Because the various industries housed in cities of the past throughout Massachusetts, cities like Lowell with cloth, Brockton with shoes, and New Bedford with whales, brought prosperity not only to the cities themselves, but the surrounding areas and the state as a whole.
Eventually when these industries died off as whaling did, or moved to more advantageous and profitable places as the cloth manufacturers did, the strong economy went away too, leaving behind depressed cities and economies. These smaller cities were the anchors of regional economies around the state, but with the moving of production, the change in products and production, and cheaper labor overseas they have been dealing with the social and economic challenges while still having many assets that could be utilized and built on to bring the city back
These cities, whose hey days have been long over, have been designated Gateway Cities and the leadership of these cities entered “a compact to unite their administrations in future efforts aimed at economic and community development,” asserting their desire to work cooperatively to address issues of common concern.
To do this there are those who are in on the plans from the beginning, charting the course of the rebirth, and, having the advantage to not only control the plan, can adapt their personal advantages according to knowledge as yet unknown to the general public.
They knew where the train will be going and where the profitable properties will be along the tracks and could use that for their personal gain with no competition from those not in on the planning.
In cities anywhere in similar circumstances, the desire is to take “gateway cities’, however they are designated elsewhere, and bring them back to what they had been as far as economic power and quality of life making them Class A cities, an idea in and of itself a good one, but it is, however, in the fulfilling of the dream that a good idea goes bad.
Gentrification is good if it improves the quality of life and the economy of those living in a city while expecting new people to arrive.
Gentrification is immoral when it relies on removing those who live in the community so they can be replaced by those whose only purpose in the community is to bring higher paychecks and disposable income as opposed to those who are already there because it is their home.
My building and the mistreatment of the tenants is emblematic of the problem faced by people in the city, largely invisible to those not directly affected by displacement. It happens and no one notices, which is a good thing for those who will reap the benefits only if things are kept out of the public eye so no one could object until the unstoppable motion has begun.
When a city leader revealed he was aware that a 24 apartment building was being sold and knew it six months before tenants were told not only that it had been actively on the market complete with the time for price negotiations, but that it was sold and they had 30 days to uproot and relocate, competing for the few affordable, available apartments with the people from those 24 apartments and those from other places so emptied, and upon reaching out to city hall for help those tenants found there was nothing organized by the city to aid those their plans were displacing even as they knew displacement is a by-product of gentrification and knew it was coming, there are questions
A class-A rating is another way of saying leadership will not be happy until the city is too expensive for present residents, just as organic in the supermarket means high prices.
If you see a city as only brick and mortar and a source of income and personal profit for those in control but ignore the spirit of the city is in its people, then you have what we’re having- the removal of people who stayed with the city and kept it alive so they could eventually get moved out to make room for more desirable people.
I was in my building seven years, and quite a few repairs may have been well intentioned by the building manager, but they were kept to the easiest and least costly until certain repairs seemed to be getting more serious attention, assumed by the tenants to have been done to improve their present environment only to realize these, like their uninformed continued occupancy of the building helped get the seller a higher price than the buyer had originally offered.
I suppose the assumption will be that, when the building I had been in but from which I was kicked to the curb, as all other residents had been, is finally remodeled into luxury apartments, we, the displaced, will be happy for those people who can afford the rent and see city pride in that.
Sadly, in spite of speeches about city pride and the greatness of its people, those in the position to do so will change all that in a heartbeat for the sake of the plan and the pockets.
It is wonderful to show the world how much improved a city is and how welcoming it is for those they hope will move there while those in charge of the rebirth bask in the glow of praise, but it is disgusting that those who had lived there get to see the wonder, not as residents who live in the improved city, but as visitors seeing what others got because they were run off.
So, too, it is good that the Gateway Cities that were the economic powerhouses and the gateways to all those immigrants who were the workers who made them so and who produced the profits from overseas commerce those cities benefited from, are being reborn.
It is far from good that to have this happen to present residents, many the descendents of those immigrants who made the city, must just go away.
In addressing the needs of Gateway Cities, people on low income, seniors, and renters need to be considered as citizens and included in plans accordingly.
Otherwise, what should be a Gateway City will continue to be a Get-away City.
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