What gets measured gets done: Annual Report on the Conditions of Children | County initiatives on poverty, from Orange County to Salt Lake County

In college I thought I was gonna end up in the business world.  One of the books big back then was In Search of Excellence (published in 1982), about high performing organizations.  

It turns out I was more interested in organizations per se and how they operate than whether or not they were for or non profit.  And in high and continued performance.

One of the key points in the book is "What gets measured gets done," making the point that "making the numbers" is the focus when you're asking for measurable results.

Separately, I opine that everyone says kids are important, but too often money nor solid programs fails to follow the concern.  That being said childhood poverty has dropped significantly over the past 30 years due to a broader safety net ("Expanded Safety Net Drives Sharp Drop in Child Poverty," "How Poverty Programs Aided Children From One Generation to the Next," New York Times).

I expect that there is serious backsliding starting this year given cuts to Medicaid, food security programs, and schools more generally.

So the fact that Orange County California publishes a report, Annual Report on the Conditions of Children, to focus in on interdicting poverty at the county level is pretty interesting ("Win some, lose some: It’s not always easy being a kid in the O.C.," Orange County Register).  

Childhood is measured by poverty, health outcomes, academic achievement in annual snapshot

... There are several positive signs. More than 90% of all pregnancies include prenatal care; vaccination rates are high; kids have more access to emotional support; lower income students are doing better in math and language; foster kids are getting more timely permanent placements, and local kids are less likely than their peers around the state to get arrested, with fewer local cases leading to serious legal outcomes.

The negative signs, though, are blinking red. Child poverty is rising, as seen by increases in food assistance and free lunch programs. A higher percentage of local kids face “insecure housing” (read: homelessness). There are more preterm births and low birth weight babies. Teen pregnancies and dropout rates are both rising. There are, among children and teens, more “accidental deaths” — which include drug overdoses. More kids born drug-exposed and more are reporting that they suffer from depression. And child abuse, locally, remains a serious concern, with the county posting a higher rate of abuse than the state average.

Measurement is the first step.  Action planning, implementation, review and continuous improvement is the second, and its hard.  Especially in the face of too often limited funds.

In my writings on equity planning and social urbanism, I've never gotten into the weeds, recommending metrics and specific programs and initiatives for addressing it.  

-- "An outline for integrated equity planning: concepts and programs," 2017
-- "Equity planning: an update," 2020
-- "Social urbanism and equity planning as a way to address crime, violence, and persistent poverty: (not in) DC," 2021 
-- "Black community, economic and social capital: the Englewood neighborhood of Chicago/Chicago," 2021

That's a necessary step for making public officials accountable for improvements in their communities.

Counties and areas of extreme poverty.  A number of cities like Richmond, Chicago (Invest SouthWest) and Dallas (Grow South) have developed anti-poverty revitalization initiatives.  I think some have gone by the wayside as administrations turned over.  

In Toronto, rather than provide financial support to all kinds of organization, the United Way focuses its efforts on a set number of impoverished neighborhoods.

I am not so familiar with county initiatives specific to poverty, although I mention all the time the Hennepin County Works program, which focused on reinvesting in Minneapolis to stop population leakage and rebuild ("A COUNTY AND ITS CITIES: THE IMPACT OF HENNEPIN COMMUNITY WORKS," Journal of Urban Affairs), because the County feared it was at risk from property tax declines.  It wasn't so much an anti-poverty measure as much as it was about being pro-center city.

Many school systems have related initiatives ("Schools #2: Successful school programs in low income communities and the failure of DC to respond similarly," 2019).  

Dayton, Ohio has is a major initiative focusing on "neighborhood schools" and adding human services functions, ("50-plus ways you can help 6 Dayton schools, thousands of students," Dayton Daily News, "Dayton's neighborhood school centers," New Directions in Youth Development).  

Roy Utah has boosted high school graduation by better linking elementary and middle school outcomes to high school, with mentors and other services ("How Roy High boosted graduation rates from 70% to 92%," KSL-TV).

