This month’s ballyhooed announcement of the proposed $65 million Machinery Row project in Racine left me sceptical. The Iowa developers’ plan, the latest of several big ideas for the Belle City’s redevelopment (most of which have failed due to lack of financing) might someday bring shops & loft dwellings to a pair of decrepit asbestos-coated buildings along the Root River downtown. If it were planned for Kenosha, I’d be more hopeful about this optimistic notion coming to fruition.
For much of the last century, Racine & Kenosha were similar industrial & trading ports of modest size. They also had a relative lack of sophistication in common, despite being located within easy train or driving distance of two metropolises, Milwaukee to the north & Chicago to the south. As a person raised in Racine I hate to admit it, but over the past 20 years Kenosha has outgrown its shrinking neighbor to the north. Lest it decline into a city housing a majority of poor people amidst privileged pockets of wealth, Racine can’t afford to fall farther behind.
In transforming itself from a primarily factory-based (hence dangerously polluting) economy into a bantamweight cultural dynamo, Kenosha has become an attractive place to live & to visit. These sibling cities on Lake Michigan have benefitted from - and sometimes been hindered by - the gravitational pull of their metropolitan neighbors. As they struggle to establish a new identity in the early 21st century, Racine & Kenosha are diverging - one for the better, the other for the worse.
Racine regularly has the state’s highest unemployment rate (now around 12 percent) as well as crime & poverty rates that rival Milwaukee’s sad “misery index.” A 2012 United Way Indicator Report stated that Racine has a 24.6 percent poverty rate, above the national average. As part of its Industrial Cities Initiative, a 2012 study of ten Midwestern cities by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago (FRBC) assessed why some manufacturing hubs are thriving while others struggle. The report named Racine a “fading city” while praising Green Bay as a resurgent industrial center. Green Bay, by the way, replaced Racine as the third most populous city in Wisconsin several years ago, while Kenosha is now fourth.
In reaction, Racine Mayor John Dickert claimed that the FRBC study didn’t entirely capture all the nuances of the city’s efforts to attract manufacturers. As a matter of fact, the Belle City is having trouble retaining even some of its well-established companies. For example, InSinkErator, a waste-disposer manufacturer (founded in Racine in the 1920s) recently decided to expand production by leasing a 160,000-square-foot property in the Business Park of Kenosha rather than building in Racine County.
By contrast, Kenosha is clearly a city on the rise, a community that is successfully managing the difficult transition from an American Motors Corporation (later Daimler-Chrysler-Jeep) company town into one that has diversified its economic base & added several new reasons to relocate there. The mostly friendly competition between these local rivals, located just 10 miles apart along the western shore of Lake Michigan, offers hope that neither will fall too far behind the other.
In terms of population increase, an indicator of a city’s attractiveness to migrants, Kenosha is home to about 100,150 people - up over 20,000 residents since 1980. In that same 34-year period Racine’s population declined, from over 85,000 to just 78,303 residents. Yet, with its beautiful sandy beaches & historic Wind Point lighthouse (1880), Racine beats Kenosha in lakeshore aesthetic appeal. Even so, Kenosha’s commercial as well as residential property values have leaped ahead of Racine’s.
This is partly due to Kenosha’s proximity to the Illinois border & Chicagoland’s wealthy north shore. But credit should also be given to Kenosha’s more practical political leadership, which extended sewer & water service along Hwy. 50 all the way to I-94 decades ago (a feat Racine has yet to accomplish on either Hwy. 11 or Hwy. 20). Many middle-class Illinoisans have recently moved to Kenosha in order to take advantage of the lower cost of living in Wisconsin. This influx of migrants provides welcome tax revenue for Kenosha - far more than Racine has been able to capture so far. Moreover, during the summer boating season, you’ll see more Illinois-tagged vehicles cruising downtown Kenosha than you will in Racine.
In terms of cultural institutions, Kenosha has surpassed Racine. The volunteer-driven Racine Theatre Guild’s bland mainstream productions are dull compared to the stage shows put on by either Carthage College or the University of Wisconsin - Parkside. And Kenosha is miles ahead in quality museums. Its Civil War Museum, Dinosaur Discovery Museum, Kenosha Public Museum, Kenosha History Center & Anderson Arts Center have well-defined educational missions as well as diverse collections. The contemporary craft objects on display at the Racine Art Museum do draw visitors from far & wide, but the small collection of paintings, drawings, photographs & sculptures at its affiliated Wustum Museum are not very interesting. Kenosha’s nicely curated historical museums put the low-budget, industry-focused Racine Heritage Museum to shame.
