THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, June 4, 1995 TAG: 9506020638
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J3 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: IN THE CITIES
SOURCE: BY MIKE KNEPLER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 96 lines
Do you zone out whenever you hear the term ``regionalism''?
Once again, it's being brandished in public as the usual crowd of politicians and business leaders - and now even neighborhood activists - rev up the rhetoric.
Before you jam in your earplugs, consider this: When it comes to regionalism, you can't really go AWOL. Most of you already are participating.
Call this the think-small approach to the big picture, a way to remind us why anyone should want regionalism in the first place.
You participate in regionalism every time you cross city lines to:
go to work, college or trade school;
visit a relative or friend;
pray in a house of worship;
dine out, be entertained or go shopping.
When you cross city lines, you rely on neighboring municipalities to maintain and police their streets and to educate a continual stream of competent workers for your place of employment.
Looking at it this way, you begin to see that thinking about the area regionally is not an end in itself; it's a means toward preserving and improving our quality of life.
If that's the goal, then why doesn't regionalism have more regional appeal in Hampton Roads?
Perhaps most definitions of regionalism get hung up in government. The words get attached to areawide agencies for transit, for sewage and garbage disposal, or for proposals on revenue-sharing from economic development.
That accentuates bureaucracy. It obscures any concept that citizens of one locality often depend on the financial health of neighboring cities.
We forget that neighborhoods throughout Hampton Roads share problems and successes.
But people usually perceive regionalism the way most leaders let us see it: back-room politicking, stuffy conferences in lavish hotels and piles of research reports.
As Wolfgang Pindur, an Old Dominion University professor of urban studies and public administration, observed: ``People are not going to sit around reading 300- and 400-page reports'' on the region's declining economic competitiveness.
Pindur does not advocate doing away with individual city governments, but he says some municipal services, such as economic development, would be delivered more efficiently on a regional basis.
Still, how do you get people to see themselves as regional citizens?
To some degree, advocates show signs of learning how to broaden public understanding of regionalism.
Neighborhood leaders in Virginia Beach recently hosted the area's first ``grass-roots regionalism'' conference for civic leagues throughout South Hampton Roads. Only 50 folks attended, and organizers faced a fundamental question when Carolyn Lincoln of Bellamy Woods in Virginia Beach told Norfolk Mayor Paul D. Fraim: ``As parents and citizens, for us to buy into regionalism, we have to understand how it affects us.''
To cultivate a regional consciousness, advocates could consider other ways to blur the boundaries between citizens and leaders.
Promoters of regionalism could involve more people with everyday regional experience and no ties to politics, such as clergy who have congregations composed of residents from more than one city. ``These are folks who do not have to defend the boundaries of the cities, like political officials,'' Pindur noted.
Another way may be to build on successes for rallying civic spirit. Each city has its own sponsor of a ``first citizen'' award honoring leadership and achievement in the individual localities. What might happen if a group began naming a First Citizen of Hampton Roads?
Some recipients of individual city first-citizen awards say they would support a regional program. But they note possible problems in finding a sponsor.
Michael Barrett, First Citizen of Virginia Beach, suggested the Hampton Roads Chamber of Commerce, with which he is affiliated. But he fears this may foster the perception that regionalism only helps businesses.
Perhaps the first citizens of each city could form a committee every year to solicit nominations and select a winner. The exercise could turn into a public demonstration of regional problem-solving.
They could anoint the winner at a large banquet. Not the usual stuffed-shirt affair, though. Have a potluck supper among citizens of every rank, tuxedos to blue jeans. Anything goes, with only one proviso, that no more than two people from any one city can share the same dining table.
Admission proceeds could go to a regional leadership training program.
Another idea: use the programming of each city's municipal cable-TV station. What if all local governments broadcast one show a week from a neighboring locale? They could swap features on museums, history and interesting people.
City Halls, stop complaining that your best efforts don't get regional publicity. Here's a way you can do something for yourselves.
But let's have a couple of stipulations: no talking-head discussions with politicians interviewing each other and no propaganda about the glories of patching potholes.
Be creative. Use the little pictures to understand the big one. by CNB