Fish Farm Creativity

The Massachusetts Avenue Project (MAP) is a creative community organization doing some really interesting things on Buffalo’s West Side.

As reported in the Buffalo News, MAP has a greenhouse made out of straw bale, which they utilize for operating a community garden that provides education, training and food for area residents. MAP has added to their greenhouse a small fish farm to grow and sell live Tilapia. Tilapia are warm water fish that grow to about 8 to 10 inches, weigh a pound to a pound and a half.

The fish will sell for $5 to $6 each and MAP’s fish farm can grow 2,000 Tilapia. Jess Meeder of MAP, has created an amazing self contained eco-system to make the fish farm work. Rain water caught in MAP’s 1,000 gallon rain barrel is heated to 80 degrees, which keeps the greenhouse warm. The farm’s plant beds filter the water before it is returned to the fish pond. The fish eat vegetable leavings and algae, avoiding the need to buy fish food. Electricity is used to heat the water currently, but solar power is being explored as an option.

The first crop of fish will be ready to be sold in the spring. If this pilot project works, expanding to include catfish may be a next step.Through a very creative approach at a cost of $500, MAP has created a cool way to provide fresh food and increase their revenues.

Our Leaders Lack Skills

It is Election Day as I write this. Elections should be about a community thoughtfully electing leaders to move us forward to a better future.

A new survey from Pearson and Executive Development Associates determined that business leaders are concerned about attracting talented individuals to assume executive positions. As many elections go uncontested, we have a problem attracting talented people to run for public office.

When business leaders were asked what skills were lacking in the pool of talent primed to assume executive positions within the next few years responses included: strategic thinking, leading change, the ability to create a vision and engage others around it, the ability to inspire, and the ability to understand how the total enterprise works.

The above list of skills unfortunately appear to be lacking in most of our elected officials.

The reason for the lack of available business talent according to Judy Chartrand of Pearson is that finding the combination of skills mentioned above is difficult because it takes the right blend of personality, time and experience. According to Chartrand “You need somebody who’s got really good critical thinking capabilities, somebody’s who’s got really good interpersonal personality qualities, they need to have the courage to be able to make those tough decisions under fire, they also need to have the right experience.”

Strategic thinking, leading change, the ability to create a vision and engage others around it, the ability to inspire, and the ability to understand how the total enterprise works.

Our elected officials spend far too much time on small thinking, resisting change, not engaging others with a vision and a lack of understanding regarding the big picture. That being said I hope you voted and beyond that I hope you consider running for public office as we truly need leaders with some critical skills to move us forward.

Race vs. Party Affiliation

A recent Washington Times article titled Justice concludes black voters need Democratic Party, talks about an interesting nonpartisan election issue in Kinston North Carolina. Kinston, is a city with a population of 23,000 people, 65 percent of Kinston registered voters are black and two out of five City Councilmembers are black. Last November a ballot initiative to move city elections from partisan to nonpartisan passed 64% to 36%, with broad support among black and white voters.

City of Buffalo Councilmember Joseph Golombek has pushed a similar initative in Buffalo. The Buffalo Common Council recently passed a resolution in support of putting the idea of nonpartisan city elections to a public vote. In my opinion party labels when addressing issues such as streets, sanitation, parks and other city services are meaningless and divisive when trying to operate government services.

Several weeks ago Kinston conducted its first nonpartisan city elections. In fact most municipalities in North Carolina (Charlotte is the most notable exception) hold nonpartisan elections. The United States Justice Department ( as outlined in the linked letter) has objected to implementing nonpartisan elections in Kinston.

Although black voters make up 65% of Kinston’s voters, their turnout in elections has been less than that. The Justice Department decision to over turn partisan elections is based on the opinion that partisan elections are needed so that black voters can elect their “candidates of choice” identified by the Justice Department as those who are Democrats and almost exclusively black. According to the Justice Department, Because of the low turnout from black voters, cross over votes are needed from white voters to elect blacks to office. The Justice Department explains that white voters in Kinston will vote for black candidates only if they are Democrats and therefore the city cannot get rid of party affiliations for local elections because that would violate black voters’ right to elect the candidates they want.

