Seattle's Central District, 1990-2006: Integration or displacement?

Urban Lawyer

Volumn 39, Issue 2, 2007, Pages 167-256

  McGee Jr , Henry W ^a,b  

^a SEATTLE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

CENSUS; DEMOGRAPHIC TREND; GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION; SOCIAL STRUCTURE; SUBURBAN AREA; URBAN HOUSING; URBAN POPULATION;

NORTH AMERICA; SEATTLE; UNITED STATES; WASHINGTON [UNITED STATES];

EID: 38349048483     PISSN: 00420905     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (224)

1. Bill Kossen, Old Neighborhood, New Money, SEATTLE TIMES, Jan. 20, 2000, at E1;
2. see also Jeffrey Gregory Zane, America, Only Less So?: Seattle's Central Area, 1968-1996 (2001) (Ph.D. Thesis, University of Notre Dame) (on file with author).
3. Dr. Zane, writing of the fact that white realtors generally steered Euro American prospective purchasers away from the Central District, suggests: "There were many reasons to direct a family away from the Central Area. Crime and poor schools dissuaded many from choosing to reside in the area. Unlike other residential sections, the Central Area contained few shopping centers, especially for groceries. Perhaps more critically, during the gas crisis, only six Central Area gas stations remained open, and these were allotted disproportionately little gas by their parent companies." Id.
4. QUINTARD TAYLOR, THE FORGING OF A BLACK COMMUNITY: SEATTLE'S CENTRAL DISTRICT FROM 1870 THROUGH THE CIVIL RIGHTS ERA (1994).
5. Quintard Taylor alternatively refers to the "Central Area" as the "Central District," but many civic organizations in the Central Area indeed use the words "Central Area" in reference to their identity. It is used here to denote the geography of a place in Seattle that is more amorphous than the word "district" might suggest. Id.
6. Id. Until 1900, African Americans were scattered through every section of Seattle, and their presence rarely sparked any alarm among their neighbors. But the housing market became racially segregated as the vast majority of Seattle's African Americans, including the 1,900 newcomers who swelled the black population between 1900 and 1910, concentrated in two neighborhoods .... These two communities slowly grew toward each other during the next three decades, creating a reversed L-shaped section.
7. Id. at 82. The legacy of racial animosity lingers even today. Much of Seattle's current residential property remains burdened with racial covenants prohibiting sale to African Americans. For example, the Seattle Times reported in 2005 that: Residents of Innis Arden, an upper middle-class neighborhood overlooking Puget Sound, have been trying to collect enough signatures to erase an embarrassing little secret from their record books .... Written into the neighborhood's bylaws by Boeing founder Bill Boeing, the 60-year-old restrictions prohibited the sale or lease of the homes to anyone who wasn't white. Blacks and Asians, the restrictions said, could occupy the homes only as domestic servants.
8. Lornet Turnbull, Homeowners Find Records Still Hold Blot of Racism, SEATTLE TIMES, June 3, 2005, at A1;
9. see also Viking Properties v. Holm, 118 P.3d 322 (Wash. 2005) (The presence of the covenants in the deeds in the Seattle suburb of Shoreline was used in an attempt by developers to create greater density in a single-family neighborhood by arguing - without success - to the Washington Supreme Court that the racial restrictions invalidated other covenants containing development restrictions.).
10. See Michael Ko & Mike Lindblom, Did Deputy Say Who He Was? Fatal Shooting Raises Questions, SEATTLE TIMES, Apr. 9, 2002, at B1. The deputy sheriff asserted he saw a gun on the seat next to the victim. No gun was ever found, except that of the deputy sheriff.
11. Id. A Seattle NAACP leader called for the officer to be fired, declaring, "Historically, regardless of circumstances, no police are indicted or found guilty of killing anyone.... I have no faith in the inquest, but we'll let the process play out before we take any more action."
12. Leslie Fulbright, Inquest Testimony Begins with Deputy's Neighbor. Protesters March Outside Courthouse, SEATTLE TIMES, Aug. 27, 2002, at B3. The officer was never charged or indicted, but a civil action was filed and is pending.
13. Michael Ko, Family Seeks Millions in Shooting; Complaint Targets Sheriff's Department and Deputy, SEATTLE TIMES, Apr. 8, 2003, at B1.
