Stuff going on adjacent to the neighborhood I need to ramble about.

It's no secret that Minnesota is one of the worst states in terms of racial disparities in income, education, and health.

It has a long history affecting generations.

We can see the effects today, even from past policies.

Parts of the city remain largely white even years after redlining and racial covenants were outlawed.

Those neighborhoods have higher incomes and home values. They resist any change, fearing it might jeopardize that.

Years of housing discrimination and white flight have created neighborhoods that are now majority Black, Asian, Indigenous, & Latino. Residents in these neighborhoods make significantly less than their white counterparts and they are more likely to be burdened by housing costs.

It's important to note that those costs have increased along with the greater Minneapolis/Saint Paul metro.

They've increased although no market-rate development has occurred in the Frogtown/Midway area for a long time.

This is because Minneapolis/Saint Paul (and suburbs) haven't been building enough housing (and especially low-income housing) for years. When supply is tight, prices increase.

They've increased to where a lot of white millennials suddenly start caring about housing policy.

This is good and bad, but I think where things get hung up is around race - current injustices and past injustices.

A lot of people turn a blind eye to it, others pay it lip service, and there's always the paternalistic white nonsense that happens.

This all sort of rolls into the city council denying a proposal to turn a empty lot into a market-rate apartments, even with the developer making promises of a good number of subsidized units.

Ostensibly due to neighborhood opposition - not established regulations or policies.

In neighborhoods impacted the most by racism, it is *vital* we listen to residents when it comes to changes to their own community.

Fears/anger around displacement/gentrification are real - even if we debate if/how much new housing affects those.

It's also really important that we try to listen to *all* the residents, because we know the loudest voices don't always reflect the majority.

And white people love picking/elevating neighborhood voices that reflect their personal views on things, to the exclusion of others.

So everything is skewed.

Is displacement a legitimate concern? Yes, but we've seen displacement with no new housing built.

Are community changes a legitimate concern? Yes, but I've yet to see white people NOT find a way to live where they want to.

So what is the best option? Should we continue to corral every BIPOC resident into neighborhoods everyone deems "proper" for them? So we can continue to neglect their schools, health, and safety? So police racially profile them if they dare step outside that neighborhood?

Do we let developers and investors destroy currently affordable housing to build more expensive housing because they can't build anything?

Do we insist housing is offered at a price the city deems appropriate but will almost certainly result in worse outcomes for everyone?

It's disingenuous of the city to insist on affordability in some neighborhoods, while doing nothing to provide funds to create that housing, or making it possible for residents to move to other areas of the city.

Time is lost waiting for "perfect" housing that will never come.

I think even the least charitable view of that development is this: the only thing worse than building it was not building it.

It's far better to allow new residents on empty lots rather than forcing everyone out of the neighborhood who can't afford it.

I witnessed Columbia Height in DC kick a lot of Black and Latino residents out to the exurbs once white college educated people decided living in DC close to the metro was more desirable than living in the suburbs.

This happened without a single building being erected.

Even low-income housing won't solve a lot of problems created by racism.

Why do we expect something NOT being built to provide redress?

This is what I want:

- More housing everywhere.

- Affordable housing in every neighborhood.

- Housing vouchers.

- City money given to new developments that set aside a certain percentage of occupancy to low income residents.

And lastly: stop pretending that disallowing new construction on a case-by-case basis is going to do anyone any favors.