Part 6: The Future

The Promise

Nashville Public Radio

Society & Culture

4.9 • 777 Ratings

🗓️ 14 March 2018

⏱️ 26 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Does this big idea to have low-income and higher income people living side-by-side really make a community better, safer, healthier? As The Promise comes to a close, we dig into the fundamental question driving this massive overhaul of Nashville’s public housing.

The city’s housing agency is betting on mixed income, big time. But its only attempts have been on a much smaller scale than what’s envisioned for the James Cayce Homes. We explore one particular attempt, at a housing complex nearby known as John Henry Hale. And what we find reveals that building pretty homes, and putting people side-by-side doesn’t necessarily produce a flourishing community.

Music Credits:
The Insider, Black Ant, and James Pants, all found through the Free Music Archive

Production Credits:
Writing and reporting: Meribah Knight
Editing: Blake Farmer, Anita Bugg. With additional help from Tony Gonzalez
Sound Design: Tony Gonzalez

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is what we've been waiting for.
0:04.0	This is what we've been waiting on.
0:06.0	I want the first one move in there.
0:08.0	Some people want change, some people don't.
0:10.0	Some people are afraid of change.
0:12.0	Some people embrace change.
0:14.0	But change is here.
0:16.0	Change is here.
0:18.0	The 99 rundown buildings that make up the James Casey housing projects in East Nashville are coming down.
0:25.6	And their place will be a brand new cluster of colorful, modern apartments.
0:30.6	And the housing authority is banking that they'll attract a new kind of tenant,
0:34.6	teachers and nurses and young professionals, living alongside families
0:39.5	on public assistance. If there's a silver bullet for concentrated poverty, housing director
0:45.6	Jim Harbison believes this is it. And that's what today is all about to me, living together
0:52.3	about judging each other by the size of their wallet,
0:54.6	the coat of their skin, where they go to church, or if they go to church at all.
0:57.7	There will be dozens of ground-breakings before this dream comes true.
1:01.5	And right now, in the early days, violence has been an unwelcome backdrop.
1:08.4	Just two blocks down the hill here, a talented, beautiful young 16-year-old woman recently lost
1:14.1	her life.
1:15.7	Early this summer, another talented, beautiful young woman killed in the basketball courts.
1:22.6	Ten days ago, another shooting and a murder right here at Casey.
	...

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