Dublin Core
Title
Box 15, Folder 3, Document 60
Text Item Type Metadata
Text
SEATTLE, WASHINGTON
Seattle was one of 63 cities named in November 1967 to start
planning in the Model Cities program. Subsequently it received a
$209,720 planning grant to develop a plan for a 2.25 square mile
area in the center of the city.
About 10 percent of the city population, or 58,000 people
live in the model neighborhood on two percent of the city's land
area. The model neighborhood contrasts sharply with the general
prosperity of Seattle, which is considered a "white collar" city
with a median average income of $6,942.
Unemployment in the model neighborhood is three times the
city rate, median annual income is 27 percent lower, nearly half
(45 percent) of family heads did not finish high school, and one-
third of the families live at or near the poverty level.
Eighty-five percent of Seattle's Negro population live in the
model neighborhood, making up more than half the neighborhood popu-
lation. The area also includes Japanese and Chinese communities as
well as small numbers of American Indians, Eskimos and Filipinos.
Ten percent of the residents are white.
Citizens Involved
Seattle's five year program for upgrading this area incorpor-
ates the work of 10 citizen planning task forces working closely
with volunteers from public and private agencies at the local,
State and Federal levels.
During seven months of weekly and semi-weekly meetings, over
1700 citizens participated in task force planning. Proposals ap-
proved by the task forces were passed on to the Seattle Model City
Advisory Council, composed of 86 representatives from neighborhood
Organizations, ranging from church and fraternal to militant civil
rights groups. The City Demonstration Agency (CDA) staff, a group
of 23 professionals, including seven persons on full time loan from
city, county, State agencies and private enterprise, worked closely
with the task forces and the Council to develop the final plan for
approval by the Mayor and City Council.
Five Year Strategy
Seattle's five year program aims at a turn-around of all as-
pects of life in the target neighborhood.
"Solutions will be aimed as much at the inherent contradictions
of our institutions as the individual victim of these contradictions"
the Seattle program says. "We need altered ways of life as well as
altered lives."
~ More =
To accomplish this, Seattle looks to both public and private
Support. Two key elements of the plan, an economic development
corporation and a housing development corporation, are expected to
bring several million dollars of private and other non-federal funds
into the neighborhood and multiply the impact of this money by keep-
ing it in the neighborhood.
Backing up these programs will be concentrated manpower train-
ing and supporting health and social services to give model neigh-
borhood residents the chance to get the jobs involved in the physi-
cal and economic improvement of the neighborhood.
At the same time, fundamental improvements in the education sys-
tem -- dealing with what is taught, how it is taught and how parents
and children in the neighborhood look at the schools ~-- are projected
as essential to the long range self-sufficiency of individual resi-
dents and of their community.
Coordination of these various efforts will take place bcth at
the city level, where similarly operated agencies have gained new
experience working together, and at the neighborhood level, where
the Model Cities program already has opened new channels for parti-
cipation in governmental and other decisions affecting the neighbor-
hood.
PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
Economic Development and Employment
Seattle's basic approach is to provide adequate family income
to overcome poverty in the model neighborhood and at the seme time
increase the amount of economic leadership in the neighborhood and
eliminate marginal employment by upgrading skills. The City hopes
to double in the next five years the number of model neighborhood
families who own or control economic resources. A key element for
developing new resident-owned businesses in the neighborhood is the
United Inner-City Development Foundation now being organized with
the cooperation of some 30 groups in the area. This .Corporation
would draw on the resources of the Washington State Development
Corporation and private and Federal resources to increase tenfold
an initial capitalization of $3 million.
The economic development program will be backed up by changes
in the delivery of manpower services, expanded skills and. manage-
ment training and an extensive consumer protection program. To co-
ordinate existing employment counselling, training and placement now
provided by 12 agencies, the plan calls for an Employment UniCenter
with outreach and one-stop services. Among other activities, the
UniCenter would immediately start a Management and Intern program
designed to bring residents into supervisory and policy making
positions in government and eventually in the private sectcr.
