Across the Great Divide

Amazon helps a town appreciate its small businesses

Small businesses and nonprofits have a lot in common: They operate on thin margins, develop strong local ties and support their communities’ economic and social wellbeing.

But what happens to those strong bonds when an online retailing giant comes in with a deal that benefits one side and threatens the other? That was the question at the heart of a recent mini-rebellion led by a feisty western Colorado bookseller, who heard her favorite community radio station, KAFM, promoting a new fundraising partnership with Amazon.

Margie Wilson, owner of Grand Valley Books and another bookstore in Grand Junction, asked, “How does a community-supported organization expect to keep receiving local business support when they encourage their members to shop for books and other products on Amazon?”

At issue was the benign-sounding AmazonSmile program. AmazonSmile lets charities use Amazon’s technology to raise funds from supporters via click-and-forget transactions. After a one-time signup, it automatically uses 0.5 percent of a qualified sale to benefit a nonprofit designated by the purchaser.

These are sales, says Amazon, that were going to the company anyway. The consumer feels good about supporting a chosen charity, and the organization raises more money without added fundraising overhead. For cash-strapped nonprofits with limited technical resources, this looks like a risk-free helping hand.

To Wilson and other main street business owners, it felt more like a slap in the face. A powerful competitor that participates little in the hometown’s charitable or civic affairs was harvesting local goodwill, customer browser information and purchases that sent dollars out of the community.

Wilson decided to take a stand. She enlisted customers, friends of the station and other business owners to ask the KAFM Board to reconsider its participation.

The board did — and then voted to terminate its AmazonSmile partnership, saying: “The fundraising method that sparked the controversy arose out of new technology, but the KAFM Board determined the resolution needed to come from an old ‘technology’ — neighbors helping neighbors.”

The reversal with Amazon shouldn’t make a dent in the station’s revenue. (The average consumer spends just under $1,000 annually with Amazon. That’s $5 per donor who signs on to the program.)

Indeed, I talked to another local nonprofit exec who says its AmazonSmile relationship is not considered a source of charitable dollars. Rather, it’s used more like a cash-back credit card for comparison shopping and making large purchases of items that are hard to find locally. Her search for a solid gallium supplier, for example, led her to a small Ohio company. She estimates this approach has saved thousands of taxpayer dollars on the science kits it produces for public schools.

Not all products sold on Amazon compete with local retailers, and some of the “Amazon” sellers are actually small businesses searching for customers beyond their communities.

So why should local nonprofits be concerned about healthy relations with businesses that do compete with Amazon? Online sales transactions support Amazon’s business model but not the more participatory relationships most nonprofits want to cultivate. In other words, “I gave at Amazon” could become the new line, “I gave at the office.”

Rob Bleiberg, executive director of the Mesa Land Trust, empathizes with fellow nonprofits seeking creative ways to expand fundraising, but also appreciates how good ideas don’t always produce the desired results.

His group once enlisted two businesses to collect a voluntary 1 percent surcharge from their customers to support land preservation. While the experiment was well received, the land trust lacked the resources to scale up the program beyond the original cafe and bike shop. When ownerships changed, it was discontinued.

Bleiberg said small businesses give his organization “wonderful support,” and he counted off the ways: Cash donations, owners serving on the board, memberships, event underwriting, publicity, ties to national suppliers, and providing matching funds to attract donations.

Last year, he said, 65 businesses wrote checks for over $30,000, covering about 7 percent of his organization’s operating budget. And some owners gave as individuals, too. In addition, three local establishments sponsored events and drink promotions earlier this year that raised several thousand dollars for a bike trail project. All these events help build community among like-minded people, and they produced sales that stay in town to recirculate in the local economy.

Local business owners “use the bike trails and see expansion as a good amenity for the town, they’re good citizens, and their support is good advertising to a compelling demographic,” Bleiberg said.

On one of those points, at least, small businesses and Amazon agree.

[This post first appeared as a column distributed by Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News (hcn.org). It's also cross-posted at my author site, charliequimby.com.] 

Businesses Aren't Built Alone.

Note: This is an edited cross-post from the Growth & Justice Blog.

In an op/ed appearing in several Minnesota newspapers, State Representatives Deb Kiel and Dan Fabian call out Minnesota Department of Revenue Commissioner Myron Frans for saying something to the effect that a Thief River Falls entrepreneur did not build his business alone.

