Panelists: Ernest Burden, Noah Griffin, Gary Kamiya, Mattie Scott

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After World War II, the federal government embarked on a national initiative to address urban blight in America’s aging cities. The Housing Act of 1949 funneled billions of dollars into cities that suffered from poverty, crime, and the exit of the middle class from cities to suburbs. San Francisco was one of these cities. 
 

 

Between 1956 and 1977, redevelopment targeted San Francisco’s Fillmore District and Japantown in the Western Addition. The result was the demolition of roughly 2,500 Victorians and 833 businesses, and the forced relocation of up to 20,000 residents. The communities most deeply impacted were African Americans and Japanese Americans. But far from being a decaying center of urban blight, the Western Addition was a thriving district with a vibrant multicultural population—perhaps the most diverse urban neighborhood in America.
 

 

This presentation features the voices of those who were there to witness the effects of urban renewal and what we learned from this tragic chapter in our city’s history.