One of my favorite, and best equipped, "squeaky wheels" helps make my point. If you want something, ASK. If you are against something, PROTEST Speak up, vote, contribute, as Lauren does, and maybe... at the end of the day, home will be a place to be proud of. Best! Liz
---------- Forwarded Message ---------- The reason Woodland Terrace is included is because I wrote a letter to the school district and asked them to include it. Lauren Leatherbarrow Original Message: ----------------- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Wed, 28 May 2008 21:45:51 GMT To: UnivCity@list.purple.com, [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [UC] Fw: PW article, catchment and real estate When I look at the Catchment boundaries, I see: a Zig that took the boundary to Woodland Avenue for the length of one city block, capturing Woodland Terrace: kids not so much, BUT.. History, CA (Community Association activists) and important PENN power (a then dean) , and a Zag that included 4200 Regent: a charming block with PENN Affiliates, a higher up on the Historic Commission and the Republican Ward Leader. This Zag did not capture the homes with the then majority minority ownership on the west side of the park, and ignored the charming homes of the 4500 block of Regent (which was enjoying a separate PENN benefit - restoration of "Blighted" homes, for resale <to mostly PENN affiliates>) and a Zig that leaped west of 46th south to Chester Ave for homes south of Pine: blocks that contained the homes of Lindsay Johnston, Melani Lamond, the Byes and myself, (major local Realtors, active in CAs) and also the home of Dennis Culhane (a PENN Power and one of the movers behind the school) and the home of Jon Suppovitz who had a hand in getting PAS up and running. This Zag excluded the Condos in Garden Court reducing options for single parents with more modest incomes. And cut so close to the Lea & Wilson School boundaries that it was almost too transparent for those shut out of the PAS boundaries. And there was even a brief little Zag that included Ludlow Street, until S.Ali moved his school aged boy to Osage. I see the boundary as evidence that squeaky wheels do get greased. By the way, I believe there ... ... IS a National Historic Designation as a "streetcar Suburb" and ... the article undervalued the difference in price between homes in the catchment and out. But, I don't have time today to document either of my beliefs. All the best! Liz Campion ---------- Forwarded Message ---------- Let me return to my main points then, Frank. First, the notion Ray floated, that the School District of Philadelphia might pattern a school's boundary around the boundary of a proposed Historic District, suggests to me someone who has no real-world experience with the School District -- either as parent, employee, coordinate government worker or outside agent. The School District has far bigger fish to fry than other people's real-estate concerns. *Every* neighborhood school is surrounded by real-estate concerns. But the School District's billion-dollar focus is its own real-estate concerns. Here Penn obviously had some input into PAS: it built the darn thing. But it did not show any interest in "historicity" in so doing; PAS is dazzlingly modern. In general, the entire "dotted line" between Penn and historic designation is missing. Secondly, incessant ruminations about whether or not rising property values in University City were engineered by local agents such as Penn, PAS, UCD, etc., repeatedly ignore that similar price rises have been sweeping sister neighborhoods at a similar radius from Center City for the past 10 years. I submit there is no evidence -- none at all -- that local actions caused any of University City's run-up. To demonstrate they had, you would have to study a neighborhood that was similar in 1998 but lacked our local institutions, and show the price run-up in that neighborhood has been less than ours. To my knowledge, that work hasn't been done. Until it is done, all this talk about various forces "trying to gentrify" University City is a lot of irate talk about an effect that may, in fact, be zero. Thirdly, the idea that gentrification -- upward class mobility in an urban neighborhood -- is globally and massively bad for poor people in a poor city, cannot be true. There may be local undesired consequences when a community climbs up the social ladder; few things in life are 100% good. But overall, the chief governmental problem poor Philadelphians face is that there aren't enough non-poor Philadelphians to pay the taxes to fund the services, in education and elsewhere, that poor people need. Therefore, the poor need to attract more middle-class and prosperous residents to Philadelphia. Presumably they will have to live somewhere. Unless you just stack 'em up in high rises in Chestnut Hill, that strongly suggests some neighborhoods must see an influx of prosperous newcomers. If not in University City, then where? Remember: it is the urban poor who need gentrification, not the gentry. The gentry can always go be gentry somewhere else. I hope you find this clearer. If not, let me know. -- Tony West Frank wrote: > And you are avoiding the issue by focusing on whether or not the > people commenting have children, clean up after their dog, leave their > cubicle, etc. What's your point? >> >> >> Back to schools and real estate. You comment on the way I make my >> point ... but not on the point itself. Whether or not a person has >> real estate or children, their opinions will be better formed if they >> refer to the world beyond Spruce Hill. Neither the School District >> nor the urban real-estate market exists inside a neighborhood bubble. >> >> Again I say: Middle-class and wealthy folks don't "need" the inner >> city; they've shown they can live outside it and without it. It is >> chiefly the poor who need to live within a taxing body that includes >> the non-poor. Any disagreement with that proposition? >> >> -- Tony West ---- You are receiving this because you are subscribed to the list named "UnivCity." 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