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The Shadows ofTarrytown

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Edited and created by Claire PowellExcerpts of news articles from kxan.com, the Austin American-Statesman, wikipedia.org, klru.org, the Austin ChronicleThanks to A. Nelson and Scott McDonald

The Shadows ofTarrytown

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When given the assignment of researching a neighborhood in the Austin area, my first instinct was to go somewhere nice — I wanted to be able to go out and take pictures in lines of old trees and beautiful mansions, I’ll admit it. But within the first few moments of visiting Tarrytown, it became clear that this was not a neighborhood full of only new money and poorly-paid gardeners. Every house seems to have an obvious surveillance camera or a “protected by [alarm company]” sign in their yard. Residents look suspiciously at people walking along the streets, and those homes that abut seedier areas have erected tall fences and

bought loud dogs.

My goal in this book is not to cast aspersions on Tarrytown. Far from it. I merely attempt to expose that which isn’t immediately obvious: that gentrification is not working as quickly as it might, that crime is rampant, that there are reasons for suspicious neighbors and very bright porch lights. These things have remained hidden from prospective buyers and nearby residents, barely reported in the news, and for a reason. Tarrytown has a reputation

to maintain.

I am simply here to ignore that reputation.

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AUSTIN (KXAN) - Austin police are searching for burglars who are breaking in to homes in the Tarrytown neighborhood in West Austin, in many cases, while the people who live there are home and asleep.

“It was terrifying,” said victim Robyn Malloy, who was asleep along with her husband when their home was burglarized August 12. “My children were asleep upstairs in their bed as my husband and I were and that’s just a huge violation.”

The Malloys had left a side door open, something the never do, because they were expecting their daughter home late. When their daughter arrived home, she noticed Robyn’s car was missing.

“Not only was my car gone- but our phones were gone- both

of our phones were gone,” said Malloy. “At that point

we realize, not only has someone stolen my car, but they’ve been in our home.”

Anyone with information regarding these cases is asked

to call the APD Burglary Unit Tip Line at (512)

974-6941 or the Region 1 District Representatives

at (512) 974-5340.The Malloys were able to track

their cell phones to a motel at 12th Street and Interstate

35 and police found Robyn’s SUV a couple of blocks away.

“We’re scared. Two nights later, we found out it happened to one of my neighbors so obviously there is a rash of

crime in this neighborhood that is very upsetting to

all of us,” said Malloy.

Burglars TargeT TarryTown Homes

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Austin police sent out an alert this week warning people in the neighborhood that the burglars are targeting homes in the Central West area of Austin from Greenlee Drive south to the 2300 block of West Ninth Street and west of MoPac Boulevard.

The burglaries took place between Aug. 9 and Aug. 15, but there have been no more reported since that date.

Sierra Norman is another victim and was home alone when she said a man tried to break in to her parent’s home just two blocks away from the Malloys.

“I was just sitting in the kitchen and then all of the sudden I

hear a noise at the front door,” Sierra recalls. “Then like 30 seconds later I hear the same

noise at the back door. I got up and kind of walked around and

looked out the front window and I saw a guy and he was

like up against the window. I think he saw me and he kind of looked at me and then he ran.”

Norman said it was dark, around 11:30 p.m. and she could not make out

what the man looked like, but said he had a towel

slung over his shoulder.

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Virginia Forbis also lives in the neighborhood and said she is being extra vigilant.

“It certainly made me start turning my alarm on- because I haven’t been turning it on but it was on last night and it’ll be on tonight,” said Forbis.

Her daughter-in-law, Christye, is relieved to hear it.

“We were scared- even though she has an alarm- it was alarming that the burglar went in while people were home,” said Christye Forbis.

One family, who did not want to be identified, told KXAN

their door was kicked in while they were asleep in their home

with their children. They have since added security

cameras and additional lighting to their property, both

things police recommend.

In addition, a number of vehicle burglaries have been

reported near Greenlee Drive just west of Exposition

Boulevard. It is unknown whether the vehicle burglaries

and home burglaries are related.

