Where do Chicago’s Middle-Class African-Americans Live
A couple of weeks ago, University of Chicago grad student Daniel Hertz (who blogs about segregation and Chicago community issues at City Notes), wrote an editorial for Crain’s Chicago Business where he used demographic data to look at where middle-class African-Americans live. The first map looks at the total number of middle-class African-Americans in each community area, but as Hertz himself noted, it’s kind of limiting, since it tells the total number of the population rather than what proportion of the population they make up.
Which is why he created a second map.
The map doesn’t label the community areas, so if you don’t know what they are atop of your head, here is the wikipedia guide.
50 Percent And Higher
The results are interesting for a number of reasons. First, there’s only one community area where the middle-class African-American population exceeds 50 percent. As recently as the early 2000s, people would probably assume it would be Chatham. But what was once one of South Side’s few solidly middle-class neighborhoods has been struggling as of late. Plus, its population has shifted as more working and poor residents have been moving in, attracted to its safety and stability.
So instead, the only African-American community area that’s more than 50 percent middle class is now Calumet Heights, which is made up of of middle-class Pill Hill and the more working-class Calumet Heights neighborhood. While the community area has seen an upswing of problems it never had to grapple with before, I would still peg it as more safe than not.
40-50 Percent
Next, we have the community areas that are 40-50% black middle class. And that’s where things get interesting. We have Avalon Park - a triangle-like community area that is similar to Calumet Heights in a lot of ways. We have Washington Heights - a community area that I would peg as more working-class than middle-class. It grapples with crime and half-abandoned commercial corridors, but it’s safer than a lot of the neighborhoods to the north and east of it.
But then, we have Roseland - a community area that is known for high crime and poverty. Which, suffice to say, surprised me. But the folks the Sixth Ward blog (one of my go-to sources for community-level perspective on that part of the South Side) suggest that Roseland is more complex than the stereotypes would suggest, and that many neighborhoods on the north side of the community area are safer and more well-off than popular impressions suggest. And it does have a pretty cool-sounding doughnut shop. I still haven’t really explored the area yet - though I keep meaning to - so I don’t have any personal impressions.
And finally, there is West Pullman. Unlike Roseland, this community area was more working-class than middle-class historically. It was devastated by deindustrialization, and it has to deal with high levels of pollution on top of crime, poverty and commercial disinevestment. Yet at least 40 percent of the residents are middle-class African-Americans.
I got nothing.
30-40 Percent
Looking at the community areas which are 30-40% black middle class, there are some obvious ones, but some unexpected communities also made the list. Douglas and Grand Boulevard community areas make up Bronzeville, which has seen some significant redevelopment during the real estate bubble as Stateway Gardens, Robert Taylor Homes and other public housing developments came down and mixed income housing took their place. There was also been a lot of new housing built along Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard (the area’s main thoroughfare) and areas near Illinois Institute of Technology.
During the first half of the 20th century, Bronzeville has been a political and cultural center of the African-American community (and home to a vast majority of it). As far back as the 1980s, many middle-class African Americans have been trying to return Bronzeville to its former glory. The movement gained a lot of traction during the height of the real estate bubble, but since then… Not much has happened. And some of initiatives that did get off the ground were mired in corruption.
Which is a long way of saying that I’m not surprised that those community areas have a sizable black middle-class population, but I’m also not surprised that it’s not larger.
I am a bit surprised to see that Kenwood is in this group. Whereas black gentrification efforts in Bronzeville came in fits and starts, Kenwood’s black gentification was far more successful. Just to give you an idea of how successful, President Barack Obama’s Chicago home is located on Kenwood/Hyde Park border. I honestly would have expected Kenwood’s figures to be in the 40-50%
Much further south, Burnside and Pullman are more working-class than middle-class, but the community areas are safer than most, and many parts are quite appealing (especially the mixed-race historic Pullman neighborhood). Chatham is also in this category, which, again, is not surprising. Morgan Park has been a black community for almost as long as Bronzeville, and the western half in particular is known as more middle-class than working class.
Ashburn is an interesting one. Unlike pretty much all community areas I listed so far, it isn’t majority African-American. Since the 60s, Scottsdale neighborhood has been mostly white, Wrightwood has been largely black and Ashburn (which is located between the two) has been more of a mixed-race neighborhood people tend to assume the entire community is. But regardless of the actual demographics, the community is working-class and fairly safe - so, again, I can see the appeal for middle-class residents. The fact that Metra’s SouthWest Service provides a fairly quick link between the community’s neighborhoods and downtown Chicago surely doesn’t hurt, either.
