Recognizing West Tampa as a Complex Adaptive System
The Complexity Brownbag has identified a local issue that would be fruitful to understand from a complexity perspective: the redevelopment of West Tampa. A recently published article on the topic is: “Workshop Looks at Problems Facing Growing Area” by Jose Patino Girona, The Tampa Tribune, 10-5-06. Gary Burge has provided a link to the article on the Complexity Brownbag website he created, which is: http://garyburge.com/complexity/ I posted a response there, and am re-posting it here because I am still a total novice when it comes to figuring out how to link to other sites. Definitely check out Gary’s page for additional posts from other Complexity Brownbaggers regarding the issue.
So here are my initial thoughts on the topic:
I really like David’s suggestion that we practice viewing local issues through a complexity lens by making sense of issues emerging in relation to the development of West Tampa.
It does seem that recognizing West Tampa as a complex adaptive system could be helpful to expose some of the assumptions that people living outside West Tampa make about the area, the people who live in the neighborhood, and their own motivations. I do sometimes have the sense that “redevelopment” suggests that either an area is dead, or that what exists is mostly bad and needs to be transformed “back” into something good.
As if.
When my husband and I moved to Tampa 2 years ago, we felt like we had to find a home a.s.a.p. We were living in temporary housing on MacDill Airforce Base when we arrived, and I thought I was going to go crazy living there, having previously been rooted in a vibrant, diverse community in Los Angeles. Within 2 weeks, we found a house south of Kennedy Blvd, in what we later came to learn is referred to as the “SoHo” district. We were trying to find a house somewhere between MacDill AFB and USF to split the difference, commute-wise.
Once we moved in and got settled, we started to explore the area. My husband found a dojo a few blocks north, which led us to begin exploring the neighborhoods north of us. As soon as we found West Tampa, I remember thinking, “now THIS is where I’d really like to live!” The sense of community was obvious …people sitting on their front porches chatting with one another, saying hello as we walked by. Men playing chess in the park. Kids riding their bikes. Singing and peals of laughter coming from the churches that are sprinkled throughout the neighborhood & the revival tent that went up in the summer. Guys washing cars. Women coming and going from the hair salon. Preschoolers chasing one another on the playground of their child care program.
We don’t find these things where we live, just a few blocks south. Restaurants, yes. Bars, yes. Pilates studios, yes. But with more and more condo complexes going in, the churches on the corners and houses with front porches South of Kennedy are fewer and father between…
So I got myself a library card and hung out in the library on Howard, just off Main Street in West Tampa. What a stately building, with the history of the neighborhood recorded and celebrated within. Not a huge selection of books, but more than enough to keep me well read.
And I went to Luis Doors, on the corner of Howard and Main, where at least 3 of the men are named Luis. Spent a good half hour with the youngest Luis, just hearing about the neighborhood, and getting advice on what to look for in a new front door. Felt more welcomed there than I’d felt anywhere else so far in Tampa.
I’m sure my experience of West Tampa has only provided a glimpse of what is thriving there. As a CAS, seems there are networks that aren’t just between residents as neighbors, like what you see in the homeowner’s associations of “bedroom communities,”…seems like the stores, churches, and library in West Tampa serve as means of connecting people together naturally. And there is a cultural richness…signs in English and Spanish hang in storefront windows, and from the front porch socializing I’ve walked by, it seems that black folks, Latino folks and some white folks are neighbors. (There’s probably much more diversity than that, but as a wannabe West Tampanian, that’s what I’ve noticed.) I wonder how this rich diversity has contributed to transforming exchanges within the neighborhood. I wonder how neighbors have supported one another through painful events and circumstances…my intuition is that they have. Sure would be nice to be a part of a neighborhood like that, especially these days. I’m curious about the various ways that kids as well as adults, especially recognized elders, have naturally self-organized within the neighborhood to create a community that feeds their souls…would love to hear about the ways the people who live there have come together and generated the energy that is now attracting “outsiders.”
I believe that this energy, this “potential,” more than the poverty or other “needs” of the community, is what is really drawing people to West Tampa. Residents, developers, service providers, researchers, you name it. To the extent that we outsiders refuse to acknowledge this attraction…and frame proposals to move in and “revitalize” West Tampa AS IF we are the ones offering something to the community, rather than copping to our growing awareness that we see something of great potential within the community and would like to be a part of it…well, I say shame on us. Talk about one sure way to squelch the vitality that is so attractive to begin with…
