Governing Magazine/June 2004 GLIMPSES SPIDER FAN Patrick Lynch, the attorney general of Rhode Island, talks about Spider-Man so much that you'd think the action hero, who is returning to movie theaters this month, was his running mate. Lynch loved Spider-Man as a child, but his recent obsession dates back to his inauguration day in 2003. It seems Lynch was preparing to take the oath of office when his 5-year-old son, Graham, tugged on his sleeve. "Remember Dad," the boy said, quoting Peter Parker's Uncle Ben from the first Spider-Man film. "With great power comes great responsibility." Some may guffaw at the melodramatic moment, but Lynch swears the story is true. He's also decided that Spidey's credo so befits the challenges of his job that he recites it again and again. After using the phrase in a newspaper op-ed last year, he began sprinkling it into speeches and found that audiences, whether high school students or business leaders, cheered it. Now, Lynch has put the quote on a plaque, which he plans to hang outside his offices this month during a ceremony timed to coincide with the release of the film "Spider-Man 2." He's invited comic-book author Stan Lee and Tobey Maguire, the movie actor who plays Spider-Man, to Providence for the event. "I'll never tire of talking about Spider-Man," Lynch says. "It's genuine to me, and people hook into it." Critics say Lynch, who's a youthful 39, undermines the gravitas of his office with all his superhero talk. (And in a tiny state such as Rhode Island, some Green Goblins might wonder whether he's exaggerating his power, too). Yet, a politician could do worse than to align himself with a cartoon character who's grossed more than $400 million at American box offices--a fact that Lynch seems keenly aware of. "If "Spider-Man 1" had been a flop," he says, "I don't think people would appreciate it as much." --Christopher Swope PROFILE IN CANDOR Jim Gibson, the mayor of Henderson, Nevada, and a possible candidate for governor, reacting to a poll that showed him with 62 percent statewide name identification. "I have done nothing to achieve that level of recognition." THE STREETS OF SAN DIEGO The "vroom, vroom" of engines getting ready to drag race may still be heard on San Diego streets, but the shouts of encouragement from onlookers have diminished markedly. It's not that the "sport" of illegal street racing is any less exciting to aficionados. Rather, those who watch can now be arrested and fined $1,000 or thrown in jail for six months. The ordinance has put a real damper on the street-racing scene, according to Deputy City Attorney Linda Peter. Under state law, it had long been illegal for vehicles to engage in a speed contest, but racers largely ignored it, despite hundreds of prosecutions over the years. Along with the races came large numbers of spectators, which had the tendency to fuel other unwanted activities such as assaults, urinating in public and defacing property. The illegal street racers and their fans used a Web site to communicate and keep one step ahead of the law by moving among several streets. "They would go from site to site," Peter says. "The cops couldn't stay on top of them." The city needed an ordinance that would effectively steer the action off the streets. After it was enacted in the fall of 2002, the organized crowds quickly dissipated. A spectator who was arrested challenged the law, but an appellate court ruled in the city's favor at the end of March. Other California municipalities and San Diego County, which have similar ordinances, were also relieved at the outcome. --Ellen Perlman SHIRT TALES West Virginia has long been the butt of jokes about backwoods ways and poor vocabulary. Residents roll their eyes when they hear references to their state bird being the satellite dish or a laptop being where the cat sleeps. But it's another matter entirely when the cracks about inbreeding come from a corporate entity. Abercrombie & Fitch has issued a $24.50 T-shirt depicting a map of the Mountain State emblazoned with the phrase, "It's All Relative in West Virginia." State officials have asked the clothing maker to cease and desist sales of the shirts. "A major company that makes quality apparel doesn't need to stoop to these kinds of things," Governor Bob Wise complained on MSNBC, "a T- shirt with a slanderous, unfounded stereotype." Abercrombie & Fitch has backed down to public pressure before, notably in 2002 when it dropped a line of T-shirts depicting Asian stereotypes and last Christmas when it discontinued a catalog that readers found too racy. But it has no plans to scotch its West Virginia shirt. Moreover, the company hasn't experienced the same sort of criticism about its shirts from officials in Florida (a chesty girl saying, "Come See Our Naples"); Maine ("We've Also Got Crabs"); or New Hampshire ("40 Million Squirrels Can't Be Wrong"). --Alan Greenblatt PAYING TO PARK Average unreserved monthly parking-garage rates, 2003 MOST EXPENSIVE New York (midtown) $425 Boston $390 New York (downtown) $300 San Francisco $300 Chicago $238 Washington, D.C. $225 Philadelphia $220 Seattle $220 Pittsburgh $214 Los Angeles $177 Honolulu $175 Houston $165 Portland, Ore. $165 LEAST EXPENSIVE St. Louis $99 San Jose $92 Louisville $75 Raleigh $72 Boise $70 Ft. Lauderdale $70 Kansas City $70 Orlando $70 Columbia, S.C. $65 Memphis $60 Salt Lake City $50 Phoenix $48 Bakersfield, Calif. $40 Fresno, Calif. $40 Orange Co., Calif. $40 Source: Colliers International NEW BIG-BOX BATTLES Some are white, others are blue. Some are parked in the street or driveway, while others are plopped right on the front lawn. In any case, Portable On-Demand Storage units--or PODS--intended for short- term use, are becoming permanent eyesores in Northern Virginia communities. And officials there are