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How is it that a thread entitled "stop denigrating PG county" became a magnet for racially charged, scornful language? People really should stop denigrating a 500 square mile area that is still mostly undeveloped and has unjustly earned a negative reputation from a relatively small part of the county where crime actually HAS run rampant. That small area is the way it is largely as a result of gentrification in DC displacing low income families into areas of the county close to the city starting in the '70s and '80s.
What do you expect when a county grows at an exponential rate and disproportionately by individuals at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder? The system was overwhelmed at every level. Of course that downgrades the schools, emergency services, and everything else. Add to that, "white flight" devaluing property values, exagerrating the demographics, and shifting the tax base and you had a real problem. The thing that has actually made for a tremendous improvement has been higher income African-Americans moving in and raising the bar. Things have been improvings steadily over the last decade, but very slowly. Unfortunately, their numbers alone cannot lift an entire county. The growth needs to be diverse as with any vibrant community.
The negative stigma, perpetuated by views like many posted on this forum, has retarded the natural growth and diversification of the county. People relocating to the metro area are still actively steered away from the county based on twenty year old stereotypes. Instead of a normal and natural development pattern all around DC, northern Virginia is grossly over developed and Montgomery county is not far behind creating the worst traffic congestion in the nation.
Prince George's county has its problems, but it will be what it grows to be. It shouldn't be understated that the county is still mostly rural. (Bare in mind that its largest "city" is the Town of Bowie.) It is changing, though. It is right next to the nations capital, so growth is inevitable. The question is: will the all too common denigrating views continue to dominate its growth path. The truth is that there are areas of PG as nice or nicer than any other in the region (waterfront, parkland, rolling hills, country clubs, horse farms, etc.), but who cares if the voice of the denigrators is the only voice ever heard.
How is it that a thread entitled "stop denigrating PG county" became a magnet for racially charged, scornful language? People really should stop denigrating a 500 square mile area that is still mostly undeveloped and has unjustly earned a negative reputation from a relatively small part of the county where crime actually HAS run rampant. That small area is the way it is largely as a result of gentrification in DC displacing low income families into areas of the county close to the city starting in the '70s and '80s.
What do you expect when a county grows at an exponential rate and disproportionately by individuals at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder? The system was overwhelmed at every level. Of course that downgrades the schools, emergency services, and everything else. Add to that, "white flight" devaluing property values, exagerrating the demographics, and shifting the tax base and you had a real problem. The thing that has actually made for a tremendous improvement has been higher income African-Americans moving in and raising the bar. Things have been improvings steadily over the last decade, but very slowly. Unfortunately, their numbers alone cannot lift an entire county. The growth needs to be diverse as with any vibrant community.
The negative stigma, perpetuated by views like many posted on this forum, has retarded the natural growth and diversification of the county. People relocating to the metro area are still actively steered away from the county based on twenty year old stereotypes. Instead of a normal and natural development pattern all around DC, northern Virginia is grossly over developed and Montgomery county is not far behind creating the worst traffic congestion in the nation.
Prince George's county has its problems, but it will be what it grows to be. It shouldn't be understated that the county is still mostly rural. (Bare in mind that its largest "city" is the Town of Bowie.) It is changing, though. It is right next to the nations capital, so growth is inevitable. The question is: will the all too common denigrating views continue to dominate its growth path. The truth is that there are areas of PG as nice or nicer than any other in the region (waterfront, parkland, rolling hills, country clubs, horse farms, etc.), but who cares if the voice of the denigrators is the only voice ever heard.
Am I to assume that you are involved in the real estate industry in Prince George's County, and if so, what agency? I must agree with you completely on your statement, having lived through most of these changes, Prince George's County is changing, and George's County will continue to have growing pains, as any county does with progress. I lived in Bowie for 20 years and remember when the majority of the shopping centers that are there now were not there, nothing but open fields and woods. If Prince George's County is to be respected, then the individuals that are on this thread that are from Prince George's County must at least show a certain amount of respect for each other regardless of the color of your skin, we are all in this together and if we wish to make this county a good and safe place to work and live we all have to work together.
