Richard T. Ely 1854-1943

This year marks the 75th Anniversary of Lambda Alpha International. Formed by four students at Northwestern University under the leadership of Richard T. Ely (1854-1943), Lambda Alpha has grown to more than 2,100 members in twenty-two chapters worldwide.

Our honorary land economics society provides a forum for the study and advancement of land economics where the "winnowing and sifting" of ideas takes place in an atmosphere of mutual respect. The Society's original goal of "fostering a closer association with academia and professionals involved with land economics and related fields", while still valid today, has expanded. Our Society is now a catalyst for the advancement of land economics by facilitating the interaction of members who have distinguished themselves in their professions, their communities and through academic achievements. Lambda Alpha International provides an opportunity for distinguished practitioners and scholars to come together in fellowship to discuss, debate and perhaps solve dilemmas involving use of our land resources.

I ask that you join with me this year in celebrating our achievements, but more importantly to provide new energy to make a difference through our professions in our communities.

One of the more important goals of our Society is to build our Land Economics Foundation corpus. Now about a quarter a million dollars, our goal is to increase the Foundation's endowment to $1 million so we can undertake educational programs that can have a significant impact within our communities. To achieve this goal, we need your help. We will be identifying specific programs this year and will looking for a donor to provide a significant initial contribution to kick-off our funding raising efforts, so if you are interested or know someone who is looking to make a difference in improving our environment, please give me or Stan Hamilton, the Foundation president, a call.

Finally, please join me this year for the Spring Weekend Experience in Boston beginning Friday evening April 29 through Saturday April 30. Program information and registration will be soon forthcoming. And please join us during the formal 75th Anniversary celebration at the 36th Biennial Congress in Chicago beginning Thursday evening October 20 and ending Saturday night October 22 with a dinner on the Frank Gehry designed stage of the Jay Pritzker Pavilion at Millennium Park.

Larry Lund

International President
LarryLund@LAI.org
312-751-1250

Editor's Column

Every winter quarter I teach a course at UC San Diego Extension called California 2020: Trends in California Demographics.  This quarter my class of 40 students represents a broad cross-section of the real estate industry and most are trying to obtain a certificate in Urban Planning Studies.

My course calls upon my education and career in both real estate economics and demographics. I lead the class in a discussion of world demographics, the demographics of the United States, then California and ultimately San Diego. Inevitably, the backbone of the course is real estate and its development and how we can solve our housing problems in the state.

But that’s not what my editorial is solely about today. Instead, it is about the future of our metropolitan areas and whether or not they will prosper or decay. What leads me to this discussion is the textbook for my course: Richard Florida’s The Rise of the Creative Class.

This seminal text is based on the thesis that the survival of any metropolitan area in the U.S. is tied to its ability to attract high quality talent to today’s and tomorrow’s growth industries. He quickly makes the point that our basic industries in American are going through a massive transition. The winners are those industries that rely on the “creative class” like telecommunications, bio-med, bio-tech, software, health care and entertainment.

Equally important, those industries tend to cluster in locales that have a university system that supports the creative industries. Therefore, what we are seeing in America is a group of metropolitan areas that are highly attractive to the creative class and their related industries. Further, he opines that it is folly to try to attract the creative class to metropolitan areas where the basic “spine” of those industries is missing.

As I look at the Census data over the past few decades, it is evident that the rise of the creative class is causing massive population swings within the nation and causing other metropolitan areas to decay. What becomes more apparent is that this trend toward “creative class” metropolitan areas is largely unreversible, leaving large numbers of metropolitan areas to stagnate over time.

Relating this to housing, most of these “creative class” markets have severe housing problems, whether on the east or west coast, and most often have political systems that strongly oppose creative affordable housing solutions.

Perhaps an organization like Lambda Alpha should develop a white paper exploring this subject. Or support a paper written by a recipient of an LEI scholarship. It may provide food for thought.

Alan Nevin
International Editor
anevin@marketpointe.com


In Memoriam

Edward L. Johnson

Edward L. Johnson

1910-2004

LAI Eulogizes Edward L. Johnson at Memorial Service

Ed Johnson, the first initiate into Lambda Alpha International was eulogized at a memorial service January 5, 2005. Following are the remarks that Peter Ulrich, former president of the LAI Los Angels Chapter and current Los Angeles chapter historian made on behalf of Lambda Alpha International at the memorial services that were held in Mr. Johnson's memory.

Remarks by Peter Ulrich, Historian, Los Angeles Chapter, Lambda Alpha International at the memorial service for Edward Johnson, 05 January 2005, Lake Avenue Church, Pasadena, California.

Good afternoon. I am here in a dual capacity: Ed Johnson and I were good friends and colleagues over the years.  We met while serving on the board of directors of the Salvation Army in Los Angeles a number of years ago.  Then, we were members of the honorary land economics society, Lambda Alpha International, of which Ed Johnson was a member and which I joined in 1964.  But Ed was more than just a member of Lambda Alpha, he was the very first member initiated into the society at Northwestern University in 1931.