14. Blaine Harden, Whitest Cities Get Even Whiter; Newcomers Are Buying Real Estate in Communities Where Blacks Were Once the Majority, HOUSTON CHRON., June 25, 2006, at A3.
15. Id.
16. Id.
17. ESTHER HALL MUMFORD, SEATTLE'S BLACK VICTORIANS (1980);
18. see also STEPHANIE STOKES OLIVER, SONG FOR MY FATHER (2004). The author is also indebted to the Black Heritage Society of Seattle, especially to Reverend Phyllis Beaumonte of Mount Zion Baptist Church, an officer of the Society.
19. HORACE R. CAYTON, LONG OLD ROAD (1965).
20. See also ST. CLAIR DRAKE & HORACE R. CAYTON, BLACK METROPOLIS (1945). An enduring classic, the book has been reprinted several times and as recently as 1993. Horace Cayton and St. Clair Drake were sources of inspiration for the author of this study when he was a student at the Northwestern University Medill School of Journalism.
21. See Henry McGee, Afro-American Resistance to Gentrification and the Demise of Integrationist Ideology in the United States, 23 URB. LAW. 25 (1991), reprinted in 23 LAND USE AND ENVTL. L. 215 (1992).
22. Cf. Donald Bryant & Henry McGee, Gentrification and the Law: Combatting Urban Displacement, 25 WASH. U. J. URB. & CONTEMP. L. 43 (1983), reprinted in CHARLES DAYE ET AL., HOUSING AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT (3d ed. 1999).
23. The literature is vast. For recent developments on gentrification in New York City, District of Columbia, Oakland, California, and West Palm Beach, Florida, see Tasha Robertson et al., Neighborhood Watch, THE CRISIS, May/June 2005, at 21.
24. On New York City, see Janny Scott, White Flight, This Time Toward Harlem; Newcomers and Good Times Bring Hope, and Fears of Displacement, N.Y. TIMES, Feb. 25, 2001, at A18.
25. On San Francisco, see Evelyn Nieves, Blacks Hit by Housing Costs, Leave San Francisco Behind, N.Y TIMES, Aug. 2, 2001, at A1. By coincidence, African Americans in San Francisco moved to the southeast sections of San Francisco and then to the East Bay, and many moved to small cities in Oakland that previously were "no go" blue collar suburbs. Seattle's African Americans also were displaced to the southeastern Rainier Valley, then to inner-suburbs southeast of the city, also too once "no go" blue collar suburbs. The south has witnessed the same phenomenon.
26. See Shaila Dewan, Gentrification Changing Face of New Atlanta, N.Y. TIMES, Mar. 11, 2006, at A1.
27. United States Census Bureau, 2000 Census, http://factfinder.census.gov (follow "Decennial Census; get data" hyperlink; then follow "2000 Census: 2000 Summary Tape File 1: Detailed Tables" hyperlink; then select state: Washington: Add; Show Results: Race: Add; "Show Results" hyperlink). The census analysis was performed by Sebastian Lemire, University of Washington, B.A. 2004, and M.Sci., London School of Economics 2005. This article would not have been possible without his contribution.
28. Richard Morrill, Gentrification in Seattle, 55 CENTRAL PUGET SOUND REAL ESTATE RESEARCH REPORT 81, 81 (Spring 2004).
29. Id.
30. Id.
31. Id.
32. Id.
33. Richard Morrill, Gentrification in Seattle, 55 CENTRAL PUGET SOUND REAL ESTATE RESEARCH REPORT 81 (Spring 2004).
34. Id.
35. David Marshak, Editorial, Closure Plan Is Institutionally Racist, SEATTLE TIMES, June 13, 2006, available at http:// archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgibin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/ display?slug=marshak13&date=20060613&query=closure+plan;
36. see also Emily Heffter, Other Cities Also Mired in Debate over School Closures, SEATTLE TIMES, July 5, 2006, at B1.
37. See Appendix, infra, on Central Area rents contrasted with other areas, 2004-2005.
38. Andrew Jackson & Keith Nyberg, Fact Sheet Distributed to Potential Buyers by Real Estate Firm (July 2006) (on file with author).
