A Big Idea For Human Development And Neighborhood Restoration

I live in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, a small, postindustrial ‘legacy’ city on the Tar River, an hour’s drive from the state capitol, Raleigh. In my city, we have two underutilized, underappreciated assets: our young people and our built inventory. Both have suffered decades of disinvestment and neglect. In community meetings, surveys and reports, employment, housing affordability, blight and crime are recurring areas of concern for residents. They are big issues, seemingly intractable, and not unique to Rocky Mount. I have often thought, if we can figure out how to tackle these issues here, we can be an example for similar communities.

Here’s the Big Idea: A thousand homes, a thousand people.

A $100 million investment in Rocky Mount over the next ten years, for the uplifting of our residents and our neighborhoods through employment, training, and housing development. For $100 million, hundreds of new apartments and hundreds of new houses could be built, along with hundreds of renovations. We could train and employ youth, young adults, and adults with barriers to employment such as a criminal record or disability. We could provide them income while they are training. We could provide down payment assistance for home purchasers that would incentivize private mortgage lending. We could support local landlords who want to improve their properties and maintain affordability. We could support small businesses that would continue to operate in our community and region.

This could be transformational.

• Imagine the households that will have sufficient income to meet their needs.

• Imagine the improved conditions that hundreds, perhaps thousands of children will experience when the financial stress in their homes decreases and their surroundings become more beautiful and supportive of human development.

• Imagine the benefit to local businesses of increased spending on supplies and services, both during construction and as a result of increased household incomes.

• Imagine the change in the trajectory of the life prospects of hundreds of people who will have portable skills that will allow them to support themselves no matter where they live.

• Imagine the improvements to city services that could be funded through increased tax revenue from new and improved housing.

• Imagine the benefit to economic development and business recruiting when prospective businesses see revitalized neighborhoods and a functioning housing market for their employees.

• Imagine supporting dozens of entrepreneurs in businesses that do not require enormous sums of start-up capital or years of specialized education.

• Imagine our greatest asset, our next generation, being seen as a force for positive changes in our community.

Within the city and the surrounding counties, we have most, if not all, of the ingredients we need: excellent community colleges; community-based programs that focus on construction training and alternative education; a high school devoted to technical education; headquarters for several large construction firms; and strong corporate citizens who have a stake in improving the quality of life and local economy.

And we have data gathered over the past decade, through the Twin County Visioning, the city’s 2014 housing study, and most recently, researching and mapping created by UNC Greensboro. We know where many of the needs are, and where the dilapidated properties are.

It’s past time to invest in our people and the homes they live in. The cities that thrive in the coming decades will be the ones that do.