Can St. Louis Compete? A Truly Depressing Series From The Post-Dispatch

Despite the tone of some of my posts, I do not hate St. Louis.  I actually LOVE the region and raising my children here.  However, I've seen the area decline in so many ways that it pains me to think about what will become of the region if something doesn't change, and soon.  That's why I think making transit a priority is important.  That's why I think funding our schools is important.  And that's why I share this story from the March 28th St. Louis Post-Dispatch

 The sign posted on the side of the former Chrysler plant in Fenton boasts 5 million square feet for sale.

Can St. Louis compete?

By Tim Logan

ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH

Sunday, Mar. 28 2010

> First of a three-part series

For a long time, St. Louis has been falling behind.

You know the story. The long, slow drift from grand Gateway to the West to the
faded outpost of flyover country. The shuttered factories and the departed
corporate headquarters. The bleeding away of the best and the brightest.

It's almost a cliché.

But it is true. And it is real. And it is threatening to get worse.

As we turn the corner out of the Great Recession and into whatever new economy
comes next, our region is struggling to keep up. Our population is growing
slowly. Our work force is aging rapidly. And we have a hard time cultivating
the sort of innovators, entrepreneurs and bright minds who will build the
economy of the future.

These challenges are not new. But facing them is more important than ever if
our region hopes to grow in the years to come.

For we are no longer just competing with Memphis or Milwaukee for jobs and
economic relevance. We are competing with Rio and Bangalore and Guangzhou. And
to compete, we need a world-class work force, the sort of people who can make
sure that the ideas that drive the new global economy are conceived and carried
out here, not halfway across the world.

"People with just a high school degree aren't going to cut it anymore," said
Richard Longworth, a fellow at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and author
of a book on the Midwest in the global economy. "Those jobs are gone."

TALENT DEFICIENCIES

When it comes to the size and skill of our work force, St. Louis is slipping on
several fronts:

— If current trends hold, our working-age population will soon begin to shrink,
and will decline by 85,000 between 2018 and 2028, leaving 5 percent fewer St.
Louisans to power area companies and compete with faster-growing cities.

— Our high school dropout rate is among the highest in the nation. One in eight
students region-wide drops out at some point in high school, according to data
compiled by the East-West Gateway Council of Governments.

— Although the region is adding college graduates, it is doing so at a slower
pace than many other places, especially among young adults who are deciding
where to launch a career. One-third of St. Louisans age 25 to 34 have at least
a bachelor's degree, compared with 48 percent in Washington and 53 percent in
Boston.

These trends have direct, measurable costs, said Joe Cortright, a Portland,
Ore.-based economist who studies work force and regional economies. Such trends
slow growth. They dampen productivity. And they can deter big companies from
locating in St. Louis and small ones from growing here.

"Employers are increasingly putting emphasis on their ability to find and
attract talented employees," Cortright said. "They tend to grow more in places
where those people are easier to find."

He even puts a number on it, a figure he calls a "talent dividend."

Research, said Cortright, shows a clear link between a region's rate of college
graduates and its economic health. Boosting the percentage of St. Louisans with
bachelor's degrees by 1 percentage point would generate an additional $2.1
billion a year in economic activity. That's $746 per person.

DEAL FALLS THROUGH

Richard Fleming cast the problem in another light: in terms of jobs that didn't
come here.

As president of the Regional Chamber and Growth Association, Fleming spent a
year just before the recession trying to woo a major employer to open a data
center. Fleming wouldn't name the firm, but said it was "a Fortune 50" company
that wanted to hire 1,500 people at good wages. Forty cities wanted the
facility, and the company narrowed it down to two finalists — St. Louis and
Raleigh, N.C.

The firm's consultants recommended St. Louis, Fleming said. But the company was
worried about the region's slow growth, concerned that it couldn't get the
workers here it would need over the years to come.

"Perception became reality," Fleming said. "And we lost the deal."

Whether real or perceived, the importance of talent is hardly a new idea.
Cities have been trying to cultivate it for a long time.

But that effort has taken on a new urgency in a global economy where anything
that can be done more cheaply somewhere else probably will be. Economic growth,
the thinking goes, lies in doing what no one else can. And that takes brains.

