Abortion LawsState by State, 2022

Source: Planned Parenthood (plannedparenthood.org)

The nation continues to see red in a world that is anything but.

The act of Redlining is a horrific practice that was believed to be left in the past as the Supreme Court sought to eradicate it.

Yet, by nature, the enterprise has caused Individuals of color across the nation to be caught in a riptide of repeated systemic oppression. Moreover, the educational systems within urban environments are ripped apart as issues of overpopulation, lack of funding, and abandonment sprint forward in droves. Looking to the future, government officials seek solutions to the plights of the endangered masses.

Redlining as a concept can be found across the nation. It is not an issue of exclusive areas, but in the backyards of people, coast-to-coast; areas such as Louisville Kentucky are examples of textbook redlining in practice. “Ninth street is what we referrer to as ‘The Great Divide’ and it truly is the end of the central business district at the beginning of what is and has historically been considered West Louisville,” Director of Develop Louisville Marlyn Harris said. Harris is currently aiming to reshape the area of Louisville against this vast rift by identifying and rectifying needs. Quite an important issue that has arisen is the lack of available housing. “The city of Louisville requires about 30,000 units of affordable housing. There are limited dollars and we try to stretch those dollars as far as we can, but the development of affordable housing is very expensive” Harris said. Affordable housing is the keystone in providing a safe and financially plausible option for displaced persons. Moreover, the lack of cost-effective places for residents coupled with the prevalence of decrepit buildings has caused a decrease in the life expectancy of individuals within these areas. These Depreciated structures feature long outdated, and even illicit, building materials. The materials notably include; lead paint and asbestos, and “From my Health Equity Report, If you live in west Louisville, you are far more likely to die 12 to 15 years earlier than an individual living in East Louisville,” Harris said.

When examining why this occurs, there is one primary factor that has caused people of color to be fixated in these areas. When comparing the absence of generational wealth within these communities. ”So if you have a business, and it’s a thriving business, and I retire, I can pass that on to my children, and my children can have that business and that’s generational wealth. It’s no different than a house located in the West End that was redlined. Parents couldn’t renovate the house. The value of the house decreased. And there’s no generational wealth to pass on,” Harris said. Harris further provided an example of this phenomenon in action. “Before my parents moved out of their house, they built it for $70,500 in 1950 and this is a great example of generational wealth. They built that house for around 17,500 and I bought it from them for around $75,000 In ‘99. I sold that house, you know, I bought it for $75,000 from them and I sold it for $164,000. That’s a huge return

by Jack Binkley

on investment. The steep property values in the West End don’t get up to $164,000 even for houses that are [worth] $70,525 30 years ago. They’re 60 or 70,000. Now, so you’ve got a depressed market area, a lack of generational wealth transfer,” Harris said.

The dominos begin to fall when viewing how this lack of generational wealth disadvantages the surrounding community. Staying within the Louisville area, Iroquois High School has been known in the community as the definition of an ‘Inner City School’. “The building was old, broken, and ugly as shit. One of the things that astounded me is that there was one whiteboard in the whole school. No High SCS (Socioeconomic Status) school and no white school would be like this, let’s call it like it is,” Dr. Rob Fulk said. Fulk was the principal at Iroquois through the pandemic and previous. He has seen firsthand the results of neglect in these urban environments. Moreover, the resulting sum is on students. “Iroquois has the highest level of Free and Reduced lunch students in the state,” Fulk said. Infrastructure aside, Iroquois has, in the past, had a litigious reputation in the eyes of locals. “When I was asked to go to Iroquois, I knew they had many incidents that were present in the community. Various gun issues were spilling out of the building into the area,” Fulk said. Even in light of this, Fulk has also managed to turn the Iroquois around for the better. “I brought in Smartboards for each classroom alongside other resources, while also spending extensive time on professional development. Now, Iroquois has the highest graduation rate it has had in the past 30 years. You don’t hear about Iroquois in the news anymore,” Fulk said. For the better, Iroquois has seen a massive change in not only perception but performance. “There are 1000 brilliant young men and women at this school that we should be fixated on instead of focusing on bad things that have happened in the hallways,” Fulk said.

Moving beyond this example of urban schools, while still staying grounded in the Louisville Metro area; The next step is to find what issues still exist and communities & officials can combat them.

“All of that is culminating to you know, persons of color going to college less often. Because their parents can’t afford to send them to college?” Harris said. The collegiate study has been deemed a necessity in the modern day and the fact that individuals are inherently disadvantaged not only by the perception of their skin color but by the pillow they rest their heads on at night: is abysmal.

”For the last two years, we’ve been in this pandemic and we’ve got people who don’t have internet, they don’t have access to Wi-Fi. How is your kid going to learn if you don’t have access to Wi-Fi and the internet?” The covid pandemic has impacted the entire global population in some form or another. Yet with the frantic scramble for toilet paper, urbanized areas are oftentimes looked over when the effects of covid are played out. According to a study conducted by the National Library of Medicine Entitled “Historical Redlining and Resident Exposure to COVID-19: A Study of New York City,” the effect of the Pandemic on redlined communities is as follows; “The devoid of investments and loans in redlined neighborhoods had significant negative effects on neighborhood conditions, including crowded housing, poor housing quality, lower quality services from local municipalities, and lack of amenities such as recreational facilities and establishments offering healthy food choices.” Residents of these areas are gifted with a lack of basic needs and amenities on all levels ranging from diet to the sanctity of the places that are their homes. So, in light of this, what can be done? How can individuals combat this issue? “So I would say first and foremost, educate yourself about what it is. I mean, I’m amazed at the number of people who don’t know about redlining. You know, I live in the East End and I will have conversations with my friends and they’re like, what’s redlining? I’ve never heard of it. And I will open the curtain and I will say, do you see this nice suburb that we live in with these nice sidewalks and nice streets and nice bushes? This is all the effects of redlining because this is what happened. We were able to get that while they didn’t,” Harris said. Above all, people must be educated about this topic, especially when in a position to make a change regarding it.

Though the process of redlining was outlawed in 1968 with the enactment of fair housing paramutation, the effects of such a practice can be felt as it echoes from the past to the present. The history of said practice stretches far and wide, causing ricochets in school environments, amplifying disenfranchisement in these neighborhoods, and creating even more of a rift between the areas of high & low income. The issue is neither black nor white; it’s red in the face.