= More =
A City Trainee program would also be started to give special
training and placement to model neighborhood residents normally
ineligible for city jobs.
Housing, Physical Planning and Environment
The Housing program in carrying out its objectives to increase
the supply of housing and the degree of homeownership in the neigh-
borhood will be another key element in the economic development of
the neighborhood. A non-profit Housing Development Corporation is
expected to bring $6 million into the neighborhood to meet a goal
of 5,400 housing units over the next five years. The Corporation
will be owned by stockholders from industry, government and the
neighborhood, with neighborhood stockholders electing the Board of
Directors. Planning is under way for the first 150 units of new
and rehabilitated housing. A start would also be made on establish-
ing a Land Bank to purchase vacant land in the neighborhood for
housing use.
The Physical Planning and Environment program focuses on expand-
ing recreation areas in the neighborhood, transportation needs of
residents, and resolving problems caused by two proposed transpor-
tation corridors through the neighborhood.
Planning will continue on a public transportation and develop-
ment corridor to include parks, recreation-entertainment centers
and public facilities along the proposed R.H. Thomson motorway runn-
ing north-south through the entire length of the neighborhood. A
Similar study for a housing and park complex is scheduled for the
proposed I-90 which would cross the neighborhood in an east-west
direction.
The start of several recreation projects and block develop-
ment to provide small recreation areas in each block is scheduled
immediately. The program also includes a project in which residents
will operate a roving "Fix-it" wagon to provide minor home repair
services at cost to neighborhood families.
Education
Despite four years of compensatory education programs, model
neighborhood students are four years behind other city children at
the end of high school. Seattle's goals -- enriching education,
making education a better preparation for work life, and broadening
parent, teacher and student participation in the schools =-- are
designed to deal both with felt and expressed needs and realiza-
tion of institutional change.
= More: =
« 2s
Seattle has given priority to the socio-economic integration
of schools as a means of enriching education when combined with
curriculum redevelopment and staff training and retraining. As
the first in a series of educational complexes planned by the
Seattle public schools, a Middle Schools Educational Park Demon-
stration for grades 5-9 would be planned and built on the edge of
the University of Washington campus.
Since no complete program for vocational education now exists-
in the schools, Seattle plans an early start of an extensive Occu-
pational Skills and Incentive program to provide technical training
for 6,000 students immediately. As a start towards its objective of
doubling employment of model neighborhood residents in schools,
Seattle would begin a project to hire 100 students as apprentices
and tutors, and 200 adults in a New Careers program for education.
These activities, combined with Youth Leadership Development and
counselling, are designed to better prepare model neighborhood stu-
dents for work.
Several activities are also aimed at increasing neighborhood
participation in the schools, including a Model Neighborhood Educa-
tional Advisory Council and an office to handle complaints or prob-
lems of teachers, pupils and parents.
Welfare
Seattle's welfare program is based on an assumption that the
quality of social service is directly related to those requiring
the service. Tying in closely with economic development, the wel-
fare program aims to eliminate poverty in the model neighborhood,
heighten the dignity, status and self-esteem of recipients and
strengthen and coordinate social services.
As a part of its coordination and concentration of social
services, the city plans comprehensive day-care services for 5,000
children; neighborhood centers to coordinate social service delivery,
and expanded services for the elderly.
To test possible modifications in the welfare system that would
offer incentives for reducing welfare rolls, the city proposes a
Direct Income Grant Demonstration program for a limited number of
model neighborhood families. This is one of two in the nation under
serious consideration by the Department of Health, Education and
Welfare.
As a means of improving communication between welfare recipi-
ents and the Welfare Department, the program calls for special sup-
port to the ADC Motivated Mothers Council.
