What one thing would you be willing to do to improve the blight in less afluent neighborhoods?

Question

Look at the worst area in your town or city, If there was one thing that you would be willing to do to help it make a comeback what would it be? Then tell me if you are or are not doing it and why.

I am glad you turned your answer back on me Missipik. Personaly I am willing to and have done things in the past to help revitalize neighborhoods. Your narrow comment is why I asked the question. I personaly have at this time a plan being made to do a can and bottle collection along a street that runs through one of the worst areas of town. Getting organized and volunteers is the hard part but in the end it will be worth it.

in response to bulabate...

Blight= the run down apperance of the neighborhoods
Plight= the run down lives of those who live in Blighted neighborhoods.
I give you credit for being concerned about the one over the other but that was not the question being asked. besides the plight of the impoverished is a national epidemic and one that my family is fully immersed in ourselves. We live paycheck to paycheck and do the best we can. sometimes with out the money we need to by extra formula or gas for our car. My concern in this Question was and is concerning the apperance of neighborhoods not the ability of the people in those neighborhoods to live the american dream. If it were up to me that would never be an issue but it isn't up to me and it is an issue just not the one in this question.

Answer 1

I would be willing to clean up parks, etc IF I weren't petrified of being shot when I entered those areas.

Seriously, when I first moved to this city I made a wrong turn once... turned out to be a dead end. I ended up boxed in by a Caprice Classic and at least 15 kids (yes, kids, about 11-17) approached... one of them came right up to the car and asked what I "needed". Luckily, I escaped but not without some serious fear for my life. I've never been so scared.

Other things that could be done... the courts could actually start keeping criminals in jail. The non-effective war on drugs could be turned into a huge money-making scheme for the government, effectively reducing the number of criminals in our prisons AND reducing drug-related crime (robberies and murders, to name two). People in those neighborhoods could actually start to CARE about what their porch and front lawn looks like.

Answer 2

Community Gardens have been successful in several cities. An ugly vacant lot turned into flowers and food, thru hard work and cooperation. Fosters a sense of pride in the area. Graffiti and vandalism tend to go down in those areas, BECAUSE it is people working together for a common goal.
I like getting my hands in the earth and watching/helping things grow. I don't mind pulling weeds, and I like the rewards of a garden. it's pretty and tastes good.

Answer 3

I live in the national historic district of Freedmen's Town, which has been destroyed for higher profit corporate development, claiming to improve "urban blight" but at the expense of laws and rights that were overrun to seize funds and lands for private profit and to wipe out local residents seeking preservation.

http://www.houstonprogressive.org/4d-songs.html

To remedy this situation and to restore the community, I am launching a national contest to award a cash prize and personal laptop to any student who can write a letter or essay convincing public leaders from both major parties, such as Colin Powell or Condoleeza Rice, Sheila Jackson Lee or Barack Obama, to head up a national microcredit banking program to finance community ownership, as modeled after the Federal Reserve. I plan to announce this formally as soon as I save up the funds.
http://isocracynow.blogspot.com

Given the local residents' plans to restore the public housing as a residential campus facility:
http://www.houstonprogressive.org/campus94.html
I have proposed returning this "forty acre" complex to the African American community as reparations for unlawful seizure by eminent domain by the government, which violated the Black owners rights to assemble peaceably and to petition for a redress of grievances. Since the Federal Reserve build a facility over the site of historic gravesite burials nearby, my proposal is to issue "federal reparations notes" against the debt owed to taxpayers for public funds misallocated by corruption, in order to "microfinance" ownership of historic houses, churches, schools and businesses under a charitable land trust managed by the community.

Currently my funds are used to pay rent on a small duplex used as office space for two neighborhood organizations. This is my way of restoring the right of the residents peaceably to assemble in order to petition in defense of constitutional civil rights that have been violated by evictions and demolition throughout the community. If defending the right to petition is enough to keep the democratic process alive, where the past wrongs can be corrected, I believe the neighborhood can save itself from destruction. If the limited resources we have are not enough, then we may lose the last remaining Freed Slave district left in the United States despite our best efforts to preserve the history.

http://www.houstonprogressive.org/4d-index.html

Answer 4

Hey how come none of these nit-pickers corrected you on the word usage "blight" should it be "plight" instead. i do not care myself & do not appreciate it when some insignificant fool points out a grammer error & then never addresses the Question! Your solution is to little pay-wise my solution http://www.usbig.net/ for the better society of USA!

Answer 5

I think its important to simply not discriminate. Giving the disadvantaged an equal chance to redeem themselves is probably the smallest thing any of us can do, but when several people make a conscious effort to not discriminate, it could make a huge impact on helping those less advantaged circumstances.

Answer 6

You must have seen the Jerry springer show it does explain the root cause of the whole problem.The best thing you can do is to teach less affluent how to live a disciplined and civic life.If they are able to do that then every thing will fall in line and their lives will become much happier .it will also help to get rid of criminal gangs in the Neighborhoods.

Answer 7

Create mixed-income housing. Its the only way. Have a doctor living next to a deli worker, a lawyer on the 7th floor, and so on. The socio-economic lines will begin to blur.

Answer 8

the exact same thing as you. absolutely nothing. just following your lead

Answer 9

Tear it down. No, because they might move near me!

Answer 10

go to a strip club get very drunk and come home and get laid