Compounding the urgency for St. Louis is the long, grinding recession, which
has wiped out nearly 60,000 jobs here in the past two years, including those of
many highly skilled professionals at companies such as Anheuser-Busch InBev,
Macy's and KV Pharmaceutical. Those are 60,000 people who could leave the
region for greener pastures, and take their skills with them.

So far, there has been little of that kind of movement — the recession is
hitting hard just about everywhere. But as the recovery takes hold, many
experts expect that to change; high-skilled workers will flow to the places
with good jobs.

RETENTION WORK

Keeping skilled workers from flowing out of St. Louis is a full-time job for
Blair Forlaw.

She oversees talent development programs for the RCGA, which, Fleming said, has
stepped up its focus in those areas since losing that data center. Forlaw leads
an effort to help laid-off information technology workers find new jobs in St.
Louis. And after Pfizer, a major pharmaceutical company, said last fall that it
will cut nearly 700 jobs in Chesterfield, she is helping to launch a similar
effort to keep science workers here.

With Pfizer's cuts, there will be roughly 2,200 scientists and skilled
technical workers who have been idled in St. Louis since the start of 2009,
Forlaw said. If the region hopes to keep growing its biotech and medical
industries, keeping them in town is essential.

"These folks who are being let go, they have not only skills but experience,"
she said. "We don't want to be in a position of having lost them, and then
trying to bring in companies that need that kind of talent."

The science-worker program is just starting, and it got an early boost from an
unrelated decision by St. Louis University to hire 12 former Pfizer employees
for a new health research center. But the RCGA program will focus mainly on
connecting the jobless with companies, or startups in need of talent, and on
helping people shift into new science-related industries. Anything to put them
to work here.

"This is all about the economic strength and vitality of the region," Forlaw
said.

And these high-skilled workers will generate more than just high-end jobs.
Their ideas will provide a range of opportunity for others, said Roderick Nunn,
vice chancellor for work force development at St. Louis Community College.

"Look at Austin, Seattle, the Research Triangle. You see a cluster of highly
trained professionals, and a lot of other jobs being created," Nunn said. "For
every scientist, you've got to have lab techs. For every surgeon, there are
nurses and aides."

SEEDS FOR SUCCESS

These sorts of workers are the people most likely to launch innovative
startups, or use their talent to help small firms grow. This, too, generates
jobs.

Startups may not make as big a splash as luring a corporate headquarters or an
auto plant, but there is far less competition to attract them, said Longworth,
of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. And once established in St. Louis,
startups are more likely to plant deep roots.

"We're not talking about landing a Fortune 500 company," he said. "We're
talking about launching 500 little companies and hoping some of them grow."

That has been the recipe for some of the region's most-touted success stories,
such as World Wide Technology, a supply-chain management firm that has grown in
20 years from startup to $2.2 billion in revenue; or Express Scripts, which has
become one of the largest pharmacy-benefit management companies in the U.S. But
all sorts of cities are trying to attract the kind of people behind companies
such as those. And there are only so many to go around.

Many regions, including St. Louis, have poured millions of dollars into
amenities — from parks to loft apartments to event centers — designed to
attract footloose young talent. Results have been decidedly mixed, and skeptics
abound.

What really draws talent, Longworth argues, is opportunity. Smart people want
to use their brains and will go where their talents can be rewarded. No amount
of amenities will change that.

"It takes more than bicycle paths and coffee shops," he said. "You need jobs."

Its Gonna Hit The Fan This Time

A new film from Michael Moore is coming on October 2.

I know he can go a bit over the top, but this looks like it could be a solid piece of filmmaking.

For the record, I'm not getting compensated in any way for posting this, I just think its an important film from someone I admire. This is part of the film's PR push:

"It's got it all -- lust, passion, romance, and 14,000 jobs being eliminated every day.” - Michael Moore

CAPITALISM: A LOVE STORY tackles an issue Michael Moore has been examining throughout his career: the disastrous impact of corporate dominance on the everyday lives of Americans
(and by default, the rest of the world). But this time the culprit is much bigger than General Motors, and the crime scene far wider than Flint, Michigan. From Middle America, to the halls of power in Washington, to the global financial epicenter in Manhattan, Michael Moore will once again take filmgoers into uncharted territory.

