As I see the economy take blow after ferocious blow I cannot help but think “how long can this last?”  Throughout history, local and otherwise, we have always found a way to persevere.  People have a habit of looking challenges in the face and busting through them with sheer will and determination.  We in Windsor have been knocked down and bloodied before, left for dead on more than one occasion, but like some monster from the black lagoon, we just won’t die.

Other cities have fallen.  Elliot Lake, once a thriving mining community nestled in the woods of boreal northern Ontario is now a small retirement community.  When my grandfather lived there 15 years ago, houses were selling for as little as 20,000 dollars.  Allentown, Pennsylvania was gutted by the steel industry leaving, and so was Gary, Indiana.  Not to mention several others, all whose names we know well and whose stories echo in our ears in a dreadful resonance.

The pattern has always been the same: the city is built around a seemingly endless and all-powerful industry.  The city has its glory days, people move there from all points east and west and the local culture is defined by a “blue collar attitude” and a “hard-nosed approach”.  Almost anyone can acquire a high-paying, secure job for life.  It is anyone’s entree into the middle class.  Then, like a thief in the night, the company starts to scale back. 

Your uncle gets laid off, then your grandfather, then your mother.  Your aunt loses her coffee shop that served the workers in those plants for years and then your friend’s father loses his clothing store.  Soon, the company cuts production to almost nil, and the community is left with a huge disparity between those who have and those who don’t. 

The most maddening thing about the situation is that jobs that were once practically given to whoever showed up are now like hen’s teeth.  The people lucky enough to hang onto that job in the steel mill or the coal mine or, yes the auto factory now view themselves with a sense of entitlement, and tragically look down upon those who aren’t working next to them.  This type of thinking is not only prevalent in Windsor, but all working class cities that have fallen on hard times.

Suddenly those who don’t have start leaving the once thriving community, leaving large blocks of empty houses and foreclosed properties.  It all seems to have no end, no reason.  A great sense of defeat and malaise sets in that seems to have no end. 

Stopping this cycle from happening completely in Windsor is going to require some drastic thinking from the citizens.  It is going to require dramatic change and it will require some re-treading of ideas and practices from the past.

Growing up next to the automotive industry in Windsor was the tool and die industry.  These companies were almost totally locally founded, by people who didn’t come from a lot of money and they had talent and a drive to succeed.  They were mostly trained from high school, at trade schools such as W.D. Lowe.

Perhaps W.D. Lowe could be re opened for what is was built to be – a trade school where young people from an early age could be trained in the trade that they show the most promise in.  Have them come from all other high schools in a program that evaluates their talent in their sophomore year.  If they show talent with fixing cars, then they learn to be mechanics.  If they have an affinity for carpentry – they learn how to become a carpenter, etc.  While in school for their remaining 2 years they also learn how to start their own businesses and how to manage money properly.  They could learn economics and global technical trends so that when they are 18 years old, they have already had a college-calibre level of training and on the job experience.  They now totally ready to become apprentices who will then take their skills and either start businesses or contribute to existing businesses.  They would also be able to manage their money and be able to find a job or create jobs for others.

That old castle is just sitting there, waiting to be re-used.  Wouldn’t it be a measure of poetic justice to see W.D. Lowe opened again to be used as a pipeline of ideas that would directly contribute to the resurrection of Windsor?

A graduate of this program could invent a better wind turbine, or a more efficient solar panel.  Perhaps a group of grads could invent a more efficient and powerful electric engine and found a company that manufactures them.  If you build the minds and skills, the ideas will come.

We cannot expect to ride this storm out and hope that things go back to the way they were before this all started.  We also can’t expect the solution to be a quick and easy one.  Obviously, what we have been doing has not worked.  It will not work the way the current business climate is set up and our old ways and thinking will fail us again and again until we take risks and do something different. 

Windsor needs a lot of things right now.  We need good bike lanes and we need better air quality.  We need a more convenient and walkable city with a greater emphasis on healthy living and sustainability.  We need to respect and treasure our creative class and provide it with spaces and funding.  We need to stop the out flux of people leaving this city and we need smarter building practices and more creative adaptation of our few historical buildings and spaces that we have left.  We need a better attitude and we need real leaders who take chances and value ideas and alternate opinions.

Most of all, Windsor just needs a second chance.

Tags: economic development, Education, Entrepreneurs, investment, local business, local economic development