A member of an old and respected family in Prince George's County
Am I to assume that you are involved in the real estate industry in Prince George's County, and if so, what agency? I must agree with you completely on your statement, having lived through most of these changes, Prince George's County is changing, and George's County will continue to have growing pains, as any county does with progress. I lived in Bowie for 20 years and remember when the majority of the shopping centers that are there now were not there, nothing but open fields and woods. If Prince George's County is to be respected, then the individuals that are on this thread that are from Prince George's County must at least show a certain amount of respect for each other regardless of the color of your skin, we are all in this together and if we wish to make this county a good and safe place to work and live we all have to work together.
A member of an old and respected family in Prince George's County
Thank you for also trying to maintain the dignity of discussions like this. I own property all over, but I am not with any real estate agency. Please be careful. The last time someone accused me of being a realtor, they deleted a bunch of my posts. For that reason I have stopped naming specific neighborhoods.
I have lived in the region for years and I saw what I described all happen with my own eyes. I expected things to balance out by now, but there is still a "flight" mentality when it comes to this county. It is really a shame.
Thank you for also trying to maintain the dignity of discussions like this. I own property all over, but I am not with any real estate agency. Please be careful. The last time someone accused me of being a realtor, they deleted a bunch of my posts. For that reason I have stopped naming specific neighborhoods.
I have lived in the region for years and I saw what I described all happen with my own eyes. I expected things to balance out by now, but there is still a "flight" mentality when it comes to this county. It is really a shame.
I can understand your dilemma with the possibility of being associated with the real estate industry because of your screen name. I am a member of the largest fence company in Prince George's County. I to think it is really a shame about the flight mentality in this county. I remember back in the late 50s and early 60s when the same thing was happening and then again in the late 60s and early 70s when it started again and I guess it's continuing to this day which is a real shame because I think Prince George's County can only benefit from its diversity.
From a member of an old and respected family in Prince George's County.
I can understand your dilemma with the possibility of being associated with the real estate industry because of your screen name. I am a member of the largest fence company in Prince George's County. I to think it is really a shame about the flight mentality in this county. I remember back in the late 50s and early 60s when the same thing was happening and then again in the late 60s and early 70s when it started again and I guess it's continuing to this day which is a real shame because I think Prince George's County can only benefit from its diversity.
From a member of an old and respected family in Prince George's County.
It comes down to people like you who can see things for what they are: as you said "growing pains". Eventually plain-old demand will make a lot of this moot. If you look back at the history of New York, the growth in and around the city was not exactly symetrical. Even in our area, reputations and realities of neighborhoods have changed. It is hard to believe it, but Foggy Bottom, Capitol Hill, Aurora Hills, and Old Town Alexandria were all once considered bad areas. Things change. It just takes time, growth, and migration.
What I can't quite figure out is why there seems to be such a concerted effort to bash this particular county.
""What I can't quite figure out is why there seems to be such a concerted effort to bash this particular county"
I was born and raised in PG. I'm still here 44 years later. I didn't realize until I joined this forum that PG was such a hell hole. I musta been living in la la land with my blinders on. I guess I'm one of the lucky ones that have never been shot at, mugged, or raped by home invaders. I graduated high school and have a fairly decent paying job as a copy editor/document production specialist without a college degree, just good old public school (musta learned something). Some areas of PG are less than desireable, but when you have people like us defending this county, people should realize that they need to stop generalizing and assuming that every nook and cranny of the county is filled with crime, slums, and under-educated individuals.
PropertyMan,kjg1963, I find it interesting that here are two individuals, one that is a native Prince Georgen and one, that I am assuming, is not, and yet you both basically seem to be saying the same thing, that you care for this county. I find it very commendable and cannot for the life of me understand why people of Prince George's County cannot seem to get along, it doesn't make any difference what color your skin is or your beliefs or even your status within the community, we are all one community and should be working together to make this community better than what it is, it's understandable that there's going to be problems, that always happens with changes, but in the long run we can all benefit from them. Just recently I was back in my old neighborhood and saw a lot of changes and things I didn't recognize anymore, but I'm not complaining, the things that I grew up with were right at that time the things that are going on now are right for this time and who knows those things may not be there in the future, change is something that you can not stop, this is something that is going to happen no matter where you live or work or play, all we can hope for is that we benefit from it. We all need to put aside our silly pettiness and realize that we are one big community depending on one another.
