The Politics of Selecting Relocation Housing Sites: A Case-Study of White Plains, New York
Lawrence
P. Goldman
Seminar 90
Dr. Edgar Shor
May 12, 1967
Preface
This
study would not have been possible were it not for the help and encouragement
of many people. I thank the many busy individuals who each allowed me an hour
or more for interviews. I am grateful for the candor with which, for the most
part, they answered my questions.
I
am indebted to Jay Driller, Mike Divney, and Hank Whittemore who tolerated my
sometimes incessant questioning during the long weeks when I was steeped in the
tedious process of gathering background information.
Great
thanks are due to Kenneth Allebach. The Urban Renewal Director, unlike many
public officials, was able to make the vital distinction between scholarly
research and journalistic expose. He always treated my pursuits as the former
and answered my sometimes delicate inquiries with commensurate frankness. His
guidance, suggestions, and constructive criticisms were invaluable in the
completion of my work.
Most
of all, I would like to thank Dr. Edgar Shor whose wise and patient instruction
and whose insistence on academic soundness rest at the very base of this study.
Table of Contents
Introduction
……………………………………………………………………………………………. 4
The
Actors ……………………………………………………………………………………………… 11
Analysis
of the Selection of Public Housing Sites ……………………………………. 16
Conclusion:
Politics and Planning in White Plains …………………………………… 43
Afterword
……………………………………………………………………………………………… 48
Appendices
……………………………………………………………………………………………. ??
Bibliography
…………………………………………………………………………………………… 51
Introduction
White
Plains, New York is a city of 50,000 people. It is only recently, however, that
the residents of White Plains have begun to recognize the fact that they live
in a city and not in a medium size suburban town. Except for the newcomers of
the last few years, almost all residents refer to the city as a town. Even the
Mayor, who for the past ten years has been deeply steeped in problems and
crises that can only occur in an urbanized area, is wont to refer to the “north
end of town” and the “fine people of this town.”
White
Plains has become in the last 15 years the major retail center of Westchester
County. Moreover, several large industries and businesses – including I.B.M.,
General Foods, and All-State Insurance – have moved some of their operations to
this city. This has naturally created a small-scale influx of semi-skilled and
non-skilled labor. The Negro population has been steadily increasing and
commensurate residential over crowdedness in the downtown area has followed.
Yet,
the people of White Plains, particularly the old-time residents, have been reluctant
to abandon the notion that their area is still an exclusive suburb. Perhaps
their reference to the city as a “town” is an unconscious expression of this
reluctance. In any case, the days when White Plains was a community of
commuters to New York City are gone and will never return. Today, in fact,
three times as many people commute to White Plains to make a living as
commute from White Plains to New York City. White Plains has become what
planners call a satellite city.
The
advent of urbanism is usually accompanied by certain endemic problems. Complex
social and economic questions are forced into the open when a town grows into a
city, when an essentially residential retreat becomes an important urban
center. Whether the emerging city develops the common pathologies of
urbanization – blight, degeneration, and economic and social devaluation – or
matures into a pleasant community in which to live and work depends greatly on
the attitudes and fore-sightedness of the indigenous population and the
community leaders. Most importantly, the future of a city is determined by
willingness of its citizens to confront the area’s problems directly and on a
comprehensive level.
Fortunately,
White Plains has, for the most part, recognized its problems and has slowly started
to treat them in a sensible and rational fashion. In the early 1960’s the city
contracted an independent and highly respected consultant corporation to
elaborate a Comprehensive Development Plan for the city. In the Spring of 1962,
the legislative body of the city – the Common Council – created a professional
Planning Department to supplement the already established Planning Board whose
main function had been to wield authority over zoning matters. The function of
the newly created department was to “prepare plans for the city’s orderly
growth and to advise the elected officials in the implementation of the plans.”
Another
significant measure taken by the city in the attempt to alleviate its
increasing urban problems was the decision, made in early 1964, to implement a
“bussing” system to rectify racial imbalance in public schools. The Negro
population was becoming more and more condensed in the downtown area and the
neighborhood school plan functioned to isolate Negro children in one or two
elementary schools while leaving the others almost totally white. The bussing
plan was based on a formula that rearranged the composition of the schools so
that no one school was less than 10% nor more than 30% Negro.
Although
White Plains had taken somewhat firm steps to remedy its school and planning
problems, there remained on particularly conspicuous blemish in the city. A
large sector of the downtown area – sometimes referred to as old White Plains –
had declined and degenerated into slum and partial slum conditions. Over 66% of
the physical structures in this area – a mixture of houses, apartments, stores,
warehouses, industries, and commercial enterprises – were substandard. Vacant storefronts, dismal and decaying
houses, critically out-of-repair apartments buildings, and a host of marginal
businesses cluttered this section. The narrow streets were usually well
littered and there was little or no play space for children in most of the
area. In short, a major portion of White Plains’ downtown section had been
stricken by a cancerous blight that threatened to become malignant and expand
outward.
About
2500-3000 persons live in this area of the city and about one-half are Negro. These people were, according to the
Bureau of Statistics, mostly in the “modest but adequate” income group; abject
poverty was not found to be widespread.
Although the figures demonstrate that employment is relatively stable and that
incomes are adequate among residents of this section, the extremely high
property values and rental costs in the rest of the city and outlying areas
functioned to virtually “lock” these people into their present homes. In other
words, most of these families could not move elsewhere in White Plains.
It
will be important for later analysis to note that on the periphery of this are
stands a massive complex of public housing that was built in 1951. These
vertical ghettos, although perceived as a progressive measure when built, are
now generally considered a blunder by both lay citizens and government officials
in White Plains. Any discussion of new public housing, whether it be among
supporters or detractors, inevitably includes a statement to the effect: “we
don’t want another Winbrook.”
Urban
renewal as a possible remedy for White Plains’ downtown problems was first
discussed in the closing years of the 1950’s. At that time, a group of
businessmen and other community
leaders, distressed at the rampant deterioration of a large segment of the
city’s core, suggested preliminary investigations as to the feasibility of
White Plains receiving federal funds for urban rejuvenation under the 1954
Housing Act. The city acted upon these suggestions and in September of 1959,
The Housing and Home Finance Agency – gave the city initial certification for a
workable program for community improvement. At this point, both the goals and
the scope of urban renewal in White Plains were extremely vague. At very least
it may be said that the community leaders who originally proposed an
examination of urban renewal for the city never dreamed that it would reach the
dimensions that it has today: a plan that schedules the major portion of
downtown White Plains for demolition and redevelopment.
That
the Central Renewal Project has grown so huge is a result of a plethora of
interrelated factors that are of no real concern here. It is useful to point
out, however, that the project will renovate an area of over 130 acres and will
include the demolition of more than 550 buildings.
The project is one of the ten largest in the country, a fact that has even
greater impact when the relatively small size of the city is considered. In
short, the scope of the project has expanded far beyond anything envisaged by
those who initially fostered the idea. As the director of the White Plains
Urban Renewal Agency, Kenneth Allebach, has said:
“As
this program developed, the city began committing itself more and more,
never
being quite sure what, in the long run, it was committing itself to.”
From
the preliminary certification by the HHFA in 1959 to the final approval of
White Plains’ Application and the signing of the Central Renewal contract with
the Department of Housing and Urban Development in July of 1965, the program
had been in the “planning stage.” One of the most nagging, yet crucial problems
that had to, by law, be resolved in this stage was the question of what to do
with the residents of the area who were to be displaced by the project.
Relocation housing had to be provided for all of the people who lived in the area.
Not until the city could demonstrate that ample housing resources did exist or
were being built could the project receive the necessary funds to move from the
planning to the execution phase.
Thus,
the success and indeed the very existence of urban renewal in White Plains
rested quite heavily on the city’s ability to resolve the question of
relocation housing. The professional staff of the Urban Renewal Agency, the
Mayor, The Common Council, and other officials and citizens committed to making
renewal an actuality were well aware of the large number of programs in other
cities that died ingloriously in the planning stage because of stalemated
housing controversies. The prospect of rehousing a vast number of slum or
semi-slum dwellers, many of who belong to nationality or racial minority
groups, inevitably elicits some ugly responses from previously silent, even
benign members of a community. In an upper-middle class, formerly residential
suburb, the indignation and rumblings of dissent are probably magnified.