Health
The Health program focuses on delivery and increased use of
health services by model neighborhood residents to achieve a level
=— More =
of health in the neighborhood comparable to that of the city. One
approach will be a multi-service health center with outreach into
the neighborhood through health stations that would provide 24-hour
emergency treatment and transportation services. Another element
will involve Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound and Blue Cross-
Blue Shield with services being financed through a prepaid health
insurance plan.
The program also calls for a Detoxification Center to treat
alcohol and drug abusers. All health activities in the neighborhood
would be coordinated through a special Model Neighborhood Health
Advisory Board.
Law and Justice
The Law and Justice program focuses on both the short-range
problems of easing racial and community tensions around law enforce-
ment and the long-range impact of changes in the judicial and insti-
tutional systems.
As a start toward increasing the minority representation on the
police force, the city would establish a Public Safety Trainee pro-
gram for residents, leading to a career in the Police Department.
Other activities to improve police-community relations include pay-
ing officers for time spent in non-enforcement functions and employ-
ing residents in non-enforcement duties and as observers to record
police and resident interaction.
To improve legal services for residents the city would expand
the public defender system, and continue planning to provide legal
help to the marginal poor, and work toward increasing the number of
judgeships.
Culture and Arts, Youth
.
The Arts and Culture program is designed to help give Negroes
in the model neighborhood an opportunity for cultural ;jidentity and
to increase the numbers of residents in art related careers. A
priority project to start immediately is the conversion of a former
synagogue into a multipurpose neighborhood center with an auditorium
for movies and the performing arts, and space for other community
activities including a Teen Canteen. Also planned immediately is
an Afro-American Arts Museum which would display the work of resi-
dents and well-known artists and include a bookshop and arts shop.
The plan calls for a revised school curriculum to include courses
in African arts and culture.
The Youth program focuses on economic life chances of youth
through a special employment service and registry for part time
jobs. To promote managerial.skills the program proposes developing
businesses such as a youth-operated Maintenance Service that would
contract with local businesses and avartment buildings and a Youth
Transport Service to provide minibus service to the model neighbor-
hood.
# # # #
Seattle was one of 63 cities named in November 1967 to start
planning in the Model Cities program. Subsequently it received a
$209,720 planning grant to develop a plan for a 2.25 square mile
area in the center of the city.
About 10 percent of the city population, or 58,000 people
live in the model neighborhood on two percent of the city's land
area. The model neighborhood contrasts sharply with the general
prosperity of Seattle, which is considered a "white collar" city
with a median average income of $6,942.
Unemployment in the model neighborhood is three times the
city rate, median annual income is 27 percent lower, nearly half
(45 percent) of family heads did not finish high school, and one-
third of the families live at or near the poverty level.
Eighty-five percent of Seattle's Negro population live in the
model neighborhood, making up more than half the neighborhood popu-
lation. The area also includes Japanese and Chinese communities as
well as small numbers of American Indians, Eskimos and Filipinos.
Ten percent of the residents are white.
Citizens Involved
Seattle's five year program for upgrading this area incorpor-
ates the work of 10 citizen planning task forces working closely
with volunteers from public and private agencies at the local,
State and Federal levels.
During seven months of weekly and semi-weekly meetings, over
1700 citizens participated in task force planning. Proposals ap-
proved by the task forces were passed on to the Seattle Model City
Advisory Council, composed of 86 representatives from neighborhood
Organizations, ranging from church and fraternal to militant civil
rights groups. The City Demonstration Agency (CDA) staff, a group
of 23 professionals, including seven persons on full time loan from
city, county, State agencies and private enterprise, worked closely
with the task forces and the Council to develop the final plan for
approval by the Mayor and City Council.
Five Year Strategy
Seattle's five year program aims at a turn-around of all as-
pects of life in the target neighborhood.
"Solutions will be aimed as much at the inherent contradictions
of our institutions as the individual victim of these contradictions"
the Seattle program says. "We need altered ways of life as well as
altered lives."
