It looks like Braddock, Pa. Mayor John Fetterman is shaping up to be a national spokesman for the Rust Belt region.
Or, as this story puts it, “the pissed-off avenging angel of the Rust Belt.”
He recently spoke at the University of Michigan’s Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, so this article focuses on his message for cities in Michigan.

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I’m kind of surprised we haven’t heard more about this, though I guess it could have been overwhelmed by the swine flu madness and all the other news this week.
Last week, President Obama basically said he has “no present plans” to reopen NAFTA, something he “vowed to do during his campaign,” as The New York Times reported.
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I’m kind of surprised we haven’t heard more about this, though I guess it could have been overwhelmed by the swine flu madness and all the other news this week.
Last week, President Obama basically said he has “no present plans” to reopen NAFTA, something he “vowed to do during his campaign,” as The New York Times reported.
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How do you overcome the perception – and reality- of a central city neighborhood in a Rust Belt city that is losing population? That’s Terry Glazer and United North’s challenge.
Glazer leads the Lagrange Development Corporation, a community development group that works to improve housing, jobs, economic opportunities, and the neighborhood in general in North Toledo.
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Rust Wire was able to sit down last week with the very busy Rhoda Matthews, executive director of Flint Club, a Flint, Michigan-based group working to improve the city and reaching out to the large group of Flint natives who no longer call the Vehicle City home.
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This recent Financial Times story is singing the praises of Pittsburgh’s Lawrenceville, an up and coming trendy neighborhood.
The challenge: “attracting new, affluent buyers while also retaining ‘mom-and-pop retailers’ and keeping house prices low will be difficult.”
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This recent Financial Times story is singing the praises of Pittsburgh’s Lawrenceville, an up and coming trendy neighborhood.
The challenge: “attracting new, affluent buyers while also retaining ‘mom-and-pop retailers’ and keeping house prices low will be difficult.”
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The city of Detroit has unveiled a local currency, according to Model D media.
We’ve written about Toledo’s buy local movement. Printing a local currency takes the buy-local economic development notion to its highest level.

The exchange of local currency requires a commitment from buyers to spend their money at local merchants.
Many communities from Ithaca, New York to Pittsboro, N.C., have resorted to this Depression-era concept to stimulate the local economy, USA Today reports.
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Toledo’s Warehouse District is small – but growing.
Check out the story and multimedia slideshow from The Blade about this beautiful 1887 building that was transformed into a home:
http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090329/ART16/903270254
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“VisitPittsburgh is now marketing the city as a glamorless destination for the post-luxury age,” the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09086/958705-53.stm
“‘Nobody is going to raise their eyebrows when you book your conference in Pittsburgh,’ said Craig Davis, vice president of sales and marketing for the region’s official tourism agency.
‘Why risk the possible issue of booking in what would be considered a resorty type of destination when you can get all you need in Pittsburgh?’
The thinking goes that if financial institution Wells Fargo had planned its employee rewards trip to Pittsburgh instead of Las …