Repairing Past Harm: Do Designers and Planners Have a Role?

Our usual date and time, if we have a black urbanist journey, to an accessible queer feminist future with Christian Jeffers. And the following week we have an author's form on, with Seth Kaplan, who is the author of Fragile Neighborhoods. Go to CNN. Org slash resources slash on the park bench for upcoming webinars. And to sign up. And of course, join seeing you or renew your [email protected] you. Dot org slash memberships. And of course, go to Public Square or see a new journal for news. And commentary on the urbanism field, WWW. cnu.org slash public square. Today we feature a presentation of the harm inflicted on black communities by the planning profession and what we can do about it. We're gonna be recreating a main stage presentation from CNU, 31 in Charlotte. And. so, we're gonna, have that, that was, not recorded but was a very popular presentation. We're trying to bring it to a larger audience. So Mitchell Silver is a professional planner who is a former New York City parks commissioner and has held many positions of honor in the field such as President of the American Planning, Planning Association, President of the American Institute of Certified Planners. He's had a long and distinguished career. He's a member of Cnu's board of directors. Mallory botches, seeing you president will be the interviewer and moderator for this session. Mallory has 25 years of international work in urban planning and community development. And a wealth of experience in nonprofit leadership and she's coming to us today from Detroit where she's at the Better Cities Film Festival. I'm Rob Studeville, editor of C News Public Square. First, there's going to be a presentation followed by brief discussion between Mitch and Mallory and then Q&A from the audience. Please use the Q&A function to Zoom to ask your questions as they occur to you. And now I am going to pass this along. Too much. If I can. Okay. Are we good? Yes, we are. Okay. Well, good afternoon and good morning everyone depending on where you are in this country is certainly a pleasure. To be with you and as Rob stated, this is a. Main stage presentation I gave along with Marcus King and Charlotte. So you will see a reference to Charlotte to front end but right now I'm in Raleigh on North Carolina. This was a conversation as part of code reform. And so was my privilege both Marcus and I to to share our perspective. About why does important address code reform. But the real question is, you know, as we look at a lot of past harm, what is the role of planners and designers? And so this was something that I spent about a year working on and have some practical tools that people can explore and so I certainly look forward to your questions. So since I wasn't Charlotte, it was very important. That since addressing past Harvey must acknowledge what happened in the past. I wanted to begin today by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land on which we gathered today. We were in Charlotte for centuries, a land known as Charlotte was home to and cared for by Native peoples. These include the Qatar, the chihuahua, the sugary, the watery, and the waxar people. We commit to honouring their history, presence and future. We also acknowledge the unjust practices and harm imposed on the slave people and generations of black Americans who reside or resided on the land. The reason why I bring this up. Is that there is this neighborhood called Brooklyn Village in Charlotte. It's located in the second ward. And the Brooklyn neighborhood was predominantly black community at Thrive. As really a sustainable town within the town of Charlotte. But during the 19 sixties and 70, s Brooklyn was raised in Charlottes first wave of urban renewal displacing thousands of neighborhood residents that ultimately destroyed more than 1,400 structures. The reason why I call that out is where we met in Charlotte. Literally, we were right next to the Brooklyn neighborhood. So as people were enjoying the conference and walking through the streets nearby, our venue site wanted to say exactly that there was a neighborhood here that no longer exists. And so it's important that we recognize the places that we resided while it looks great actually did create some past harm. And in fact, the people walked out of the building, they would literally see a sign called East Brooklyn Village, which was a remnant of what used to be there. So it's very important that as we plan for places we have got to understand the history because there are still people that have memories of the Brooklyn village and we can't just start from scratch we have to have conversations about the places we plan and design for because people are still holding these very harmful and painful memories. Now as was stated, I served as both president of the American Planning Association. And the American Institute of Certified Planners. And what is always important to me is I always like to look at the ethics of our professional organizations. It gives us our sense of purpose by establishing these aspirational values and of course rules of conduct. And throughout my career, I always looked at the code of ethics. It gave me my purpose. It told me what I was supposed to do. And I was so gratified that a few years ago, we decided to double down and actually make a pledge about how we're going to conduct ourselves as professionals. Now I'm sure Maller will tell you but CNU is now embarking on taking a fresh look at their charter and equity and diversity and inclusion is part of that effort. But it's very important that we make this pledge that we communicate to the public, what do we stand for? You know, what are our values? And so for me, that is critically important. The reason why I say this, we are going through an amendment process and so is open to the public to submit amendments to the charter. But before that happened in September of 2018 the board wanted to take a stand and see an you. It wasn't put into the charter, but they did say the promise of the charter is that can only be fulfilled by identifying and confronting exclusionary policies. Practices and behaviors empowering those that have the most affected and committing ourselves to accelerating actions and strategies that foster more inclusive communities. So it is our hope that as we have this conversation, this very powerful language adopted by the board. Could find its way as part of the amended charter. But I want to know shift gears to the American Institute of Certified Planners. As I told you, it gave me the passion, the courage, the inspiration to address issues. So I'm not going to go through all the principles, but there was one that really moved me as a very young professional. And that one that we needed to recognize as planners, our unique responsibility to eliminate historic patterns of inequity. Tied to playing decisions represented documents such as zoning ordinances and land use plans. And moreover that we as plants need to recognize and work to mitigate the impacts of existing