~ More =
To accomplish this, Seattle looks to both public and private
Support. Two key elements of the plan, an economic development
corporation and a housing development corporation, are expected to
bring several million dollars of private and other non-federal funds
into the neighborhood and multiply the impact of this money by keep-
ing it in the neighborhood.
Backing up these programs will be concentrated manpower train-
ing and supporting health and social services to give model neigh-
borhood residents the chance to get the jobs involved in the physi-
cal and economic improvement of the neighborhood.
At the same time, fundamental improvements in the education sys-
tem -- dealing with what is taught, how it is taught and how parents
and children in the neighborhood look at the schools ~-- are projected
as essential to the long range self-sufficiency of individual resi-
dents and of their community.
Coordination of these various efforts will take place bcth at
the city level, where similarly operated agencies have gained new
experience working together, and at the neighborhood level, where
the Model Cities program already has opened new channels for parti-
cipation in governmental and other decisions affecting the neighbor-
hood.
PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
Economic Development and Employment
Seattle's basic approach is to provide adequate family income
to overcome poverty in the model neighborhood and at the seme time
increase the amount of economic leadership in the neighborhood and
eliminate marginal employment by upgrading skills. The City hopes
to double in the next five years the number of model neighborhood
families who own or control economic resources. A key element for
developing new resident-owned businesses in the neighborhood is the
United Inner-City Development Foundation now being organized with
the cooperation of some 30 groups in the area. This .Corporation
would draw on the resources of the Washington State Development
Corporation and private and Federal resources to increase tenfold
an initial capitalization of $3 million.
The economic development program will be backed up by changes
in the delivery of manpower services, expanded skills and. manage-
ment training and an extensive consumer protection program. To co-
ordinate existing employment counselling, training and placement now
provided by 12 agencies, the plan calls for an Employment UniCenter
with outreach and one-stop services. Among other activities, the
UniCenter would immediately start a Management and Intern program
designed to bring residents into supervisory and policy making
positions in government and eventually in the private sectcr.
= More =
A City Trainee program would also be started to give special
training and placement to model neighborhood residents normally
ineligible for city jobs.
Housing, Physical Planning and Environment
The Housing program in carrying out its objectives to increase
the supply of housing and the degree of homeownership in the neigh-
borhood will be another key element in the economic development of
the neighborhood. A non-profit Housing Development Corporation is
expected to bring $6 million into the neighborhood to meet a goal
of 5,400 housing units over the next five years. The Corporation
will be owned by stockholders from industry, government and the
neighborhood, with neighborhood stockholders electing the Board of
Directors. Planning is under way for the first 150 units of new
and rehabilitated housing. A start would also be made on establish-
ing a Land Bank to purchase vacant land in the neighborhood for
housing use.
The Physical Planning and Environment program focuses on expand-
ing recreation areas in the neighborhood, transportation needs of
residents, and resolving problems caused by two proposed transpor-
tation corridors through the neighborhood.
Planning will continue on a public transportation and develop-
ment corridor to include parks, recreation-entertainment centers
and public facilities along the proposed R.H. Thomson motorway runn-
ing north-south through the entire length of the neighborhood. A
Similar study for a housing and park complex is scheduled for the
proposed I-90 which would cross the neighborhood in an east-west
direction.
The start of several recreation projects and block develop-
ment to provide small recreation areas in each block is scheduled
immediately. The program also includes a project in which residents
will operate a roving "Fix-it" wagon to provide minor home repair
services at cost to neighborhood families.
Education
Despite four years of compensatory education programs, model
neighborhood students are four years behind other city children at
the end of high school. Seattle's goals -- enriching education,
making education a better preparation for work life, and broadening
parent, teacher and student participation in the schools =-- are
designed to deal both with felt and expressed needs and realiza-
tion of institutional change.