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AUSTIN (KXAN) - Police responded to a Wells Fargo Bank robbery at 3100 block of Windsor Road.

A man walked into the bank with an assault rifle. No shots were fired during the robbery.

He fled the scene on foot heading north. Police are asking residents in the area to lock their doors.

The suspect is described as a white man with blue eyes, about 5 feet 10 inches. He was wearing a blue button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up and jeans. He was wearing a black ski mask during the robbery.

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Friends of a hit and run victim in Austin hope a new Facebook page will lead to clues about the suspect

in the case.

The Facebook page is called Justice for Courtney Paige

Griffin and encourages anyone with information about the case

to come forward. More than 200 people have joined the

group which is determined to get justice for Courtney.

Courtney Griffin died on May 27 while walking home to her Tarrytown apartment. An

aide to representative Wayne Christian, Gabrielle Nestande,

was arrested a few hours later and charged with failing to stop

and render aid.

wells Fargo Bank roBBery in wesT ausTin TarryTown HiT-and-run VicTim rememBered

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Griffin’s friends are using the Facebook page to draw attention to the police investigation into Nestande. Austin police are still trying to determine if Nestande had been drinking the night of the crash. Two sources tell KXAN Nestande was seen at a Rainey Street area bar on May 26, the Thursday night before the crash. Griffin’s body was discovered by a neighbor just after 5 a.m. Friday.

“Any information that we can get in that regard is going to be pertinent to prosecuting Gabrielle further than just failure to render aid,” said Heather Tatum, one of Griffin’s friends.

Nestande is scheduled to make her first court appearance

Friday in Travis County for a pre-trial hearing. Her attorneys

have said they do not believe alcohol was a factor. The TABC

investigation and the APD investigation into this case are

both ongoing.

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below average above average

Crime statistics for the Tarrytown Area

National Average

Income/financial

Average household income

Median household income

Median income under 25

Median income 25-34

Median income 35-44

Median income 45-54

Median income 55-64

Median income 65-74

Median income over 75

Percent increase/decrease in income since 1990

Average household net worth

Percent increase/decrease in income since 2000

Median home sale price

Sales tax rate

Sales tax type

Average household total expenditure

$141,380

$78,224

$39,118

$63,650

$90,325

$103,297

$104,029

$70,688

$61,607

140%

30%

$707,317

$460,000

5%

PL

$90,851

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“Cities are gentrified by the following types of people in sequence: first the risk-oblivious (artists), then the risk-aware (developers), finally the risk adverse (dentists from New Jersey).”—Bill Kraus

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Tarrytown is most often defined as the area bounded by Enfield Road in the South, 35th Street in the North, MoPac Expressway in the East, and Lake Austin in the West. In addition to being a quiet neighborhood full of meticulously maintained homes, the neighborhood has several shopping outlets including Tarrytown Center and Casis Village, both of which feature local businesses... Tarrytown caught the eye of the national media when Jeanne Daniels, a Houston, Texas resident and animal rights activist, inherited the shopping center and decided to eliminate any stores that sold meat or leather. This brought serious changes to the area as many local favorites went out of business, and engendered some seriously angry responses from locals.

Many Austin residents would consider the Tarrytown

area already gentrified, with concern for the area being

unnecessary. Yet the area near Clarksville, originally a freed

slave area from the early years of Austin, have yet to become

truly “upscale,” owing to its proximity to the few remaining

pockets of public housing. Homelessness, due to the

increasing gentrification in the area, rising property prices,

and the construction of Mopac, is abundant. Crime, especially

theft, has increased in past years. Tarrytown information from realtors or chambers of

commerce, of course, gloss over this issue. Yet to the inhabitants,

the issue remains vital.

HisTory oF TarryTown

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The geographical nearness to downtown, the simple economics of still-affordable property and a retreating social stigma about East Austin have led to urban gentrification. Economics are starting to reduce to ability of indigenous families to maintain their stand in Central East Austin. White families and businesses are becoming downright popular.