The Justice Department also expressed concern that nonpartisan elections would eliminate political party support that is provided to black candidates. The conclusion reached by the Justice Department is highlighted in the excerpt below:

“Removing the partisan cue in municipal elections will, in all likelihood, eliminate the single factor that allows black candidates to be elected to office. In Kinston elections, voters base their choice more on the race of a candidate rather than his or her political affiliation, and without either the appeal to party loyalty or the ability to vote a straight ticket, the limited remaining support from white voters for a black Democratic candidate will diminish even more. And given thst the city’s electorate is overwhelmingly Democratic, while the motivating factor for this change may be partisan, the effect will be strictly racial.”

An interesting point is that Democrats in Kinston have been in power for more than a century. While black candidates have won elected office in Kinston, a Republican or any unaffiliated candidate has not won a city election since Reconstruction. Kind of defeats the argument that race is more of a hurdle than political affiliation in winning elections.

I support nonpartisan elections because I believe that we need to move beyond party labels in evaluating candidates. Some Republican, Conservative, Independence Party candidates have good ideas, but the hurdle of party labels prevents them from being serious contenders for public office. There is very little difference between political parties, its all about my gang vs the other gang. Special interest money funds all candidates regardless of party affiliation at the expense of the average person. While the Justice Department is concerned about lessening party influence, I am all for lessening the influence of political parties.

The logic put forth by the Justice Department in preventing non partisan elections is disappointing. Kinston’s registered voters are 65% black who have the majority status to elect candidates of their choice, regardless of white votes and regardless of party labels. Some local politicians in Kinston believe that voter apathy is the largest barrier to black voters electing candidates they prefer and that the Justice Department has gone too far in its decision over turning nonpartisan elections.

What do you think about nonpartisan elections and the Justice Department’s decision?

10 Reasons Your Team Hates You

Bosses day was celebrated last week. We all have bosses and some of us are also bosses in addition to reporting to a boss. Being a boss is not easy. Below is a copy of an interesting article written by - Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC.

I love the suggestion at the end of the article, which I have repeated here:

“There they are: 10 reasons your team hates you. Do any of them fit? I’ll tell you what: I DARE you to email this post to your team members and ask them to anonymously circle any of the above behaviors that apply to you. I then further challenge you to fix the one or two that have the most votes. Trust me – all of you will be happier if you do. How’s THAT for provocative?”

10 Reasons Your Team Hates You (They Just Won’t Say It To Your Face)

Your team hates you. Really. They do. They hate their boss (you) but they just won’t say so because they like getting paid. But when they go home at night, they spill their bile about their taskmaster of a boss who does nothing but drive them crazy (isn’t that what you do too?).

It’s been a while since I’ve been controversial (okay, maybe the post on trust not being the most important aspect business partnerships was provocative but I’m talking controversial at the level of the I don’t care about your degree post). For this post, I’ve been sure to drink a glass of vinegar before typing.

If you don’t start fixing some of these behaviors, you might end up with a mutiny on your hands. In today’s world though, that doesn’t involve them tossing you in a dinghy – instead they’ll all just quit their jobs.

Before you go all “Mike has lost it again. This post doesn’t apply to me so I won’t read any more of it.” I’d ask you to spend the 2-3 minutes it will take to spin through the below list and see if any of the points resonate. If you make it through all ten and can honestly say none apply to you, bravo (related: are you hiring?).

If some of the points do resonate, I’m asking you to commit to rectifying some of these behaviors. We’ll all be happier that way. To assist with that, I’ve offered some suggested behavior modifications for each of the ten.

Full disclosure – I’ve been plenty guilty of some of the below behaviors. Fortunately I’ve had talented folks around me help me work on many of them. I’m not perfect by a long shot yet. I guess what I’m saying is all of these things apply to all of us even in some small measure.

So here goes… 10 Reasons Your Team Hates You:

10. You don’t prioritize. Everything is important. When you do this, you remove your team’s ability to say no to less important work and focus their efforts on critical tasks. The fix: write down all the tasks you have folks working on and FORCE yourself to assign a H, M, or L to each task (and treat it as such). Thou shalt only have 33% of all tasks in each of those three categories – you can’t assign everything a “High” importance.

