The More Things Change …

From an activist perspective, we still have a long way to go.

Richmond has seen a lot of changes in the four decades since Style Weekly’s first issue. The Confederate statues on Monument Avenue that once seemed immortal are now gone. The quaintly named Boulevard now honors a Black athlete and civil rights hero. There’s a public school named after the country’s first Black president. Big changes.

But the changes have mostly been symbolic. What has stayed the same are the poverty and racism that have long characterized Virginia’s capital city.

One in five Richmonders still lives in poverty, twice the statewide average.

According to a November 2020 VCU study, the metro Richmond area is the only area of the state with “severe” school segregation along racial lines.

Police-community relations are still marked by widespread distrust, and for continuing good reasons.

Why, despite a historic rise in consciousness about racism, hasn’t life gotten better for poor and working-class Richmonders, the majority of whom are African-American and Latino?

The problem is systemic. The mayor and city council oversee a city with an aging infrastructure and great financial needs, but a limited tax base. Valuable land that could be generating revenue is occupied by tax-exempt state and federal institutions and hundreds of houses of worship and nonprofits. State law forbids the annexation of surrounding county land without permission from the counties, which aren’t going to agree to that until the city’s poverty is spread around regionally.

Richmond might have been able to invest in new revenue-producing projects, but former Mayor Dwight Jones maxed out the city’s credit, leaving it chasing after schemes that have to provide super-profits for corporate partners. And those politically charged schemes aren’t always successful.

The Navy Hill debacle was too pro-Dominion to get past a voter-sensitive city council. The next plan, to extract tax money from the poor in the form of casino losses, was voted down in a referendum. The Diamond proposal has less popular opposition, so maybe that one will pass, especially since it fits in with the real strategy for transforming poverty-stricken Richmond into a prosperous city.

At this point, it should be more than clear that the long-term goal is to drive out low-income residents and replace them with upper-middle-class professionals and empty nesters who can afford to buy or rent the condos sprouting up like mushrooms in areas like Manchester, Scott’s Addition and Shockoe Bottom.

On the one hand, the new condo dwellers are paying more real estate taxes, either directly as owners or indirectly as renters. This brings in new revenue. And on the other, poor and working-class Richmonders are forced to move out of town because of the destruction of public housing, speculator flipping in gentrifying neighborhoods and the reluctance of “developers” to build more affordable – and less profitable – housing. And as the poorer folks leave, with their kids, the city will be able to shrink the public school system.

Both trends will result in fuller city coffers and the possibility of lowering the city’s outrageously high real estate tax rate, which will lead to even more professionals and empty nesters buying housing in the city, resulting in a financially prosperous – and much whiter – Richmond. Already, the Black population, once the majority, is down to 46.1 percent of the city. (U.S. Census, July 2021)

And of course, this all means less and less political power for the Black and Latino communities, which also will be minorities in the counties for years to come.

Is there a solution? A way forward to a more just and equitable Richmond? Yes, but it would mean deep, structural changes.

The state law forbidding city annexation must be changed so Richmond can follow the more prosperous path of other, more regional cities, like Charlotte. The formula for distributing state funds to public schools must be changed from one that favors more affluent school districts. The minimum wage must be raised to a living wage. “Developers” must be convinced to invest in really affordable housing. There needs to be tax relief for long-time elderly homeowners.

But for any of that to happen, there would have to be a strong, energetic and committed community movement demanding justice on a wide range of issues. Unfortunately, that movement doesn’t exist in Richmond today. Maybe it can still emerge, under the pressure of the simple desire to survive, but the near total silence over the ongoing destruction of public housing isn’t a hopeful sign.

So let’s feel good that some of Richmond’s more odious symbols of racism have been torn down, but at the same time admit that we still have a long way to go to see real changes in this city.

Phil Wilayto is an activist and editor of The Virginia Defender quarterly newspaper. He can be reached at: virginiadefendernews@gmail.com.

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