Working class families are pushed out of Nashville by rising costs

BY AMANDA HAGGARD

In Nashville, we hear a lot about who is coming to Nashville: At one point, the line was that more than 100 people were moving to the city everyday. What’s lost in that metric is that while the city gains several people coming here for high-paying jobs, we’re losing the working class families who can no longer afford to live here.

In the past three years, a pattern has emerged: At least seven people per day are leaving Nashville for outlying counties, according to Metropolitan Social Services’ annual Community Needs Evaluation. Rising costs of living is considered the greatest factor in people leaving the city.

“Working class families are exiting Nashville and those in poverty find themselves trapped in ever more costly and difficult situations,” the report says.

Native Nashvillian Kennetha Patterson, 37, was forced to make the decision in 2016 to leave the city she grew up in. Patterson and her husband and five kids were living in an apartment in Edgehill when the complex was sold.

“At first, I watched my other neighbors being pushed out,” Patterson says. “We kinda didn’t know what was going on. We just noticed people’s belongings getting thrown straight in the dumpster.”

Patterson and others started trying to

mediate evictions — the new owners of the complex wanted to create a new layout with more expensive units that she knew she and others could not afford. They had at one point convinced the property owners to replace the units one-for-one rather than build bigger, more expensive units in the complex. She got behind on rent, but the company didn’t want to work with her even when she had the money to get caught up.

Patterson and her husband and their five kids moved to Cheatham County because they couldn’t find anywhere in Nashville they could afford. While the housing was cheaper and they had more room in their home, Patterson was still driving to and from Nashville for work every day in addition to getting her kids to school. She was driving more than 100 miles a day.

“I would go to work and then I went to get the kids from school and then my husband would go to work and come home after we got there,” Patterson says. “It’s just a lot for a family.”

When her family moved out of Nashville, they made $60,000 annually.

“So that seems like enough, but we have five kids, seven in a family, so that’s still poverty, right? It still wasn’t enough in a city like Nashville where it seemed like things got more expensive by the day,” Patterson

says. “Making those numbers make sense as far as what people make and what that gets them is something that’s hard to get through to some people.”

Patterson’s family is back in Nashville, but living with her mother right now. They were working with their landlord to purchase the home they were renting, but the landlord decided to sell before they could come up with enough money to buy the home.

“We also had barriers on our credit that kept us from being able to purchase,” Patterson says, adding that many don’t realize that living in a family member’s home is still considered homelessness. Losing their apartment in a neighborhood Patterson was familiar with eventually lost them the ability to live in their own home.

According to the Community Needs Evaluation, the loss of working class families presents a challenge in terms of, “maintaining a distribution of population that resembles the one the city has long experienced.” The influx of singles and childless couples and the loss of families obviously means a totally different makeup of people after a length of time.

Patterson, who has worked in community advocacy, believes the key to making changes is letting the people experiencing

barriers guide and drive the discussion. This is more than having community meetings in areas that are struggling or providing outreach, it’s involving members of the community in the building of a new structure.

“Just talking to the real people is a step, but it seems like [the government] always does things on this trickle down basis and that never works, giving someone with no experience with poverty the reins won’t work,” Patterson says. “We have to be part of the solution, doing the work.”

Patterson has started an organization called VisionHeirs, which works with people on eviction prevention, particularly large families who aren’t served well by services for people experiencing homelessness. She says a big part of advocacy, and her work personally, is making sure she values every single person in a family and recognizing that keeping these people in the community is important.

“You have to look at the whole family,” Patterson says. “There is always a story and we just have to believe every person is a jewel that’s in the family. And we have to care about bringing forth their purpose and what they’re meant to do. Not everyone has generational wealth, but they all have value to the community.”

NASHVILLE NINTH WORST IN THE NATION FOR STUDENTS EXPERIENCING POVERTY

BY AMANDA HAGGARD

More than 25 percent of the students attending Metro Nashville Public Schools are in poverty, according to Metro Social Services’ Community Needs Evaluation.

Davidson County ranks ninth highest for most students living in poverty among the nation’s 50 largest school districts — more students are in poverty in Nashville than in Los Angeles and Chicago.

In addition to that, more than 3,400 students of those students are experiencing homelessness.

Under the McKinney–Vento Homeless Assistance Act, homelessness is defined as a lack of a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence. That could mean students living in shelters, cars, public spaces, substandard housing or with other families due to the lack of alternative accommodations or students who live a migratory lifestyle.

Community Achieves, run by Alison McArthur and Catherine Knowles, attempts to use MNPS resources to help students experiencing poverty.

McArthur, the community Achieves

coordinator, says the program has a site coordinator at each of its 22 partner schools.

MacArthur says it was her hope that the program would serve as a means of identifying and providing support around areas of challenge for MNPS students and families through internal programs and community partnerships.

That might look like food insecurity, lack of school clothing or inadequate healthcare, and in some schools, there might be a need for parental empowerment. Community Achieves provides

supports for parents and the wider community too by offering GED and ESL courses.

“It varies across the board and schools, and the supports will look different in each community. The schools coordinate lots of events for families so they can come to school and learn about ways to advocate for their students, and then, there are just basic needs for the families, like food boxes, clothing, diapers, hygiene items,” she says.