9. You treat them like employees. You don’t know a darn thing about them as a person (which makes them feel like nothing more than a number). The fix: read this post about 7Up.

8. You don’t fight for them. When is the last time you went to bat for a team member? And I mean went to bat where you had something to lose if it didn’t work out? When you don’t stand up for them, you lose their trust. The fix: identify something you should have gone to the mat for recently and get out there and fight. Get someone that raise they deserve. Go fight for them to get that cool new project.

7. You tell them to “have a balanced life” then set a bad example. You tell them weekends are precious and they should spend them with their family then you go and send them emails or voicemails on Sunday afternoon. The fix: either curb your bad habit of not being in balance or learn how to do delayed send in Outlook so your messages won’t go out until Monday morning.

6. You never relax. You walk around like you have a potato chip wedged between your butt cheeks and you’re trying not to break it. When you’re uptight all the time, it makes them uptight. Negative or stressful energy transfers to others. The fix: laugh, get a remote controlled car or tricycle to drive around the office, or put on a Burger King crown. When you relax, your team knows it’s okay for them to relax too.

5. You micromanage. You know every detail of what they’re working on and you’ve become a control freak. They have no room to make decisions on their own (which means yes, they’ll make a mistake or two). The fix: back off. Pick a few low risk projects and commit to not doing ANYTHING on them unless your team member asks you for assistance. It’ll be uncomfortable for you. Give it a try you micromanaging control freak.

4. You’re a suck-up. If your boss stopped short while walking down the hall, you’d break your neck. Your team hates seeing you do this because it demonstrates lack of spine and willingness to fight for them. It can also signal to them that you expect them to be a sycophant just like you. The fix: try kicking up and kissing down instead.

3. You treat them like mushrooms. Translation: they’re kept in the dark and fed a bunch of crap. Do you ration information? Do you withhold “important” things from them because it’s “need to know” only? All you’re doing is creating gossip and fear. The fix: stop acting like 007 and spill some beans.

2. You’re above getting your hands dirty. You’re great at assigning work. Doing work? Not so much. They hate watching you preside (and they hate it even more when you take credit for what they slaved over). The fix: get dirty. Climb under the proverbial tank and turn a wrench. Roll up your sleeves and pick a smaller project you can handle in addition to your other responsibilities and DO THE PROJECT YOURSELF.

1. You’re indecisive. Maybe. Or not. But possibly. Yeah. No. I don’t know. OH MY GOSH MAKE A DECISION ALREADY! That’s what you get paid to do as the leader. You drive them crazy with your incessant flip-flopping or waffling (mmmm waffles… oh. Sorry… still writing). The fix: DO SOMETHING! Acknowledge you might make a mistake but do something. A team is much more likely to follow a leader who makes decisions (even some bad ones) than a leader who makes no decisions at all.

There they are: 10 reasons your team hates you. Do any of them fit? I’ll tell you what: I DARE you to email this post to your team members and ask them to anonymously circle any of the above behaviors that apply to you. I then further challenge you to fix the one or two that have the most votes. Trust me – all of you will be happier if you do. How’s THAT for provocative?

Felony Franks

Felony Franks is the name of a new hot dog business that recently opened in Chicago that is causing a lot of controversy. The owner of the business hires ex-cons as a way to help them obtain jobs. Some don’t like the name and are complaining that the business negatively impacts the neighborhood . The owner took a vacant piece of property invested $160,000 dollars and created 12 jobs by opening Felony Franks.

An excerpt from a news article about Felony Franks:

Customers enter a cramped space framed by cinder-block walls, with no tables or chairs. Near the entrance hangs a mock list of Miranda rights: “You have the right to remain hungry. Anything you order can and will be used to feed you here at Felony Franks.”

Servers standing behind bulletproof plastic — standard for stores in the neighborhood — ask customers, “Are you ready to plead your case?” Among other dishes, the menu lists the Misdemeanor Wiener and the Chain Gang Chili Dog. Side orders, such as fries, cole slaw and garlic bread, are dubbed “accomplices.” The restaurant’s slogan is, “Food so good it’s criminal.”

