Slum Fight Starts Here
Item
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Title
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Slum Fight Starts Here
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Repository
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Library of Virginia - Virginia Chronicle
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Date Created
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1/14/1960
Vol. 20, No. 14
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Creator
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By: Alvaine Hamilton
Fairfax County Sun Echo
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Description
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Article on the beginning of the housing hygiene ordinance process. Outlines the goals of the ordinance that would be passed in 1961, and the study that was put in place to recognize the extent and conditions of the problem of substandard housing.
The article lists the sites of interest including Gum Springs and its drainage problems being of key interest. Dr. Harold Kennedy makes the note that the bulk of substandard housing is actually white homeowners, contrary to the belief that the majority were Black homeowners. However this distorts the fact that the vast majority of white homeowners in Fairfax County were not owners of substandard housing while around 40% or more of Black homeowners were - displaying the disproportionate state of affairs and systemic experience of displacement in place for Black homeowners in Fairfax.
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Index/Partial Transcript
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On skepticism of the ordinance: "Chairman Anne Wilkins said 'we should be helping the people who live in these dwellings, not punishing them for living in them'"
"Supervisor William Moss said: 'This is going to apply to the very segment of the population least able to comply financially with the ordinance's requirements.'"
"[Dr. Kennedy] made the point, too, that 'the bulk of the problem, contrary to popular opinion, is not Negro, but white families.'"
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Research Themes
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Housing Hygiene Ordinance
Gum Springs
Eviction
Displacement in place
Myth of Progress
Board of Supervisors
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Type
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Newspaper
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Researcher Name
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Jacob Connelly
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Bibliographic Citation
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Hamilton, Alvaine. “Slum Fight Starts Here.” Fairfax County Sun Echo, January 14, 1960, Vol. 20, No. 14 edition. Library of Virginia.
