A guest post by Jefe:
Prince George’s County, Maryland (“PG”) is the wealthiest US county with a black majority (66%). It is at the northern edge of the “Black Belt” and just to the east of Washington, DC. It is home to the US Census Bureau, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Andrews Air Force Base and the University of Maryland.
Before the 1600s, it was home to two Algonquian speaking peoples: the Nacochtank (now extinct) and the Piscataway. Descendants of the Piscataway mixed with free people of colour to form communities of tri-racial isolates, similar to the Melungeons. The Piscataway have obtained tribal recognition by the State of Maryland.
In 1696 PG became a county in the colony of Maryland.
In 1791 it ceded part of its land to the Federal Government to form the District of Columbia.
By the 1850s, blacks formed a majority. Many worked as slaves on tobacco plantations.
After the Civil War, Jim Crow laws, although less severe than in the Deep South, were applied together with practices common in the North (eg, restrictive covenants) to enforce strict segregation.
During the Great Migration, blacks poured into DC. By the 1950s, blockbusting and white flight had made DC the first large US city with a black majority. Many whites fled to PG county, making it 85% white by 1970 and larger than DC itself. Neighborhoods and schools remained highly segregated.
In 1973, the Maryland Supreme Court ruled against the county for failing to desegregate. PG became the nation’s largest school system ever subject to mandatory desegregation by busing. White parents placed their kids into hastily established segregation academies. Middle class blacks started moving in, reaching a majority around 1990. Segregated white neighborhoods are no longer found in PG and mandatory school busing ceased in 2001. By 2012, the school system was about 80% black, 11% Hispanic and 5% white. In Maryland, only Baltimore has a worse performing school system.
In the 1990s, PG led the nation in police-induced fatalities. Victims were overwhelmingly black and nearly half were unarmed. Despite electing a black county executive in 1994, the situation did not improve until after a US Department of Justice probe in 2000. Its crime rate is still the worst among metro DC jurisdictions.
By 2012, DC had lost its black majority, due to gentrification, pushing poor blacks into PG county and elsewhere. Poor black ghettos have formed in inner Beltway areas that used to be all white decades earlier. Ex-DC mayor and Ward 8 councilman Marion Barry Jr often referred to PG county as “Ward 9”.
Five of the nation’s top ten wealthiest black-majority communities are in PG. Some of this affluence can be attributed to the affirmative action policies of the Federal and DC Government after 1970 and to the general attraction of highly educated blacks to the area. However, PG is still the poorest county in the DC metro area, the nation’s wealthiest.
Private corporations and think tanks shun PG despite its proximity to DC and the presence of one of the nation’s largest research universities.
See also:
- The black middle class in America
- Jim Crow
- black ghetto
- gentrification
- white flight
- blockbusting
- Some numbers on Black Americans
- Melungeons
- Marion Barry
- Anacostia – the part of DC right next to PG county
- American school resegregation
- The DOJ report on the Ferguson police
- segregation academies
- Great Migration
Further Reading:
- Washington Post: Prince George’s neighborhoods make ‘Top 10 List of Richest Black Communities in America’
- Politico: Washington’s Ferguson Next Door:Lessons from Prince George’s County’s history of police brutality.
- Prospect.org: The Collapse of Black Wealth
- Amazon: Places of Their Own: African American Suburbanization in the Twentieth Century (Historical Studies of Urban America
- Washington Post: Joining Washington’s one percenters takes more than the U.S. average
- BlackDemographics.com: The African American Middle Class
- Washington City Paper: “They Enjoy Interacting With Other Blacks.”
- Business Insider: 21 Maps of Highly Segregated Cities in America – race maps of US cities
Thank you Julian Abagond,
Is it possible for you to answer a question?
Please excuse me. I did mail this question to you. Did you get it OK?
“Hello Julian,
“My question is about latest DOJ survey table 42.
Will you please let me know where you get the following numbers: “…As it turns out, of the 77,852 people surveyed, only 56 people reported “rape and sexual assault (a)”…”
https://abagond.wordpress.com/2011/11/23/
I’m looking at the survey and table 42 but maybe in the wrong places?…”
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I was born in DC, raised in PG County until I was 18 and enlisted in the USAF. Made the huge mistake of returning to PG after separating from the military. Having lived in PG County for 18 years prior one would think that I would know better than to return and attempt to raise a family there. To say the school system in underperforming is putting it lightly. And the school system is just an indicator of everything else that’s wrong with PG. You couldn’t pay me to live there again. I moved to Anne Arundel County just as soon as I could afford to and I have never made a better decision in my life.
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Wow, nice post, jefe.
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@”Its crime rate is still the worst among metro DC jurisdictions. It is on par with the City of Baltimore.”
I take issue with that last statement:
PG Co. total crime per 100k: 4,300
violent crime rate: 510 (Montgomery’s is 477)
homicide rate: 6
http://www.goccp.maryland.gov/msac/crime-statistics-county.php?id=21
vs
Baltimore City total crime per 100k: 6,200
violent crime rate: 1,406
homicide rate: 34
http://www.goccp.maryland.gov/msac/crime-statistics-county.php?id=25
@”Poor black ghettos have formed in inner Beltway areas that used to be all white decades earlier.”
Not poor by my standards. Only 9.4% of PG Co residents live below the poverty line. That’s less than statewide (9.8%), and far less than nationwide (15.4%)
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I remember reading a book back in the day the 90’s or early 2000’s by African American author Connie Briscoe titled P.G. County. And I was under the impression that African American’s who lived in this part of the United States were upwardly mobile professionals who lived in nice neighborhoods. They were not ghettos.
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PG County is primarily a middle class and upper middle class area. Its income is still above average for Maryland as a whole, and Maryland is the US’s wealthiest state. It ranks somewhere around #65-70 wealthiest in the Nation, above even most middle class white majority counties. Its poverty rate should be below the national average and the state average.
The blacks who moved in the County often had higher incomes than the whites they replaced.
Nevertheless, it is still poorer than the other metro DC counties, e.g., Fairfax, Loundon, Arlington in Virginia and Montgomery, Howard, and even Calvert and Charles in Maryland. Loundon and Fairfax vie for the #1 and #2 spot in the nation. It can be overall middle class to wealthy and still have pockets of poverty, e.g., in inner Beltway areas close to Anacostia that resemble inner city ghettos or in the rural areas in the extreme southeast of the County. There are all black towns set up there there after Reconstruction that are still poor.
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..Great article, I can’t say that I blame anyone for wanting to study Black folks and the awesome culture that is of the African diaspora, even non-Blacks can’t get enough of learning about ’em! lbvs ; )
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@resw77,
I think I was looking at information that included some crime statistics from the 1990s, when it was indeed quite bad. I has improved since then.
Maybe we could just delete “It is on par with the City of Baltimore.”
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@Kiwi
Why don’t you share what you know about Cupertino, or similar city that is majority brain drain Asian? There are only a few cimmunities in the USA like that. I even know more about Chinatowns or Hawaii than I know abt majority Asian suburban brain drain towns.
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@Jefe
It has improved a lot since then. Total crime is almost half what it was in the 90s, even as the county has added 100,000 people and gotten more black.
“There are all black towns set up there there after Reconstruction that are still poor.”
I’m not sure what you’re talking about. Clearly there’s some poverty, like anywhere, but even PG County’s poorest zip codes are richer than the national average.
@Kiwi
“Is Prince George’s County a good example of whites not accepting blacks, either, even when they outperform whites in education and income?”
Yes. Affordable housing is a big issue in the DC area (as well as other large metro areas) and you hear middle class whites use that term quite often. Yet they completely ignore PG County when considering housing–even the childless who don’t have to worry about public schools.
PG County’s average home price is $175,000 less than neighboring Montgomery Co. and $70,000 less than Anne Arundel, but people like JB would rather pay more because of the negative stigma of PG County, which as Jefe pointed out, is still one of the wealthiest counties in America.
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And I live just around these parts. I spent my first few months to a year of life in Oxon Hill, Md. I believe that might be a district of PG county.
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@resw77,
I have asked Abagond to delete “It is on par with the City of Baltimore.” I agree that it may be somewhat inaccurate or misleading.
Have you lived in PG county? Have to been across the rural tier area, esp. in the extreme southeast of the county near the Patuxent river (which separates it from Calvert), It harks back to the tobacco plantation era. Blacks living there are largely descendant from local pre-Civil war slaves, not the ones descendant from the Great Migration era like the majority. I remember when they still had the tobacco auctions in Upper Marlboro.
