Yesterday, I opened my report on budget problems at my local community center. I showed that our local concerns were very much connected to global problems. Now I turn to how people took responsibility for the problems, or more accurately did not directly confront them, revealing a seamy side of politics as usual in America. The key figure is Town Supervisor Paul Feiner.
The supervisor was passionate about only one issue: the fact that there were inaccuracies on the unsigned flier announcing the meeting about proposed budget cuts of the Theodore D. Young Community Center. In Feiner’s response to the A&P closings in the primarily African American surrounding community and when it came to the budget of the center, he was the cool bureaucrat. He denounced the anonymous author of the flier, revealing real anger. On the defensive, he declared that the rumor that the center would close was absolutely not true. I was relieved. But when it came to details about the center’s budget, he was evasive, without passion, using clichés to deflect responsibility, stoking the anger of the community.
Feiner and the Town Board’s basic position: because of revenue short falls, the town was faced with a choice, there had to be either significant tax increases or program cuts to balance the budget. In order to rationally meet the challenge, the board was asking all the relevant commissioners to outline possible ways to cut programs. I am sure there was a target provided, but from the public discussion I didn’t catch it. The impact of proposed cuts would be weighed against their impact on programs by the board in the fall. Feiner emphasized that no program was being targeted and that the goal was to deliver lean and efficient good governance. Strikingly, he used procedure to evade answering any question about specific programs.
The seniors were particularly concerned about their group trips. The swim teams emphasized how important swimming was to them. A former director of the center reminded the board and the public that years ago she said that the building of a multi-million dollar multipurpose center for seniors, now completed, would ultimately lead to cuts at Theodore D. Young Community Center, threatening its existence. She resigned on this issue. Now the chickens apparently have come home to roost. A couple of women sitting next to me, told me that they go to both places, but there was little going on at the newer center. A local minister emphasized that the center is not a recreational facility, as it was called by town officials, but a community center, providing vital services for a community with pressing needs.
Feiner’s answer to all questions: no cuts have yet been made. All cuts would be proposed by the administrators of the town programs. All proposals would be appraised in the fall. The town board would decide then what combination of cuts and taxes would be passed, so it is silly to protest now. When concerns were heatedly expressed, it seemed that the board heard but did not listen. No commitments were made. No special appreciation of the community center was expressed. No bottom line, no guiding principles concerning the method of appraisal were revealed.
While it was good to see public officials meeting with the public about pressing issues, it was jarring to note that there was little or no give and take. Gestures were exchanged, but the words of the officials and the public expressed two competing positions that didn’t affect each other. There was no interaction between those who raised the issue of tough fiscal choices that have to be made and those who expressed pressing needs that had to be respected and taken into account, particularly as they were manifestations of long festering problems in the community and in American society at large, i.e. racism. Individual prejudice was not apparent, but the circumstances surrounding the proposed budget cuts and the closing of the A&P, both locally and nationally, appeared as a case study of institutionalized racism. Business as usual, political and economic, have a disproportionate impact on the African American community in Westchester County, without evil intent.
The public meeting concerning the budget cuts at the community center was a microcosm of a major crisis in our times. There was conflict here of a standard sort on the question of what goes into good governance, what are the responsibilities of government and how a community’s concerns should be discussed and addressed. The public officials appeared to give the impression that they were responding to the community, but when questioned no one took responsibility. There was a specific tragic dimension to this all. It is happening because there is now an irrational macroeconomic policy being pursued, cutting government budgets and programs in hard times when these programs are most needed for sound economic and social policy reasons, revealed in my home town. And there was the enduring racial dimension. Business as usual has a racist accent at the Theodore D. Young Community Center, and beyond.
This is a particularly sad story that is playing out in Jeff’s community. Perhaps institutionalized racism is at work, or it might be some sort of “classism.” It appears that Jeff’s community center is threatened and, the outcome is uncertain. I’m sure that a great deal of pain will be felt if it closed or consolidated with the newer one. Communities all across the United States are going through this type of trauma.
