost
*Organizational Cost
*Layoff Plan Requirements
*Short-term Financial Costs
PLAN
*$12.5 million shortfall
*$7.6 M in reductions id’d without layoffs
*$332,000 in Council, County Officials, Partner Agencies Reductions
*$800,000 in net unanticipated funding
*$1.8 million in operating savings beyond proposed reductions from directors
*$2.0 million FY08 surplus used to balance
Reductions by Department
*CIO $389,000
*Social Service $403,000
*Finance $428,000
*Public Works $743,000
*Law $143,000
*Mayor’s Office/Senior Advisor $226,5000
General Services
Total $1,569,000
Commissioner’s Office $105,000
Parks $803,000
Facilities and Fleet $661,000
Public Safety
Total $2,801,000
Commissioner’s Office $24,000
Police $638,000
Fire $1,518,000
Corrections $336,000
Emergency Management $26,000
E911 $171,000
Code Enforcement $88,000
Other Reductions
Council $118,000
County Officials $167,000
Partner Agencies $47,000 [leave out the Library; another story]
Other LFUCG Admin. Reductions
-Senior Staff Furloughs $70,000
-Sick Leave Adjustment $639,000
Wrapping up with what the Mayor characterized as Good News:
*No Layoffs
*No use of rainy day funds
*Good economic news for 2010
*FY10 reductions help with FY11
*Work of LFUCG continues.
