Does Scranton really suck...Part deux. (Philadelphia, Pittsburgh: real estate market, 2009, insurance)

[weluvpa]

Lets try this again............Lets hear it about the Electric city........Stay on topic because we know what happens when we stray to far to the left.......or right....

Lets hear the pros and cons of our Electric City....

[go phillies]

Pros: good people, good neighborhoods, good schools, nice older houses that aren't "cookie cutter," quite a bit to do for a small city--a good mix of city life and outdoor recreation.

Cons: corrupt politics, lack of family-sustaining jobs (but that's not just Scranton, that's pretty much the entire area).

But once again in response to the NJ transplant who bashes Scranton yet chose to move here, NJ politics is so corrupt it makes Scranton look honest....the average NJ politician makes Chris Doherty look like a choir boy.

[weluvpa]

Please stay on topic and do not bring NJ into a discussion about Scranton...Thank You. I certainly wouldn't want this thread to be suddenly locked down for having a discussion that might just be a little off topic....

Thank you and please stick to the OP.

[ScranBarre]

PROS:

Historic Architecture: Next week I hope to get up to Green Ridge on some night to photograph some of the stately homes in that area all lit up for the Holiday season. Scranton is a very photogenic city. When you're like me and see nothing but vinyl-sided cookie-cutter crap all over your community, it is refreshing to see a home that has a story to tell about all of the families that have lived in it since perhaps 1890 when a father of eight children built it with his bare hands. That was the era when people still preferred quality over quantity---you don't see any new construction with pocket doors, stained glass windows, spiral staircases, turrets, widows' walks, natural woodwork, etc., and I don't understand why. I get chills up and down my spine when I watch this video on YouTube:
YouTube - Christmas in Scranton! You Scrantonians who think your city is "ugly" must be living under a rock! Give me Green Ridge over the sterility of South Abington ANY day of the week!

People: Say what you will about the council crazies, the Pine Brook loiterers, or the downtown riff raff, but whenever something goes awry in the Electric City people band together to help one another out. I'm reminded of seeing a fire recently on WNEP, and one of the women interviewed said that the neighborhood would be getting together to help collect money to help the family. If someone in Scranton finds out your child is battling leukemia, for example, you can expect to find an invitation to a charity spaghetti dinner being held at the neighborhood church in your child's honor. We all remember the outpouring of support when Capt. Jim Robeson of the Scranton F.D. was tragically killed in the line of duty, and it brought a smile to my face to see the townspeople of Hyde Park lining the streets, as well as his fellow comrades working together to help finish renovating his home for his widow and son. You just don't see stuff like this here in the suburbs---the very same place that so many Scrantonians are beating down the door trying to flee to!

Potential: I can't think of another medium-sized Rust Belt city as poised for an impressive comeback as Scranton. Our city is now widely-recognized across the country thanks to "The Office", the recent presidential election, Saturday Night Live, this forum, (and yes, even the growing reputation of the much-maligned University of Scranton). I see more out-of-state license plates (tourists? investors?) in NEPA now than ever before. Our real estate market has been very resilient while many nearby metropolitan areas have seen home values tumbling into oblivion. Our unemployment rate may be rather high, but with the continued expansion of places like CenterPoint in Pittston Township and the election of a progressive new president I feel as if 2009 will be a year of positive change on that front. Where some see a blighted home I see a dream home for my future children (I hope to lovingly restore a home in the city myself someday).

Location: Where else can you find such affordable real estate just two hours from New York City, two hours from Philadelphia, three hours from the NJ shore, four hours from Baltimore or Providence, and five hours from Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Washington, DC, and Boston? We're in the middle of it all, yet we're still a world apart. When I consider relocation I have a hard time imagining a more convenient location than Northeastern Pennsylvania.

Higher Education: The Scranton/Wilkes-Barre area is blessed to be home to Marywood, King's, Wilkes, Misericordia, Johnson, Baptist Bible, Keystone, Lackwanna, "Da U", PSU (2 campuses), LCCC, TCMC, ITT Tech., and the upcoming Wilkes Law School, amongst others. This area is a HOT BED of higher education with majors ranging from architecture to accounting to forensics to nursing all at our fingertips. Now all we need to do is retain our talent instead of exporting them to the BosWash Corridor (of which we'll probably be a part by 2030).

Low Violent Crime: Yes, 2008 might have been an UGLY year for violence in the Electric City with such shockers as an elderly man whose throat was slit at random in broad daylight on a downtown street, the three young males (including a former classmate of mine) who were beaten to death inside their home, brutal home invasions, highly-publicized arsons, muggings galore, the woman whose body was dismembered and dumped all over I-380, strong-armed robberies, etc., but generally speaking besides this God-forsaken year (2008 has been an AWFUL year for everyone I've spoken to) Scranton is an INCREDIBLY SAFE place to raise a family!


CONS

Negativity: It goes without saying that Scrantonians LOVE cheese with their "whine." Their gripes of "high property taxes" elicit laughs from we suburbanites who tend to pay as much, on average, for ONE home that TWO average homeowners in the city pay for combined (i.e. the two tax bills weluvpa covers for two homes equal that of my parents' ONE home). People by and large have the mindset "this city sucks and is sinking faster than the Titanic." I'd like to ask them all "If the city is so bad and has no future, then why do you STAY?" I'm sure South Abington is full of fellow "Scranton quitters" who were too wussy to stay and help foster positive change in the Electric City, and they obviously have room for many more. People don't realize just how good the city is until they move away and then pine for Steamtown, "The Office", Old Forge pizza, Channel 61, the Archbald Pothole, Lake Scranton, the 307 overlook, etc.