Here's the trailer:


Purely personal opinion, but I'm looking forward to seeing the film. I've seen the mess we're in through by own eyes, I'm anxious to see it through Michael Moore's.

PRAISE FOR METRO ST. LOUIS!

Its no secret that I've been more than a little bit critical of Metro, the St. Louis public transit system, for their incomprehensible lack of decent management and horrendous service cuts. The cuts have made thousands of people in the St. Louis region change their commuting habits, and many even change their jobs.

I won't rehash old posts, but I've written below about the tremendous efforts of the Mayor and staff of the city of Chesterfield, MO to get service restored to that suburb. For that I am eternally grateful. Now comes word from Metro that
a significant amount of bus service is likely to be restored in August of this year.

Assuming Missouri Governor Jay Nixon finds the bill on the pile of unsigned laws on his desk and signs it in the near future, about a third of the bus service that was slashed earlier this year will be returned.

It ain't over til its over, but it looks like Metro has worked hard to get the money they need and put it where its most needed. I applaud them on their efforts and only hope everything goes as planned.

Of course, the situation will be updated here.

The Austin Model-Polar Opposite of St. Louis

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3fUkvuvFHg&feature=channel_page

Clicking on the above video will take you to its YouTube site. You can also click on the headline to be taken to the video. Sorry, embedding of this video has been disabled, but I assure you its worth watching.

Submitted for your approval (sorry Rod) a commercial from candidate for Mayor of Austin, Texas Brewster McCracken. In this spot, the candidate takes an objective look at the CITY of St. Louis and how it went from boomtown to laughingstock. His message? Don't let what happened to St. Louis happen to Austin.

McCracken is spot on. The CITY of St. Louis has been allowed to die because of petty politics, a complete lack of vision for the region, and denying its residents essential services like well paved streets, decent schools, and functioning public transit.

As you can imagine, the locals here are up in arms about this shot at St. Louis. They're hurt, and I don't blame them. Its harsh, but its completely true.

St. Louis is the poster child of how to kill a city's soul, drive the people and businesses you need to thrive to the suburbs (where I live and could not be happier), and have city and county leadership spending too much time at the baseball stadium (with the vacant lot next door that was supposed to be a multi million dollar shopping/office/residential mecca in time for July's All Star Game) and not enough time looking around to see what a mess they've made or thinking of realistic ways to improve the quality of life in the region.

I don't know anything about Brewster McCracken. Wait, I do know ONE thing. He's got a better view of the sorry state of St. Louis than the people running our region do. Maybe our local leaders will take a minute, watch this commercial, and ponder what they've done to the once grand CITY of St. Louis.

Perhaps during the seventh inning stretch?

Metro Discovers It Has A PR Problem (DUH)

I've got to hand it to the fine people at Metro, the public transit agency in St. Louis.

I won't go into all the farces and fiascoes they've been responsible for lately, you can read them on earlier blog posts. But I've got to give them the award for UNDERSTATEMENT OF THE DECADE in Friday's article from The St. Louis Beacon. You can click on the headline to read the whole story about their budget problems and how the State of Missouri is going to ride in (presumably NOT on a bus) with twenty million bucks to bail them out. But if you go down to the bottom of the story, you see Metro's solution to one of the worst Public Relations practices in the Universe:

Making the case to the Public

Although 486 positions --- mostly bus drivers --- have been cut, Metro is trying to do some "resource shifting" to add a person to help bring the agency into the new technological age.

"Metro is behind the curve on new media," Metro spokeswoman Dianne Williams said. It’s not a question of preserving a bus driver instead of adding a public relations person. That person could assist "in bringing back enough money to put a whole lot more than one bus driver back on the street," she said.

"Everyone tells us we've got to get out in the community and tell the people our story," Baer said. Instead of using volunteers, "I don't think it's unreasonable to add one new media person," he added.

"We're looking at improving our public relations with the community," Klevorn said.

REALLY? YOU THINK?

