From SCVNEWS.com

[CLWA] – The Castaic Lake Water Agency has announced the revealing of a new, sustainable landscape makeover to a Saugus family as part of the conclusion to a year-long conservation campaign, “What’s Your H2O Solution?”

CLWA began the year with a community conservation contest encouraging residents to submit water-saving ideas to the Agency. The best and most feasible ideas were considered for top prizes. The grand prize, a $5,000 landscape makeover giveaway from Stay Green Inc. was awarded to Steve and Thane Petzold of Saugus.

“We are thrilled with the results,” said homeowner Steve Petzold. “Even though many of our plants were drought-tolerant already, they were planted so many years ago that they weren’t thriving. We truly appreciate this opportunity and we’re very grateful to CLWA and Stay Green for their attention and hard work on our new front yard,” he added.

CLWA has been anticipating this event for quite some time. “We enjoyed hearing from Santa Clarita residents on how they are actively saving water in and around their homes and it was great to share those ideas with others,” said Stephanie Anagnoson, Water Conservation Program Coordinator at CLWA. “Many of the winning concepts were ideas that were easy to duplicate and didn’t cost much money,” she said.

Stay Green’s involvement proved critical to the success of the contest by showing residents how quick and easy some of these ideas are to implement.  Items like installing a drip irrigation system, adding mulch to reduce runoff and replacing existing plants with more colorful SCV-friendly plants were a few that Stay Green implemented at the Petzold home for a more colorful, updated look that will save them significant amounts of water every year.

“What we were able to offer the Petzold family can be done by most residents who are looking to save more on their water usage,” said Rene Rivera, VP of Operations for Stay Green, Inc. “It’s important for people to understand that planting drought-tolerant plants does not mean that your garden has to look drab or colorless. There are so many vibrant options for perennials that grow well here in Santa Clarita. We really enjoy showing residents how beautiful a sustainable garden can really be,” said Rivera.

About CLWA

The Castaic Lake Water Agency is the Santa Clarita Valley’s public water wholesaler.  CLWA operates three treatment plants, three pump stations, three storage facilities, and over 45 miles of transmission pipelines. Our mission is to provide reliable, quality water at a reasonable cost to the Santa Clarita Valley. www.clwa.org

Talk about it

As the 2013 budget process began, New Richmond city officials had a few goals in mind. The most significant goal was to decrease the city’s overall tax levy by 2 percent when compared to 2012.

Through a series of cuts, new ideas and wage freezes for all city employees, city employees have proposed a budget that meets the city council’s early goals.

According to Mike Darrow, city administrator and utilities manager, the proposed budget will be considered at the Dec. 10 council meeting.

“The 2013 budget was drafted with a lot of input and hard work,” he said. “One of the first goals was to reduce our budget while maintaining services. City staff played an integral part of the budget process at the front-end and provided additional suggestions and thoughts.”

A major component of the city’s effort to operate more efficiently is an ongoing restructuring of employee duties and responsibilities, Darrow noted.

“The City of New Richmond has a committed group of professionals that are working to make this city operate under our own definition of the ‘new normal,’” he said. “What this means is more cross-training, internal support and solution-based strategies for all departments. 2013 will see an even greater commitment by the city to provide even greater services with lower budget levels in some cases.”

The city staff also is committed to focusing more on grant writing and in-house projects over the next year, Darrow said, in hopes of saving taxpayer money. Employees are also working to eliminate redundancies in the local government and thus reducing the overall cost of operating the city.

Another key component to the city’s operation will be a greater emphasis on community involvement in some areas, Darrow said. Among the ideas being discussed is an effort to find a community organization willing to take on downtown flowers and landscaping as a project rather than having a city employee handle the tasks.

Darrow said he’d also like to develop a “stock sale” concept providing local residents a chance to donate toward specific projects – such as parks or a new library.

Darrow, who is going through his first budgeting process in New Richmond since his hiring as administrator earlier this year, said he’s been impressed with the effort of everyone involved.

“Many times budget decisions can divide communities or departments,” he said “I am extremely proud of the 2013 budget process and the input, energy and dedication that our staff, city council and commissions put into this budget.”

The preliminary budget calls for a 13 percent cut in the general government budget, which was accomplished in part with a decision to not hire a new clerk/treasurer following the depature of Joe Bjelland and a decision to reduce the number of seasonal employees who are hired. The cut comes despite an expected 11.7 percent rise in health insurance costs for next year.

There will be a slight increase in the economic development budget to reflect the city’s renewed focus on job creation and business assistance. The budgets for police, fire and public safety will remain at 2012 levels, while the parks and library budgets will see slight budget declines.

Among the city’s planned capital improvement projects for 2013 will be the fire remodeling project ($528,000), street improvements and blacktopping ($125,000), and Doughboy Trail development.

Tags:
new richmond, local government, news, wisconsin

More from around the web

This blog series is about an opportunity.  It’s written from the point of view of an architect and urban planner trying to work out ways that more of us can design more practical, meaningful, beautiful places—the kinds of places most likely to realize both our own intentions and the aspirations of patrons, clients, and publics who rely on us.

The Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao. Frank Gehry, architect. Sketches by Albrecht Pichler

My basic idea has been to step back, look at the unfinished cultural revolutions of Modernism, and continue to build on their defining enterprise—the rapid advance of reliable sciences. The impact they have had on construction-related technologies has been enormous. But the insights of the maturing sciences of nature and human nature—of evolution and ecology and how human biology interacts with an environment—are only beginning to be applied systematically in design education and day-to-day practice. We have valuable bodies of knowledge about the physical environments we build “out-there” on the land—places that profoundly affect how we all feel, think, and act everyday over a lifetime—yet we are only beginning to understand how each of us actually experiences those environments, “in-here,” and why we respond and react the ways we do. In the design professions we are, in a sense, like doctors trained more deeply in anatomy than in a patient’s total experience. That’s more or less left to informed “intuition” and, in the case of our professions, ideologies or “design sense.”

