Protest, Poverty and Politics

Our man in Washington travels to the national conventions.

Michael W. Lynch from the November 2000 issue

(Page 2 of 5)

So going into the tour, I had a working knowledge of the city and its problems, but I’m hard pressed to think of any solutions, partial solutions, or even effective painkillers (other than a shift from crack to heroin, the ultimate painkiller, for those still living in this miserable place). On the tour, I knew I’d get the liberal view. Perhaps they had the answers.

The trip was disturbingly like a poverty peep show. Fifteen journalists boarded an over-the-road tourist coach. The last time I was on such a coach I was hitching a ride with French tourists to get from Italy to France. Yet instead of peering at mansions on the Mediterranean coast, we were looking out at boarded-up buildings, sagging porches, and poor people languishing in the humidity. All from our air-conditioned comfort. We stopped to meet with community leaders who were working to solve the city’s problems.

Camden is the archetypal post-industrial slum, nine square miles of almost unmitigated misery. Population peaked at 125,000 in the 1950s and has dwindled to 83,000 (and continues to drop). There are good people here: I’ve met many, both community activists and average citizens. But the desperation can’t be imagined; it must be experienced. Building after building is boarded up, burnt-out, or collapsed. There is only one supermarket (and it’s not centrally located). There are no movie theaters. There are hundreds of open-air drug markets.

City government is in complete collapse. The current mayor, an alleged drug dealer and Mafia front, is under federal indictment, the third one in recent times to find himself in such a situation. The city spends $120 million a year, but a mere $20 million is raised through local taxes.

We were blessed with two tour guides: Edward Schwartz, president of the Institute for the Study of Civic Values and a long-time anti-poverty activist, and Randy Primas, a former mayor of Camden. As we rolled out of Philly over the Ben Franklin Bridge, Schwartz set the scene. Basically, there were once good manufacturing jobs on which even those who didn’t graduate from awful government schools could manage to support a family. Then those jobs left, explained Schwartz, who didn’t really explain why. Those with skills left, too. Those with none stayed, and the place became an "industrial dustbowl." The government spent millions to help out, but it’s still not enough–the communities need more. "There has been a lot of money spent," said Schwartz. But "the amount we received was a pittance compared to the amount we were losing, and that is true today." Schwartz’s comments underscored a continuing omission when it comes to poverty: There is discussion of the jobs that left but never of new jobs created, or of why they weren’t created. The hostility to business and industry –whether taking the form of oppressive regulation, rising taxes, or riots–is never mentioned.

Schwartz handed the microphone to Primas, the former mayor. Primas, a Democrat whose first act as mayor was to let the state build a prison on Camden’s waterfront in exchange for a bailout, told us of a beautification project on Admiral Wilson Boulevard, one of the seediest roads in New Jersey. (In building a prison, one participant pointed out, he was planning for the future, since it could double as the mayoral mansion.) When Philly landed the Republican Convention, New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman quickly found $50 million to tear down a series of businesses and plant grass. A few of the businesses owners didn’t want to sell. The government gave them no choice and bulldozed anyway. All for a good cause, right?

"All along here were nothing but billboards and hotels that rented by the hour, and several gas stations," Primas told us as we rolled past a field of grass that used to be home to the businesses. He was proud of the government’s good work, yet he was engaging in selective memory.

All the businesses he mentioned had indeed been there. But they weren’t what Primas claimed. I know because I visited the owners earlier this year, before their businesses got flattened by the state’s wrecking ball. (See "Eminent Domain and the GOP Convention," June.) Among the establishments: Camden’s only decent (and legitimate) hotel, the Four Winds Motor Lodge, which had been bought and renovated by an immigrant named Jagdish Gupta; a brand new liquor store; a stereo speaker store; and a bunch of gas stations. All of them thrived off the road’s heavy traffic. When I spoke with him, Gupta was especially critical of the plan to take his business away via eminent domain: "I’m losing everything," he said, explaining that the government was offering a below-market price for his property.

I mentioned Gupta’s plight and asked Primas about the wisdom of wiping out taxpaying businesses in a city that has none to spare. "It was one of the hotels that rented by the hour," Primas declared to the bus, which simply wasn’t true. "That one wasn’t. I was there," I said, as Primas grimaced. A writer from The Economist said perhaps I shouldn’t admit that, and a few ladies giggled. "That was a decision that was made," Primas pronounced. Spoken like a true politician–in the passive-authoritative voice.

Our next stop was a corner in East Camden where a public housing project is being torn down and replaced with lower-density units. A Catholic priest, Monsignor McDermott, who runs a nonprofit housing program, was our host. As the red arm of a backhoe tore down the brick building behind him, McDermott told us of his urban renewal plan to bring in middle-income residents.

Unlike New Urbanist planners, who want to squeeze us into ever-tighter quarters, McDermott says density is a problem, not a solution. There’s no one but women, children, and drug dealers in the nearby housing project, he explained. "How do you propose to bring middle-income people to Camden?" I asked, knowing that when people get any money they tend to beat it out of places like Camden and never look back. I also know that the city’s tax rates are twice as high as those of neighboring towns–there are so few property owners left in Camden, they get whammied. And the schools are 50 times worse than those in the suburbs, making the city hugely unattractive for anyone with kids.

I’m sure McDermott believes in miracles, and not only because he’s a priest. Just listen to his plan to bring the middle class back to Camden: "Part of it is the type of houses we are going to build, and there will also be a light rail…" he told me as the backhoe tore the roof from the building. McDermott is confident because the houses will go for just $40,000, which is damn cheap for a newly refurbished house (each house, he said, costs roughly $100,000 to buy and fix up). But there’s no rush to get into Camden, even though buyers can rely on a steady stream of government cash and incentives.

Back on the bus, I asked about the role high taxes play in keeping residents and businesses out of town. Primas told a story involving the bank for which he now works. The bank has identical buildings in Camden and a neighboring suburb. The taxes for the suburban branch, which does much more business, are $20,000 per year. The taxes in Camden are $40,000. The same is true for homeowners, though on a smaller scale. Primas drew no practical lessons from his example, however. High taxes, especially on business, seem to be, if not a force of justice, then a force of nature.

There is a recognition that money isn’t the only answer, yet that’s the only model the politicians know. "Certainly money isn’t the issue," said Primas of the schools. "We’re spending $11,000 a student"–a sum that would come close to paying tuition at some of Jersey’s better private academies, if not its swankiest prep schools such as Lawrenceville or Peddie. Yet Camden’s schools don’t even have a superintendent–you literally can’t pay anybody enough to stay in the position–and kids drop out in droves.

We continued to drive around the city in comfort, being told of myriad government programs and reminded that it is the government’s discretionary spending, the very spending the Republicans meeting in Philly want to cut, that keeps these people alive. The final destination on our tour was North Camden, home of Riverfront Prison and many nonprofits working to revitalize the area. We passed the historic home of Camden’s founder–now in a city park–which is appropriately burnt down. We saw boarded-up building after boarded-up building. "Despite the challenges you see," Primas told us, using challenge as a euphemism for abandoned houses and litter-strewn lots, "the section looks 50 times better."