The example of Clarksville in West Austin serves as the direction that things will no doubt go in East Austin. As a white youth, Jake Billingsley grew up with black families because his dad was the minister at St. James Episcopal Church in East Austin. Billingsley moved to Clarksville in the 1970s after a black co-worker sold him a house. Living in the same house today, which is appraised at a magnitude more than the original cost, Billingsley is a community organizer. He recalls the history:

“[Clarksville] was founded by Charles Clark in approximately 1870. Governor Peace of Texas

had deeded land to some of his former slaves. And some

of that plantation land also formed that first settlement of Clarksville. Because this

community thrived so much and was known as this ‘freedom

town,’ in the 1970s it became recognized by the National

Register, which registers national historic places and

sites in the United States, as one of only two, really, black

national historic districts in the entire United States. The other

one is Martin Luther King’s birthplace in Atlanta, Georgia.”

ausTin genTriFicaTion

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Pauline Brown moved to Clarksville at an early age (from Wheatville, another black enclave that didn’t survive too long). The community thrived at that time, centered around the Sweet Home Baptist Church and family relationships, though they had to get many services, like schools, miles away in East Austin. Brown recalled that the comfortable life in Clarksville suddenly gave way when the MoPac Expressway came to life off the drafting table:

“Clarksville started seeing a change when the city council

decided to build an expressway on the west side of town. That

included coming across the whole area of Clarksville.”

MoPac’s construction eviscerated the heart of

Clarksville. The remaining families, those whose

properties weren’t in the path, eventually found development

knocking on their doors and sold out long ago. Ms. Brown is probably the oldest original resident of the neighborhood

who still lives there, but the cost to join her as a

neighbor is quite expensive now. Since the mid-1950s

Ms. Brown has soldiered on, striving to protect as much

of the old neighborhood and its history as she can.

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It’s important in a discussion of gentrification to understand what the word means, and what people often mean by it. Gentrification is extremely important racially and in terms of class and the poor — in all major cities, these are important questions because these people make up the majority of the city’s population. And yet these people find the least amount of representation.

Simultaneously a physical, economic, social and cultural phenomenon. Gentrification

commonly involves the invasion by middle-class or higher-

income groups of previously working-class neighborhoods

or multi-occupied “twilight areas” and the replacement or

displacement of many of the original occupants. It involves

the physical renovation or rehabilitation of what was

frequently a highly deteriorated housing stock and its upgrading

to meet the requirements of its new owners. In the

process, housing in the areas affected, both renovated and

unrenovated, undergoes a significant price appreciation.

Such a process of neighborhood transition commonly involves a

degree of tenure transformation from renting to owning.

A formal definition is given by Chris Hamnett in his journal,

“The Blind Men and the Elephant: The Exploitation of

Gentrification,” he defines it as:

genTriFicaTion and THe Homeless

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In summary to the above: gentrification is the redevelopment of the inner core of older metropolitan areas. Middle- to upper-class people move into lower to working class areas in the city and renovate them. This phenomenon is growing increasingly throughout the nation. It is a positive movement for those doing the renovating — they get to buy lower priced housing in the city and renovate to their own preferences, and eventually sell at a much higher price then what was paid. For the city this is great, because a rundown neighborhood is renovated and it brings more people into that area of the city. Upscale chain shops will open up in the area, and it will become a “yuppie” area to live in.

This may sound like a great idea, but there is a major

downfall. Jane Jacobs, author of The Death and Life of Great

American Cities says, “Cities are an immense laboratory

of trial and error, failure and success, in city building and

city design.” Gentrification, in terms of an experiment, is a failure. It displaces the prior

occupants of all the housing in the area because of the rising

costs due to the renovation. Also, it displaces a society

without homes: the homeless.

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When nighttime temperatures dipped into the 20s a couple of weeks back, a handful of local churches opened up their doors to the homeless. As usual, the Austin Resource Center for the Homeless’ 175 beds were all taken; next door, the Salvation Army’s 100 slots reserved for homeless males were filled as well. Anywhere between 50 and 70 people typically spill into the church shelters when they open on nights the temperature falls to 32 degrees, said Carol Swicker, program director with Front Steps, formerly the Capital Area Homeless Alliance.