If Metro had the slightest clue how to communicate with the public, both its customers and (more importantly) the people who can help fund their operation, they might not be in the horrific mess they've put themselves in.

But the Big Guy at Metro, Robert Baer remains clueless. Must be busy working on May's half hour update to the world.

Oh and Bob, thanks for not responding to my e mail of my last post. THAT'S the kind of "Public Relations" that keeps Metro so in touch with the community.

ST. LOUIS METRO AT ITS FINEST

As a media consumer and media professional, I've always been of the belief that brevity is key in communicating a message. Obviously, the good people at Metro, the agency responsible for the transit disaster in St. Louis, missed that memo.

Submitted for your approval and available by clicking the headline on this post, the newly posted Metro Customer Focus for April 2009.

Where do I begin to discuss the faults with this attempt to tell their tale of woe by FINALLY trotting our their President and CEO to talk about everything they're trying to do to get transit service restored to St. Louis?

Here are a few observations:

• THE VIDEO IS 24 MINUTES AND 26 SECONDS LONG. Mind you, that's less than the time between most bus service in St. Louis, but its FAR too long to hold even the most interested person's attention so whatever messages are supposed to be communicated are lost in the blur of the diatribe.
• Someone at Metro or their overpaid production company found the new technology called STEREO for this presentation! You get to hear the Metro Director of Communications asking questions in the right speaker and the Boss answering them in the left speaker. Let's hope everyone watching on their computer has two good working speakers so they can enjoy the miracle of binural sound.
• There's no transcript of ability to download the unnecessarily long video, so if you have a life or can't plant yourself for 24:26, you're out of luck.

Again, Metro shows its true inability to connect with the rest of the free world by trying to get their message out, but in a completely ineffective way. How much did the production, hosting, and bandwidth cost, and will they see any kind of ROI? Could the money be used somewhere else, like getting people to ride the nearly empty busses they've put into my part of the St. Louis area?

I pray that their efforts to make operating funds come from the State and Federal governments are just a little bit better thought out than this, another classic Metro public relations fiasco.

LAST MINUTE DEAL SAVES SOME WEST COUNTY BUS SERVICE

From stltoday.com:

Metro OKs buses to job centers
By Ken Leiser
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
03/27/2009

Buses will continue to roll to employment centers in the Chesterfield Valley through the end of the year under a tentative agreement announced today.

Massive service cuts will take effect on Monday and were to cut off bus service west of Interstate 270. But Chesterfield Mayor John Nations today pledged more than $173,000 to create a new route that will reach employers along the Highway 40 corridor.

That will represent the local match for a federal job access and reverse commute grant, said Metro Ray Friem, Metro's senior vice president for transit operations. Fare collections will cover the remainder of the cost.

Metro's board of commissioners authorized its top executive, Bob Baer, to negotiate details of the agreement with Chesterfield and others who are working to maintain bus service to far west St. Louis County through Dec. 31.

"Public transportation is an extremely important element of building a good business climate and consequently creating a good quality of life," Nations told reporters after today's Metro Board of Commissioners meeting.

The new route would begin at the Clayton MetroLink station, then go to the Ballas bus transfer center and points west along Highway 40.

Nations said there are 26,000 jobs in Chesterfield alone and public transportation is "an integral part" of that effort. It is critical to the nursing homes, hospitals and service sectors.

Chesterfield's pledge could include a mix of public and private money from businesses that have so far agreed to cover part of the cost, Nations said. Businesses may wind up funding the entire local share.

Some Metro commissioners expressed concerns about authorizing the 11th-hour deal without all of the specifics in hand. But others said it was important to prevent a disruption in bus service to parts of the region.

Metro, the region's largest transit agency, will dramatically scale back the reach of its bus system - wiping out two dozen bus routes and modifying others. Beginning Monday, service will be suspended to 2,300 of the 9,000 bus stops and bus shelters in the Missouri half of Metro's system.
MetroLink trains will run less frequently on both sides of the Mississippi River during peak commute periods.
Buses and trains that remain are expected to be more crowded.

This is significantly less service than there is today, but it is service that will reach the retail centers, nursing homes, and hospitals that were about to be cut off from public transit.