Contemporary knowledge of the biological foundations of “experience” is potentially as revolutionary in its own way as the re-discoveryof the arts and natural philosophy of Greece and Rome by the humanists of the European Renaissance. We now have effective ways to understand the exceptional skill of the artists and designers who, over millennia, have been creating the world’s great places. We can’t know what was in their minds, of course, but we can know why we respond to their work as we do.  Some very smart people are at work in this field, learning and writing about nature and human nature, and I have laid out a sketch that applies my understanding of their findings and ideas in an organized perspective—a way of thinking about design that I call “a new humanism.”

Some “deeper order” of things

The full experience of a built environment clearly goes well beyond the biological foundations. Its distinctive, rich contents—in a sense, its texture—emerge from what each of us has absorbed from living in this contemporary, still industrializing culture, and accumulated in unique personal memories. But those cultural and individual influences are already well and widely analyzed in design histories, criticism and education, and they are routinely integrated into design vocabularies—into the expressive languages of coherent styles. Yet, since the Pythagoreans’ vision of a mathematical harmony in the universe, extended by Vitruvius and then later humanists to include the human body, the search has continued for some deeper order of things—some level of human nature or universal laws underlying the development of all cultures and the diverse languages of their architecture, landscapes, and settlements.

In the perspective outlined here, the source of a unifying order is the growing understanding of how an evolved, interacting mind and body seem to work—how the overwhelming mass of information in our environment is sorted out into coherent feelings, thoughts, judgments and effective courses of action. In other words, it is an exploration not so much of what we see, but of how we tend to react—because of what we are.

For my purpose, the important point is this: by learning more about the sciences that underlie the arts of design we can all have a better chance to understand ourselves— our ecological roles, our impact on the land and on the human experiences we are creating there. It means a better chance of anticipating and then addressing, more reliably than we do now, the likely responses of very different people and the pleasures—pragmatic, intellectual and sensory—possible in the environments we design. The knowledge I’ve drawn on is fragmented, but we can still make the most of it.

A quick sketch

This perspective will be outlined in the posts that follow. After the first two, an “Introduction” to the potential of a broader kind of humanism, I’ll explore the evolutionary “Origins” of how we experience a built environment, and, as a result, what happens when “A Mind Encounters Architecture” and “The Body Responds.”  Then I’ll look at how the places we design communicate in the “Languages of Humanism” and aesthetic experience.  Then my “Interim Conclusion” is a summary of how a new humanism could be applied to create the kinds of places we aspire to, more often than we build.

A note about words, names, and places.  I use the word “we” in two contexts.  Because I am writing from the perspective of a practicing professional, I use “we” to refer to members of the teams that produce the built environment: the design, engineering, legal, financial, and marketing professions, businesses and government officials, and our patrons and clients—all of us who have taken on the direct responsibility of shaping the habitat. In most contexts, however, I use “we” as a brief way to say “homo sapiens.”  In addition, I try to use sparingly well-worn terms like “meaning,” by focusing on how we create, recognize, and use meanings—the significance to us of built forms in practice.

I use the word “experience” in its general, conversational sense: a continuing, subjective, indivisible but shifting mix of conscious and unconscious sensations, ideas, moods, and feelings that dominate a moment and then become selectively filed away among networks of memories.

Finally, I use the term “science” to include scholarship in the humanities that’s based on thoughtful, rigorous observation of the links between human biology and the places we build.

Regarding illustrations and designers, most of the examples I have selected are more—usually much more—than fifty years old. The purpose is to try to be free of the intellectual biases and commercial culture of the past generation or two and refer instead to the work that seems to have gone through test-after-test of time. In an important sense, too, these are not “my” selections, but places chosen by arrays of visitors who decide to spend significant measures of their energy, time, and purchasing power just to experience what it is like to be there.  I’m trying to understand why that happens.

Most illustrations refer to our Western European/American culture because that is my background—my “native language.” They necessarily express my North American bias, just as my reading of human nature reflects my male-brain bias. But analyses by others who are more broadly educated suggest to me that this perspective may well apply more widely—allowing, naturally, for the substantial variations in genetic heritage. And equally important for me, the ideas in this blog series first came to life in the excitement of having my mind opened by these “Grand Tour” places, as I experienced them one-on-one. I’m convinced that if I had studied them early in my career as passionately as I did later, I would have practiced architecture and the planning of settlements differently—and better.

Finally, if, in these unsettled times, the outlook outlined here may seem overly positive, it is because architecture, landscaping, and city building are essentially positive, optimistic acts.

Mont S. Michel on the Normandy coast of France where “…arrays of visitors” go “just to experience what it is like to be there.” Sketches by Albrecht Pichler

This is the first of a series of posts that spell out a set of ideas called “A New Humanism in architecture, landscapes, and urban design.” They’re about enlarging the way we think about design by applying, in day to day practice, a broader range of insights into the cutting edge sciences of nature and human nature — using them to understand how our evolved mind-and-body actually experience the places we design, and why people respond the ways they do. The next post will examine Experience: What is it like to be there?

Robert Lamb Hart is a practicing architect and planner educated at Harvard GSD and the University of Pennsylvania. He is a founder and a principal in Hart Howerton, a planning, architecture, and landscape design firm with an international practice out of offices in New York, San Francisco, London, Shanghai, Park City, and Boston. He believes that the design professions have been falling behind in their understanding of one of the defining enterprises of the Modern revolution, the application of the maturing, fast-moving sciences of ecology and human behavior — and the compromised results are showing.

