BUILDING FOR SCHOOL AND COMMUNITY - Kennedy Bibliothek

35. From the very outset of planning for the center, full communityparticipation
was sought and utilised. However, in contrast to the
Jefferson Center and Dunbar processes, Pontiac's Board of Education used
the seed money, given for the original programming process, to finance
an expert feasibility study on the proposed center. The expert planners
and architects proceeded in close contact with agencies and citizens.
Based on the result of their work, the City Commission passed a resolution
endorsing city involvement and thus further progress in planning and
design. After a highly complicated and difficult implementation process,
the HRC began its operations as the first center of its kind in the country.
It was successful in many ways: it attracted agencies and universities
to use the new facilities; its educational spaces, programs, and organisation
are innovative and attractive for teachers and students. However,
the most successful aspect of the HRC is its innovative urban and architectural
design. Compared to the other two centers which have been particularly
successful in achieving other goals, it seems that the HRC has
generated a new type of architectural design which appropriately reflects
the center's function as a focal point for community activities. The
question may be asked whether this specific quality is (or is not) a
direct outcome of the fact that architects and planners were given the
opportunity to direct the initial programming process.
36. Although the HRC alleviated an educational and social services deficit
/goal ii), paragraph 317 and enhanced inter-agency co-operation /goaliv),
paragraph 3l7> it did not achieve the racial balance it set out to create.
By integrating six primary schools (two predominantly black lower-class
and four predominantly white middle-class) under desegregation orders and
by adding a whole range of social services, the central administration
assumed that the white flight to the suburbs would be halted, or at least
slowed down. This proved to be impossible. Within three years most of
the inner city area had become predominantly black and Spanish American, and
those white parents who could afford it sent their children to private
schools. A defeat of political forces responsible for the HRC at subsequent
elections stopped the concept from spreading any further throughout the
city. Only recently, in fact since the middle of 1975, has there been a
reverse trend in that white families are moving back into the inner city.
This trend, due mainly to economic constraints, appears for various reasons:
the sharp raise in prices of suburban housing, the cheaper price of housing
in inner city locations, and the higher cost of private transportation
following the world oil crisis. Thus, the possibility seems to exist that
the HRC (in a couple.of years) may indeed become what its originators
fought for - an integrated community/school center.
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