The
supporters of urban renewal in White Plains were thus confronted with a
prodigious problem that had to be handled with utmost caution. There are
essentially three alternative solutions to the question of relocation, all of
which must be implemented for a successful program. First, and least functional
in a city like White Plains, is the securing of dwelling units through the open
real-estate market. Secondly, federally operated middle-income housing can be
built, or taken advantage of if already in existence. Thirdly, and probably
most common, is the use of present or newly constructed public housing.
The
city, of course, would have to utilize all three alternatives in order to
supply enough housing and to satisfy the different needs and requirement of
those to be displaced. In total, about one thousand families would have to be
relocated and roughly half of these were eligible for public housing. It should be noted at this point that
“eligible for public housing” in White Plains is somewhat euphemistic; that is,
the rentals of private dwelling units is so costly in the city (an average of
more than $180 per month) that
the only alternative to public housing for many families would be to leave
White Plains to live elsewhere.
Finally,
it is of primary significance to point out that Negro families comprise both
50% of all families living in the urban renewal area and approximately 50% of
those eligible for public housing.
The latter is of particular relevance to the decisions being studied in this
paper in that an intense fear of Negro proliferation underlay the opposition to
several of the proposed public housing sites. On the other hand, support by
certain PTA groups and the School Board of various sites was based on a desire
to create (or maintain) racial balance in the schools of the city.
The
only existing public housing in White Plains – The Winbrook project – showed
little promise as a potential resource because of the total lack of vacancies
and, in addition, a sizable waiting list. It became apparent, then, that in
order for White Plains to proceed with urban renewal, a large amount of new
public housing was a concomitant necessity. Early in the 1960’s, the
anticipated need called for about 350 additional units. In order for the
federal Public Housing Administration to commit the requisite funds, the city
had to demonstrate a viable program for building the new housing and feasible
site selections. Until these stipulations had been met, te city would not
receive the 27-million-dollar federal grant and 39-million-dollar federal loan,
and the 7-million-dollar New York State grant
that would enable it to move from the
planning to the execution stage of the project.
Therefore,
in order to ensure the actuality of urban renewal in White Plains, the city
officials were completed to arrive at certain crucial decisions about the kind
and location of new public housing in the city. Richard Hendey, the Mayor of
White Plains, recognized from the very beginning the difficulties the city would
inevitably confront in the selection of new public housing sites:
“Selection of sites for low rent
housing is one of the most difficult and sensitive
decisions
which has to be made in connection with urban renewal. While most citizens a
agree
that public housing is necessary to provide decent housing for families of low
income,
hardly anyone can agree on the location of such in existing neighborhoods.”
The Actors
Prior
to the explanation and analysis of the decisions that determined the location
of the new public housing sites, it is useful to enumerate the actors. For our
purposes the actors will be defined as those individuals or groups who actually
made decisions, or who tried to influence decisions; in other words, the actors
are those who participated in or attempted to participate in the
decision-making process. This section of the study does not undertake to
analyze the role of each group, nor does it seek to measure the relative power
or influence of the various groups. Rather, this is solely for the purpose of
identifying the important participants and briefly describing their formal or
alleged functions.
Governmental Actors
The Mayor.
The
Mayor of White Plains has been, since 1958, Richard Hendey. He, like all other
elected officials in the City, is a Republican. In fact, White Plains has never
in its 51 years as a chartered city had a Democrat in the Mayoralty or on the
Common Council.
The
Mayor is elected every two years by the entire city and, in general is charged
with the usual executive responsibilities. In addition, the Mayor is a voting
member of the Common Council and Chairman of the city’s Urban Renewal Agency.
The Common Council.
The council
consists of the Mayor and six Councilmen who are elected at large every four
years. Candidates for the Council are chosen by the 92-member White Plains
Republican committee at a city convention meeting. The Republican nomination in
White Plains is tantamount to election.
The
Common Council has the usual legislative functions but is only a part-time body
having to meet, by law, at least once a month. During the relocation housing
controversy, however, the Council often met several times a week.
The Urban Renewal Agency.
Originally the
Department of Urban Renewal (established in October of 1960), the status was
changed to that of an agency for financial reasons in 1965. The Agency is
comprised of four members of the Common Council and the Mayor who acts as
Chairman. Administration of the Agency is carried out by the Director, Kenneth
Allebach, and Assistant Director, Myron Orlofsky. The Agency also employs a
professional staff of about 25 individuals.
The Planning Board.
The
Board has eight members appointed by the Mayor and functions to make
recommendations to the Mayor and Council on zoning matters. Also, the Board
makes suggestions relating to general city planning. The members of the Board
are ordinary citizens of White Plains who meet periodically.
The White Plains Housing Authority.
This
agency, established pursuant to a State enabling law, determines the need for
and the plans of public housing in the city. The Authority is responsible for
constructing new public housing and managing that which already exists. The
Housing Authority is an autonomous, public-corporate entity, established by the
Common Council in line with the State enabling law. Five commissioners
appointed by the Mayor (part-time, without pay) and a full-time chairman govern
the unit.
Urban Renewal Citizens Advisory
Committee.
This
group of nine citizens was appointed by the Mayor in 1960. Its main function is
to provide the Mayor and Council with an independent source of advice and
assistance on matters relating to the urban renewal program. The Committee has
met monthly since its inception.
Committee on Minority Housing.
This
committee was appointed by the Mayor early in 1962 in order to meet a new
federal requirement for recertification of urban renewal progress. The Committee
has nine members, all citizens of White Plains. The responsibility of the
Committee is to see that minority group families living in the area to be
rebuilt obtain good relocation housing in an area, if possible, in which they
want to live.
Non-Governmental Actors
White Plains Citizens Housing
Council.
This
organization was started by some leading citizens of White Plains in 1959 for
the purpose of promoting new housing in the city. The group was most interested
in generating additional public housing for those families whose homes were
severely deteriorated. In the summer of 1961, when Urban Renewal plans were
made public, the Council focused its attention on the relocation housing
problem and took a strong stand against the centralization of all public
housing in one area.
The Democratic Party.
The
Democrats have never held power in White Plains and, on many issues, adopt a
“gadfly” stance towards the Republican powers. On the question of Urban renewal
in general, the Democrats have provided a kind of “loyal opposition;” that is,
they are committed to the program and its goals, but regularly criticize the
means. The have been particularly vehement with their criticisms of the choice
of relocation sites.
The Reporter Dispatch.
This
is the only newspaper of any consequence in the city of White Plains. The paper
is highly consistent in its Republican orientation both on the city level and
in the offices of the county-wide chain. The Reporter Dispatch has strongly
supported urban renewal but has been a severe critic of the city’s relocation
housing program. Almost everyone in White Plains depends solely on this
newspaper for information about what is going on in the city.
The Board of Education.
As
previously mentioned, the city’s school board has successfully presented and
implemented relatively progressive integration program for the public schools.
Its primary interest in the relocation housing problem has been the
preservation of public school integration.
Parent Teacher Associations.
PTA groups, acting
individually and in affiliation through the White Plains Council of
Parent-Teacher Associations, have been concerned with the selection of
relocation sites since late 1961. Their interest has, in general, been to avoid
the overburdening of any one school district with the low-income families to be
relocated.
Urban League Committee on Urban
Renewal.
The
Urban League remains the only civil rights organization in White Plains of any
size and significance. Still, the group has a surprisingly small membership
with little active participation. The Committee on Urban Renewal and the
Housing Committee of the Urban League were both chaired by Myron Isaacs, and
energetic and capable worker who persisted in his attempt to insure an
equitable and rational choice of relocation sites throughout the housing
controversy. The Urban League in White Plains is, for the most part, run by as
many white as Negro citizens.
Neighborhood Associations.
Several
residential neighborhood associations were intimately, often passionately involved
with the relocation site issue. Almost invariably involvement was for the
purpose of deterring the construction of relocation housing in or near the
particular neighborhood. In some cases, when total prevention became obviously
impossible, the efforts of the neighborhood groups were redirected towards
attempting to reduce the number of dwelling units to be included on the site.
