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"However, with integration, came white flight and whites fearfully fled intown to the suburbs in droves while selling their homes to blacks at exponentially inflated prices..." Steelers10 then said "the OP is 100% correct," to which you added, "Awesome, awesome post! +1...to the extreme."
Maybe you didn't mean to agree with the OP's statement but it sure sounded like you did.
By the way, I've pointed out that Kruse doesn't cite any instances of whites charging blacks drastically inflated prices for their houses during white flight. If you believe he does cite such instances, why don't you post them?
You might want to take a look at some of the other books on this subject, such as Lisa McGirr’s Suburban Warriors: The Origins of the New American Right; Larry Keating's Race, Class and Urban Expansion, Matthew Lassiter's Suburban Politics in the Sunbelt South: The Silent Majority; Ronald Bayor's Race & The Shaping of Twentieth-Century Atlanta, Richard Bernard's Sunbelt Cities: Politics and Growth Since World War II, and Clarence Stone's Regime Politics: Governing Atlanta 1946-88.
I don't think you'll find any instances of whites charging blacks drastically inflated prices there either. If you read back over my posts, you'll see that I've clarified this issue with the original poster. He and I are really not that much in disagreement. As you know, I lived through this on the front lines myself and thus have a good bit of firsthand knowledge as well.
The Vinings/Smyrna area provides numerous examples of older apartment communities which had a majority black or hispanic population. A developer comes along and offers to buy the apartment complex, (which is usually 20 years old or older) and the poor minority population which resided in that complex is forced to move. The developer bulldozes the apartment complex and builds a new higher priced condo or townhome development which typically has a pedominately white population. A visible example is along Paces Ferry Rd. in Vinings where the old apartments next to the Quick Trip were located. They were 1970's vintage. Now, there are condos and the exclusive Avignon develoment with prices in the $600's.
The "diversity" of Vinings was just a transitional phase.
To give a little reality check about the gentrifying neighborhoods. while there may be affluent whites and poor blacks attending the same public schools, they could hardly be called "neighbors" or part of the same community - in fact most of the whites consider their neighborhoods to be "transitional" meaning they are going from all poor and black to gentrified. The whites are just waiting for all of the old black "grandmas" you speak of to either sell out at a good profit (and have a yuppy couple come in and gut and remodel the house) or die off and the same thing happen with "grandma's" children getting the profit.
You have to remember that a large percentage of the intown black population in the Old Fourth Ward, for example continues to live in apartments while the gentrification is taking place in the single family homes on the surrounding streets. To give a micro example, the apartments along Boulevard are all black, while the surrounding streets of single family homes are being slowly gentrified. What happens when the owners of the old apartmtents along Boulevard choose to sell out to a developer who wants to put in lofts from the $300,000" Where do you think the diversity of that neighborhood will go? Will the whites in the homes make a plea to keep the lower income residents of their neighborhood, or will they be happy that as the newer, pricier real estate comes in, their homes will now be as expensive as their neighbors to the north of Ponce de Leon in Virginia Highlands (when they paid a lot less when their neighborhood was in the early stages of gentrification)?
The dirty little secret is that there has been a deliberate campaign by the City of Atlanta to tear down public housing and give the former public housing residents a Section 8 Voucher and encourage them to scatter to Clayton, County, Dekalb and southwest Cobb. Back in the early 1990's, Atlanta had the second highest percentage of public housing residents in the nation (after #1 Newark). At that time, the City used the Hope 6 Program to tear down public housing complexes (it started with Techwood) and rebuild "mixed income" communities and scatter most of the former residents with Section 8 Vouchers to suburban locales.
Your hopes of truly integrated communities is unrealistic and when the housing market picks up, gentrification in the intown neighborhoods will accelerate and the poor black population will decrease - evidence of this was seen in the last mayoral election. Right now, the integration you see in intown neighborhoods is just a transition phase and not a permanent condition.
Very well described. Only a few places in America have achieved true and lasting integration. By and large what you see in metro Atlanta is a brief snapshot in time when the majority is going out and the minority coming in. Did anybody ever live in or visit Clayton County in 1997 then go back in 2000? That didn't take very long.
