Gentrification’s insidious violence: The truth about American cities

[KamaAina]

http://www.salon.com/2014/04/08/gentrifications_insidious_violence_the_truth_about_american_cities/

A few years back, when I was still a paramedic, we picked up a white guy who had been pistol whipped during a home invasion in Williamsburg. “I can’t believe this happened to me,” he moaned, applying the ice pack I’d given him to a small laceration on his temple. “It’s like a movie!”...

While film narratives of white folks in low-income neighborhoods tend to focus on how endangered they are by a gangland black or brown menace, this patient was singular in that he was literally the only victim of black on white violence I encountered in my entire 10-year career as a medic....

Gentrification is violence. Couched in white supremacy, it is a systemic, intentional process of uprooting communities. It’s been on the rise, increasing at a frantic rate in the last 20 years, but the roots stretch back to the disenfranchisement that resulted from white flight and segregationist policies. Real estate agents dub changing neighborhoods with new, gentrifier-friendly titles that designate their proximity to even safer areas: Bushwick becomes East Williamsburg, parts of Flatbush are now Prospect Park South. Politicians manipulate zoning laws to allow massive developments with only token nods at mixed-income housing....

With gentrification, the central act of violence is one of erasure. Accordingly, when the discourse of gentrification isn’t pathologizing communities of color, it’s erasing them. “Girls,” for example, reimagines today’s Brooklyn as an entirely white community. Here’s a show that places itself in the epicenter of a gentrifying city with gentrifiers for characters – it is essentially a show about gentrification that refuses to address gentrification. After critics lambasted Season 1 for its lack of diversity, the show brought in Donald Glover to play a black Republican and still managed to avoid the more pressing and relevant question of displacement and racial disparity that the characters are, despite their self-absorption, deeply complicit with. What’s especially frustrating about “Girls” not only dodging the topic entirely but pushing back – often with snark and defensiveness against calls for more diversity – is that it’s a show that seems to want to bring a more nuanced take on the complexities of modern life.

[msongs]

1. lotta BS in this article. when non whites gentify a neighbor is that racist too? nt

[KamaAina]

2. That happens a lot less frequently

than white gentrification.

[AverageJoe90]

7. Not to mention that his claim that, "No one is safer in communities of color than white folks.",

is, unfortunately, isn't all that accurate, simply because many of these neighborhoods are quite poor and rundown, and all the problems that come with that(see: Southeast L.A., pretty much all of Detroit, etc.).....but then again, I wouldn't want to be stuck in a *white* neighborhood with those problems, either.

I happen to live in a neighborhood that just happens to have a significant portion of African-Americans, and some Latinos, and we are definitely a safe place. But we're also a pretty well-off neighborhood, in which the average home price is somewhere in the 250-300k range.

My point is, it's poverty that makes much of the problem, even if it IS also true that the danger of poorer communities of any ethnicity are often overblown by the MSM and talk radio(which is definitely true).

[Louisiana1976]

3. Developers in neighborhoods where gentrification is taking should build mixed-income developments

so the poor aren't priced out of the neighborhoods.

[AnalystInParadise]

17. Why?

n/t

[geek tragedy]

4. The alternative to some kind of gentrification

is decline and decay. Places either get more desirable and attractive, ergo more expensive, or they go the other direction. And, the absence of drug dealers shooting each other tends to undercut the idea that it is violence .

Now, gentrification can be done with mixed but on balance favorable results, or it can be done in an almost revanchist manner that rewards developers and liquidates communities.

Here in Brooklyn we've seen both kinds.

[Throd]

8. I have seen both kinds in Long Beach, CA as well.

[KamaAina]

12. So no integrated neighborhood can be stable?

I've often wondered about that.

[geek tragedy]

14. Gentrification is integration.

It's when affluent people start returning to areas known for being concentrations of poverty.

One really can't decry de facto segregation and then complain when white folks start moving into 'someone else's' community.

Economically, crime wise, and in terms of quality of life, neighborhoods go in one direction or the other. The key is how fast they go in the 'right' direction.

There is no social justice in maintaining concentrations of poverty with high crime, poor schools, and decaying buildings and no services.

[KamaAina]

15. Yes, but does the community remain integrated?

Or does it get put on the path to all-white?

The experience in Brooklyn, especially North Williamsburg, has been the latter.

[geek tragedy]

18. Fort Greene would point to yes.

Economically, neither is particularly diverse.

But gentrifying Clinton Hill and Bed Stuy are highly diverse.

To put it another way: should west Crown Heights become more like east Crown Heights, or vice versa?

[KamaAina]

20. Or should there be some cross-pollination?

So that it would just be "Crown Heights"?

This might have averted the tragedy that ensued when a prominent Jewish leader's limo hit-and-ran a 6-year-old West Indian kid.

[geek tragedy]

21. That crown heights no longer exists .

West crown heights is gentrifying but diverse, with good schools .

East crown heights is like circa 1986 Beirut.

[KamaAina]

22. Sounds like de Blasio needs to step in.

Unless "Groundhog Gate" sinks him.

