Last night, I attended my first meeting as a new member of my city's Community Development Block Grant committee. The mayor chose me as his representative because, as he put it, I've got a head on my shoulders - heaven knows I'll still need to wrestle the learning curve of our county's red tape. With any luck, bureaucratic navigation will be left to some of the oldhands who have been at this task for two decades.
"Community development" is self-explanatory: it's the use of taxpayer funds on which most people, left or right, can at least generally agree. This system invites cities in the Greater Cleveland area to bid competitively for local funds to drive projects aiding deserving parties such as the low-to-middle-income demographic. Cities may provide justification for up to two proposals and one master plan; the county's selection committee judges proposals on a point-based scale that values proximity to recipients, overall impact, need and - occasionally - civic creativity. Cities scoring the highest receive money from a grant pool for one project and, if proposed and costs oblige, a master plan. (Cities can hypothetically juggle as many chainsaws as they wish, but need matches from other grant sources.) County taxes are high but even Democrats know when to cork the barrel; the pool is finite and competition is quite real.
Sometimes a bit contentious, too. As you'd expect, the county seat is Cleveland; Cleveland's politics and status as an Entitlement City often influence the outcome of bids and the flow of cash. To be fair, some of the cleaner suburbs don't have much to claim in the way of "slum and blight" - better to have good neighborhoods and no need for reconstruction. And you'd expect an appreciably large city with a dynastic party machine to push its weight around. As the committee's chair explained to us last night, however, the county has been moving away from traditional mortar-and-brick projects and embracing modern objectives such as ADA initiatives and considerations for the elderly. Every city has an aging population and needs to care for them; my city in particular is noted state-wide for a shuttle-bus system for senior citizens, and has been pioneering a year-round center for the mentally handicapped.
Word on the grapevine is that we had all of our ducks in a row last year for additions on the facility for the handicapped but were denied a grant by a sliver of points on somewhat captious grounds. Now, the county has certainly delivered fairly to us in the past and - let's face it - scoring by points is scoring by points; if "close" counted, the standard would be wrecked. But the rejection was surprising, if not disheartening.
What it managed to provoke was a faint, Rocky Balboa-like determination in the tenor of the meeting that may very well carry through the committee's deliberation, review and recommendations over the next few months: a discreet undercurrent of WE WAS ROBBED. Very discreet. With worthwhile projects and justification to match, we'll win our share soon enough. I look forward to participating in this.