questioning the legality and propriety of the growing phenomenon. "They come and they stay for years on end," says Penelope A. Gross, a Fairfax County supervisor. "We had one storage container that was on someone's front lawn for over two years, and that's not what they're meant for.... They are not very attractive, and people are complaining about them in the neighborhoods." In fact, users who place them in the street are violating the county's existing zoning laws. And although PODS in driveways or on front lawns don't breach any county rules (since they generally do not exceed the county's permitted maximum size of lawn fixtures), their on-going presence "is not in the spirit of the county ordinance," Gross says. Fairfax County Supervisor Gerry Hyland has witnessed similar problems in his jurisdiction. Residents of the Huntington community are trying to clean up their neighborhood, but many are growing concerned as PODS are springing up on the small properties and being maintained as permanent fixtures. The issue has been turned over to the county's planning and zoning department, which is looking into whether a specific amendment is needed for the ordinance. "The idea of having a large box that you place in the front yard is a rather unusual occurrence because normally sheds and those type of structures are found in the rear of properties," Hyland says. "This is something we need to put our hands around and figure out what to do." --Brad Amburn THE CREATIVE CLASH A backlash is brewing over the theory of cultural and recreational opportunities as key economic development tools. Losing a company to relocation is something no mayor wants to see happen. So Mayor Dave Cieslewicz of Madison, Wisconsin, tried hard to persuade the CEO of Epic, a medical software company, to stay in the city rather than picking up and moving to a nearby suburb. Cieslewicz did what he could to sell her on all the charms that Madison could boast and the suburbs lacked. "I tried to pitch her on the idea that what your employees really want is cool places to go to lunch and art galleries and music venues," Cieslewicz recalls. "She looked at me and said, 'What my software engineers want is to order lunch from their terminals, have it dropped at the door and keep working at their desks.'" Epic ultimately opted for the suburbs and a corporate campus the company couldn't get in town. The experience soured Cieslewicz on the hottest idea in economic development--the notion that cool, hip cities thrive by keeping highly educated workers happy. This approach has been promulgated by Carnegie Mellon professor Richard Florida on the municipal lecture circuit and in his book, "The Rise of the Creative Class." In a nutshell, Florida argues that rather than attracting companies through tax incentives, cities should market themselves to educated knowledge workers who could live anywhere and prefer socially tolerant places offering plenty of cultural and recreational opportunities. Florida has been enormously influential with both city officials and the media, but suddenly there is a backlash, with critical articles appearing in numerous publications. Florida now gets mocked and trivialized for promoting bike paths, gays and rock bands as economic development tools. "Everyone thinks they can build a handful of cappuccino places and life will be grand," says Cieslewicz. "Every community in the country from Toledo to Poughkeepsie has decided that they're going to be the next cool town, and gosh, we can't all be." Perhaps the most damning criticism was put forward by Stephen Malanga in the Manhattan Institute's City Journal, noting that the cities Florida's book rates highest, such as San Francisco and New York, have performed below the national average in job growth over the past decade, while the cities that he spurns, including Memphis, Oklahoma City and Las Vegas, have been big economic winners. "The cool cities concept has been dubbed the latest economic snake oil," says Michael LaFaive of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy in Michigan. "It's just urban renewal with a different name that requires the same type of central planning that has failed us in the past." "It would be an understatement to say that my book...has generated heated debate," Florida writes in a recent column answering his critics. But despite the carping, Florida can take heart. Many state and local officials remain convinced that his ideas have merit. Steve Higdon, head of Greater Louisville Inc., the city's joint chamber of commerce and economic development agency, says that there's no question that some entrepreneurs are more interested in a tax break than a skateboard park. But, he says, "I don't think there's any argument that a city that is able to attract and retain educated, passionate and motivated individuals will have a strong city." In other words, the idea of the creative class has proven not to be an economic cure-all, any more than building sports stadiums or expanding convention centers were in the past. But Florida has helped put quality-of-life issues into the overall mix that state and city planners consider, along with the fundamentals of schools, taxes, crime and services. "Nobody thinks that all you have to do is have some coffee shops and street musicians and your economy is going to take off," says Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper. "All Florida shows is that quality of life has an impact on your ability to attract businesses." --Alan Greenblatt ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 2004, Congressional Quarterly, Inc. Reproduction in any form without the written permission of the publisher is prohibited. Governing, City & State and Governing.com are registered trademarks of Congressional Quarterly, Inc. http://governing.com