It’s evident from the commissioner’s response to the business owner that there are two vastly different ideas as to how we should help our economy grow and add jobs to our area.

The Dayton administration proposes big government, increased taxes and long-term dependency.

We maintain that local businesses — the backbone of our economy — will help rebuild our economy with a more favorable tax code that makes it easier for business owners to operate and expand, decreased regulations and a government that gets out of the way.

The representatives work themselves into a lather over the commissioner's comment so they can segue to a popular and evergreen theme: Minnesota is an unwelcoming place for small business, with taxes and regulation that stifle entrepreneurs and drive companies into the low-tax arms of South Dakota.

But where's the proof? One business owner grumpy about his taxes does not make a case. And while the gentleman's company wouldn't exist without his original vision, hard work and risk-taking to get it off the ground, he could not have built it alone.

No one really builds a business without the help of other people or the support of the community in which it operates.

No matter how hard you work, no matter how smart you are, no matter what the income tax rate is, your business's potential is extremely limited without the talents, ideas, contacts and labor of other people. And while the importance of location varies with the type of business, no owner can function without the public infrastructure, laws and court systems that support the company.

As the founder of a business that has lasted for 24 years, some of them without me since I turned it over to employees, I learned how hard it is to find, recruit and retain good employees, suppliers and customers—and how important place is, in educating workers, giving them relevant experience and providing an environment where they want to live, raise families and enjoy a well-rounded quality of life.

Without employees, you're unlikely to ever have to worry about paying the top tax rate.

However, it's also true that a majority of small businesses are one-person enterprises, so in that sense,  there are a lot of business people whose businesses are the product of their work alone.

Starting a business is tough, but it's even harder to build one. Look at these facts:

• The average American small business employed roughly 2.5 to 5 people, depending on the industry PDF.
• 90% of companies with workers on the payroll employed fewer than 20 people in 2007, when the economy was in better shape.
• Only about 3% of small business owners in the U.S. will earn enough to be subject to top-tier federal tax rates; 57% of small businesses have revenues of less than $25,000 a year.
• About half of small businesses either fail or close within five years; by 10 years only about 35% are still around.

Most of these businesses fail to grow because of inexperience, insufficient capital, poor management practices and competition, not regulation and taxes. And here's one more reason why businesses don't grow:

Most small employers are restaurateurs, skilled professionals or craftsmen (doctors, plumbers), professional and general service providers (clergy, travel agents, beauticians), and independent retailers. These aren’t sectors of the economy where product costs drop a lot as the firm grows, so most of these companies are going to remain small. And according to Hurst and Pugsley’s survey evidence, the majority of small business owners say that’s precisely their intent—they didn’t start a business for the money but for the flexibility and freedom. Most have no plans to grow.

In other words, the greatest limitation on the growth of small businesses is the individuals themselves.

I can honestly say that government never got in the way of my business, nor did it directly intervene to make us successful. It simply contributed to the conditions that allowed us to succeed, and when we did, it collected more taxes.

But issues vary by industry. If there's concrete evidence of real problems, Kiel and Fabian should cite them and propose solutions. Instead, they allege a Dayton administration hostility toward business in general, while claiming credit for Minnesota job gains, lower than average unemployment and higher tax revenues that occurred under the governor's watch.

"Getting government out of the way" is a political slogan without an actual track record. Constant carping about Minnesota's tax rankings and business climate hasn't helped a single business, and it's probably scared away a few.

Virtue, Government and the Marketplace for Social Services.

I invited Craig Westover to join me in a discussion about a shutdown-related story I considered rich with implications about the roles and limits of government: Does Private Wealth Make Compassion Possible?

The original story concerned social services providers who elected to continue services to their clients, despite not being paid during the shutdown. A psychologist provided some context about possible motivations the providers might have, but I thought there was a lot more worth discussing.

Craig responded to the original post in a form that invites breaking the discussion into individual themes. I'll set up separate posts, so we (and readers) can extend the discussion in the comments section without creating one overwhelming read. 

Here's his first point:

Indeed, Charlie, there are lessons to be learned from All About Kids.

The first is a lesson about virtue. Roxanne Williams is a virtuous person, but not as you imply because she does what she does for low-income people. She is virtuous because she takes her work personally, and she takes personal responsibility for the results. That low-income parents benefit from her work is also a benefit to the community, but Williams deserve praise for her dedication to the work, not for whom it was done. The same praise is due a contractor who performs unpaid time and provides unpaid materials on a job he underbid on a $1M home. Virtue is about the work, not for whom it is done.