The dirty little secret is that there has been a deliberate campaign by the City of Atlanta to tear down public housing and give the former public housing residents a Section 8 Voucher and encourage them to scatter to Clayton, County, Dekalb and southwest Cobb. Back in the early 1990's, Atlanta had the second highest percentage of public housing residents in the nation (after #1 Newark). At that time, the City used the Hope 6 Program to tear down public housing complexes (it started with Techwood) and rebuild "mixed income" communities and scatter most of the former residents with Section 8 Vouchers to suburban locales.
The claim that former public housing residents have scattered to the suburbs, causing a rise in crime and deterioration in the schools, etc., is made quite often here on the forum. I was surprised to read this week in the AJC that research indicates it's not true. The great majority of former public housing tenants have remained in the City of Atlanta. Actual data collected by researchers in two different studies shows 13% and 15%, respectively, as the proportion who've moved to the suburbs.
The claim that former public housing residents have scattered to the suburbs, causing a rise in crime and deterioration in the schools, etc., is made quite often here on the forum. I was surprised to read this week in the AJC that research indicates it's not true. The great majority of former public housing tenants have remained in the City of Atlanta. Actual data collected by researchers in two different studies shows 13% and 15%, respectively, as the proportion who've moved to the suburbs.
I don't think David1502 was making any assertions about increasing crime rates or deteriorating schools referring to the demolition of housing projects. If you are familiar with the Lakewood Fwy Corridor of SW Atlanta, a large number of apartment complexes built in the 50s and 60s were condemned and a large number of those residents did move to Union City, College Park, East Point, and Riverdale because they were the closest available areas with a proliferation of rental units.
Very well described. Only a few places in America have achieved true and lasting integration. By and large what you see in metro Atlanta is a brief snapshot in time when the majority is going out and the minority coming in. Did anybody ever live in or visit Clayton County in 1997 then go back in 2000? That didn't take very long.
True...but for Clayton County, I would actually say 1997 versus 2004...you could even do 2002 versus 2004. (!)
It was swift and rapid in Clayton County, no doubt.
"However, with integration, came white flight and whites fearfully fled intown to the suburbs in droves while selling their homes to blacks at exponentially inflated prices..." Steelers10 then said "the OP is 100% correct," to which you added, "Awesome, awesome post! +1...to the extreme."
Maybe you didn't mean to agree with the OP's statement but it sure sounded like you did.
By the way, I've pointed out that Kruse doesn't cite any instances of whites charging blacks drastically inflated prices for their houses during white flight. If you believe he does cite such instances, why don't you post them?
You might want to take a look at some of the other books on this subject, such as Lisa McGirr’s Suburban Warriors: The Origins of the New American Right; Larry Keating's Race, Class and Urban Expansion, Matthew Lassiter's Suburban Politics in the Sunbelt South: The Silent Majority; Ronald Bayor's Race & The Shaping of Twentieth-Century Atlanta, Richard Bernard's Sunbelt Cities: Politics and Growth Since World War II, and Clarence Stone's Regime Politics: Governing Atlanta 1946-88.
I don't think you'll find any instances of whites charging blacks drastically inflated prices there either. If you read back over my posts, you'll see that I've clarified this issue with the original poster. He and I are really not that much in disagreement. As you know, I lived through this on the front lines myself and thus have a good bit of firsthand knowledge as well.
I read your posts. Did you read mine? Reading your posts it is clear you are not reading the posts of others clearly nor did you do anything but a cursory skim of Kruze's book. Please feel free to reread the post I specifically directed toward you. Big citation in that one!
As soon as a get some time on my hands, I will reply... But I never said "white people in gov't" are solely causing all these issues. But I'll talk about it later...
To give a little reality check about the gentrifying neighborhoods. while there may be affluent whites and poor blacks attending the same public schools, they could hardly be called "neighbors" or part of the same community - in fact most of the whites consider their neighborhoods to be "transitional" meaning they are going from all poor and black to gentrified. The whites are just waiting for all of the old black "grandmas" you speak of to either sell out at a good profit (and have a yuppy couple come in and gut and remodel the house) or die off and the same thing happen with "grandma's" children getting the profit.