plans and procedures that result in tennis of discrimination, displacement, and environmental justice. I used that as a rallying cry and when I go into a neighborhood I have these all top of mind. So whether it's a canvas plan or a massive plan or zoning changes will look very carefully at what these documents say. So we can create a better path going forward. So this term repairing past harm really comes out of the term reparations. A lot of people have a very visceral reaction when you hear that word, but I just want to do a very quick overview of reparations in the United States. To be clear to a system of redress or egregious injustices and this is not foreign to the United States. Native Americans had received land and billions of dollars through various programs and treaties because they were forcibly exiled from their native lands. Japanese Americans receive 1.5 billion. They were paid for those that were interred during World War II. United States through the Marshall Plan helped to ensure Jews receive reparations from the Holocaust. And then 1952 West Germany agreed to pay 3.5 billion Deutsche marks to Holocaust survivors. But the main point is that black Americans enslaved people are the only groups that have not received reparations from state, sanction, discrimination. Now a lot of my friends and I have this conversation like saying, wait a minute. That did not happen under my watch. Why are you playing to me to address or repair these past harms? The only way I can make this clear comparison is that I want to look at toxic dumps. Some of you may remember love canal. This was a company that dumped, 22,000 tons of toxic waste on a site in Buffalo. They buried it and then sold the land to the city for a dollar. And a city developed it and about 25 years later in fact let me go to that slide the hooker found chemical company in 1,953 they covered up the earth and sold to the city for a dollar and 25 years later, 82 different compounds and 11 of them suspected of parcogens started to leach in base bins and schoolyards and backyards, they created devastating harm to this community. Now, 25 years later, the planners and the mayor who were there today said, I wasn't here 25 years ago when the hooker chemical company dumped all this stuff. So I don't have any application to clean it up. Wrong. You're here now. And that toxic dump is now creating harm to the community. The question is, what do you do? Now, clearly the company was fined over 100 million dollars to clean it up. Because we had an obligation to address the past harm even though we weren't here when that harm was created. And so the tacity is not just caused by hazardous waste. But it's also caused by centuries of hazardous systemic racism. No, you weren't here when people were enslaved. No, you may not have been here when it was harsh Jim Crow laws, but you're here now. And the question is, you let that toxicity affect our neighborhoods or do you have an obligation to repair past harm? We can go the landscape across America and in fact we all know that some of the bills that the president is issuing to kind of knit together and connect neighbors destroyed by highways and urban null. For example, Mallory is in Detroit. Black bottom in Detroit neighbor was destroyed to make way for the I. 75 and the I 375 quarter these were thriving black communities that were destroyed by highways and urban renewal plants, something the Congress of new urbanism has at the top of their list of priority to help stitch, not just the urban fabric, but these neighborhoods to together. When I taught school, graduate school in New York City, almost every student when it was time to do their paper wants to talk about the Cross-bronx Expressway. Robert Moses way of moving traffic through New York City, but literally destroyed neighborhoods. Till this day, there are families that talk about how this destroyed their lives by just taking away buildings. The livelihood, the culture, what people knew and where they played in the street, there are still effects today. And to go further and I was very intrigued as I as Rob posted or C and you posted this presentation, my good friend Joe Manicosey who I'm sure you all know is doing a lot of research on this wealth gap and he share with me some slides about the lost wealth in a lot of places in South Carolina and North Carolina. But this whole thing about the 40 acres to the mule, which was a way of, I guess, attempt to address reparations. That was overturned some years later. But to think about the value of the 40 eighth in the mule had it continued. This would have enriched those homeowners 640 billion dollars today That's the wealth that was lost from those 40,000 free slaves because their property was taken back and given to others. In fact, and this is from Bloomberg News, slaves or enslaved people lost an estimated 20.3. Trillion, not 1 billion, trillion dollars in lost wages for their labor. So this country was built on 20 trillion dollars. Of free labor. That is devastating harm and we have to be sensitive to that. And then Brookings Institute did a study and they estimated black own homes are undervalued by 23% for a total of 156,000,000,000,000,000 of lost wealth. In the United States. Joe is doing it city by city or town by town. So again, reach out to him if you want to find out more about his work. United States have really struggled to deal with this issue of past talk, particularly when it comes to black Americans. . 40 was first introduced in Congress in 1,989 and proposals to create a federal commission just to study. Just a study reparations and recommend some remedies. And in 117 congress that was the last one introduced the bill again in 2,019 It failed. And so that bill, that one bill, just a study. The impact of past harm has been stalled for 30 years. But on the local level, we have a lot of state and local governments that are stepping up to address past harm. I'll go through a couple of what they're doing. The only state doing it right now that studying it is California and you can see all the other cities on a local level that are trying to find a way of addressing and repairing this past harm. And let me add, I'd say about half of the work that I'm doing today are clients looking to in some way address the past harm. Those are projects that are near and dear to my heart and I'm actually pursuing. So California in 2,020 became the first state in the country to establish a state reparations task force. Nearly 2 years later, the panel released its first report last month outlining the state's involvement in slavery and how it continues to harm black Americans. Evanston, what they're doing there is that they're the city gave 16 black residents 25,000 each to put toward a down payment on a home mortgage or home repair this payout was intended to make up for discriminatory housing practices. Black residents experience between, 1,919. In. A city where I worked. They created a reparations commission in March of 2022. And their goal is to have a commission that will help repair the damage