East Austin Gentrification: Hallelujah! (Dallas, Van: transplants, home, landscaping)

[scm53]

Originally Posted by Raskolnikov

Also- here's another reason why East Austin became 'blight' in the 1970's and 80's. The original poster should be completely ashamed of themselves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03v-YLgKwjI

So, your premise is that closing Anderson HS in 1971 caused the blight of East Austin? If there were two HS in East Austin in '71, and one of the two closed in '71, then why did blight continue after LBJ opened in '74? If anything, a brand new HS replacing a 20+ year old one should have enhanced values.

[ScoPro]

Originally Posted by scm53

So, your premise is that closing Anderson HS in 1971 caused the blight of East Austin? If there were two HS in East Austin in '71, and one of the two closed in '71, then why did blight continue after LBJ opened in '74? If anything, a brand new HS replacing a 20+ year old one should have enhanced values.

Old Anderson was not just a school, it was also a center of community culture & pride. Closing it destroyed a lot of that, just like President LBJ's "Great Society" dismembered the black family.

LBJ was a misplaced attempt to mollify the East Austin community which was outraged at the closure of Anderson. Moving the revered name up to the new high school in affluent NW Hills was mighty awkward, IMO.

At least that was the way I remember it. Can't speak for the old East Austin folks.

I thought it was unnecessary to build LBJ... Reagan was just "around the corner" so to speak.

[Raskolnikov]

Originally Posted by ScoPro

Old Anderson was not just a school, it was also a center of community culture & pride. Closing it destroyed a lot of that, just like President LBJ's "Great Society" dismembered the black family.

LBJ was a misplaced attempt to mollify the East Austin community which was outraged at the closure of Anderson. Moving the revered name up to the new high school in affluent NW Hills was mighty awkward, IMO.

At least that was the way I remember it. Can't speak for the old East Austin folks.

I thought it was unnecessary to build LBJ... Reagan was just "around the corner" so to speak.

Exactly. Not only did the city close Anderson, but they re-opened a 'new' Anderson High in northwest hills, an affluent neighborhood, and they got rid of the old colors and mascot. You talk to people whose children or grandchildren attended Anderson, and you will hear the hurt and anger in their stories, as the previously posted video shows. Austin has really done minorities a lot of wrong, and it continues even now.

[ScoPro]

Originally Posted by Raskolnikov

Exactly. Not only did the city close Anderson, but they re-opened a 'new' Anderson High in northwest hills, an affluent neighborhood, and they got rid of the old colors and mascot. You talk to people whose children or grandchildren attended Anderson, and you will hear the hurt and anger in their stories, as the previously posted video shows. Austin has really done minorities a lot of wrong, and it continues even now.

Yep, the Anderson Yellowjackets were an Austin icon.

Good on Hollywood Henderson for trying to revive some of that community pride with his athletic program at the old school field.

[scm53]

Originally Posted by Raskolnikov

Exactly. Not only did the city close Anderson, but they re-opened a 'new' Anderson High in northwest hills, an affluent neighborhood, and they got rid of the old colors and mascot. You talk to people whose children or grandchildren attended Anderson, and you will hear the hurt and anger in their stories, as the previously posted video shows. Austin has really done minorities a lot of wrong, and it continues even now.

All true. Still hard pressed to understand - in a vacuum - how closing a school for three years led to "blight". If correlation is causation, them one could say that desegregation - which is why Anderson was closed - was the cause of East Austin blight.

[GPax]

Regardless of the caustic historical public policies that led to inequities, segregation and marginalization in East Austin, residents are responsible for their own individual actions or inactions that help degrade and diminish neighborhoods. No one's forcing folks to litter, junk up their yards, buy/sell drugs, blast the horns and bass for all to hear, let homes fall into utter disrepair, collect dogs as if they were stamps and let children run amok.

Some like to complain once gentrification is upon them but did nothing to better their neighborhoods - push for sidewalks, fight illegal dumping, clean up their homes, control their animals, partner with local businesses, put code enforcement to work, collaborate with fellow residents, for example - before the elements of change came along.

Neglecting or abusing your neighborhood is an invitation to others who can do better. Enter gentrification. And not a moment too soon.

[Raskolnikov]

Originally Posted by GPax

Regardless of the caustic historical public policies that led to inequities, segregation and marginalization in East Austin, residents are responsible for their own individual actions or inactions that help degrade and diminish neighborhoods. No one's forcing folks to litter, junk up their yards, buy/sell drugs, blast the horns and bass for all to hear, let homes fall into utter disrepair, collect dogs as if they were stamps and let children run amok.

Some like to complain once gentrification is upon them but did nothing to better their neighborhoods - push for sidewalks, fight illegal dumping, clean up their homes, control their animals, partner with local businesses, put code enforcement to work, collaborate with fellow residents, for example - before the elements of change came along.

Neglecting or abusing your neighborhood is an invitation to others who can do better. Enter gentrification. And not a moment too soon.

Did you learn the meaning of empathy as a child? While individuals are responsible ultimately for their actions, there is a flaw in what you're saying. It's not really your fault, you are just uninformed about the history of east Austin - and it shows in your statement "did nothing to better their neighborhoods- push for sidewalks..." Do you realize that the residents of east Austin back in the 1930's-80's pushed for sidewalks, pushed for basic sanitation, city services - and were ignored? Do you realize that the dirty industries were all located in East Austin by city design? Do you realize that african american doctors, lawyers, businessmen, entrepreneurs all wanted East Austin to be a nice community (just like you), yet when they tried to get the city to do simple things like create ditches, help with flooding/ water runoff, build sidewalks, make the streets safer --- the city often completely ignored them? The only thing the city would do for East Austin's residents was to beef up police brutality. That was one budget line item that they would always give more to.

Enter the newcomers- the hipsters and the affluent white progressives, who they think are doing east austin a favor. They want bike lanes? They got it! They want taxpayer subsidized coffee shops and retail buildings with yoga centers and dog salons? They got it! They want services that cater to white early 20's hipsters with dual incomes and 1 dog? They got it! It's just ironic that the city suddenly is putting in bike lanes all over east austin, when the african americans who were originally forced to live there only got factories and trash dumps.

So - if you look at a 40 something individual black person who you think is not landscaping their yard nicely to look good for your property values, you ought go to talk to them and find out what happened to them, their parents, and grandparents. Maybe invite them over sometime, try to be friendly and understand where they're coming from.

[Uberguber]

I'll agree with GPax' standpoint. The real injustice here is that these indigenous folks stand by and do nothing while outsiders RAISE their property values for them. Imagine paying 50K for a house, then having those pesky gentrifying hipstesr come along and offeringto pay 300K for it.

Trying to give poor people a 250K profit for sitting on theirr a**es?

who do these hipsters think they are!?

[Uberguber]

The resistance to gentrification smacks of the entitlement mentality the underclass has in our country. Even when being handed free money without working for it, they still find a way to complain, and won't waste an opportunity to play the race card even when it's irrelevant.

The suburbanites on this forum feign outrage because they secretly want these people to remain "in their place" because they know that when they get priced out, the next stop is their suburban neighborhood. Round Rock, Pf and Cedar Park (now with a rail connection to east Austin) have a big target on them for minority relocation. This is the heart of the matter, and those suburbanites take a moral stand from the comfort of their protected neighborhoods on the metro's periphery.

[ppp38]

In a few years the hipsters will be run out of East Austin due to raising costs and general "Dallas-ification" of the area and only then will they understand the plight of the people that they have displaced.