ModeShift - Part 27

In Detroit, Scales of Finance and Fairness Have Tipped Over

by Keith SchneiderAugust 26, 2014August 28, 20140

On July 18, 2013 Kevyn Orr, Detroitâ€™s emergency manager, acted on the remarkably broad authorities afforded him by an eight-month-old state law and filed a petition to launch the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history. Orrâ€™s intent, he said, was to reduce the beleaguered cityâ€™s operating costs, reduce the cost of servicing the cityâ€™s debt, and set Detroit on a fresh course to redevelopment and prosperity. During a news conference that evening, Detroitâ€™s elected one-term …

Circle of Blue Honored by Society of Environmental Journalists

by Keith SchneiderAugust 6, 2014August 6, 20140

Credit: Photo Â© Matt Black / Circle of Blue Kettleman City resident Maria Salcedo’s ten-month-old daughter, Ashley Alvarez, died from complications stemming from multiple birth defects during a rash of such occurrences between 2007 and 2008 in this small farmworker town in the Central Valley. Contaminated drinking water is viewed as one of the potential causes. Photo Â© Matt Black / Circle of Blue. Click image to enlarge. Circle of Blue, where I’ve worked …

Louisville and Carmel in New York Times Articles That Confirm First Principle of U.S. Economic Development

by Keith SchneiderJuly 23, 2014July 23, 20141

CARMEL, Ind. â€“ James Brainard, the 60-year-old mayor of Carmel, Indiana, is not the kind of public official who deplores change. Heâ€™s just the opposite, in fact. In 1994, this prosperous suburb just north of Indianapolis held a planning workshop, inviting its 31,000 residents to consider ideas to redevelop Carmelâ€™s crossroads downtown, parts of which date to the cityâ€™s founding in 1830. The next year Mr. Brainard, a moderate Republican, was elected to the first …

ROMP Bluegrass Festival Honors The Masters and Advances Compelling New Artists

by Keith SchneiderJuly 18, 2014July 25, 20147

OWENSBORO, KY — Bill Monroe, a virtuoso mandolin player and the father of bluegrass music, was born in 1911 and raised on a ridgetop near Rosine, Kentucky about 40 miles south of the bluff on the Ohio River where Owensboro is located. With every passing year the connection between Monroe, his birthplace, and this river city gets closer. That’s never more true than during the last weekend in June when Owensboro hosts ROMP, the River …

LeBron James’ Letter Is Celebration of Superb Writing

by Keith SchneiderJuly 15, 2014January 7, 20211

Four years ago, when he both challenged the self-effacing values of his Midwestern roots and embraced the youthful self-absorption of his generation, LeBron James announced his departure from Cleveland in a nationally televised broadcast viewed by millions. I was in a diner in Antrim County, Michigan watching the interview while hydrating with a cool beer after a 60-mile summer bike ride. On Friday James explained his return to Northeast Ohio, his intent to finish his …

Narendra Modi, India’s New Prime Minister, Can’t Overlook Faltering Energy Production

by Keith SchneiderJune 25, 2014July 10, 20140

India’s new Prime Minister Narendra Modi swept into office in May on a message of aspiration, and a reputation for action. During the nearly 13 years that Modi served as chief minister of Gujarat, before arriving in New Delhi, his successes included drastically curtailing the number of hours that manufacturers in India’s premier industrial state went without electricity. The state’s transmission grid was strengthened and Modi promoted the development of 900 megawatts of solar generating …

Peru’s Recession and Insurgency Revives Its Democracy; Example For the U.S.?

by Keith SchneiderJune 4, 2014June 18, 20142

CAJAMARCA, Peru – North of Lima, 350 miles, this regional capital is spread across a high mountain valley near the northern terminus of the Andes Mountains. Spanish conquistadors began their conquest of Latin America here in the early 16th century when they murdered the last Incan emperor. The room where the Incan chief is said to have spent his last days is a half-block from Cajamarca’s central square. Roman Catholic cathedrals flank the southern and …

Growth in Lima, Peru’s Capital, Served Without Water

by Keith SchneiderJune 2, 2014May 31, 20140

LIMA, Peru — Villa El Salvador is a section of this capital city of 9 million residents that lies between the Pacific Ocean and the coastal highlands. The community climbs up and rolls down steep slopes in a seemingly endless expanse of densely packed rooftops made of plastic, sheet metal, and wood. The unpaved streets, lined by the one-story walls of two-room homes, have no names. Still there is order and tidiness to Villa El …

Henderson, Kentucky’s Riverwalk Along the Ohio River Shows Value of Public Investment

by Keith SchneiderMay 21, 2014May 22, 20145

HENDERSON, KY — The 981-mile Ohio River Valley, which extends from Pittsburgh to Cairo, Ill. is full of surprises these days. Pittsburgh shed its sooty industrial coat of the 20th century to emerge as a center of engineering and biomedical innovation. Cincinnati, battered by race riots and disinvestment, is building a $1 billion riverfront neighborhood and a streetcar line. Louisville’s days as a meatpacking hub are long gone. Now it’s the growing capital of the …

Pharrell’s ‘Happy’ Is Fun and, Perhaps, Something More

by Keith SchneiderMay 11, 2014July 21, 20141

Pharrell Williams was born and raised in Virginia Beach, Virginia, where his friends and family knew from his earliest days as a percussionist in the school band, and his singing performances in school plays, that the artist with the top song on worldwide pop charts for the last 10 weeks would amount to something rare. Even before Pharrell posted the ‘Happy’ dance video last October, he’d won seven Grammy Awards for songwriting, production, and performance, …