And my response:

Craig, I agree with you somewhat on your point about virtue, although I would use the word integrity because it has less of a moralistic overtone. The integrity displayed by Roxanne and your contractor exists in many work settings, whether the payer is a wealthy client, a low-income parent, a global corporation or the state government.

Let me also observe that your lesson declares a tie and allows everyone to dust off their hands without doing anything. I'm not interested in handing out brownie points for abstract virtue.

I believe the kind of work also matters in this discussion. To separate the work from the client strikes me as overly convenient to your argument; we can all think of cases in which the worker was "virtuous" but the client's purpose or the work's outcome was horrific.

Compassion and caring for others is a very important attribute of this story. Note that it is about about the delivery of social services — not IT services or construction. (State highway contractors suspended their work during the shutdown, and it now appears they may not get paid for the costs they incurred, thanks to language inserted in the budget bill. That example raises a whole other set of issues.)

We hear from small government advocates that the private sector could better fulfill roles presently taken by government — but except for some generalities about "the market," not how this will take place or how effective it will actually be.

Integrity of the sort on display here is a valuable social asset. My interest is in how our governmental, social and economic systems either encourage or repress the beneficial practice of integrity.

So here's a question: What happens to Roxanne and her clients if the government gets out of her business?  

Craig answered:

Charlie, to qualify the kind of work is the crux of the difference between your philosophy and mine. You would insert a third party, in this case yourself (“I believe”), as arbitrator of some hierarchy of values to be imposed upon others, legally through taxation or morally through peer sanction. I do not believe any third party has that authority – legal or moral.

I agree, compassion and caring is a part of this story, but compassion implies the concept of “compassion to whom for what.” Roxanne Williams extended services to her clients at personal expense – people in whom she had a vested personal interest. They were individuals to her with faces and names and personal relationships. Her personal integrity was at issue; she could have walked away as others did, but to walk away would have been to sacrifice her integrity – a greater sacrifice to her than whatever material loss she might suffer.

I submit that Williams did not sacrifice anything to serve her clients at her own expense during the government shutdown (she chose a higher value over a lesser value) and for that she is to be praised. By your definition -- the “kind of work” matters -- Williams’ primary merit is that her effort was done selflessly for others, not what she accomplished. The latter attitude is fundamental to progressivism – taking the property of the wealthy is ok if doing so provides for others, for example.

The reason you hear only generalities about “the market” and not how the private sector could (would) better fulfill roles presently taken by government is because free-market advocates are not arrogant enough to assume they have all the answers; they know, however, that there are people who do have the answers, and removing the expectation (and moral hazarad) that government will solve all social ills would motivate a diversity of alternatives for, in this case, daycare for low-income families.

Government cannot solve the normal problems of a complex community, but the expectation that government can creates a moral hazard that represses the beneficial practice of integrity. There is no virtue, no integrity, when A & B get together and take from C to benefit D because they feel D is in need and C can afford it, and it is D’s need alone that makes him deserving. That Williams was not newsworthy (or unable to display integrity by your definition) until government shutdown would seem to support my point. It was not the presence of government that displayed Williams’ integrity; it was the absence of government.

Charlie, I cannot nor would I presume to definitively answer your question “What happens to Roxanne and her clients if the government gets out of her business?” any more than I would definitively tell you what product will replace the iPad or what company will be the next Apple. I do know the iPad replacement will be really cool; I also know that without the general expectation and moral hazard of government mucking around in social problems, spontaneous solutions, more efficient and effective (albeit not perfect) solutions, will arise. I speculate about such in my original response, which I leave to discuss in a later thread.

And my reply:

"I do not believe any third party has that authority — legal or moral."

 This, of course, is why we should not give 16-year-olds the right to vote, and why we will not make much more headway on this question.

Finally, you twisted my meaning about Roxanne Williams and the “kind of work.” What she accomplished matters very much; what she did and who she did it for had more social value than, say, polishing doorknobs in one of David Koch’s vacation retreats.

I'll keep the comments open here, but let's move on to "lesson two:" The Private Sector Makes Government Possible.

The Imaginary Travels of a Job Creator.

Wandering Job Creators are getting to be right up there with The Hook as a tale to scare gullible Minnesotans.

You've heard of them, I'm sure. Those heroic figures who daily fling themselves against hostile government regulation and confiscatory tax rates to bring you jobs that would not have existed without their brilliance, perseverence and wealth. Especially wealth, which, as you know allows them to live anywhere they choose — including South Dakota.