[geek tragedy]

23. He can do some, but not enough.

It costs more to build housing than lower income people can pay.

[KamaAina]

24. As I recall, he's committed to building 200,000 affordable units citywide.

I envy you. The current mayor of The Tenth-Largest City In America(TM) (San Jose) is committed to building... um, a couple of hundred, for the chronically homeless that live in an encampment called "The Jungle" that is generating negative headlines, even in his house organ, the Mercury News.

[geek tragedy]

25. Build or preserve. And it will have to mean

high rises.

200,000 is barely enough to keep up with population increase-2.5% of 8 million residents.

[KamaAina]

26. At least he's trying to keep up.

As a former NYC resident, I've long been eying the Sunnyside, Queens rail yards as the affordable equivalent of the West Side's Hudson Yards: deck it over and build. And is anything going on in Arverne, Queens (next to Far Rockaway)?

[geek tragedy]

28. Far Rockaway area up in the air after Sandy.

Problem is: if housing costs more to build (land plus construction plus ongoing maintenance) than a lot of people can afford, where does the money come from?

Gentrification will have its limits in BK-never goes too far away from subway stops .

[amandabeech]

40. I was living in the NYC area when that happened.

It was just awful. The relationship between the two communities was so bad, and the whole situation deteriorated so quickly.

Really, the New York police should have put the quietus on that rabbi's daily high speed limo convoy. It was really a deadly accident waiting to happen. There was no reason that he and his party could not have obeyed the speed limit and the traffic signals. IIRC, there had been a number of close calls before the deadly accident.

[Nye Bevan]

5. Congratulations to Detroit for avoiding the curse of "gentrification".

Other cities should strive to emulate its example.

[nomorenomore08]

6. Yeah, unfortunately it almost seems like a case of "damned if you do, damned if you don't."

[KamaAina]

13. Actually, people who would be called "gentrifiers" elsewhere

are moving into Detroit. Many from out of state. The difference is that Detroit had declined so far that there is plenty of room for them without displacing anyone.

[nomorenomore08]

37. That's kind of what I was thinking too. Thanks for spelling it out. n/t

[XemaSab]

9. Figurative "violence" should not be confused with actual violence

When a cop shoots a dude, that's violence.

When the KKK lynches a dude, that's violence.

When a dude gets killed in a driveby, that's violence.

When a young hipster couple moves into the house next door from San Francisco so they can start a family, THAT IS NOT VIOLENCE.

[XemaSab]

11. And as a response to #10

When everything is violence, then nothing is violence.

We should have zero tolerance for violence in our culture, whether from cops, husbands, politicians, girls... whoever.

When a dude sells his house, it's a bummer, but it's not violence.

[AnalystInParadise]

16. Standing applause

I almost vomited reading that article. It sounded a lot like "the upper middle class white guy had it coming".

[AndyTiedye]

41. The Author is Doing This to Justify Violence as a Response to Gentrification

Not only is violence not justified as a response, it won't work.
The response would be more police. Lots more police. And we know where that leads.

[daredtowork]

10. Displacement from Housing is Violence

When your landlord sells the property because the area has become "desirable", and there is no other low income housing to go to because the Mayor has been secretly plotting against low income housing (I'm looking at you, Mayor of Berkeley) then the imminent terror of homelessness...an the succeeding experience of homelessness...is indeed violence.

It is also a form of negligence and abuse by the State, because the State omits to put in place any safety nets to protect the people who experience this violence of being displace from their long-term housing arrangements by the desires of the wealthy.

Other collateral damage includes the inability of important low-income nonprofit workers to be able to get housing in the area, leaving the people that need them bereft of help.

[KamaAina]

19. Tom Bates is plotting against low-income housing?!

for those of you playing along at home, Bates is the longtime mayor of Berkeley who sees himself as carrying on Berkeley's proud progressive tradition, although fewer and fewer of us do. Kriss Worthington (a real progressive on Berkeley City Council) or another challenger needs to hit him on this. Hard. Especially with the homeless population growing, because of the Bush-ruined economy and the neighboring town of Albany "clearing out" a large homeless encampment on the Bay shore. (many of the people evicted have occupied a freeway underpass in Berkeley)

Oh, and low-income for-profit workers need housing, too. Berkeley has a housing impact fee on new market-rate development, like the luxury Arpeggio condos downtown (this was unheard-of in Berkeley until recently); this is because the affluent residents will go to Starbucks, Subway, etc., and the baristas and sandwich artists have to live somewhere.

[daredtowork]

29. Yes

Bates sold all the public housing units in Berkeley to private owners. He has been keeping money Berkeley acquired for low-income housing locked up in committee and consultants even though demand is desperate. You should see the poor receptionist guy at the Center for Independent Living fielding call after call from disabled people who have no place to go. All he can do is refer them to CIL's monthly housing workshop. I went to that workshop to see what advice it gives. All they can tell people to do is get on waitlists for existing dedicated low-income units, and they acknowledge the waiting lists are now months to years long! The situation is a tacit invitation for the poor to move out of Berkeley! Meanwhile Bates, a a real estate developer, has been moving forward with "luxury apartment" projects and high end shoebox apartments for tech commuters: these apartments are so expensive that they place no pressure for rents to come down. Rent is skyrocketing here, and that's why landlords are selling out from under longterm fixed-income residents and undermining rent control.