The most active neighborhood groups were: (1) The North Broadway Association
(North end, 2000 members); (2) The Woodcrest Heights Association (North end,
150 members); (3) The Carhart Association (downtown periphery); (4) The Gedney
Park Association (South end).
Analysis of the Selection of Public
Housing Sites
The
intention of this, the major section of the study, is two-fold. First the
writer will attempt to untangle and to render comprehensible the intricate
concatenation of events that lead, over a period of almost six ears, to the
decisions made by the common Council of White Plains as to where to locate the
new public housing necessitated by urban renewal. Secondly, the writer strives
to treat the history of these events, and decisions analytically; that is, to
go beyond a superficial and journalistic narrative in order to determine the
essential factors that ultimately lead the Council to act as they did.
It
would, of course, be extravagantly pretentious of the student to endeavor to
attribute causal characteristics to any of the ostensibly contingent factors.
Rather, the level of analysis always emphasized “what appears to have
influenced decisions” rather than “what certainly has determined decisions.” In
this way, no ultimate truths will be discovered. But, hopefully, some
interesting hypotheses and significant insights will emerge concerning how and
why a series of important decisions were made in the city of White Plains. The
goal, then, is heuristic rather than conclusive.
Underlying
the following chronological treatment of the public housing controversy in
White Plains are certain key analytical questions. These questions served three
interrelated functions for the writer: they guided the research so as to anchor
the mass of data to some coherent theme; secondly, they allowed for the
organization of the study so that what is meaningful to the social scientist –
the regularities and the generalities – tends to become more evident; finally,
they operated to aid the writer in establishing a level of hypothetical
explanation as opposed to pure description.
The
analytical questions are:
1)
What role did the various actors play?
2)
Who comprised the decisional unit in the
selection of sites?
3)
Who attempted to influence the decisions?
4)
How did the potential “influencers” perceive
their vested interests?
5)
How did they go about attempting to have their
perceived interests translated into public policy? What were the channels of
access to decision makers?
6)
To what degree has the interest of ****
influence group been met and, as far as determinable, to what degree is this
attributable to the group?
7)
Who has had (or not had) power and who has had
(or not had) influence on this issue in White Plains? Why?
The relocation housing controversy
in White Plains was ignited soon after the public announcement of preliminary
plans for urban renewal around 1960. For the next six years, the flames of
public debate blazed with varying intensity, often dwindling into no more than
a meager glow for extended periods, only to be fanned by the efforts of a newly
incensed interest group. To portray the citizenry as maintaining a frantic
pitch of dissent over the six years would be a gross distortion. The great
majority of the city’s residents never became involved at all and those who
took an interest did so, for the most part, quite sporadically. Yet, some extremely
vocal and vociferous voices did emerge at times – thus warranting the term
controversy.
The issues at stake
in the relocation housing problem changed or were modified several times over
the course of six years. The first issue to elicit any public response turned
on the intention of the Common Council – as expressed in the preliminary
renewal plans in 1960 to centralize all relocation in one section of the area
to be redeveloped (hereafter referred to as the Urban Renewal Area). The outcry
of sundry groups was aimed at the disadvantages of centralized relocation plan
and the plea came forth for a “scatter-site” program – a concept, as we shall
see, that grew to have a distinct and separate meaning for almost every
interest group.
When, late in 1962, The Common Council reversed its initial
stand and began to advocate several relocation sites outside of the
Urban Renewal Area, the nature of community debate shifted; the new focus
became the precise location of public housing. As Milton Longhorn, President of
the 2000-member North Broadway Association, stated:
“Public
housing in White Plains is a big, bad bird flying over the town. It
flies
around from place to place and whenever it shows any sign of
landing
in the area, the natives come out and make noise to drive it
away.”
Most recently, the subject of
greatest controversy has been the size (i.e., number of dwelling units) of the
public housing to be built on a particular site. Thus, as the recipient
neighborhoods have reconciled themselves to the presence of low-income housing,
they have re-channeled their efforts towards keeping the buildings as small as
possible.
The decisions with
which this study is most fundamentally concerned, then, are: first, the Common
Council’s reversal in 1962 away from the original plan of centralized housing
within the area to several sites outside of the area; and secondly, the
selection, by the Council, of two specific locations for public housing from an
array of over twenty-five alternatives.
Preliminary urban
renewal plans – as stated and made public in 1961 – called for almost all
relocation housing (300 low-oncome units and 225 middle-income units) to be constructed
in a residential super-block north of Barker Avenue. Thus, the original plan as presented
to the citizens of White Plains, included almost all relocation housing within
the downtown area to be redeveloped.
Opposition to this
policy was not long in coming. The first barrage of dissent was discharged in
the closing weeks of 1961 and during January 1962. Probably the first group to
take a stand against centralization of housing was the White Plains Citizens’
Housing Council – an ad hoc group of well-respected citizens. This group had no
apparent vested interest other than its stated goals of the promotion of decent
housing for all the people of the city. The Housing Council adopted two related
courses of action to try to influence the Mayor and the Common Council. First,
it researched the alternatives to a centralized program and, in December of
1961, presented a report to the Mayor and the Common Council. Secondly, member
of the Council and well-known White Plains architect, explained:
“We tried to promote a general
community backing for the locations we had in mind. Over a period of several
months in early 1962, we appeared in front of PTA groups, neighborhood
Associations, etc. At the end of this campaign, which the newspaper covered
well, we were able to present a kind of scrapbook to the Mayor and Council
showing them the various groups that had endorsed our plan.”
When Heidtman
finally did meet directly with the Mayor and three members of the Council in
March, 1962, he found that re received “a fairly sympathetic audience.”
The Housing Councils’ strategy – to
attempt to influence a large number of voters – probably appears more
successful than it actually was (a number of other groups in the city had been
awakened by the issue of centralization simultaneously, and quite independent
of the Housing Council). Yet it is undeniable that Heidtman’s attempts to
galvanize voters against centralization and the concomitant publicity served to
compel the Mayor and Common Council to reflect on their original decision.
Heidtman appeared
with Kenneth Allebach – the city’s Urban Renewal Director – at a public meeting
sponsored by the Battle Hill PTA on January 3, 1962. This meeting was highly
significant for several reasons. Although the city administration was still publicly
committed to centralizing housing in a 15-acre area north of Barker Avenue, Allebach
went on record as saying:
“Personally, I agree with Mr.
Heidtman and the people who say that scatter-housing is socially the most
desirable method of relocation. But there is a considerable difference between
what is theoretically desirable and what is administratively workable.”
Allebach
also indicated that he thought that “a ground-swell of public sentiment” could
bring about a change in the
proposed relocation plan.
It
appears that what Allebach meant by “administratively workable” was
“politically feasible.” He left little doubt in anyone’s mind where his own
convictions rested. By publically encouraging the work Heidtman’s Housing
Council, Allebach further indicated that he would be in favor, in fact would
welcome, a bombardment of public opinion in opposition to the Mayor and Common
Council’s program.
To
understand the Urban Renewal Director’s somewhat courageous stand at this time,
it is necessary to say something about the man, himself. Allebach is a highly
qualified professional housing and urban renewal expert who was brought to
White Plains from Philadelphia where he had a high-level position in that
city’s housing program. In his new job, he was an expert, a professional who
was compelled to work within a government run largely by part-time amateurs.
Allebach is not hesitant to talk about government in the suburbs:
“The decision-making process is
very slow. They are not sophisticated people; they are not people who sit down
and blue-print a plan for a long period of time after carefully thinking it
out.”
