Richard Florida, author of The Rise of the Creative Class spoke–is still speaking–to the Downtown Long Beach Associates annual gathering. His point: Long Beach is poised to take advantage of an economic change bigger than the switch from agriculture to industry: the rise of creative types.

We’ll deal with more in a moment, but first this: we’re sitting at Table 31–Dave Wielenga, Steve Lowery, Kristina Coffeen and I–when Florida takes the stage. I’m reading Dave Wielenga’s story on the Chamber of Commerce coup d’etat at City Hall; in short, the Chamber has bullied the city into handing out subsidies to such big-box retailers as Wal-Mart.

But like I say, Florida takes the stage as I’m reading, and he announces that (a) city officials including Mayor Bob Foster have read and understood his book and (b) great cities, cities on the rise, cities like Boston, don’t hand out subsidies to companies; Boston didn’t give Lycos a dime, he says, and yet Lycos moved from Pittsburgh to Boston. Great cities create an environment for creative people and wait for the employers to find them.

Was Florida ripping City Hall? Or is he just unfamiliar with the Chamber Coup?

Tags: big-box, Boston, chamber of commerce, creative class, Long Beach, richard florida, subsidies, tax holidays, Wal-Mart

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Paul Brennan 9 months ago 1 point
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No, he’s not ripping on anyone. Florida knows his own thesis, which he’s been continually repackaging for resale since 2002, and if it doesn’t fit the facts of the particular city he’s talking about, then so much the worse for the facts. Back in 2002, when his work was new and shiny, reporters at the New Orleans Times-Picayune noticed something interesting about Florida’s Bohemian Index of 50 American cities. New Orleans was in the bottom ten of the most bohemian cities. Ranked well above it were such towns are Richmond, Milwaukee, Rochester, and Salt Lake City. Yep, Salt Lake City was more bohemian than pre-Katrina New Orleans-- and Florida wasn’t making some subtle joke about the old N.O. basketball team moving to Utah and keeping the name “Jazz”.

So, if you’re interested in hearing Florida give the same speech he's been giving for half a decade, you'll get your money's worth. But if you expect him to really know something about the city he’s supposed to be talking about, you‘re likely to be disappointed.

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jesus 9 months ago 1 point
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Jesus is confused. Dick Florida? What did they do?

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