Not for nothing, but “gentrification” has the reputation of being a destroyer of neighborhoods by the forcing out of older, less affluent residents, and in many cases around the country that’s absolutely true. But with that said, one of the realities homeowners in certain other neighborhoods have to come to terms with is that change is inevitable — it’s coming, like it or not.
Personally, I’ve always been a fan of change since, once you comprehend the fact that it’s coming, usually under the guise of progress, whether you like it or not, you prepare for it and fight to get the kind of change you want, the kind that best protects your interests and the interests of your neighbor’s.
The neighborhood in which my wife and I reside is currently heating up in terms of interest from developers, but we are neither surprised nor fearful since we’ve known for a long time now that the community of Hough was going to eventually be “discovered,” as if we had somehow been lost, or not included on maps of the city. For a number of us long-term residents, we welcome the attention and look forward to working with developers to create good outcomes for everyone involved. But in the end, we live here, developers don’t, so we should be first among equals.
Of course, not all of my fellow residents are of the same mind. There are some that want nothing to do with developers and any new projects, preferring instead to relish in the power of just shouting “NO” to whatever is being proposed. For them, having the power of stopping white folks’ plans dead in their tracks is somehow a delicious form of payback for insults real and imagined. Nonetheless, it’s not always a prudent course of action. Some folks will cut off their nose just to spite their face.
The question we should begin to ask is: How do we hold developers responsible for any negative impacts their projects might have on our community?
By way of example, years ago, a county commissioner wanted to build a juvenile detention facility on Community College Avenue at 37th Street. He asked me to broker a meeting with Frank Jackson, who was then the councilman representing Ward 5. Jackson stated that they had just built new homes next to where the facility was being proposed to be built and his concern was, “Will the facility cause the new homes to lose value?”
I then asked the commissioner, “If the homes were to lose value, would the county make up the loss?” The answer was “no” and that was the end of the meeting. The facility didn’t get built.
I want to be welcoming to quality developers coming into Ward 7/Hough, but I want them to be responsible to the community for any unintended harm their projects might cause. Fair is fair.
From CoolCleveland correspondent Mansfield B. Frazier mansfieldfATgmail.com. Frazier’s From Behind The Wall: Commentary on Crime, Punishment, Race and the Underclass by a Prison Inmate is available in hardback. Snag your copy and have it signed by the author at http://NeighborhoodSolutionsInc