From his considerable experience in
the field of housing, Allebach recognized the dangers of concentrated
relocation. A very basic tenet of public administration – that administrative
officials are constantly seeking support from sources independent of the
elected officials to whom they are legally responsible and consequently court
potential supporters – indicates that Allebach may have encouraged the
advocates of scatter-sites for the purpose of leverage against the Mayor and
the Common Council. This explanation, however, seems unlikely when the virtual
political invulnerability of the Mayor and the Councilmen is considered. The
more probable interpretation is that the Urban Renewal Director was merely
expressing what his thought to be the most rational solution to the housing
question. Furthermore, there is a real possibility that Allebach’s relative
unfamiliarity, at that time, with governmental practices in White Plains –
almost never to differences of opinion within the Council or the Executive come
to the public attention – lead him to speak with unusual candor. One leading
and knowledgeable citizen of the city claims that Allebach was ultimately
“called upon the carpet” by the Mayor for his public statements at the Battle
Hill meeting.
This
is not to say, however, that Allebach did not favor public dissent to the
original centralization plan. In answer to the question of whether the
objection of citizen groups to the centralized housing program made his job of
persuading the Common Council and Mayor an easier one, he explained:
“Only
to the extent that I could say, ‘look, you have the support of this group, that
group, and the other group.’ In general, I was able to bring considerably more
substantive arguments to the Council in support of the scatter-site philosophy
than the lay citizens groups.”
Several
other interests in White Plains registered their protests to centralized
housing at about the same time (early in 1962) as the White Plains Citizens’
Housing Council. Probably the most significant among these were the PTA groups
in the city. These associations of parents and teachers acted separately –
through their individual school district organizations – and jointly – through
the city-wide Council of Parent-Teacher Associations which had found, late in
1961, a special committee on relocation housing.
The
vested interest of the PTA groups was obviously to prevent the racial imbalance
in schools that single-site relocation would undoubtedly engender. The PTA’s used
two separate methods to have their perceived interests translated into a public
policy change. First, several of the individual groups and the joint federation
of groups adopted strongly worded resolutions and issued public statements
favoring the use of scatter-sites. Secondly, several PTA groups attempted to
enlist the support of the Board of Education in their opposition to housing
centralization the downtown area. The Board of Education remained publicly
uncommitted at that time and throughout the relocation controversy. Whatever
stance the Board may have taken behind the scenes was never clear to this
student. However, it seems likely that the Board made lucid to the Mayor and
the Council their unequivocal commitment to the maintenance of racial balance
in the public schools throughout. On one occasion Board of Education President
Andres Stevenson asserted:
“The
Board of Education is committed to a program of maintaining racial balance in
the public schools…While, the decisions regarding housing sites are not within
the jurisdiction of the Board of Education, the Board of Education has advised
the Mayor and the Common Council of its racial balance plan and the effects of
relocation housing.”
Neighborhood
PTA groups also provided energetic backing for a scatter-site program. One
group, the Ridgeway School PTA – located in the 100% White, upper-middle class
southern section of the city – went so far as to adopt a resolution, by a slim
majority, welcoming a public housing unit in their school district. The resolution was introduced to the
group by Myron Isaacs, a crack lawyer, who was also chairman of the Urban
League’s Committee on Urban Renewal. Isaacs, along with Heidtman and the
Citizens Housing Council, was responsible for the inception of the scatter-site
philosophy in White Plains. His Ridgeway PTA resolution was highly significant
for two reasons. First, it dramatically demonstrates the widely diverse
interpretations of “scatter-site.” Isaacs, at this early date, envisioned many
locations with small numbers of dwelling units.
Members of the city administration and the Common Council, on the other hand,
thought of “scatter-site” in terms of two or three public housing (and two or
three less “objectionable” middle-income housing) apartment buildings located
somewhere other than in the URA. As Urban Renewal Director Allebach has been
wont to point out, low-rise, small relocation housing is precluded in White
Plains because of the high cost of land.
The
second significant element in Isaac’s resolution is that a relocation site in
the Ridgeway school district would have breached an informal yet highly
regarded line across Bryant Avenue – a line that has successfully isolated the
southern part of the city from all but White residents. In March of 1964, the
Mayor announced that one of several relocation sites would be on the corner of
Bryant Avenue, on city-owned land. Although this site was quickly endorsed by
all relevant city officials, the administration abandoned consideration of the
site a few months later claiming that deed restrictions on the land could not
be eliminated or circumvented. Isaacs,
himself a lawyer, thought that other factors were involved:
“Deed restrictions, like any other
property interest, can be condemned for a public purpose. This particular
restriction was a short-term one, and I don’t think that an Administration
determined to use the site would be kept from doing so by the restriction. I
know that there were activities by some of the neighborhood organizations in
the southern part of town, making private representations to the Mayor and
Council in opposition to that site. I am inclined to believe that those
representations were more important than any other factor in bringing about the
abandonment of that site. I don’t see any practical obstacle other than the
political one.”
Richard Maass, Chairman of the
Mayor’s Committee on Minority Housing agreed with Isaacs view. Mayor Hendey, however, later reflected
that although there was pressure from the south section of the city, the Common
Council would have gone along with this site for middle-income housing
(the original proposal was for public housing).
Thus, with the abrogation of the Bryant Avenue site in 1964, the invitation of
the Ridgeway School PTA and, more significantly, the possibility of utilizing
the segregated southern section of the city for relocation were summarily
rejected.
This
digression from the initial analysis of the centralization – scatter-site
controversy is worthwhile for two reasons. First, it demonstrates what lies at
the very base of the relocation issue: racial and economic discrimination.
Secondly, it points to an instance where a neighborhood group – the Gedney Park
Association – has been successful in deterring the publicly stated plans of the
Mayor and Council. Even if we accept Mayor Hendey’s contention that in the
final analysis the deed restrictions were the primary obstacle, he also
admitted that the Council would have only agreed on middle-income housing for
the area, a reformation of public policy that can only be attributed to the
outcry of the politically powerful and financially wealthy Gedney Park
residents.
The
question to be asked now is: what effect, if any, did the opposition of the PTA
groups, the Citizens Housing Council, the Urban League, etc. have on the city’s
original proposal to centralize housing in the U.R.A.? The answer, or a strong
indication of what the answer would be, came only a few weeks after the various
interest groups had made public their protests. On January 17, 1962, the Urban
Renewal Advisory Committee – a group of citizens appointed by the Mayor and
generally considered a captive of City Hall – added its support to the
scatter-site philosophy. It is
almost inconceivable that this group would have taken such a stand without the
cognizance and probably the approval of the Mayor. The resolution of the
Committee urged the reconsideration of the original plan; furthermore, the
Advisory Committee specifically suggested that the Common Council make studies
of the sites suggested by Heidtman’s group, the Citizens Housing Council, thus
confirming the impact of that group’s effort.
The
boost given to a scatter-site program by the Citizens Advisory Committee –
indicating to many people that the Mayor’s support was imminent – apparently
elicited an adverse reaction from neighborhoods that suddenly felt threatened.
Although no city group or neighborhood association took a stand – publicly –
against scatter housing, the student is lead to believe that there were private
objections made to the Mayor by panicky citizens. Only two weeks after the
Advisory Committee’s suggestion to review the centralized housing plan, the
Mayor issued a public statement, speaking for himself and the Common Council,
vehemently opposing the spread of multi-family construction (i.e. apartment
houses) into stable, one-family residential areas. Although he did not mention public
housing in particular, his reference to the protection of property values
coupled with the public outcries of the preceding weeks in favor of scattering
relocation housing around White Plains leaves little doubt as to his
intentions. The Mayor’s statement did not preclude scatter-sites but did
severely limit the possible locations.
Urban
Renewal Director Allebach later claimed that the Mayor’s intent was to
“reassure White Plains that planning would be rational and that nothing drastic
would be done.” It appears to the
writer that Allebach’s explanation is slightly euphemistic; that is, the
purpose of the Mayor’s comment seemed to be to quell the voices of opposition –
those citizens who perceived the scatter-site philosophy as a threat to their
own neighborhoods.
Several
interests in the city misinterpreted the Mayor’s statement to be an unqualified
negation of the scatter-site concept. The Democratic City Committee in a public
statement pointed out that the Administration “is still not committed to a
policy of scatter-housing, a policy publicly favored by the Democratic Party
during recent campaign.” The
urban League also condemned Hendey’s statement as a reinforcement of rather
than a destruction of the “invisible walls (of segregation)” in the community.
