After a half-century of federal oversight, segregated neighborhoods are still pervasive across America
Milwaukee resident Exie Tatum III grew up in heart of the city and still lives there. The African American father owns a home in a predominantly Black neighborhood but has been house-hunting in pricey, majority-white suburbs, searching for an affordable home that he might someday pass along to his young son Charles through inheritance.
“It would really change the game,” Tatum said of owning a suburban Milwaukee home.
But statistics suggest he’s fighting an uphill battle.
Despite 50 years of federal oversight under the landmark Fair Housing Act of 1968, housing segregation persists in America’s largest cities and urban centers — and an exclusive ABC News analysis of mortgage-lending data shows a pattern of racial isolation remains consistent following decades of failed initiatives.
The analysis shows that 20 of the nation’s top 100 metropolitan areas have an “extreme dissimilarity index” of 50 or higher — meaning at least half of the population would have had to move to another neighborhood in the area to achieve total integration in 2019.
The Milwaukee metro area is at the top of ABC News’ “extreme” segregation list, but that list also includes America’s largest metro areas — New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and Chicago. [Continue reading…]