Wanted: young families

[cannon_fodder]

WSJ article with an interesting conclusion:  cities wasted the 1990's and thus far in the 2000's trying to attract the single young professionals.  Inevitably they will choose the hippest location and do good for the economy, but shortly down the road they will get married.  MOST, when it comes time to start a family, flee the hipster destinations.

When they flee they are riding high on their income curve and now have a joint income (more disposable income).  They start families and need bigger houses and tons of baby products.  They want yards, cheaper living, and safe streets to come home to.  They need some entertainment, good schools, and destinations for weekend trips.

The cities that can attract those people will garner residents for the prime of their lives and perhaps into their retirement.  

Are you seeing what I'm getting at here?
http://opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110010911

[Renaissance]

Completely agree with the premise of the article.  Also see what you're getting at: this can and should be Tulsa's niche.  In my mind, at least, the young married professional cohort still certainly fits under the "YP" umbrella, and is the most important demographic that Tulsa can appeal to.  This is why it is vital that Tulsa improve its center in a way that is appealing to families.  This includes parks, gathering places, shopping, and family-friendly dining and recreation.

Perhaps an improved Riverparks, complete with a Tulsa Landing, as well as a new Driller's Stadium downtown could satisfy this.  As well as good streets and low crime, of course.

Or, we could just let Jenks provide all of that and, as the article says, just "deal with the fact that people with six year olds keep moving to the suburbs."

[TheArtist]

This says it nicely..."Boosters such as Mr. Levy look increasing towards reviving the traditional family neighborhoods which surround Center City. His organization has worked closely with local public and private schools, church and civic organizations to build up the support structures that might convince today's youthful inner city urbanites to remain as they start families. "Our agenda," Mr. Levy says, "has to change. We have to look at the parks, the playgrounds and the schools"

I have always touted Tulsa having a mix of environments. We need to offer great lifestyle examples for all stages of a persons life and desires. We cant really grow the suburban neighborhood model anymore but we can improve our inner city neighborhoos, schools, etc. Having good examples of safe pleasing urban neighborhoods will be a way for Tulsa itself to compete a bit with the suburbs for that demographic.

My sister and her husband followed the trend in the article. When dating age they lived in those little houses near the "trendy" areas and also liked being able to go to the "watering holes". We still need to have those areas and grow them so our young will stay in Tulsa and we will be able to attract them. Along with having good full blown colleges.

Once they had their first kid, they have now moved to south Tulsa near Jenks.

But they do say how they long to live back in mid-town and have looked at places like Jamie is building in the Pearl.

There are actually 2 very different demographics that like urban, walkable districts, the young and the empty nesters who are downsizing and want a more active lifestyle in a pleasing environment. The areas they may choose may be different, Brookside versus around Utica Square, but often overlap and have similarities.

We have to regrow and offer good urban neighborhoods and leave the suburban growth to the suburbs.  

We are lucky imo to have booming suburbs. They will feed into Tulsa the next generation of young people who want to move to college and the "big city" bustle and dating life. And our suburbs are close enough to the inner city to be easily accessible for work commutes.

Basically, you cant go wrong with doing the basics right. Walkable streets and development, good schools including colleges, keep down the crime, an eye toward a beautiful environment, appropritate building use and looks (zoning), parks, art, infrastructure,, then things will take care of themselves. The city will sell itself and grow. No real need to worry about particular demographics. Do the basics right and every demographic will like it.  Forget the demographics, focus on an attractive living environment.

[PonderInc]

Whenever I talk to people to try to understand why they want to live in places like Owasso, they inevitably say: "affordable housing" and "good schools."  This is the mantra that everyone repeats until they believe it's true.  Of course, I think that "affordable housing" typically equates to "cheap construction" ...and the cost of commuting--purchasing/maintaining multiple cars, gas, auto insurance--for every member of the family offsets any perceived savings on house payments.  (I also tend to think that "good schools" is often a code word for "mostly white."  But that's another story...)

While the suburban schools certainly dedicate millions to athletic facilities, I don't know for sure that the schools themselves are necessarily better.  I know one kid who's incredibly bright, but who, after taking several years of a foreign language at one of those "better schools" (and making straight A's) couldn't translate a simple sentence into that language.  Of course, this is just one example.  