According to an analysis of the local homeless situation

released last month by the Community Action Network, a public-private partnership between local organizations,

government offices, businesses, and individuals with a focus on

health and well-being issues in Austin and Travis County,

the shelter-seeking crowd made up only a fraction of

Austin’s homeless population. Among the highlights of

“Facts and Questions About Homelessness,” an update of CAN’s 2001 “Homelessness Assessment Report” and its

2002 Homelessness FAQ (see www.caction.org/reports.htm), are these disconcerting

statistics, paraphrased directly from the analysis:

Homelessness: THe Big PicTure

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• Over a 12-month period, there were more than 6,200 homeless people in the Austin area.• From Sept. 12, 2005, to Sept. 12, 2006, 6,242 unique individuals received services from Austin-area homeless service providers.• On any given day, there are about 4,000 homeless individuals, 1,900 of them Downtown.

• More than 1,500 children are affected by homelessness in AISD. In this school year, AISD Project Help served 1,556 homeless students. • The high cost of living contributes to homelessness. Austin has the highest housing costs for an urban area in Texas.• Low wages contribute to homelessness. Of the top 10 occupational categories in the Austin area, nearly 30% of jobs have a median wage under $10 an hour.

“The primary reasons that people become and remain

homeless are poverty and lack of resources” – specifically, a

lack of affordable housing – said Rick Rivera, chair of Austin’s

Homeless Task Force, one of CAN’s several planning

arms. Unfortunately, Austin has plenty of the former and a

scarcity of the latter. According to U.S. census figures, 15.7%

of Travis Co. residents live below the federal poverty

line – $19,350 for a family of four. Considering that federal

poverty line numbers tend to be conservative estimates,

the 15.7% figure only hints at the extent of poverty here.

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Unless you’ve been living on another planet, you’re already aware that affordable housing is hard to come by in the Austin area, where, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development, fair market rent for a two-bedroom apartment is $836. According to Lisa Garcia, vice president of assisted housing for the Housing Authority of the City of Austin, about 5,900 families are on the local waiting list for Section 8 vouchers and 4,680 are on the list for public housing.

Despite the gloomy stats, however, Austin was one

of a select number of local governments across the

country recognized in a report released Oct. 31 by the National

Alliance to End Homelessness for its efforts to work with its

homeless population. However, without a combination of good

affordable-housing programs and significant homelessness-

prevention plans in place, well-intended community

efforts to make a dent in the local homeless population

won’t make a lasting difference, said Nan P. Roman, president

of the National Alliance to End Homelessness. “You

can’t cherry-pick a few pieces and think that they are going

to work,” said Roman.

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Simply focusing on rapid rehousing without prevention programs won’t work, for example, because “as soon as you empty out the shelter

… the beds are just going to fill up again,” she said.

Austin’s Ending Chronic Homelessness Task Force, also affiliated with CAN, has focused on rehousing through collaborations with housing nonprofits like Caritas of Austin and Foundation Communities, noted Rivera, but overall homelessness-prevention efforts – such as making child care more affordable, raising the minimum wage, and offering accessible substance-abuse programs, for example – haven’t been as strong, he said, because the funding simply isn’t there.

Considering, Rivera added, that 15% to 20% of the Austin-

area homeless population is classified as chronically homeless – continuously

without a home for at least a year or temporarily homeless

at least four times over a three-year period, according

to a HUD definition cited in CAN’s FAQ – and that the

chronically homeless consume about 50% of all services used

locally by homeless people, putting money into prevention efforts at all levels – local, state,

and federal – makes sound economic sense. “It’s a matter of time and resources.” And if

governments don’t invest more in these types of programs,

“we’re going to continue to have our community

experience this,” he said.

