*President Joe Biden, via the U.S. Department of Transportation has awarded $3.3 billion in grants to marginalized communities for vital infrastructure enhancements in 41 states. The Reconnecting Communities and Neighborhoods (RCNP) pilot grant program offered through the U.S. Department of Transportation announced its latest round of recipients this week.
Allocations will be used for transit improvement projects whether it is driving, walking, or designing trails for biking in neighborhoods. Areas receiving funding were disrupted or inconvenienced by “man-made” damage such as railroad or highway construction. Historically these developments blocked access to opportunities for Black people, seeded gentrification and eventually caused Black neighborhoods to completely vanish and squelched Black affluence for generations.
The grants are a part of Pres. Biden’s Investing in America agenda stems from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and will benefit 130 communities that have traditionally been left out of attaining federal investments. Biden committed to include minorities in his policy-making when he took office. The proliferation of this program is a fulfillment of that commitment with lasting benefits.
In many communities biking/walking trails, paved roads and easy access to the highway are luxuries. The absence of these seemingly normal parts of modern living may be linked in some instances to urban blight. The neighborhood connection program is an urban renewal reformed, with a focus on being reparative. Endeavoring to “right the wrongs of the past,” it puts the power in the hands of organizations that serve the interest of their communities to combat past systemic racism, which prevented the equitable disbursement of funding. In some past cases, planners constructed highways that leveled entire Black business zones or neighborhoods in various parts of the country.
The once prosperous Greenwood area in Tulsa, OK known as Black Wall Street is a well-known example of a Black area being destroyed by highway construction. In 2023 a grant from the Biden Administration worth $1.6 million was awarded to the city’s North Peoria Church of Christ to do a feasibility study on removing a patch of highway that was built in the middle of Greenwood. The US Department of Transportation noted that the applicants provided “a compelling depiction of how a historic Black neighborhood in Tulsa suffered the punishing effects of urban renewal.” Communities in Mississippi, Florida, Georgia and North Carolina have similar stories.
The Bronzeville area in Milwaukee, WI where Blacks from the South headed north to seek work during the Great Migration, was a bustling all-black sub-division.
While speaking at the Pieper-Hillside Boys and Girls Club in Milwaukee on March 13, Biden lamented the depletion of advancement for African Americans.
“Sadly, too many communities across America have faced a loss of wealth, prosperity, and possibilities that still reverberate today.
Imagine all those homes and mom-and-pop stores that could have been posted and passed down from family to family, and financial security and generational wealth would have resulted,” the president said.
Referring to the upcoming improvements to the Sixth Street corridor that is funded by $36 million grant from the RCNP he told the youth assembled there that the project is for them. Biden also noted how the investment will create “good paying” jobs in Milwaukee.
Among other grant awardees, the City of New Orleans, LA was awarded $61.5 million. The Capitol of the Pelican state, Baton Rouge will receive $13.6 million. Sec. Of Transportation Pete Buttigieg said creating a causeway that will connect New Orleans East along I-10 to New Orleans proper is a classic example of what this program is all about.
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