I applaud the hard work of The City of Chesterfield and especially Libbey Malberg, the city's Assistant City Administrator for Community Services & Economic Development. This is a rare example of a city government (Chesterfield, NOT St. Louis) working hard and committing resources in order to maintain jobs and quality of life for its citizens.

Of course, Metro has not posted official word of this deal or released the final route map and schedules. If this route starts Monday, they've got some quick work to do, something they aren't always known for.

In any event, this is a little victory, and for that I am thankful.

ST. LOUIS PUBLIC TRANSIT TO BE WORSE THAN BEIRUT

AS WITH ALL POSTS ABOUT THE PUBLIC TRANSIT SITUATION IN ST. LOUIS, THESE COMMENTS ARE PURELY PERSONAL OPINION AND NOT CONNECTED IN ANY WAY WITH MY EMPLOYMENT OR EMPLOYER.

Monday, March 30 is the day that the St. Louis region regresses to the Stone Age in terms of its public transit system, or lack thereof.

The March 22nd St. Louis Post-Dispatch has two well written articles about the situation. The first story, which the graphic comes from, is an overview of the transit changes to come. Story number two looks at the way regular people will be affected by the changes.

A peek at my previous posts will make my thoughts on how we were forced into this service reduction plan clear, so I won't waste bandwidth repeating them here. I urge you to look at those posts to get some background on this horrific situation.

Yes, as a visually handicapped person, I am directly affected by these changes since I don't drive and Metro is cutting any buses that come near me on March 30th. I've been fortunate enough to be included in meetings and communications about Metro's overtures to return service to the Chesterfield Valley, an important business destination, and some of the nursing homes in my area that rely on bus riders for employment.

Metro's publicized that they want to do everything they can to help restore the service, they've just forgotten to mention to the public that they've asked the businesses and governments in the West St. Louis County area for $300,000 to start the greatly reduced route and keep it running until the end of the year. They've also not mentioned that there will be at least a $600,000 shortfall should that service extend into 2010, and that's ONLY assuming they get a million dollars in Federal matching funds and $400,000 in farebox revenue. So yes, they've offered to help, but in today's economy, it seems fairly safe to assume that the resumption of service is a longshot at best. I think I'd rather bet on the St. Louis Rams to win the 2010 Super Bowl.

Forget my personal situation. I'll figure out how to get to work. I'm every bit as concerned about the long term impact these changes are about to have on the St. Louis region. Here's the bottom line. St. Louis becomes a THIRD class mass transit region on March 30th. Metro's years of mismanagement, the horrendous Prop M campaign orchestrated by St. Louis County Executive Charlie Dooley and his cronies, and lack of honest public education about the economic impact of a horrid public transit system will converge into a perfect storm that will put people out of work, leave employers scrambling to find workers-even in this recession, and make anyone looking to expand or bring a business to St. Louis think twice.

I've said in other forums that St. Louis has a worse public transit system than Beirut. Here's proof.

I've had a number of conversations with senior Metro staffers about this situation, and it does seem that they do have real sympathy for the individuals about to the stranded and the huge hit the already staggering St. Louis economy is about to take. They had a plan to essentially launder Federal Highway Administration money and get their hands on it for operating revenue, but the Feds saw right through that and stopped it. They say they're still working on ways to increase service, and if nothing else they're putting another tax increase on the ballot in April, 2010. However, anything they do at this point to address the problems they've gotten themselves into over the years is far too little, and far too late.

We as citizens of the St. Louis region should be embarrassed and ashamed of our "leaders" and the Metro Board Of Commissioners for letting this happen.

GUEST POST-ARE YOU HAPPY OR CONTENT?

I came across this well crafted essay from one of the media industry's most gifted researchers, Bob Lawrence, the President of Pinnacle Media Worldwide and thought it just had to be shared.

ARE YOU "HAPPY" OR "CONTENT"?

Where do we go from here? We look around around and see some of the most wonderfully, talented people out of work; people who could really make a positive difference for so many struggling radio stations. As a result, many of us are working even harder to take up the slack. The truth is though, that the product is not at the forefront of everyone's mind and we can't really blame anyone. Everyone is very much in the same situation; survival mode! I am about to tell you somethings you no doubt, already know, but do you keep them with you as life's trump card?