Albrecht Pichler, who drew the sketches, is a practicing architect and a principal in Hart Howerton’s New York office.

Tags: A New Humanism in architecture landscapes and urban design, A New Humanism: Part 1 – Introduction, Albrecht Pichler, American culture, Architect, architecture, Art, Bilbao, biological, body, city building, deeper order, Design Practice, design sense, designers, Ecology, environments, European Renaissance, evolution, France, Frank Gehry, Grand Tour, Greece, Guggenheim Museum, homo sapiens, humanists, illustrations, Interim Conclusion, Introduction, judgements, landscaping, Languages of Humanism, millennia, Modernism, Mont S. Michel, native language, New Humanism, Normandy, optimistic, Origins, positive, pythagoreans, rich content, Rome, sketch, sketches, The Body Responds, Vitrubius, We, Western European culture

[CLWA] – The Castaic Lake Water Agency has announced the revealing of a new, sustainable landscape makeover to a Saugus family as part of the conclusion to a year-long conservation campaign, “What’s Your H2O Solution?”

CLWA began the year with a community conservation contest encouraging residents to submit water-saving ideas to the Agency. The best and most feasible ideas were considered for top prizes. The grand prize, a $5,000 landscape makeover giveaway from Stay Green Inc. was awarded to Steve and Thane Petzold of Saugus.

“We are thrilled with the results,” said homeowner Steve Petzold. “Even though many of our plants were drought-tolerant already, they were planted so many years ago that they weren’t thriving. We truly appreciate this opportunity and we’re very grateful to CLWA and Stay Green for their attention and hard work on our new front yard,” he added.

CLWA has been anticipating this event for quite some time. “We enjoyed hearing from Santa Clarita residents on how they are actively saving water in and around their homes and it was great to share those ideas with others,” said Stephanie Anagnoson, Water Conservation Program Coordinator at CLWA. “Many of the winning concepts were ideas that were easy to duplicate and didn’t cost much money,” she said.

Stay Green’s involvement proved critical to the success of the contest by showing residents how quick and easy some of these ideas are to implement.  Items like installing a drip irrigation system, adding mulch to reduce runoff and replacing existing plants with more colorful SCV-friendly plants were a few that Stay Green implemented at the Petzold home for a more colorful, updated look that will save them significant amounts of water every year.

“What we were able to offer the Petzold family can be done by most residents who are looking to save more on their water usage,” said Rene Rivera, VP of Operations for Stay Green, Inc. “It’s important for people to understand that planting drought-tolerant plants does not mean that your garden has to look drab or colorless. There are so many vibrant options for perennials that grow well here in Santa Clarita. We really enjoy showing residents how beautiful a sustainable garden can really be,” said Rivera.

 

About CLWA

The Castaic Lake Water Agency is the Santa Clarita Valley’s public water wholesaler.  CLWA operates three treatment plants, three pump stations, three storage facilities, and over 45 miles of transmission pipelines. Our mission is to provide reliable, quality water at a reasonable cost to the Santa Clarita Valley. www.clwa.org

I am so honored to be receiving this award tonight, named after one of the great visionaries of the modern conservative movement in America. We sure could use Jack Kemp right now. Sadly, he is not here, but his ideas and the principles behind them are. And they are useful to us as we confront the great economic challenges and opportunities our nation currently faces.

The existence of a large and vibrant American middle class goes to the very essence of America’s exceptional identity. Every country has rich people. But only a few places have achieved a vibrant and stable middle class. And in the history of the world, none has been more vibrant and more stable than the American middle class.

One of the fundamental promises of America is the opportunity to make it to the middle class. But today, there is a growing opportunity gap developing.  And millions of Americans worry that they may never achieve middle class prosperity and stability and that their children will be trapped as well with the same life and the same problems.

For those of us blessed with the opportunity to serve our country in government, one of the fundamental challenges before us is to find an appropriate and sustainable role for government in closing this gap between the dreams of millions of Americans and the opportunities for them to actually realize them.

The key to a vibrant middle class is an abundance of jobs that pay enough so that workers can provide for themselves and their families, enjoy leisure time, save for retirement and pay for their children’s education so they can grow up and earn even more than their parents.

Today, too many Americans cannot find jobs like these, and in fact some cannot find any job at all.

There are two main reasons for this.

First, the weakened American economy is not creating enough jobs of any kind, especially middle class jobs.  And second, we have a “Skills Shortage”. Too many Americans do not have the skills they need to do the new middle class jobs. 

The path to a prosperous and growing American middle class is the combination of a vibrant economy that creates middle class jobs and a people with the skills needed for these new jobs. The federal government can play an important role in encouraging a vibrant economy and in equipping our people with the skills they need for 21st century middle class jobs.

Federal policies on the national debt, taxes and regulations all have a tremendous impact on economic growth and middle class job creation.

Our $16 trillion debt and the lack of a plan to fix it, scares people from investing money in opening or growing a business. They are afraid of getting hit with massive tax increases in the future to pay off this debt.

The leading cause of our growing future debt is the way Medicare is currently designed for the future. That is why we must reform and save Medicare as soon as possible. The sooner we act, the likelier we can do it without making any changes for people who are currently in the system, people like my mother.

Our complicated and uncertain tax code is also hindering the creation of middle class jobs. You can’t open or grow a business if your taxes are too high or too uncertain. That is why I oppose the President’s plan to raise taxes. It isn’t about a pledge. It isn’t about protecting millionaires and billionaires. For me, it’s about the fact that the tax increases he wants would fail to make even a small dent in the debt but would hurt middle class businesses and the people who work for them. Over half of the private sector’s workers in America work for the kind of companies the President’s plan may raise taxes on.