caused by public and private systemic racism. In St. Paul, Minnesota, the city apologized for its role in institutional and structural racism experienced by black residents. In this case, they had an advisory committee that is going to establish a framework for a reparations commission. Valerie again, she's in a great place right now, Detroit. Detroit, the city's new task was a result of a ballot initiative. That was passed by Detroit residents during the November, 2,021 election when more than 80% of the traitors turned out and supported the creation of a task force focus on housing and economic development programs and this 13 member body will research harm done to Detroiters through slavery and systemic racism, practices of the past. And also the present. And in New England we have Amherst. In this case, the town council approve the creation of a fund to allocate 2 million in reparations over the course of a decade. A firming the town of Amherst's commitment to end structural racism and achieve racial equity for black Americans. So to understand our past harm, the question is do planners and designers have a role? To address. Repairing past harm. Clearly, we do not have the ability to create legislation or appoint a commission or a task force. But we as planners and designers, whether an APA or CNU, we must acknowledge and recommend how to repair past harm because the implications. Are still with us today. And so you all know another term for repairing past harm is also called restorative justice. We all know some of these urban planning practices. Some of my colleagues said sprawl was damaging. Yeah, it was. But to many black Americans and people of color, there were other issues that really created harm. Redlining, segregation, urbanule plans, use of eminent domain, public policy, restrictive covenants, I can go on and on. Homeowners associations. Uneven code enforcement. So these are just this is not even a full list but a partial list of some of those unjust planning practices both past and present that we have to be cognitive of. Now, I was very privileged to attend the California AP Diversity Summit. Was just blew me away they introduced something I knew about a lot of people in the audience did not know about about the existence of sundown towns. There was actually a cure code that you could scan to find out the sundown towns in your state. If you don't know what it is, if you were black caught in any town or rural area when the sun went down, basically you could have been killed. And so they wanted to make sure that they were the first in California to recognize the history of sundown towns and wanted to make sure that they understood the impact. What was so powerful about this conference is that they outlined for me in a way that just crystallized. You know, what's the first step? To really repairing past harm. And it's quite simple. Is to acknowledge. Is to apologize. And that is to a toll. Now there are many places that are now doing land acknowledgements and they're acknowledging the past harm. You also see some places as you saw from some of the seas I share with you will apologize for the home created but then the atone part. That's where the rubber hits the road and that's where it becomes very difficult. It's not just monetary. Reparations. There were different things planners and designers could recommend as they do their work. So Glendale confronted it as racist past and they apologized. They publicly apologize for the sundown laws that exist in Glendale. Even though it did occur in many other towns and villages and cities in California. And then with the unanimous passage of a resolution, Spartanburg apologized to black residents. So you see this movement happening across the country of places really want to confront their very dark past even though they weren't present at the time recognizing that that harm created that toxicity. If it wasn't cleaned up, still exist in many of these underserved communities. And so this is a list and I want you to pay class very close attention to. Here are some of the recommendations as a beginning for plants and designers they should do. Apologize at the beginning of a public engagement process. Believe it or not when I I'll show you a project shortly in Texas where I start the meeting apologizing to the residents for the harm created. By the plant profession. I apologize. They looked at me. I said, what did you just say? It changed the entire tone of the meeting because I acknowledged that we don't always get it right, but in the past. The plant profession did very, very painful things as this community and we're not just gonna let it go under the rug. We're going to talk about it. I also recommend that we actually conduct the study to understand the implications of past harm so we can avoid them in the future because we didn't just address past harm. We should avoid creating any new harm. And so it's important to have those conversations. Undertaking equity audit. Use fairness as a new methodology for making decisions. Protect sacred sites and buildings. In many black communities or communities of color. It's not just the architecture, it's not just the design, it's the memories, it's the experiences. That took place in these places and spaces and buildings. And we need to understand it and acknowledge it. In fact, in Oklahoma City, CN you had a legacy project to help preserve the Jewel theater Those are one of those sacred sites. There meant a lot to the community. Every other building in that era demolished, but the Jewel theater remained and now there's this ongoing effort to restore the Jewel Theatre as a way to catalyze development in that part of Oklahoma City. Suggest tack release, tax relief for vulnerable areas. This is hitting directly to the fear of gentrification. Can this be done? Canada's taxes remain stable so people are not forced out of where they live. Allow hermanuel air as sunset. When I was playing director, we couldn't change state law, but we allowed those urbano plans just to sunset. So and we work with the community to co-create a plan for the future rather than a tool that can, domain could be used to take their property. And then finally, listen with empathy. What am I doing? I was privileged to write the afterward for a book that's coming out in January call planning, afterward for a book that's coming out in January, called Planning and Designing with Empathy. And the reason why I say empathy is that as planets and designers, we must attain the ability to understand how other people feel. In a situation from their point of view. And not our own. And so that's something that's critically important. And so this whole book, Empathy Design, is really trying to understand our perspectives and how to create these inclusive spaces. So I mentioned to you that this is the place this is in Denton, Texas. It's in the Dallas, Fort Worth Metro area. And we were hired to come up with an Arab plan because it was a lot of harm to this community and the city in Texas recognized as something they had to do. This