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Kiwi,
It is going to be difficult to compare Santa Clara County to PG county. PG has the legacy of its mass desegregation program (involving nearly 150,000 students in the 1970s). Very few places experienced that, including all of the neighboring jurisdictions. Asians have never been bussed around to achieve racial balance.
Can you confirm that the housing in majority Asian neighborhoods are noticeably cheaper than majority white neighborhoods. In your experience, are whites willing to pay a premium to live in neighborhoods that are less than 10% Asian, even if they don’t have kids?
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i had like the 3rd comment earlier but sometimes my posts don’t show up here for real!!! But this is a great article, jefe!!!
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“It is on par with the City of Baltimore.” is deleted.
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I live in Maryland in Howard County which borders PG County. Honestly, PG County for black people isn’t much different from how Baltimore County is for white people. PG County sees the entire spectrum of black life from rich to middle class to poor and ghettoized. Similarly, Baltimore County is the same for white people. You have upper middle class whites in Towson in Baltimore County, but you also have low income high crime white communities that may even qualify as ghetto in Baltimore County bordering South Baltimore in areas like Lansdowne, Dundalk and Essex. Maryland is a very diverse state.
And PG County is very different from Baltimore, culturally speaking. Baltimore is very slow and unpretentious. PG County culture is more aligned with black DC culture than anything. DC area culture as a whole is very reserved and people tend to be unfriendly, to be honest. Segregation is a way of life in the DC area. The DC area is so segregated that the majority of blacks who live in white-majority Montgomery County on the opposite side of the beltway are fairly recent African immigrants and their children. But you would be hard pressed to find a non-black person in swaths of PG County. The only really integrated areas of PG County are in the northern fringes of the county in quiet generally safe middle class areas like Bowie and Laurel as well as sketchy ghetto towns like Hyattsville and Riverdale which border Montgomery County and DC. PG County is upscale, minus the ghetto inner beltway communities. But even the upscale upper middle class communities in PG County are relatively dangerous because many people that live there have ghetto roots and the truly bad areas are often a stones throw away. The crime ridden inner beltway communities in PG are an extension of Northeast and Southeast DC. But even those areas have improved in recent years. Even the drugs of choice are different in Baltimore vs. PG County. Baltimore is about heroin addiction. The drug of choice in PG County is PCP. Scary stuff.
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@ SanFranpsycho415
You know, a few months ago when you started mentioning about your experience with suburban central Maryland between Washington and Baltimore, I knew instantly you were referring to Howard County. It is the wealthiest county in Maryland (the wealthiest in the USA) and often among the top 5 in the nation – reaching 2nd in 2013. It is majority white, but has significant amounts of Asians and some Blacks, mostly of the Brain drain variety. It has few Hispanics.
Maryland is the wealthiest state in the nation and about 30% black. That would not be possible unless the majority of the black population was at least middle class, with some in the upper middle class or even rich upper tiers. But a Howard County resident looking at the rest of Maryland would see communities poorer than theirs and maybe exaggerate the rate of “ghettoization”.
However, it sounds like you have little actual experience of living, working, going to school, or even plain hanging out in PG county. I don’t think of Hyattsville and Riverdale as ghetto towns – Hyattsville is not upper middle class, but it is fairly solid working middle class and it is NOT majority black (about 30-33% each white, black and Latino). Riverdale is at least 1/2 Latino and mostly middle class too. The photo in the post of the Prince George’s Plaza Metro station serves Hyattsville. The second photo is a street in North Brentwood, on the north side of Hyattsville – I would not call that “ghetto” (although they do have a couple poverty pocket neighborhoods nearby .
I would have called Suitland a crime-ridden “ghetto town” 10-15 years ago – and a centre for police brutality, but even that has become more middle class after the metrorail station opened. There are pockets of poverty near the DC line, but not as much as, say, 15 years ago. There are also pockets of poverty in the extreme SE rural tier, eg, near the areas of Aquasco and Eagle Harbour, black towns that are hail back to the early 20th century.
It also sounds like you have little experience with Baltimore county also. There are many middle class majority black neighborhoods in Baltimore County, lodged right between Baltimore city and Howard county, in communities such as Woodlawn, Randallstown, Owings Mills and Lochearn. Yes, it has a wide variety of upper and lower class whites, but it is almost 30% black too.
I grew up in PG and even though I live outside the USA, when I do go to the USA, I make a beeline to PG county. My parents lived there until they passed away, and my father is buried in northern PG; my mother’s ashes are in a cemetery in southern PG. My last trip to the USA involved a court appearance in Upper Marlboro (PG’s county seat). I have been the width and breadth of the county since the 1960s, and witnessed its transformation.
Some of what you say is a bit disturbing, ie
I agree with the last sentence. Crime rates have dropped. The metrorail system has spurred some middle class revival in inner beltway areas. But what do you mean that the wealthy neighborhoods in PG are dangerous because they have “ghetto” roots? Are you implying that there is some pathological propensity to crime that is perhaps absent in brain drain upper middle class suburbs? That sounds like a statement from someone who has never actually lived there, yet harbours a belief about cultural propensity to crime.
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@ jefe
Hyattsville is NOT nice. I know many people who grew up there and live there currently. PG Plaza and the surrounding area are sketchy. I have a friend who lives in the area behind PG Plaza and it is definitely not a desirable area. People have been killed over their sneakers in PG Plaza and the surrounding areas in the past.
I went to Tesst College for a while in Beltsville. So I do have experience going to school in PG County. The only white guy at the whole school was the dean who sat in an office in the back. Almost everybody at the school was black except for a handful of Latinos and Asians such as myself.
And I was talking about Baltimore county for white people, not black people. As soon as you cross into Baltimore county coming south from Howard County, it is a white trash ghetto area. Lansdowne, which is majority white, is not a nice area. My friend lived near Lansdowne Middle school and we used to hear automatic gunfire every night, just people letting off. I wasn’t talking about black middle class areas like Randallstown.
And I live in Columbia, which is 25% black. There are more blacks in Columbia than Asians. Most black people are concentrated in the older villages in Columbia in Harper’s Choice, Wilde Lake and Long Reach. Yet Columbia does not have real crime.
And many upper middle class black communities in PG County do have very high crime risks. For example, Woodmore, MD in PG County has a median household income of $150K but the murder risk there is over five times the national average. How do you explain that?
http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/MD/Woodmore-Demographics.html
Similarly, Mitchellville has a median household income of over $100K yet the crime risk is higher than the national average in every category. The crime risk in Mitchellville is nearly three times the national average.
My neighborhood in Columbia is a little under 50% black, yet the crime rate here in Harper’s Choice is much lower than the national average in every category.
http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/MD/Columbia-Demographics.html
The truth is that the culture in much of PG County is actually ghetto. There is tons of Scetion 8 where I live in Harper’s Choice, but people out here “Choose Civility” like Columbia’s trademark slogan. The police are the biggest gang in Howard County. Nobody gets killed out here. On the other hand, PG County was averaging 200 murders a year for years. The inner beltway is no joke.
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thanks, jefe
@”Have you lived in PG county? ”
No, but I’m very familiar with it, and own two properties now in the county. It took years to find both because of steep competition with flippers, and I went all over the county and checked out demographics, sales trends, etc. before purchasing. Plus family have lived there for many years as well, albeit in wealthy Accokeek, Clinton, Ft. Washington, Upper Marlboro and Bowie.
“Have to been across the rural tier area, esp. in the extreme southeast of the county near the Patuxent river (which separates it from Calvert), It harks back to the tobacco plantation era. Blacks living there are largely descendant from local pre-Civil war slaves”
Perhaps, but those would be small communities. Nowadays, the Southeastern county is where the wealthier areas are. Brandywine, for example is a rural area in the extreme southeast and census says its median household income is $112,975 and 72.2% are black. Greater Upper Marlboro is about $100,000, and 75% black
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@SanFranpsycho415
“Yet Columbia does not have real crime.”
Columbia’s violent crime rate is double what it is in Bowie, and crime per sq mile in Columbia is also higher than Bowie.PG Co’s largest community (which for crime statistical purposes includes Mitchellville and Woodmore).
http://www.neighborhoodscout.com/md/columbia/crime/
http://www.neighborhoodscout.com/md/bowie/crime/
“For example, Woodmore, MD in PG County has a median household income of $150K but the murder risk there is over five times the national average. How do you explain that?”
