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This is on top of a study a few years back showing that Grand Rapids is one of the worst cities economically for African Americans.
GR is the tale of two cities and two different realities, to paraphrase a study from years ago, one black, one white, separate and unequal.
I was visiting GR over the Easter Weekend and was amazed by the level of gentrification going on. Gentrification is pushing south from Wealthy towards Franklin Street. The inner SE side has been Grand Rapids "Harlem" since the 70's. It has the cheapest rents in the city and with rising housing values and rents in other parts of the city......this will push out long time residents as rents and property values rise due to increase demand. People will be pushed into low income housing in Kentwood and Wyoming, while Grand Rapids becomes a mecca for hipsters and the like.
I have a six figure income. I am college educated. I am a professional. I have a family. I also have an elderly parent living in GR and with all the positive news about growth and economics.....I still cannot see myself moving back there and the main reason is that it is NOT a place that is good for black people. All the growth and things going on in GR seems disconnected from the black population....who just appear to be "in the way".
I give GR props all the time. I am a big Michigan proponent and booster. All things Michigan, even though I know longer live in the state. I guess that is hypocrisy because I voted with my feet and got out of the state to make a better life for myself. The area is just too conservative/alt-right, notwithstanding GR being blue.
I've been knowing this. I used to get pulled over regularly in grand rapids but I haven't been pulled over once since leaving. I barely kept a driver license living there now I have a cdl. Go figure.
I've been knowing this. I used to get pulled over regularly in grand rapids but I haven't been pulled over once since leaving. I barely kept a driver license living there now I have a cdl. Go figure.
No doubt....I literally developed a complex about it. I had been pulled over and otherwise treated like a criminal in GR way too many times. The really odd thing was the feeling, on the near SE side when visiting recently, that I did not belong there or was out of place,......with the gentrification going on, when I spent many years living in the same neighborhood.
To your point, I have only been pulled over once by city police since I left Gr. I was never pulled over in the city of Detroit (north of 8-mile is a different story though). Now that I don't live in the state, its only state troopers pulling me over and its usually legitimate because I tend to have a led foot.
That said Wyoming was NOTORIOUS for pulling over black folks back in the day. They were almost as bad as Dearborn. Hey....but who cares.....new buildings are going up monthly....woooohooooooo
This study is nothing new. This happens nationwide.
Correct....but there are degrees of difference from place to place. I was NEVER stopped once in the city of Detroit, over an 8 year period. I spent more years as a driver in Detroit than in Grand Rapids, but stopped way more times in Grand Rapids.
I don't know what it is like in Grand Rapids now, but if it is 2 to 1 now, back when I was there it had to be 3 to 1. The one thing I can say, though, is that things in someway seem to be improving in GR in regards to race. I think the younger generation is a lot different. The 45 and over crowd is much different in attitude than the 25 and younger.....and of course....that is true everywhere.....so there is hope. If GR was a little better in regards to race......I would move there because its really a nice area with beaches nearby and the like....and its got its only little charm and character and an otherwise robust economy (although wages are not great). The one big plus used to be cheap housing to offset the lower wages......now prices are rising pretty fast and soon that advantage will be history.
Correct....but there are degrees of difference from place to place. I was NEVER stopped once in the city of Detroit, over an 8 year period. I spent more years as a driver in Detroit than in Grand Rapids, but stopped way more times in Grand Rapids.
I don't know what it is like in Grand Rapids now, but if it is 2 to 1 now, back when I was there it had to be 3 to 1. The one thing I can say, though, is that things in someway seem to be improving in GR in regards to race. I think the younger generation is a lot different. The 45 and over crowd is much different in attitude than the 25 and younger.....and of course....that is true everywhere.....so there is hope. If GR was a little better in regards to race......I would move there because its really a nice area with beaches nearby and the like....and its got its only little charm and character and an otherwise robust economy (although wages are not great). The one big plus used to be cheap housing to offset the lower wages......now prices are rising pretty fast and soon that advantage will be history.
That video is no shock to me anymore. Just sadness. In Georgia there was a case of an unarmed teenager getting stomped by the police, in Gwinnett County.
Grand Rapids having this issue is not a surprise. It isn't particular to Grand Rapids either.
I say it's nationwide because there are so many places with a ratio similar to Grand Rapids. Parts of metro Atlanta Blacks get pulled over at high rates. I've seen it happen to my father. Inside Atlanta proper, not much of an issue. In places like Cherokee County, Forsyth County, parts of Cobb County, this can happen much more.
It is sad that nice areas would have situation where the police are pulling Blacks over in alarming rates.
That video is no shock to me anymore. Just sadness. In Georgia there was a case of an unarmed teenager getting stomped by the police, in Gwinnett County.
Grand Rapids having this issue is not a surprise. It isn't particular to Grand Rapids either.
I say it's nationwide because there are so many places with a ratio similar to Grand Rapids. Parts of metro Atlanta Blacks get pulled over at high rates. I've seen it happen to my father. Inside Atlanta proper, not much of an issue. In places like Cherokee County, Forsyth County, parts of Cobb County, this can happen much more.
It is sad that nice areas would have situation where the police are pulling Blacks over in alarming rates.