The
Reporter Dispatch, the only newspaper of significance in the city, praised the
Mayor in an editorial:
“Although they did
not mention it, the seven elected leaders of the community (the Mayor and the
Council) left no doubt in anyone’s mind that they were acting to make the
city’s feeling known in no uncertain terms on the matter of extreme concepts of
“scatter housing” for the urban renewal relocation project.
There have been
many views expressed on ‘scatter housing’ … but it seems that the vast majority
of the people of White Plains are as concerned with maintaining the type of
community in which they are living as they are with fulfilling the very
praiseworthy aims of racial balance in the schools” (emphasis mine)
The
newspaper, then, construed the Mayor’s statement as a rejection of the
“extreme” aspects of a scatter-site program – and with this it heartily agreed.
But in order to approach an understanding of this editorial stance, it is
necessary to say something of the role the Reporter Dispatch has traditionally
played in the city.
The
Reporter Dispatch is a Republican newspaper that, first and foremost, backs the
Republican Administration. Very rarely does the paper oppose in toto a
basic policy of the Mayor and the Common Council. The question may be raised,
then, as to why the Reporter Dispatch opposed the scatter-site program, even
when the Mayor and the Common Council publicly committed themselves to it. One
answer is offered by the reporter who covered the City Hall “beat” during much
of the housing controversy:
“I have not known
the paper to oppose an important policy of the Council. Therefore, when the
Common Council embarks on a progressive program such as urban renewal, which
was originally generated by the Democrats, it is not the total policy of urban
renewal that is questioned but the progressive aspects of the program.
Also, it must be
pointed out that 90% of its news in this area is obtained by press release, 10%
of its news is background, background to the hard news lead. Almost never does
a reporter seek a scoop. There is very little honest delving into the workings
of city government.”
At another time during the housing
controversy, the Reporter Dispatch vehemently opposed a decision of the Mayor
and Council. This will be treated later.
For
the purposes of this study, it is highly significant that the newspaper has
failed dismally in influencing relocation policy. When Mayor Hendey was asked
whether he thought the paper’s opposition to scatter-site housing might have
made his eventual support of it politically unwise, he replied:
“Politics as far
as this Council goes doesn’t enter into it. This is not campaign talk or
anything like that. We’re all residents of White Plains and none of us have any
political ambitions. We want to live here after we get through our terms and we
want to make White Plains the best small city we can. Personally, I don’t think
we worry whether the paper is going to come out for us or against us. When we
make a decision, we let the chips fall and if it’s wrong, we’re to blame. But
we try to make the decision which is best for the whole city.”
Aside from confirming Allebach’s
comment (related earlier) about the unsophisticated nature of government in the
suburbs, this statement must, contrary to the Mayor’ claim, be analyzed
politically as it raises a highly political question: why were the Mayor and
Council able to ignore, with impunity, the criticisms and position of the only
widely-read local newspaper?
The
answer is three-fold. First, as mentioned previously, the Mayor and Councilmen
have little to fear from the Democratic opposition. Moreover, they were well
aware that the newspaper would be on their side at election time, regardless of
any political differences in the interim. Secondly, the newspaper has never
been very successful in influencing the elected officials, because the elected
officials are convinced that they have a tight hold over the paper (e.g. news
by press release). Finally, the Reporter Dispatch, according to ex-reporter
Whittemore, supposed that the majority of readers would oppose the scatter-site
plan simply because it gives the impression that it is going to disrupt the
community. This reaction never
materialized and the sale source of community-wide communications in the city
was left screaming in the wilderness.
Despite
Mayor Hendey’s variously interpreted statement on scatter-housing (February 1,
1962), it was abundantly clear by the summer of that year that the city
officials had little desire to adhere to the original plan of centralized
relocation housing. The important question, of course, is why the Mayor and the
Common Council reversed their initial plans for one huge site in favor of
several sites scattered around the city.
The
most feasible explanation for the policy turnabout is the following: Although
the Mayor and Councilmen were aware of the relative advantages of several
scattered sites, they misconstrued what the public reaction to such a proposal
would be. The Mayor had been in consultation with Urban Renewal officials from
New Haven, Hartford, Providence, and Boston on the questions of relocation
programs. Moreover, he had been
continually exposed to the persuasive arguments of a housing expert – his own
Urban Renewal Director, Kenneth Allebach. Yet, until the outcry of public
sentiment – PTA groups, Citizens Housing Council, Urban League, Democratic
Party, etc. – late in 1961 and throughout 1962, the Mayor appeared reluctant to
broach the delicate subject of dispersed relocation sites to the community.
Urban Renewal was unquestionably the largest undertaking in the history of the
city and it seems possible that the Mayor did not want to risk upsetting the
tractable consensus on the total program by proposing a potentially
controversial relocation plan. When it became apparent, however, that a
significant number of citizens were not only opposed to highly concentrated
relocation north of Barker Avenue but were adamant in their support of
scattered-sites, the Mayor was able to reverse his position without fear of the
adverse repercussions he initially anticipated. In short, a scatter-site plan
would not endanger the entire programs.
The
writer’s conclusion – that the elected officials’ eventual support of
scatter-site plan was the result of citizen group backing of a program that the
officials originally perceived as theoretically desirable but politically
perilous – is not without validation. When asked if city groups had any
influence in the change of policy, the Mayor replied:
“If anyone
influenced us, it was the schools. We discussed housing and relocation with
them in terms of their own plans.”
When questioned as to whether the
Urban Renewal Staff, particularly Director Allebach, favored a scatter-site
policy before he and the Council subscribed to such a policy, the Mayor
responded:
“I don’t
know the timing on it, but I think that all of us had the same ideas that he
had. It was through his assistance that we did get to talk to the people of the
Urban Renewal Administration (in Washington). Also, he knew men at New Haven,
Hartford and places like that.
There were
some on the Council whose minds were made up at the same time as his was, but
with others he had some influence, yes.”
Hugh
Leslie, a member of the Common Council, was more vague about who provided the
influence leading to the city’s reversal policy:
“It came
from several people. I think the Mayor had as much to do with it as anyone;
also, Allebach and the members of the Council. I think the preponderance of
thinking her in the city, from the Minority Housing Committee, the urban
renewal people, etc. favored scatter-sites. It’s hard to put your finger on who
had more influence than someone else. It came more as a community solution to
the problem.”
Urban
Renewal Director Kenneth Allebach provided greater confirmation on the
effectiveness of civic groups in influencing the Mayor and the Council. When
asked if the pressures applied by various city groups induced the Mayor and the
Council to reconsider and eventually alter their original stance, he answered:
“Sure, No
question about it. The Mayor and the Council got the very clear impression that
they had a broad range of support for this program or as political people they
wouldn’t have supported it.”
Thus
it appears that despite the Mayor’s assertion that “politics doesn’t enter into
it,” the decision to abandon the
preliminary plan to centralize most housing in one super-block would not have
been made were it not for the vociferous protestations of several civic groups.
There was no public announcement of the change in policy by any member of the
city administration. Rather, the indication received confirmation when, in
1963, the Citizens Advisory Committee, the White Plains Housing Authority, the
Planning Board and the Minority Housing Committee (appointed by the Mayor in
March 1962) began to consider sites for public housing in several locations
throughout the community. That these official groups would undertake such an
endeavor without the explicit approval of the Mayor and Council is
inconceivable.
Not
all six members of the Common Council were convinced of the values of a
scatter-site program. According to Richard Maass, whom the Mayor appointed
Chairman of the Minority Housing Committee in 1962, only three councilmen and
the Mayor had been persuaded of the wisdom of dispersed relocation sites. Councilman McMahon admitted that he
and Councilman Brewster would have preferred to see the housing remain in the
Urban Renewal Area.
However, the tradition of local government in White Plains calls for the Council
and the Mayor to present a united front to the community; for this reason, most
citizens of the city were never aware that disagreement existed within the
Common Council. The majority – 3 Councilmen and the Mayor – were in favor of a
modified scatter-site plan and any substantive discussion to the contrary took
place only in executive session.
At
the beginning of 1963, the officials of the city of White Plains were
confronted with two interrelated problems in their relocation housing program.
