This Black History Month, we are looking at how the discriminatory housing policy called “Redlining” impacts people across the country, specifically in the states where we work with families. 

We founded Choices with the commitment to help people of all ages facing behavioral health challenges get the quality care they deserve. Our families often live in neighborhoods that have long been neglected and excluded by policies like Redlining. 

Living in an area without quality jobs, grocery stores, or sidewalks can make raising a healthy family feel impossible. It’s important to understand how our neighborhoods came to be and remember that we can improve them in the future by advocating for what is right today. 

Indiana 

Starting in central Indiana, we recommend a video from the Fair Housing Center of Central Indiana.

It shows the history of how neighborhoods were created and then ranked based on how likely a bank might be to do business with people that lived there. Areas with white residents were ranked high, allowing those families to build financial security for generations. Areas with Black and other minority residents were ranked low, robbing those families of the same opportunity. This is a clear example of the systemic racism that is responsible for much of the inequality and injustice we see today.

Visit IndianaHousingNow.org to access rental assistance and other tools.

Ohio

Moving next to western Ohio, we recommend the PBS documentary “Redlining: Mapping Inequality in Dayton & Springfield,” which is available in full for free on the ThinkTV YouTube channel. 

The film shows the many consequences of Redlining—like abandoned houses. Not just eye sores, these properties are hazardous and costly for cities everywhere. Former Dayton Mayor Rhine McClin says in the film,

“When we see abandoned property, let us not forget the families that were there, and not abandon them.”

Learn more about this topic by watching the full film. If you need assistance in this area, see the Montgomery County housing resources.

After decades of lending discrimination, advocates worked to get passed the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977. This law encourages banks to offer mortgages to middle and low-income families. Today, nearly all banks meet the requirement of the law, despite the obvious and widening wealth gap. 

In 2021, the U.S. Department of Justice announced an initiative to combat redlining by working more closely with banks and states’ attorneys general to enforce fair lending laws.

Mississippi

We see the negative effects of Redlining on neighborhood streets and in those neighbors’ pockets. In the United States, there is a dramatic difference in financial net worth between Black and white families, known as the racial wealth gap. A large contributor to this gap is the rate at which Black families are approved—or denied—for safe, affordable mortgage loans.

In Mississippi, according to Calandra Davis and Sara Miller, the mortgage loan denial rate for Black residents earning over $150,000 is higher than the denial rate of whites earning three times less.

Black women are impacted even more, being denied for the application and the loan twice as often as white women, according to the Urban Institute.

After decades of lending discrimination, advocates worked to get passed the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977. This law encourages banks to offer mortgages to middle and low-income families. Today, nearly all banks meet the requirement of the law, despite the obvious and widening wealth gap. 

In 2021, the U.S. Department of Justice announced an initiative to combat redlining by working more closely with banks and states’ attorneys general to enforce fair lending laws.

Visit HUD.gov for Mississippi resources like an eviction prevention toolkit and more. Check out the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau for homebuyer resources or file a complaint. 

Louisiana

Most American infrastructure was built between the 1950s and 1970s, after neighborhoods were carved out by redlining. Oftentimes highways were built through redlined neighborhoods. Large complexes for government, universities, housing, and business were all built in redlined neighborhoods because the land is typically cheaper.  

For decades, development went on this way, packing large-scale and highly dense construction materials into previously redlined areas. These same areas are now known as “heat islands.” NASA says, “the urban heat island (UHI) effect occurs when non-vegetated surfaces trap heat during daylight hours, increasing the overall temperature of urbanized cities relative to adjacent rural areas.” 

In 2020, three researchers analyzed 108 US cities to see if the role of historic redlining has a relationship with intra-urban heat. They found that in nearly all cases, those redlined neighborhoods that have retained people of color and/or low-income, are hotter than their non-redlined counterparts. 

In 2021, Climate Central published a report ranking US cities with the most intense heat islands. New Orleans was ranked the worst heat island. The study rates the heat island from 5-9 degrees of intensity and Nola scored a scorching 8.9 degrees.

 

Intense heat islands exist in all parts of the country, from New York City to Houston to San Francisco. But those cities aren’t recovering from Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Ida.

 

Joshua Lewis is a research professor at Tulane University who set out to study the effects of Hurricane Katrina on the vegetation patterns in New Orleans.

If you’re interested, here are some ways you can help reduce heat islands.

To his team’s surprise, flooding was less predictive than variables like wealth, race, housing recovery, and/or land abandonment. “A whole range of neighborhoods were hit by Katrina. They don’t all have equal access to [recovery], and that is what we see driving the type of vegetation emerging on these abandoned properties,” said Lewis. 

Abandoned properties typically have no upside, as revealed in Dayton. But vegetation and grass are permeable, which means they can provide a cooling effect. However, while these lots may be green, they are open invitations for invasive plants species and rodents—creating other problems entirely. 

Excessive heat worsens air pollution and can increase the likelihood of heat stroke or dehydration, especially in vulnerable populations; including anyone who works outside or lacks adequate cooling mechanisms. Southerners certainly can handle the heat, but as the global temperature rises, without mitigation efforts like planting trees or whitewashing roads and roofs, heat islands will get worse.

Redlining is a well-studied public policy that shows its consequences in our everyday lives.

It’s important to remember that not all Black Americans live in poverty or redlined neighborhoods; and that the negative consequences affect everyone.

• • low-income (less than $52k/year for 3) has fallen 7%
  • middle-income ($52-$156k/year for 3) has risen 1%
  • high-income (more than $156k/year for 3) has risen 7% 

“Black poverty remains egregiously disproportionate to that of White and Asian Americans; but fewer Black Americans are poor than 50 years ago, and more than twice as many are rich,” wrote Elijah Anderson in his 2023 Atlantic article.

Those gains are a result of different public policies, which oftentimes come from advocates and citizens working toward positive change. There are many ways to correct the imbalance and inequity created by redlining like increasing black homeownership and wealth through tax reform and carefully designed neighborhood development.

 

One national advocacy organization is the National Low Income Housing Coalition. They provide state-by-state housing data and advocacy information. Their policy priorities include tax credit reforms, the Eviction Crisis Act, more affordable housing funding in the federal budget, and more.

You can advocate for change by being in touch with your elected representatives. You can join federal or state advocacy efforts, or both, by becoming familiar with what legislation is currently being considered and how you can help it become law.