17
Safe and Livable Communities comprised 3 percent of expenditures (versus 10%), Lifting Youth
and Families Out of Poverty represented 7 percent of expenditures (versus 36.3%), Provide
Adequate Housing for All represented 18 percent of expenditures (versus 21.2%) and
Governance accounted for 14 percent of expenditures (versus 0%).
Several “time sensitive” projects not included in the original strategic plan and initial set
of benchmarks have been approved by the AEZC upon the request of the executive director,
acting on the instructions of the Mayor. To fund these projects, dollars were taken from
previously approved benchmarks or new benchmarks were created. As shown above, Safe and
Livable Communities and Lifting Youth and Families Out of Poverty were the two categories
that were most frequently turned to for the funding to support new initiatives since these
categories had few or no active projects.
Several factors account for these changes in emphasis as Atlanta’s strategic plan was
implemented. These include:
o Low Priority. The AEZC has focused on economic development projects with
little interest in other types of projects like human services. There were few—if
any—AEZC staff to advocate for specific programmatic initiatives outside of
economic development and the AEZC board members representing organizations
with expertise in the human services area were unable to stimulate interest in this
programmatic area.
o Local Capacity and Demand. Since the City has no formal human services
agency, primary program responsibility for these activities rests with state and
county agencies and nonprofit organizations. Other than the six members of the
CEAB, who serve on the AEZC board, there has been no voice for bringing
attention to investment in programs and activities in the human services area.
o Political Will. Most local stakeholders noted that Atlanta’s EZ program has been
tightly controlled by the Mayor’s Office. Many attribute the lack of focus
around Atlanta’s EZ initiative to Mayor Campbell’s inability or unwillingness to
articulate a vision for the utilization of Empowerment Zone resources. Several
board members said they kept waiting for the Mayor to step up and identify his
priorities for the EZ initiative and the Zone neighborhoods, but that never
happened. Instead, Mayor Campbell opted to send the board a variety of ad hoc,
“time sensitive” projects which some observers have noted appear to be more in
line with providing assistance to “Friends of Bill,” than to any strategic initiative
for revitalizing Zone neighborhoods.
Baltimore’s Spending Patterns and Priorities
Table 2 reports an overview of EBMC’s budget for Title XX funds as of the September
2003 EBMC Board meeting. While this is an indication of the scope and priority of EBMC’s
activities in the empowerment zone, it is important to recall that EBMC has also leveraged
funding from a variety of sources to support its initiatives in the empowerment zone. The figures
in Table 2 are organized into four columns. The first column is the “budgeted” amount of funds.
Convention