Above all, the relocation plan had to be finalized and submitted to the federal
government in order that the Central Renewal Project could receive the
requisite funds to enter the execution stage. Secondly, alternative
scatter-sites had to be studied so that decision could be made as to the
precise location of the relocation housing. Theoretically, a resolution of the
second problem should have preceded the filing of the federal application. In
reality, this was not possible. Thus, in Mayor Hendey’s words:
“We had
learned from other communities that had been through the process of urban
renewal that if we waited to get our housing settled before we filed the final
plan, it would take a good many years. Thus, it was agreed that we would file a
plan with all housing in the north end of the city with the definite
understanding that little if any would go there because we didn’t want another
Winbrook. The Agency, the Advisory Committee, and the Council members all
agreed that we wanted to spread it around a bit.”
The Mayor and the Urban Renewal
Director had received assurances from the state and federal authorities that
they would not be bound to an application plan that shoed all housing
centralized within the URA. Meanwhile, the search for appropriate sites outside
of the URA began.
The
process of selecting specific sites for public housing was highly complex in
White Plains. The anticipated controversy and antagonistic reaction of affected
neighborhood groups was further complicated by the disparity between the federal
application and the publically stated plans of the city officials. Never, in
fact, was the Mayor able to adequately persuade all segments of the community
that the centralized relocation plan as elaborated in the federal application
was merely and expediency.
Indeed,
two full years after the Mayor and the Council made it apparent that the
proposed super-block of housing within the URA had been rejected, there
remained considerable skepticism within the city. At a public hearing in June
of 1964 – held, according to law, to discuss urban renewal in its entirety –
Lloyd Miller, president of the small but energetic Woodcrest Heights
neighborhood association, delivered a lengthy and detailed statement on the
relocation issue. He said in part:
“While verbal
assurances have been given that those responsible for Urban Renewal no longer
plan to use the Barker Avenue site as shown in the plan before the Common
Council tonight, the fact remains that the Barker Avenue site is still in the
plan we are called upon to approve tonight, two full years after the necessity
for alternatives become clearly evident…
We reject the idea
that a deadline is more important than the plan itself. This is expediency not
the type of good planning a 40-million-dollar project deserves.”
The
Woodcrest Heights Association together with the neighboring but much larger
North Broadway Association was intensely persistent in its quest to deter any
relocation housing north of Barker Avenue. These two neighborhood groups had a
clear perception of their vested interests: property values and neighborhood
integrity would be threatened by large numbers of low-income families in the
Northern part of the city (see appendix #2).
Although
the natives of the two north-end neighborhood groups were probably solely
economic, they were able to derive a considerable portion of their arguments
for sociological date pertaining to the adverse effects of highly concentrated
relocation housing. There lies a certain irony here in that two neighborhood
groups that feared the spread of Negroes and other low-income families into an
area adjoining their own, found themselves in an unlikely alliance with the
Urban League, the Minority Housing Committee, and other liberal groups which
opposed the centralized housing plan for totally different reasons.
The
strategy of the two north-end groups – which to a great extent was developed
and implemented by the turbulent Mr. Miller – was simple. They attempted to
“make noise” and this influenced the politicians who they felt, could not
afford the adverse publicitiy.
Furthermore, they sought to establish alliances with other city groups who,
they believed, shared their stakes in blocking housing in the northern part of
the city. Indeed, the affiliation between the 2000 member North Broadway
Association and the 150 member Woodcrest Association deftly maneuvered the
powerful North Broadway group into taking a much stronger position than they
wanted to. In addition, the
North-end groups attempted to elicity a statement from the Board of Education
to the effect that centralized housing would irrevocably upset the racial
balance in the city’s schools (see appendix #3). The School Board, however,
reported that it was unlikely that any extra transportation would be required
to maintain racial balance in the public schools if relocation housing were
centralized north of Barker Avenue.
This not only represented a setback to the north-end groups, but emphasized the
School Board’s independence of the city administration which, by this time, was
unequivocally committed to a scatter-site program.
Miller,
who characteristically held a “conspiracy theory” of government, refused to
accept the School Board’s statement as an objective evaluation. He remains
convinced that the “city fathers” still, in 1965, wanted to locate the
relocation housing in one super-block in the northern part of the city and that
the School Board adopted its stance to avoid antagonizing the city “power
structure.” Miller also interpreted the newspaper’s support of centralized
housing as a reflection of what the “power structure” really wanted. When confronted with the fact that
virtually every city official had publicly stated that relocation housing would
be dispersed, Miller replied:
“The Reporter
Dispatch reflects the Common Council, the Mayor, the Chamber of Commerce – the
power structure if you will – and this (centralized housing), is what the power
structure would like to do. It is inconceivable to me that the newspaper is
acting by itself. Part of the power structure is behind this. If they got any
sort of favorable reaction or no unfavorable reaction to this (centralized
housing), despite the avowed intent for scatter-site housing, there would have
been a change.”
When
it became totally clear that not all relocation housing would be
centralized in one area, the north-end neighborhood groups shifted the target
of their opposition. During the Winter of 1962, the city decided to undertake a
second, much smaller Urban Renewal Project on Lake Street, several miles from
the downtown area. The purpose of this “vest-pocket” renewal was to clear an
area for a public housing project. The Lake Street project was to be at the
base of a large hill in the very eastern part of the city. The Woodcrest
Heights neighborhood spreads over the hill and is theoretically adjacent to –
but actually well separated by the sloping terrain – the proposed public
housing site. The construction plan originally called for an 100+ unit, twelve
story building and was then revised to 95 units and ten stories. The new focus
of the Woodcrest Heights and North Broadway Associations was to persuade the
Common Council to reduce the size of the Lake Street project.
The
methods employed differed only slightly from those utilized to deter the
centralized housing program. In April of 1963 Lloyd Miller – then chairman of
the Woodcrest Heights Urban Renewal Committee – wrote to the Mayor conveying
the sentiments of the Association on the Lake Street project (see appendix #4).
Then, in autumn of 1963 attempted to obstruct action on the Lake Street site at
a Common Council meeting. After achieving nothing at the Council meeting,
Miller presented his arguments to the Planning Board. Here, he met with a small
measure of success, effectively delaying the Board’s approval of the site for
one month. But on December 18, 1963 the Planning Board, as was inevitable,
approved a ten story, 95-unit project for Lake Street. Miller’s comment after
the fiery session: “Our goose is cooked. They are going to approve it.”
At
first glance, it may appear that the North-end neighborhood groups were
successful in their attempts to influence public decision making. Relocation
housing, after all, will not be centralized in the northern section of the
absolute size of the Lake Street public housing project was slightly reduced.
In reality, however, the protest actions of these groups were probably
negligible, except in so far as they contributed to the greater voice of the
entire city in opposing centralized housing. Urban Renewal Director Kenneth
Allebach commented on the ostensible effectiveness of the north-end groups:
“I think that the
success is more apparent than real. You can be pretty well assured of success
when you are opposing something that the public decision-making body has
already told you that it wasn’t going to do.”
In short, although some of the
perceived interests of the North Broadway and Woodcrest Heights Associations
were ultimately served, the probability is that this success could not be
attributed directly to the efforts of the groups.
The
answer to the more significant question – why the large north end neighborhood
groups were so impotent in their attempts to influence the city’s officials –
lies in fact of “one-party government” in White Plains. The northern part of
the city had traditionally voted 8-1 or 9-1 in support of the Republican ticket and the Mayor and Council had little
to fear in the way of losing votes no matter, within limits, what they did.
Indeed, that Mayor Hendey could afford to make the following statement
demonstrates the total lack of political leverage (or threat) at the disposal
of the north end neighborhood groups:
“The neighborhood
groups had no influence on us. We had made this decision on our own. Generally,
these groups are more or less selfish and would not see the interests of the
whole city.”
A
brief review of the decision to construct a large (175 units) public housing
project on the corner of Schuyler and DeKalb Avenues – an area directly
adjacent to the business section of town and several blocks from the URA – is
useful to re-emphasize the considerable policy-making latitude of the Mayor and
the Common Council even in the face of vociferous neighborhood and newspaper
editorial opposition.
