Residents of a historically Black neighborhood in west Baltimore filed a complaint this week asking federal officials to investigate whether the city's redevelopment policies are violating fair housing laws by disproportionately displacing Black and low-income residents to make way for so-called urban renewal projects.
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“I lost everything,” Banks told The Associated Press. “It’s like we had no voice. We could make noise, but nobody would hear us.”During a recent visit to the neighborhood, Banks stepped cautiously through an unsecured back door and peered inside the house, wondering aloud whether squatters had moved in. Her eyes settled first on the marbled vinyl floor tiles she installed herself many years ago.
“Baltimore has long been a tale of two cities,” said Marceline White, executive director of Economic Action Maryland, which joined Banks in filing the complaint and organized a news conference Monday in Poppleton. Then came Baltimore’s so-called “Highway To Nowhere,” which was designed to connect the downtown business district to interstates surrounding the city. Officials used eminent domain to demolish nearly 1,000 homes in the 1960s and ’70s, cutting a swath through majority-Black west Baltimore and severing ties between Poppleton and other nearby communities.
In 2015, the city agreed to partially subsidize the Poppleton redevelopment project. That was after officials tried to terminate their agreement with the developer, citing a lack of progress, but the company sued and won. Most displaced residents have been offered financial assistance. Banks said she didn’t initially qualify because her landlord sold the property voluntarily, but the city later gave her compensation she used to pay off debts.
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