Today is the 51st anniversary of the federal Fair Housing Act, and New York City is debating adding a comprehensive planning requirement to its charter — one that would require the City to assess and address racial and economic disparities in its land use, planning and budgetary decisions. Some have argued that this would be unwise and impractical.
But this complaint about allegedly cumbersome planning obscures the long history of racist top-down planning that has fundamentally shaped our city — for the worse. Generations of government decisions have driven low-income people of color to under-resourced neighborhoods, creating the city we have today, which remains one of the most segregated and unequal in America. Planning that finally centers the needs of low-wealth communities of color is not a radical idea: It’s a necessary and proactive way to address inequities that were put in place by past plans, and have been in place for far too long.
Consider this condensed history of how that perverse planning shaped the city and metro area we live in today.
The federal government entered the housing field in the 1930s and began to offer home loan insurance and refinancing, but it didn’t offer this support everywhere; it encouraged lenders not to invest in “redlined” neighborhoods with aging housing and many residents who were poor or of color. Federal programs, and the decisions of private banks, investors and local governments that participated in them, created segregated and drastically unequal neighborhoods — not by accident, but by design. The effects persist: the vast majority of neighborhoods marked “risky” during the New Deal remain low- or moderate-income communities of color today.
Beginning in 1949, urban renewal was implemented to devastating effect in New York City. Federal policy called for “the clearance of slums and blighted areas,” declaring this a public purpose that could justify the legal taking of private property. Residents living in “slums” were forced to relocate so the government could demolish and pave the way for future development, resulting in the displacement of over 100,000 black New Yorkers. Many were sent to the furthest reaches of the city, where the city built public housing for people displaced by urban renewal. These areas had few job opportunities, long commute times and high poverty rates. Today, many NYCHA complexes, the populations of which are over 90% black and Latino, remain in these far-flung locations.
In the 1970s, New York CIty responded to its fiscal crisis by cutting essential city services from the communities that (supposedly) didn’t need them. But flawed methodology, political maneuvering and outright racism meant that “planned shrinkage” hit hardest the communities that could least afford it: poor and working-class people of color. When the Bronx burned, it was mostly because the city cut services from the least politically powerful communities.
Though redlining, urban renewal and planned shrinkage operated in different ways, all were planning initiatives designed by those in power and imposed on low-income communities of color. Today, racism in city planning may be less deliberate, but the disempowering posture toward poor black and brown communities is all too familiar. Over 70% of planners in the New York metro area are white, while most communities slated for rezonings by the de Blasio administration are predominantly of color. Areas are regarded as “ripe for development” now because they were impacted by past divestment and clearance and have yet to fully recover.
But planning in these areas is not centered around remedying the past harms to, or addressing the current needs of, these communities. All too often, investment is tied to future development, a future where residents are likely to be wealthier and whiter, and current residents may not be in the picture at all.
It shouldn’t be this way, and it doesn’t have to be. Comprehensive planning can require city agencies to center their plans and spending around demonstrated neighborhood needs — which is not required today — and to direct future growth where it is least likely to fuel displacement. It can establish a framework where the needs and aspirations of all neighborhoods are assessed and considered at the same time, instead of decisions being made piecemeal, with the greatest burdens being pushed on the most marginalized. And it can help us strike the right balance between planning for what neighborhoods need right now, and what our whole city will need in the future.
All of this would help direct resources to the neighborhoods that need them, and create new opportunities for affordable housing in areas that have too little of it today — both key strategies to further fair housing.
Critics of comprehensive planning say it’s just too hard, and it won’t help us reach the outcomes we want. But many other cities plan for equity, and New Yorkers of color in under-resourced neighborhoods know that planning can work here.
The history of racist planning in this city has shown us that planning can create real and lasting consequences. So are we ready to use that power for good?
Weibgen is a senior policy fellow at the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development.
