PlaceEconomics Blog: Save America's Treasures Update

Monday, February 8, 2010

Save America's Treasures Update

Yesterday I wrote about the White House announcement that the Preserve America and Save America's Treasures programs were to be eliminated. The reason given was that: Both programs lack rigorous performance metrics and evaluation efforts so the benefits are unclear.

Benefits are unclear? If anyone had bothered to make the most basic of calculations they could not have said that with a straight face.

So today I requested from the National Park Service the data on the expenditures from Save Americas Treasures. I suppose it took me maybe two hours to do this analysis, using, by the way, the Department of Commerce's econometric model for economic impact.

Here's the story:

Between 1999 and 2009, the Save America's Treasures program allocated around $220 million dollars for the restoration of nearly 900 historic structures, many of them National Historic Landmarks. This investment by the SAT program generated in excess of $330 million from other sources. This work meant 16,012 jobs (a job being one full time equivalent job for one year...the same way they are counting jobs for the Stimulus Program). The cost per job created? $13,780.

This compares with the White House announcement that the Stimulus Package is creating one job for every $248,000. Whose program is helping the economy?

I know they aren't stupid at the White House. Are they just too damned lazy to make the most basic of analyses?

Or did they conclude that the preservation movement was just so impotent that they could kick it around with impunity?

If there was such a thing as shame left in Washington the White House should be ashamed to be throwing away a program that creates 18 times as many jobs per expenditure than does their own Stimulus Plan; ashamed to be so inattentive they the couldn't be troubled to do a couple of hours of work before they dumped a program; but mostly ashamed of kicking around a constituency group because they were deemed to be too weak and small to defend themselves.

This isn't the audacity of hope; this is the audacity of demagogic, self-serving, Richard Daley Chicago gutter politics.

Labels: economic impact, Save America's Treasures

19 Comments:

At February 8, 2010 8:50 PM , Tom King said...

Here's what I posted on ACRA-L in response to the same news.

OK, I'll say it. I think Save America's Treasures and Preserve America are the kinds of things that Republican administrations create to (a) look virtuous, (b) justify swish Rose Garden ceremonies, (c) reward their rich friends with grants and (d) create smokescreens behind which they can have their way with laws like NEPA and Section 106 that might otherwise obstruct them in privatizing public resources and screwing over the general public. Preservationists ought to suck it up and support elimination of such programs, provided the administration takes steps to make laws like NEPA and 106 actually work.

Tom King
At February 8, 2010 8:54 PM , Dick Ryan said...

Thanks for trying to preserve the funding for PA and SAT. I've been working on reassessments for communities here in Texas that are designated by Preserve America and in the Texas Main Street Program. Many of these communities are in economically depressed rural areas located off major transportation corridors. They have little hope for economic development other than heritage tourism. Heritage organizations and help from heritage grants are about their only hope. Eliminating an already minimal source of potential funding will create an almost hopeless situation.
Who are you sending your work to?
I was thinking I could gather information concerning the unemployment rates in the PA communities in Texas and send it in to someone?
At February 8, 2010 8:59 PM , Dick Ryan said...

Thanks for trying to preserve the funding for PA and SAT. I've been working on reassessments for communities here in Texas that are designated by Preserve America and in the Texas Main Street Program. Many of these communities are in economically depressed rural areas located off major transportation corridors. They have little hope for economic development other than heritage tourism. Heritage organizations and help from heritage grants are about their only hope. Eliminating an already minimal source of potential funding will create an almost hopeless situation.
Who are you sending your work to?
I was thinking I could gather information concerning the unemployment rates in the PA communities in Texas and send it in to someone?
At February 9, 2010 9:54 AM , Anonymous said...

This post, like most preservationists', focuses on the Save America's Treasures program. What about the Preserve America program? Since its inception the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation has built its PR and communications staff without really growing its core expertise to deal with what the agency is legislatively mandated to do: Regulate Section 106 compliance. Tom King could not have said it any better. There may be a slim case for preserving SAT, but I say good riddance to PA.
At February 9, 2010 10:16 AM , Dick Ryan said...

Here's a list of the SAT rich Republican friends - including the Unitarian Church in Charleston -

http://www.nps.gov/history/hps/hpg/downloads/2009SATGrants.pdf

only preservationists or other poor people would get excited about such sums of money. ditto for PA which you'll have to download at

http://www.nps.gov/history/hps/hpg/preserveamerica/search.htm
At February 10, 2010 12:21 PM , Anonymous said...

@Tom:
The Clinton administration created SAT, the Bush administration PA.
All grantees for both programs go through Section 106 review with NPS or the sister agencies, and the SHPOs, even the earmarks.
All grants are required to match the federal grant with non federal funds, dollar for dollar, thus not a "reward".
SAT is announced with a mere press release.
The SAT competitive grants and all of the PA grants go through a rigorous selection process with recommendations made by expert career Federal employees.
You need some facts.
At February 10, 2010 12:55 PM , Tom King said...

Dick Ryan and annonymous have both missed my point, I think. No doubt "good" projects get funded through SAT and perhaps PA; no doubt "good" applicants apply. Certainly SAT was a Clinton administration "initiative" (in one of its more Republicanesque moments). Such programs remain pork-barrel opiates that serve to keep both politicians and organized groups of voters (to say nothing of preservation advocates) happy while the institutions designed to protect us from the excesses of government -- like NEPA, Section 106 review and the ACHP -- wither away.
At February 10, 2010 1:39 PM , Anonymous said...

