This page was last updated on June 17, 2004.

Death watch; Editorial; Beaver County Times; June 10, 2004.

For a change, the TImes editorial board provides suggestions.  Much of the time the Times only bashes.

Unfortunately, the Times suggestions are tainted by the liberal beliefs of the editorial board.  Most of the suggestions rely on the notion that financial help is the major stumbling block and must come from the outside.  Aliquippa, or any other community, can't get back in its feet until its residents take full responsibility for the situation and do something about it themselves.

"Watching Aliquippa die is like having a beloved family member who is gravely ill.

"Surgery might save his life, but in your heart you know he will never recover from the cancer that has sapped his strength.  After all the pain and suffering from the disease and the surgery, he will be a shell of the person he once was.  His only chance of recovering fully is to have radical, experimental surgery.

"Aliquippa has reached that point.

"Last week, the city revised its Act 47 recovery plan to include a wage freeze for its 35 unionized workers.  Under the act, the city is required to have a recovery plan in place that outlines short- and long-term strategies for it to become fiscally stable.  The city has been operating under Act 47 since 1987.

[RWC] What difference does it make whether Aliquippa employees are unionized or not?  Would the wage freeze not be an issue if the employees were nonunion?

"Instead of pointlessly arguing about the past, the city's leaders and residents must look for radical solutions and partners - private and public - to help it get back on its feet.

"Here are some admittedly radical ideas for which the city would need outside help to implement:

• Petition the state to give it the power to abrogate quickly the rights of property owners and the money so Aliquippa can demolish blighted and tax-delinquent buildings.  All it takes are two or three blighted houses to make an entire block look bad.  Turn the vacant lots into off-street, residential parking lots.

[RWC] We need to watch out when someone proposes easing property rights laws.  Any new rules would need to make sure it isn't too easy for the government to take a person's property.

I don't like the parking lot idea.  Whether you call it a parking lot or a vacant lot, it can cause problems of its own.  It would be better to make the lot ready for building and keep it clean.  Only if prospects for sale are poor should parking lots or playgrounds be considered.  These uses would require maintenance expense by the borough.  (I know Aliquippa is technically a city, but I believe that designation is ridiculous given Aliquippa's population.  What's next, metroplex?)

The formation of neighborhood associations could also be beneficial.

• Work with lending institutions to set up separate very low-interest or no-interest loan programs for the purchase and renovation of homes in the city.  One problem Aliquippa (and many other older towns, for that matter) faces is that it has too many old homes that don't have the amenities that homebuyers are looking for. (Rental property would be excluded.)

[RWC] Who will subsidize these loans?  You can't expect the lending institutions to eat the difference between a low- or no-interest loan and the fair market rate.  Why exclude rental, or even business, property?  Wouldn't you want all property to be well maintained?

Instead of below-market loans, why not devise an incentive plan based on property tax rates?  For example, purchasing property would earn the owner a temporary reduction in property taxes.  The rate would gradually increase to the "full" rate over several years.  Likewise, qualifying property improvements would earn a temporary tax reduction.  This would facilitate ongoing property maintenance to make property falling into disrepair a little less likely.

The advantage of the tax abatement approach is that it doesn't require subsidies from outside the community.  It puts the responsibility on the citizens of Aliquippa, not on someone else.

• Seek corporate backers that would provide the funding to allow B.F. Jones Memorial Library, working in conjunction with the Aliquippa School District, to set up aggressive education outreach programs that start in infancy and extend through adolescence.

[RWC] It's fine to give money to libraries, but let libraries be libraries.  The object of this recommendation is a back door to government preschool and daycare and the resulting indoctrination.  Parents must take care of their children themselves.

• Tap religious organizations to provide funding that would allow the city's churches to establish after-school, evening and weekend activities for the children and teen-agers.

[RWC] Again, the Times is looking for someone to assume parental supervision responsibilities.  Don't get me wrong.  Occasional activities for children are great and I loved them as a kid, but they can't take the place of parental attention and supervision.  Why would the religious organizations need to provide funding?  Shouldn't parents be willing to pay for, or volunteer to help provide, activities?

• Have Aliquippa declared a school choice community and find pro-voucher backers to provide the needed funding.  This is no reflection on the job being done by the school district.  Its teachers, administration and school board are working as hard as they can to improve the district.  However, the sad reality is that many people won't buy homes in the city because of its schools.  Decoupling the two would eliminate that concern.

[RWC] This is amazing.  Dating back through 2002, the Times has published at least four relevant editorials and not one had a good thing to say about school choice and vouchers.

Why does the Times believe school vouchers will require more money?  A survey I did of local Catholic grade and high schools in 2003 showed their tuition was lower than the per-student expenditure of the Aliquippa School District.  Properly run, a voucher program would save the district money and/or provide more per-student funding for the students staying in the government schools.  Note, Catholic schools gladly accept non-Catholic students.  A 1999 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article said 10% of Pittsburgh Diocese enrollment was non-Catholic, with non-Catholic enrollment in some inner city schools approaching 95%.¹  The Tulsa Diocese reports non-Catholics represent 29.8% of its enrollment.

"The problem with all of these measures is that they require money, money and more money, which is the same problem that Aliquippa faces now.  To overcome that, the city can sell its recovery package as a grand experiment that could benefit other older communities.  The experiment might not work, but it's worth a shot."

[RWC] It's true the Times suggestions would "require money, money and more money," but that's because they are essentially socialist suggestions in a different wrapper.  I'm not saying some amount of money wouldn't hurt, but money isn't the solution.  Aliquippa needs to save itself, with only a little outside help.  A community that's been under Act 47 for 17 years doesn't sound like a community with the will to win, however.

1. Non-Catholic families are finding Catholic schools a blessing; Ann Rodgers-Melnick; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; August 23, 1999.

© 2004 Robert W. Cox, all rights reserved.