Former Mayor Speaks on Downtwon Houston

Former Mayor Speaks on Downtwon Houston

BY PHILIP MONTGOMERY
Rice News Staff
May 6, 1999

Former Houston mayor Bob Lanier wrapped up his lecture series held on the Rice campus by recalling the three keys to revitalizing the city: reversing the rising crime rate, capitalizing on ethnic diversity and rebuilding the inner city.

On April 28 in James A. Baker III Hall, Lanier concluded his three-part lecture series by talking about the theory and practice of revitalizing downtown Houston. The lecture series was co-sponsored by Rice’s School of Social Sciences and the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy with support from the Shell Oil Co. Foundation.

Shortly after winning the mayor’s seat in 1991, Lanier began a campaign to put more police officers on the streets, to rebuild the city infrastructure, including streets, sewers and water, and to treat Houston’s ethnic diversity as a positive rather than a negative factor.

While the hundreds of police officers hit Houston’s streets, Lanier started repaving roads and improving sewer and water lines. As part of his downtown revitalization project, he focused on the long-neglected neighborhoods surrounding the downtown area by slowing crime and revitalizing neighborhoods, some of which had been neglected for more than 30 years.

“None of it was fancy or new,” Lanier said. “It just made common sense.”

Lanier’s care for the city’s impoverished areas resulted in strong political support from those neighborhoods. His formula was simple: treat people as you want to be treated, pave the roads, put up street lights, improve services.

“It makes a family feel like you really care about them,” Lanier said.

In the three lectures, Lanier expressed the importance of equality for all, belief in a free market system, subsidizing locally not federally, and providing education opportunities for everyone. Those elements were key to the revitalization of downtown.

He concluded his last lecture by recalling his vision for Houston: clean, safe, beautiful, an educated work force and opportunity for every man, woman and child.