In cities, displacement, eviction and relocation — the cornerstones of mid-20th century urban renewal (often described as “Negro Removal”), redevelopment and highway policies — are not practices of the past. These practices are occurring in the 21st century, even if they sometimes look different. For instance, in Atlanta, the Peoplestown neighborhood, described as that city’s “last working-class Black neighborhood,” is being threatened by the municipal government’s use of eminent domain to take privately owned property for public use. A news article from The Guardian maintained that “this process is replicated throughout the U.S. If successful, eminent domain could become the newest tool that local and state governments could use to accelerate the gentrification and displacement that is already impacting low-income Black and Brown communities.”1 Sadly, this is not surprising, even if quite disconcerting, particularly for those whom Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. would have described as the “children of light” — people who believe in freedom; contest racism, poverty and materialism; and strive for equality, including in housing.2 It is absolutely crucial that people have places to live — that are not streets, homeless shelters, day-rental motels or otherwise substandard, transient, or exorbitantly priced housing. Even with that vital physical need met, we know that location, or where people live, also often impacts their access to schools, jobs, economic stability, safety and general wellbeing. The built environments that we construct, as well as how we invest in and develop their infrastructures, signal what and who we value and what and who we do not. History and contemporary conditions provide abundant evidence that what and who we value are indisputably influenced by race and socioeconomic class, both of which can affect not only whom we live next
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