Patrick Cooper Talks Voter Turn-out, Development and Social Media
I had the opportunity to sit down and talk with mayoral hopeful Patrick Cooper Wednesday morning over some coffee. Urban Standard provided a relaxed environment for Cooper to take a break from his hectic schedule and discuss the previous election and the upcoming runoff. In light of the low voter turnout in the Downtown area for the Dec. 8th election, I hoped to find and flesh out some new material that could energize the downtown base; encouraging the informed but–apparently–uninspired citizenry from the area to actually show up for Cooper’s runoff against William Bell.
We started by discussing the low voter turnout from an area that, paradoxically, has one of the highest demands of time from a candidate and expectations from the mayor’s office: the Historic Loft District. These are the people who stand to gain the most from Downtown revitalization and better city planning, and yet had the 3rd lowest turnout of any ballot box in the city, weighing in at a dismal 18% of registered voters. This effect isn’t limited to this one area though. Several other parts of the downtown area with wealthier and younger residents had an equally poor turnout. Where’s the disconnect? Is it a false sense of security since Bell isn’t even on the radar in this area? Do people not feel that they stand anything to gain based on which of the two candidates win the runoff? Whatever the reason, I hope to reverse this trend by showing, based on our conversation, what we stand to gain from electing Patrick Cooper: a man who wants to get Birmingham on course now rather than just sustaining a life-long political agenda as William Bell has been doing for the past 30 years.
If you talk to Downtown residents, you’ll know that the biggest complaint is lack of livable infrastructure in the area. There are very few areas where someone could spend a weekend evening getting dinner, entertainment, and drinks all in the same proximity and practically nowhere to shop, get groceries, or go to the movies. This isn’t only a negative thing for people who live here, businesses are less likely to open in areas where there’s nothing to attract and sustain potential employees. Cooper wants to change this. He wants to engage a government-run Redevelopment Authority that helps empower the private sector through focused city planning and tax abatements. In this economy, private developers probably aren’t going to risk failure in a sunken downtown area. This creates a feedback loop of less and less people as other businesses leave downtown for the more populace places. A Redevelopment Authority could lessen the overhead risk for new businesses and help methodically place them in a beneficially location. According to Cooper, this would include finding the best site for an Entertainment District, whether it be in the BJCC area, or somewhere more in the city center, complete with theaters, bars, restaurants, and clubs. Cooper also mentioned purchasing empty old buildings and actually finishing nice public spaces like the Railroad Park with complimentary businesses surrounding. This dedicated team of downtown development could finally breathe life into a decomposing economic engine and more importantly, give the city a soul again. One that we’re proud of and happy to take part in and responsibility for.
Cooper also stressed his desire to reclaim the role of Mayor as a position of leadership. Not just in the government but in the community as well–encouraging young people to get involved in local politics and shaping them into the leaders of tomorrow. He wants to include lots of young people in his staff to not only get the vibe of that age group in the city, but to actively appeal to this base to attract more recent college graduates to businesses in the area. He also wants to reconstitute the plethora of boards and commissions around the city that could stand some youthful revitalization. By working with these young people and helping them get results for their own areas of interest around town, Cooper hopes to make involvement hip while at the same time attracting and retaining Birmingham’s bright young minds. Cooper also wants to take the lead in terms of technology that allows him to connect and interact with people in the city more than ever before by continuing his use of social media like twitter and facebook. Obviously, I’m not expecting him to personally be tweeting about his breakfast, but providing the public with an easy way to know what’s going on in City Hall promotes the opportunity for involvement in ways that are currently just absent from Birmingham.
All of these progressive and uplifting ideas, however, depend on him getting electing in the runoff on Jan. 19th. Two years ago, 45% of the city showed up to vote for the mayor. Only 26% showed up on Dec. 8th. The people downtown can’t just continue to complain about what’s happening to the city if they refused to vote. Cooper can win this race, but only if we actually show up. It can’t be taken for granted! In some of the boxes where Cooper didn’t beat Bell originally, he was only a handful of votes behind. For every 20-30 more voters that show up for Cooper, another box that Bell might win will be offset. Anyone can see that Birmingham is on a downward spiral and being complacent or uninterested is being an enabler of the failed policies of the past. It’s time for us to shake off the negativity we’ve felt from previous experiences with city-government and take pride in Birmingham’s potential. The only way the city will progress is by letting a smart, forward-thinking person take the wheel. Patrick Cooper is our best option to get things turned around in the Mayor’s office but we’ve got to take responsibility for getting him there. Talk to your neighbors. Talk to your friends at school and church and anywhere else. Offer to give people rides to the polls. There’s only a few weeks left until January 19th, so with just a little bit of work until then, we could be enjoying the benefits of having a smart and level-headed city leader in office for years to come.
See you at the polls!
Recent Comments