But what job creator would move their residence and business just for a more friendly tax climate?

This urban myth has been repeated often by state Republicans, including House Speaker Kurt Zellers, Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch and state party chair Tony Sutton, whose main authority on the subject of jobs comes from killing them during his tenure at Baja Sol.

In one version, Rep. Zellers, about 3:10 into this interview, describes a hypothetical small businesswoman forced to relocate her business to Sioux Falls, SD, or Hudson, WI, in order to "keep her doors open" because Minnesota raised its top tax rate and her business income flows to her personal tax return.

The scenario is unlikely in so many respects.

Assuming our Hudson-bound owner is successful to have a household taxable income of $300,000, the Dayton income tax proposal would take an additional $1550 in taxes. The higher rate would not affect her ability to pay the tax deductible expenses associated with the business, so it's difficult to see how the owner might have to close her doors. She would have slightly less disposable income if her business sales remained flat; if sales declined she would earn less and pay less tax, and if sales rose, she'd make more money and pay a bit more in taxes, too.

To save that $1550, she'd have to change her state of residence and sell her house or add the cost of acquiring a second residence in the new state. In the current housing market, the sale would unlikely be quick or profitable for the owner.

To establish her business in the new location, at minimum she would have to locate new space, change her business communications (letterhead, phone, website, signs), reinstall systems, reregister vehicles, etc. If she is a professional or tradesperson, she may also have to obtain a license in the new state, register her business and become acquainted with state rules and tax regulations. There will likely be some business interruption and revenue loss associated with a move.

She might be able to count on retaining her customers if her business is conducted virtually or if they remain in the same geographic radius. If she has employees, they may decide to move to the new location with her — or she will have to go through the work and risk of finding a new and comparably performing work force.

She will encounter new competition in a new location and may have to introduce herself to new customers and suppliers. For about 15 years, my company has maintained a sales office in Atlanta that we tried to expand into a second creative shop. The regional business culture made it a struggle and we eventually stopped pouring money into the attempt. Unless a business serves national clients, it will be challenging to pick up new customers as the new kid in town.

Relocating retail and service businesses — the vast majority of businesses affected by the Dayton tax proposal — is risk-laden for the owner, but not necessarily bad for jobs here because other companies will fill the need left behind. For example, Sen. Amy Koch is associated with two family businesses — one in property management and the other providing services to local utilities. If she relocated, could she take those jobs with her or would they have to stay in Minnesota because the properties and utility lines are here?

Yes, we may lose some of the income from the departing high earner, but the greater local loss of jobs is not through migrating owners — it's due to cutting teachers and other public jobs. The idea cutting these positions frees capital to create private sector jobs has some validity, but the impact of losing real jobs is greater than the benefit some phantom jobs. Ask Speaker Zellers about the impact on his family of losing his wife's job as a public school teacher. Would he trade it for his tax cut "job creation?"

When you look at these claims in light of reality, they fall apart, and the media should insist on real examples and data that show this is an actual problem whenever this storyline resurfaces.

 

 

Reports of Parking Death are Greatly Exaggerated.

Yesterday's post about Central Corridor parking linked to a story [scroll down to July 22; original Finance and Commerce link is dead] quoting the owner of Swank Retro antiques. He said he has 22 spaces in front of his store, but that will shrink to three after light rail operation begins. 

Perhaps, if you include the spots across four lanes of University.

Here's the actual parking plan [PDF] from the Met Council, which has been shown to the block's business owners. The detail shows that there are 10 spaces planned in front of Alan Guttenfelder's store at 1910 University.

Grey areas show surface parking lots. There are no parking spaces retained on the north side of University.

University Av. Parking Endangered by Lack of Business?

Over and over we've heard that the Central Corridor light rail line running between St. Paul and Minneapolis will eliminate 85% of on-street parking along University Avenue.

Periodically, I bike commute along University, and since I've done some consulting related to Central Corridor on business mitigation, I'm sensitive to impacts on those small businesses that give the street what vitality it has left.

Today, I rode both ways along University from Stadium Village to Lexington. On my return trip during the lunch hour, I noted one side of one block where the on-street parking spots were taken (outside a pawn shop and outlet store). Another block also came close to being full near KSTP-TV. (It's also close to a limited stop number 50 bus route stop.)