Instead, we should follow the example set by Jack Kemp set, who laid the foundation for the Economic Recovery Act of 1981 that helped usher in the strong economic recovery during President Reagan’s first term. We should keep rates low on everyone. End the multiple taxation of savings. Simplify our tax code by getting rid of unjustified loopholes. And generate new revenue by creating new taxpayers, not new taxes. Rapid economic growth is the only way to generate the kind of money we need to bring this debt under control. Tax increases do not create new taxpayers. And they do not create rapid economic growth.

And excessive regulations are impeding middle class job creation too. Regulation is necessary to protect our natural environment, keep our food and medicine safe, and ensure fair competition and fair treatment of our workers. But regulations cost money to follow. The more expensive a regulation is, the less money a business has left to give raises or hire new people.  So we need to have a balanced approach to regulations. We have to weigh the benefit of any given regulation, against the impact it will have on job creation. That is why we should implement something like Senator Paul’s REINS Act so that if a regulation is going to cost the economy over $100 million, Congress gets the final say on it, not an unelected and unaccountable bureaucrat.

Getting control of our debt, and reforming our federal tax code and regulations are critically important, but it is not enough. We will need to do more.

For example, we should expand our domestic energy industry. American innovation has now given us access to massive new deposits of oil and natural gas, making America the most energy rich country on the planet. This new energy wealth means all kinds of new middle class jobs, from the fields and platforms where we drill, to the manufacturing plants that will return to the U.S. with the lower cost of energy.  These are just the type of jobs we need most right now: well-paying, middle class work that doesn’t require an expensive advanced degree and that contributes to the strength of our economy.

We need to take full advantage of this by approving the Keystone pipeline, tearing down unnecessary regulatory barriers to tapping our own energy sources and opening more federal land to safe and responsible exploration.

Sound monetary policy would also encourage middle class job creation. The arbitrary way in which interest rates and our currency are treated is yet another cause of unpredictability injected into our economy. The Federal Reserve Board should publish and follow a clear monetary rule – to provide greater stability about prices and what the value of a dollar will be over time.

Getting control of the debt, reforming taxes and regulations, growing our energy industry, and predictable monetary policy are five concrete things the government can do to help our economy create new middle class jobs.  But if the higher wages people make at these jobs is offset by an increase in the cost of living, we are just running in place.

Nothing is taking a bigger chunk out of the budgets of our middle class households than the cost of health care. We must provide the conditions for people to get the health coverage they need in an affordable way.

One way to make health care more affordable is a Flexible Savings Account that allows families to save tax free money to pay for medical bills. As a federal employee with four young kids who have had their share of accidents, I am blessed to have that option, which I use to pay for our co-payments, my 12 year old daughter’s braces and out of pocket costs of medicine. I wish more Americans had the chance to have one like their members of Congress do.

That is why we should all be shocked that Obamacare cuts the amount you can save from $5000 to $2500. And it requires you get a prescription from a physician to purchase over the counter medications.  So if I want to buy some Advil with my FSA, I now need my doctor’s permission.

In addition to promoting Flexible Savings Accounts, we should create a health insurance system that focuses on empowering people, not bureaucracy. People should be able to buy a health care plan that fits their needs and budget, from any company in America that is willing to sell it to them. And they should be able to buy it with tax free money, just like their employers buy it for many of them now.

We should also expand the number of Community Health Centers, as well as work with hospitals to find the best way to integrate them with their emergency rooms to try and get non-life threatening walk-ins to seek treatment there.

These are just a few of the things we can do at the federal level to create the conditions for middle class job creation and stabilize the growth in the cost of living. But no matter how many middle class jobs are created, you can’t grow the middle class if people do not have the skills to get hired for these jobs. 

Not so long ago, even if you didn’t graduate from high school, if you were willing to work, you could find a job that paid enough for you to buy a home, start a family and eventually send your kids to college and a better life. Those days are long gone, and they are probably never coming back.

Today, education plays a central role in the 21st century knowledge economy. Four-year college graduates earn an average of 70 percent more than those without such a degree.  But that doesn’t mean that everyone has to get a four year degree from a university in order to get ahead. I am proud that my hometown, Miami, is the home of Miami-Dade College, one our nation’s pioneers in education-for-work programs.  Years ago, they set up numerous work training programs by working with employers to design the curriculum, and provide mentoring and internship opportunities. Even if you don’t go the traditional college route, you can secure a good living by earning an education that is customized to your interests and strengths.

So what are the things government should be doing in education?

First, our elementary and secondary schools need state level curriculum reform and new investment in continuing teacher training. We have an opportunity through the 2013 reauthorization of the Higher Education Act to make some major improvements.

Second, the public school system for millions of disadvantaged American children is a disaster.  Many of these schools deny opportunity to those who need it most.  We need to allow charter schools and other innovative schools to flourish. The key to that is empowering parents. Parents should be the ultimate decision makers on where their children go to school. But poor and working class parents often have no choice about what schools their children can attend. All our parents should be able to send their children to the school of their choice. For parents with special needs children, the freedom to choose their kids’ school is especially important. 

Third, our tax code should reward investment in education. If you invest in a business by buying a machine, you get a tax credit for the cost. If there is a tax credit for investing in equipment, shouldn’t there be a tax credit for investing in people?

Let’s provide tax encouragement to help parents pay for the school of their choice.  Let’s create a corporate federal tax credit to a qualifying, non-profit 501(c)(3) Education Scholarship Organization, so that students from low income families can receive a scholarship to pay for the cost of a private education of their parents’ choosing. 

