Youngstown: Still Branding

Yours truly attended the premiere of Ray "Boom Boom / I Killed a Man in the Ring" Mancini's latest endeavor, "Youngstown: Still Standing," a film chronicling the trials of early Youngstown including plenty of kaboomy cars and mob killings, the whole Jimbo debacle, and the emerging rebirth of the city as a can-do Phoenix from the ashes.

The movie itself could have stood alone as a short documentary about Youngstown Mafia. It was compelling, with plenty of entertaining anecdotes from regular Joes and famous ex-Youngstowners. The greater portion of the film concerned this topic, if not for its exciting stories but also for its huge amount of file footage and photos. The steel mills were also waxed nostalgically upon, with charming retirees adding colorful commentary. Next a pair of denim bellbottoms stomped all over Congress, and then I guess nothing happened for a few years until a bunch of kids started realizing the story of Youngstown not only made a great story, but also A GREAT T-SHIRT.

For the past five or six years, the city has lent itself well for branding by a number of enterprises. It has found its way into fashion, music, art, fiction, and even beer. And why not? It is a symbol of the Everyman: hard-working, laid-back, unpresumptuous, and honest. There are plenty of folks in town who fit this bill. But there are also plenty of people who want to have the effortless honesty and attitude that others have naturally. Taking on the Youngstown brand is a way to instantly earn Rust Belt cred without having to deal with the strife of a long life in the city.

How should we feel about this: Insulted? Flattered? We should be proud that our struggles are an inspiration to others. Those who want to tell our story are helping the rebirth every day with their articles and books and photos and music. But we should not be made a novelty. The Youngstown AK47 t-shirt is clever enough, but it can seem like a novelty when worn by others to either make fun or look tough. I guess that's how Chevrolets/Fords being peed on by Calvin or George Bush must feel when they see t-shirts lampooning them. T-shirts can be such a bitch.

Black humor is used as a way to cope, but what do outsiders have to cope with? They don't deal with the city. The "Murder Capital" brand is amusing, but those who have seen the effect our crime rate has had on the citizens can't explain it to the guy wearing the shirt in another town far away.

The industrial wasteland makes for romantic lyrics, paintings, photography and writing. But when does it stop being art and begin being so-called recession porn?

Young people like the brand too. College kids have been on the North Side for years, coming from their lower-middle/upper-middle class homes to live in houses worth less than their cars. They seem to think living in the city is either a learning experience or an amusing adventure, but to paraphrase some song lyrics, "cause when you lay in your bed at night watching roaches climb the walls, you can call your Dad and he can stop it all."

The city has a wide mix of people as citizens - young and old, well-off and poor - and we are all kinda in it together. The nicest house in town is only a block or two away from some of the worst. This creates a kind of camaraderie, and hopefully prevents making generalizations. Not all successful people in town are naive, and not all working-class people are blue-collar martyrs. Branding can encourage these stereotypes.

A respectable generation has a vested interest in maintaining and preserving neighborhoods and the history, but devote less time to their neighbors and the crime. It's great to have any influx of interest in the city, but people should be aware of all the aspects of the city, good and bad, popular and unpopular, before they brand themselves.

In closing, Rust Belt Brewery makes a hell of a beer. That's a brand I'd represent.

Sing along with the common people,
sing along and it might just get you through,
laugh along with the common people,
laugh along even though they're laughing at you,
and the stupid things that you do.
Because you think that poor is cool.

Off With His HUD!!!

Oh, the HUD debacle. To offset the onslaught of insane crime that began 2010 for Youngstown, we had to have a bit of comic relief to remind us that not all news is so bloody and yucky. For the uninitiated, let me recap:

* City CDA director Bill D'Avignon was in charge of completing a HUD grant application so that Youngstown could share in some of that sweet, sweet stimulus money (which is only dreaded "pork barrel spending" when someone else has it, apparently).
* Instead of filling out the application himself, which our tax money pays him to do, he passed the application off to the 22-year-old daughter of his girlfriend (the girlfriend formerly worked at the Vindicator and now works for the city). The daughter had no grant writing experience, had just graduated from YSU, was a former Jambar editor and currently worked for the Tribune.
* The application sucked ass. We got a ZERO out of 10 on most of the requirements.
* We didn't get any money.

Before we found out why we were denied the sweet, sweet stimulus bucks, an angry mob took up their Internet pitchforks and went straight after the man who was clearly responsible for this despite having nothing to do with the CDA or the application filling out or reviewing process - TIM RYAN. Yes, it was his fault we didn't get any money, and you were all very vocal about it:

* "The Democrat Party believes you deserve to be rejected for believing in socialism and re-electing socialists. They know you die hard Dems are what the first dictator of the USSR called you, useful idiots."
* "Sounds like the valley liberal DemoPORKERS are on their way for a Washington, DC vacation at taxpayer expense. Tim Ryan does not deserve re-election. He has yet to do anything for the valley. Taxpayers can no longer afford to support the spending of deficit creating dollars for these kinds of projects. The liberal DemoPORKERS in the valley just don't get it."
* "Hey Timmy "Pelosi Lap Dog" Ryan. I'll bet you're proud of this one. If you would have spent more time on our local issues rather than the Health Care fiasco or going to Copenhagen maybe you wouldn't have dropped the ball. Believe me if Our area would have gotten the HUD grant You would have been the first one to take credit. Now your just a whiner trying to save face. Sometimes a cheat is just a cheat."

The entire town wanted Tim Ryan's head on a stick for this. Goes to show how much they know about the political process.

SO, despite having nothing to do with the application being an epic fail, Tim Ryan takes a meeting in Washington that was supposed to be about Youngstown 2010 (another mess, to be discussed later), and uses it to try and find out what happened, and how Youngstown could still try and get some money for HUD. Imagine his surprise when he goes on the back of the entire town clamoring for his blood, representing poor Youngstown who needs this money so bad and wants to know why, WHY we were ignored, only to find out it was because something, unlike money and jobs, Youngstown unfortunately has plenty of - GROSS INCOMPETENCE.

So, Tim Ryan was vindicated. The Vindicator, always the source for such daring headlines as "HUD to Mahoning Valley: Drop Dead," had to eat crow like it was going out of style. The Tribune, despite employing the girl at the center of this scandal, had no clue what was happening until the story broke, and appeared to be protecting their employee at the cost of good journalism. Everybody lost in this debacle.

I'm not a Tim Ryan fanatic, nor am I trying to make him look like a saint. This is merely to point out how quickly the Valley is to cast blame upon a political figurehead before they even know what's happening, only to look as bad as that grant application after the truth comes out.

But you know who coulda stopped all this? JIMBO. <- sarcasm.