By David Sher
I got up this morning, grabbed my gym bag, and headed to my workout.
I ran into a friend in the gym I hadn’t seen in a while and asked him about his two adult daughters.
He said one daughter was living in Atlanta and the other in New York.
I replied that’s what’s wrong with Birmingham. “We can’t hold onto our children.”
Parents often complain to me about losing their children and grandchildren to other cities and emphasize that they’re never coming back.
He sighed, ‘I guess Birmingham just isn’t exciting enough.
I told him I don’t really buy ‘the Birmingham is not exciting’ argument.
The reason we’re losing our children is we don’t have the jobs for them.
He agreed and then blamed our conservative legislature.
I said if that were true, how do you explain that Alabama is the home to two of the fastest growing metro areas in America?
The Daphne-Fairhope-Foley Metropolitan Area is the sixth fastest growing and the Huntsville Metro Area is the 20th fastest growing in the U.S. Huntsville now has 50,000 more people than Birmingham.
In fact, Huntsville, now Alabama’s biggest city, keeps winning and winning–both with the government and private sector.
The Space Command is coming to Huntsville and IKEA, one of most globally successful retailers in the world, selected Huntsville for its first Alabama store.
According to Consumer Affairs, Alabama is ranked as the 7th most popular state for seeking a new home.
Yet our Birmingham region remains stagnant while Daphne and Huntsville have the same state government,
Then I asked him to explain Florida and Texas, the two fastest growing states in the U.S., who may be more conservative than Alabama.
According to a recent report from the National Association of Realtors, just 3% of movers cited political reasons as their primary motivation.
I’m not trying to promote conservative governance. I’m just trying to make the case that there has to be a bigger obstacle to Birmingham’s growth than our legislature.
It’s fragmented local governance.
Let’s Follow the Lead of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh in Allegheny County Pennsylvania until recently faced the same structural problem as Jefferson County.
Jefferson County has 35 cities–Allegheny County has 130—four times as many.
Allegheny County, just like Jefferson County, had only two branches of government, legislative and judicial, with no executive branch.
No Jefferson County commissioner, including its president, is elected county-wide.
But unlike Jefferson County, Allegheny County recognized the problem and fixed it.
Allegheny Count didn’t combine cities.
Allegheny County didn’t merge schools.
Allegheny County opted for one strong county.
On January 1, 2000, the Home-Rule Charter went into effect in Allegheny County. It replaced the three elected commissioners with an elected chief officer (the County Executive), a county council with 15 members, and an appointed county manager.
The transformation was dramatic and immediate. By creating a true executive branch with a county-wide elected chief executive, Allegheny County suddenly had unified regional leadership that could speak for the entire metro area.
The county executive became accountable to all 1.2 million residents, not just individual districts, and could coordinate economic development across all 130 municipalities.
The results speak for themselves. Today, the three most important politicians in Pennsylvania are widely recognized as the Governor of Pennsylvania, the Mayor of Philadelphia, and the Mayor of Pittsburgh.
Pittsburgh now has a seat at the table in statewide and national conversations precisely because the region created the unified leadership structure that gives them political clout and economic coordination.
This is the kind of unified regional voice that Jefferson County desperately needs but currently lacks.
The Path Forward: Bringing Our Children Home
The solution is right in front of us: follow Pittsburgh’s lead and complete Jefferson County’s governmental structure by creating a truly independent executive branch. A county-wide elected executive accountable to all 660,000 Jefferson County residents could finally give Birmingham the regional political voice and economic coordination that would make us competitive.
Until we fix this fundamental flaw, we’ll keep losing our most precious export—our young talent—to cities that figured out long ago that fragmented governance kills economic prosperity.
The choice is simple: continue operating with broken government structure, or build the unified leadership that brings our children home and puts Birmingham back on the map.
Our competitors aren’t waiting. Neither should we.
David Sher is the founder and publisher of ComebackTown. He’s past Chairman of the Birmingham Regional Chamber of Commerce (BBA), Operation New Birmingham (REV Birmingham), and the City Action Partnership (CAP).
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Invite David to speak for free to your group about how we can have a more prosperous metro Birmingham. dsher@comebacktown.com
Thought-provoking column about a complex question. One thing to me is clear: The Birmingham Metro won’t grow by waiting for the state to bring them jobs. The Birmingham metro must be powerfully proactive in finding companies that are a good fit for the metro and persuading them to locate here.
A Tale of Two Malls? Can you or any of your readers venture a theory why Brookwood Mall remains empty and (to the best of my knowledge) devoid of any serious proposals to redevelop it—while there are major plans to redevelop the Galleria? Is this a symptom of poor cooperation among the cities surrounding Brookwood, while Hoover demonstrates its free standing economic clout that’s superior to all the other Jefferson County municipalities?
I’m a transplant here. Moved in 2018 after 15 years in Nashville. I have been proposing to anyone who would listen that the best route to consolidation is a county mayor – and honestly it would probably be wise to make it “birmingham -Jefferson county”. Let the suburbs keep their schools – we have the choose act now so schooling no longer is as big a reason for families not to move to Bham or the suburbs without their own districts.
Honestly – it seems like the consolidated county government should probably take over all or most of Birmingham’s governance. I think people underestimate the value of the whole county voting for the largest governing body. Just as you like to say, the suburbs are nothing without Birmingham, but simultaneously, where would Birmingham city be without the dollars coming from the OTM suburbs.
This plan actually seems feasible and would do wonders for the area. Maybe we could keep the interstate lights on. Lol
It is extremely optimistic to think a government plan could “do wonders” for anything.
