In a consensus vote, Austin City Council approved on March 4 a measure that will create an African American Culture Center and Embassy in East Austin.  The resolution states that the city acknowledges responsibility for the 1928 Master Plan Act, which led to segregation in Austin.

Austin’s racial demographics helps understand the necessity for a plan that will gain momentum for equality.  Currently, the African American population is at about 8% in Austin.  African Americans make up 10.5% of the unemployment rate, according to Data Austin.  There is a hike in homelessness and according to the Enforcement and Compliance History Online, Black Americans are over a third of the homeless population in the city. 

The culture center and embassy will give Austin’s Black community a place to organize agendas and discuss issues concerning the community.  It will also be a place to organize opportunities for social and economic progress.  

“We can have that access to an organization that is involved in civics that is watching what happens at City Hall and making sure they are advocating the needs of our community,” Mayor Pro Tempore Natasha Harper-Madison said.  

She was presented with the idea from Nook Turner, a representative of Austin Black Coalition, a Black-led organization that has been around for over 50 years.   

“This whole process is more like a program as opposed to a one-off thing,” she said, referring to what impact the resolution may have. 

Although most of the people who spoke at the meeting were excited about the plan, some have been critical of the item.  Tiffany Washington, who referred to herself as the only Black farmer in Austin, spoke during the meeting to disagree with the measure due to a lack of a financial impact.  Victor Reed, on his YouTube page “Believe That (with) Victor Reed,” was critical about the lack of transparency of the plan.  He said he thinks that the item should have been presented to the Black community.  

“This is just one of the phases and part of the discovery process,” Harper-Madison said.

“It wasn’t presented to the community and there will be an opportunity for stakeholders to contribute to the process.  This is an appropriate place to talk about economic empowerment.” 

Although redlining, a discriminatory practice that began in the 20ths century, which forced Black citizens out of their homes and placed them into a separate area of town, which led to the devaluing of Black-owned businesses and homes, the one positive was there was a sense of community.  The Black community needed to take care of and do business with each other out of necessity.  

“After the 1928 Master Plan, Black people lived in the Negro District.  There wasn’t a shortage of being around Black people,” Harper-Madison said.  “We could communicate with Black people, worship with Black people, go to school with Black people, eat with Black people, purchase Black-made products and patronize Black businesses.”  

Now she said this isn’t the case.  

“Once people were able to and people started to voluntarily migrate, people were displaced from the community because of gentrification, we are now a fractured community,” she said.  “There are pockets of us everywhere, but we don’t have a concentration; this will be a great way as a community to come back together.” 

The center and embassy will create an atmosphere where the Black community can initiate its impact on Austin’s government.  

“It will be a great resource to be able to establish some of the equity and aspect we talk about so frequently,” Harper-Madison said.  “We can lobby for the things that we are looking for to be able to give that business advice you otherwise don’t have.  I believe the sky’s the limit, honestly,” she said.

During the City Council meeting, Mayor Steve Adler thanked the Black Austin Coalition and Harper-Madison for her leadership in creating item 67.  He talked about the city’s growth through slavery and Black disenfranchisement.  He spoke about how its impact affects the city today. 

“Our own version of institutional racism has had a disastrous effect on the city minorities,” he said.  “Poverty rates for Travis County Blacks and Hispanics populations are two and half times the poverty rates for whites.  It will require a commitment from each of us to address the displacement crisis and expand health care options, transportation in every corner of the city to ensure are just and equitable.”  

“This resolution set forth a pathway for atonement and restitution,” Adler added.  “It will require us to address our history and repair the wounds and say, ‘Black Lives Matter.’”