Four years after the New Jersey State Legislature voted to spend $175 million to help revitalize Camden, a series of resignations has placed the troubled riverfront town at another crossroads, reported the New York Times.
In Rethinking Revitalization, a November 5th New York Times article, Camden residents wondered when and if real recovery would take place, while Penn Press author and historian Howard Gillette, Jr. noted the lack of quantifiable signs of improvement, such as more jobs and more affordable housing.
"The real question is when you have a city that goes bankrupt like Camden has, do you try ot manage your way out, or do you try to create an environment in which you get investmen to reverse the market economy that has left the city behind? And can you do that in a way that is also fair and complementary to the needs ot the people who are here?" said Gillette.
Howard Gillette, Jr.’s Camden After the Fall: Decline and Renewal in a Post-Industrial City chronicles the history of the post-industrial American city and points toward a sustained urban revitalization strategy for the twenty-first century.