Letter to the Editor

In Phil Kidd's blog this week, he shares a recent letter to the editor "Y'town isn't my town" and his response. Inspired, I couldn't sleep last night until jotting this down, which I mailed in this morning:

Youngstown IS the Valley

In response to Boardman resident Merle Lee's letter "Y'town isn't my town", which proposes a boycott of Youngstown to protest its exploration of income tax generation from a Joint Economic Development District. There is a fair debate to be had about the proposal. It should be noted, however, that Youngstown is the reason for the suburbs' existence, and the revitalization of Youngstown is essential to the future of the region as a whole.

Youngstown has only been recently rescued from the claws of corruption and deserves a chance to find its way forward using all of the resources at its disposal. My family and I moved back to the city this year after a decade in the suburbs because of the vitality of its communities and culture. We believe in the growing renaissance that is leveraging the legacy of Youngstown's neighborhoods to realize a new urban identity.

To further this transformation, the region must move beyond urban-suburban conflict towards cooperative cohabitation, where each city promotes the other's health for mutual benefit. By supporting the development of Youngstown, the surrounding communities stand to gain higher quality of life through increased employment opportunities, higher wages, richer real estate values, expanded arts offerings and an elevated regional profile and attendant tourism dollars.

We owe it to ourselves and each other to engage in meaningful debates on these issues and policies. Ad hominem attacks only serve to isolate and insult. There's much rebuilding to be done. And we can only do it together.


Tyler S. Clark