According to a series of articles in the Berkeley Daily Planet, Bates characterized building low-income housing as "really stupid":

The Newport council got a federal grant to build low income housing. But for every proposed site, conservatives stirred up the neighborhood with fears of low income families. Schools were suffering from declining revenues due to lower enrollment (reflecting changing demographics), and the BCA school board was forced to consider closing schools, to make the hard choices over which to close, and to decide what to do with closed school sites.

With a dominant majority on the Council, many of the most active people in the progressive community were appointed to boards and commissions, and so became part of the administration. The community began to rely on the elected officials making the right decisions, and it became difficult to fill city hall with aroused progressive citizens. On the contrary, the seats were now largely filled with angry conservatives.

Bates was harshly critical of Newport’s attempt to increase low income housing. “They made some really stupid, in my judgment, decisions that haunted them, one of which was... the federal government said that they had all this low income housing that was available, and if Berkeley wanted them, they could get like 172 units of low income housing. And they said, ‘Sure. We want it.’ So then they’d try to figure out where to put the low income housing... And guess what? Nobody wanted it anywhere... So they took the schools and they also controlled the school board and they basically took school
ground and converted it to low income housing... and people were angry..."

http://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/pdfs/Tom-Bates-and-the-Secret-government.pdf

You might think this is a "conspiracy theory" from the past, mounted by people who oppose Bates as Mayor. Except he's still doing it today!!! Berkeley has more grant money for low-income housing RIGHT NOW!!! And for the last few years it has mysteriously been detoured into "studying the problem" while building these units for the 1% have been on the express lane!

If building low income housing is "stupid", Mayor Bates's idea of smart is to squeeze the low income (black?) people out of town.

What's a travesty on top of that is Berkeley has no good resource for handling the ensuing housing crisis. CIL is not the resource - their monthly housing workshop is just an overview. It won't really help people. But the poor receptionist has nowhere to refer all the people who are calling!!!

Ps. If you try to comment on this in local papers you get trolled by Ayn Rand market-uber-alles types to high heaven. Given Bates's previous stunt with stealing newspapers to win an election, I'm starting to wonder if he hires some of them. As far as I can tell, his State Senator wife Loni Hancock does jack to help low income people, too.

[KamaAina]

32. Monthly housing workshop?!

Down here in No Man's Land (San Jose), we do ours weekly!

[daredtowork]

36. It's pathetic :(

The material is old xeroxes of units - almost useless. The program really needs to be updated. All it tells you is that you need to find the units yourself, and that you will be keeping track of a lot of waitlists separately, and if you are about to lose your housing you are doomed. There info is focused on people who already have SSI - no recognition of people on General Assistance caught in the eternal SSI application process. At best you will get notified if there is an upcoming opening of the Section 8 waitlist somewhere - but that won't be in Berkeley.

I think they need to buff up this workshop in view of the current crisis - update the material as well as hold it more often. Moreover, someone needs to get a grant to offer real housing resources in Berkeley. Especially bridge resources while people on fixed and very low incomes - especially disabled people - are on those long waitlists for the ostensibly dedicated "low income" units. (As far as I can tell, those are unicorns in Berkeley, though).

Just to underscore this problem: the receptionist who is having to field all these calls would like to get his own place, but he can't afford it. He doesn't have access to any "inside knowledge", either.

[nomorenomore08]

38. "It is also a form of negligence and abuse by the State."

I think you hit upon the crux of the matter right there. Arguably, the biggest issue is those in power simply not giving a shit about poor people.

[brooklynite]

27. Here's a clue: cities change...

Today I live in a very upscale neighborhood. 80 years ago it was run-down and the house we live in was abandoned and boarded up. Sixty years before that it was upper middle class.

Cities evolve based on who WANTS to live there, who HAS to live there and who WON'T live there. Trying to lock in an economic or social strata leads only to stagnation.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

31. Yes, but it would be best

If a balance could be struck that didn't push out all of the locals when gentrification takes place. It seems that often, the very qualities, like the little hole in the wall eateries, local businesses, etc., that draw the gentrifiers in disappear as gentrification proceeds.

So much of the local flavor is often lost in gentrification.

[nomorenomore08]

39. This. So much this.

[AngryAmish]

30. When whites move away it is white flight.

When whites move in it is gentrification.

When most whites move away but some stay behind to run the government it is Ferguson.

When whites stay put it is segregation.

White people...can't live with 'em...can't live without 'en.

White people.

[KamaAina]

33. "When whites stay put it is segregation."

Explain?

[AngryAmish]

34. White people staying in all white areas maintain segregation.

[rug]

35. It is class warfare, plain and simple.