Great article in the Plain Dealer about the city East Cleveland–Ohio’s poorest city–its new mayor and the seemingly impossible task of turning it around.

Gary Norton is young (37) and well educated (he attended Morehouse College in Atlanta and earned his master’s degree in public administration at Cleveland State University’s Levin College of Urban Affairs). And that’s a big change in a city that has been characterized by political mismanagement and corruption. Former Mayor Emmanuel Onunwor was convicted on bribery charges in 2004.

Norton’s election has injected fresh hope in the largely black, inner-ring suburb of Cleveland, which has lost more than 1,500 homes to foreclosure in the past two years–about 500 per mile, the highest in the state.

Youngstown residents have launched a campaign against the Department of Housing and Urban Development after losing out on grant money to help deal with the aftermath of the foreclosure crisis.
Local activists are circulating a petition protesting the region’s denial of the second round of Neighborhood Stabilization Funds–a program of the Stimulus Bill which provides funding for demolition, rehabilitation and landbanking efforts.
The denial came as a surprise after the Youngstown area was praised by the Brookings Institution for its application, which brought together city and suburban leaders.

-AS

Between 2000 and 2008, large metropolitan areas saw their suburban poverty rates grow at twice the rate of inner cities, according to a new report by the Brookings Institution.
For example, in 2008, 23 percent more people were living in poverty outside the city of Cleveland’s borders than inside it. That’s a 44 percent jump since 2000, for a total of 9 percent of the suburban population. Meanwhile the number of poor in the city of Cleveland decreased, WCPN Ideastream reports.
Similar trends were reported in Akron and Youngstown.
Also of note:
-Social service …

The Washington Post sent Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Michael Williamson and reporter Anne Hull to Youngstown and Warren recently to document how the recession is affecting former steel towns.
The pair found newly shuttered businesses and former industrial workers struggling to stay afloat in lower-paying, more-competitive, service-based economy.
The story begins at Uptown Gems where working class people come to sell their valuables following layoffs or pay reductions.
“At campaign time, they are celebrated as the people who built America,” Hull writes. “Now they just want to know how much they can get for …

What can Las Vegas learn from the Rust Belt? Quite a bit, according to this article in the Las Vegas Sun.
Not to toot our own horn, but this story references Rust Wire, and our own Angie Schmitt!
I thought this story was well-written, and made an interesting comparison: though many wouldn’t think of it this way, Las Vegas and Detroit are both one-industry towns - Vegas’ industry of course, being tourism.
The author definitely did his homework- and talked to a number of knowledgeable folks in Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Boston and elsewhere.
I …

As many young adults do, I recently took upon the endeavor of buying my very first home. I began my search after many years (almost ten) of renting apartment after apartment, and then renting an entire house. I always enjoyed the freedom that comes with renting. An apartment felt like an over extended stay in a hotel room, it really wasn’t my place to begin with, I just stayed there for a while-I can leave anytime I want, or that is, when my lease ends. After some time, I started to see and hear the value of ownership from friends who became proud home owners.

I began my search in Youngstown, focusing on both the North and south sides of the city.

In this video, Detroit residents rally to save their neighbor from foreclosure.
“The crime wave that is going on in this neighborhood is a crime wave by the banks that are evicting people unfairly instead of modifying their mortgages and doing everything they can to make sure they stay in their homes,” one neighbor says.
I wanted to note that the particular bank involved is Wells Fargo, one of the leading villains of the foreclosure crisis. In Cleveland this $25-million bailout recipient refuses to appear in court for code violations on its …

This is a very big deal in Youngstown.

Ten years ago, people were afraid to walk in the city’s downtown. Next month, a private developer is unveiling luxury apartments starting at $1,200 a month in one of the city’s formerly vacant downtown buildings.
People in the community have been watching with excitement and apprehension as the project took shape over the past year and change. Last year, I was told, only five people lived in Youngstown’s downtown, excluding housing projects. (A friend of mine joked, they were lobbing to have home delivery …

Reuters is running a story about the precipitous job losses in Southern states.

While during the house boom, these states enjoyed relatively low unemployment rates, many have now seen jobless tolls reach the double digits.
Georgia weighs in at 10%; North Carolina, 11%. South Carolina bests them both with 12.1%.
Florida has been especially hard hit because of declines in the tourism industry.
A friend of mine just moved to Charleston and she said the job market there is terrible. Everyone she knows is a server, she said. I was surprised.

CNN is reporting that many cities that were hard hit by the recession early on are starting to recover, while economic conditions continue to decline Sun Belt cities in Florida, California, Nevada and Arizona.

RealtyTrac and The Federal Reserve Bank are reporting that the recession appears to be ending in the Northeast and Midwest but is continuing to ravage the Southwest.