Dayton and Springfield Redlining documentary | Photo by CET and ThinkTV | PBS
Red lines run deep in Dayton and Springfield, ensuring racial inequality and discrimination in our urban development. Redlining: Mapping Inequality in Dayton and Springfield explores this historical practice, earning it an Ohio Valley Regional Emmy, an award well-deserved.
Background
According to PBS, “Redlining: Mapping Inequality in Dayton and Springfield" tells the national and local story of redlining, a practice that embedded racial segregation and inequality into the development of American cities and suburbs and created a wealth gap that continues to impact our communities today
The 2022 documentary is a collaborative effort headed by Writer and Director Richard Wonderling, Producer Selena Burks-Rentschler, Editor Jason Wilson and Executive Producer Gloria Skurski.
Just under an hour long, it reached over 20,000 people in its streaming career with a library screening survey reporting that 97.7% of viewers reported the documentary as excellent or very good.
The story is just as relevant today, if not more, in a community still divided by the impact of redlining.
Summary and commentary
The film opens with quintessential footage of old American life, setting the stage for the influential time period the documentary explores. It’s reflective of the nostalgia people may have for this bygone era. The introduction is effective in evoking this feeling many have, the preconceived notions of an era that was actually drought with conflict and suffering.
The narrator introduces us to this rise of the American middle class, “It’s not surprising that the rise of the American middle class and the rise of home ownership shared a similar trajectory.”
Not only is the documentary a visual treat within its first minute, but it effectively introduces its topic with the background needed to understand the underlying issue. This is how we usually perceive the era, but the documentary has you hooked.
“...But it was more than that.”
How have we misperceived the American Dream of the 50s and 60s?
“It was the launching pad for the average white American family,” the narrator continues.
The documentary then goes into the importance of home value, which is the backbone for the financials of many. Value in the home leads to wealth, which leads to purchasing power in other areas. By having a home of good value, you are creating generational wealth.
The simplified but thorough building of this information is what makes the documentary stand out to me in its excellence, any one may understand the complex topic matter through the easy-listening style of writing.
“But it wasn’t for everyone…”
Now we turn to the minority groups of America, deprived of the so-called “American Dream” through artificial obstacles by a white-majority society. The main obstacle? Redlining.
Government and city planners allowed for redlining, an “illegal discriminatory practice in which a mortgage lender denies loans or an insurance provider restricts services to certain areas of a community, often because of the racial characteristics of the applicant’s neighborhood.”
Minority groups had their neighborhood and white people had theirs. And nothing was going to allow them out of it.
High-quality footage shows a planner outlining in red minority neighborhoods on a map, as well as assigning “grades” to reflect areas of mortgage security. The maps determined who may get access to a mortgage. Nearly all neighborhoods of “low security” were minority neighborhoods.
The documentary is refreshing in its unabashed honesty, not afraid to call redlining a federal policy.
The policy was indeed an American phenomenon, happening in cities across America everywhere in the 1930s. We then are taken to Dayton and Springfield during the Great Migration, which were cities of manufacturing and innovation during the time period.
Even in northern states, the documentary tells the story of the black minority in Ohio with descendants of those who migrated, again approaching the subject with honesty and clarity.
It’s easy to empathize with those interviewed, assisted by the presentation of real family photos from the time period. I highly appreciated the personal take the documentary took as we see the impact on the individual. We also are introduced to other impactful events of the era, such as the Tulsa Race Massacre and the gathering of the KKK.
In just one event, 7,000 people pledged to the Ku Klux Klan in Dayton. Not only this, but one of the first overtly racially restricted neighborhoods in America– Ridgewood– was in the area. The first black family in Ridgewood would not move in until 1985.
Racially restricted deeds continued to grow in prevalence, referring to the red-lined maps. No loans were to be made to the areas in red. And often members of a red-lined area were not even aware of the concept of redlining.
The explanation goes into the options left for African Americans unable to gain a mortgage, sometimes pushed into Dayton’s “worst slum in America.”
I found this both an interesting and refreshing addition. Often the story of redlining does not go beyond its definition and base economic impact, but the documentary finds angles one may not have considered.
It not only goes into the devastating impact of redlining but the champions that help fight against it, writing their story where others would not dare to. These stories go into the present, fighting discrimination in housing. Most educational resources focus on the past impact of redlining, but not the modern stain it leaves. It is financial, but also cultural.
“90 years later and the maps continue to tell the story,” the documentary tells the viewer.
The documentary ends with a call for more action towards the effects of discrimination and inequality still felt today.
Overall, I consider Redlining: Mapping Inequality in Dayton and Springfield a hidden gem of a documentary, easily understandable, honest, thorough and a breath of fresh air to a topic understudied and under-advocated.
Watch free Redlining: Mapping Inequality in Dayton and Springfield.