The
Schuyler-DeKalb site was first suggested by the Citizens Housing Council as
part of their original plea for a scatter-site program early in 1962. In August
of 1963, the Citizens’ Advisory Committee and the White Plains Housing
Authority publicly supported the use of the site for public housing. The approval of the Housing Authority
at this point may be interpreted as tantamount to approval by the elected officials
of the city. Although in principle the Housing Authority is charged with the
construction of all public housing including participation in the decisions as
to site selection, in practice the agency has done little more over the years
than manage the existing law income housing. On the question of site selection,
then, the Authority acts only as a “rubber-stamp” for the Mayor and the
Council.
An
expected chorus of complaints arose from the residents of the Carhart
neighborhood – the area where the suggested project would be built. This
section of White Plains, once characterized by fine, old homes and populated by
some of the city’s best families had begun to degenerate. Rooming houses – a
fairly certain symptom of incipient deterioration – are becoming increasingly
common in the area. Still, the objections of the Carhart Association’s
membership were loud, if not as well organized or articulated, as were those of
the north end neighborhood groups on the question of centralized housing. The
usual arguments of overcrowded, traffic problems, lack of recreational space,
and insufficient school facilities
were employed. There was, however, little attempt to mask the fact that the
possible reduction in property values caused, it was believed, by Negro
proliferation rested at the base of the Association’s objections.
Also
opposing the Schuyler-DeKalb site with, it must be added, highly unusual
ferocity was the White Plains Reporter Dispatch. The violent
dissension of the daily newspaper was unusual for several reasons. First, as
pointed out earlier, the paper rarely criticizes an important policy decision
of the city officials. Secondly, the Reporter Dispatch, only
seven months before waging a scathing editorial battle against the site,
assumed a mild position in favor of the site. And thirdly, the April 26, 1965
editorial opposing the project in the Carhart section was so fiercely acerbic
in its content and received such high priority in its presentation that it
represented, without doubt, the most intense editorial crusade by the newspaper
in many years. Entitled “This Planning Monstrosity must be avoided, “the
editorial and its accompanying serial photographs covered most of the first
page of the edition in which it appeared.
The
most widely given and authoritative explanation for the editorial lambasting of
the Schuyler-DeKalb site is that considerable pressure was brought to bear on
the newspaper by large advertising interests. Alexanders, B. Altmans, Saks
Fifth Avenue and other sizeable department stores are all located in an area
bordering the Carhart neighborhood. These stores purchase hundreds of thousands
of dollars of advertising in the newspaper each year. When the implications of
using the Schuyler-DeKalb site became clear to the executives of the various
department stores, they were able to pressure the county-wide executives of the
newspaper into a position of vehement opposition. The earlier editorial, moderately
supporting use of the site, was probably written by the city editor who, in the
final analysis, was superseded by his county-wide superiors.
Yet
in the face of emotional pleas and acid accusations from the residents of the
Carhart neighborhood, and despite the bitter protest of the Reporter Dispatch,
the Common Council approved the Schuyler-DeKalb site on April 28, 1965 – only
two days after the dissenting editorial appeared on the front page of the
city’s newspaper. The procedure of the Council was unusual in that the final, publicly
announced vote stood at 5-2 – thus breaking an unwritten, unstated principle
that the Council as a whole supports the opinion of the majority unanimously,
at least in public. Councilman McMahon, who along with Councilman Brewster
voted against the site, point out:
“I think
that this is the toughest decision the Council has ever had to make. I do not
exaggerate when I say that the members of the Council spent sleepless nights
over this. It came to a point where something had to be done, and that was that.
I think the Mayor himself, would have liked to find another site.”
An
informed source later indicated that the original number of dissenting votes
exceeded two, but that the Mayor “pulled the reigns” over other recalcitrant
councilmen. Hugh Leslie, a Council
member who finally voted in favor of the site, explained that he was initially
opposed but that the determination of the Mayor and the position of the
majority of the Council lead him to reconsider and ultimately change his vote.
That
the Mayor and the Common Council ignored the strong objections of the Reporter
Dispatch in approving the relocation site can be explained in terms of
the overall impotence of the newspaper as an opinion leader in the community.
The elected officials concluded correctly that even the massive editorial
effort against the Schuyler-DeKalb site would little effect public sentiment.
Throughout the eight years of urban renewal in White Plains, the Reporter
Dispatch has been singularly in affectual in its attempts to influence
public policy – from its abortive efforts to induce reversion to the original
centralized housing plan to its futile attempts to mobilize support for or
against a particular scatter-site.
The
insensitivity of the elected officials to the outcries of the enraged Carhart
residences requires further explanation. The Carhart neighborhood Association
had gone to extreme lengths to deter approval of the Schuyler-DeKalb project;
yet, the Mayor and Council members were able to politically afford an
indifferent attitude towards the protestations. The reason is fairly clear cut:
The Carhart Association represented a relatively small neighborhood whose
political influence had declined along with the physical character of the area.
No longer do wealthy, prominent families populate the Carhart area; rather,
first and second generation minority groups predominate. Moreover, the Carhart
residents lacked support of other city interest groups in their objections. As
Urban Renewal Director Allebach explained:
“In the case of
the Carhart area, I think that the city stumbled accidentally on just the right
technique to get the Schuyler-DeKalb site through; that was by first proposing
a middle-income site on the corner of Bryant and Mamaroneck Avenues which
brought down a storm of protest from all over the southern part of the city.
Well, when several months later they abandoned that site and moved several
blocks north to Schuyler-DeKalb, the Carhart neighborhood was left virtually
alone in their opposition.”
In short, after the voices to which
the Mayor and the Council had to be sensitive were quelled by the abandonment
of the Mamaroneck-Bryant site, the relatively weak voices of the Carhart
members were almost totally isolated and thus ignorable.
Mrs. Rose Stipo, a
leader of the Carhart group, articulated her frustrations:
“We had meetings
with the Mayor, wrote letters, attended public hearings, and hired an attorney.
But we found out later that we wasted our time, money, and breath. The decision
had already been reached. Many of our members have already moved from the city,
and our President and Vice President have quit and left.”
Conclusion: Politics and Planning
in White Plains
This
paper has been a case-study of how a medium size, eastern city grappled with
the problems of relocation of new public housing projects. The stated purpose
of the study was two-fold: to untangle and to render comprehensible the
intricate concatenation of events that lead, over a period of almost six years,
to the decisions made by The Common Council of White Plains as to where to
locate the new public housing necessitated by urban renewal; and, to treat
these decisions analytically in order to determine the essential factors that
ultimately lead the council to act as it did.
Both
the preparatory research and the organization of the study on paper were guided
by a set of analytical questions (see page 17). Hopefully, the probable answers
to these questions – no claim is made for absolute truth – emerge from the body
of this paper. Strictly drawn conclusions are superfluous to this, or any, case-study;
therefore, this final section will be devoted to some general remarks on the
nature of politics and planning in White Plains.
The
relocation program that was finally adopted by the Mayor and the Council may be
considered a moderate, scatter-site plan. Although the original intention of
centralizing all housing in one super-block was totally rejected, the
alternative plan hardly indicated a commitment to a full-scale scatter policy.
Rather, the Council decided to construct low-income housing in three,
reasonably separate sections of the city.
This
should not be interpreted as a compromise between the position of those who
advocated centralized relocation and those who called for small, low-rise
apartments dispersed all around the community. The Mayor and the Council
conceded almost nothing to the few voices that urged either of these
alternatives. The vast preponderance of public opinion, however, did oppose
locating all the new housing within the URA and this, coupled with the
arguments of Urban Renewal Director Allebach and other professional experts,
impelled the Mayor and Councilmen to act as they did.
The
decision to build a few. Relatively large public housing projects rather than
many, well-dispersed small ones is usually explained in economic terms. Land
costs are high in White Plains and, it is pointed out, high-rise construction
is the only financially feasible method. Although this is probably true,
certain social and political factors cannot be overlooked. About one half of
the families to be relocated were Negro and social conditions in White Plains
simply preclude, at this point, the integration of many neighborhoods. What is
more, those areas of the city that would most stubbornly resist integration,
appear to have the political influence necessary to prevent it (see page 27).
