“The Poverty Problem in Syracuse: Matt’s Memo
This article points out that the thoughtless design of the city of Syracuse has been a large contributor to the prevalence of poverty. The layout of the city, especially the interstate, has divided Syracuse into sections and caused isolation and increased poverty problems. A quote that stood out to me was by Valerie Hill who said, “Poverty was designed to happen. It does not happen just because. It was written into the plan.” I thought that was a pretty powerful statement and definitely pointed fingers at the setup of the city as being one of the root causes that allowed Syracuse to get so bad.
http://cnycentral.com/news/local/the-poverty-problem-in-syracuse-matts-memo
“The Cancer Correlation”
This article postulates the correlation between radioactivity in the Colombian River and cancer rates in the Oregon counties bordering the river. Researchers noticed that starting from the Hartford Plant and continuing downstream, cancer rates were higher in the areas next to the river and highest particularly around the lower Colombian. I chose to look at Oregon because both my aunt and uncle who live in Port Land have been recently diagnosed with Cancer and the discussion in class made me wonder if the environment there led to them both having it.
http://www.intimeandplace.org/Hanford/activities/cancercorrelation.html
1) This article was written for CNY Central News about the poverty problem in Syracuse. The author wrote it for his job so he can get paid and chose the subject because it is a pertinent problem for the locals that follow his news station. He wants to write about a story that will peak interest in the community and his desired audience so they will read CNY Central News again. His objective was to point the blame of the poverty lines seem=n in Syracuse to how the city itself was constructed. He wanted to clearly show that the design of the city, especially the interstate has caused division in the community and created bubbles of poverty. He mainly used professional quotes or facts to support his claim. The author tries to relate with the reader and make it more persona buy using words like “you, we and our community.”
2) One quote that I found most impactful was a quote by Valerie Hill from the Southwest Community Center said “poverty was designed to happen. It does not happen just because. It was written into the plan.” This really point fingers to the design of this city being a root cause for the prevalence of poverty and the segregation of Syracuse. It shows that it was made to happen and needs to be addressed. It also makes the reader think that if poverty was “written in the plan” couldn’t it be unwritten? Couldn’t there be something we can do to redesign the area? That powerful quote is said in the first half of the text and lets the reader ponder it while being delivered the rest of the information.
http://cnycentral.com/news/local/the-poverty-problem-in-syracuse-matts-memo