Disputes over Penn's role in the gentrification of West Philadelphia and the displacement of native residents, which have been raging for decades, were revisited again last night at a forum entitled "A Call for Shared Prosperity."
The forum, held in DuBois College House and organized by the African People's Solidarity Committee -- a part of the International People's Democratic Uhuru Movement -- featured four speakers who have encountered and fought gentrification in various forms.
"This forum is so important because with it we are making a call, specifically to those of us in the white community, to take a stand against the landgrab and the disruption of the African communities here in North [and West Philadelphia], throughout the city and around the country," APSC member Peg Shaw said.
The irony of the name of the event is that Penn officials in interaction with the community have themselves often called for a "shared prosperity" for both the University and the surrounding community. It was a firm tenet of the last administration that for the University to prosper, the surrounding community needs to do so, too.
But critics of Penn vehemently argue that, although the University has gotten more suave with its marketing and public relations, the essence of its policies toward the community has not significantly changed.
In discussing Penn's efforts to upgrade and sanitize the neighborhood, Neighbors Against McPenntrification member Richard Rogers said that, despite the rhetoric of diversity, "Penn doesn't want working-class people in their neighborhood."
Rogers, a Penn alumnus, discussed Penn's history of expansion through landgrabbing in the larger historical context of urban development. He pointed to current demographic influx into the cities as a primary cause of the increased gentrification in the recent years.
Al Alston of the African-American Business and Residents Association experienced the problem of gentrification firsthand in the Brewerytown community in North Philadelphia, when two private developers began efforts to construct residential complexes of more than 100 luxury lofts each.
This new development "will do all the standard things that gentrification always does. It's going to drive up our real estate taxes, and it's going to drive up the rent," Alston said. "And we know that's going to [mark] the end of our community. We will officially be priced out of our community."
The same pattern of increasing real estate values forcing displacement has fueled the controversy in West Philadelphia. New, higher-priced housing forces the surrounding real estate to become more expensive. And Alston wasn't shy at pointing fingers.
"The lead players are the elected officials. These are the people who are shepherding the entire process," he said. "If not for them, it would be a much more difficult road for the other players -- the wealthy developers, the speculators, the folks who want to come back into the city."
The discussion, which brought together more than 30 community members and students, was also highly politicized on the topic of black liberation and reparations. In fact, the keynote speaker was Sateesh Rogers, a member of the revolutionary African People's Socialist Party.
Persistent social and economic inequalities, including police brutality and unfair incarceration patterns in the minority communities, were a recurring theme and a call for action at the forum.
"We are one African people, and our immiseration and our suffering as a people has come ... as part of the same historical process," he said. "The same process that has the majority of Africans living in poverty and squalor in Africa is the same historical process that has Africans in Philadelphia wondering whether or not they will have a place to stay at night."