39. This author remembers well that in the Chicago of his youth - and beyond - a telephone number was sufficient to distinguish a "Negro" area from one that was a "no-go" white neighborhood. The western boundary of his area was the Rock Island railroad tracks, only a block away. The eastern boundary of Chicago's "Black Belt," was Cottage Grove Avenue, but three miles away from his house. In New York, once upon a time Harlem ended at 125th Street. One could name streets throughout the nation between which African American places to live were confined. See generally ST. CLAIR DRAKE & HORACE R. CAYTON, BLACK METROPOLIS (1945).
40. See also the more recent JAMES A. KUSHNER, AMERICAN APARTHEID: AN HISTORICAL AND LEGAL ANALYSIS OF CONTEMPORARY RACIAL SEGREGATION IN THE UNITED STATES (1980).
41. STEPHANIE STOKES OLIVER, SONG FOR MY FATHER (2004). The author recounts how her family moved just outside the Central Area in 1961, apparently without any significant racial problems, though she relates that she had heard that some African American families moving into predominantly white neighborhoods were met with threats and trouble.
42. This author lived in one such enclave in August 1953, when he lived at then 226 22nd Avenue South (the compass designation has since changed), a few houses from John Street, the first street north of Madison.
43. See PAUL DE BARROS & EDUARDO CALDERON, JACKSON STREET AFTER HOURS: THE ROOTS OF JAZZ IN SEATTLE (1993). Jackson Street was regarded by many as the southern boundary of the Central Area, and Jackson Street was the center of African American night life. The first scenes of recent motion picture Ray, about the life of Ray Charles, were filmed of his adulthood in a Jackson Street nightspot.
44. U.S. CONST. art. 1, § 2 specifies the mandate and duties of the United States Census Bureau, including, but by no means limited to, the content of the Housing and Population Censuses and the procedures involved in the administration of these.
45. Available at http://www.census.gov/prod/cen2000/doc/sf1.pdf; app. B.
46. See infra Table 1, Block Groups 77.1-4; 79.1-2; 87.1-2; 88.1-5; 89.3-6; 90.1.
47. United States Census Bureau, 1990 Census (follow "Decennial Census: get data" hyperlink, then follow "1990 Summary Tape File 3: Detailed Tables" hyperlink; then select block group: select State: Washington: select county: King County: Select census tracts: 77.1-4; 79.1-2; 87.1-2; 88.1-5; 89.3-6; 90.1: Add; next; select Race of House-holders: "show results" hyperlink); United States Census Bureau, 2000 Census: (follow "Decennial Census: get data" hyperlink, then follow "2000 Summary Tape File 3: Detailed Tables" hyperlink; then select block group: select State: Washington: select county: King County: Select census tracts: 77.1-4; 79.1-2; 87.1-2; 88.1-5; 89.3-6; 90. 1: Add; next; select Race of Householders: "show results" hyperlink).
48. Debbie Gruenstein Bocian et al., Unfair Lending: The Effect of Race and Ethnicity on the Price of Subprime Mortgages, CENTER FOR RESPONSIBLE LENDING, May 31 2006, at 3, 5, available at http://www.responsiblelending.org/pdfs/rrO11-Unfair_Lending-0506.pdf
49. See Bob Tedeschi, All's Fair in Love, War and Lending?, N.Y. TIMES, July 16, 2006, at § 11, col. 1; see also Binyamin Appelbaum, Higher Loan Rate More Likely for Minorities, Study Concludes, SEATTLE TIMES, June 11, 2006, at E1.
50. See MUMFORD, supra note 9.
51. See Scott Harding, Urban Development, Housing Loss and Class Segregation: A Case Study of Gentrification in Seattle (2000) (unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Washington).
52. The process is still underway. See Philip Dawdy, Circling the Square, SEATTLE WEEKLY, June 28-July 4, 2006 at 17(describing a proposed mega housing project on a parking lot immediately adjacent to the south of Pioneer Square in which housing for 2,000 residents is slated for development). According to the report, "[tlhe housing won't be cheap. The majority of the units are intended for the urban gentry who can afford $500,000 for 1,100 square feet and up to whatever it is you get for $1 million or more."
53. Id.
54. Redlining comes from "the apocryphal practice of mortgage lenders drawing red lines around designated 'no loan' areas on city maps." Richard H. Cleva, State Regulation of Federally Chartered Financial Institutions: Washington's Anti-Redlining Act. 54 WASH. L. REV. 339, 339 (1997).