Pontiac/Oakland County, Michigan.  But I think the Hennepin County model is extendable, an apt model for more places, especially as a way to address poverty.  I wrote about this in terms of Pontiac,  ("Pontiac Michigan: a lagging African American city in one of the nation's wealthiest counties") where I admitted I was embarrassed for not thinking this long before when I was a resident of wealthy Oakland County in middle and high school and a couple summers once I started college.  For a time I even went to Pontiac Schools in 6th and 7th Grades.

East County/Montgomery County, Maryland.  For Montgomery County Maryland too ("East County, Montgomery County, Maryland: Council redistricting spurs ideas for revitalization").  I just wrote about Long Branch ("Long Branch, Montgomery County: Main Street manager job | Purple Line").

Separately, Montgomery County Public Schools puts more money towards Title I schools serving impoverished areas ("When Unequal is Fair Treatment," Education Week) although outcomes continue to lag ("Educational Inequality in Montgomery County Public Schools," Montgomery County Sentinel).

Equity planning/social urbanism.  Another way to think about such programs is through the concepts of equity planning and social urbanism.  The programs above have influenced my thinking about this definitely.

-- "An outline for integrated equity planning: concepts and programs," 2017
-- "Equity planning: an update," 2020
-- "Social urbanism and equity planning as a way to address crime, violence, and persistent poverty: (not in) DC," 2021 
-- "Black community, economic and social capital: the Englewood neighborhood of Chicago/Chicago," 2021

Salt Lake City.  There are tons of reports about economic disparities between the East and West sides of Salt Lake.  The west side is more Hispanic, more people of color, more poverty (series: "Roads to Understanding: Salt Lake City’s west side," KSL-TV. "s," Salt Lake Tribune).  

The west side is where the city's industrial district lies, including the state's five oil refineries, so air quality is a particular concern ("West-siders, at last, may have the proof they need to fix air pollution," Salt Lake Tribune).

Meanwhile the east side pretty much thrives as it's closer to and abuts the Wasatch Front mountain range so people haven't been inclined to move "west" as is more typical in most metropolitan regions, as they grow, they grow west.  

Even so there is population shrinkage or at least shrinkage of households and fewer children so schools on the east side of the county marked by closing schools in the adjacent Granite School District ("Granite Schools is looking to close 3 more elementary schools," KUER/NPR).

Salt Lake has closed west side schools because of low enrollments, while Salt Lake's stay open because the east side still has a preponderance of large Mormon families ("School closure and consolidation planning needs to focus on integration planning at the outset as a separate process," "Equity/"Equity" versus efficiency and the school closure debate").

The school system does have a number of Title I initiatives and a couple of schools more like the Dayton model, with community health clinics and community centers as part of the school grounds.

The physical divide between East and West is created by railroad tracks and a massive train yard as well as I-15, which follows the route of the railroads ("Will Salt Lake Heal its Historic East-West Divide, or Exacerbate it?," Building Salt Lake, "Utah and SLC wanted to punch a hole through I-15. West-siders fought back," Salt Lake Tribune).

So the city has plenty of initiatives promoting growth on the west side, prioritizing funding projects there over the East Side.  

To me, the biggest problem of development on the west side is lack of town centers, but I've grappled with how to write about it and haven't yet. 

It makes it hard to develop commercial districts and small businesses ("A coffee truck, known on Salt Lake City’s west side and at farmers markets, opens a brick-and-mortar cafe," "Mestizo Coffeehouse, part of a ‘beautiful community’ on SLC’s west side, is closing," Salt Lake Tribune).  (There is a redeveloping district along North Temple, but in terms of the east-west divide, it's more of an extension of the Central Business District.)  

There is also a citizen-initiated proposal, the Rio Grande Plan, which would revive the Rio Grande Station for long distance and commuter railroad sand light rail service, which may also involve undergrounding railroad tracks outside of the rail yard, making it easier to get between the east and west sides ("Study highlights Salt Lake City's east-west struggles. What will be done about it?," KSL-TV).  (I was the first person at the public launch of the proposal to say publicly that the RGP should be implemented in association with the coming of the 2034 Winter Olympics.)

