Downtown churches are growing again. Take Miami, where Gesu Catholic Church (founded 1896), Trinity Episcopal (1896) and First United Methodist (1897), were in slow decline from the 1960s on. These churches aren't back to 1960s levels of attendance, but they are growing for the first time in decades. But this is just the beginning, church members say. The uptick has been widespread, but total numbers are still modest. Church officials are convinced more are coming because so much housing is being built downtown. More than 5,300 units have been built in downtown Miami in recent years and an additional 17,000 have been approved. There's another side to the downtown renewal story for churches. Their land is suddenly worth a fortune. That's why First United Methodist Church of Seattle is selling its beautiful 1907 building to a developer who plans a high-rise office tower. First United Methodist will relocate to nearby Belltown, where it will get more space and an underground parking garage. The senior pastor told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer the church will be in a better position to grow the congregation and help the homeless.
Libraries were once a grim but necessary gathering place for high school students writing term papers, but most students today can find more information online than at the best-stocked central library. Given this, why do we need public libraries? The answer seems to be for meetings. Take St. Louis, where thousands of groups use libraries for meetings and lectures. Meeting rooms are cheap or free, some come with audio-visual equipment and, as the St. Louis Post-Dispatch pointed out recently, most people know where the local library is located. St. Louis County libraries host about 6,000 meetings a year, the city libraries about 4,200. Politicians also like libraries. In Georgia, suburban lawmakers are larding the state budget with appropriations for libraries in their towns. As one told the Atlanta Journal Constitution, "In certain districts, libraries are like community centers and civic centers used to be. When we do legislative town hall meetings, for the most part, we do them at libraries." Ironically, while spending on library buildings is up in Georgia, per- capita spending on books and maintenance is way down.