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ASHLEY AIDENBAUM:
Detroit As 'Global City'
Shelli Liebman Dorfman
Contributing Writer
A
shley Aidenbaum is committed to helping build a positive future
for the city of Detroit, promoting its revitalization and contribut-
ing to efforts that help to attract and retain talent.
A University of Michigan graduate, Aidenbaum is a group publisher for
Issue Media Group, a Detroit-based media company that creates weekly
online magazines focusing on growth and investment in various cities.
Aidenbaum, 26, has working to drive the Inc. 5000 company's expansion
into larger markets, including Baltimore, Tampa and Toronto.
She participates in the publication of Model D, an online magazine high-
lighting stories of Detroit's development, creative people and businesses,
vibrant neighborhoods and places to live, eat, shop, work and play.
Ashley, who lives in Ferndale with her husband, Ryan Hertz, also has been
an urban policy consultant for the state of Michigan and is published in
the Michigan Journal of History.
In 2008, while consulting for the Michigan State Housing Development
Authority, she helped plan the Creative Cities Summit, an international
conference in Detroit that focused on issues facing post-industrial cities.
Growing up in West Bloomfield, Ashley was involved with the BBYO
and belonged to Temple Beth El in Bloomfield Township. Her parents —
Connie and Guido Aidenbaum of West Bloomfield — are now members
at Adat Shalom Synagogue in Farmington Hills, where Ashley will attend
services on the High Holidays.
Ashley's Dream:
So many experiences have shaped my love for cities and for Detroit in par-
ticular. My Jewish upbringing fostered curiosity, a thirst for learning and a
deep appreciation for community. But it wasn't until my first trip to Israel
in my adolescent years that I saw how a particular place could contain and
facilitate these values.
As a publisher, I travel to cities like Baltimore that share many of Detroit's
challenges as well as cities like Toronto that have realized an impressive cul-
ture of inclusion and innovation that has helped the city to prosper.
All cities experience crime, struggle with forms of inequality and tension,
and have to adapt to economic changes. We publish in other Rustbelt cities,
like Pittsburgh and Cleveland, that also had to make a major transition into
the new economy. Thomas Sugrue's Origins of the Urban Crisis is perhaps
one of the most powerful accounts of Detroit's distinct story, and helped me
to understand the injustice and intolerance that tore apart our city.
In spite of this troubling legacy, Detroit continues to emerge as a creative
hub ripe with opportunity to create art, business and social change; we find
stories for Model D every week about companies hiring and expanding, new
neighborhood and downtown growth and redevelopment, and community
leaders doing great work — highlighting especially young people choosing
to return or relocate to the city.
Chip and Dan Heath demonstrate the effectiveness of studying "bright
spots" in their recent book Switch, which struck me as an encouraging vali-
dation of our approach. Our publications focus on success and what's work-
ing rather than focusing on failure and loss. So much is possible!
One effort we will continue to publicize and support in particular is the
"Global Detroit" initiative, spearheaded by former State Rep. Steve Tobocman
(supported by the New Economy Initiative), because in short, to transition to
the new economy and facilitate economic growth, Detroit must embrace its
future as a global city that welcomes new Americans and embraces diversity.
We should care about the future of Detroit and its residents regardless of
whether they are Jews, but precisely because we are Jews. I envision a future
Detroit that is dense, thriving, inclusive and sustainable. Jews have a rich
tradition of the kind of entrepreneurship and leadership required to help
facilitate the emerging revitalization of Detroit; part of what compelled me
so deeply about my first trip to Israel was imagining the barren land that
is now so thriving and fruitful. I hope that through my current work and
future efforts that I can play a part in Tikkun Olam — which I've decided
must begin with my home, Detroit.
A Gk. /144
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September 29 • 2011
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