Vast sections of our close in, older neighborhoods are now vacant or in utter disrepair. Housing that once provided for raising generations of families have now become drug houses reaping a crop of disintegration of family life and crime. The physical environment of our neighborhoods has deteriorated with the accumulation of years of neglect and the new poisons of drugs, juvenile crime and disillusionment. The economic neighborhood bases of small and medium size businesses are gone. Available affordable and decent housing in many sections is now virtually non-existent due to abandoned and dangerous structures.
Crime is prevalent and, in many cases, a way of life.
The pride of these once vibrant neighborhoods is broken. The Empowerment Zone boundaries encompasses much of this inner city core. It is twenty square miles with a population of 102,000. There are 46,000 children and young adults in the Empowerment Zone with almost half living below the poverty level. The future for young people is bleak with the lack of even entry level jobs for the undereducated and unmotivated.