Grand Rapids is not Detroit, Flint or Saginaw when it comes to crime, although it had its pretty bad years on the SE side when it was like that. Homicides have been a record lows in the city of Grand Rapids for the last few years. I don't remember the last time I heard of someone shooting at a cop in Grand Rapids....hence, where does their level of fear come from? Yeah....there are people in that city killing each other....but not the police. As soon as the kid started crying.....they should have realized there was no threat and they should have put their guns away. Calm down and ignore the gun I got pointed at you....
Wrong place at the wrong time...smh....that is a 300 year old story. No....this is not unique to Grand Rapids. This has always been the way things happen.....and its been worse. Now you just have cameras catching it. Another sad thing is that people generally think of the black community as just a bunch of whiners who want something for nothing and who use hyperbole about race to make excuses for our bad behavior. They do not see what we see and live.....but sometimes the video catches the reality and exposes it to the world.
Oh well.....look at all the shiny new buildings in Grand Rapids.
Last edited by Indentured Servant; 04-22-2017 at 08:54 PM..
Grand Rapids is not Detroit, Flint or Saginaw when it comes to crime, although it had its pretty bad years on the SE side when it was like that. Homicides have been a record lows in the city of Grand Rapids for the last few years. I don't remember the last time I heard of someone shooting at a cop in Grand Rapids....hence, where does their level of fear come from? Yeah....there are people in that city killing each other....but not the police. As soon as the kid started crying.....they should have realized there was no threat and they should have put their guns away.
Wrong place at the wrong time...smh....that is a 300 year old story. No....this is not unique to Grand Rapids. This has always been the way things happen.....and its been worse. Now you just have cameras catching it.
Oh well.....look at all the shiny new buildings in Grand Rapids.
I know Grand Rapids isn't Detroit. By that measure, what it shows is that Blacks can be treated poorly by police officers anywhere, regardless of crime rates. One reason I brought up Gwinnett County. Gwinnett County is a suburban county of metro Atlanta. It is not a "hood" county. Some officers stomped a Black teenager on the ground, despite him not doing anything wrong. This fear is evident in Grand Rapids and in other nice areas in the USA.
I know Grand Rapids isn't Detroit. By that measure, what it shows is that Blacks can be treated poorly by police officers anywhere, regardless of crime rates. One reason I brought up Gwinnett County. Gwinnett County is a suburban county of metro Atlanta. It is not a "hood" county. Some officers stomped a Black teenager on the ground, despite him not doing anything wrong. This fear is evident in Grand Rapids and in other nice areas in the USA.
Yeah....I lived in Atlanta for a hot second (cabbage town pre gentrification), near memorial drive. I know about those suburban counties in Atlanta. Me and a friend had guns pulled on us by police in Clarkston, Ga, near Stone Mountain, before its demographics changed. Of course....they were looking for some black guy.....and yep....I was black. I was on a pay phone....this was in the late 80's. A police helicopter first flew over and shined the light on me on the phone. Next thing 4 police cars pulled into the parking lot, opened their doors and pulled out their guns. My friend was walking out of the Waffle House and they grabbed him too. Same story.....we were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I had totally forgot about that story until you mentioned Georgia. I have been stopped so many times by the police in my life, most in Grand Rapids.....that I cannot remember them all. I really used to think I would end up in jail for something that I did not do. I was not really worried about getting shot by the police....just getting sent to jail for something that I did not do.
Yeah....I lived in Atlanta for a hot second (cabbage town pre gentrification), near memorial drive. I know about those suburban counties in Atlanta. Me and a friend had guns pulled on us by police in Clarkston, Ga, near Stone Mountain, before its demographics changed. Of course....they were looking for some black guy.....and yep....I was black. I was on a pay phone....this was in the late 80's. A police helicopter first flew over and shined the light on me on the phone. Next thing 4 police cars pulled into the parking lot, opened their doors and pulled out their guns. My friend was walking out of the Waffle House and they grabbed him too. Same story.....we were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I had totally forgot about that story until you mentioned Georgia. I have been stopped so many times by the police in my life, most in Grand Rapids.....that I cannot remember them all. I really used to think I would end up in jail for something that I did not do. I was not really worried about getting shot by the police....just getting sent to jail for something that I did not do.
I'm going to be 31 soon, and I didn't live in metro Atlanta until the mid 1990s. I have no idea what Atlanta was like in the 1980s. Clarkston was a place I was afraid of in the 2000s. I was told that the police might mess with me out there for "wrong place, wrong time".
It wouldn't surprise me that you got harassed by the police there in the 1980s. It can happen there now. That what you describe is just nuts. Helicopters and the equivalent of a war-like situation. It doesn't surprise me. I just cannot really think of anything to say. Wrong place, wrong time can happen alot.
I do have my own horror stories. It doesn't involve the police harassing me, but people calling the police on me because I looked "suspicious". Someone called the police on me twice because I looked upset. I've seen where a woman could yell and no one called the police. I so much as slightly raise my voice or looked disgusted, the police were called. This happened twice. On a college campus. I'm not a large guy, and I was even smaller back in those days. I lucked out because the police figured I wasn't a threat to anyone. It could have turned out differently. All of this in Georgia.
I have seen my father get harassed by police officers in the suburbs of Atlanta. The far outskirts particularly. And this is in the 2000s.
I understand the fear of being sent to jail for something you didn't do. I've had this fear. In many cases, it just takes someone's word of mouth for this to happen.
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