Thus,
in light of the outcry against centralization on the one hand and the fear of
Negro proliferation backed up by significant political power on the other hand,
the Common Council chose to expedient middle course: a few scattered relocation
sites strategically located so as not to infringe on any “hallowed”
neighborhood. The choice of the Carhart area for the Shuyler-DeKalb site may
seem to be an exception but, as explained in the text, the opposition of the
Carhart residents was sufficiently isolated to present no real political
threat.
The
conclusion should not be drawn that the actions of the Common Council were
merely the vector resultant of impinging political forces. Within the extremely
broad limits of “no centralization” on one side and “no wholesale Negro
proliferation” on the other, the elected officials retained a large amount of
discretionary latitude. The Mayor and Councilmen – confident that as
Republicans they would be re-elected no matter what, within the given limits,
they decided – were able to ignore or only give “lip service” to most interests
within the city. In fact, a recurring comment by the leaders of interest groups
in the city was that the Council’s solicitation of public and group opinion was
largely perfunctory, that public hearings were a sham, and that the elected
officials irreversibly locked themselves into decisions before listening to
public debate.
Furthermore,
the Common Council and the Mayor enjoyed almost complete independence from the
various agencies and official committees concerned with the relocation problem.
The White Plains Housing Authority was allowed no planning function and
provided little more than a rubber stamp for Council decisions. The Citizens
Advisory Committee offered some critical thought but never escaped, or
attempted to escape, the control of elected officials. The Minority Housing
Committee, established to aid in the relocation of minority-group families,
tried at one point to expand its jurisdiction by suggesting specific housing
sites. The chairman of the committee, however, resigned out of dire frustration
in his relationship with the Common Council:
“They rarely asked
us for our opinions, failed to respond to our suggestions, and frankly I
resigned from a feeling of frustration.”
The only governmental agency that
wielded any influence over the Mayor and the Council was the Urban Renewal
Agency. This, of course, is mostly the result of the highly effective and
competent Director, Kenneth Allebach, who admits that even he worked almost
four years before he won the full confidence of the elected officials.
Finally,
the Mayor and the Councilmen never had their independence challenged by what
was potentially the most influential interest group of all: the 3000 or so
residents of the Urban Renewal Areas. For some reason these citizens –
certainly the most affected by relocation policy – never organized to have
their opinions heard. Indeed, it is unclear as to whether there existed a
predominate opinion among this group at all. In general, the area residents
appeared unconcerned with the location of the new public housing. The possible
reasons behind this apathy suggest a starting point for what could be a very
illuminating and provocative study.
In
conclusion, the decisions of the Mayor and Common Council of White Plains on
the location of relocation housing sites have been made, within the state
limits, without fear of political repercussions. The debate as to whether
one-party government breeds efficiency and rationality or dogmatism and
unresponsiveness is as old as democracy itself. The position of White Plains’
major proponent of urban renewal is clear:
“Urban
Renewal has succeeded in White Plains, so far as it can be said that we have
succeeded, principally because we have enjoyed one-party government. The whole
area of partisan bickering has been of no consequence to the decision-making
process. Programs in other cities have been bogged down by political
interference and political bickering. Because of the partisan nature of the
approach to government in these, cities, the decision-making process had broken
down completely. I sometimes shudder to think what will happen in White Plains
if this one-party system is broken up before Urban Renewal gets into the
ground.”
Afterword
The
concern of the social scientist is with what is typical, regular, and
recurrent. The findings of this study tend to contradict what other students
have found in other cities faced with problems similar to those of White
Plains. To conclude that for some mystical reason White Plains is unique does
not provide a sufficiently scholarly explanation. Therefore, some hypotheses as
to why events unraveled the way they did and decisions were reached the way
they were will be offered. The studies used for comparison – and, to this
student’s knowledge, the only research focused on problems comparable to those
analyzed in White Plains – which is a study of three projects in New York City
and Politics, Planning and the Public Interest by Martin Meyerson and Edward C.
Banfield, which is an analysis of relocation decisions in Chicago in the early
1950’s.
Some
hypotheses which, upon much further investigation, might possibly reveal and
explain the differences between White Plains and other cities in their modes of
treating relocation question are:
1.
The time factor. White Plains confronted its
relocation in the early and mid-1960’s, during a period when Civil Rights
Revolution was at its apex. Chicago (and to some extent New York) dealt with
their problems before Civil Rights was a popular issue and very few questions
of a sociological nature were raised in deciding where to place public housing.
2.
The size of the city. White Plains is a small to
medium sized city with a large middle-class. New York and Chicago – the two
biggest urban areas in the country – are extremely heterogeneous and have only
a small percentage of middle-class citizens. Middle-class residents of White
Plains were largely responsible for the introduction of sociological criteria
in choosing relocation sites.
3.
The governmental structure. White Plains has a
strong City Council form of government with virtually no competing governmental
centers of power. Chicago, according to Banfield and Meyerson, has not one but
six city governments; and New York government, Davies points out, is a series
of “semi-autonomous little worlds.” In short, White Plains government is
characterized by an usually complete integration.
4.
One-party politics. White Plains is governed by
one party with the elected officials chosen at large. Both Chicago and New York
have dominant-party systems but officials are elected by and expected to serve
specific constituencies.
5.
Criteria in choosing sites. The political
invulnerability or elected officials in White Plains allowed them, within
limits, to select relocation sites on the basis of what they perceived as being
“good for the city as a whole.” In Chicago and New York, such decisions had to
be made more on the basis of political compromise.
6.
Neighborhood groups. In New York and to a lesser
extent in Chicago, neighborhood groups gained political access to some parts of
the complex city governments and were able to influence site selection. In
White Plains, the neighborhood groups were unable, for the most part, to effect
the decisions of the only center of power – The Common Council.
7.
Mass Media. In New York the mass media –
television and newspapers – were opinion leaders in determining the reaction of
many people to urban renewal. White Plains has only one city-wide instrument of
communication, the newspaper, which remained totally ineffective in influencing
opinion through the struggle.
These hypotheses
are set up to do no more than suggest differences between White Plains and
other cities that may have had consequences on not only the way decisions were
reached, but on the substantive nature of the decisions. Further investigation
and detailed research would be necessary to prove or disprove the relevance and
functionality of each hypothesis as an explanation of the unique way in which
White Plains resolved its relocation problems.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
Books
Banfield, Edward C., and Meyerson, Martin. Politics,
Planning and the Public Interest. Illinois: The Free Press, 1955.
Davies, J. Clarence, III. Neighborhood Groups and Urban
Renewal. New York: Columbia University Press, 1966.
Public Documents
City of White Plains. City
Charter. 1915.
City of White Plains. Amendments
to City Charter. 193601963.
The Central Renewal Project. Urban Renewal in White
Plains. Printed by the City of White
Plains, 1964.
White Plains Common Council. Hearings:
Central Renewal Project. June 10, 1964.
Reports
Wood, Elizabeth. A Survey of the Residents of the White Plains
Central Renewal Project. City of White Plains 1965.
Newspapers
The Reporter Dispatch. White
Plains, N.Y. 1960-1966.
Personal Interviews (all
conducted during January, 1967)
Allebach, Kenneth. Director of the
White Plains Urban Renewal Agency.
Fredman, Samuel. White Plains City
Democratic Chairman.
Heidtman, William. Ex-president of
the White Plains Citizens’ Housing Council.
Hendey, Richard. Mayor of the City
of White Plains.
Isaacs, Myron. Chairman of the
Urban League Committee on Urban Renewal.
Leslie, Hugh. Member of the Common
Council of the City of White Plains.
Maass, Richard. Ex-Chairman of the
Urban Renewal Minority Housing Committee.
McMahon, Francis. Member of the
Common Council of the City of White Plains.
Miller, Lloyd. President of the
Woodcrest Heights Association.
Stipo, Rose. Secretary of the
Carhart Association.
Whittemore, Louis. Ex-Reporter for
the White Plains Reporter Dispatch.