Fourth, let’s encourage career, technical and vocational education. Why can’t more of our students graduate with a high school diploma and an industry certification in a trade or career? Let’s find ways for our returning veterans to put the skills they’ve developed in the Armed Forces to use in civilian job opportunities.

Fifth, let’s look for ways to address soaring college costs and encourage skill development that doesn’t require the traditional four year college route.  The groundswell of creativity and technological change in higher education will lead to dramatic reductions in the time and expense of higher education, so long as government financial policy doesn’t stand in the way. We should make sure our federal aid programs don’t discriminate against online course credits and help give parents and students more choices.

And finally we need to reform our federal college grant and loan programs. College affordability is an issue that is very personal to me. The only reason why I was able to go to college was because of federal grants and loans.  But when I graduated from law school, I had close to $150,000 in student debt.

A debt I paid off just this year with the proceeds of my book An American Son, the perfect holiday gift and available on Amazon for only $11.99

Let’s explore integrating the Pell Grant program with our tax system. And before they take out a student loan, let’s make sure students and their parents know how long it will take them to complete their education, what their likelihood of completion is, how much they can expect to make after graduation, and how much their monthly payment on the loan is going to be.

The “Know Before You Go” Act which I co-sponsored with Senator Wyden of Oregon would ensure future students and their families can make well-informed decisions by having access to information about things like their expected post-graduation earning potential, and how long it will take them to pay off their student loans.

The bottom line is we are trying to prepare 21st century students using a 20th century education model. Now is the time to be creative, innovative and daring in reforming the way we provide our people the skills they need to make it to the middle class.

Beyond education, there is another obstacle that is keeping too many young Americans from moving ahead. Many young Americans do not have the skills they need to get a middle class job because they grew up in an unstable environment.

They live in broken and often violent homes. In substandard housing, in a dangerous neighborhood. With poor nutrition and no access to primary health care. Often they are being raised by a heroic single parent, and sometimes an elderly grandmother. And they may not have the chance to participate in afterschool activities because they can’t afford the fees and can’t get out of work in time to take them.

Rising above these circumstances is possible. Every day, some amazing parents and caretaker grandparents are overcoming all of this to give these kids the chance at a better life.  But the research on this topic has consistently found that children raised in tough circumstances, struggle in comparison with children raised in a more stable family setting. They face higher risks of falling into poverty, failing in school, or suffering emotional and behavioral problems. They have lower scores on standardized tests, lower grades, and a much higher chance of dropping out of high school or failing to attend college. Widespread societal breakdown is not something government can solve, and yet it is one that the government cannot ignore. We cannot separate the economic well-being of our people from their social well-being.

What the federal government can do to confront societal breakdown is limited, yet important.  Rather than pretend we know the answer, we should start by engaging those who do important work every day in mentoring young people and leading them on the right path: their teachers, coaches, parents, priests, and pastors. Government leaders should take part in, and encourage, a national conversation about the importance of civil society institutions and leaders in creating the social infrastructure needed for success.

We should look at churches and faith-based organizations in the community as part of the solution. Kids joining the Boy Scouts and being involved in a church’s youth group aren’t just nice things for them to do.  One day it might have a real impact on their standard of living and ultimately our national economy.

And let’s protect our nation’s safety net programs. Not as a way of life, but as a way to help those who have failed to stand up and try again, and of course to help those who cannot help themselves. But these programs must be reformed to enhance family stability, financial opportunity, education and a culture of work.

But perhaps the most effective thing we in government can do about societal breakdown is acknowledge the impact it is having. Ask any of the amazing teachers we are blessed to have here in America. I have four of them in my own family. They are on the frontlines of this problem. They will be the first to tell you that every single day, kids bring their home experience in to the classrooms. Every day, they see firsthand how kids living in dysfunctional homes are going to really struggle to make it. As a people, we cannot build a vibrant and broad-based middle class if we do not solve this problem.

My parents immigrated here with few skills, limited education and no money. They worked in the service industry. In almost any other nation on earth, those jobs would barely provide a daily living much less a better future. But in America, my parents made enough money to buy their own home and a car. They felt so confident in the future that in their 40’s they had two children, me in 1971 and my sister in 1973.

We didn’t have everything we wanted, but we had more than we needed. And most importantly we had a strong family, living in a safe and stable home. Our parents loved each other, made sure we knew they loved us, and encouraged us to dream. They made it very clear that, because we were Americans, we could go as far as our talent and hard work would take us.

My father grew up poor and motherless with limited education. My mother lived in a home with dirt floors in rural Cuba, raised by a disabled father who struggled to bring food home every night. But their children now live lives so far removed from where they came from not so long ago. The four children of an uneducated working class immigrant couple from Cuba are all college graduates working in a professional field and enjoying a standard of living significantly higher than our parents.

Our story is not rare in America. But it is rare in the world. Had we been born almost anywhere else, at any other time in history, our lives would have been very different.

I would probably have been a very opinionated bartender.

But instead I was born and raised in late 20th century America. Where our economy produced jobs for relatively low skilled workers like my parents. Where those jobs paid enough for them to make it into the middle class. Where the government helped me and my siblings pay for college. And where today all four of us live a life much better than our parents.

Because of where I was raised, and who I was raised by, I know that what we have here is special. The exception, rather than the rule. And if we lose it, there is nothing to take its place. If America declines, so will the world.

Today, the journey my parents made from poor immigrants to working middle class is harder than it was in their time.  The world has changed, the economy has changed and our society has changed. But whether or not the journey my parents made is still possible to all who are willing to work for it will decide whether America will decline or remain this special place. For nothing represents how special America is more than our middle class.  And our challenge and opportunity now is to create the conditions that allow it not just to survive, but to grow.