There is more than just a statue of a Roman god and mountain ridge dividing OTM and Birmingham. Put a proposal to consolidate Birmingham, Homewood, Mountain Brook, and Vestavia Hills governments….you wont get 10% support from the OTM crowd. To consolidate governments at this point would only trigger another white flight. Shelby county would grow exponetionally again.
I’m interested to see if anybody is willing to put an actual plan together and submit it to the local populations to guage support. I doubt anybody will risk their reputation to consolidate OTM with Bham, but I’ll wait for times/dates of when plans will be presented to local governments and to the public.
I can’t help but to think Bull Conner is looking up from the afterlife and getting a chuckle from inclination to consolidate.
I must say, this is the most I have agreed with Sher so far. I was one of those who was a part of the “brain drain” from Birmingham, as I knew I wouldn’t be able to find the life I wanted there. Yes, the jobs are not there, but in hindsight, it is not always about having a “good job” in the area, but rather, it is about having the resources/opportunities/capabilities/connections to accomplish what you want where you are. True, it is more difficult in Birmingham versus elsewhere, but it can be done. More local intergovernmental cooperation may help with securing large corporations or firms (for those that want the good jobs), but it may not always require consolidation. I do agree that the left/right political debate gets old and it accomplishes nothing (I currently live in a red state with one of America’s fastest-growing major cities). It is a tired excuse to use the political climate as a reason for inaction, as it only serves as a convenient scapegoat while requiring that those who complain can still do nothing but “vote out the rascals” and everything will magically be better. All in all, I think it requires people in the area to be more entrepreneurial and not always depend on some Fortune 500 corporation to come along and save them – that’s not the magic bullet. Make your own opportunities out of what you have and over time, it will pay dividends.
Like clockwork a post about “Losing Our Children”. There is a difference between correlation and causation. One can correlate a decline in BHAM population with conservative state government or with liberal local government, but that does not mean that decline in population is caused by governments state or local. Instead maybe look at historical trends. Historically children tend to leave areas for more opportunity. I’m willing to bet a Back Forty beverage that Birmingham children seek out areas for more opportunities than what they grew up with. Typicall everyone wants more opportunity. Yes, there are some folks that are fine with the current status.
Can Birmingham be better? Yes. Is it caused by government design? No. It is caused by opportunities or rather more opportunities elsewhere.
With apologies to my friend Tom:
Another friend Jack, says that mediocre people are always at their best. Regrettably, we, as a people are comfortable with mediocrity, complacency, and the status quo. Unless and until there is a sea change in both the corporate and political leadership, we will continue to limp along.
I just read Roy Johnson‘s editorial today in al.com and that may account for such a negative comment.
I have lived in the Birmingham area all my life and I am now a retired architect. I came back after college and had a successful career. My children came back also. One went to experience life in New York but came back. My first grandchild and his future wife are coming back.
I have watched and heard that the problem with Birmingham is the suburbs for more than 50 years. I was a member of the Young Men’s Business Club that ran the “One Great City” add in the Birmingham News in the 1970’s. However, nothing has changed. Without a great vision for the future, I would not be a supporter of this concept today.
To some extent, I think it is the lack of leadership limited by the city’s geographical area. However, I believe it mostly the lack of a great vision that appeals to a large majority of the metropolitan area.
Our firm once worked with a Birmingham developer on a project in Chattanooga. I asked him why he thought Chattanooga had prospered so much when Birmingham had not. His answer? He said the last three mayors of Chattanooga were real estate developers that knew how to get things done, not politicians. Does this sound familiar? I once encouraged an acquaintance who was a developer to move into the city and run for mayor as an idea.
I do not know the solution. I have had a few ideas in the past. We have a many exceptionally smart people in the Birmingham metro area. Maybe someone could gather a group that could explore a viable vision for the metro area that is not based on consolidation of the suburbs which has never worked. I know there have been efforts in the past and hope I have not offended anyone. These are just my observations after reading numerous articles addressing our children not coming back to Birmingham.
As I have said many times on this site you have to offer something good in return for OTM support. Birmingham has proven time and time again it will not offer what the people want. You have to start if you are going to have county administrator to fix the basic problems Birmingham has. It has to start with education. The Birmingham and Jefferson County schools are horrible compared to the outlying communities. No OTM family wants to give their children the type and quality of education that is offered in Birmingham and Jefferson County. You will never attract a great influx of people and business opportunities until you fix that basic problem.
Black people in Birmingham will never give up political power to the White MAJORITY. If all of Jefferson county voted for a mayor I can guarantee you that the mayor will end up being white and the black racists of Birmingham will never allow that.
Far too often the discussion on race and racial politics only goes in one direction in this country, Only one side of the story is allowed to be told.
Damon, that is not a given. Though there are more whites who live in Jefferson County, whites are not a majority. And Jefferson County certainly votes Democratic. But why should it matter if the Jefferson County exec is white or black? Here are the numbers: Race & ethnicity (2023): White (non-Hispanic) 47.9%, Black (non-Hispanic) 42.3%, Hispanic (all races) 5.2%, Asian 1.8%, Two or more races (non-Hispanic) ~1.8%.
Presidential election: Harris 162,112 (54.27%) • Trump 131,123 (43.90%) • RFK Jr. 5,469 (1.83%)
So you want to know why nobody wants to live there. This comment above is a good example.
I moved back to the South in general to care for aging parents. For me, it is bad enough being in Atlanta. I cannot imagine what life must be like in Alabama if you are a person of color, an immigrant, a woman or LGBT. And whether you want to deal with this fact or not, all those groups together provide a majority percentage of new businesses.
It’s not your conservative fiscal policies. It’s your historical and present day image of essentially being hostile and dangerous for anyone but straight, white people.