I-81 at a crossroads: Panel discusses racial implications of highway project

By Ashley M. Casey

Staff Writer

Community members and leaders of local organizations are urging the New York State Department of Transportation to consider racial and economic factors in the replacement of the Interstate 81 viaduct that goes through Syracuse.

In a panel discussion held Nov. 17 at the Community Folk Art Center, experts on housing, urban planning and community engagement joined attorneys from the New York Civil Liberties Union to discuss the effects of the I-81 renovation on communities of color and low-income Central New Yorkers.

“This is not just an infrastructure project,” said discussion moderator Yusuf Abdul-Qadir, director of the Central New York chapter of the NYCLU. “This needs to be a racial justice project; also, this needs to be an economic justice project.”

Abdul-Qadir offered historical context to what the interstate highway system did to black communities. According to Abdul-Qadir, the 1.4-mile stretch of I-81 that runs through the city of Syracuse was constructed in the 1950s and ‘60s, slicing black neighborhoods apart and ultimately leading to Syracuse’s status in 2016 as the 13th poorest city in America.

“It wasn’t just a means of getting from point A to point B. It was a means … to ensure that white communities did not have to live in urban spaces with black communities,” Abdul-Qadir said.

As the interstate system grew in the United States, an exodus of middle-class white families moved from cities into the suburbs. “White flight” led to focusing resources on improving life in the suburbs instead of investing in cities, Abdul-Qadir said.

“Most of our property values are tax-exempt,” Abdul-Qadir said. “If we don’t have a robust community that lives in the city, how are we funding our schools? Part of what this 81 situation did is create those realities.”

Kevin Jason, an NYCLU staff attorney, said “white flight … decimated the tax base,” preventing proper funding of the Syracuse City School District. As residents moved out of the city, tax-exempt institutions — hospitals, churches and university buildings — took their place without replacing the tax revenue, Jason.

While the Interstate Highway System was created to improve the safety and efficiency of road travel, I-81 “has never been just a transportation policy,” said Sally Santangelo, executive director of CNY Fair Housing.

“These were as much housing policies as they were transportation policies,” Santangelo said of I-81 and urban renewal, which she said shifted middle-class people and resources to the suburbs.

‘The look of fear’

As the construction of I-81 displaced black communities, racial progress in Syracuse was undone, according to Ocesa Keaton, executive director of Greater Syracuse HOPE.

Keaton said Syracuse was looked upon as an example during the abolition movement, but things have deteriorated significantly since the 19th century. In 2016, a Rutgers University professor concluded from census data of the 100 largest metropolitan areas that Syracuse had the highest concentration of poverty in Hispanic and black populations.

“People looked to us, to our community, as being innovative in race relations, and somewhere along the line, we either forgot or chose to ignore the roots of our history,” Keaton said. “There’s no reason at all that we should be no. 1 in the nation for concentrated poverty when we started as being no. 1 in the nation for being innovative in our approach to race relations.”

Keaton said African-Americans moved from the South to the North, Midwest and West in the first half of the 20th century, looking to escape racist violence and to find jobs.

“African-Americans started coming to Syracuse because they looked at it as a safe haven,” Keaton said. “Then, our white brothers and sisters became scared because they thought … we were taking their jobs.”

That fear and prejudice caused white people to drive black communities into more undesirable parts of Syracuse. Keaton said. She added that African-American farmers were pushed out of the 9th Ward into the 15th Ward, and black-owned businesses popped up alongside Jewish-owned businesses.

The construction of I-81 and urban renewal, Keaton said, was praised by the Post-Standard at the time as “well-thought-out to cause minimal disruption to the residents of this community.”

Instead, she said, the project began “ripping apart where they worshiped, where they went to eat, where they relied on each other.”

Keaton said she sees “the look of fear” on older African-Americans’ faces when the I-81 question is discussed.

“They remember having bustling communities of African-American business owners. They remember having whole blocks of harmonious relations where they were able to move forward,” she said.

While there is fear that the renovation of I-81 could undo the economic progress that communities of color have made, residents now have access to more information and more ways to express themselves as compared to the 1950s and ‘60s.

“This time, we are not food at the table,” Keaton said. “This time, we are serving the food at the table.”

Making community voices heard

Rashida Richardson, legislative counsel for the NYCLU, said the effects of I-81 on Syracuse and its communities of color resulted from “top-down decisions” made by federal and state officials.

Richardson said the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) does not just measure the impact of a project on the air quality or environmental factors of a site, but also the impact on historical lands and the communities that live there.

“We should be somewhat optimistic about this because it is a real opportunity for communities to organize and to be more invested in what is going to happen and what needs to happen to move forward,” Richardson said. “Luckily, we’re in a position where the agencies in charge of these decisions have to, by law, listen to us.”

Syracuse is not alone in the effects it has suffered from urban renewal. Richardson said many communities around the country took similar socioeconomic hits, so whatever decision is made for I-81 could be a model for other areas of the nation.

Bob Haley of the Central New York chapter of the American Institute and Architects/Urban Design Center said the reconstruction of I-81 will be the “biggest change in our history for the next 50 years.”

“This decision is it,” he said. “It will set all the planning and all the economics for our kids and our kids’ kids for the next 50 years, just the way we’ve been unhappy with the reality of what’s happened.”

Haley called Sen. John DeFrancisco’s suggestion of an additional study of a tunnel option a $2 million “wild card,” but he stressed that the New York State Department of Transportation has essentially rejected a tunnel option in favor of either replacing the viaduct or dispersing traffic throughout a “community grid.”

“If you take the viaduct down, you return the land so it can grow in value with the rest of the city,” Haley said. “Our input right now should be about what is the economic impact for the long-term future of choice A or choice B, and which do we prefer?”

What residents are saying

After the panel discussion, community members voiced their concerns about the I-81 project. Here’s a sampling of their comments:

On development and employment:

“Whenever my mama talked about Reagan, she said, ‘Trickle-down economics don’t work,’” said one resident, who asked what kind of “development” would occur with the community grid proposal.

She questioned whether tax breaks would be given to developers who build “mixed-income” housing where most of the units are luxury apartments and only a few are affordable housing.

“Beautification” of the area, she added, meant more surveillance and pushing poor people of color even further to the margins.

The resident also noted that “the poverty in Syracuse is mostly working poverty,” so she asked what type of jobs developers would bring to the area.

“How can we get these organizations to teach a trade?” another resident asked.

On displacement and affordable housing:

Another resident said she heard people who are displaced by I-81 construction will be given Section 8 vouchers.

“When I hear ‘Section 8,’ I think of ‘the hood,’” she said. “The housing market is going to go up and people won’t be able to afford to move back into their neighborhoods.”

Ocesa Keaton, executive director of Greater Syracuse HOPE, agreed.

“Section 8 vouchers doesn’t mean you get to move to Manlius or Cazenovia,” she said. “It means you get to move to another ‘hood.’”