Otherwise, I did not see a block with free or metered parking that came close to being half full with parked cars. Most could easily sustain an 85% on-street parking loss. This is consistent with other informal parking surveys I've taken along that stretch.

Some business owners along the avenue say lost parking is a problem:

Alan Guttenfelder, owner of Swank Retro antiques, said he relies solely on street parking for his business at 1910 University Ave. W. Guttenfelder said he has 22 spaces in front of his store, but that will shrink to three after light rail operation begins.

“We are really short on parking now,” he said. “There is one-hour parking in front of my store now because too many people are trying to park there for extended hours."

Swank Retro is a cool store near Iris Park and Porky's Diner. I won't dispute Guttenfelder's claim about parking's importance to his business. But he's only open there Friday through Sunday, and Monday there  were plenty of open spaces.

I seek out gritty, diverse urban streets. I have a high tolerance for decay and an overdeveloped appreciation of the semi-inept underdog. I love that the avenue has the "home of the 30-dollar tire."

But make some slow runs down University Avenue and its shuttered storefronts before you swallow the line that light rail construction will kill University Avenue businesses.

Sin Taxes to Balance Budget: Same Old Story.

The Star Tribune suggests that a return to sin taxes might provide a way out of Minnesota's budget problems.

Funny. It worked the other way before Prohibition. In 1910, 30%  of the government's revenue came from taxes on alcohol. The federal income tax introduced in 1913 was used as a justification for lost revenues from banning booze in 1919.

Taxes on cigarettes and liquor would make Minnesota's tax system more regressive — unlike the proposed fourth tier income tax rate, which would pull tax revenue  from the state's top earners.

Opponents of the income tax hike persist in claiming that such an increase would hurt "small businesses." In debate on the measure, Rep. Paul Kohls went so far as to say 40,000 small businesses would be affected by the tax increase.

I haven't reviewed the tax proposal in detail, but I know when we analyzed a similar fourth tier proposal last year, the best estimate was about 30,000 taxpayers had some income that could be categorized as coming from ownership in a business.

But most of the businesses that are profitable enough to put owners in the top tax bracket have multiple shareholders and tend to be larger than what most consider "small." (The Small Business Administration generally classifies small businesses [PDF] as having 500 employees, although the range is from 100 to 1500.)

A better estimate might be 10,000 businesses affected.

Of course, the GOP position and the Strib's compromise come down to: let the little guys pay.

Seminars are Filling Fast!

A local business ran an ad in today's paper. Can you guess what Strategy Resource International does? I had to go the website, www.happinesswarehouse.com, to get the whole picture.

The balance of Kindness and Professionalism is what makes us different.  We put kindness and the legitimate understanding of your goals first.  We follow up with true professionalism that makes you feel comfortable as you receive high quality attention in the area it is needed.

Guy's experiences across America, Israel, India, Sigapore, Thailand, England, Scotland, Whales...Offers you a rarely valuable, truly international, quality of insight and opportunity to apply many of the very best strategy sources available to any area of your life and work.

I'm not sure what a "rarely valuable" quality of insight might be, but the company has a pretty interesting mashup of offerings.  Guy sounds like a combo of Tony Robbins, Joel Osteen and Winston Wolfe. 

Here are just a couple:

Devotion Defense - When faith leads to firearms, Graceful Guns by Strategy Resource International is the answer for the training you need to be safe and effective.  Called to carry?  Special training for firearm students working to satisfy scriptural injunction or direct summons.  The different quality of respect wherein we operate offers an important difference to the person required to satisfy divine compulsion.

Graphic Design & Concept Development.  "Marksman for Justice by Design." True Blue Branding is a widely applicable function of S.R.I..  When you can't quite get other designers to do justice to your cause, give us a shot. 

Can Economics Explain Hot Tomato Cafe?

We biked out to Fruita, a small town west of Grand Junction, for the reopening of a local pizza cafe that had moved into a new building after failing to come to terms with its former landlord.

The Hot Tomato Cafe renovated an empty building around the corner once occupied by a dry cleaners. (Around the corner is about as far as you can go in Fruita and still be downtown.)

We arrived sometime around 1:00 and the line stretched from the order counter to the door. It was the same way when we left, and the festivities involving bands in the street hadn't even begun to take shape yet.

You can see the improvements the two women owners have made to the building — adding a spacious outdoor seating area along the side. Landscaping is still in process, and the bike parking might need a little work, but no one was complaining.

