I have lived both in the South End on Beacon Hill, as well as in the North part of Seattle. At this time I cannot afford to live in Seattle proper because the ridiculous costs have gone out the roof as we all know. Red lining has been around forever. Thirty years ago I had white friends who retired and moved to Seattle from the East Coast. They wanted to live in the South End because they wanted to live in a diverse population. Unfortunately the realtors of several different companies, constantly send them to properties with predominately white neighborhoods, even though they kept repeating they did not want to live in those neighborhoods. They were advised that they do not want to live there, go where their own people existed doncha know.
While I do not think we should just sit back and accept it,redlining happens in Seattle. Since I was a teen before the neighborhoods have gotten more diverse in 50 years ~ however much of that is due to gentrification, especially in those great old homes on Capitol Hill that has driven Black populations out due to the rising taxes and rents.
Now that the homeless populations have reached the scary 10,000 people wandering the streets on the coldest night of the year, there is some call to build "affordable" homes, whatever that means. Affordability was what they called the razing of Yesler Terrace, Holly Park and Montlake Vista public rentals to build "affordable" homes. None of the displaced or even blue collar middle class could call these homes "affordable" indeed they were displaced and guess what? Homelessness began to rise as soon as those residents were kicked out. There was no plan to relocate these homeless families into other homes. Indeed the realtors bought the land for pennies on the dollar and sold them at unaffordable prices, and sure they may have become "affordable" for upper income people who also took those homes at quite "affordable" prices.
Just sayin' that if we truly want to change things listen to the great warrior and philosopher Lau Tse who said, "you cannot know your future until you know and come to nreconcile your past." We keep repeating the same old crap over and over and then wonder why the illegalized homeless have no place to crap except in the doorway of the streets.
Yes speak up this is a start ~ but march, yell, show signs, write letters and tell it like it was ~ and is ~ about the terrible history our own city has lived and relived over and over to make it what it is today.
Oh. And yes those "tiny homes" seem like a fix, but it cannot begin to answer the diverse and many faceted reasons for homelessness now. Try being a low waged worker who make low wages but "make too much" to qualify or try fitting three kids in one of those things, see what I mean? Now I live in a quickly being gentrified Kenmore building poor quality,unaffordable and instant slum tiny apartments that the blue collar and poor will never afford for those over-priced homes ~ until they begin to fall apart.
Hope this helps ...
Love, Cat in "Seattle"
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