The Belle City does have the 32-acre Racine Zoo, which opened in 1923 & only started charging admission in recent years. Depending on your point of view, it’s either an impressive feature for such a small city (zoos help conserve endangered wildlife) or a sad mode of life for the creatures who reside within its walls (zoos are prisons for wild animals). Personally, I’m not a fan of any cages, unless they contain rabid animals or human psychopaths. But the zoo grounds do provide a great summertime live-music venue for the Animal Crackers jazz series.
Kenosha has a clear edge in libraries, with four branches of the Kenosha Public Library system - as well as the vast, publicly accessible collections at UW-Parkside. Although it has just a single downtown branch, the Racine Public Library does offer a panoramic blufftop view of the lakeshore in its main reading room.
In niche enterprises like craft-beer brewing, Kenosha is well ahead with two downtown micro-breweries: Public Craft Brewing Co. & Rustic Road Brewing Co., both established in 2012. Racine has only the Reefpoint Brewhouse (at the Reefpoint Marina since 2013), which contracts with Milwaukee’s Lakefront Brewing for production of its tasty proprietary beer recipes.
Yet the news isn’t all bad for Racine. My hometown leads Kenosha in one critical growth sector of the US economy: the government incarceration industry, specifically state prisons. In addition to suburban Sturtevant’s Racine Correctional Institution, there’s the inner-city Racine Youthful Offender Correctional Facility. Kenosha probably doesn’t mind losing in that category. Besides, Kenosha doesn’t need those state jobs as badly as Racine does.
In other downtown amenities, the competition is closer. Kenosha has a fleet of colorful vintage streetcars that follow a two-mile loop around downtown & back to the Metra train station that carries commuters & visitors to & from Chicago. Racine has a more diverse choice of boutique shops & fine restaurants along Main Street & Sixth Street.
Kenosha, however, has more live-music venues (& usually better audiences) than Racine - although the Belle City’s club owners have been hosting more bands lately. In yet another example of civic backwardness, Racine has no farmers’ market remotely comparable to Kenosha’s spectacular Saturday Harbor Market.
Kenosha, however, has more live-music venues (& usually better audiences) than Racine - although the Belle City’s club owners have been hosting more bands lately. In yet another example of civic backwardness, Racine has no farmers’ market remotely comparable to Kenosha’s spectacular Saturday Harbor Market.
In terms of sports franchises, at least, Racine remains the equal of Kenosha. The Racine Raiders semi-pro football team has played at Horlick Field for decades, while the Kenosha Kingfish baseball club, a new addition to the Northwoods League, was launched this May. On the other hand, Kenosha offers more choice facilities for free recreational sports. These include a first-class velodrome (bicycle race track) & two outdoor municipal swimming pools. UW-Parkside is deservedly proud of its wooded cross-country skiing trails, which double in warmer weather as a renowned competitive cross-country running course.
True, the capitalist-philanthropist Johnson family supports numerous projects that have made Racine a more pleasant place to live. Their main companies, SC Johnson & Son (home-maintenance & personal-care products) & Johnson Financial (insurance & banking) still co-sponsor Animal Crackers, a live-concert series at the zoo featuring distinguished jazz & blues artists, among many other events.
Furthermore, the trio of structures designed by Frank Lloyd Wright (who called Racine a “backwater”) for the late patriarch H.F. Johnson still draw architecture enthusiasts from around the globe. The Wingspread modernist mansion (now home to the Johnson Foundation) in tony Wind Point, the Johnson Wax administration building & the adjacent research tower give Racine a few distinguished landmarks unmatched by any in Kenosha.
But even the billionaire Johnsons, owners of the largest private corporation in Wisconsin, can only do so much to help Racine on the Lake (as local boosters have re-branded the Belle City). Without a more sustainable local economy, and given the cruel vagaries of globalization, the future of Racine does not inspire much confidence. At least Kenosha is just a short drive away for us Racine residents.
[© 2014 by J.C. Mrazek]
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