55. Central Seattle Community Council Federation, Redlining and Divestment in Central Seattle: How Banks Are Destroying Our Neighborhoods, 10 (July 1975) (on file at the Seattle Public Library) (hereinafter Federation).
56. Id. The level of detail for the report is truly phenomenal as local lending institutions, plus state and federal agencies, refused to disclose data about lending patterns in the area.
57. Id. Two years after the report was issued, the Washington State Human Rights Commission issued a report on redlining in Seattle and noted the report as an exception to the limitations of most studies on redlining in Seattle.
58. Spratlen, infra note 42.
59. Called "Mayor's Reinvestment Task Force."
60. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, DRAFT REPORT OF THE MAYOR's REINVESTMENT TASK FORCE 2 (1976) (on file at the Seattle Public Library).
61. Dr. Glover Bames et al., Final Report: Community Members of Mayor's Reinvestment Task Force (June 3, 1976) (on file at the Seattle Public Library);
62. Russell Kelleran et al., Final Report: Lender Members ofMayor's Reinvestment Task Force (May 27, 1976) (on file at the Seattle Public Library).
63. Dr. Thaddeus H. Spratlen, consultant and study director, Patterns of Residential Mortgage Lending and Property Sales in Seattle 1974, 1975, and 1976: Preliminary Report of the Redlining Task Force to the Washington State Human Rights Commission, (Jan. 31, 1977) (on file at the Seattle Public Library).
64. Save the City (KCTS TV Channel 9 broadcast 1977).
65. See generally Fairness in Lending Act, WASH. REV. CODE §§ 40.04.005-.515 (1977) (making it illegal for banks to utilize lending standards that have no economic basis); Mortgage Disclosure Act, WASH. REV. CODE §§ 19.06.010-030 (1977) (replaced by the Fairness in Lending Act of 1981).
66. Save the City, supra note.43.
67. Federation, supra note 37.
68. Id.
69. See Erik Eckholm, Study Documents "Ghetto Tax" Being Paid by the Urban Poor, N.Y. TIMES, MY 19, 2006, at A14, Col. 5.
70. Federation, supra note 37.
71. Though on their face the loans might appear usurious, the usury cap turns on the type of business the lender is in (e.g., bank, savings and loan, credit union, thrift, payday lender). The relevant statues, federal or state, determine the maximum interest rates that any given entity can charge. For example, WASH. REV. CODE § 19.52.010 covers usury in general, which caps at 12% per annum or four points above the prevailing treaury bond yield. However, the Consumer Loan Act, WASH. REv. CODE § 31.04, covers institutions making small loans, such as payday lenders, and allows higher interest rates not above 24.99% a.p.r.! Banks, savings and loans, and credit unions are regulated by several different laws. Some national banks are governed by the National Bank Act and the Office of the Comptroller of Currency. Federal credit unions are subject to the National Credit Union Administration. Federal Thrifts are subject to the Office of Thrift Supervision. FDICs are governed by the Depository Monetary Control and Deregulation Act. Unless a state opts out, FHA or VA loans have their own regulations on interest rate caps and preempt state law. See 12 U.S.C. § 18 (2000). In short, many borrowers are at the mercy of congressional and state lobbyists.
72. Federation, supra note 37, at 18.
73. See, e.g., 38 Fed. Reg. 34,653 statements of policy 531.8(b), 531.8(c)(b) (Dec. 17, 1973).
74. Federation, supra note 37, at 18.
75. Id.
76. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, supra note 40.
77. Id. at 2-30.
78. Russell Kelleran et al., Final Report: Lender Members of Mayor's Reinvestment Task Force 12 (May 27, 1976) (on file at the Seattle Public Library).
79. Dr. Glover Barnes et al., Final Report: Community Members of Mayor's Reinvestment Task Force, at 9-13 (June 3, 1976) (on file at the Seattle Public Library).
80. Federation, supra note 37, at 24.
81. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, supra note 40, at 25.
82. Id. at 26-30.
83. Kelleran et al., supra note 57.
84. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, supra note 40, at 40.