Those institutions might protect in a perfect world but they do not provide bricks and mortar funding. Funding that creates jobs and puts money back into the local economy.
SAT is about more than preservation... it is the definition of shovel ready.
At February 10, 2010 3:17 PM , Dick Ryan said...

I admit I've always believed in a carrot and stick approach. If we preservationists just try and tell people what they can't do, we won't get far. I also admit to selling out readily in terms of Tax Credits which I philosophically disagree with(as one of your pork-barrel opiates) yet of course I support the ITC for Rehabilitation.

In terms of jobs creation, I seem to remember back in the 1980's, that the US Chamber of Commerse found that dollar for dollar, rehabilitation created 2 1/2 times as many new jobs as new construction.
At February 10, 2010 4:04 PM , Jean said...

Having lived and worked in preservation on both the east coast and in the Chicago area, in my view this action on the part of the Obama administration is as much a comment on the weakness of preservation here in the heartland as it is on the programs themselves. People in this administration have seen firsthand the attack on the Chicago HP ordinance and the weak support of preservation elsewhere in Illinois. I am constantly amazed at the almost naive assumption by people who live in areas with strong preservation activity that their experiences are universal. I agree with Don that this should be a wake-up call that helps everyone in the field to realize that preservation is still struggling for standing in many parts of the country.
At February 10, 2010 4:14 PM , Tom King said...

I believe in carrot and stick, too, and the economic justifications for rehab are doubtless sound ones. But it's been a hard decade watching preservationists go ga-ga for carrots while the sticks all turned to spaghetti. Now we're faced with an economic and political situation in which a lot of belt-tightening is in order, and if preservationists just try to keep the carrots, instead of developing a more comprehensive and sophisticated strategy that (a) addresses the sticks as well and that (b) reaches beyond historic preservation to relate to others concerned about the quality of the cultural environment, I think that will be sad.
At February 10, 2010 4:58 PM , Dick Ryan said...

Sticks in general have had a tough time in this decade. It's as if the "public" has no rights any more. We continue to be inundated with cell phone towers, billboards, wind turbines and where I live in Austin Texas, cable lines, which can hang or dig up the streets any time they want, all in the name of economic competition and "property" rights.
At February 10, 2010 6:00 PM , Anonymous said...

Tom King is so off base. Looks like the Republicans WERE (a) more virtuous. (b)Maybe the preservation funding is needed for the Wednesday night parties at the White House and (c) where did the minute funding of PA and SAT go to the rich? I think you are looking at where the amazing "Stimulus Program" and soon "Jobs Program" went, re: into rich supporters pockets. As far as tightening belts, this is for show only to fool those that will buy it. The percentage of all of the proposed cuts, compared to the budget is less than 1%! Gee, that will really get us back on the right track. My recent 106 experience was compromised because of the need to apply for a Stimilus Grant. Of which there will be two available for the entire state.
At February 11, 2010 6:18 PM , Tom King said...

The Republic of Tejas is a rather special case, but the proliferation of cell towers across the land with little concern for impacts on historic views and neighborhoods is in part the result of the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation's willingness to buy into an idiotic programmatic agreement with the FCC that violates the clear language of NHPA itself -- while congratulating itself for doing such wonderful work through Preserve America. And the preservation community was too befuddled to catch them on it.
At February 14, 2010 1:15 PM , Isaac D. Kremer said...

I'd like to echo "anonymous" and add that programs with $250,000 to $750,000 award ceilings are hardly an incentive to the "rich." Instead they provide the only line of support available for small to medium size communities without deep pockets. Having said that, the need for a coordinated outreach and advocacy strategy for the preservation movement is perhaps needed more now than ever before. Hopefully folks will attend the Preservation Advocacy Week March 1-5 in Washington, D.C. and especially the lobby day on Wednesday, March 3. Registration is still open. Hope to see you there!
At February 15, 2010 12:47 PM , Tod Bryant said...

I'm very confused about Tom King's comment. Why should preservationists support the loss of all-too-scarce funding? I really don't care why these programs were created, as long as they fund worthwhile projects. What do these programs have to do with 106 and NEPA? Please explain the connection between SAT and PA funding and those laws.
At February 15, 2010 4:31 PM , Tom King said...

The connection is this: The interests who dislike having things like historic preservation and the environment in general get in the way of development have done a pretty good job of gutting NEPA and Section 106 over the last decade or so. It's my contention that they've kept preservationists off their backs by tossing them crumbs in the form of SAT and PA grants, which preservationists have naively glommed onto in lieu of doing anything about the dismantling of environmental protections. SAT and PA have also given the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation something ever so much more fun and prestigious to do (Give Grants! Hold Ceremonies!) than the watchdog job the law originally gave it.
At February 17, 2010 11:18 AM , Kate Singleton said...

I think it is extremely important for preservation/neighborhood/downtown advocates to have the numbers to support anecdotal information that preservation and revitalization does pay--on a number of levels including jobs, sales and property tax revenue. I really appreciate any type of economic analysis I can get. So, thank you Don. Unfortunately, we don't often have the information to show that preservation and revitalization are truly economic development tools.

That said, not all programs work as well as they could but I agree that both these programs offer funding to entities and projects that may have no other opportunity. Yes, the ITC has been fantastic for large developers (my clients) but it has been harder for small projects. And, for small communities, non-profits and individuals PA and SAT can be extremely helpful. These projects create short term (construction or consulting) and long term jobs as well helping communities add to their economic strategies (sales tax and property tax).

Dick Ryan is right, for many small rural communities their historic downtowns and neighborhoods are the only economic development opportunities they have.
At February 20, 2010 10:54 PM , Anonymous said...

You're spot on - as always. Welcome to Chicago politics.