At the same time, Tulsa has got to figure out a way to get a qualified school superintendent.  Perhaps I'm being overly judgemental when I say that we should demand someone who can speak in complete sentences using correct English grammer.  (A grasp of subject/verb agreement is one of my prerequisites for President of the United States and school superintendents...currently, neither office-holder qualifies...)

Hey, I've got the solution!  Merge the Union School District back into Tulsa...and keep their superintendent.  Then we can bring all that Tulsa money back into the Tulsa School District where it belongs!  

And then we can proudly tell everyone that Tulsa is a great place to live, and has good schools, too!

[swake]

The schools issue is overblown. 1/3 of Tulsa is in the Jenks, Union and Bixby school districts. Booker T and Edison are highest rated public high schools in the state other than the statewide gifted school. There are a couple of really good public charter schools and a lot of good private schools as well. Schools are struggling in the poorer areas in north and east Tulsa where parents are often not as involved with the schools. This is not unique to Tulsa, urban schools across the nation have these same problems.

Tulsa's loss of population issue is overblown too. We lost some population during an economic crisis earlier this decade, but that trend has already reversed itself. Today the real issue is that the city of Tulsa is has little developable land and an aging population so population growth is slow. Are you going to force empty nesters out of their homes so that more families can move in? Overall the city has probably had positive annual population growth in 13 of the last 17 years. With all the new growth on the west side today Tulsa is nearing Broken Arrow on the number of new homes built annually.

There are areas of the city (and this is true of any large city) where the schools struggle, where crime is bad and where kids are in danger. The city and schools should address these areas but this is far from the norm in the city. There is no huge glut of homes on the market, no large amount of abandoned homes, no huge loss of population, no crisis in home prices (unlike much of the rest of the nation). The student population of Tulsa Public Schools is no dropping, in fact it has been slowly rising.

Tulsa has some budgetary issues as the costs to provide services rise and sales taxes that used to be captured from suburban dwellers often are collected on goods bought in the suburbs instead of in the city. Sales tax free internet purchases also hurt. Tulsa still collects substantially more sales taxes per capita than Oklahoma City. There are issues that need to be addressed with regards to how all cities are funded in Oklahoma but this is a governmental problem and hardly a crisis for the health of the city overall.

If the cities budget issues can be addressed which will help our marginally high crime rate and the condition of city streets I think most people would say the city is doing very, very well. Jobs are up, income is up, population is up a little in the city and up pretty well outside the city.

[Double A]

quote:Originally posted by swake

Booker T and Edison are highest rated public high schools in the state other than the statewide gifted school.

Ahem, forget about TSAS? They have the third highest ACT composite average in the state and are second highest in the Tulsa area with End of Instruction (EOI) results of satisfactory or better.

[swake]

quote:Originally posted by Double A

quote:Originally posted by swake

Booker T and Edison are highest rated public high schools in the state other than the statewide gifted school.

Ahem, forget about TSAS? They have the third highest ACT composite average in the state and are second highest in the Tulsa area with End of Instruction (EOI) results of satisfactory or better.

I mentioned Charter Schools, of which TSAS is one, correct?

[TheArtist]

Often to its just the perception of a neighborhood. A new one in the suburbs seems to be safer, just plain looks nicer because its new, has more young people like yourself there (the demographics), a new home has its own appeal aka. no fixing up, style is whats "in", etc. A neighborhood that is perceived as desirable withing the inner city is often more expensive than one in the suburbs, so cost can play a factor.

As for the schools, again some of it is perception, some demographics. One thing you will begin to notice is how Glenpool is beginning to grow now. Their school district ranks very low on the rankings I have seen. People said everyone was moving to Jenks because of the schools. The fact that as the lemings move south, the flow of development in that direction is now just naturally also going to Glenpool and you cant say its because of their schools.  BUT their schools will get better simply because the demographics of the people moving to the area and the children/students that come with that demographic, will make better grades...the schools test scores etc. will show that improvement. Soon Glenpools over all test scores and academics will become better and you will hear that everyone moved and is moving there because of the schools. But remember how it started.    

Its a combination of perception, cost, and demographics. Those are difficult things to change because each one highly influences the other.