Dallas Black housing: Past, present and future
Panelists, from left: Sheila Lucas, Dr. Sharon Middlebrooks and Betty Cul-breath. – Courtesy photos
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(The Dallas Examiner) – A community discussion on the state of Black housing in Dallas, hosted by the NAACP, was held July 25 at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center. The discussion was centered around the past, present and future of Black neighborhoods and Black homeownership. Dr. J. Ester Davis of The
Lucas, president of the Dallas chapter of the National Association of Real Estate Brokers, addressed the first question presented to the panel – what was the state of housing for the Dallas Black population in the past? She began by highlighting the plight of Black real estate professionals – specifically, that Black people were at one time prohibited from holding the title of realtor.
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“If you noticed, I did say realtists because we were formed in 1947. And the reason is because NAR,” which was the National Association of realtors, Lucas explained, “would not let us be realtors. So we had to start calling ourselves realtists.”
At the same time, she revealed that Black homebuyers were also facing discrimination. Redlining was a practice that was enacted by many banks in the U.S. in the 1960s. Residential maps were color-coded or outlined in red to identify neighborhoods mostly populated by people of color. These redlined areas were then deemed “too risky,” and banks refused to lend to the residents.
“As we know, Black families were prevented from receiving the same life-changing benefits and subsidies [as others] through the practice of redlining. We are still probably going through redlining now,” Lucas added.
Culbreath, board chair of the Dallas Housing Authority, described the areas throughout the city where Freedmen, known as freed slaves, first settled upon arrival. “In Dallas, we had roughly 78 pockets of those settlements,” Culbreath stated.
Located in areas such as White Rock, Bonton and the Booker T. Washington addition, these settlements were in undesirable locations, all bordering a railroad, river or some other body of water. Despite this, residents of the settlements were proud people. “They were teachers. They were principals. They took pride in where they were,” said Middlebrooks, NAACP Dallas President.
The Washington area – now referred to as Uptown – was largely made up of working class, second-generation freed families. “Most of the women of that community worked in the houses of the folks in Highland Park, and the only thing that separated us was railroad tracks,” Culbreath said. “We didn’t just start owning homes after integration when people started moving to South Dallas. We had up and coming, really good stable Black neighborhoods all over this place.”
South Dallas started as a predominantly White residents, including a Jewish community. Culbreath went on to explain the regression that took place after the original residents migrated to the north and south suburbs, making way for Black, middle-class homeowners to move into the area from the settlement neighborhoods.
“We’ve always had our own communities. Crack cocaine disturbed that. And we have not overcome that because those people who could, went away. They ran away from what was happening. And where’d they run? To the suburbs,” Culbreath explained, describing a similar migration of Black middle-class South Dallas residents due to the effect of the crack cocaine epidemic of the 1980s.
The discussion turned to the current state of Black Dallas housing. Culbreath mentioned that many of the Black South Dallas residents who fled to other surrounding areas left their parents and elder family members behind. As the years progressed and those aging homeowners began to pass away, the younger generations bore the financial burden of paying the property taxes for the homes left behind. The result was widespread foreclosures.
LaTrena Lampkin, a third-generation Dallas resident, said she attended the discussion because she wanted her voice to be heard. She spoke in the interest of generational wealth and Black residents, including herself, retaining possession of familial homes. Lampkin is now the eldest living member of her mother’s family and has been fighting to keep property that her relatives worked hard to sustain.
“I want to maintain our property. My biggest issue is that we are not unified,” Lampkin said. “When I go in to probate court, what I’m seeing is they’re so quick to just distribute our property. And I’m having a problem with that when I’m trying to retain our property and they’re not assisting us.”
So, what does the future hold, and what can be done now to combat the shortcomings of the past and present? Panelists and attendees discussed in agreement that access to information is vital in changing the state of Black housing. The Dallas NAACP hosts classes on retaining property and has attorney members affiliated with NAREB who can assist homeowners at risk of foreclosure.
“We have to be able to explain, in detail, how to purchase a house and how to keep a house. We have these classes at least once a month, but they’ve got to come out and get the information,” Lucas added.
The meetings are held every third Thursday of the month at 6:30 p.m. at the Thurgood Marshall Recreation Center, located at 5150 Mark Trail Way. More information can be found at https://www.dallasnaacp.com.
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