The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company (A&P) filed for bankruptcy protection on December 12, 2010, and is operating under Chapter 11 of bankruptcy law. The parent company of A&P also owns Pathmark, the Food Emporium, Waldbaum’s and Super Fresh. . As of September 11, 2010, they had $2.billion in assets and $3.3 billion in debt. They had difficulties meeting large interest payments on their loans, and a distributor who supplied about 70% of its inventory would not agree to continuing arrangements. They filed for protection in the Southern District of New York. JP Morgan Chase agreed to fund it during bankruptcy proceedings and restructuring being headed by Frederic F. Brace, chief restructuring officer who is charged by the courts with liquidating the company’s assets as efficiently as possible in order to be able to address a broad range of claims against the company. The company has tried to turn around its business, and has failed. Prior to bankruptcy filing, it has either closed or sold a number of stores. A&P has lost customers to lower-priced grocery alternatives such as Wal-Mart, Costco and Target. A&P labor costs have been described as high, and there have been concerns expressed about lack of work rule flexibility. The company’s purchase of Pathmark for $679 million dollars in 2007 added significant and apparently unsustainable debt. It is rumored that at least one foreign competitor is considering buying some of the company’s assets, aided by a relatively weak U. S. currency. My guess is that few if any companies would want to assume its labor obligations, so if there are sales, it will involve asset sales, and the acquiring companies will hire employees under their own terms and conditions.
“Classism” is a possible explanation for the store closings because those stores which have the most value will be the ones which ultimately survive. That is a function of both volume and margins. Those stores which sell more products and a better mix of higher value products which more affluent customers can afford are the ones which potentially have the highest value. Lower volumes and lower margins generally yield lower value.
This debt problem has severely impacted both the private and public sectors. In both cases, lives and livelihoods are negatively impacted, especially in the short term. The question remains will a good outcome from the private and public restructurings. Restructurings are preferable in my opinion to complete closures.
I live in a community which has done much of its governance in various forms of open meetings between town officials and citizens. It has been taking place for parts of two centuries. The meetings are frustrating, but citizens have a significant influence on governance. It is part of my community’s culture which has been challenged in recent years as old timers have left the community.
I’ve carried with me a Ugandan and Asian inspired saying for some time, “When elephants dance, the grass gets trampled.” There are a number of variations of this.
It is clear that people in Jeff’s community are being trampled by political, economic, social, cultural and other forces, as are many others all across the United States. I believe that this will continue to occur until policies are put in place to facilitate significant economic growth in the private sector. We need to grow the economic pie in order to share more of the value. There are major disagreements on how to achieve this. If the economic pie was substantially larger, chances are Jeff’s community center’s existence would not be threatened.
Yes, the tragedy of this situation has both race and class actors.And yes, economic growth would help solve the problem. But the government has an important role to play – to make sure that those who are disadvantaged because of class or racial reasons, shouldn’t drown in economic rough waters.Thus,given a choice between tax increases for the privileged and cutting programs that truly serve the needs of the less advantaged and those who have been systemically oppressed, tax increases are sensible. I hope this becomes clear for the society at large and for my hometown.
I agree, Jeff. Small-scale events often open windows into large-scale problems, and I think this is the case with the sentiments you describe. Here in Texas, for example,many people are worried about the massive cuts on education currently being debated, which will, of course, affect people with fewer resources. I want to believe that no crass racist intentions underpin in any of this, but these sorts of decisions result in crass racist outcomes nonetheless, outcomes that in fact are expected as a matter of course.
Rafael, yes. You have just succinctly defined institutionalized racism. I hesitated using the “r” word, because I see very little explicit racism at my center, and the members of the town board, including Feiner are not racists. But there are racist consequences evident in Texas, as you point out, and in New York, as I see it. This is even more the case in Washington D.C. with the ridiculous attacks on sound social programs that won’t have any effect on the long term deficit.
Yes, Jeff. What your community is experiencing is echoing throughout the country and becoming the norm: Wisconsin, Texas (as Rafael points out), education, workers in Ohio (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/16/us/16ohio.html. The more despairing side to me agrees with Paul Krugman who recently wrote about our “Shock Doctrine” moment (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/25/opinion/25krugman.html?scp=1&sq=paul%20krugman%20shock%20doctrine&st=cse.
The more patient side to me is reminded that the public sphere, as described by Arendt, presupposes a “viewer”. My hope is that the citizens who showed up at your meeting, the parents at my local school, and the multitudes in Wisconsin and elsewhere are watching, listening, and making sense of the parts and wholes that define our current moment. It is our only hope.
The powerless throughout the country are being asked, or more properly forced, to bear a disproportionate cost for a problem that was, by and large, not of their making. As Regina point out, given that this is a widespread problem, there is thus a fate being shared by many, therefore the potential for a social movement to develop, a counterpoint to the Tea Party one might hope.
Organizing is the key here, and though I don’t imagine there will be many billionaires that would lend their financial support to such a populist uprising, I think there could be sufficient support from a progressive community that is perhaps disenchanted with Obama, but, at the same time, reluctant to really come out and express their frustration with him. Perhaps developments like what Dr. Goldfarb described, as much as they are becoming the norm, could be the tipping point.