The University of Utah runs an interesting community program there called University Neighborhood Partners ("University of Utah University Neighborhood Partners program and community revitalization in West side Salt Lake City/County," "How University Neighborhood Partners helps west side leaders," Salt Lake Tribune) and is investing in a small version of its hospital in West Valley City ("Hospitals as urban anchors/revitalization levers, not usually, but with great potential to serve communities in important ways: Examples are two forthcoming projects by Intermountain Health and University of Utah Health") which abuts Salt Lake, and is even more Hispanic demographically. 

A new restaurant opens in the 9th and 9th district.

By contrast, East Side has thriving residential-commercial districts like 9th and 9th ("In Salt Lake City, a dynamic neighborhood with small businesses and room to stroll in," Washington Post, 2013), Sugar House, and 15th and 15th ("Thinking about the opportunities for success with neighborhood commercial districts: comparing Manor Park in DC to 15th and 15th in Salt Lake").

Salt Lake County.  Salt Lake County has its issues.  The County is mostly economically successful, but the west side and certain other pockets of the county lag the wealthier areas.  

While the County is majority Democrat, the way County Council districts are organized, the County Council currently is majority Republican.  Some of the members are seriously conservative and focused on "reducing the size of government" even though as a growing place, demands for infrastructure and other programs are greater, not reduced.

The County faces budget issues because of that growth.  It voted to raise the property tax, not much all in all, but there is opposition ("There’s a new referendum push underway. This one targets Salt Lake County taxes," Salt Lake Tribune).  

The County is cutting back investment in many areas--I know this because I am on the Board of Sugar House Park which is half owned by the County, and we just got a big push back on our capital planning efforts because of this--pushing back some projects as much as 6 years.

Salt Lake Deseret News photo.

The Republican majority voted to close some day care centers ("Families brace for challenges as Salt Lake County child care centers are set to close," KSL-TV) and a senior center to reduce costs.  

Even when offered money by a prominent foundation to keep the day care centers open, leading Councilmembers said no ("A famous Utah family’s foundation offered to pay for S.L. County day cares, public records reveal," Salt Lake Tribune).

To be fair, I don't think the County's wanting to close day care centers is necessarily "bad."  It does have to measure spending and outcomes, and how many people programs serve.  And they argued spending $2 million on 247 people (children) wasn't the best use of funds.

But instead of just voting to summarily cut the program, it could have looked at alternatives that were cheaper, such as supporting "seats" at other for profit and nonprofit centers.

I'm hardly an expert on all the programs in the county and nonprofit and philanthropic initiatives that focus on ameliorating poverty.  

I do know that Granite School District has a number of Title I initiatives (Educational Achievement and Workforce Development: A Review of Community Based Approaches, Gardner Institute, University of Utah).  

(Chris Detrick | Tribune file photo) Promise South Salt Lake Site Coordinator Susie Estrada shows children pictures of the staff members at the Hser Ner Moo Community Center in South Salt Lake City Tuesday, July 18, 2017. 

South Salt Lake ("How “Promise South Salt Lake” is creating safe spaces for youth and families," ABC4, "South Salt Lake Promise program helps youths thrive in community centers," KSL-TV) and Millcreek have created "Promise" initiatives which function comparably to the University Neighborhood Partners, bringing a variety of resources together to help people who can use the boost.  The Promise Partnership Utah organization supports such groups across the state. 

(Ironically, in the area, they call South Salt Lake "sketchy," urban and impoverished.  People here have little experience with true urban poverty! "Areas to Avoid: Salt Lake City’s Danger Zones," RLG)

Conclusion: Why not a Salt Lake County Community Works Program, focused on poverty reduction? But mostly my response is that like Oakland and Montgomery Counties, very wealthy counties, Salt Lake County has a lot of wealth too, and rather than offer programs in a piecemeal basis or none at all, could a "Hennepin Community Works" program be developed to address the county's economic lagging areas in a more systematic way.

Could the Promise Programs and the University Neighborhood Partners initiative become the foundation of a more focused, overarching and branded County program serving impoverished areas in more systematic ways than the county is doing presently?