The video, “Holding Ground,” was motivational and eye-opening to me as a new macro-practitioner.  It focused on the history, issues, and effects of revitalization efforts in the Dorchester and Roxbury neighborhoods in Boston.  This documentary chronicled the community building efforts and activities of what would eventually become the Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative (DSNI).    

In the 1960s, Martin Luther King Jr., brought national attention to the decline of the neighborhoods surrounding Boston, most specifically to both Dorchester and Roxbury, when he called on the city to set an example for other communities around the country in abolishing ghettos and uniting around a creative vision for improving the area.  The documentary discusses the problems the area faced over time and pays particular attention to the influx of newcomers after the war.  As white, Irish-Americans left the cities to move to the suburbs, blacks from the South, Latin Americans from the Caribbean and Cape Verdeans moved into the area in search of jobs and a better life.  Unfortunately, by the 1960s the banks and city government, in an act of racism, had “redlined” the neighborhoods, making it impossible for homeowners to sell their property to the new people moving in.  In an attempt to reclaim their investments, many homeowners turned to burning their property to collect on insurance claims.  Increasingly, homes were burned, properties were left abandoned and vacant lots dominated the landscape.  The vacant lots became dump sites for everyone.  Companies would truck in their waste and dump it illegally on the property, much of which was city owned.  Residents, many of which were children living below the poverty level, were living in squalor and as a result were getting ill.      

Things would begin to change when Ray Flynn became mayor of Boston.  In an attempt to win over some of the black vote, Flynn would send in a team to evaluate the area and make recommendations for improvements that would revitalize the area.  However, the residents of the neighborhood would not be pushed around.  They had witnessed what had been happening in other neighborhoods around the city as improvements were made to bring in revenue for the city, displacing many of the poorer families.  They felt the “improvements” that had been completed in some areas served only to benefit the city and the wealthier members of the communities.  Nothing was being done to help them.  The residents of this neighborhood decided to band together and demand that the mayor and the city listen to them and allow them to participate in the revitalization efforts.  They utilized the political activist approach, as mentioned in Fraser and Kick’s article, Understanding Community Building in Urban America (2005).  They fought to change the institutional structure that they saw as causing the declining conditions of the neighborhood when they demanded that representatives of each ethnic group living in the community be elected to serve on the board of the DSNI.  

The DSNI organized community meetings at St. Patrick’s Church, instituted multi-lingual button campaigns to get the word out, carried out protests and marches to block further dumping on vacant lots, planned cultural street fairs to unite the citizens as a community, held door-to-door surveys and informational campaigns to educate the members of the community.  As mentioned in Netting (Chap 5), according to the resource mobilization theory, a social movement needs a collective identity, structure and a strong message. Leaders like Che Madyun, would recognize the need to build a collective identity, uniting all three cultural groups as one in a demand for change.  They would eventually consult with city leaders to seek to take back the land that had been abandoned through the use of eminent domain and would buy back the land previously owned by the city.  The community building efforts would not be swift, but would need a sustained effort over the course of many years.  Today, the DSNI has more than 3600 members, has rehabilitated over 1300 vacant lots in the Dudley St. triangle, built more than 400 new homes and rehabbed another 500.  They have been able to build various types of capital for the 

community.  As Homan discussed in Chapter 2 (2008), a healthy community needs various forms of capital to be successful and continue to thrive. The DSNI built social capital within the community by fostering both horizontal relationships within the community and vertical relationships with government and city agencies outside the community (Netting.)  In addition, human capital was developed with the fostering of a youth movement that grooms future leaders, provides scholarship money and incentive to the youngest members of the community and ensures that its youngest members have safe places to play and learn.  Political capital was developed as the relationship between community members and city officials grew.  The positive interactions between these forms of capital should provide a long-lasting effect that would not have been allowed to happen had the city come in with the original plan of revitalizing this neighborhood without participation by the community.  

What I have most noticed through the readings and videos we have watched is that these types of successful changes in communities cannot happen without some form of conflict.  As Saul Alinsky said, “Change means movement. Movement means friction.”  If there is no conflict, the status quo prevails.  But, making change happen requires in-depth planning and a sustained commitment on the part of those involved, AND above all else, participation is key! 

Fraser, J., & Kick, E. (2005). Understanding Community Building in Urban America. Journal of Poverty, 9(1), 23-44.

Homan, M. (2011). Promoting community change. Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole. 

Netting, F. E., Kettner, P. M., McMurtry, S. L., & Thomas, M. L. (n.d.). Social Work Macro Practice (5th ed.).