Less apparent than the paint job and the cheery interior is the role a unique and beloved business can play in a community. The pizza and beer at Hot Tomato are good, and cycling is part of the vibe, but it was clear that most of the people showing up today were there because they wanted this little institution to exist in their lives.

I get really tired of hearing about how the market is all-important, and how economic principles (are you listening, Craig Westover?) should determine how governments and societies make decisions. The adherents to this thinking would have us believe that we have made the choice when we have a Domino's instead of a Hot Tomato in our neighborhoods. And that if a Pizza Hut franchise can come up with the financing where a Hot Tomato can't, well, that's as it should be.

You could try that line of thought in this pizza joint this afternoon, but I don't think you'd get any takers.

Redevelopment Battleground Looks Different Today.

This account of small businesses trying to survive anticipated construction of the Central Corridor Light Rail route reminded me of a story I wrote 35 years ago — and what has happened since.

I was freelancing for the Minneapolis Star and for Preview magazine, the Minnesota Public Radio program guide that has long since morphed into "region's most widely circulated lifestyle magazine, catering to a well-educated, affluent audience." 

Preview then was edited by writers like Patricia Hampl and covered Minnesota through a very different lens. It published arts and literary reporting, but also my account of the New Ulm anti-draft march and another cover story about urban renewal on the fringes of downtown Minneapolis.

[Photo: Washington Avenue between Marquette and Second Avenues. These buildings were replaced by the unremarkable 100 Washington Square, designed by Minoru Yamasaki, who went on to design the World Trade Center. From John McNab's photostream]  

It was titled: "Development or Destruction?"

By this time, the early 1970s, most of the city's Washington Avenue skid row had been eradicated, though not much of the promised new development had yet materialized.

The Minneapolis Tribune editorialized at the time: "The ugliness of blight is ... disappearing and a new beauty and orderliness replace it." But a local architect said that it was "the most inexcusable act of civic vandalism in the history of Minneapolis."

In fact, some of the land that went from flophouse to parking lot is still used for parking cars. A few of the remaining flop houses found new, trendy life, while others are in different states of productive use.

The north end of town was being remade for insurance companies and other corporate titans. A beautiful new Federal Reserve Bank building went up, only to be replaced by a more workable building on the site of the former train station.

Southwest near Loring Park, where my domestic partner and I lived in those days, the affordable apartments and small businesses were just starting to be exposed to gentrification. New landlords were buying the four-story apartment buildings, buffing them up, and charging much higher rents than we were used to paying. Those higher rents pushed us into home ownership, which turned out to be a good deal.

The city's lead development person at the time told us, when we asked him about what would happen to the area's poor people, "they just go somewhere else." And indeed they did.

For small businesses, though, relocation is another matter.

I interviewed some business owners whose buildings in the neighborhood were going under the wrecking ball. A used bookstore owner had been moved to his current location after the city demolished his previous building, to which he'd moved after losing his original storefront. It turns out used book businesses were a reliable barometer of real estate that was underutilized, since they had very low sales per square foot.

His reactions to moving a fourth time were mixed. He thought the city would help him find a new location again and provide assistance to pack and move two floors of books. But the stock of suitable space in the city was going away. He was tired of moving, and each new location had added to his costs and reduced his foot traffic.

He moved to a much smaller location and, before too many years passed, closed down his shop.

Another retailer who sold unpainted furniture was suspicious of the city and opposed to the redevelopment, but eventually found a new storefront in the neighborhood. After operating there for two decades or more, it eventually moved to St. Louis Park and closed in 2004. 

The University Avenue businesses face different development pressures from the light rail, since the surrounding real estate is not nearly as valuable as land next to the core downtowns. But small service businesses that rely on repeat customers are rightly concerned about how changes may affect them, and they are righteously angry that the needs of larger, non-taxpaying institutions are getting more attention.

Some of their businesses will die — either killed outright by construction, or more likely, by the combination of change and the owner's lack of skills or capital to adapt.

As I look back at the redevelopment that came into my old neighborhood, I see some fears were unrealized, while others were legitimate. Al Franken and other millionaires live where the bookstore once stood, but a fair amount of what we fought to save is still there. I can still see all three of the buildings where we once lived. One of the teachers at the shelter lives in a building next door, so I suspect the rents are still relatively affordable.

Though I miss parts of the old city and am repulsed by some of its replacement, I can't definitely say the old stuff was better than what we have now. Today is different, and that's the way life is.

The old days just go somewhere else.