New Jersey has four horrible cities (Paterson, Newark, Camden and Trenton) while the rest of the state has a high standard of living.

I read this article in Rolling Stone and wondered if "tech valley" will go in the same direction (Albany, Troy, Schenectady).

http://www.rollingstone.com/cu.....perate-town-20131211

Or are we still decades away from that.....if ever???????

No, we have all the signs. That's what really gets me angry. There are places in the rust belt, and also in the farm belt, where all the jobs left an area, and the population moved away. Not so, here. This area HAS NOT suffered a population loss, and while the city has, in fact, suffered job losses, this area has not been as hard hit as some parts of the country. People who live in Clifton Park, Colonie, etc. mostly don't work where they live. They don't have downtowns, either. There is no economic reason for the tri-cities to be the way they are. The biggest factors in Schenectady's decline have been 1)the increase in crime combined with the highly visible problems in our police department, 2) the decrease in services combined with increases in taxes, and 3)the problems in our schools, which the dumping of undesirables from NYC in the city made worse.
Right now, the number one factor keeping people from moving here is not the schools, even though I thought it would be, it is plain and simple, the high taxes. Detroit has high taxes, combined with high crime, diminished services, blight, and loads of people on welfare. Detroit still has an auto industry,it did not go away. The areas around Detroit aren't doing to bad, either.
We could still be okay, if we had leadership to come in here and take care of the city. The only government that is going to help us is a government that does its job. There is NO REASON for Schenectady to be this bad, none at all. Our "leaders" gave tacit approval to using our cities as dumps, now the offer us loans to clean up some of the resulting mess.
Notice one of the downtown crowd using "our" when referring to the downtown neighborhood? People are on to these carpetbaggers. If we can't vote their henchmen and henchwomen out, we are doomed. Some of them are beating feet themselves, good riddance, but in such a way as to not allow a chance to get somebody who will work for the residents in there.

That article was pretty bleak though... Camden has no grocery store and one McDonalds. The businesses do not even want to be there at any price. The local cities have some dangerous areas but they at least are functional. One point in the article though was that they felt that the city police were a bit bloated so they disbanded them and went with a county police set up.

human animals trained to work in the industries to get $$ for food and housing then industry leaves....

the human animal trained as it was, is left with no land/no water/no clothing etc.......

humans either make their own way where they are hoping to get better, or pack up and leave that sh!t behind....

Our previous mayor did look into dissolving our police force. Our current mayor can't even manage to get them to stop taking city cars to their homes outside the county. Also, they are determined to wait it out and make sure a non-resident rogue cop gets his pension locked in, before determining whether or not he pointed a gun in a teenager's face.
We can't do without a police force in Schenectady, it would become completely unlivable here, but it would be nice if they would be even slightly cooperative in not killing the goose that lays the golden eggs.

Whatever happened to that story?  

Quoted from Madam X

Our previous mayor did look into dissolving our police force. Our current mayor can't even manage to get them to stop taking city cars to their homes outside the county. Also, they are determined to wait it out and make sure a non-resident rogue cop gets his pension locked in, before determining whether or not he pointed a gun in a teenager's face.
We can't do without a police force in Schenectady, it would become completely unlivable here, but it would be nice if they would be even slightly cooperative in not killing the goose that lays the golden eggs.

I know the father of the teen....he said it was UNCALLED for.....yes, the gun WAS pointed

What tech? Camden is the home of Campbell's Soup. Comparisons between Camden, NJ and Schenectady are on the mark. Although New Jersey has yet to raise regressive
sales taxes to benefit millionaire developers. Also know as Metrograft. Give more tax money to the Proctor's Power Plant that should turn things around.