was this predominantly block area called Quaker. It was right next to downtown, very affluent. You can see from the map, this was a very well affluent community during this time. The community was raising money for war bots and so the white community was losing its wealth. And no one went to the black community and so they were able to reinvest and you can see from the photos it was very thriving. But this also intersected with the rise of the Ku Klux Klan in Texas. They were very troubled by the existence of this very well-to-do black community right next to downtown. And because they got experience raising money for war bonds, they started raising money for park bonds and decided to remove this community all the residents and they created a park. Here is the park today not most black residents do not code to this park because of the painful memories that it creates. And during our public meetings, they kept saying, we don't want another Quaker town. There are still people alive today that have memories of what happened in Quaker town. They're older now, but they were younger when everyone was asked to move and celebrating this one hundredth year this year. So this is something that we're working through in Denton, Texas. I was hired by the city of Ashville, to come up with a plan for the Pack Square Plaza. This is the Vance Monument. He was a governor who was a slave owner was known as a white supremacist and right after Black Lives Matter the residents started to demand that this monument come down. The black residents never felt comfortable in this space because of that monument. And so the county and city agreed to take the monument down. You know, saying when it was dismantled, sometime in 2022. And so they wanted to come up with a plan and there's the base that's remaining is now in North Carolina Supreme Court because some residents want the monument back. But our goal was to create a space for healing. For unity, a social gathering place where everyone feels welcome. And so that project was just completed actually last week and it was approved by the City Council. But what was meaningful about this was with a community conversations. They were difficult to hear. We had to really understand the importance of the harm that was created. And spent a lot of time in focus groups and listening sessions. And I'll never forget the moment where we had to stop the meeting because there's one woman who was white, her father owned a supermarket. And it was set on fire. It was in the black community and the firefighters in Ashville would not go to that supermarket to put up the market to put out the fire. And it was all the black residents that came to her father's aid to put it out. And so in that moment, it was emotional. I had to stop the meeting, throw at the agenda because this woman put back her father was part of the people who put out the fire or right there started hugging. It was this moment of intense unity. And that's the magic of when you listen and talk about some of that harm. It was painful. Her father was Jewish, which could have added to some of the problems. But the bottom line is it was a very powerful moment of seeing this community come together. And so for us, the engagement was so critical to this process. You could read some of the things. It came from the community and informed the design process and so for us it was important to create new spaces in the plaza, specific engagement, expression, storytelling, oral history, public art, and we show some present images in the upper left hand corner it was how we're going to redesign the space. But more importantly, we wanted to reposition this underused space in from the Biltmore building as a meditation growth that people can go and start the healing process. And so that's what we shared with them. So I do wanna pivot now as I close to the importance of the policy guide. I'm so proud that in 2,023. The American Planck Association released a policy guide on zoning for equity. And so this is available to you. You can just Google it and download it as a PDF. And you see right here the table and contents. I have to say how proud I was as a planner that APA took this on to really give a tool. For planners and designers and those that are doing co-reform on what you need to look at if you want to now design not just for form and for use and for roads and now design not just for form and for use and for roads and sidewalks, not just for form and for use and for roads and sidewalks, but about equity. And so this is pretty powerful. And for use and for roads and sidewalks, but about equity. And so this is pretty powerful. They broke it up to 3 parts. One that deals with equity in the rules, equity in the people, and then equity in the map. And so all that is described in that report that you can download. It gets into very distinct areas about zoning, form and design, use regulations, development standards. I think we all know that right now a big issue being discussed is home occupation use. That could be very difficult, for certain communities about what they allow, how many unrelated individuals can live in one home. So really start to unpack these rules. Why were they intended to be there and how we can reform them and change them going forward. And in terms of people, make sure the composition of our zoning commissions are reflected community, avoid overcomplicated regulations. As we all know, too many regulations can drive up the cost of housing. And if we truly want to have attainable and affordable housing. We need to look carefully at our regulations. And then a big issue we hear is notification. A lot of places of color are very upset about the notification process. It's not too far, not enough. They're not engaged. And then these developments happen without their knowledge. And so there's a lot of pushback. And so each day governs the distance from 400 to 800 to one. Even if there's a cemetery in between people do not get notified and so really rethink our notification process. So people are most affected can be part of the process. And then of course, zoning maps. Make them more land available for the right. Development, remove disparities. And also have fewer inclusionary lines to make sure and that's something we all believe in that we have a much more mixed use districts. So as I wrap up, I want to share again when I set up front. These are our aspirational. Values, both as planners and as designers. So I don't have to repeat it. I said at the front end and also share with you again the statement from the board, which we hope we hope. Will now be part of the amendment, a charter amendment process that will be voted on in Cincinnati. So as I close, I really want you to embrace your sense of purpose. Your charter and values as designers and planners to design, plan, and code for the future, but also to address or repair past harm. I thank you for your time and now I look forward to Mallory's questions and then ultimately I get to hear from you the audience. Thank you all for much. Thank you so much, Mitch, for that. That