My Hometown

Yesterday, the Brookings Institute named my hometown, Youngstown, Ohio, number one in percentage of poverty concentration, the poorest of the poor among 100 larger cities in the United States. I didn't expect the article and the story on The Rachel Maddow Show to affect me so much, but it really made me want to cry. I admit, even as a little kid, I wanted to leave Youngstown. All I ever wanted was to live in a huge city by the ocean with football and hockey teams. I wanted it to be New York City but I ended up in Southern California. There's no football here, but I've got the beach, hockey and futbol (soccer), and I can play golf year-round. I'm happy here, but I'm so sad for Youngstown. It was fun growing up in the murder capital of the US, alongside the mafia. Although that looks like childs-play compared to the situation now. It was a far more innocent time then. Regardless of the fact that I wanted to leave, part of who I am is because of the place I'm from. Youngstown helped shape the person I am today. Every day, on the TV, in the papers and on the internet, we get news about the Occupy Movement in cities across the US. The place I'm from, and place I live, point out Occupy's premise of the extreme and growing disparity between the haves and the have-nots. There is a house for sale in a city near me on the market for $32 million, and Youngstown has nearly 50% of their poor living in extreme poverty: neighborhoods with no jobs, no stores, no hope, nothing but blight, and no way out. Where is parity, where is fairness, where is the middle ground? Where is the American Dream? Does it exist anymore for the dwindling middle class? I don't think I live as well as my parents, and my generations' children probably won't live as well as I do. How do we get back to where Youngstown is the place of my youth--a place with world-class medical facilities, a great university, a vibrant downtown, a place where you could skate at an ice rink, swim at a public pool, cruise through a beautiful park, live for Friday Night High School football, and eat the best Italian food ouside of Italy? How do we regain that ideal? I don't know the answer - I wish I did.