What the hell is “murder risk” and what does it have to do with actual murders? There were 0 murders in Woodmore last year. Columbia had 2 homicides.
“The truth is that the culture in much of PG County is actually ghetto.”
That’s an opinion, not truth.
“Nobody gets killed out here.”
Except for the handful of people who are murdered in Howard County each year.
“On the other hand, PG County was averaging 200 murders a year for years. The inner beltway is no joke.”
PG Co. has NEVER had 200 murders a year. Never. Last year there were 54.
Any more myths to spread?
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@ jefe
So I guess the murder risk stats I posted about Woodmore were lies because we know that numbers lie, right? You still didn’t explain why the murder risk in Woodmore is so high despite it being wealthy nearly all black area. The murder risk in the Rancho San Antonio district in East Oakland, the statistically second most dangerous city in America, is lower than Woodmore in PG County. The murder risk in Rancho San Antonio is three times the national average and the median household income there is only $34K a year in California, not $150K in Maryland like Woodmore. You got some ‘splaining to do:
http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/CA/Alameda-County/Oakland/Rancho-San-Antonio-Demographics.html
And comparing Columbia or anywhere in Howard County to PG County is a joke. Columbia is pristine compared to most of PG County. Please, there have been over 3,000 homicides in PG County between 1980 and 2008. Numbers don’t lie.
http://www.newsline.umd.edu/justice/specialreports/prince-george%27s-homicides/cold-cases-050311.htm
Why do you wish to live in an alternate reality where PG County is pristine as Howard County? Because it’s not reality. In that same time frame, there haven’t even been 100 murders in Howard County. Please stop living in a fantasy world. I know what ghetto is. My old block in San Francisco had a murder rate of 200+ per 100K in the early 90’s. Some of the most respected gangsta rappers in Northern California come from my old neighborhood.
http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/OCEAN-VIEW-Neighborhood-reclaims-its-mean-2633774.php
Huge sections of PG County are ghetto. And oh, I’m sorry, PG County had nearly 200 murders a year, not exactly 200.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/01/AR2006010101049.html
Until you come with some real explanation of why upper middle class communities in PG County have murder risks five times the national average, your blind hometown defense of PG County has no validity.
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@ SanFranpsycho415
You are responding to resw77, right? I think he was the one disputing your quoted crime stats, right? I never made any comment about your quoted stats.
The only thing I said in the post was that “Its crime rate is still the worst among metro DC jurisdictions.” which probably both you and resw77 might agree on. I am making no further evaluation about the crime rate. You and resw77 can try to battle out your crime rate stat disputes yourselves.
It looks like both you and resw77 look to select stats to support your respective viewpoints.
My background and relationship to PG county are different from both yours and resw77’s. I was never a casual visitor or outside investor to PG county. I grew up there, educated from preschool to high school, even took courses at the Univ. of MD and PG Community college. I worked summer jobs at the US census bureau. My parents lived there in separate residences until they died; their remains are in 2 separate cemeteries in PG and every trip I make back to the USA is to PG county. I no longer live there, but I have witnessed the changes and upheavals that it underwent over a period spanning nearly 50 years, from when it was still strictly segregated and subject to anti-miscegenation laws to the state it is in today.
When my family first moved to the county after our apartment building in Anacostia was blockbusted, MD still had anti-miscegenation laws. We could not rent an apartment as a family. My mother had to rent one in her maiden name and the rest of the family moved in later. We have come a long way since then.
My main point in bringing it up was to make a comparison to Ferguson.
After the Michael Brown shooting last year, I was thinking to myself, DANG, Ferguson looks just like PG county in the early 90s, when it had become majority black, but ruled by white elected officials and a white police force. It was then that the police brutality rates were so high. They did not drop after the county elected a black county executive. In fact, it took a DOJ probe in 2000 before the rates improved. The point was that electing black officials does not automatically translate to an improvement in police protection, as long as the black officials are complacent in allowing the police to abuse their power and privileges.
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@SanFranpsycho415
When you start to use mock ebonics to make your points, it starts to weaken your arguments. Added to that your selection of crime stats (from 2005) make you sound like a non-black person who speaks like they know exactly what is wrong with Detroit (and Cleveland and Newark and Baltimore, etc.). Those people invariably use selected crime stats as confirmation bias to reinforce their own stereotypes.
I suppose that you do not agree with Abagond about why there are black ghettos and why they form in the first place.
(https://abagond.wordpress.com/2008/08/13/black-ghetto/)
In PG county, we can find communities that are over 75% black but can be considered upper middle class. I suppose you would call that a relatively “wealthy” ghetto, but still ghetto.
But what do you mean by PG county having “ghetto roots” and that even the wealthiest communities in PG are still “ghetto” by that definition? What does “ghetto roots” mean? High propensity to crime? Black? I have personally seen PG county for the past 50 years, so I am trying to understand where it got its “ghetto roots” from.
Then, you say that Hyattsville qualifies as “ghetto”. Now, if you look at the census dot map in the post, you will see that Hyattsville is a mixture of red, blue, orange and a sprinkling of green. It is not majority black. In fact, Latinos, blacks and whites each form 30-35% of the community – quite racially mixed. So, it is not “ghetto” by virtue of being majority black. By and large, the income falls into the middle class range, so we cannot call it a ghetto strictly because it is poor. It was founded in the late 19th century, but became a white blue collar suburb after WWII. Are these the ghetto roots you are referring to?
Howard County is the wealthiest county in Maryland, the wealthiest state in the US. The county ranks 3rd or 4th in the nation (trailing only Fairfax county and Loundon county in the VA suburbs). PG’s mix of working class and upper middle class, together with its black majority, poor police protection and poor performing schools, make it look “ghetto” from the neighboring counties peering in. I heard it back in the 1970s. I heard it back in the 1990s. I still hear it today. The rhetoric has not changed. The effect of the 1970s desegregation has had a lasting effect on its image which has never been erased, regardless of how wealthy it has become.
Since the 1990s, it has also had to face the issue of being the recipient of many of the displaced persons from the gentrification of DC.
I agree that PG has some serious problems to contend with. Part of that comes from the neighboring jurisdictions. I know for a fact that, for example, that for years, the Fairfax county government bitterly fought the expansion of the DC Metro to Tysons Corner, Dulles Airport and neighboring areas PRECISELY to keep the residents of SE Washington and PG counties out of their communities and an excuse to arrest or harass blacks found wandering around in those areas. I also know that private corporations, lobby groups, research organizations, etc. shun PG like the plague, despite its easy access to DC, its location between DC and Baltimore, the presence of the Univ. of MD, etc.. I guess they think exactly like you do. Somehow, it is perceived as “ghetto” no matter how wealthy it is.
Your article quote of 2005 crime statistics also fails to explain something – the fact that southern Maryland, including neighboring Charles county, consistently experienced decreasing crime statistics 10 years ago, while Howard’s was increasing. Charles county’s black and white population is almost even (about 45% each), yet both its white and black population are largely transplants from PG. If PG has such a “ghetto culture”, how did that magically disappear the second they moved to Charles? My brother is precisely one of those who moved from PG to Charles around 2003-2004.
You also picked an article from 2005. Crime rates have dropped faster in PG since then compared to neighboring counties.
I don’t blindly defend PG, but I want to know what you mean by “ghetto” and “ghetto roots”. I agree there are pockets of poverty in PG, but by and large, I don’t see it as a “ghetto” What we do have are some mixed working class white, Latino and black neighborhoods which are a bit rough, and we have wealthy black neighborhoods just a stone’s throw from poorer ones, which make them easy targets. It faces some social problems that neighboring jurisdictions do not, among them, the severe stereotyping from neighboring counties. I hired a man to help me work on my parents’ houses after they passed away. He lived off New Hampshire avenue in Montgomery county about 5 mins. walk to the PG county line, yet constantly made disparaging remarks about PG county vs. Montgomery. Yet his house was not even as nice as the ones 3 blocks away in PG county and all the transportation from his street to DC must go through PG county. I had to take some of his comments with a grain of salt.
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@rew77,
I will let you battle your crime stats issue directly with SanFranpsycho415. But both of you seem to pluck out crime stats to support your individual positions. I am not that interested to debate what selected crime statistics says about PG. That is definitely a contentious debate, one that has been vigourously going on for over 40 years.
