« entrepreneurs and the wider public. It was as if Mumford's challenge had finally registered. During this time Oregon's famed new land use planning law came into existence, setting into motion a statewide process that culminated in the preparation of 277 local comprehensive plans. Portland's Comprehensive Plan was an awesome three-year undertaking, designed to provide a total framework for land use and development to the year 2000. Unlike the Moses Plan, which had been drawn behind closed doors, this new effort involved the city's neighborhoods and literally thousands of people in reviewing plan alternatives. But some of the plan's more controversial elements, such as increased housing densities in the city, set up a divisive tug of war between neighborhood groups and city planners. Despite its intent to strengthen urban neighborhoods and encourage transportation alternatives, the Comp Plan did not go much beyond providing a flexible set of guidelines. It was criticized for lacking a true sense of vision for the city's future. The other plans that combined with Portland's to fill in the region's urban growth boundary were no different. What the land use planning process alone seemed incapable of providing— definitive action—was redeemed by a series of citizen task forces and study groups throughout the decade. The Tri-County Local Government Commission (1975-76) initiated the formation of Metro as the first part of a two- tier government reform scenario. The city's Energy Policy Steering Committee (1978-79) resulted in the establishment of a "one-stop" Energy Savings Center to promote conservation and low-cost weatherization. Additionally, the Metropolitan Directions 1980 study (1979) indicated how rich in potential new solutions Greater Portland really was. Among other things, this survey of the area's progressive leadership recommended a regional growth policy based on a "carrying capacity" approach, programs designed to reduce peak hour traffic and discourage the use of autoCommunity Self-Help: An Idea Whose Time Has Returned Long before government assumed responsibility for social problems, neighborly good will and local self- reliance were community standards. Families, churches, neighborhoods and voluntary groups—all essential to a vital democracy—stood between the individual and the large institutions of public life. But in the two centuries since the American Revolution our society has grown more complex and our problems more resistant to solutions. Government attempts to provide answers—growing out of the New Deal era of the '30s and expanding in scope for nearly half a century—are now being withdrawn. Conservatives justify cutbacks in social programs on the grounds that extensive government involvement has failed to provide solutions and has created "clients of the state." Liberals counter that social cutbacks severely harm those people least able to provide solutions on their own. Disillusionment—among people of every political stripe—is now general, and the need for a fresh approach to community concerns grows increasingly evident. As Bruce Stokes of the World- watch Institute notes in his book. Helping Ourselves, By breaking up issues into their component parts and dealing with them at the local level, interdependent problems can once again become manageable . . . if individuals and communities are to gain greater control over their lives, then they must do so by empowering themselves. Over the past 15 years, a new type of structure—the community-based organization (CBO)—has emerged throughout the country as an important source of innovation and institutional change. CBO's are in the best American tradition of neighbor helping neighbor. They involve people directly in working for the betterment of their local community, working for the adoption of needed legislation (citizen participation) and actually administering neighborhood projects (community self-help). The roots of some of the most successful urban revitalization efforts are here: alternative schools, consumer co-ops, urban homesteading programs, crime watch block clubs, appropriate technology projects and community development corporations. However, as Bruce Stokes also points out, self-help activities do not take place magically on their own. The role of government is vital to their success. In the minds of many people there is an inherent contradiction in government support for self-help activities. According to this view, local endeavors can only succeed if they are free from government intervention. This distinction, while ideologically neat, is not appropriate for the complex issues facing society over the next few decades. Community self-help efforts require experiments and learning processes that take time to evolve. Community-based initiatives often seem to be stymied rather than encouraged by public officials. Despite lofty rhetoric, nowhere in either current federal or state government proposals is there a mention of strong policy commitments and community capacitybuilding efforts (seed funding, training and technical assistance) designed to assist citizens to help themselves. In Portland, there are some encouraging signs. Several city commissioners have been exploring ways to stimulate self-help efforts. The Housing and Community Development office has also been working on a process to establish a neighborhood self-help demonstration program. If self-help projects are to succeed, they must be controlled by the people they're designed to assist and be based upon local partnerships among government, private business and community groups. Local government can play the crucial role of "enabler" by providing incentives and adopting policies that promote dialogue and cooperation at the neighborhood level. —Steve Rudman 41
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