was fantastic. And for folks who weren't in Charlotte or for those who were for CNU. 31 and got to hear this live on stage. It's a it's a conversation that I think you know I want to dive into some of the details of but I also think that It is an area that for many of us in our practice, we are continuing to learn and expand. How we deliver new urbanism where we are delivering these principles to whom you know whom is participating in that process. And so I'm really grateful for you to walk us through your your wisdom about how we need to think about that differently more expansively and and with a with more clarity on the harm that we are coming into repair in the first place. So I wanted to start off, you discussed the charter amendment process which we just launched on Monday and for folks that might be viewing this and haven't seen much of our communications we have we have put a full blast out about this and will continue to for the next 2 months. But seeing you the board of CNU has authorized this process for considering ways that the charter could be expanded, amended, you know, added to in a way to consider the fundamental principles of our work after 30 years since the charter was was first being drafted and so i wanted to ask you you know that question i sort of brought up about adding layers to our work or adding expanding our scope as new urban. We're adding expanding our scope as New Orleans to our work or adding expanding our scope as new urbanists. And I wonder if you could reflect a little bit on you know, the new urbanism is a movement, 30 plus years long. You have a, you know, incredible career spanning longer than that, sir. I, I wonder if you could reflect on how widely as we look at cities, we have come to learn more as professionals impacting the urban more as professionals impacting the urban realm and what you see as added learning we still need to do more as professionals impacting, the, urban realm and, what you see as added learning we still need to do. And it, you know, to me this sort of adds to what are the harms that we aren't currently considering that we need to, you know, continue to expand our understandings of and adapt our practice as a result. Let me just say, you know, we continue to evolve. There's no question the color of law was a game changer and it was a way of articulating the harm that a lot of people did not see. The book was well written. It was very specific to places and spaces we all recognize. You know, when I went to planning school, I was very upset when a call of law came out because I didn't know this when I was in planning school. I knew about urban nool. I knew about some other harms. But you know, he was able to put it all together in a way that we can see it. And so now young people coming out of school speak a very different language. And then a whole civil and social unrest, I give credit to the Gen Z population. Yes, that's keep up the momentum. It's not just about protest, is about staying active and seeing that change that really changed the conversation. And so reparations has been around for a long time. Repairing past hard has been a wrong time, but I think we're at that moment where people are now seeing the disparity growing between the rich and the poor. Affordable housing continues to be an issue. Homelessness keeps rising. And so we as plants and designers, we can ignore that as not a clean slate. We do have an obligation to be protectors. You know, I didn't share all of our code of ethics, but it's our job. It's not just about land use patterns, it's not just about the built environment, it's the people who exist there. And I see now there's more of a recognition of people that want to go beyond just the bricks, the mortar, but really look at the people that they're planning for. So I've seen that evolution in my career. And so for me, I'm just pleased that where we're going. I just want to make sure both all generations keep their foot on the gas pedal because there when you hear these stories about the past harm it makes me more determined. To do whatever I can to address the past harm, but also. Avoid making new heart. . Yeah, yeah, I think that's a great point and being willing and responsible to, you know, acknowledge that we are continuing to learn from our efforts. One thing I talked to a lot of Narbonous about is that this is a this is a movement of of innovation and you have to be mindful that that innovation is involving the lives of human beings, you know. Right, right. And like I said, I've, I love my new urbanist colleagues and we have this big debate about sprawl. Yes. Sprawl Heart is harmful, but it's a development pattern. I'm looking more at the harm, the lost wealth, you know, these amazing beautiful neighborhoods that were wiped away. Because we had to have a highway. It's not just stitching, you know, creating a boulevard from what a highway is. But what about the culture, the wealth, the activities? We have projects all over the country from Indiana to Detroit that's not just trying to stitch the urban fabric together, but trying to stitch the soul of community back together. Yeah. Well, so that's gonna lead me to another question that I have here in Detroit, as you mentioned. The along with the better cities film festival which is happening here this weekend which is why I'm here in conjunction with Sandy, Michigan and a whole lot of CNU affiliate organizations and and action groups. And so there's going to be a number of panel discussions associated with films. And one of those is, I was just this morning talking with films and one of those is I was just this morning talking with your CNU. 31 of those is I was just this morning talking with your your CNU, 31 co-presenter Marcus King and other CNU board member. He's here in Detroit and he's going to be on a panel talking about the the discussion around as you brought up interstate 3 75 and the removal of of that interstate that you know urban renewal project that separated. Massively separated portions of the city. And I wonder, you know, CNU has had, 8, publications of the freeways without features reports, which are great in elevating the need, the the need in local communities to remove these urban freeways, these urban highways that are have had such and continue to have such devastating consequences for the communities. But I wonder if you could talk a little bit about, you know, that idea of expanding our scope that it isn't just about taking the the monstrosity out. It's about the work that then comes on the other side of that to bring the community to truly restore the communities that were damaged and that's these are social issues, they're physical design, challenges, they are policy issues and I wonder if you could talk a little bit about when you look at these sorts of projects, you know, what you're looking for is key indicators of going beyond just the removal. Of the infrastructure that was problematic. Yeah, number one, I don't wanna put all the pressure on planets and designers. We have to have a multi disciplinary team. There