Government has a role to play. And we must make sure it does its part. But it’s a supporting role: to help create the conditions that enable prosperity in our private economy. That’s a crucial role but a necessarily limited one. It can’t substitute for what it is meant to enable—a thriving free economy. It is not the ever expanding reach of government, but rather having access to the benefits of thriving economy that allows the poor to rise into the middle class. Not by making rich people poorer, but by making poor people richer.

To do that we need a limited and effective government. And you can’t have one without the other. Big government is not effective government. Big government has never worked. The promise of more government as the answer to all our problems is easy to sell. But when it is put in practice, it fails every time. Big government has never been able to create and sustain a vibrant and stable middle class.

If any people on earth should know that, it is us. For most of us, we need to look no further than our own communities to see where the answers to our challenges lie. It starts with strong and stable families. It continues with a vibrant civil society filled with people working together to improve their country, and with a thriving free enterprise economy that creates good paying jobs and can draw upon people with the skills to do those jobs. 

Government’s role is to support those institutions and policies that strengthen the family and the community. To implement pro-growth policies that support a vibrant free enterprise economy that creates middle class jobs.  And to provide access to schools that teach our people the skills they need to fill those jobs.

The emergence of a strong, vibrant and growing 21st century American middle class is the answer to the most pressing challenges we face. Millions of Americans with jobs that pay more means more buyers for our products, more customers for our businesses and more taxpayers for our governments. The more they spend, the more jobs they create for others, who in turn spend their money in the economy as well. And even with low and stable tax rates, the taxes they pay will mean new revenue for our government to provide for the national defense, fund our safety net and pay down our debt.

If we are determined to remain an exceptional nation, this is the only way forward. And if we embrace it, the promise of the 21st century is extraordinary. The United States will soon be the world’s largest producer of energy.  The emergence of affordable American natural gas will allow manufacturing to return in force to our shores once again. American innovation promises to revolutionize health care, communications and transportation. And every year, millions of people around the world are entering the middle class, now able to afford the things we invent and build, hire us to provide services, and take trips here to visit our tourist destinations. If we make the right choices now, life in America can be better than it has ever been.

Some say that our problem is that the American people have changed. That too many people want things from government. But I am still convinced that the overwhelming majority of our people just want what my parents had, a chance.

A real chance to earn a good living, and provide even better opportunities for their children.

A few weeks ago, I was giving a speech at a fancy hotel in New York City. When I arrived in the banquet hall, I was approached by a group of three uniformed employees from the hotel’s catering department.

They had seen my speech at the Republican Convention, where I told the story of my father the banquet bartender.  And they had a gift for me. They presented me with this name tag, which says “Rubio, Banquet Bartender”.

That moment reminded me that there are millions of Mario Rubio’s all across America today. They aren’t looking for a handout. They just want a job that provides for their families.

But there just aren’t enough jobs out there like that. And many of them do not have the skills they need for the jobs that are available.

All they want is a chance to earn a better life for themselves and a better future for their children. Whether they get that chance or not, will determine whether America remains exceptional or declines.

But it all starts with our people. In the kitchens of our hotels. In the landscaping crews that work in our neighborhoods. In the late night janitorial shifts that clean our offices. There you will find the dreams America was built on. There you will find the promise of tomorrow.

Their journey is our nation’s destiny. And if they can give their children what our parents gave us, 21st century America will be the single greatest nation that man has ever known.

For five months, residents of the Walnut Neighborhood have been pushing a mantra on Niowave officials regarding the white, 14,000-square-foot pole barn they built on the property: “Fix the façade.” 

A plan surfaced recently to address the neighborhood’s desire. Neighbors rejected it because the entirely landscape-based plan would not do enough to either hide the building or blend it in with the surrounding neighborhood, residents say. A tax break worth more than $200,000 for the particle accelerator company hinges on neighborhood approval of improvements. 

Now residents are planning to picket the neighborhoods of Niowave head honchos if the situation doesn’t improve.

At a Walnut Neighborhood Organization meeting on Thursday, 11 people were in attendance — including City Council President Brian Jeffries and Council members Carol Wood and Jessica Yorko — to discuss next steps with the company. The message was undeniable: If Niowave officials don’t do something about the pole barn soon, it’s going to get personal. 

“I’m amazed at how this happened,” said WNO President Rina Risper. Niowave has shown an “inability to meet with neighbors and an inability to discuss this with transparency. The disregard for our quality of life is mindboggling.”

The group distributed two fliers at the meeting. One contained the addresses of Niowave officials Terry and Beth Grimm, Mark Sinila and Jerry Hollister. The other was a draft list of “Asks” — essentially what the group wants to be done about the pole barn, which was built earlier this year as an addition to Niowave’s Walnut School headquarters. 

The list went as follows: Remove all chain link fencing around the property; remove signs on the building and property; eliminate the need for on-street employee parking; create a landscaped berm at the corner of Kilborn Street and Seymour Avenue; plant mature trees on the property; create a rain garden at the south storm drain; eliminate glare from the roof; improve the landscaping; and the kicker — replace the current façade to better blend with the original school building.

The list and plans to protest came after a landscaping proposal shown to three residents on Nov. 16 was rejected by the neighborhood after a series of discussion sessions over Thanksgiving weekend. Niowave retained Lansing-based landscape architect Bob Ford to come up with ideas to help address the neighborhood’s concerns. Niowave asked that the neighborhood sign off on the landscaping and send a letter of agreement to the City Council. 

A request for a $230,000 personal property tax exemption has been “postponed” until Niowave “makes amends with the neighborhood,” Niowave Chief Financial Officer Mark Sinila said recently.

