Reason: Little Pink House

[VIDEO] As stated with an earlier video from Reason magazine, one of the things I pride myself in doing with this blog is presenting ideas that get you to think. With that last video it illustrated ways that bigotry can prove to be expensive and proved to be an opportunity for an enterprising real estate entrepreneur in the 20th century.

This video takes a different track. John Stossel in his recent video with Reason talks about eminent domain. You may have heard that term fairly recently with regards to the former Dominick's on 71st/Jeffrey as there was significant interest in getting another grocery store to that space.

What Stossel discusses in this video is a movie called Little Pink House. It's about a woman who lost her house in an eminent domain fight that went all the way up to the Supreme Court of the United States. Basically the city of New London, Connecticut wanted to condemn an entire neighborhood for redevelopment which as you see in the video above still hasn't happened even in 2018. You can read up on the Supreme Court case here.

Could this be how many low-income Chicago neighborhoods can ultimately become relatively affluent neighborhoods? Is this what could happen to Englewood or Woodlawn? Is it what's happening with Bronzeville?

Let me elaborate with Bronzeville, that area for many years contained those notorious housing projects that have been demolished in the course of the past decade. Now granted these were government housing projects - and certainly not a case of eminent domain - that unfortunately trapped crime, social issues, etc and now the land where these projects stood are up for grabs. Will the future developments on these lands be housing for the rest of us or will they be for the affluent?

Feel free to chime in on what you think about the video. Better yet feel free to chime in on the "dreaded G word".