were those out there, my good friend and Canada, Jay Pitter, that just did the Jamaica little Jamaica cultural district. You gotta reach out to the storytellers, Dr. Andrew Roberts who did the Texas Colony Project that know this work. And as we do this work, we have to bring in those. And in some cases, you need to bring in a therapist. Because some of these conversations are quite painful and the ability to talk about some of the past harm is and and those that help us heal. That is all part of the growth process, the rebuilding process. So look, we're talented planners and designers. But we have to start reaching out to those other professionals that will really understand what is going on. I often say I remember after Black Lives Matter all my allies say, what can I do? What can I do? What can I do? And I'm like saying, can you stop for a second? The first question you should ask is, how do I feel? Hmm. And asking how do I feel with empathy starts to understand what is the design process, what do we have to do as planners, we seem to have all these, you know, bike lanes and this and that. We have all the tools. That we could put in place. But are we listening first? And what's right for this community? What may happen in Kansas City may be different than Detroit. Maybe different than Oklahoma City. And so it has to be local. You need to have a multidisciplinary team, but there has to be a healing process not just to heal the fabric but also to heal the community. And so to me that's something I would recommend. Make sure you have a multi-disciplinary team that understands past harm and how do you plan a way forward. Yeah. Well, that sort of leads me into, I'm gonna jump into the QA. There are a lot of good questions here and one of these. Is not just about repairing the past investments but Brian Kelly said he'd love to hear more on what criterion might be for a fairness methodology for capital projects. So thinking about not creating more harm. Yeah. So in New York City, when I was commissioner, actually took the job because the mayor got me on that equity button. And the first thing we did, we came up basically with errors that were vulnerable, kind of a vulnerability index of neighborhoods. And then we did analysis to take a look at where investment occurred over 20 years. You can't hide those numbers and once we looked at it, it blew us away. Yeah. For some reason, of all of our investments, certain neighborhoods were just left out. Everyone pays taxes even if you pay rent. Yeah. You pay your taxes to your rent. How could it be after 20 years these places were neglected? So we do a capital plan. You certainly want to look a state of good repair. You want to look at growth. But equity in terms of making sure you're distributing those capital projects equally. And time was one consideration. In New York City, we looked at this continuum and there of our 2,000 parks, 10% had received any investment. In over 2 decades. And so that group went to the top of the list. Lot of people said that's not fair that's not fair equity means fairness and for us we look at how what was invested in various parts of the city. Yes, a lot of people want to invest in downtown because it's catalytic, but we also want to invest in quality neighborhoods to make them stable. And so it's not fair. That taxpayers and underserved communities are subsidizing places that are more affluent. So the first thing we do is we look at how capital dollars are distributed and for new capital plans or capital project us improvement plans, we want to make sure there's a criteria. In the decision-making that has fairness and distribution across the whole city is done fairly. Yeah. And I think that's an interesting, point to think about the New Orleans movement that we are there are many planners. I'm a certified planner. There there are a lot of folks working in the planning profession, but also a lot of other professions. Both in municipal governance but also in the private sector that are impacting these projects from a variety of angles. They may be contracted in to work on projects. They may be they may have oversight or need to work in concert, you know, someone from a Department of Transportation working in concert with someone from the Department of Planning in order to make sure that the the fairness is you know this is an intricate system embedding the fairness is a multilateral strategy. So I would, this is very easy to do. I remember there was one city council member. She heard me talk about this some years ago. Per city manager. Assistant A manager did the assignment. In the middle of the meeting once they saw where investment took place over 20 years he this county the assistant city manager apologized the council member because it was right there in plain sight. And he was blown away that the committee she represented. Really saw no investment. 20 years. You can imagine the hundreds of millions of dollars that everyone paid into the taxes. Okay. So the point I'm making is that using not just fairness, but fairness, data, good repair, there are other criteria if you need a new fire station because the response time needs to be improved. But equity fairness needs to be one of the criterion. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So this there's a there's a question here from Nick Rogers. Oh, hey, man. And Yeah, I like to I like to announce the names when I when I moderate these because oftentimes folks know who these questions are coming from. So Nick said, what do you recommend that communities consider for accounting for and addressing the harmful damage that past practices such as those mentioned. When that harm resulted in the complete eradication of black neighborhoods, if no one is left to heal and to rebuild an interpretative plaque doesn't feel the like a proportional response. I mean, this varies from place to place. There are some places where the entire black community was wiped out. But there's still this affection. There is still memories of that place. In some cases, people have moved away, but the church is still there. And so there's no question it varies from. There are some people that remained, they're all gone. To me, it's still important that you find different approaches, you know, in New York City. We, after Black Lives Matter, did this process with the public where we identified spaces and places that were renamed, but it was intentional. It wasn't just a name. It was a community process that allowed them to pick names. So for example, Dina Horn grew up in Brooklyn. We renamed the Prospect Park Manshell, the Lena Horn, Van Chel. The crowd went crazy. Actually was my last day as commission, New York City. But it's Malcolm XA promenade where he lived in right near Laguardia airport. So naming is not the only thing, but how do you create those spaces? How do you rebuild it to make sure that is intentional that those that used to live there can find their way back. So Nick, very hard question because it's different scales that you're dealing with. But if you look at some of