Neighborhood Pride is at the heart of Mayor Michael B. Coleman’s vision to make Columbus “the best city in the nation in which to live, work and raise a family.”

Neighborhood Pride is a team effort by City departments, neighborhood groups and individual citizens, businesses and other partners to make our neighborhoods safer and cleaner, keys to a more vibrant and exciting future for Columbus.

For one week, (there is) an intense delivery of City services, including the cleaning of alleys, mowing high grass in the public right-of-way and neighborhood recreational areas, replacing burned out street light bulbs, offering block watch and fire prevention outreach and evaluating exterior housing for code compliance.

Prior to each “Pride Week,” City employees reach out to neighborhood groups in the Pride District to help craft the specifics of each Neighborhood Pride effort.

City staff members make presentations at area commission, civic association, business associations and other groups to introduce Pride to the neighborhood.

More importantly, City outreach staff fields residents’ questions and ask citizens to identify their concerns in the area so Pride can efficiently and effectively address those priorities. Before each Pride Week, neighborhood leaders and key City staff board a City vehicle and drive every street and alley of a Pride District. During this “Pride Tour,” neighborhood leaders are asked to point out specific concerns that will be addressed during Pride Week. This is a key to Pride’s success. Each neighborhood is unique and has vital attributes to contribute toward making Columbus a great city. Residents’ active participation in this process—and other aspects of Neighborhood Pride—is essential for Pride to be a success.

Citizen participation in Pride is necessary before, during and after Pride Week. Neighborhood Pride is the beginning of a long-term process for changing the way the City does business with its customers to the benefit of residents. Citizens’ concerns change with time, as neighborhoods are living, evolving communities. A strong, ongoing partnership between a neighborhood and the City enhances the effort to deliver services in a more timely, efficient and responsive manner to a neighborhood.

A changing city demands flexibility from Neighborhood Pride. Accordingly, Pride is designed to be an ever-evolving program to meet the changing needs of citizens and the times. Lessons learned during each Pride effort have spawned a more efficient and stronger version of Neighborhood Pride since its inception in the spring of 2000. This change for the better, coupled with department reorganizations through the City’s Operations Review effort, has realigned City government to become more citizen friendly and accountable to the foundation of City government: its citizens.

A resurgence in the Gallatin Public Square with attractive shops, well-attended restaurants, and a beautiful new library all within walking distance of each other lacks only one other element to be as 'cutting-edge' and trendy as any other other highly touted suburban American community: affordable, attractive housing with a 'historic' and architecturally eclectic feel.

Do the principles outlined below sound like something that central Gallatin could benefit from?

"We stand for the restoration of existing urban centers and towns within coherent metropolitan regions, the reconfiguration of sprawling suburbs into communities of real neighborhoods and diverse districts, the conservation of natural environments, and the preservation of our built legacy.......neighborhoods should be diverse in use and population; urban places should be framed by architecture and landscape design that celebrate local history, climate, ecology, and building practice.... reclaiming our homes, blocks, streets, parks, neighborhoods, districts, towns, cities, regions, and environment.

Infill development within existing urban areas conserves environmental resources, economic investment, and social fabric, while reclaiming marginal and abandoned areas. ... develop strategies to encourage such infill development over peripheral expansion.

Cities and towns should bring into proximity a broad spectrum of public and private uses to support a regional economy that benefits people of all incomes.

Affordable housing should be distributed throughout the region to match job opportunities and to avoid concentrations of poverty.

The neighborhood, the district, and the corridor are the essential elements of development and redevelopment in the metropolis. They form identifiable areas that encourage citizens to take responsibility for their maintenance and evolution.

Many activities of daily living should occur within walking distance, allowing independence to those who do not drive, especially the elderly and the young.

Interconnected networks of streets should be designed to encourage walking, reduce the number and length of automobile trips, and conserve energy.

Within neighborhoods, a broad range of housing types and price levels can bring people of diverse ages, races, and incomes into daily interaction, strengthening the personal and civic bonds essential to an authentic community.

Concentrations of civic, institutional, and commercial activity should be embedded in neighborhoods and districts, not isolated in remote, single-use complexes.

Schools should be sized and located to enable children to walk or bicycle to them.

A range of parks, from tot-lots and village greens to ballfields and community gardens, should be distributed within neighborhoods.

The revitalization of urban places depends on safety and security. Streets and squares should be safe, comfortable, and interesting to the pedestrian. Properly configured, they encourage walking and enable neighbors to know each other and protect their communities.

Architecture and landscape design should grow from local climate, topography, history, and building practice.

Preservation and renewal of historic buildings, districts, and landscapes affirm the continuity and evolution of urban society. "

The above is taken from the Charter of the Congress of New Urbanism, but it sounds a lot like the Gallatin (Citizens) Visioning Committee report of 2007, in which a broad spectrum of people from Gallatin proposed a development/quality of life plan for the future of our city.

Go to this link for more information on the CNU:
http://www.cnu.org/Copyright 1996, Congress for the New Urbanism. Permission is hereby granted to reproduce the Charter in full or in excerpt, provided that this copyright notice remains intact.© 1997-2007 Congress for the New Urbanism. Opinions posted in CNU Salons and in comments are those of their respective authors, not of CNU.