Some customers just laugh. Others who live nearby think the penal puns are an affront to a community grappling with crime and trying to change for the better.

In my opinion turning an empty piece of property into a business that employs 12 people is a good thing. The name Felony Franks is creative business marketing. What do you think?

Transparent Government

New York City is taking an interesting approach in engaging the public to assist the city with improving public access to governmental information. Private corporations around the world are tapping into open source contributions to help them with new ideas. Government needs new ideas, what do you think about the approach being used in New York City?

Developers, Start Your Engines: NYC’s Grand Experiment in Mobile Apps

BY Cliff KuangTue Oct 6, 2009 at 3:11 PM

Today, New York’s pulling back the curtain on a grand experiment: NYC Apps, a public competition to design Web and mobile apps that tap massive amounts of public data that have previously been largely tucked out of view–from restaurant inspection data to traffic updates to city budgets. In all, there will be 170 data sets available at Data Mine, starting at 1pm today. The competition will reward $20,000 in cash prizes, in designations ranging from Best Application to Data Visualization and “Investor’s Choice.” The grand prize winner, in addition to bagging $5,000, will get dinner with Mayor Michael Bloomberg himself.

As we’ve reported before here, numerous cities are jumping on the mobile app bandwagon. Austin, Boston, San Francisco, and Portland have all been exploring ways to put city data in the hands of citizens, to improve quality of life. Portland has been particularly cutting edge: There are already a slew of apps that will do everything from tracking exactly where your bus is to figuring out your best mass-transit commute options. San Francisco, meanwhile, has began an effort very similar to New York’s, with last month’s launch of DataSF.org.

New York, meanwhile, has been busily trying to amp up its innovation bona fides–for example, there was an open call last spring to reinvent taxi services, with plug-in technology solutions. But NYC Apps could become a continual source of innovation: The city plans on turning the competition into an annual event.

This time around, submissions will be due two months from now, on December 8. One week later, public voting will begin. On January 7, the winners will be selected. Watch this space for updates on the ideas that come across the transom.

Loving Where You Live

Below is an interesting article about what makes people attached to their community and what makes people love where they live.

What do you think about the results of this study and how does Buffalo rate in your opinion on the top three items mentioned below?

The top three things that make people love where they live

Matt Thompson is Knight Foundation’s Interim Online Community Manager. He edits the Soul of the Community blog.

Image courtesy of Pink Sherbet Photography on Flickr.

Over the past two years, we’ve asked almost 28,000 people from all over the U.S. how they feel about their communities. Are they satisfied with where they live? Would they recommend it to others? Is it perfect for folks like them? Are they proud to live there?

We also asked them a ton of other questions about their community. How are the highways and freeways? How well do community leaders represent their interests? How safe is it to walk around their neighborhoods? How’s the local economy?

From their answers to the second set of questions (regarding different aspects of their community), we tried to figure out which of those questions did the most to predict their answers on the first set of questions (regarding their own feelings about the community). And in place after place, knowing how they perceived three key aspects of the community told us the most about how much they cherished the community overall.

3. Aesthetics

Image courtesy of Яick Harris on Flickr.

In each community, Gallup researchers asked residents two questions about its attractiveness – how they rated the area’s parks, playgrounds and trails and how they rated its overall beauty and physical setting. It turns out a pretty city is a lovable city.

You might have suspected this. After all, an area’s aesthetics are one of the first things we talk about when we say why we love a place. Urban design has become a huge topic nationwide over the past few decades, well-reflected in the online conversation through popular sites like Inhabitat and Worldchanging. We intuitively thrill to projects like Manhattan’s High Line – turning an abandoned rail line into a public park – because we recognize that these aesthetic enhancements are important for a community’s well-being.

But would you have expected that our feelings about our community’s aesthetics play a bigger part in our attachment to a place than public safety or highways and freeways? That surprised me, and it suggests to me that as much as we talk about urban design and green space, we might still be underestimating its impact.

2. Social offerings

Image courtesy of fabbio on Flickr.

It sometimes seems as though every city in America is working on a never ending downtown revitalization project. In recent years, a lot of emphasis has been placed on creating vibrant social cores for our communities, dense places where diverse groups of people can interact. Our study suggests these efforts are valuable.