the tools I left, it gives you some opportunity to think about what you can do. Particularly some of those sacred sites and places and buildings. The Audubon ballroom where Malcolm X was assassinated. Young planner I worked on that space to make sure it was preserved even though the whole area had changed. So it's a hard question, but you have to be intentional. Have conversation about the past past harm. And then of those tools I suggested figure out a way that Elise could repair, acknowledge, and atone for that past harm. So I have a couple of inter related questions here that I'm gonna try to weave together for you. The first is from Howard Blackson who says past farms were applied over many generations. Should we expect to heal these harms in one generation? And how do we address climate mitigation and adaptation difference in addressing long-term generational changes, knowing of course that there is intersectionality between the the anticipated climate. Impact harms that will continue to reinforce malinvested communities in the first place. There's no question we have climate refugees. People of color in terms of environmental injustice, they're at the top of the list, whether being moved to flood prone areas, not having proper insurance, there's no question that it's also climate change and environmental hazards that are creating harm. Yeah. We have to deal with the generation that with us now because they're the ones we're in interacting with, but we also have to recognize that generational trauma. Is passed down generation to generation. And so we have that's why it's important to apologize and acknowledge. To me is the beginning of the healing process, but to me these can't be just empty gestures. It has to be followed up with a tone in and that could take many different forms. And so the person who asked the question, I agree, 100%. That it goes beyond just racism. We now see it embedded in our landscapes through climate and through environmental hazards. But to me, we have to deal with the generation that's here now. They're the ones that we're engaging, but also recognize and acknowledge that it passed down generation generation and each person, place family may experience at harm very differently. We just have to acknowledge it and recognize it's there and not just start the playing process at day one is if nothing else before it ever occurred. It sort of makes me think of what you mentioned earlier about, you know, sort of continuing to redress the, our own work to ensure that it those those ways that we are attempting to improve lives are in fact doing exactly what we we have intention towards. And the toxic dump is probably the best example. If that is not cleaned up, one, that land cannot be used, but it can leak out and affect other places. The same is happening with these communities that experienced toxicity from racism or environmental injustice, it is still there. And I have a hard time saying, well, it didn't happen under my watch. I didn't do anything about it. The question is, the planners and designers and urbanists today have the courage to start to unpack that, to talk about it, and do we feel that we have an obligation to address some of those past harms. I can't leave that toxic thumb unchanged. We've been cleaning up contaminated sizes of the country. What about our neighborhoods? Well, and it speaks to another question here that, you know, asked to just talk about the urgency of addressing the harm. And continuing and compounding harm. We risk delaying, you know, you're sort of creating a compound interest situation of this only continues to exacerbate. But it also makes me think of a question or a thought that I had for you when you were, during your presentation and you talked about empathy, you know, addressing, you know, sort of starting from a position of empathy, of attempting to first understand what other people's experiences are that might be different from our own. And as you know, CNU is working on better exploring ways that inclusion in our in our own practice can can be that we can be more successful in an inclusionary practice so that we can better understand how to do so and what that looks like. You know, the in applied fashion. And it it made me think of something that actually Marcus brought up at the main stage at CNE. 31. That new urbanist, the norganism is, is in many ways has a a primed focus on the public realm. And the experience of the public realm just as a as a place in space is significantly different for different groups of people. And being able to empathize, for example. That when your example of Quaker town in Denton Texas made me, you know, really think about this that the The public realm has been a space of public humiliation for groups of people in a way that I think is a white woman I I intend to be empathetic with but also is not my lived reality or my generations, you know, my my family's lived reality and I wonder if you could, I know that you spent a lot of time with New York parks, there in New York City. I wonder if you could talk about people how that empathy is supported and encouraged. The the idea of naming after Lena Horn is something, you know, that someone folks love, but is that enough or are there ways that we in our own? You know. There's more. So I wrote. An article a piece, for the national urban trails. It's if you Google it, you can find it about my experience as a black man. It was written for Black History Month being on a trail of a runner. And just a feeling that I get and I offered some testimonials of some other people, experiencing trails and how they felt not welcome. And at the end, I just offered a simple solution. Because I'm running and there's someone that's looking at the river and their bike is there and they're running back think I'm gonna steal it. I'm running sweating. I'm not going to steal your bike. But just a simple hello. How are you ahead, Nod. Just less people know that you're welcome because, you know, as a black American, bad stuff happens in the woods. And they say, why aren't people of color coming out to trails? It's like because bad things happen to us. I don't know what's happening around the corner. But I think the whole point is is that we have to Do the small things. For people to feel welcome. When we design parks in New York City, you know, I've been to places where they're saying, well, we don't want to have a basketball court. No, it's not, you don't want to have the basketball court, it's who uses the basketball court. And I applaud Detroit because they put a court in a center of downtown and campus marsh and nothing's happening. It has one resident said, oh, I don't know about. Basketball court, the noise, the language. And I said, have you ever watched pickle ball? And he was like, wow, that's a good point. No. Yeah. So I think how we frame this, how we perceived, how we racialize public space. Marcus was absolutely correct. The monuments, the images, the roles in New York City we had a sign you couldn't loiter in a park that is crazy that's what you do in a