85. Id. at 44-48.
86. Kelleran et al., supra note 57, at 11, amend. 4.
87. Barnes et al., supra note 58, at 6.
88. Id. at 7.
89. Id. at 9.
90. Federation, supra note 37, at 1.
91. Id. at 2. Central District bank branches loaned Central Residents $.24 on the dollar for their deposit while the suburban branches loaned $.97 on the dollar - with some branches loaning as high $2.40 for every dollar of deposit.
92. Id.
93. Id. at 13.
94. Sadly, the federal government had laws against redlining and divestment but no laws to compel disclosure to make it possible to identify. Id.
95. Federation, supra note 37, at 3.
96. Id. at 4.
97. Id. at 5.
98. Id.
99. Id. at 11.
100. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, Supra note 40, at 12.
101. Federation, supra note 37, at 9.
102. Id. at 10.
103. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, supra note 40, at 2.
104. Id.
105. Id. at 15.
106. Id. at 12.
107. Id. at 15.
108. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, DRAFT REPORT OF THE MAYOR'S REINVESTMENT TASK FORCE 16 (1976) (on file at the Seattle Public Library).
109. Id. at 16.
110. Id. at 17.
111. Id. at 18.
112. Id. at 21.
113. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, DRAFT REPORT OF THE MAYOR'S REINVESTMENT TASK FORCE 21 (1976) (on file at the Seattle Public Library).
114. Id. at 21-24.
115. Id. at 24.
116. Id. at 25.
117. Id. at 35-36.
118. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, DRAFT REPORT OF THE MAYOR'S REINVESTMENT TASK FORCE 42-43 (1976) (on file at the Seattle Public Library).
119. Kelleran et al., supra note 57, at 13.
120. SEATTLE, WASH. MAYOR, supra note 96, at 50-51.
121. Spratlen, supra note 42, at 2.
122. Id.
123. Id.
124. Barnes et al., supra note 58, at 6.
125. Id. at 7.
126. Id. at 7.
127. Id. at 23, 26.
128. Id. at 24-25.
129. Barnes et al., supra note 58, at 28-29.
130. Kelleran et al., supra note 57.
131. Save the City, supra note 43, minute 25.
132. Id. at minute 19.
133. Spratlen, supra note 42.
134. Id.
135. Zane, supra note 1, at 203-04.
136. Id.
137. Spratlen, supra note 42 at 35-37.
138. Lenders had contended that there was no anti-minority animus as a factor in redlining, but as the case in Seattle's segregated elementary and secondary schools, the redlining was de facto in that they were victims of socially dictated patterns of racially homogenous neighborhoods beyond their capacity to change.
139. Spratlen, supra note 42, at 39-40.
140. Fairness in Lending Act, WASH. REV. CODE §§ 40.04.005-.515 (1977) (making it illegal for banks to utilize lending standards that have no economic basis);
141. Mortgage Disclosure Act, WASH. REV. CODE §§ 19.06.010-.030 (1977) (replaced by the Fairness in Lending Act of 1981).
142. See also Federal Fair Housing Law Passed 1968, 42 U.S.C. § 3601(2000).
143. Constantine Angelos, Bank, Community Combine on Development, SEATTLE TIMES, Nov. 4, 1991, at C3.
144. Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), The Great Divide: Home Purchase Mortgage Lending Nationally and in 115 Metropolitan Areas, Salt Lake City Region Data Supplemental 11 (2003) available at http://www.acorn.org/fileadmin /Community_Reinvestment/Reports/Great_Divide_2003_Main.pdf.
145. Binyamin Appelbaum, Higher Loan Rate More Likely for Minorities, Study Concludes, SEATTLE TIMES, June 11, 2006, at E1.
146. The article also reported that Charlotte, North Carolina, reported in August that African Americans who borrowed from 25 of the nation's largest lenders were four times more likely than whites to pay high rates. The story said blacks with incomes above $100,000 a year were charged high rates more often than whites with incomes below $40,000. Id.
147. See also Peter Passell, Race Mortgages and Statistics: The Unending Debate over a Study of Lending Bias, N.Y. TIMES, May 10, 1996, at C1, which commences: "The statistics don't lie. Black and Hispanic home buyers have a harder time getting mortgages." Id.