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Gentrification’s relation to crime is highly problematic. Since Adam and Eve fell from grace and were expelled from Eden into the first city, Western culture has associated the city (i.e., the man-made environment) with crime, pollution, and corruption, especially when contrasted to the benign, simple, sturdy, and honest ways of the pastoral (God-given) rural life. This tendency to equate cities with crime is not merely a quaint residue from our cultural past since cities have, indeed, usually always suffered higher crime rates than have rural areas, small towns, and suburbs. Central city neighborhoods have typically been the most dangerous of all, especially those scarred by physical and economic deterioration.

does genTriFicaTion aFFecT crime raTes?

Indeed, research has shown that the fear of crime is

one of the main reasons that middle-class people

flee urban neighborhoods. Gentrification, then, appears

to be both anomalous and counterintuitive, for why

would middle-class people (who have other choices) begin

moving into the very teeth of the crime problem? What

kind of people are these? What effect should one expect

them to have on the safety of the new neighborhoods they occupy? One’s expectations

about gentrification’s relation to crime rates should depend to some extent on one’s definition

of gentrification itself.

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Journalists use the term rather loosely to describe variously the redemption of architectural treasures, the in-migration of middle-class residents to once disreputable city neighborhoods, the rapid escalation of residential property values, and the proliferation of “fern bars,” boutiques, and quiche-serving cafes along formerly shabby city boulevards. These assorted definitions reflect the diverse usages of “gentrification” in common parlance, but they do not satisfy the academic demand for precision. While physical improvements to property may accompany gentrification, they cannot per se define it; indeed, neighborhoods may be physically ameliorated through the sole efforts of the indigenous residents, just as prices may soar merely as a result of a general inflation in housing markets.

Similarly, the taste for fern bars, croissants, quiche, and the like may also flourish in

unflaggingly affluent suburban shopping malls; thus one

cannot divine the presence of gentrification simply by their presence. As a result,

most scholarly treatment of gentrification accepts Clay’s (1979) distinction between “gentrification”

(where newcomers in old neighborhoods make physical improvements in houses) and

“incumbent upgrading” (where the housing stock is improved by the existing residents, and

little or no population change takes place). Accordingly,

scholars tend to make population change a necessary (but not sufficient) condition

of gentrification: gentrification is said to take place whenever high-income people replace

low-income people in central city neighborhoods and when that turnover is accompanied by capital reinvestment in the

neighborhood’s housing stock.

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Though the scholarly literature has paid virtually no attention to forms of commercial gentrification, a similar definitional standard would seem to be appropriate: a boutique opening in an affluent suburban shopping mall would not indicate commercial gentrification, but a boutique replacing a pawnshop or a shoe repair shop on a central city avenue would. Thus gentrification necessarily implies a turnover process in which lower-class neighborhood incumbents are succeeded by (at least) middle-class ones and in which the housing stock improves through rein- vestment. This process never happens all at once, and indeed it may be drawn out over many years.

In the interim the neighborhoods are often a curious mixture of old and

new ways. Elegant townhouses may coexist in the same set of

blocks with subsidized housing projects and single- room-

occupancy (SRO) hotels. Working-class ethnic residents with staunchly traditional and

familistic values may witness with dismay the invasion of

their neighborhood by younger, affluent, but nontraditional

households — artists, bohemians, gays, singles, and childless couples — the social

and demographic groups reported to be the “shock troops” of gentrification.

During the transitional periods, humble corner stores and

beauty parlors may sit next to discos and charcuteries.

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As several writers have noted, this coexistence is not always peaceful. In some “urban villages” where strong ethnic bonds regulated neighborhood norms and social behavior, the invasion of affluent new-comers who did not share those norms triggered vocal resentment by incumbents at the newcomers’ life-styles. In the Fairmount (Philadelphia) neighborhood studied by Levy and Cybriwsky (1980), conflict between the two groups even boiled into violence against the newcomers and their property. In this sense the social conflicts attending a neighborhood’s gentrification contributed directly to the crime statistics for that neighborhood. But conflict of this magnitude is relatively rare. One expects that the relation between gentrification and crime rates is considerably more complex.