park is loiter which is sit or stand with no apparent purpose. But that rule could be racialized and if you're for black or brown teenagers, you're loitering if you're 2 nice gorgeous white couples sitting on a bench, enjoy yourselves. So he's right and as something we have to think about when I was New York, we quadrupled the amount of seating. We doubled down on doing more basketball courts. And we made sure there are places for people of color to eat because when they go to public spaces For them it's a social gathering. They want to break bread, they want to eat, they want to hang out, and a restroom which is critically important and so many of our parts and public spaces don't have the things which is basically saying you're not welcome here. Yeah, yeah. Well in taking that into another layer of perhaps lack of inclusion Brian Leonman has a question here. No organism has become known for increasing property values and bringing more benefits to those with the wealth and access to it. What can we do to make sure more people can enjoy places created and recreated based on these principles? To what extent do we have the influence to regulate financial support? And affordability? I know that's a hard one. But it cuts both ways. I'm not sure. Yes, and you has been accused of being a profession for the affluent or the privileged. But you know, I don't want to be controversial, but there are some places. That they're happy to see property values increase because now they want to retire, they don't see this gentrification, they're like saying my goodness my health was worth 50,000 someone wants to offer me 300 I can now retire and go somewhere the others are saying that being forced out. It's hard, unless you're very determined in your design to make sure that you're providing housing for all and not for the privileged. You want to have a mix of density and opportunities, something that CNN truly supports. From missing middle to A to US to ensure you have mixed use developments where everyone feels welcome. If that is intentional on top of mind, I think our designs will work. But understand some of our approaches, you must have that engagement. I've heard many communities, something, CNU advocates is bike lanes. There are some community say when I see a bike lane. I'm saying no because that's the first sign of gentrification. But ourbists will say, no, no, no, that's an important tool in our toolbox. So it's hyper local. You need to talk to community, find out what works, but if you're going in with all the right thoughts and values. We're planning for people, not for place. To make sure that it's a. Place where attainable, if not affordable, and be very careful that what you're recommending does not increase affordability, I'm sorry, increase value in one place. And then puts pressure on other neighborhoods. So it's surgical. It is not easy, but it's a great question. Yeah, well, and there is a related question that sort of filters into this. So, local, you know, the local communities often need to overcome the continued use of restrictive private covenants to that limit the access exactly as you're talking about. The limit the creation of ADUs requires single unit homes only, you know, etc, etc. That exclusionary limitation that then pushes the pressure into other parts of the community. Yeah, when I was playing director, I said, you think I should tell these residents you think I'm bad? Okay. Did you see somebody's hormone, homework associations and respective covenants. I mean like food and the way they enforce it is, you know, I think this should be a whole overlook and limitation on what H bonus association can do and what is deemed to be illegal in restrictive covenants. I agree. Hmm. They many of them are exclusive and that to me is the opposite of being inclusive. So I think that we have to be loud and clear that our goal is create inclusive communities as part of that board statement that is a role of CNU. And like I said, we got to be loud and fight against it whether in a public or private sector because our goals create inclusive communities not exclusive communities and sadly some of our new famous new urbanist development lean toward that side. So some repentance and redemption. Will be. Okay. There, very fair. Well, I'm gonna I'm gonna we have one last question here looking at the end of the hour, but it relates to here in Detroit. The questions from Healey Sutton who says, I'm glad so many cities are acknowledging their terrible history and trying to make it right. But if that doesn't come with changes to what's going on today, it seems fairly pointless. I think particularly of what seems to my layperson brain like a very unequal development happening to revitalize Detroit. And I wonder if you could just give a little bit of perspective on maybe not Detroit specifically or if you'd like to please do we're enjoying where I am but you know the the intentionality behind making sure that that that it is not unequal. As Healey describes. Right. Well, I'm gonna go back to those 3 words. It is acknowledged. Apologize and a tone. A tone is where we have to hold people accountable. Many places Canada has a land acknowledgement. Yes, some will apologize, but it's the atonement. Okay, if I'm sorry. What am I gonna do about it? And so it requires a change. It could be a change in me to be a change in the way I work, it be a change of addressing the community is being harmed. But to get to a question, atonement takes very different forms. It's not a monetary contribution or repayment, but it could take other forms. And I think it to shorten other places, we've got to hold people accountable to the atone. And I don't know what the atone is for the Troy versus Indianapolis versus Flint, Michigan. But that to me is where the conversation should really occur and how CNU can play a role in what does that atonement look like because we all have to acknowledge harm was created. So that's more of a generic. You know, more higher level response, but I'm always looking for the atone. Yes, you apologized. Yes, you acknowledged, but now what are you going to do about it? To me, that's the real power of apologizing and acknowledging for past arms. Well, looking at the end of the hour, I want to thank you so much, much for, for being willing to recreate this presentation, which was well very much a lot of positive feedback. At CNU, 31 and we knew that we wanted to have, to have you be able to share that with more folks. And as the the chat and the questions sort of indicate this is a topic that folks in the organism really want to continue to talk about but also want to learn from and improve our practice. And so I'm really grateful for you sharing with us today. And thank everybody for joining us and we will see folks on the Park Bench at the next webinar. Thank you so much, everyone. Yeah. All the I'm just seeing the comments now. Hello to everyone I know. Wasn't looking at him so I wasn't distracted. Thank you, Mallory. Thank you, Rob. This has been a pleasure to join you this morning or afternoon.