But as with the previous group, there are some communities that surprised me. Auburn-Gresham is infamous for violence and crime - though, as a recent South Side Weekly article notes, the community is not entirely without its charms. And, once again, I have to note that I never explored this community myself, so I don’t have my own impression. Greater Grand Crossing is also not the most obvious candidate, but there have been several innovative efforts to revive the traditionally working-class community. The Dorchester Project arts collaborative seeks to bring art to the community and get the residents involved. (I visited it last year - it’s really quite fascinating). And for almost two decades, millionaire Gary Comer has been trying to revitalize Pocket Town - a section of Greater Grand Crossing he grew up in - to very mixed results.
Middle Class African-Americans in Mostly White Neighborhoods
In his editorial, Hertz also included a third map - a map that looks at what percentage of African-Americans living in a given community areas are middle-class. While the results aren’t too different from the previous map for neighborhoods that are majority African-American, it gives us a better sense of how many African-Americans settling in mostly white neighborhoods are middle-class.
And there is some interesting information there, too. The sad fact of the matter is, when African-Americans move in mostly white neighborhoods, white residents tend to worry that they are poor and thus “ghetto.” The map reinforces that this is usually not the case - quite the opposite. If you look at which community areas have black population that is over 80% middle class, you realize that most of them are overwhelmingly white. That includes Jefferson Park, Clearing and Dunning, where black population is in single digits and, in case of the first two, has significant Polish-American populations. Archer Heights is another one, and while it has been mostly Polish-American until the early 2000s, it has seen Mexican-Americans move in at ever-larger numbers. (And even now, it’s black population is below 1%).
Looking at 60-80% community areas, we have Beverly, which is mostly white (and significantly Irish), but whose black population stands in 35%. Since the 70s, the community has been encouraging middle-class residents of all races to move in, as part its rather creative (and ultimately successful) attempt to avert White Flight and blockbusting. We also have nearby Mt Greenwood, those black population stands at 5% - and it’s one of those communities on the edge of the city that’s populated by more well-off city workers who would love to live in the suburbs but can’t do to residential restrictions. The Forest Glen community area falls into the same category - and its black population is under 1%. Finally, there’s Avondale - the traditionally Polish-American, working-class neighborhood that has seen some gentrification and whose black population stands at 3%.
Looking at the 40-60% community areas, you get gentified and gentrifying North Side community areas like Lincoln Square, North Center and Irving Park. You get Albany Park and West Ridge - traditional ports of entry for immigrants that have also seen some gentrification (which makes me wonder if some of the African-Americans included in the statistic for those neighborhoods are actually immigrants from African countries ). You get the Loop and the gentrified South Loop (which lost a pretty decent chunk of its overall black population over the last 15 years). You get Southwest Side communities which have traditionally been majority white (mostly Polish and otherwise Slavic), but which have become increasingly Mexican-American over the past 15 years - West Lawn, West Elston and Brighton Park (Garfield Ridge is majority white at the moment, but current demographic trends suggest that, give it another 10-20 years and it will be majority Mexican-American). There’s also Hegewisch, which is located on the southeast end of the city is and is in the similar position as Garfield Ridge. And finally, there’s Hyde Park, which has been mixed-race ever since the University of Chicago undertook an enormous project to make the neighborhood integrated and mostly middle-class as a way to avoid white flight and disinvestment.
But what interests me about that map is what isn’t on it. Uptown has the largest African-American population of all North Side community areas - yet its middle-class African-American population is below 20 percent. Edgewater and Rogers Park also have larger than average black populations (though, given their roles as traditional ports of entry, there is once again the question of how many of them are African-Americans and how many of them are immigrants), but their middle-class numbers are 20-40%. I was honestly surprised that Rogers Park’s number is smaller than nearby West Ridge’s which has smaller black population.
In Conclusion
So what is the takeaway from all this?
In my experience, middle-class residents don’t want to live in neighborhoods that have higher-than-average crime, poverty and other issues - unless they feel like being urban pioneers/want to jump on the gentrification trend. Clearly, that’s not the case with Chicago’s African-American residents. I have to wonder why that is. Neighborhood loyalty? Community connections? Desire to support/improve African-American communities that have seen better days? Some lingering legacy of segregation? Not wanting to deal with suspicion/hostility from white people?
Somebody needs to find out.
Whatever the case may be, Hertz’ maps make it plainly obvious that not everybody who lives on the South Side is poor and/or criminal. Not even in the neighborhoods that are best known for crime and poverty.
I’ve written before about the South Side Stigma, where businesses are reluctant to invest in all neighborhoods south of Cermak Road even when the neighborhoods where crime is low. But what this underscores is that there are plenty of communities where residents have the means - and desire - to shop for decent goods, eat in decent restaurants and generally spend their money. That there are local residents that have the experience and skills businessses can tap into. Some places are safer than others (much safer, in some cases), but the market is there, waiting to be tapped.
Besides - it’s very easy to dismiss neighborhoods when you think they are just crime-ridden hellholes. But when a piece like that comes along and reveals that they are a lot more complicated than that, such attitudes become harder to justify.