148. ACORN, supra note 120, at 49-50.
149. Jack Broom, Not Afraid to Show Her True Colors, SEATTLE TIMES, Feb. 22, 2005, at E1, col. 2 (quoting DeCharlene Williams, one of the most prominent Central Area business women, a sole proprietor since 1965 and a leader of the Central Area Chamber of Commerce in 1983).
150. Blanca Torres, Central to Business, SEATTLE TIMES, Oct. 2, 2004 at E1, col. 1 (quoting same business woman above, DeCharlene Williams).
151. Danny Westneat, Should We Live Together, SEATTLE TIMES, Apr. 27, 2006, at B1, col. 1.
152. See Quintard Taylor, The Civil Rights Movement in the American West: Black Protest in Seattle, 1960-1970, 80 J. NEGRO HIST. 1 (Winter 1995) (discussing Reverend McKinney's singular role in the 1960s in Seattle and his association with Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.).
153. Id.; see also Interview with Samuel McKinney, Reverend of Mount Zion Baptist Church in Seattle, Wash. (June 2, 2004) (on file with author).
154. TAYLOR, supra note 2; Interview with Samuel McKinney, Reverend of Mount Zion Baptist Church in Seattle, Wash. (June 2, 2004) (on file with author).
155. Bill Kossen, Bittersweet Days in the Central Area, SEATTLE TIMES, Jan. 17, 2005, at E1, col. 1.
156. Id. The crime issue remains problematic, at least in certain quarters of the Central Area.
157. See Dennis Pauley, System Failure, SEATTLE TIMES, Apr. 11, 2005, at A1, col. 1, reporting in 2004: "682 felons were released from prison into the Central Area and surrounding neighborhoods," even though "the intersection of 23rd Avenue South and South Jackson Street has experienced an increase in crime...." Id. The article reported funding cuts in social service counseling and other support services as a threat to the area.
158. Interview by Anita Koyier-Mwamba with Keith Stafford, owner, Everybody Fitness, in Seattle, Wash. (June 18, 2005) (on file with author).
159. Interview by Anita Koyier Mwamba with Eddie Rye, Jr., community activist, in Seattle, Wash. (July 5, 2005) (on file with author).
160. Id.
161. Bill Kossen, Old Neighborhood, New Money, SEATTLE TIMES, Jan. 29, 2000, at E1.
162. Id.
163. Id.
164. MUMFORD, supra note 9.
165. Id.
166. Interview with Thurston Muscally, real estate investor, Central Area Development Association, in Seattle, Wash. (June 10, 2004) (on file with author).
167. Interview with George Staggers, Executive Director, Central Area Development Association, in Seattle, Wash. (July 5, 2004) (on file with author).
168. Id.
169. One of CADA's many developments is described by Chelan David, Rising Above: Welch Plaza Brings New Vitality to Corner of 23d & Jackson,MADISON PARK TIMES, Aug. 2005, at 1, col. 1.
170. Interview by Anita Koyier-Mwamba with Larry Gossett, Seattle City Councilman, in Seattle, Wash. (July 7, 2005) (on file with author).
171. Id.
172. Interview with Samuel McKinney, Reverend of Mount Zion Baptist Church in Seattle, Wash. (June 2, 2004) (on file with author);
173. see also Quintard Taylor, The Civil Rights Movement in the American West: Black Protest in Seattle, 1960-1970, 80 J. NEGRO HIST. 1 (Winter 1995).
174. Interview by Anita Koyier-Mwamba with Lariy Gossett, Seattle City Councilman, in Seattle, Wash. (July 7, 2005) (on file with author).
175. Id.
176. Id. However, elsewhere in the interview, Gossett stated, "I'm hopeful that we can continue to develop strategies to keep the highest percentage of African Americans and other people of color in the Central District because I think it would be sad, even tragic if it became a neighborhood where black people existed no more."
177. Id.
178. See Interview with George Staggers, Exec. Dir., Central Area Development Association, in Seattle, Wash. (July 5, 2004) (on file with author);
179. see also Chelan David, Rising Above: Welch Plaza Brings New Vitality to Corner of 23rd & Jackson, MADISON PARK TIMES, Aug, 2005, at 1, col. 1.
180. Interview by Anita Koyier-Mwamba with Richard McIver, Seattle City Councilman, in Seattle, Wash. (June 29, 2005) (on file with author).