I do contend that there are pockets of lower income areas in PG. I saw middle class blacks (and some Latinos) pushed out of inner city areas in DC since the 1990s due to gentrification. PG has been the main recipient of the black and latinos displaced. Some of the very crime ridden areas have improved in the past 10-15 years, especially in the areas near the new Metro stations. Some have not improved as much.
Alexandria, VA used to have lower income black neighborhoods too until the early 80s. They have also been largely pushed out.
When I was talking about the rural SE quadrant of the county, I was not referring to Greater Upper Marlboro, Brandywine, or even Cheltenham or Rosaryville – areas with easy access to Rt. 5, Rt. 4 or Rt 301. Those areas have enjoyed some middle class suburban and exurban growth in the past couple decades which are definitely not poor by any standard. I was referring to the area starting with Croom and Baden, going further SE down to Aquasco and Eagle Harbor. Those people are mainly descendant from the tobacco plantation era, and many blacks there trace their origin to before the Civil War. We also have a few communities inside the Beltway that were solidly black middle class since before WWII, eg., Glenarden, Palmer Park and Fairmount Heights (where the pre-70s segregated black schools used to be). The vast majority of the rest of the black population probably trace their origin either to the Great Migration era (via DC), or to more recent educated migrants from elsewhere in the country.
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@Sanfranpsycho
“So I guess the murder risk stats I posted about Woodmore were lies because we know that numbers lie, right? ”
I asked what the hell a “murder risk” was, and you can’t even tell us. It’s not something the FBI or any police department measures, FYI. It’s just something the silly website you keep referencing uses.
Woodmore had 0 murders last year, and Columbia had at least 2, according to Howard Co. police stats. Those are the facts.
“And comparing Columbia or anywhere in Howard County to PG County is a joke. ”
I compared Columbia, Howard Co.’s largest community, to Bowie, PG Co’s largest community, and Columbia has higher violent crime rate, and higher crime rate per sq mi. Those are the facts.
Here are some more facts. Columbia’s median household income: $99,887
Bowie’s: $107,012.
Whether you think Columbia is more “pristine” than Bowie is a matter of opinion.
“And oh, I’m sorry, PG County had nearly 200 murders a year, not exactly 200.”
Not even. Try sticking to the facts.
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@Jefe
“But both of you seem to pluck out crime stats to support your individual positions. ”
Not true. I was the only one who plucked out crime stats. Sanfranpsycho used some phony “murder risk,” whatever that is, and some inaccurate homicide figures from the 90s, as if it’s not 2015.
“I do contend that there are pockets of lower income areas in PG.”
I don’t dispute that there are lower income areas in PG, just like in every other county in America. But the fact is that PG’s poverty rate is lower than state and national average, as mentioned above.
“I was referring to the area starting with Croom and Baden, going further SE down to Aquasco and Eagle Harbor. ”
And, as I said, those are very small communities. But Croom, for example, has a high median household income of $105,116.
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@ resw77
How are hard statistics from a real estate website “phony”? It deals with crime rates in recent years. And I doubt you have any experience with PG County. Because PG County is where upper middle class black suburbia collides with the ghetto in many places. Numbers don’t lie. I didn’t make up those stats.
The truth is that PG County is more like a big city than suburbia. It has hardcore crime ridden inner city areas bordering Northeast and Southeast DC as well as nice upper middle class areas. But many upper middle class areas in PG County border high crime areas. Hence, the high crime risks in certain upper middle class communities.
Many people from PG County go into instant defense mode when people from bordering counties try to tell them that their county has real crime. I never said the entirety of PG County was a slum. Many areas in PG County are among the most desirable in the nation.
But to compare communities in PG County of a few thousand people to Columbia, which has nearly 100K people, is a joke. Columbia’s crime rate for a city of 100K is exceedingly low, past and present. 2 domestic murders in a city of 100K is Babylon. The high crime risks in upper middle class towns in PG County are no fable. I’ve dated a few girls in PG County in areas like Glenarden and Springdale. Their neighborhood was nice, but the gas station around the corner was full of scary loiterers selling drugs and there was an undeniable ominous feeling in the air for a reason.
PG County is the richest black majority county in America. Where I’m from in San Francisco, historically, is much worse for black folks as a whole. For many years, San Francisco had a higher murder rate for blacks than the much more notorious Oakland next door:
http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/openforum/article/S-F-more-deadly-than-Oakland-for-blacks-2543681.php
This is because SF has no black middle class left to speak of. As it stands, the majority of blacks in SF reside in extremely run-down housing projects, many among the worst in the nation like Sunnydale in Visitacion Valley:
http://sfbayview.com/2014/02/black-and-thinking-of-moving-to-san-francisco-dont-do-it/
Oakland has a sizable black middle class. There are neighborhoods in the Oakland hills that are predominantly black and upper middle class. San Francisco is a city that is a victim of the white lens. By far, the worst neighborhood in the entire Bay Area, historically, is Bayview-Hunter’s Point in San Francisco. Hunter’s Point has the highest infant mortality rate in California and the neighborhood sits on the most toxic waste dump on the West Coast. Some years, 50% of all homicides in SF occur in Hunter’s Point despite the neighborhood only being 5% of SF:
https://21stcenturyurbansolutions.wordpress.com/2009/06/21/a-history-of-bayview-hunters-point-part-2-crime-contamination-and-crisis/
But to say PG County hasn’t had it’s share of ghettoization is a flat out lie. The crime rate is dropping in every big city in the nation. It’s nice to see the bad areas of PG County clean up as well. But to act like the bad areas of PG were never “that bad” is insulting to the thousands of lives claimed there over the decades. Stop it.
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@ resw77
How are hard statistics from a real estate website “phony”? And PG County logged in 173 murders in 2005, not exact 200, but close.
I doubt you have any real experience with PG County. Because PG County is where upper middle class black suburbia collides with the ghetto in less than a mile radius in too many places.
And it’s not just Woodmore with the high murder risk for a city of a median household income of over $100K in PG. Fort Washington, MD in PG County has a median income of over $107K a year, yet the murder risk is three times the national average. Once again, numbers don’t lie. Please try to refute why the statistics from this website are somehow “phony”:
http://www.city-data.com/city/Fort-Washington-Maryland.html
http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/MD/Fort-Washington-Demographics.html
Similarly, the murder risk in Springdale is over three times the national average despite the median household income there being $101K a year:
http://www.city-data.com/city/Springdale-Maryland.html
http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/MD/Springdale-Demographics.html
Riddle me this, if the murder risk stats on this website are really “from the 90’s” then why is the murder risk in my old neighborhood of Oceanview in San Francisco much lower than any of these upper middle class towns in PG County despite the fact that it was so bad in 2012 that the neighborhood was begging for the police substation to reopened and there was 9 homicides there that year in the community of roughly 12K people. My old neighborhood in SF was just as bad as any hood in America in the 90’s and I already proved at from a statistical standpoint. The police refused to reopen the substation there unless the whole thing was encased in bullet proof glass. Yet Woodmore, Springdale and Fort Washington in PG County all have much higher murder risks than Oceanview in SF. I guess this website must have some agenda against PG County? I doubt it.
http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/CA/San-Francisco/Oceanview-Demographics.html
http://sfbayview.com/2012/12/omi-neighbors-inner-city-youth-call-for-reopening-103-broad-st/
Honestly, I’d rather hang out in the “Murder Dubs” or Funktown (“Funk” is Bay Area slang for beef, and beef there is serious) in East Oakland where median income is a measly $34K in California the murder risk is also three times the national average because at least there, me being mixed race Asian there would be a complete non-issue, unlike much of segregated upper middle class black PG County where being non-black makes you stick out like a sorethumb, Lucky for me, I’m thoroughly racially ambiguous and whenever I’m in the blackest areas of PG County, most people just assume I’m lightskinned black.
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@SanFranpsycho415
I get your point, but murder risk and crime stats are not one in the same and you are trying to merge them as if they are. A murder risk or any type of risk is the likelihood of something happening. On top of that I have found those sites in comparison with more reliable state data to be lacking (to each their own).
Plus you are trying to argue what the area is like today, but using stats from 1990s. That is a sign you don’t have a real grasp on the area and are relying on sources to tell you what the area is like. Sources a year prior…okay I get that. Crime stats 5 years ago and on….hmmm…
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@Sanfranpsycho
“How are hard statistics from a real estate website “phony”?”
