Cities and towns--Growth

The purpose of this study is to look at the effects that industry concentration has on the growth of local areas. People will go where the jobs are so by evaluating employment data one can also evaluate the growth of an area. Common economic basis calculations and indices were used to provide useful information about characteristics of growth, competitiveness, and concentrations of local industries compared to the national level. The key results show the complex nature of urban and regional development exemplified by changes in employment and that access to more and complex data will be necessary to gain a greater understanding of urban growth.

Growth management grew as a concept and policy objective in the 1970s and 1980s. The interrelationships of the state and local governments changed when Florida developed growth policy and local government implemented the policy. Nine mandatory elements to be included in a local comprehensive plan and seven mandatory concurrency elements of the 1985 Florida Growth Management Act were expensive elements for local government to implement. As a result, the issue of funding the impacts of growth drove the growth management agenda, leaving the question of compliance. The question is: Did Florida local government comply with the transportation concurrency element of the Florida Growth Management Act? This dissertation analyzed five Florida counties and two Georgia counties to determine whether there was compliance with their respective state transportation policies. The study purposely looked at counties in different stages of growth to determine if the transportation requirements of the Florida Growth Management Act and the Georgia State Planning Act affected local budgets. Transportation is the most expensive element in local government budgets. Development orders would cease without the road capacity to carry the impact of proposed developments, making transportation the linchpin to state growth policies. A visual analysis and a multiple regression analysis were used to evaluate local government compliance with state transportation policy. A two-stage numerical evaluation was used for the visual analysis. The analysis looked for a slope change, a break in the trend, or both, after the impact of the intervention of the interrupted time series. A multiple regression analysis calculated the regression coefficient for a before and after dummy variable. The multiple regression removed the effects of population, interest rates, and road expenditure variables and isolated the effect of the dummy variable to determine local government compliance.

Although federal, state, and local governments have invested millions of dollars in social and economic programs, many citizens do not possess the basic necessities of life. The gap between the "haves" and "havenots" continues to grow. According to a 1990 Bureau of the Census report, the poverty rate among blacks in America is 31.9 percent; hispanics, 28.1 percent; and whites, 10.7 percent. Further, young black males have one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation. For example, the Department of Labor reported that during the fourth quarter of 1991, the unemployment rate of black males between the ages of twenty and twenty-four was 21.5 percent; hispanic males, 12.3 percent; and white males, 9.8 percent. Consequently, cities are faced with high unemployment rates, declining tax base, large welfare rolls, and increased crime. To combat these and other problems, an economic development planning approach which closes this gap must be developed. The economic development planning and implementation activities of the Cities of Fort Lauderdale and Pompano Beach, Florida, are explored to determine the extent to which they are addressing the needs of disadvantaged residents, particularly African-Americans. Questionnaires (surveys) and personal/telephone interviews are the basic techniques used to collect data. Based on the corporate-center, the distributive-corporate, and the corporate-distributive approaches to economic development planning and implementation, responses are analyzed to classify each City's approach. Responses concerning selected development projects are also analyzed to determine the extent to which these projects are addressing identified needs of the economically disadvantaged. The results indicate that both Cities have on-going economic development programs, which are attempting to close the gap between the "haves" and the "havenots," however, certain segments of the population are still excluded. A conceptual framework, "team enrichment" or the people-centered approach, is developed to bridge the gap between economic development planning and the needs of the disadvantaged. Team enrichment yields team empowerment. Team empowerment is the catalyst for community empowerment, which in turn achieves social, political, and economic power. Power is achieved through the actions of a community economic development (CED) triangle, which is held together by a strong community-public-private alliance.