181. Id.
182. Id.
183. Prominent Boule members have included Arthur Ashe, W.E.B. DuBois, the celebrated poet James Weldon Johnson, the historian Carter G. Woodson, and Martin Luther King, Jr. The Boule currently counts among its members former Houston Mayor Lee Brown, the CEO of American Express Kenneth Chenault, former Virginia Governor Douglas Wilder, Philadelphia Mayor Wilson Goode, and historian John Hope Franklin.
184. Interview with Ezra Teshome, real estate investor, State Farm, in Seattle, Wash. (June 18, 2005) (on file with author).
185. Id.
186. Id.
187. Id.
188. Id.
189. Interview with J.L Aboitiz, retired, in Seattle, Wash. (Nov. 2004) (on file with author).
190. Id.
191. Interview with Antoinette Sabarots, teacher, Eckstein Middle School in Seattle, Wash. (Oct. 30, 2004) (on file with author).
192. Interview with Samuel McKinney, Reverend of Mount Zion Baptist Church in Seattle, Wash. (June 2, 2004) (on file with author).
193. The title of the 1936 runaway best-selling and Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about plantation life in the American South, and the destruction of Atlanta to crush the insurgency against the United States. It was also the title of a famous motion picture released in 1939 starring Hollywood icon Clark Gable.
194. The actual house where General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant is located on an 1,800 acre national park in the western reaches of Virginia and has a website: http://www.nps.gov/apco.
195. Conversation with Stalin Harrison, Jr., barber in Seattle, Wash. (July 26, 2006) (on file with author) who left Mount Zion to join the Renton members of Mount Zion who supported the ousted Mount Zion pastor. The church was named New Beginnings Christian Fellowship. See Warren Cornwall, A New Church, New Start for Ex-Mount Zion Pastor, SEATTLE TIMES, Aug. 8, 2005, at B1.
196. On the Mount Zion controversy, see Florangela Davila, Zion Pastor Bows Out, With Barbs and Thanks, SEATTLE TIMES, July 25, 2005, at B1;
197. see also Vanessa Ho, Embattled Pastor of Mount Zion Baptist Resigns; Move Comes During Vote on His Future with Church, SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER, July 4, 2001, at B1.
198. Neighborhoods flip when they reach the "tipping point," which refers to the sociological phenomenon marked by the total, usually rapid evacuation of a formerly white community when African Americans move in. One section of Englewood, California, adjacent to Los Angeles, and very near the airport LAX, was subject to panic selling and the flight of Euro Americans within less than a year. See generally DERRICK BELL, RACE, RACISM AND AMERICAN LAW § 8.10.2 (5th ed. 2004);
199. DOUGLAS MASSEY & NANCY DENTON, AMERICAN APARTHEID: SEGREGATION AND THE MAKING OF THE UNDERCLASS (1993).
200. CHARLES E. CONNERLY, THE MOST SEGREGATED CITY IN AMERICA: CITY PLANNING AND CIVIL RIGHTS IN BIRMINGHAM, 1920-1980 (2005) (considering the grotesque racially segregated neighborhoods in Birmingham, Ala.).
201. One reviewer on the book noted "how Blacks struggled and succeeded in shaping city planning in Birmingham. In general, race and social class shaped the city, stimulated the regional building process, and determined the life choices and life chances of Blacks who live in [the Birminghain area]." Glenn Johnson, Book Review of The Most Segregated City in America: City Planning and Civil Rights in Birmingham, 1920-1980, J. AM. PLAN. ASS'N, June 22, 2006.
202. See Audrey G. McFarlane, The New Inner City: Class Transformation, Concentrated Affluence and the Obligations of the Police Power, 8 UNIV. PA. J. CONST. L. 1 (2006).
203. The article argues the constitutional limits on local government's ability to facilitate redevelopment projects that deliberately aim to accomplish class transformation and reconfigure the inner city for the affluent - largely clearance schemes debated by the Supreme Court and upheld 5-4 in Kelo v. City of New London, 545 U.S. 469 (2005) (affirming settled case law since Berman v. Parker, 348 U.S. 26 (1954)).