As I said, “murder risk” is not “hard statistics.” It’s not measured or reported by any police dept. to the FBI. That’s why I know it is phony. Police depts report the number of murders or crimes committed, FYI. If there were 0 murders in city A and 2 in city B, there’s no way city A can have a higher “murder risk.”
“And PG County logged in 173 murders in 2005, not exact 200, but close”
Right, a statistic from 10 years ago, when the county experienced its highest number of murders ever, which no one is denying. It’s just irrelevant now. Last year there were 54, and clearly you were 100% wrong to say “PG County was averaging 200 murders a year for years.”
“But to compare communities in PG County of a few thousand people to Columbia, which has nearly 100K people, is a joke.”
Then to compare Howard county with 304,000 people to PG Co. with 890,000 people is also a joke, isn’t it? LOL
In fact, I’ve actually compared crime rates of Columbia with Bowie, which has 56,000 people and is PG Co’s largest city. Since you don’t know how it works, crime rates are the total amount of reported crimes committed per 1,000 people, and Columbia experiences more crime per every 1,000 people than Bowie. Regardless of population differences, Bowie is safer than Columbia. Why is that so hard for you to accept and who’s defensive now?
http://www.neighborhoodscout.com/md/bowie/crime/
http://www.neighborhoodscout.com/md/columbia/crime/
“But to say PG County hasn’t had it’s share of ghettoization is a flat out lie.”
That’s called an opinion. And I have no clue what that display of ignorance is supposed to mean.
“I doubt you have any real experience with PG County.”
Why, because I’ve provided facts that disputed every inaccurate claim you’ve made? Clearly I have more real experience than you. I haven’t said anything about PG County that wasn’t 100% factually correct.
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I think its horrible that people from PG County go into instant defense mode when people living in bordering counties tell them that certain areas in PG do have a history of serious violent crime, which is an indisputable fact. The DC area is weird. You have people in safe Montgomery County towns trying to convince you where they live is so “hood” and you have upper middle class folks in PG who live less than a mile from PCP smoking dope dealing killers trying to tell you that where they live is just as safe as Columbia.
For instance, break out Def Jam Rap star, Logic, from Gaithersburg, MD released his debut album last fall. The biracial half black/half white rapper’s album was about growing up in Gaithersburg which he depicted as an uber-violent gang-ridden warzone despite the fact that Gaithersburg has a crime rate well below the national average. Seriously, Google the song “Gang Related”, he sounds like a knock off Kendrick Lamar talking about Gaithersburg like it was early 90’s era Compton.
http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/MD/Gaithersburg-Demographics.html
I think it’s great PG County is cleaning up. But to say areas in inner beltway PG County were never “that bad” is insulting to the literally thousands of people killed there over the decades. Please stop.
Personally, I never would live in PG County because I don’t want to live anywhere there is that much blatant segregation. I might live in Laurel, Bowie, but that’s about it. I wouldn’t live in Montgomery County either, save maybe Silver Spring, because the arrogant elitist attitudes of DC area residents both black and white is disgusting.
I’ve dated a few black women from PG County I met while out and about in DC. One I met while at a concert at the 9:30 club. She lived in Glenarden. I couldn’t imagine myself living there. I would stick out like a sorethumb. Another girl I met at the Lounge of III on U street, which is a predominantly black bar that caters to black professionals. She lived in Springdale. It didn’t seem that bad over there. Lots of big houses, mcmansions and nice shopping center areas nearby.
But at this point in my life, I don’t want to live anywhere near anywhere that could be possibly construed as dangerous or ghetto in any way. I grew up in the inner city in California in the late 80’s and early 90’s. That’s enough ghetto survival for a lifetime. You can keep it hood while still being bougie in PG all you want with your government job. I’d much rather live in Columbia because it’s integrated out here and the crime is much lower than the national average. Whoever tried to say Columbia having two domestic murders in a city of 100K was “bad” is an idiot, frankly. Out here is a safe haven compared to Baltimore city and much of PG County. It is a fact.
And the average in Baltimore city at this point in time is much worse than the worst of PG County. Even upper middle class areas of Baltimore like Forest Park are highly dangerous. The murder risk in Forest Park is around nine times the national average. That sounds about right seeing as people have been killed just driving through their in the recent past.
http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/MD/Gaithersburg-Demographics.html
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@SanFranpsycho415
“I think its horrible that people from PG County go into instant defense mode when people living in bordering counties tell them that certain areas in PG do have a history of serious violent crime, which is an indisputable fact.”—I don’t live in or near PG County, but It is painfully obvious that you are speaking on an area you know little to nothing about.
Just because you write a long winded paragraph deflecting does not mean you have presented some type of fact on the matter. Resw77 presented similar links. It is all a matter of what you want to believe at this point and confirmation bias is a MF.
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It is strange when people who live outside PG county, but in bordering areas, maybe even within walking distance of the border, go into instant attack mode towards PG, even towards neighborhoods wealthier, nicer and less crime ridden than their own.
Actually, I have witnessed people doing this for at least 40 years. I know that we can trace it to the mandatory desegregation that PG was subjected to in 1974, that the neighboring counties WERE NOT.
Now people from the neighboring counties go into instant attack mode towards PG without really understanding why. But I can trace it back to 1974.
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If we want to try to limit apples to oranges comparison, maybe we should select communities from the different counties which might be more comparable in size and population (ie, larger community for their county), wealth and income levels, its “exurban” planned community origins, etc.
Maybe comparing the following with each other would make more sense:
Bowie (PG)
Columbia (Howard)
Crofton (Anne Arundel)
Gaithersburg (Montgomery)
Waldorf/St.Charles (Charles)
To me, all of these communities have a similar “feel” to them, and I have relatives and friends who either live in them now or have in the past.
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@sanfranpsycho
“Personally, I never would live in PG County because I don’t want to live anywhere there is that much blatant segregation.”
LOL. the only reason PG co. is segregated is because of white flight and because people like you spread negative myths about it and will not move there, as you have repeatedly told us.
You’re foolishly acting as if blacks in PG Co. have ever been unwelcoming to non-blacks. That’s actually what whites in Howard county have done to non-whites for decades.
@sharinalr
“Just because you write a long winded paragraph deflecting does not mean you have presented some type of fact on the matter. ”
Definitely deflection with more ignorant, opinionated rambling.
@jefe
“Now people from the neighboring counties go into instant attack mode towards PG without really understanding why. But I can trace it back to 1974.”
Interesting. So when faced with the fact that Columbia was less safe than Bowie, he went into “instant defense mode,” crying “But to compare communities in PG County of a few thousand people to Columbia, which has nearly 100K people, is a joke. ”
Violent Crime rates per 1,000 people:
Bowie (PG) 1.46
Columbia (Howard) 2.94
Crofton (Anne Arundel) 1.39
Gaithersburg (Montgomery) 1.57
Waldorf/St.Charles (Charles) 4.09
Columbia has twice the violent crime rate as Bowie and Crofton and even higher than Gaithersburg. What excuse is psycho going to give us this time?
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Of the 5 communities highlighted above, Waldorf has the highest black percentage (slight majority) followed by Bowie and then Columbia. Crofton is the whitest (over 75%). I wonder if someone will try to correlate black percentage to violent crime rate.
1974 was really the watershed year for PG county. After desegregation, the media claimed that PG would be black all the way to the beltway by the end of the decade. It definitely was by the end of the 1980s (with the exception, perhaps of College Park / Univ. of Maryland). Whites poured out of PG and then spread information about how “ghetto” it had become. Yet, the middle class blacks that replaced them generally had as high or higher incomes than the whites they replaced. There was a violent transitional time (1990s), but it seems to have rebounded. Yet that perception of “ghetto” still sticks. As I said, I heard it
When my mother divorced in the 1990s, she bought a house in PG county so that she could get 50% more house for the same price (compared to the equivalent level of neighborhood, say, in Montgomery county). She parked her car in a 93% black neighborhood to catch the bus to DC every day. For a non-black person who grew up in the Deep South, she had no problem living in majority black neighborhoods, and shopping in neighborhoods others called “ghetto”. I know those places, so calling them “ghetto” is really stretching it.
There are a few communities in PG which turned rather “ghetto” in the 1990s, but certainly not most of the county. But I really think it had more to do with the white racism in DC itself (ie, gentrification plus the flight of businesses from DC neighborhoods).
