Hometown Blues (due to structural racism)
When the pandemic hit, Mission Capital followed the example of many nonprofits in the nation; and gave up its physical office. Staff were able to work remotely from anywhere in the state of Texas, but most MC staff still live in the city of Austin. Nevertheless, it is common for any city community to spend their entire life – maybe even several generations- not fully understanding the history of that place.
In order to paint a more comprehensive picture of systemic racism in our city, Mission Capital created the Austin’s Compounding Structural Racism workshop. We recently updated this offering from a two-hour to a three-hour learning opportunity, so we could expand the topics we explore, go deeper into some of them, and make the session more interactive. But, at its core, the course hasn’t changed, it is designed to illustrate through a historical perspective how structural and systemic racism has become infused across our society today.
Since its inception, Austin has been a haven for many. However, it has also been a place where discrimination and violence have ruined innocent lives. In this blog, we will name two ways that persisting structural inequities exist in the city, and are better contextualized in the class.
Gentrification
Austin is not the only city in the United States to face increasing levels of gentrification. According to a 2019 report by The National Community Reinvestment Coalition, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, San Diego, and New York City all rank for high levels of gentrification.
So what is gentrification?
On the surface, it takes many forms. Sometimes, it’s a welcome one, where old buildings get a much-needed upgrade. Other times, it is when a section of town that has been a hub for historically marginalized communities is replaced with higher-income people, usually white, who inadvertently displace their neighbors. The latter form is usually intentional by the structural design of cities, policies, and redlining.
Have you ever noticed that most of the Black population lives in East Austin? One of the reasons is because of gentrification, and it has more consequences than you might think. It can culminate in racial tension, lack of necessary services such as water sanitation, and longer commutes to high-paying workplaces.
In Austin, gentrification means that while the overall population grew between 2000 and 2010, there was a 5.4 decrease in the Black population. After all, why give your talents and time to a city that only allows you the barest and most unfulfilling opportunities, no matter how hard you work?
In order to equitably diversify, cities must offer the same housing, schooling, and employment opportunities to all residents, but gentrification means that marginalized communities are often shuffled around to unkept, low-income communities where successful prospects are scarcer.
According to the NCRC (National Community Reinvestment Coalition):
“Gentrification is controversial because it affects people at the neighborhood level, it can disrupt the familiar and established ties of a place, creating a disorienting new locale. For people displaced as the neighborhood becomes unaffordable, this is more than just nostalgia or discomfort with the unfamiliar. Often, they must accept longer commutes and a disruption of the support structures provided by their old neighbors and family. In these cases, gentrification is understood as the terminal stage of exclusion of minority (usually black) residents from affordable housing inside the city.”
Photo by JC Gellidon on Unsplash
Healthcare System
The racial disparities in the healthcare system could be a blog itself.
Treatment of pregnant women, mental health care, access to nutritious food, and safe drinking water - all of these issues land in the bottom tier of basic human needs. However, the U. S’s long history of discrimination in the medical field - whether it be in research methodologies, recruitment of staff, or implicit bias in recovery - has made it so these essential needs are skewed in favor of some over others.
Austin, like most of the United States, suffers the effects of this as well. The NIH (National Institute for Health) has reported for decades that racially marginalized communities are more likely to suffer from heart disease, depression, and hypertension yet accessibility to health services in predominantly Black and brown communities is lacking. In Austin, health insurance is paramount for a thriving community. However, according to the City of Austin open data,
“…the lowest percentage of health insurance coverage occurs among Hispanics (55.2%) compared to whites (89%), blacks/African Americans (75.2%), and other race/multiracial adults (77%).”
Like gentrification, this disparity affects not only the city’s chances of diversifying and thus growing in scope, size, and talent, but it negatively impacts the economic stability of those already living here.
How much money would you invest in your community if you were constantly afraid that a physical emergency would pop up any minute?
If no one near you has health insurance, how would you know the importance of it, much less how to obtain it or choose a plan that works for you?
As stated by the NIH (National Institute for Health):
“In addition to SRD’s direct effects on access to opportunities and resources, it affects psychological health. SRD in the forms of societal-level conditions, societal norms, and institutional policies that create and sustain disadvantage are risk factors for poor physical and mental health conditions.”
Learn More, Do More
June Jordan, prolific poet and organizer, once wrote, “…and the ones who stood without sweet company will sing and sing back into the mountains and if necessary even under the sea. We are the ones we have been waiting for.”
Although Mission Capital staff are scattered across Texas, our original community is and remains Austin. There are numerous ways that structural racism makes an appearance in everyday life, but that is also why Mission Capital is determined to address equity with our fellow nonprofits. It is often the smaller organizations on the ground, in the communities, that make swift and long-lasting change.
Austin’s Compounding Structural Racism is one way that we try to illuminate why Austin continues to struggle with intimate and stubborn problems along racial lines. With this knowledge, we hope that community members and nonprofits will be better equipped to positively impact the city of Austin.
Register for our upcoming sessions here.
You can also check out more initiatives to address these issues taken by nonprofits and the City of Austin below. Maybe they need another brilliant mind to help even the scales? Maybe we are the ones we’ve been waiting for, and the answers are at the tip of our own brilliance.
Sounds about right, don’t you think?