204. Id.
205. Id.
206. See Jayson Blair, Failed Disney Vision: Integrated City, N.Y. TIMES, Sept. 25, 2001, at 1A.
207. Although the company did "their best to ensure that this planned community would not become as racially homogenous as many other towns.... The 2000 census numbers released this year say it all: the 2,376-resident community is 88 percent white in a county that is only 59 percent white; it is 1 percent black and 7 percent Hispanic in a county that is 6 percent black and 29 percent Hispanic." Id.
208. Ely Portillo & Frank Greve, Interracial Tide Sweeps Nation: The Changing of Attitudes Is Noticeable Within a Generation, Researchers Discover, ORLANDO SENTINEL, July 23, 2006, at A26 (reporting that "[i]n 1990, two-third of Americans polled said they opposed having a close relation or family member marry a black person. That's dropped to about one-third, according to Maria Krysan, a racial attitudes specialist at the University of Illinois.").
209. Lynette Clemetson & Ron Nixon, Breaking Through Adoption's Racial Barriers, N.Y. TIMES, Aug. 17, 2006, at A1.
210. Janny Scott, Cities Shed Middle Class and are Richer and Poorer for It, N.Y TIMES, July 23, 2006, § 4, at 1.
211. Id.
212. Elizabeth Rhodes & Justin Mayo, Only 9 Areas in King County Left for Middle-Income Buyers, SEATTLE TIMES, July 16, 2006, at B1.
213. LISA A. KEISTER, WEALTH IN AMERICA: TRENDS IN WEALTH INEQUALITY 11 (2000) (Noting that wealth is what you own after you deduct what you owe. Wealth is what people rely on when there are income stream interruptions).
214. See EDWARD N. WOLFF, TOP HEAVY: A STUDY OF THE INCREASING INEQUALITY OF WEALTH IN AMERICA 7 (1995) (Noting that the United States' vaunted middle class is ever-shrinking, and the ownership of property is ever-concentrated in the upper quadrant of the spectrums of wealth and income. "Wealth inequality in the United States was at a sixty year high in 1989, with the top 1 percent of wealth holders controlling 39 percent of total household worth." By 2000, the inequality gap had become a Grand Canyon. "Today, the top 1 percent of income-earners, 2.7 million people receive 50.4 percent of the national income, more than the poorest 100 million people.");
215. CHUCK COLLINS & FELICE YESKEL, ECONOMIC APARTHEID IN AMERICA: A PRIMER ON ECONOMIC INEQUALITY 39 (2000).
216. For an exhaustive and more recent study, see Edward N. Wolff et al., Household Wealth, Public Consumption and Economic Well-Being in the United States, 29 CAMB. J. ECON. 1073 (2005).
217. CHUCK COLLINS & FELICE YESKEL, ECONOMIC APARTHEID IN AMERICA: A PRIMER ON ECONOMIC INEQUALITY 53 (2000) ("It is in the area of wealth and asset accumulation that the legacy of racial discrimination has left its most profound mark. While black and Latino incomes have begun to catch up to white earnings, black and Latino wealth continues to lag dramatically behind that of white households.");
218. see also LISA A. KEISTER, WEALTH IN AMERICA: TRENDS IN WEALTH INEQUALITY 11 (2000).
219. Paul Attewell et al., The Black Middle Class: Progress, Prospects, and Puzzle, 8 J. AFR.-AM. STUD. 6 (2004) (discussing the asymmetry of wealth between Euro and African Americans);
220. see also Donald Jay Com, Closing the Gap, 35 BLACK ENTERPRISE 236 (Issue 11, June 2005) (lamenting that "not enough black families are buying homes, causing an ever-widening wealth gap between whites and African Americans in the U.S. According to the National Urban League... the home ownership rate for African Americans is nearly 50%, versus more than 70% for whites. This disparity in homeownership is reflected in net worth as well: a median of $5,100 for an African American family compared to $67,700 for white families.").
221. Professor Charles Mayer, director of the Milstein Center for Real Estate Columbia University's Business School, in McGee, supra note 11.
222. Id.
223. Id.
224. Seattle Displacement Coalition Special Bulletin, July 12, 2006 (on file with author); See also Bob Young, Tenants in a Bind When Their Apartments Turn Condo, SEATTLE TIMES, July 12, 2006, at A1 (reporting that in the first six months of 2006, 1,162 additional apartments were lost to condominium conversion).