Researchers asked residents questions about how fun and social their communities are – Is there vibrant nightlife? Is it a good place to meet people and make friends? How much do residents seem to care about each other?

Responses to these questions did a lot to indicate how attached people are to where they live. I think this is especially interesting considering the study covers residents from a number of demographics, not just the young, single urbanites that we think of when we hear words like “nightlife.”

To be a top-three characteristic overall, social offerings had to be important to people of a wide range of ages, marital statuses and incomes. And in fact, it’s an ascendant community trait whether you’re looking at a relatively older community like Bradenton, Fla., or a relatively young community like State College, Pa. – both areas where social offerings are actually the leading indicator for community attachment.

1. Openness

Image courtesy of Luiz Felipe Castro on Flickr.

The number one trait we identified as decisive in determining residents’ attachment to a community was openness. To get at this trait, researchers asked whether the community was a “good place for” different groups of people – senior citizens, racial and ethnic minorities, families with kids, gays and lesbians, college graduates, and immigrants from other countries.

In community after community, residents’ responses to these questions told us the most about how attached they were to their community.

Urban scholars such as Richard Florida have been talking for years about the economic benefits of tolerance – a community’s friendliness to different groups of people. Our findings underscore the value of these characteristics and add some strong empirical weight.

But this leaves me with some questions. Openness might be the most significant trait in determining community attachment, but of all the areas researchers asked about, this is also one of the most personal and subjective. After all, civic leaders can fix up highways and freeways, create parks and bike trails, make housing more affordable, encourage the development of fun nightlife corridors, and work to lower crime – we have recognized public policy levers to address all of these community needs. But how does a community make itself more welcoming? Laws and policies can only go so far in addressing this perception.

Might it be that one of the community’s most important traits is also the most difficult to improve?

Are You Buying Underwear?

An interesting article in the New York Times, talks about the many different items that economists track to determine how the economy is doing. One of the tracking measures that former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan used was the purchase of underwear by men. See the excerpt below.

Have you bought new underwear lately?

In the 1970s, when Alan Greenspan, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve was still running his own economic consulting firm, he said that he looked at sales of men’s underwear as an economic indicator. Sales rose steadily in normal times, the theory went, but tended to dip when men had less money, or were trying to cut back on their spending.

The research firm Mintel projects that men’s underwear sales will fall 2.3 percent this year as men stretch out the lifespan of their boxers or briefs.

“It’s simply a bellwether,” said Bill Patterson, a senior analyst at Mintel who examined trends in men’s underwear sales. “When people are feeling confident, they spend more. The last thing you’re going to do when you’re short on cash is go and replace your underwear.”

For the record I recently purchased some underwear so I guess things are looking up. How about you?

Lessons From Atlanta

BNE Gets 19 Wins

The Buffalo Niagara Enterprise (BNE), a nonprofit, private business development and regional marketing organization dedicated to attracting new businesses and retaining existing businesses in the eight county Western New York area, recently released their Annual Report.

For the 2008-09 fiscal year BNE achieved 19 wins, which they define as when a company commits to a local project. The 19 wins equate to $336 million in private sector investment and 1,354 jobs (810 new jobs pledged and 544 jobs retained).

Among the 19 wins are the following projects:

- Yahoo’s decision to build in Lockport;

- Geico’s expansion of its workforce in Amherst;

- API Heat Transfer’s $9.5 million expansion in Cheektowaga, adding 120 new jobs;

- Kemper Systems adding 12 workers through a $3 million expansion of their Tonawanda plant;

- Sampla Belt based in Italy opening their first U.S. manufacturing plant in Lackawanna, instead of in Italy or South Africa;

- In the past year, BNE helped seven Canadian firms to set up operations in WNY;

- BNE assisted 26 companies with 106 site visits.

Promoting economic development in WNY is not an easy task. Defining a win as when a company commits to a project probably means that Bass Pro was counted as a win in the past, even though it has not happened and may never happen. Counting the number of jobs pledged rather than actually created can be a big difference as well. At least the BNE has achieved something through their efforts. What do you think about BNE’s performance?