Indeed, from the case study literature, one can find as many

reasons why gentrification might depress crime rates as

reasons why it might stimulate them. In the simplest of scenarios, gentrification

should reduce crime rates in several ways. Affluent

neighborhoods have, for the most part, long enjoyed lower

crime rates than have poor neighborhoods; thus, as central

city neighborhoods once again become more affluent,

their crime rates should increasingly approach those of other affluent neighborhoods — simply as a function of the social class of their residents. The renovation of buildings by newcomers has, in some

cases, encouraged upgrading by long-time incumbents of

the neighborhood, presumably because they become more

optimistic about their potential return on investment.

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These enhancements should instill greater neighborhood pride and reduce such minor

“environmental” crimes as vandalism and graffiti writing. Case studies report that, in response to their fear of crime, newcomers to these gentrifying neighborhoods frequently organize “citizen patrols,”

“neighborhood watches,” or similar groups. In theory, activity of this sort should deter crime (though research on the subject has failed to show that it does). The affluent newcomers usually have more political clout than do their predecessors in the neighborhood. As they increasingly come to speak for their neighborhood, they are likely to demand and receive better services from city hall. In particular, studies have shown them to be vocal and effective petitioners for improved street lighting and greater police protection — both of which should serve to dampen local crime rates.

Displacement of the poor may remove not only the elderly and the vulnerable, who are

the focus of much policy concern, but also the young and the criminal. If public housing projects and SRO

hotels- filled with impoverished welfare families, drug dealers

and users, and anomic teenagers-are the principal

domiciles of a neighborhood’s “criminal element,” then their

removal could have a salutary effect on local crime rates.

On the other hand, one can imagine other scenarios

in which gentrification actually increases crime rates. Displacement itself could be

a two-edged sword. Crime-prone teenagers and young

adults may only be displaced to adjacent neighborhoods or even to adjacent blocks,

and they may regard the burgeoning bourgeoisie

of their old neighborhood as very attractive targets.

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Furthermore, the process of being displaced may lead them to objectify the newcomers or to regard them as enemies worthy of retribution. Gentrification could subject neighborhoods to long transitional periods in which economic inequality is very salient. As research by Blau and Blau (1982) has suggested, economic inequality (particularly, economic inequality between the races) increases rates of criminal violence. As such, crime may be the “cost” that society pays for inequality —and one might expect gentrification to increase this “cost” for the affected neighborhoods. When gentrification occurs in cohesive ethnic neighborhoods (rather than in disorganized ghetto neighborhoods), it may destroy the bonds that maintained order in those neighborhoods.

As rents increase and old-timers are forced or encouraged

to leave, fewer people know their neighbors. Systems that

disciplined “rule-breakers” dissolve and are not replaced by any comparable “organic” form of social organization.

For example, the Philadelphia neighborhood of Fairmount

had, according to local testimony, long managed

to maintain order without police interference; however,

the social dislocations resulting from gentrification

caused a “breakdown” in the neighborhood’s internal

organization so severe that residents ultimately

had to petition the police for protection from youth

gangs. As noted already, gentrification can lead to

community conflicts that spill over into criminal activity.

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While these types of crimes are usually infrequent and minor (vandalism, minor physical altercations classified perhaps as non-aggravated assault, and so forth), they can be more serious, as when a newly renovated house in Philadelphia’s Spring Garden neighborhood was firebombed, causing $40,000 in damage.

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Whatever your feelings on gentrification, Tarrytown, Austin, is in the middle of it. It’s not clear whether the problems arising are caused by nearby Clarksville’s recent restructuring, the somewhat recent rise in wealth in Tarrytown itself, or a mere set of coincidences. But residents remain nervous, housed among trailers and abandoned cars. Displaced previous residents remain on the streets, with no resources in place for them or

their own unique problems.

Tarrytown is a beautiful neighborhood, definitely a lovely place to visit and have a picnic.The problems for homeowners and

renters, however, remain.

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ColophonPrinted on 80lb Classic Crest Smooth Classic Cream paper and accented with 70lb Accent Opaque Vellum White. Cover wrapped in black linen-texture paper.Set in the MrsEaves type family, the Rockwell type family, and Teutonic Std.Published under the auspices of St. Edward’s University.