Has “white flight” occurred in your area?
Article on the subject:
https://www.governing.com/topics/urban/gov-white-flight-suburbs.html
definitely has happened in Fremont, Milpitas and Cupertino in the SF Bay Area where it is predominantly Asian now. And not so coincidentally, the top elementary school districts in the state, perhaps in the country, happen to be in Fremont and Cupertino.
Huh? White flight FROM the suburbs was happening in Chicago’s West suburbs 30 and 40 years ago.
Our Hispanic population has replaced what used to be our Italian immigrant population who are now all old-timers. I suppose it’s technically white flight, but really the make up of the town is remarkably similar to what it’s always been.
Our neighborhood is pretty similar to how it’s been for some decades now, as is the neighborhood I grew up in. Not sure where people in our island would “flee” to.
In the 1970s!
@HImom - I will gladly flee to your neighborhood. 
People flee from our state due to high cost of living, but I’m sure that’s not what this thread is about.
Sure, @BunsenBurner — come on over!
we are in the midwest, but our city/school district has one of the highest poverty levels for URM neighborhoods in the country. Yes, our school district of 25K has changed significantly over the last 15 years. Sort of makes me sad and annoyed at all of the people who have left - it’s almost hurtful and slightly racist in some ways, but the people who have left would never look at it that way… I can’t tell you how many hours upon hours we’ve talked about this among friends. I like my house, the teachers at our low SES school, my kids have all been high stats kids; yet I wonder if the educational opportunities would be better if we too had moved. ??? simple answer to your question is “YES.”
To keep it from happening you have to actually want it not to happen.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/museums/ct-ent-oak-park-history-museum-0927-story.html
I don’t agree with the author’s definition and framing. If whites move from cities to the suburbs, that’s white flight. If they do the opposite and move from the suburbs back to the cities, we’re supposed to consider that white flight as well?
I live in one of the whitest states in the country. I wish we had more diversity.
My daughter’s school population in kindergarden (~70% White, 12% Asian, 10% Black, 5% Hispanic, and 3% other/mix race. My daughter’s school population as a senior in high school (~38% white, 25% Black, 16% Asian, 13% Hispanic, and 8% other/mix race. I don’t think it is all due to the “white flight” phenomenon however. The demographics of my state have changed a lot during that same time period due to many factors (immigration patterns, varying birth rates between the races, etc.).
My area has gradually become more diverse in the 21 years we have lived here. I think it’s for the better.
No, silly, the second one is “gentrification” which is equally wrong. /s
Obviously fleeing a neighborhood due to racism is wrong. Equally obviously, purposefully driving a person out of their home is wrong. But there are a myriad of actions in between those two extremes that appear to get labeled and condemned with the same level of vitriol. My husband who is British so likes to make observations on what he considers our odd societal quirks once had a very funny way to describe this issue. We were considering where to move in a new city and his conclusion was that we couldn’t move to a majority white neighborhood because that would be racist; we couldn’t move to a majority minority neighborhood because first we might be appropriating the housing stock available to POC and second if we did any home improvement projects (we’re big DIYers) we’d be evil gentrifiers; our only hope was to find a neighborhood that was mixed race in exactly whatever proportion was socially acceptable, live on the edge of that neighborhood and toss wads of cash in to the oppressed neighborhoods as we walked by every morning.
Have there been people who made housing decisions based on racism? Yes and that’s indefensible. But there are also - especially currently - plenty of people who are just looking to live in whatever neighborhood offers the type of housing, schooling, crime level, etc they’re comfortable with without the racial composition being a consideration.
I don’t see white flight in my current suburban neighborhood. Our schools and neighborhoods are diverse and the community really seems to embrace it.
I grew up in a white blue collar city neighborhood. The schools were diverse due to bussing and as little kids we never gave it a thought. I remember in high school I’d feel weird going to a friend’s house because I would be the only white person. Vice versa when she came to my house.
The “exodus” started in our section of the city because of single family homes being turned into duplexes and section 8 housing. Those who could leave did. The term for it was “creeping”. People would talk about neighborhoods being ruined and wonder how long they could stay the same.
I need to clarify that I mean row houses being turned into duplexes and apartments.
The district my kids attend is about 50/50 Anglo/Hispanic. We live in a rural and isolated community, so there’s very little in the way of school choice. Nearly everyone attends public school which makes for a very diverse student body in terms of SES. I know there are better places to go to school, but my kids have friends and experiences they wouldn’t have had anywhere else. They are very happy. And I don’t see the demographics changing at all over time, other than perhaps the Latinx population increasing even more.
@milee30 It’s a conundrum. I took a development course at Columbia in architecture school back in the day when gentrification was considered a good thing. I still have a hard time getting around that way of thinking!
I live in a diverse town, with neighborhoods that are generally not nearly as diverse, but chose our particular neighborhood after living in a different neighborhood for about ten years. Our current neighborhood school is 42% white, 31% Black and 23% Latino, it was about 15% Latino when my kids were in it. Our neighborhood made the deliberate choice to remain diverse in the 1950s. We formed a neighborhood association and talked to local realtors about what the neighborhood wanted. We put ads in Upper West Side NYC papers alerting families that were considering the suburbs to consider us. We continue to be proudly diverse.
Our suburb had classic white flight in the 70s when the high paying factory jobs left, & much like you describe, neighborhoods changed for the worse.
Seemed like we were on a little bit of an upswing, then the Crash in 2008 wrecked the housing market & neighborhoods continued to decline.
Once you get a high concentration of poverty? very very few people would choose to live there if there are other , more appealing, affordable options.
What can our suburb do if the surrounding suburbs do not have affordable housing? So, we house the unemployed poor & the working poor plus social services are concentrated here as well.