The stress levels in every area from programming to sales seem to be at an all time high and all are looking for a big miracle. We're even making deals with God. "Ok, Lord... we've learned our lesson and we promise to never allow ourselves to get in this terrible situation again... Now, will you please fix it for us?" I am a believer and I have strong faith. I also believe in miracles, but I believe that God gives us what we need rather than what we want and frankly, what we need this time is probably not what we want. What's needed just may be a good dose of reality!

No matter where in the world you live and work, we are all blessed, or "lucky" if you prefer. What we do tend to forget however, is that doesn't imply we have everything we want, nor does it suggest that we'll all be healthy, wealthy, and wise. It seems to me that we all must realize that being "content" isn't always synonymous with being "happy". I only learned recently to try being content with what I have, rather than what I don't have. No one says we have to like everything in life, either personally or professionally, but we can be "content" with it all. There are certainly lessons to be learned from our successes, as well as the trials. How we look at the place we are in life will help us learn and move to whatever is next.

My wife noted just a week ago, one evening when out to dinner, "When you were building your business, you seemed under such great stress. You were always on the road and disconnected from our family." She went on to add, "Today, when things are harder" (and it is harder for us too; perhaps even more so), "you seem more at ease and are leaning more on us then before." Wow! What an epiphany and what a blessing! Things were better professionally and business was very good - but the cost was a sacrifice for my family.

You have no doubt heard the following expressions... but do we live them?

"If there were no valleys there would be no beautiful mountains."
"If the rocks were smooth, we would never be able to climb them."
"If not for the rain, how would we appreciate the sunshine?"
(Ask San Diegans about that last one. We only get nine inches of rain a year, so when it comes, we love it!)


You get the point. While we sometimes find it so difficult to navigate through the tough times, it certainly gives us an appreciation for the good ones. Think back to the late 90's when we all experienced double-digit growth beyond what we thought possible? Did we learn from that and did anyone really think it would last forever? They called it all a bubble for a reason... they burst!

In the last several years, we have seen a good deal of thievery, deceit, lying, underhandedness, and shady business practices by many, only to fill their pockets, while good, honest people have paid a serious price. I heard someone recently say, "Money can't buy happiness, but it sure can help rent it for a while." I thought about that for a moment before realizing that this sort of thinking is what pulls us down the old rabbit hole. The truth is that money will never create happiness, nor even rent it for a short time. As trite as it sounds, happiness comes from within.

Are you content? I hope so, because of this I am certain... neither money, nor a flourishing business will make you happy. Your faith, your spouse, your children, your friends... only the relationships in your life will bring happiness. Liam Neeson was on the set of a new picture just Monday, for no doubt a proverbial boatload of money, when he rushed to be with his wife, actress Natasha Richardson. Sadly, she passed away Wednesday evening as a result of what at first, appeared to be a minor fall on a beginner skip slope in Canada. You can be sure that the academy award winning actor would gladly give it all up, if only...

I know we all do what we have to do. I'm not implying it should, or can be any other way. What I am suggesting is that it doesn't have to consume us and make us miserable. Ok - none of us probably have as much money as we had five years ago, or perhaps even a year ago, but we can still be content. No matter what, we will always have all the wonderful relationships and friendships that have been nurtured over a lifetime. It's only when we learn to be content, regardless of the prize in the end, that we can see the true reward of the blessings in all those things we already have.

Thanks to Bob for sharing. Definitely something to think about in these insane times. You can find out more about Bob and his company by clicking the link at the top of the post.

A Prophetic Look Back

I'm no fan of Osama Bin Laden, so please don't think of this as any kind of an endorsement of him or his actions.


That being said, I found an interesting story on Brian Sullivan's FriendFeed that was just plain eerie. Click the link above and read a story from CNN on November 1, 2004.


You think someone should have paid more attention to that story when it ran? W? Dick? Donald?

Maybe you don't have to fly planes into buildings to bring a country to its collective knees.