= More: =
« 2s
Seattle has given priority to the socio-economic integration
of schools as a means of enriching education when combined with
curriculum redevelopment and staff training and retraining. As
the first in a series of educational complexes planned by the
Seattle public schools, a Middle Schools Educational Park Demon-
stration for grades 5-9 would be planned and built on the edge of
the University of Washington campus.
Since no complete program for vocational education now exists-
in the schools, Seattle plans an early start of an extensive Occu-
pational Skills and Incentive program to provide technical training
for 6,000 students immediately. As a start towards its objective of
doubling employment of model neighborhood residents in schools,
Seattle would begin a project to hire 100 students as apprentices
and tutors, and 200 adults in a New Careers program for education.
These activities, combined with Youth Leadership Development and
counselling, are designed to better prepare model neighborhood stu-
dents for work.
Several activities are also aimed at increasing neighborhood
participation in the schools, including a Model Neighborhood Educa-
tional Advisory Council and an office to handle complaints or prob-
lems of teachers, pupils and parents.
Welfare
Seattle's welfare program is based on an assumption that the
quality of social service is directly related to those requiring
the service. Tying in closely with economic development, the wel-
fare program aims to eliminate poverty in the model neighborhood,
heighten the dignity, status and self-esteem of recipients and
strengthen and coordinate social services.
As a part of its coordination and concentration of social
services, the city plans comprehensive day-care services for 5,000
children; neighborhood centers to coordinate social service delivery,
and expanded services for the elderly.
To test possible modifications in the welfare system that would
offer incentives for reducing welfare rolls, the city proposes a
Direct Income Grant Demonstration program for a limited number of
model neighborhood families. This is one of two in the nation under
serious consideration by the Department of Health, Education and
Welfare.
As a means of improving communication between welfare recipi-
ents and the Welfare Department, the program calls for special sup-
port to the ADC Motivated Mothers Council.
Health
The Health program focuses on delivery and increased use of
health services by model neighborhood residents to achieve a level
=— More =
of health in the neighborhood comparable to that of the city. One
approach will be a multi-service health center with outreach into
the neighborhood through health stations that would provide 24-hour
emergency treatment and transportation services. Another element
will involve Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound and Blue Cross-
Blue Shield with services being financed through a prepaid health
insurance plan.
The program also calls for a Detoxification Center to treat
alcohol and drug abusers. All health activities in the neighborhood
would be coordinated through a special Model Neighborhood Health
Advisory Board.
Law and Justice
The Law and Justice program focuses on both the short-range
problems of easing racial and community tensions around law enforce-
ment and the long-range impact of changes in the judicial and insti-
tutional systems.
As a start toward increasing the minority representation on the
police force, the city would establish a Public Safety Trainee pro-
gram for residents, leading to a career in the Police Department.
Other activities to improve police-community relations include pay-
ing officers for time spent in non-enforcement functions and employ-
ing residents in non-enforcement duties and as observers to record
police and resident interaction.
To improve legal services for residents the city would expand
the public defender system, and continue planning to provide legal
help to the marginal poor, and work toward increasing the number of
judgeships.
Culture and Arts, Youth
.
The Arts and Culture program is designed to help give Negroes
in the model neighborhood an opportunity for cultural ;jidentity and
to increase the numbers of residents in art related careers. A
priority project to start immediately is the conversion of a former
synagogue into a multipurpose neighborhood center with an auditorium
for movies and the performing arts, and space for other community
activities including a Teen Canteen. Also planned immediately is
an Afro-American Arts Museum which would display the work of resi-
dents and well-known artists and include a bookshop and arts shop.
The plan calls for a revised school curriculum to include courses
in African arts and culture.
The Youth program focuses on economic life chances of youth
through a special employment service and registry for part time
jobs. To promote managerial.skills the program proposes developing
businesses such as a youth-operated Maintenance Service that would
contract with local businesses and avartment buildings and a Youth
Transport Service to provide minibus service to the model neighbor-
hood.
# # # #
Comments