(N.B. I would say something looks “ghetto” if the following happens:
– Supermarkets, dept stores, restaurants flee the neighborhood (followed by the fast food chains (yes, even McDonald’s leaves)
– replaced by money order / check cashing stores, liquor stores, convenience stores and small independent grocery stores and short order fast food, many of which are run and operated by Asians (Korean /Chinese).
– permanent police presence at the main intersections, and shootouts on a weekly basis.)
The claim that PG is so blatantly segregationalist is about the most ridiculous claim I can imagine anyone conjuring up. Whites, Asians, Latinos are fully welcome there – Fort Washington, MD is about 10% Asian, has Filipino shopping centres, churches and community organizations. Latinos had no issue moving in to North County inner beltway areas (e.g., along East West Highway), and in some communities, now outnumber blacks. Equal numbers of Whites live next to Blacks in Bowie and have been doing this for decades.
Washington, DC metro area has a high segregation index, but not nearly as high as many other large US cities.
The reason why communities like Glenarden are majority black, was that they were set up during the segregation era around WWII – middle class blacks were put into separate communities from middle class whites. I remember Glenarden in 1970. It was a tidy middle class black neighborhood.
The blatantly segregationalist counties are the neighboring ones. Fairfax County in Virginia is about as racist as it can get. My Aunt attended many of the county govt hearings there and you can imagine all the code words they used for “ghetto” elements. As I said before, it was racism that blocked the metro line connecting Dulles Intl Airport to Tyson’s Corner to DC.
What has not rebounded as much are the schools. In that respect, Howard has PG beat. But I think that is also a result of the 1974 desegregation era when whites plucked their kids out of the schools, set up “segregation academies” and restricted funding to the public schools. Much of the remaining money went to pay for the additional costs for bussing desegregation and the fines that PG county had to pay to Maryland for failing to desegregate. The other counties did not have to do that. The segregation academies are mostly gone, but the schools are still not quite up to par.
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@jefe
You can also look at it from an income perspective. Crofton is the wealthiest, followed by Bowie, Columbia, and Gaithersburg. Waldorf is the least wealthy of the bunch, albeit still well above national average. And the violent crime rate there is still lower than state median.
And if you take a much wealthier majority black area of PG Co., Accokeek, which is blacker than Waldorf, the violent crime rate is just 1.51.
“1974 was really the watershed year for PG county….”
Thanks for sharing…very interesting.
“The claim that PG is so blatantly segregationalist is about the most ridiculous claim I can imagine anyone conjuring up.”‘
Absolutely absurd. Blacks in PG don’t go around spraypainting racial epithets on non-black people’s property like whites do in Howard and Charles Co.
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@resw77,
I think people use crime statistics and racial demographics from selected communities to demonstrate their point (e.g., that the danger in neighborhoods is attributable to black percentage), Then others use other statistics to make another point.
So, whereas we can look at it from an income perspective, that might not be the right explanation either. It could also be a cultural thing. Charles County is culturally a lot more “Southern” than Howard or Montgomery. Some of what happens there might make it look more like North Carolina than, say, like Pennsylvania or New Jersey.
The truth is that so many factors are involved, it is really difficult to use selected crime statistics to prove anything.
But the history of labelling PG as ghetto. I know exactly where that came from, and it was not directly due to actual crime rates. It was part of the aftermath of county-wide desegregation in the 1970s. The crime rates got worse only after it was labelled a ghetto (about 10 years after that).
The whites who fled PG, to go to, say, Howard spread the word that PG had become ghetto. And the image stuck.
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@jefe
“I think people use crime statistics and racial demographics from selected communities to demonstrate their point (e.g., that the danger in neighborhoods is attributable to black percentage)”
Correct, and that’s why I had to throw out a comparable statistic, e.g., Accokeek is blacker than Waldorf but has a lower violent crime rate than whiter Columbia, to refute that.
“Some of what happens there might make it look more like North Carolina than, say, like Pennsylvania or New Jersey.”
Like what?
“But the history of labelling PG as ghetto. I know exactly where that came from”
Yeah, that was enlightening. I’d bet many people in the DC area don’t make that connection.
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@resw77,
To reply to you,
As you recall, Abagond mentioned about the US settling in at least 4 distinct waves from England, giving rise to the 4 main divisions in US society and culture.
(https://abagond.wordpress.com/2008/11/19/the-four-englands-of-america/)
The last 3 intersect right in Maryland, so we see all 3 in Maryland, ie,
– the Midland culture in NE Maryland and along the PA border
– the Coastal south on either side of the Chesapeake Bay and the lower Potomac
– the Southern Highlands or Appalachian culture which dominates in western maryland.
4 of the dialects in Abagond’s dialect map mix in Maryland.
Ancestry wise, German Americans dominate in the northern part of the state, blacks in Southern Maryland and the Southern Eastern shore along the Chesapeake bay, English in the upper part of the Eastern shore, and a mixture of generic “American” and German in western Maryland.
(https://abagond.wordpress.com/2010/01/11/some-numbers-on-black-americans/)
For a small state, it has a complicated cultural heritage. Baltimore is historically a melting pot of these cultures, with a significant 19th century immigrant population as well.
This means that culture and society wise, Howard County feels more like it could be suburban southern New Jersey or Pennsylvania. whereas Charles County looks and feels a lot more southern, like Tidewater Virginia. If I were forced to draw a line, I would draw it from downtown DC to Annapolis (roughly Route 50 and the beltway). South of that I would classify the culture as more southern. North of that, I would not. Most of the tobacco plantations, black slaves and their descendants, tri-racial Piscataway Indians and their descendants, etc. are south of that line. When people migrated to Washington DC and later moved to the suburbs, the ones from the South tended to resettle south of that line as its culture was much more similar to the South.
That line slices right through PG and Anne Arundel counties. PG county north of that line is only about 50% black, with a significant white population and increasing no. of :Latinos. South of that line, it generally exceeds 75% black, up to 95% in some areas. Bowie largely north of that line and Upper Marlboro is south. The area south of the line is the one that opposed desegregation the most, the ones that whites fled from most after desegregation, and the areas that became over 75% black. When I was a child, there were still large tobacco plantations and tobacco auctions in Upper Marlboro.
Climate is also slightly different. Southern Maryland is more borderline subtropical; hardy palm trees and Southern magnolias grow along the lower Potomac and Chesapeake bay, which is probably why tobacco did well there. Howard county gets much more snow than either DC or Baltimore. I think they planted more corn than tobacco. Charles County has a town called “Port Tobacco”.
Charles County attracted people who gravitate towards southern culture, and you notice it right away there. Travel down rt. 301, and suddenly southern pulled pork barbecue shops and country music bars start popping up. They had movie drive-in theatres there until the 1980s and their dialect is closer to southern Virginia rather than to northern Maryland. A newcomer from tidewater or Piedmont North Carolina would feel like a fish out of water in Howard County, but right at home in Charles. By the time Rt. 301 crosses the southern Potomac from Charles County into Virginia, you are well into the South.
Race relation patterns tend to follow the local culture. In the North, descendant of white immigrants (eg, Irish) were recruited to police people. Blacks did not really arrive in large numbers until WWII. But in the South, blacks have been there for 400 years. Whites have been policing blacks there for centuries, and usually by the non-plantation class, ie, working class whites.
Likewise, blacks historically have never figured prominently in Howard county. Only recently have middle class and brain drain blacks been moving there, but they are still a minority. In southern PG and charles county, black slaves (or black laborers) used to be the majority until the early 20th century. Whites moved in mid 20th century, but moved back out a couple decades later. Most of the blacks that have moved there in the past 3 decades have either local roots, or roots in the Deep South.
So, I see Howard County following northern patterns of race relations and Charles county following southern patterns. The line splits PG in two.
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A comment of mine (currently in moderation) regarding the relationship between police brutality in PG county and Baltimore is here:
(https://abagond.wordpress.com/2015/04/28/police-brutality-in-baltimore/#comment-283125)
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PG County is exemplary of the contradictions of black collective uplift ideology. African-American wealthy folks don’t send their children to the public schools there, and the elected officials have pushed for laws or programs just as classist as wealthy white suburban communities.
PG County gets unfairly stigmatized at times, but there are serious issues regarding the class divide. Subprime lending really screwed the people in that county as well, so white supremacy or racial discrimination had a negative impact.
Read this article. It addresses some of the issues black middle-class enclaves face in Prince George’s County and across the nation.
http://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2843&context=clr
Great quote on how some communities in PG were virulently anti-poor.