“There was a general consensus that landscaping alone — as nice as Bob’s plans were — are not going to cut it,” said Mary Elaine Kiener, a Walnut Neighborhood resident. In an email to Niowave on Nov. 26, Kiener wrote: “There is an overwhelming LACK of support for a landscaping ONLY approach to ‘fix the facade.’” She received no response. In the email, she invited Niowave to the WNO meeting on Thursday to discuss the issue. Behind a paper Niowave placard, there was an empty chair: No one showed. 

Kiener said the neighborhood has sent a letter to Niowave with the denial and the list of “Asks.” She said they have continually invited Niowave to the table to discuss the issue but officials never joined the conversation. She also said Niowave is hesitant to meet with any more than three residents at a time. Kiener has said the relationship is at an “all time low.” 

If Niowave continues to do nothing about the pole barn, residents plan to picket officials’ neighborhoods. City Council members who attended Friday’s meeting voiced their support for the group. 

At-Large Councilwoman Wood said the wishes of the group have been “clear” from the beginning and that picketing can “make a difference” when all else has failed. Fourth Ward Councilwoman Yorko, who represents the Walnut Neighborhood, said residents shouldn’t worry about potential costs as a barrier to what they want: “Shoot for the moon,” she said. 

The community is at a point where “they have to do what they have to in order to protect their interests,” said Jeffries. “What I’ve seen … is a relationship that is deteriorating. They can’t get Niowave to the table. They’ve got to have an understanding. Months have been lost for that to happen because Niowave has not been at the table. There is a greater level of frustration … they feel the need to get (Niowave’s) attention another way.”

“We’ve been very gracious,” said Risper. “We need to change strategy” and let Niowave know “we are dead serious about changes.” 

Residents plan to attend a City Council Planning and Development Committee meeting today to talk with Council members about their struggle and to find out more about some draft legislation that seeks to prevent problems like this in the future. 

Jeffries said a previous draft of the ordinance was “wholly inadequate” and would need revision because it only stipulated that the City Council be notified when special land use construction, like that of the Niowave pole barn, is being planned. It needs stronger enforcement language, he said.

Suwanee officials have begun another project that is designed to improve the Gateway area near I-85.

Workers recently began a landscaping effort along Lawrenceville-Suwanee Road near Exit 117 that will include trees and streetscaping. The project runs from Sawmill Drive to the new police substation just south of I-85, according to a city news release.

Eleven plazas, which will include benches and trash cans as well as landscaping, and two smaller seating areas are being created on each side of the interstate ramps and around the intersection, the release said.

Also, the I-85 ramps will be re-landscaped. The project will includes 161 elm, maple, crepe myrtle, and magnolia trees; 6,146 holly, juniper, and rose bushes; 4,255 plugs of liriope; and more than an acre of sod.

The Brickman Group of Lawrenceville has been contracted to do the landscaping work for about $285,000. The project is expected to be finished around the beginning of 2013.

Upgrading the Gateway area, which has been hit hard in recent years by business failures, was a high priority with citizens in the recent 20/20 Vision survey.

Recent improvements in the area include the new police substation, which opened in September, but a new self-storage facility that was approved by City Council in October.

— What is your reaction to the Gateway area improvements in Suwanee? What other ideas do you have? Share them in the comments below.

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JACKSONVILLE —

Tonya Sanford is a long-time fan of the annual Jacksonville Tour of Homes, visiting different residences not only to see how people dress up their homes for the holidays, but to get practical ideas, too.

On Dec. 9, however, she and her husband, Shell, will, be the ones welcoming visitors to their home at 10301 FM 768, south of Jacksonville, sharing hospitality and holiday cheer with all who stop by on the 2012 tour.

“This my favorite time of the year,” she said, describing how her husband surprised her by volunteering to list their home on the tour.

“He loves when people come out to visit, and we love to have people come over. He’s all about showing the house, but really, he’s more about showing his old stuff,” she laughed

That “stuff” includes old Jacksonville memorabilia he keeps in the shop adjacent to the house, and the 1927 Model T parked at the entrance of the property, presently decorated for the Dec. 9 event, slated from 1-5 p.m.

“This will be our third Christmas in this home, so with me being an annual tour of homes person myself, my hope is to give others ideas, not only with Christmas decorating, but also building and construction ideas, and things of that sort, because that’s what I always looked at – I looked at the home just as much as I did the decoration,” she said. “My hope is that everybody has a warm feeling about our home and can maybe get some ideas for their own home.”

For Jag Bookstore director Will Cumbee, serving as this year’s hospitality business means raising public awareness of Jacksonville College, which the bookstore serves.

In fact, he specifically volunteered to serve this year “to give more exposure of the campus to the community,” he said. “We want people to see that the bookstore is open to everyone, not just students and staff – we’re a hidden treasure that only a few people from the community come to shop, but most don’t know we’re here. (Being the hospitality host) helps to raise our identity.”

The bookstore, located in the Weatherby Memorial Building, which once housed the school library, carries traditional college texts and school spirit items and clothing, but it also has floor space dedicated to other gift items from Ganz and seasonal items, Cumbee said.

Tour of Homes participants also can purchase tickets for the tour and find maps to houses listed as part of it. The bookstore also will be offering door prizes and refreshments during tour hours.

This marks the fourth time Cumbee has taken part in a Tour of Homes event: He and his wife opened their homes two different times while they lived in Rusk, then several years ago after constructing a home in Jacksonville, where they retired.

“It’s a nice experience to get to share your home with people, and each home has its own unique personality. But, as a homeowner, you do it because you’re (invited),” he said. “A lot of people just want to see the homes, and to see the decorations and see different ways they can do things in their homes.”

Jacksonville Chamber of Commerce president Peggy Renfro said the event has been sponsored by the Chamber for about the past 25 years, and is a popular one that draws from 150 to 250 people each year.

