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This Divided Land The Way Our Neighborhoods Look Isn’t an Accident BY MADDY ALEWINE sheville Area Habitat for Humanity was shocked by the deed to a parcel of land they were developing when they came upon the part that read: this property cannot be sold to “any person of the colored race.” As an organization that condemns structural racism in the housing system, Asheville Habitat did not want to transfer this deed to another owner with this abhorrent language. In addition to seeing what could be done about the racist language in the deed, the nonprofit builder was motivated to learn more about racially restrictive covenants and how they shaped local neighborhoods, and share what was learned with the community. The first step was a deep dive into learning the history. When discussing race and housing, “redlining” is the concept most familiar to Americans. Another common but less familiar form of de jure segregation — or segregation through laws and policies — can be found in racially restrictive covenants. In the early twentieth century, competition for housing and jobs in American cities led to deadly racial violence. Covenants were a legal tool for property owners and developers to segregate neighborhoods. “Asheville really leaned into (usage of racial covenants),” Buncombe County Register of Deeds Drew Reisinger said. “I often see them written in documents throughout everything from the 1910s all the way up to the 1970s.” Homeownership is the primary means to building wealth in this country, but federal, state, and local housing policies built on restrictive covenants prevented many Black Americans from owning a home. The effect is obvious in today’s disparity in homeownership rates. According to a recent report from Land of Sky Regional Council, only 38 percent of Black households in Buncombe County own homes compared to 74 per-
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Kel Compton proudly holds up the keys to her new, affordable two-bedroom, two-bath single family home in South Asheville on January 21, 2021, after completing Asheville Area Habitat for Humanity’s Homeownership Program. The deed to Compton’s home contains a racial covenant, which prompted Asheville Habitat to make a film exploring this history. MADDY ALEWINE PHOTOS
cent of whites. As a result, the racial wealth gap is as wide today as it was in 1968, when the Fair Housing Act finally outlawed racist deed covenants. These racist laws and policies shaped the way Asheville looks today. “Asheville neighborhoods are the way they are because they were designed that way,” Asheville Habitat Executive Director Andy Barnett said. “As we learn this history, we realize that the belief that ‘deep down people want to live around people that look like them’ is just a myth.” Habitat’s integrated neighborhoods disprove this myth. “We just don’t see these (Habitat) neighbors resegregating over time,” Barnett said. “These neighborhoods continue to be thriving and vibrant places that remain racially integrated.” Next, Asheville Habitat needed
Pictured is a racial covenant highlighted in a piece of South Asheville property that Asheville Area Habitat for Humanity purchased to develop for affordable housing. Racial covenants were a common racist practice in the early 20th century that barred people of color from owning property, and they were widely used at the local level in Asheville and across the county. Although deemed unconstitutional in 1948, these covenants were used up until the 1970s and still remain in deeds today.
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