High Wage Tax: It astonishes me that no administration has yet to pinpoint exactly WHY the city continues to bleed so much of its population---the dreaded 3.4% wage tax is one of the TOP reasons why newcomers to our region avoid Scranton like the plague. If you earn $100,000 per year, why would you want $3,400 of that to go the city ON TOP of the $2,000 you might already be paying in property taxes, especially when you could just move to Newton Township, Moosic, Dickson City, etc. and pay NO wage tax and only slightly higher property taxes, on average? If and when Scranton receives its $2,000,000 annual financial windfall from the old Johnstown Flood Tax redistribution to aid communities in our state that have a high percentage of tax-exempt properties, then that $2,000,000 IN ITS ENTIRETY should go to slashing the wage tax to make Scranton more competitive with the suburbs, hopefully helping to reinforce its tax base.

Weather: I love our four varied seasons and the fact that we can have kids trick-or-treating with snow boots on at Halloween with a mid-60s heat wave having golfers hitting the links in January, but the one Achilles' Heel I find here is the cloudiness. I can handle the rain, snow, sleet, or anything else, but when you go for day after day after DAY without seeing the sun, seasonal affective order starts to set in. I believe our nearby neighbor of Binghamton, NY is one of the few cities that actually has cloudier weather than Scranton.

Demographics: There's no way to sugar coat the fact that Scrantonians, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, are more poorly-educated, impoverished, blue-collar, and more likely to be unemployed than residents of many comparably-sized cities in other parts of the nation. We're in a Catch-22 in ALL of these cases as well. We can't retain more college graduates until we have quality employers here to sustain them. We can't attract quality employers here until there are enough skilled laborers sticking around to draw from for their workforce. We can't rise from the depths of poverty without a greater emphasis being placed upon education as well as attracting better-paying jobs. People who earn degrees here are stuck power-commuting or settling for being paid less than what they should be under the false guise of a "cheap cost-of-living" (even though we pay high gas prices, high auto insurance rates, high utility rates, high property taxes, etc.) Austin Burke, President of the Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce, is a magician---he can make any negative economic media article "disappear" by putting a positive spin on it. "Yeah, our unemployment rate is 7.5%, the highest in the state, but at least we're still lower than Gary, Indiana and Beirut!"

Brain Drain: As I alluded to above many young educated people LEAVE our region, never to return (or return when they need Viagra and Depends, but I digress!) For people like me who want to earn our Master's Degrees and raise our families here in NEPA, we're left with a continuously narrowing pool of peers to befriend. I become very depressed at times to make a list of all of the friends I've lost since graduating high school due to them all relocating out of the region for "bigger" and "better" things. In a way I'm afraid to make too many "new" friends because a part of me is just asking "how long until they leave me too?" Why else would I be befriending a bunch of middle-aged soccer moms on Internet forums unless I was having a hard time retaining friendships because everyone I know is MOVING AWAY?!!

That's enough for now. I'll add more as they come to me.

[Retired Law 08]

Originally Posted by weluvpa

Please stay on topic and do not bring NJ into a discussion about Scranton...Thank You. I certainly wouldn't want this thread to be suddenly locked down for having a discussion that might just be a little off topic....

Thank you and please stick to the OP.

yes...good idea...post within the TOS...thankyou....

[johnqpublic]

I agree

[johnqpublic]

The people / neighborhoods are great, as a whole this area is a diamond in the rough, what is killing it is the political families that have been MILKING it for generations. we need a clean broom to sweep clean. I have lived here since birth , and have followed the B.S, thru the Admins.I thought McNulty was bad, but Chris Doherty has risen to a new level of the "Peter Principle"as the most unqualified/corrupt mayor this city has ever had. I actually kind of admire him , he has stolen and enriched his own so much while sticking it up our a$$es, with the help of a pi$$ poor news media that the average citizen doesnt even realize it!...

[NYRangers 2008]

Originally Posted by johnqpublic

The people / neighborhoods are great, as a whole this area is a diamond in the rough, what is killing it is the political families that have been MILKING it for generations. we need a clean broom to sweep clean. I have lived here since birth , and have followed the B.S, thru the Admins.I thought McNulty was bad, but Chris Doherty has risen to a new level of the "Peter Principle"as the most unqualified/corrupt mayor this city has ever had. I actually kind of admire him , he has stolen and enriched his own so much while sticking it up our a$$es, with the help of a pi$$ poor news media that the average citizen doesnt even realize it!...

This is something we all can agree on. Doherty must go!!!!

[loveinbloom]

I love the feeling of "family" in Scranton. Children are still treated as children and not little adults. The cost of housing is a big plus. Teachers that really seem to have the students best interst at heart, and endless things to do for families.

The roads are terrible and the infrastructure is crumbling. A city council that appears to be a puppet for the mayor. Wasting money on "window dressing" , and trying to attract a population that isn't coming instead of taking care of the needs of those who are already here!

[johnqpublic]

Loveinbloom,
I have been saying this for years, all fluff, no substance!!
Or....."putting a dress on a pig, and calling it pretty!!"