A member of an old and respected family of Prince George's County
What year, may I ask, did you graduate, and I commend you for graduating high school, however did you bother to further your education? You see the reason I ask this is because members of my family, my sisters in particular have gone on to further their education, one is a Professor of Psychiatry at Salt Lake University in Utah another is one of the founding individuals that started the E-Café on the Internet and other such Internet sites in California and another has started her own very successful mechanical engineering business for companies like Campbell's Soups, and other such companies, I myself am retired, but I am still involved in the family company and just recently was back in Prince George's County to attend some meetings to keep up with the business, so you see Prince George's County and Bladensburg High School has been very good to me and my family and continues to do so.
Member of a very old and respected family in Prince George's County
I went on to college and got a degree and started working on Capitol Hill for the House. I'm not going to go on about me but I will say that I'm doing well for myself and enjoy life everyday. I will say that Bladensburg was the absolute worse school I ever attended. It seemed more like a babysitting hall than a high school. I remember one of the newer teachers who came in and taught my history class while our teacher was on maternity leave. I ran into him a couple of years later in Georgetown and he said after that class he never taught in Bladensburg again. In class many of the students were not interested in learning and many of the girls both black and white were pregnant. Constant fights in the halls, especially the girls. Many of my teachers were not good teachers either. I am still in shock in 2007 as to why they had classes for auto mechanics. It just seemed like that school only prepared kids for becoming an auto mechanic or a clerk typist in some menial government job. I live in Seattle now, but yes I was part of Prince George's County.
Look, I am no saint (not by a longshot), but I really do care about helping out my neighbor where I can. It just pisses me off when I see post that hinders what I work so hard to teach my kids, specifically, that they shouldn't define themselves by their possesions, but by their character and do the same for others.
As far as I'm concerned, Iscalder is a bigoted spoiled brat who openly hates "whitey" and whose self worth is defined by her possesions. She preaches how much "respect" she gets from everyone and how well of she is. Well, if you do get respect from so many people as you claim, then either they are bigots just like you, or MORE LIKELY, you are a fake, phony, hypocrite, smiling at your neighbor while internally you make assumptions about them. Sounds like a clown to me. Oops, I misspelled clown... It's proper spelling is "I-S-C-A-L-D-E-R"
Sorry for the confusion.
First off let me apologize for assuming that you were a member of the fair sex, but understand that the way the two of you were going at each other reminded me of my sisters, however in the end they learn to get along. My suggestion to you, is to not lower yourself to that level of conversation because it accomplishes nothing. Bigotry is bigotry, whether it's white, black, purple, blue, green, yellow,or red, it still bigotry and with the makeup of Prince George's County as it is now it is totally uncalled for.
A member of an old and well respected family in Prince George's County.
I went on to college and got a degree and started working on Capitol Hill for the House. I'm not going to go on about me but I will say that I'm doing well for myself and enjoy life everyday. I will say that Bladensburg was the absolute worse school I ever attended. It seemed more like a babysitting hall than a high school. I remember one of the newer teachers who came in and taught my history class while our teacher was on maternity leave. I ran into him a couple of years later in Georgetown and he said after that class he never taught in Bladensburg again. In class many of the students were not interested in learning and many of the girls both black and white were pregnant. Constant fights in the halls, especially the girls. Many of my teachers were not good teachers either. I am still in shock in 2007 as to why they had classes for auto mechanics. It just seemed like that school only prepared kids for becoming an auto mechanic or a clerk typist in some menial government job. I live in Seattle now, but yes I was part of Prince George's County.
You're to be commended for what you have accomplished, but you still have not told me what year you have graduated from Bladensburg, I will admit that there were a number of years there that Bladensburg was not very good and that they had their problems, fortunately or unfortunately whichever the case may be I was not attending the school then, I do know that during the period of time that I was there it was a pretty good school, if you attended during the late 70s early 80s and into the 90s, I understand that there were a lot of problems in that school, now they have recently rebuilt that school with a brand-new building. As to why they had auto mechanics and other vocations, it was to prepare the students who went there for every day kind of jobs, the vocational part of Bladensburg, when I went there with strictly voluntary, it was not a requirement and I think it was unfair of you to classify them as greasers and rednecks because I am neither and I did attend some of those classes.
A member of an old and respected family in Prince George's County.
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