“An infamous example of this occurred in the summer of 1996 in the Prince George’s community of Perrywood. When black kids from neighborhoods of D.C. began traveling out to Perrywood to play basketball with their middle-income brethren, neighbors got upset with the noise and occasional vandalism. They hired a private security company to screen nonresidents from the neighborhood. The irony of black people hiring private police to stop and check the identification of all black male youth in the neighborhood was not lost on many residents.”
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Indeed,
Upper Middle class blacks in PG county placed their kids in private schools and vote to reduce funding for the public schools.
Upper middle class blacks hire private police to screen local black residents from blacks coming from other communities.
Few regional or national middle class retail stores actually open in the upper middle class black neighborhoods.
Few corporations, professional firms or lobbyists or think tanks open near the upper middle class black communities or the University of Maryland.
It really begs the question, is it race or class? Obviously it is both, but in ways that seem to follow a different kind of logic.
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Definitely both.
But also it is necessary to know the details which articles often do not include when trying to make a point or irony.
“…neighbors got upset with the noise and occasional vandalism.
The real question is what does that line really mean?
What kind of noise? How often? How late? When asked to bring it down what was the response? What does occasional vandalism mean? Does it mean once or twice or does it mean every other week? What kind of vandalism? How expensive? Was in getting progressively worse?
I think the easy thing is to shake one’s head. But on the other hand, just because people share the same approximate skin color and hair texture does not mean that they will be more tolerant of people coming into their neighborhood with unwanted noise and vandalism. The devil really is in the details.
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@King,
As someone who grew up in PG county and who returns frequently, I don’t think that vandalism thing is as complicated as that. I would see it more as upper middle class blacks preferring not to see those “ghetto” blacks in their neighborhood. That simple. They also don’t want to go to school with them. That is why they yanked their kids out of the public schools.
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I’m not sure the question is necessaritly complicated. It’s just the kind of questions that is necessary to ask in cases like this, whether you’re dealing with Blacks or Whites.
But you must admit, that it comes down to a question of one’s perceptions of other people’s inner motives. People who can afford it send their children to private schools all the time. In fact, many of this nations top college preparatory schools are private. Question: Is there something wrong with sending one’s kids to a private school rather than to the local public school? (Either way, your taxes will pay for your local public school.)
What would “doing the right thing” look like?
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This reasoning assumes that it has something to do with class instead of race, ie,
when blacks do it to other blacks, it’s “class”
when whites do it to blacks, it’s “race”.
My feeling is that, both whites and blacks think it is more about class (as whites believe they are non-racist and colour blind and blacks would not see themselves as racist against other blacks), but for both of them, it is about both class and race, which implies that there is some internalized racism thing going on in the mind of upper middle class black minds.
Also, why can’t they attract better retail and employment opportunities in their home communities. Most of the upper middle class blacks in PG county are forced to travel to white majority neighboring counties to access better retail and employment opportunities. But as schools, churches, community centers, etc. are more local, sending their kids to schools in the other counties mean that would be going to school with more whites, and brain drain Asians and Africans, and less socially and culturally connected.
So they live in upper middle class black neighborhoods in PG, but shop and work elsewhere.
Well, not really. Whenever elected officials take their kids out of the public school system, they also reduce funding to the public schools. Less tax dollars are invested in the schools. That is a major problem with PG.
In the other neighboring counties, many, if not the majority of upper middle class parents (white, black and Asian) still send their kids to the public schools. They will not let their elected officials shortchange them in the schools, as they also send their kids to the local schools. Not so in PG.
Yes, there are private schools in the other counties too, but the class divide is a lot more evident in PG.
That is why I noted “In Maryland, only Baltimore has a worse performing school system.” That is not saying much about PG.
The thing is, we can trace this all back to the massive forced desegregation of the schools in 1974! – Elected officials yanked their kids out of the schools. Whites moved out of the county. The social system never recovered, despite the blacks moving in often being wealthier or than the whites moving out.
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I agree with you that both class AND race always play part in such cases (including internal racism). People raised in American society cannot escape that certain pervasive stereotypes are going to come into play whenever poorer Blacks are involved. It is regrettable as it is inescapable for this generation of Americans.
That seems like a problem in many historically Black communities. Only in recent years have the larger companies like Bank of America, Starbucks, Subway, finally expanded into many Black neighborhoods. I know in LA there has recently been a push for companies to recognize that Blacks are already buying their products and using their services miles from their homes and that they would use them even more if they provided outlets in their own neighborhoods.
Of course, the issue with poorer Black neighborhoods often becomes ones of “gentrification.” Many such Black neighborhoods are populated by a majority of renters, and no sooner than businesses begin moving in, the roads are improved, the property values go up and so do the rents. The Black neighborhood simply dissipates and you have a very nice White neighborhood filled with retail and employment opportunities. But most of the upper middle class Black neighborhoods that I know about are not huge. In the grander scheme of things they are still small parcels within a large city. Maybe it’s different on the East Coast.
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@jefe
Agree with you, it’s race and class. White supremacist institutions, companies, banks, and other forces make sure that black middle-class towns and enclaves cannot keep up with the white middle-class areas. The centers of job creation, corporate America, and power generally continue to follow whites.
And there are some horribly anti-poor beliefs or politics among some in Prince George’s County. They don’t invest properly in the public school system, some enact laws or hire private police to keep out low-income African-Americans from DC, etc. The article I linked to above actually describes the first black county executive of Prince George’s County as falling into this category, as someone who based his political rise on opposition to low-income people from DC. That makes the leadership of Prince George’s County not unlike white middle-class suburbs.
@King
You’re right about asking what does ‘vandalism’ and ‘noise’ mean? Mary Pattillo has talked about this in her books on middle-class blacks in Chicago. There are competing notions of ‘proper’ behavior in the streets that separate the middle-class (or the working-class obsessed with respectability) and the lower-class African-Americans who work on their cars in the middle of the streets, have barbecues and approach their use of urban space differently. Some of the stories from PG County resemble this, and indicate how class and race intersect among middle-class communities to police or monitor the movement of low-income people of color.
Gentrification is also complicated…Lots of middle-class or upper-income African-Americans have participated in the neoliberal urban policies that promote gentrification. I don’t know too much about DC (only been there a couple of times) but is there any truth to the claim that Ethiopian and other African immigrant groups have bought up properties in black neighborhoods and rent them out to whites? It seems like everyone with power has sold out poor black and brown communities for the new ‘urban reform’ movements.
You’re also getting at the suburbanization of poverty, King. Lots of priced out or removed low-income blacks get pushed out of the city into suburbs, some presumably ending up in places like Prince George’s County. further exacerbating class tensions and poverty. The recent examples in Chicago would be the elimination of the old projects and the ‘exodus’ of Black Chicago to inner-ring suburbs or other metro areas.
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This is an interesting discussion.
Jefe makes a good point that “few regional or national middle class retail stores actually open in the upper middle class black neighborhoods.” There are very wealthy areas in PG County that don’t get the same retail and services as less wealthy white areas in neighboring counties.
This is a screaming opportunity for blacks in PG County to open businesses and chain franchises. Especially in places like Ft. Washington, Accokeek, Clinton and Rosaryville/Upper Marlboro. Instead, they are content to spend their money in Waldorf, Columbia, Hanover, and Annapolis..all of which are less wealthy areas by the way.
About schools, I find that more and more upper middle class PG residents (who can’t afford private schools for their HS aged kids are moving out so their kids can attend public schools in Mont., Charles, Howard and Anne Arundel instead of advocating for better schools in PG County.
I really don’t think PG’s school system is any worse than those in neighboring jurisdictions (apart from student test scores). I just think upper middle class blacks perceive schools are better when more whites and Asians attend, and less lower income “hood rats” attend.
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@King
But we are talking about PG county here, a county of 900,000 with 5 of the 10 wealthiest black communities in the nation within only a few miles of each other.
Yet in some of these communities, you will not even find a single Starbucks or any real department store, for example.
In fact, when whites moved out and replaced with even wealthier blacks, the department stores left with them.
You might find large areas of black middle and upper middle class around some other cities too, such as Atlanta. I would like to know what happened there.
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@resw77
I was just in PG county 6-7 weeks ago.