“It’s just a lot of fun,” she said. “It’s so neat because you get to see how they decorate not only during holidays, but their homes … the colors they use, things like that. And if you’re looking to remodel or build, it would be a good opportunity as well, not only for the inside of the home but the exterior of the home, like landscaping.”

Public response “has always been very positive, and it’s really nice to be able to have it on a Sunday afternoon,” she added. “People will go to church, go get something to eat then make an afternoon of it.”

“We try to keep it no more than five (stops on the tour) because of time issues, and sometimes you cant tour all of the places depending on their locations. (The tour is set up to be) a nice, relaxing afternoon without having to rush,” Renfro said.

While there is the common Christmas theme for the tour, each property owner does something special – sometimes several things special in his or her home.

The Newburn-Rawlinson Home at 406 Kickapoo St., built in 1912 across from Jacksonville College, will be decorated to reflect the early 1900’s at Christmas time. Little things, like stringing fresh popcorn and cranberry garlands to grace the tree, or creating special children’s trees with items of that era for display in bedrooms, are what give it an old-fashioned holiday feel.

The college alumni association, which has an office in the house, wanted to “showcase the beauty of the historic home, and Jacksonville College, too,” said Ruth Bearden, who was on hand recently to help decorate the home.

“We want to give people a glimpse into the past,” added Ester Turner, who also was setting up decorations at the Newburn-Rawlinson home. “We’re having a group sing carols outside the house, and they’re supposed to be dressed in Victorian-type clothes, and we’ll be dressed that way, too.”

Meanwhile, back at the Sanford home, the decor varies from room to room, reflecting the Mrs. Sanford’s wide variety of styles that were pulled together by local business owner Lindsey Terry of Tigerlillies Florist to create a cheerful holiday theme.

However, it’s the bedrooms of Houston and Jerrod, the children of the family, that will catch one’s eye because of their sheer creativity and whimsy.

Houston, a Texas Rangers fan, has a Rangers-themed tree to go with his red and blue Rangers bedding and other baseball decor, while his brother, who prefers cowboys, has a Western holiday theme incorporated into his bedroom.

“The boys got to pick their own thing and the rest of the house just kind of came together with my kind of tastes,” their mother said. “Their rooms were done first – they were the easiest to put together and the funnest to do.”

And this, Renfro said, is what makes the annual Tour of Homes so special: Getting to see those “certain treasures” of each of the families.

“It might be a family heirloom, with a little story behind it that they want to share, giving those attending some unique family stories,” she said.

The Tour of Homes will be hosted from 1-5 p.m. Dec. 9 at five different sites. Advance tickets are $5 at the Chamber of Commerce, 526 E. Commerce, and Jacksonville College Jag Bookstore, 105 B.J. Albritton Dr.

Ticket cost rises to $7 on the day of the tour, and may be purchased at any of the homes on the tour. However, only the bookstore will provide maps of homes on the tour. For more information, contact the Jacksonville Chamber at 903-586-2217.

In addition to the Sanford home and the Newburn-Rawlinson Home, other homes on this year’s tour include:

Malinda Felts-Shoemaker Hill Ranch, 800 CR 1815. Owner Malinda Felts will decorate her home to reflect pure country elegance. Melody Lade, owner of Tablescapes by Melody, will also provide her own special and unique style with some of the decorations throughout the home, said event coordinator Kayla Stephenson.

Weldon Charlotte Taylor, 1627 Quevado St. “Decorations reflecting the true meaning of Christmas will be on display in the Taylor home, with Nativity scenes and old world Santas in every room throughout the home,” Stephenson said. “One room will have a Nativity scene scene with Santa kneeling by Jesus in the manager.”

The Bull City Business Leaders, a Durham Business Network International chapter, invited Shop Talk reporter Virginia Bridges to a weekly meeting where the business owners shared their ideas on how to avoid burnout.

•  “I am business, business, business Monday through Friday,” said Greyson Mills, owner of Mills Landscaping. “I plan my weekends to have fun and relax.” Mills added that sometimes he will work on the weekend.

•  “Exercise,” said Brian Scott, co-owner of Aggie Technologies, an information technology support company. “I am training in Taekwondo. I usually go twice a week. On days I am about to burn over, I make sure that I go that day.”

The majestic Wamesit Indian statue, crafted in bronze by sculptor Mico Kaufman, serves as something of a ‘gatekeeper,” welcoming visitors as they enter Tewksbury, along Route 38 from the north.

Unfortunately, aside from the statue itself, the Wamesit Indian Park isn’t much to look at. Located along Main Street, near Vic’s Waffle House, the park is no more than a few hundred square feet of dirt and dead or dying grass.

But all that may change next spring.

Steve Sadwick, Director of Community Development, has hired landscape architect Lorayne Black to re-design the park, the first step in re-creating the park as a true showpiece for Tewksbury.

Black presented conceptual sketches to the Planning Board at it meeting Monday night and received positive feedback.

“It was great. She does fantastic work all the time,” said board Chairman Robert Fowler.

Black’s ideas for the park include the addition of several areas of vegetation, as well as pathways with multiple entry points leading to the statue. Black said would recommend using native plants and plants that are drought-resistant.

“We all know this is an amazing statue and one of the main gateways to the community,” said Black. “We want to bring visible attention to the statue itself.”

Once all input and information is gathered, Black said she will be returning to the Planning Board with “a more fine-tuned preliminary plan.”

Actual landscaping work could begin as early as the spring.

Sadwick said the entire project, including the landscaping work itself, will cost around $20,000. The project will be paid for with mitigation money the town received from Walmart, when the retail giant was expanding its Route 38 location.

According to Sadwick, the town has another $25,000 from Walmart it will be spending on traffic improvements on the north end of Route 38.