You have to remember that a large percentage of the intown black population in the Old Fourth Ward, for example continues to live in apartments while the gentrification is taking place in the single family homes on the surrounding streets. To give a micro example, the apartments along Boulevard are all black, while the surrounding streets of single family homes are being slowly gentrified. What happens when the owners of the old apartmtents along Boulevard choose to sell out to a developer who wants to put in lofts from the $300,000" Where do you think the diversity of that neighborhood will go? Will the whites in the homes make a plea to keep the lower income residents of their neighborhood, or will they be happy that as the newer, pricier real estate comes in, their homes will now be as expensive as their neighbors to the north of Ponce de Leon in Virginia Highlands (when they paid a lot less when their neighborhood was in the early stages of gentrification)?
The dirty little secret is that there has been a deliberate campaign by the City of Atlanta to tear down public housing and give the former public housing residents a Section 8 Voucher and encourage them to scatter to Clayton, County, Dekalb and southwest Cobb. Back in the early 1990's, Atlanta had the second highest percentage of public housing residents in the nation (after #1 Newark). At that time, the City used the Hope 6 Program to tear down public housing complexes (it started with Techwood) and rebuild "mixed income" communities and scatter most of the former residents with Section 8 Vouchers to suburban locales.
Your hopes of truly integrated communities is unrealistic and when the housing market picks up, gentrification in the intown neighborhoods will accelerate and the poor black population will decrease - evidence of this was seen in the last mayoral election. Right now, the integration you see in intown neighborhoods is just a transition phase and not a permanent condition.
I totally understand and agree. But remember, I was never talking solely about economic diversity (rich/poor). I was asking about racial diversity (black/white/etc.) within the same economic status. I talked about middle class blacks not being around middle class whites intown. I was discussing the factors that prevent the buppies from moving in the same communities as the yuppies. I would expect the same economic levels to be together, but will there be a time when different races of the same economic levels more equitably share the aforementioned intown communities?
I read your posts. Did you read mine? Reading your posts it is clear you are not reading the posts of others clearly nor did you do anything but a cursory skim of Kruze's book. Please feel free to reread the post I specifically directed toward you. Big citation in that one!
Steelers10, yes, I did read your post but only just now. I have to, like, you know, get off the internet every now and then and go do other stuff.
I don't think we're in substantial disagreement at all. The point I've raised in this discussion is the very one discussed in your quote from The Double-Edged Sword. White families in transitional neighborhoods were convinced by realtors (frightened is more like it) into selling their homes below market value, and the realtors then sold them to black families for higher prices and made a tidy profit.
If you read my original comment in this thread, you know that my reservations go to the assertion that "whites fearfully fled intown to the suburbs in droves while selling their homes to blacks at exponentially inflated prices." That's not what happened and Kruse hasn't suggested that.
The one thing we may differ on is your skepticism about the resistance of whites to selling out. Take a look at your own quote from Reid and Adelman again -- it's exactly what I've been talking about.
"Between 1960 and 1970, these neighborhoods changed from being almost 100% white to almost 100% black. In Kirkwood, for example, 91% of residents were white in 1960; by 1970, 97% of the population was black. This earlier transition in Kirkwood, East Lake, and East Atlanta was not peaceful. Between 1960 and 1970, these neighborhoods experienced raw, neighbor-to-neighbor racial hostility.Real-estate agents used white anxieties about having black neighbors to blockbust, convincing white families to sell their homes at below-market prices and then reselling these same homes to black families at prime market prices, pocketing the profits. In 1969, a white Kirkwood resident told the Atlanta Journal Constitution that he sold his home to a realtor at well below market value only to have a black family buy that same house for the highest price ever recorded. Paired with racial prejudice, this economic exploitation created enmity between long-standing white residents and black newcomers. The manifestations of this antagonism ran the gamut from the arson of a blackfamily's home, to the incorporation of Eastern Atlanta, Inc., an organization created for the sole purpose of buying property that might fall into the hands of blacks. But the endgame of this hostility was the creation of vanilla suburbs as whites moved out of the city en masse. This racial tension from the 1960s set the stage for the racial tensions that undergird gentrification in Atlanta today."
I couldn't have said it better.
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Vinings area is another example