Travelled up and down Rt. 210 (which passes through the majority black upper middle class neighborhoods of Accokeek, Ft. Washington, Friendly and National Harbor) and there is not any decent retail shopping or employment along the whole entire route. This is a pretty large chunk of PG county, so it is not as King imagines as “small parcels”. National Harbor was built recently as a convention center area, so does have a few trendy restaurants and bars, but it is not built up to serve the actual community of residents (but visitors from out of town) – it has ferry services to Alexandria and DC, but no real transportation to the nearby residential communities.
Residents in Clinton, Camp Springs, Rosaryville, Upper Marlboro, even Bowie will travel to Waldorf in Charles county, or even to Prince William Co. Va, Howard County (Columbia), or Tysons corner to go shopping (up to an hour away). I remember when the major department stores pulled out of Marlow Heights and Landover, and it coincided exactly with the white flight that followed a few years after desegregation. Never mind that the new people moving in were in fact, not any less wealthy.
Why are middle and upper middle class PG county residents forced to leave the county for work and shopping?
This I disagree with you. I went to school in PG county. It deteriorated greatly esp after desegregation. But if it is not worse, as you belief, why would parents who could afford to move out to neighboring counties, do decide to move? And if test scores are not at least one indicator of school performance, what criteria do you use? Athletics?
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“But most of the upper middle class Black neighborhoods that I know about are not huge”
They are huge by suburban standards. Ft. Washington, for example, is 70% black has about 24,000 people, median household income of $110,000 and 4.7% under poverty. Compare that to Beverly Hills which is 78.6% white has about 34,000 people and a median household of only $86,141 and 8.8% under poverty.
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@jefe
Right, it’s a shame that the 210 corridor is so underserved. But that’s a good thing for local entrepreneurs. It’s a screaming opportunity.
“But if it is not worse, as you belief, why would parents who could afford to move out to neighboring counties, do decide to move?”
As I said before, I think it’s just a perception that it’s better to school with more white and Asian students, and less lower income blacks.
“And if test scores are not at least one indicator of school performance, what criteria do you use? Athletics?”
Well it depends on how you define “school performance.” If it’s student performance, then unquestionably neighboring county schools outperform PG. But if it’s about a “better education,” I don’t think the curriculum is any better in neighboring counties. And if it’s about spending per pupil, PG spends more than Charles, Anne Arundel, Calvert, and Fairfax.
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@resw77,
Re: the Rt. 210 corridor, I also know that it is about 10% Asian, which is higher than the DC metro area as a whole. Most are Filipino and there are some businesses serving the Filipino community. And there are some black businesses, but maybe upper middle blacks tend to be less entrepreneurial?
Even non-black entrepreneurs are missing opportunities in these communities. I really don’t know why all the dept stores left with the whites. I wish I could understand what goes behind their thinking. Is it that they are afraid of damaging their brand by opening up in majority black neighborhoods.
In any case, the middle and upper middle class area spans the entire PG county and spills into neighboring counties and it is in no way what King imagines as “not huge” “small parcels”. It is quite a big area and even adjacent areas like Waldorf in Charles county are majority black – We are talking about something between the size of cities of San Diego and San Francisco that is contiguously black and middle or upper middle class.
I still very much disagree with you about the analysis of the school system and quality of the schools in PG. I am not happy with my education there. The only way I was able to do OK was because I learned to read in pre-school, and was an avid reader all throughout school and self-motivated independent student. I would read probability textbooks and french magazines just for fun.
But by and large, I don’t think the education there is very good. And the various communities I lived in or had contact with did not value education that much. If PG spends so much on education as you say they do, then they are not getting the bang for the buck.
And I don’t think it has gotten any better.
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@jefe
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think PG schools are “good,” I’m just doubting that they are any worse than neighboring county public schools systems (by the way I also don’t think test scores are an indication of how “good” a school is because you can have a wonderful teacher and wonderful curriculum, but a brick wall won’t ever perform well on a test). Maybe you could let me know specifically why you think they’re worse.
The problem with underperformance is a parental problem IMO.
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OK, it is not just the teachers.
For example, I had a good math teacher – After I studied calculus at age 14, she allowed me to go on to study probably and statistics with a textbook and independent study. There was no class for me, but she opened up one just for me.
On the other hand, they had no problem in deleting the foreign language program from the school.
And later, I even became a substitute teacher in the PG county schools for a while. THEN, I can really see the teachers’ attitudes. Not good.
–> I experienced the schools from both the students and teacher side.
And I never felt good about the curriculum either, which I have expressed elsewhere on this blog many times.
Parents and the kid’s environment outside school certainly does play a role. And parents did not place much emphasis or value on academics in PG. That was my impression then and now.
So,
it is the parents and environment, AND
it is the school and teachers.
When I sold my parents’ houses, the real estate agent told me that it was a shame that PG doesn’t invest more in their schools. Parents didn’t want to send their kids to school in PG, and that is why they did not want to move there. So, he had to target customers who placed less emphasis on the schools and perhaps valued other things (a suburban environment?). It certainly is not due to convenience to shopping and employment.
If, for some strange quirk of fate, I ended up living in PG again, the first thing I would address are the schools, the curriculum and the teachers. I don’t have kids, so maybe I have less leverage, but also less to lose.
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@Jefe
“…they had no problem in deleting the foreign language program…”
Things have changed since then. They have foreign language immersion programs starting in K at 2 schools, and I know someone who enrolled in it years ago. And every HS has foreign language. One has 10. That’s more than what’s offered at Charles, Calvert, Howard or Anne Arundel
“And I never felt good about the curriculum either….”
I don’t doubt it, but I don’t think the curriculum is all that great in other public school systems either. At least PG offers more vocational programs than Charles, Calvert, Howard or Anne Arundel.
“Parents and the kid’s environment outside school certainly does play a role.”
Right, but that’s not indicative of all county schools. There are some where parent involvement is high.
“When I sold my parents’ houses, the real estate agent told me that it was a shame that PG doesn’t invest more in their schools.”
But per pupil spending is higher than national average, and the county council voted this year to increase property taxes (already the highest in the region) to invest more in schools. Plus a big reason the county supported the casino deal several years ago was school funding.
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in the context of racism / white supremacy…unfortunately i have come to the conclusion , that people whom “classify” themselves as ” white ” are eternally dedicated to practice the religion of racism / white supremacy !!
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Sometimes it is interesting to see what right wing whites say about blacks in PG county, just to see their point of view.
Mob of black students attacks Hispanic kids in Prince George’s county
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fr5aDXgkibU)
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Yet another view on PG county:
http://www.alliyahgallows.com/2017/07/when-black-success-is-considered-glitch.html
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@Afrofem,
Have you actually been to, or explored PG county?
I stayed there this past August, and given the growing political disenfranchisement where I currently live, I have been looking into the idea of moving back to the USA. I would probably focus on the DC metro area, and probably PG county. So, I have been doing a lot of reading on what is going on there and will do more investigation on my next trip. There is currently a lot of focus on “Smart Growth”.
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@ jefe
I have not.
My relatives in the DC area are clustered in Virginia suburbs.
What caught my eye in the linked post was the blogger’s fear that affluent Black people in PG county are in the crosshairs of the state because they bucked a system designed to keep them down.
There are historical precedents for her fears given the increasing genocidal tone of White radicals in this country.
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^
Well, PG county is adjacent to the Virginia Suburbs. The MGM Resorts and Casino in National Harbor, MD (PG) is only 5 mins. drive / 10 mins. bus ride from Old town Alexandria. All of the DC metro lines that go out to Virginia go out to PG county on the other side.
Hopefully you will take the time next time to visit those 5-7 communities that are among the top 10 wealthiest majority black suburbs in the USA. However, PG has a fair share of dysfunctional, blighted areas as well that are only a few miles away.
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@ jefe
Okay, I will have to take a detour to PG county on my next visit to DC. I mostly go to tour museums there.
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Most DC metro residents do not hear much about how “wealthy” many of its neighborhoods are.
In fact, this is more a typical local news story about PG county:
Videos show thieves stealing holiday packages from Maryland homes
http://www.fox5dc.com/news/videos-show-thieves-stealing-holiday-packages-from-maryland-homes
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Found a good detailed analysis of the development and history of police brutality in PG county 1970-2015:
Social Movements Against Racist Police Brutality and Department of Justice Intervention in Prince George’s County, Maryland
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4824689/
Black political representation did not result in reduced police brutality against blacks in the county.
It improved in the 2000s, but it is still a problem.
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the anti-crime cop’s card in the restaurant the other day i was installing in said PG county, colmar manor, it was a lot of mexican people like the neighboorhood i was in anyway like everybody
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