The society was founded in 1930 by a group of four young men who were students of the eminent Professor Richard T. Ely, regarded as one of the founding fathers of the study of land economics.  The following year they decided to expand their numbers and as Ed liked to say, “they needed a guinea pig on whom they could try out their initiation ritual.”  That description was so typical of Ed’s ever-self-effacing way, but the founders I’m certain felt that the initiation ritual was of great significance.

The society has grown and prospered and in this coming fall will celebrate its 75th anniversary in Chicago.  There are now 2,500 members in chapters as widespread as Tokyo and London as well as chapters throughout Canada and the US.  So, Ed apparently helped the cause a lot by agreeing to be Lambda Alpha’s first initiated member.

After graduation from Northwestern Ed began work at Bell Federal Savings and Loan Association.  He remained active in Lambda Alpha and served as our President from 1943-44.

In 1955, he joined three other former Chicagoans who had moved west and the group started the Los Angeles Chapter of the society, which, by the way, is this year celebrating its 50th Anniversary.

In 1989, Lambda Alpha International recognized Edward Johnson with its International Fellow Award.  Ed continued to remain active in Lambda Alpha and in 1999 attended the Board of Governors meeting in Santa Monica.

As a former president of the Los Angeles Chapter, I had the privilege of working with Ed again and it was a distinct pleasure to do so.  His generous spirit was always evident at our meetings as was his interest in the field of land economics.  Many of our chapter’s members were at one time or another mentored by Ed and he is held in especially high regard by this, his home chapter.

We will all miss Ed and on behalf of our International President, Larry Lund and our International First Vice President, James Fawcett, I want to express our deep sympathy at his loss.  He will long be remembered by his friends, colleagues and fellow members of Lambda Alpha International.

Donate in Memory of Ed Johnson:

If you would like to make a donation to the Land Economics Foundation in the memory of Mr. Edward L. Johnson, you may do so online by going to 209.224.198.102 clicking on the Members tab. The password is lai. A card acknowledging your donation will be sent to Mrs. Edward L. Johnson.

Contributions to the Land Economics Foundation are tax deductible. The Foundation is a 501c3 not-for-profit charitable organization. The donations go to support Lambda Alpha International's education efforts.

The Ely-Chicago Chapter under the leadership of its new president Michael Shymanski held its fourth annual board retreat hosted by former chapter president Donna Pugh at her Bridgeman, Michigan "retreat center".

The two-day event allows the board members to spend more time than available during their monthly board meetings to talk about strategic planning issues. The retreat also functions to build teamwork among board members. This year's retreat focused on financial reporting, future programs, the Spring Chautauqua program, membership recruitment, the Burnham Plan Centennial celebration (2009), and the upcoming 75th Anniversary celebration for LAI this October in Chicago.

Congratulations to Ely member Joseph Antunovich for being a winner in the 28th International Design and Develop awards given by the International Council of Shopping Centers for designing The Market Common Carendon in Arlington, Virginia.

If your Chapter has any events or activities that you would like to share with other Chapters, please email your Chapter Announcements and any Chapter Activities to Michele Meng at LAI Headquarters lai@lai.org.

NEW LAI Brochure

Lambda Alpha International introduces a new brochure that describes the organization. This brochure, long over due, is ideal reading for potential and existing members providing better idea of what LAI represents and our goals.

The text of the brochure was the product of the editorial efforts of several LAI members, including James Fawcett, David Greenwood, Larry Lund, Roger Kallman, Les Pollock, Mike LaRue, and Nancy Seeger.

Photos in the brochure are from the photo gallery of Project for Public Spaces, Inc. (PPS) New York and the brochure was designed by Randi Robin Design of Evanston, Illinois.

The brochures were included with everyone's invoices this year, but if you or your chapter need additional copies, please e-mail your request to International at LAI@LAI.org.

LAI website visitations leap 63%! In 2004, the LAI website had 81,712 visitors, this is an increase of 31,716 over the 2003 total of 49,996 recorded visits.  Also, a Google search of "Lambda Alpha International" registered 840 hits!

The LAI website was visited an average of 6,285 times a month. The busiest month was March with 8,078 visits and the slowest was January when 5,284 visited our site.

If you would like to help sponsor Online KeyNotes, which reaches are 2,000+ membership, please e-mail us LAI@LAI.org. Annual business card sponsorships are just $250/year for twelve issues.

The presidents of each Lambda Alpha Chapter and the executive committee of Lambda Alpha International will meet at the Boston Weekend Experience on Sunday May 1 between 8:30 am and noon in the Wheatley Terrace at the Rooftop Level of the Omni Parker House Hotel in Boston. This meeting will feature a two-hour Leadership Workshop that will be lead by Russell Salzman. Mr. Salzman, a Lambda Alpha member, is the CEO of IREM and one of the country's leading experts and trainers in not-for-profit leadership.  He is preparing a program that will help chapter presidents perform their leadership role better.

In addition to the Board of Governors meeting just the Executive Committee of LAI will also meet Friday afternoon from noon to the beginning of the Weekend Program at 4 pm.

For those that attended the South Beach Weekend Experience last year you may be interested in this update on the Aqua development where we had a hard-hat tour.

http://www.theslatinreport.com/top_story.jsp?StoryName=0119aqua.txt