New Rochelle’s De Facto Segregation More Than Education

I was taken-a-back by a 1/15/2012 opinion article in the Journal News titled; New Rochelle is able to take pride in its diversity, by Dr. Walter Lipow. I wrote the following post with every intention of lambasting Dr. Lipow’s delusion of diversity but thought better of it as I didn’t want to be divisive. Last week NAACP President, Ron Williams, was thrown out of Lincoln Park. Mr. Williams was there for a publicly scheduled announcement to endorse Rob Astorino for county executive. Predictably, Mayor Bramson denies any culpability but anyone who knows city manager Chuck Strome knows he will do anything short of committing a crime to avoid being thrust into a political skirmish. The only one with a motive to disrupt this event is Mayor Bramson. To think that at the site of one of New Rochelle’s darkest days, the civil rights desegregation of Lincoln school, Mayor Bramson would bring petty politics to bear is utterly reprehensible.

For those who may not know, on January 24, 1961 Judge Irving Kaufman, in the Taylor v New Rochelle Board of Education (NRBOE) case, rendered a decision that the NRBOE engaged in “de facto” racial segregation and ordered the desegregation of Lincoln School.

Another major concern raised by Bramson’s self-indulgent action is denying Mr. Williams his first amendment right to free speech. I can no longer allow aristocrats like Dr. Lipow and Mayor Bramson’s twisted delusion of New Rochelle’s diversity to go unchallenged.

In his opinion piece, Dr. Lipow credits “like-minded liberal democrats” for New Rochelle’s diversity. He goes on to describe his children’s diverse experience in the New Rochelle School System as akin to being “at a United Nations-sponsored gathering for young people”. Finally Lipow states; “I do feel the city that my wife, my children and I love and are proud to call our hometown, would still have made Martin Luther King Jr. proud”.

New Rochelle’s citywide statistics are quite diverse but, as usual, the Devil’s in the details. In reality New Rochelle has been defined as a tale of two cities divided north and south by Eastchester Road. One of our municipal unions dubbed Eastchester Road the Mason Dixon Line, which I believe, is accurate. Let’s examine New Rochelle’s north / south diversity using three criteria:

 “DIVERSITY” by Council Districts

Dr. Lipow resides in District 5 while I resided in District 1. These are the most extreme council districts geographically north and south. The following chart reflects 2010 census citywide statistics and council district statistics from the Westchester Board of Elections based on the 2010 census.

 District 5 does not reflect anything close to New Rochelle’s citywide diversity and in fact, by no stretch of the imagination, resembles anything close to a diverse community with a 69% non-Hispanic White population. Dr. Lipow’s North End neighbors, Council District 6, are even more homogenous with an 80% non-Hispanic White population. This is in stark contrast to District 1 with a 62% Hispanic population. This repudiates Dr. Lipow’s claim of living in a diverse council district and reveals New Rochelle’s pigeonholed diversity.

 “DIVERSITY” by School Demographics

 For this evaluation I will use Davis elementary school and Columbus elementary school followed by Albert Leonard middle school and Isaac E. Young middle school. There is no high school comparison as New Rochelle has only one high school.

North / South Elementary School Comparison

North / South Middle School Comparison 

The school district is more diverse than the council districts or zip code comparison due to magnet schools and as a result of a civil rights desegregation lawsuit. That said it is clear that minorities are overwhelming confined to the south end and a major issue in south end schools is a broad population of minorities, many who don’t speak English. These same “like-minded liberal democrats” espouse uniform education and graduation rates amongst all schools, another fallacy demonstrated by the abysmal school district minority graduation rates. 

 “DIVERSITY” by Zip Codes

Now let’s examine diversity by Zip Code, 10804 vs. 10801. Dr. Lipow resides in the 10804 Zip Code (New Rochelle, Wykagyl) and I resided in the 10801 Zip Code. These are the most extreme zip codes geographically north and south.

 Once again, statistics expose that the North End 10804 Zip Code (New Rochelle, Wykagyl) is anything but diverse with an 81.8% white population compared to the South End 10801 Zip Code with a 33.2% white population.

There is also glaring difference in population

Dr. King’s dream of absolute diversity transcends the color of one’s skin to social and economic diversity. By those standards New Rochelle is once again divided north and south as the following statistics show.

Economic “DIVERSITY”

Experience always shows that one picture is worth one thousand words so I will offer a pictorial of the Victory Boulevard, 10804/District 5, and Charles Street, 10801/District 1 neighborhoods. Nothing staged, only dated pictures from 2012

District 5 / 10804 Zip

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 District 1 / 10801 Zip

These “like-minded liberal democrats” are modern-day hypocrites who celebrate New Rochelle’s diversity while living in close-knit homogeneous neighborhoods while sending their children to the most undiversified schools in New Rochelle.

They are smooth talking charlatans who promote citywide diversity while living in their Ivory Towers in homogenous neighborhoods.

Admittedly I have created a harsh picture to make my point, but the first life-lesson I was taught is that you fight fire with fire. I used an equally broad brush to Dr. Lipow’s to make my case. This in no way represents the average District 5 or 6 resident regardless of political affiliation but it does represent a large number of political phonies who proclaim citywide diversity while living in the most un-diversified neighborhoods. Unfortunately, these pretenders are the controlling entity who band and vote together to manipulate New Rochelle while herding minorities in south end districts and schools.

It has taken me over one year to finalize my thoughts and prepare for the barrage of personal attacks to follow from “like minded New Rochelle democrats”. I will surely be labeled an outsider as I moved from New Rochelle six years ago or as a CAVE (Citizens Against Virtually Everything) person, Chuck Strome’s favorite reference, as their MO is to attack the messenger if you can’t refute the facts. To them I say, bring-it-on as it will fuel me to dig deeper.

If the statistics and pictures haven’t exposed New Rochelle’s confined diversity maybe a quote from the Hartley House (Heritage Homes) project will drive home the fact that the City is well aware that minorities are compartmentalized. In communication to the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) the City of New Rochelle states,

The [New Rochelle Municipal Housing Authority] NRMHA is also involved in pre-development activities for the redevelopment of the Hartley House complex. The redevelopment is intended to reduce minority concentration by providing a choice in new location to current residents of two of the buildings to be demolished in preparation for construction of new affordable townhouses.

The goal of the Hartley House redevelopment is to create a mixed-income development that would attract persons of other racial backgrounds to purchase affordable housing in the complex in an effort to reduce minority concentration

To summarize;

The GOAL of the Hartley House project is to reduce minority concentration and attract persons of other racial backgrounds

I’m sure this is not what Dr. King envisioned nor would Dr. King be proud

 Enough said…