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15 Clearinghouse Rev. 207 (1981-1982)
Displacement

handle is hein.journals/clear15 and id is 219 raw text is: DISPLACEMENT
by Richard T. LeGates and Chester Hartman
GENTRIFICA TION BLUES

I woke up this morning, I walked out my door
I noticed my neighbors weren't there any more
I've got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues
When I asked where they had gone to
That's when I heard the bad news.
Well, I looked in the windows, I look in the doors
They were hanging up the chandeliers and sanding the floors
I got the gentrif-, gentrification blues
The rent sign said 'five-hundred fifty dollars, one
floor through'
They call it Boerum Hill to make it sound classy
Used to be Gowanus and they said it was trashy
But some folks still remember this neighborhood
When the rents were lower and the living was good.
When the brownstoners came, they said they liked integration
To live with other races and have neighborly relations
I got the gentrif-, gentrification blues
Now it's to hell with good relations
If it doesn't raise the property values.
Now we've got Hagendaz ice cream and the New York Times
'Cause the real estate agents brought in their own kind
But good-bye to Bustelo and the people who drink it.
Good-bye to integration and the people who think it.

They say that a brownstone is the people's housing
But what about the folks who can't afford a hundred
thousand?
Got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues
They're living somewhere else now
They're the many who'e been kicked out by the few.
I woke up this morning, I looked next door
There was one family living where there once were four
I got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues
I wonder where my neighbors went 'cause I
Know I'll soon be moving there too.
Somebody said, Where will we go?
There ain t no places left around here no more
I got the gentrifi-, gentrification blues
Guess we gotta fight back
'Cause we ain't got nothing to lose.
© Judith Levine and Laura Liben, written
for the Anti-Displacement Committee of
Boerum Hill/Gowanus, Brooklyn, New York.

Richard LeGates is an Associate Professor of Urban Studies, San Francisco State University. He is a member of the California Bar and
co-author of an urban studies textbook, City Lights: An Introduction to Urban Studies (Oxford, 1981).
Chester Hartman has taught city planning at Harvard, Yale, the University of California-Berkeley, Cornell, and most recently at the
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. His books include: Yerba Buena: Land Grab and Community Resistance in San Francisco (Glide,
1974), Housing and SocialPolicy (Prentice-Hall, 1975) and a co-edited anthology, Housing Urban America (Aldine, 2d ed., 1980). He chairs the
Planners Network, a national organization of progressive urban planners.
Copyright © 1981, Richard T. LeGates and Chester Hartman.
This report was prepared as part of the Legal Services Anti-Displacement Project. The opinions expressed herein are those of
the authors and do not necessarily represent opinions or policy of the Legal Services Corporation or the United States Government.
Extensive comments on an earlier draft of this report were received from Michael Stegman, former Deputy Assistant Secretary for
Research, HUD, and his staff; Carla Cohen, former Special Assistant to Assistant Secretary for Community Planning and Development Robert
Embry, HUD; Shirley Laska, Department of Sociology, University of New Orleans; and staff members of the National Urban Coalition. Useful
comments on segments of the draft report were received from George and Eunice Grier of the Grier Partnership, Bethesda, Maryland; Dennis
Gale of the Department of Urban and Regional Planning, George Washington University; David Bryson and Frances Werner of the National
Housing Law Project; Dennis Keating of the Legal Services Anti-Displacement Project; and Mawina Sowa, Jack Cann, Stephen St. Hilaire, and
Florence Wagman Roisman of the Legal Services Anti-Displacement Project Advisory Committee.
JULY 1981                                                                                                                ,A7

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